RotTS 20

Hi everybody, here is...another update!

Translated by Pryun with some touching up by me :)



Rondo of the Transient Sword: Part 20


Ten minutes later ――.

From the bar at the outskirts, Asuna and I returned to the eastern square of Taran Village.

Because it was just a village, it's inner area was much smaller compared to the Main City Ulbus. However, it also had the basic structure of «A round Table Mountain which had been hollowed out, leaving only the outer wall», in other words, it had a lot more volume from the vertical direction compared to a village built on a flat plain. In fact, two villages can be stacked up in it and not exceed the ceiling.

The round square was no exception, with tall building surrounding it. Furthermore, most of those were inns and NPC shops, and anyone could freely enter those Inns and NPC stores, because currently there were no player's house yet.

In fact, there were quite a number of people who would prefer to use a so called «empty house» over an inn. However, those empty rooms in an empty house were different from the rooms managed by NPCs, in the sense that they were not protected by the system.

Of course, while it was true that you couldn't be harmed here, sleeping in an environment where the door could not be locked could be quite uncomfortable, and the beds were so hard it was sad. I too occasionally lodged in one to save money, but I slept far from soundly compared to inside a building, and was surprised by every noise on the road while outside. It was truly an unreasonable story ―― my real body in the real world was most likely safe lying in a clean and comfortable hospital bed, with my audio and visual senses completely cut off, while in the virtual world I suffered from loud external noises and a low quality bed.

Anyway, for such reasons, from then on I abandoned being thrifty, and slept in a real inn or rented an NPC house every night.

However, for various other purposes, the city's empty houses still had some valid use. Whether it was for small meetings or to distribute item drops ―― or, to spy on someone.



"This is quite a good angle, eh."

Sitting on a chair beside the window, Asuna gave those words, while carefully staying slightly away from the window as she looked down at the square below

"This is probably the best point. If you're right behind, you probably can't see because the angle is too steep……. Tonight's meal, let's leave it here.

The four steamed buns with unknown contents which we purchased from the stores along the way from the bar here were set on a round table. They had normal creamy white skin, and were warm with steam rising and without any odd smell…… in other words, they looked perfectly normal. The item's name was 【Steamed Bun of Taran】, in Japanese that would probably translate to «Taran Manju».

Asuna turned her attention away from the source of the continuous hammering noise outside the window, and gave a glance at the suspicious buns on the tabletop and muttered.

"This……  What's in it?"

"Who knows? But, because this floor has a theme of cows,  maybe it’s a beef-based nikuman(meat bun)? Come to think of it, because in Kansai 'meat' is equal to beef, I've heard what we call nikuman in Kanto being called butaman(pork bun) in Kansai."

"So? Is this town a part of Kanto or Kansai?"

At the cool voice asking about the relevancy of the trivia regarding the two regions,  I apologised and invited Asuna to take a Taran Manju from the pile.

"Well, come on, take one while it is hot."

" ……itadakimasu"

Removing the leather glove from her hand, she picked up the bun right at the top. After she was done, i too picked one up lightly.

Having not eaten any snacks since going into the dungeon until afternoon today, I was starving. If there was a way for the avatar to project the physical reactions instead of just this feeling, my stomach would been continuously rumbling loudly during the meeting with Argo. Standing and opening my mouth wide, I was going to bite into the soft manju, and at that exact moment.

"U~nyaa!"

At that weird sound which emitted right beside my ear, I was startled and turned to face it. What I saw was, Asuna sitting in the chair, with both her hands stiffly holding the manju. On the large manju with a diameter of 12 cm was a small, tooth sized indent ―― and it looked like a viscous, cream coloured fluid squirted out from the opening, and onto the rapier user's face and neck…….

While watching rigidly, Asuna took her first mouthful cordially despite her eyes beginning to be filled with tears. She then said in a soft voice.

"……The content, tastes like warm, custard cream…… and inside it is some kind of sweet and sour fruit……"

"……………………"

The Taran Manju which was three centimeters away from my mouth was quietly moved away. As soon as I lowered it to the table and released it, a voice with the sharpness of a rapier pierced my ears.

"If…… if you have had one of these during the beta test period, and asked me to eat it despite already knowing what’s the contents but did not tell me…… I don't think I have the confidence to suppress myself…… "

"I swear I didn't know. Really, truly, 'Absolutely'"

While shaking my head vigorously, I took out a small handkerchief from my belt pouch and offered it to Asuna. It could be said to be fortunate, as the «Stain Effect» in this world would eventually disappear even if you left it alone, and could be removed instantly using an item within the «Cloth» category. While the durability of a cloth based item would decrease a little every time it is used, within the category was a magic handkerchief which could be used eternally. As mobs and some terrain have a blocking/debuff class stain effect, the infinite use handkerchief is a very desirable item, but it was a considerably rare drop……

"Mm"

While thinking of an escape, the handkerchief returned and interrupted me. In just a few seconds, the cream covering her face vanished.

After giving me a bonus glare, the rapier user faced the window, and declared to me.

"The next time we do a surveillance, all meals will be self prepared. I don't want to eat something this unexpected a second time."

Here, saying "With a cooking skill of zero the food we prepare would be really ‘unexpected’," went against my judgement, even if I pretended to be a middle school second grade (Chuni). So instead,

"I-I’ll look forward to it."

As soon as those words left my mouth, a second shot was fired to send my smile flying.

"No one said anything about making your share!"





At the manifestation of the evil feeling of wanting to give up, and all the «Taran Manju» were completely cold, now is the time to eat it properly … … I mean, the taste would be the best. Of course, as a dessert.

