Watching yet another house crash to the ground, along with the zombies inside getting smashed into a bloody mess, Ryuji couldn't help but feel a bit overwhelmed.
"Would this count as some kind of infinite resource?"
Excited by the idea, he quickly descended to the ruins, hoping to salvage anything useful from the wreckage.
Unfortunately, despite the wooden house being completely demolished, it still didn't contain anything particularly valuable.
All he managed to scavenge were some food supplies, leather, and a few mechanical and electronic components—nothing too special.
"But this does give me an idea..."
Ryuji stroked his chin as a thought struck him.
If he could find a house that offered valuable rewards, clear it out completely, and then demolish it entirely, would that allow him to repeatedly farm the same high-reward location?
That way, all they'd have to do was go down and collect the loot.
Deciding to test his theory, he built some blocks to reach the marked location and began refreshing houses over and over, carefully observing how far away a house had to be before the mission was considered a failure.
"So, the mission fails if it's more than ten meters away?"
Looking at the newly spawned house that had landed on top of the ruins—yet remained intact—Ryuji nodded thoughtfully. Then, he pressed the interact button again, summoning another house and letting it drop directly onto a protruding zombie's head.
He repeated this process seven or eight times until, finally, something unexpected happened.
On the last attempt, as the newly spawned house appeared, its foundation touched the remnants of the previous houses. In the next instant, something bizarre occurred.
A lone pillar of dirt and stone materialized beneath the house, elevating it. But more than that, all the previous wreckage—including the ruined houses and the zombies—vanished without a trace!
Not just the ones trapped under the rubble, but even the still-moving zombies nearby—they were all gone, replaced by patches of dirt and stone.
"So that's how the system works..."
Ryuji nodded, finally understanding the mechanics.
In other words, if a newly spawned house made contact with the ground, it would reset everything on that spot. But if it didn't touch the ground, only the house itself would be refreshed.
"That's kind of weird. If this were a normal game, the ground should reset right from the start... Maybe this is a bug caused by the game adapting to reality?"
He still thought of it as a bug, but that didn't stop him from planning to exploit it.
"Still, I haven't found a repeatable mission yet. I'll have to look into that later."
With a nod, Ryuji turned to the zombies inside the house, who were now furiously roaring at him. He smirked, lifted his foot, and kicked open the already battered wooden door.
"FBI, open up!"
Gunfire erupted in rapid bursts, and in no time, the zombies collapsed one by one. After looting the house—which, unfortunately, didn't yield anything too valuable—Ryuji used wooden blocks to climb out of the isolated area and returned to hand in his mission.
After that, he joined Tsunade and Kiri in mining, gathering supplies, and preparing for the next steps.
A Day Later
Tsunade and Kiri had already dug through three of the merchant's walls. Unlike the other side, where Ryuji had encountered an impenetrable barrier, but they did not dig directly to the range of the invincible wall here. Instead, they left a large area of land for other purposes.
They even decided to keep the pond.
What shocked them the most, however, was that no matter how much water flowed out of it, the pond never ran dry.
This discovery left the two completely stunned.
To be honest, even cwas surprised, though he had gotten used to such absurdities by now.
"Man, I'm exhausted..."
Kiri stretched lazily, soaking in a warm tub. After a full day of mining, nothing felt better than a hot bath. But as she glanced at Tsunade's smooth, flawless skin, curiosity got the better of her.
"So, how do you even manage that?"
Tsunade, who was busy washing her blonde hair, paused for a moment. Thinking Kiri was referring to her chest, she answered naturally:
"It's just natural."
kiri blinked in confusion before rolling her eyes. She reached out, pinched Tsunade's shoulder, and sighed in envy at how smooth and soft her skin felt.
"Uh, no. I meant your skin. And for the record, mine isn't exactly small either."
To emphasize her point, Kiri lifted her chest slightly, letting the water ripple around her as her curves stirred the surface, creating an alluring effect.
"Oh... Well, that's because of my chakra and bloodline," Tsunade explained matter-of-factly. "My lineage is quite unique, and the chakra techniques I practice also contribute to my skin's condition. But you wouldn't be able to learn them."
Tsunade's tone was serious.
"I've observed your bodies closely—especially when I treated that guy, Ryuji. His physiology is completely different from people in my world. Even the average civilian in my world has twice as many cells as he does.
"And as for you, while I haven't examined you in detail, I couldn't sense any chakra in your body. Without chakra, there's no way to learn the abilities from my world."
She wasn't just making things up. Although she wasn't a specialist in sensory techniques, she had enough skill to detect chakra. She had already checked Kelly before, and there was none.
As for Ryuji...
For his body, trying to extract chakra would result in just one outcome.
Death.
If Ryuji ever tried to extract chakra, his cells would undergo massive necrosis, and the efficiency of chakra circulation in his body was abysmally low.
To put it into perspective, if the resistance of chakra flow in an ordinary person from her world was 1, then in Ryuji's body, it was undoubtedly 10. If it hadn't been for her that day, no ordinary medical ninja would have been able to heal him completely.
If Ryuji attempted to use chakra, not only would he fail to grow stronger—he probably wouldn't even be able to walk.
"I see... That's a shame," Kiri sighed. "I heard that the mages from Arad have methods to keep their skin flawless without using cosmetics, but now that I'm here…"
She looked at Tsunade with little enthusiasm. Her eyes lingered on Tsunade's curvaceous, well-proportioned figure before she couldn't help but ask,
"Speaking of which, have you ever done it?"
She made an "O" sign with her hand, then suggestively pushed a finger through the circle.
Tsunade's expression darkened instantly.
"You don't actually believe that guy's nonsense, do you?"
She glanced toward the shop, where Ryuji was supposedly handling supplies—preparing ammunition, studying items, or whatever excuse he had come up with this time.
But both she and Kiri knew the truth. That man, filled with pent-up desire, was most likely using his calloused hands for... something else.
Honestly, it was a little difficult to watch.
But at the same time, they couldn't really blame him. Their outfits were rather revealing, and they hadn't made any effort to change that. Any normal man would have a reaction. At least Ryuji had the decency to deal with it himself rather than bothering them. That alone made him better than most.
Still, they couldn't resist poking fun at him.
"It's not just that," Kiri continued. "If we really can't leave this place, there's a high chance I'll end up sleeping with him. And if what he says is true, I might even have a way back to my own world."
She casually pulled a bottle of beer from her inventory, cracking it open as she spoke.
She wasn't just making conversation—she was testing the waters. If Tsunade had any objections, or if she had someone she cared about, then Kiri would back off.
This kind of thing was worth verifying.
"Of course, I'd take precautions," she added, taking a swig. "I have no intention of bringing a child into a world this desolate and hopeless, only for them to grow up as frustrated as that guy, unable to find an outlet. So I want to know—does it really feel as good as people say? If it does, and if what he says turns out to be true, then I won't hold back anymore."
Her tone was serious. Tsunade could tell she wasn't joking.
"…I had a lover once," Tsunade admitted after a pause. "But before we could do anything, he died."
Her thoughts drifted to Dan, and she let out a weary sigh.
Every time she thought of him, a dull pain settled in her chest. There was nothing she could do about it—Dan had been her only source of comfort back then.
But even with him, she hadn't escaped her fate of solitude.
"I see…"
Kiri looked a little disappointed.