The moist and chewy skin, with the modest sweet cream smoothly contained which did not splatter out, had a sweet and sour taste best described as that of a strawberry. It's probable that since the start, the Taran Manju was set to have the taste close to that of a «Strawberry Cream Bread», but it was possible that the staff had mischievously messed with the system configuration, and put it on sale while it was hot. In the end Asuna ate two, and her mood seemed to have improved.

This was good, but ―― the main aim of the surveillance somehow ended in vain.

Our aim was, obviously, to keep an eye on the blacksmith Nezuha in the square below, and to find out exactly how he scammed strengthening weapons, to determine the trick behind it.

Although the store's business was quite good, most of the customers were here for maintenance -- since we started our surveillance, only two players came for strengthening. In addition to that, both the strengthening were successes. Although I said it was because they were middle class weapons, the confidence of the presence of fraud was waning. The case where Asuna's sword was broken, although it came back with the  «All Items Objectize» button, perhaps it was some kind of system error…… in other words, it was likely to be caused by a bug…….

"――No, that's can't be true……"

I murmured in a quiet voice, shaking off my own weakness.

The method of weapon substitution may be unknown, but reason why the wind fleuret broke on its first attempt at that time was already known. As to why that was, A-chan…… I mean, Asuna had bought that information from Argo.

Back at the tavern, the question that came out of Asuna's mouth when Argo offered any information whatsoever, was one I didn't expect at all. "Could you investigate if there is a «Destruction» penalty for weapon strengthening failure?"

Argo was also surprised, and gave an unexpected answer.

"There is no need to investigate. Because I have already verified it."

At both of us who were stunned, who had paid for the information through the wine, Argo said.

"If you consider a harsh penalty for failure, weapon destruction is undoubtedly the first. However, there is a situation where attempting to strengthen it always end in destruction. It is when THERE ARE NO MORE STRENGTHENING ATTEMPTS REMAINING."

In other words.

That night, in front of Asuna's and my eyes, the shattered Wind Fleuret was one  secretly swapped with a still unknown method…… it’s an end product where all its 6 strengthening attempts were used up. Incidentally, the Wind Fleuret +4 currently at Asuna's still had two more attempts remaining. Therefore, even if the strengthening process failed, destruction wouldn't occur.

As the keyword "end product" appeared to me, I suddenly remembered Ryufior's case, just before Asuna

It couldn't be confirmed, even now, whether Ryufi-shi’s Anneal Blade was swapped at that time. However, the result was, rather than destruction, it failed three times consecutively. Perhaps it was because they were surrounded by witnesses, or perhaps it was because he had no stock of «End Result Anneal Blade» on hand to switch.

If the latter was the case, Nezuha, facing the frustrated Ryufi-shi, had a reason to buy the +0 end product Anneal blade at a price much higher than the market average. Rather than compensating for his loss, he was keeping it as stock for the next chance…………

"――Kirito-kun,"

A sharp whisper disrupted my thoughts.

Blinking, I realigned my line of sight. At the square below, wrapped in darkness before we knew it, the number of players coming and going had decreased.

At that time, a single player, wearing a high grade metal armor that reflected the illumination of the street lamp, as well as a dark blue vest, walked in a straight line into the round square. Undoubtedly, this person was one of the top front liners, standing with «Lind's Group»――.

Asuna and I held our breaths while watching, as the man approached «Nezuha's Smith Shop», removing his sword from his waist.

36 comments:

  1. Thank you so much!!! :)

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  2. thanks for the update :)

    pyrun had said that 20 would be the last before you stepped in. so is this the last one or will you continue?

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    1. He actually translated part 21 also, so I will be translating part 22 onward.
      You are welcome:) Please also give thanks to Pyrun :P Hahaha

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    2. F*ck yeah, im glad u both r working on this

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    3. ohh, that's great news then.
      and I actually did thank you both, it just wasn't clear I guess :)

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    4. Oh, I see, ahahaha, I'm not a native English speaker so there are quite a bit of conventions in English that I'm not very sure about...Please pardon me if I make any such mistakes, and I'll be open to suggestions for improvement :)

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    5. there wasn't any mistakes on your side, I said "thanks" and left it at that. it wasn't actually clear whom it was for.
      but I had actually meant it for both of you :)

      and judging by your previous translation of the beginning of part 20, your english is quite good.

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  3. I believe that the proper romanisarion for ネズハ should be "Nezha". That's the romanisation used on several occasions in the published version.

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    1. Umm,,,actually I remember there is an occasion after this where Kirito realised that ネズハ should be pronounced as Nezha(as in the Chinese 哪吒)(something like ネージャin Japanese but not exact) Before that occasion Kirito pronounced his name as Nezuha, so the romanisation became Nezuha, as his team members give him a nickname of Nezu also.
      Thank you for your input :)

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    2. So, you're keeping it as "Nezuha" to show that Kirito is mispronouncing it? If so, might I suggest adding a note somewhere about this for clarity?

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    3. I'm taking it as most people don't know about the correct pronunciation, also the moment of realisation comes in part 22, so adding a note will become a spoiler.

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    4. Actually not part 22...somewhere later...

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  4. Hello Dennis, thank you and Pyrun for continuing with the translation of "ROTTS", it's a pleasure to be able to keep reading the "Progressive Book" (which I consider to be one of my favorites so far from all SAO Light Novels). I know I shouldn't ask this as it might be rude, but are you substituting Pyrun on the Translation, or simply helping him out with adjustments, editing and suchs?

    If you are going to be translating all the other parts by yourself, may I ask you if you intend to keep us posted as if you are currently busy or if you will have time to release a new chapter?

    Also I would like to say that I'm really proud of your english and translation, that is, because I'm not a native English Speaker myself, so I can relate on how troublesome it could be some times :]

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    1. Hi, you are welcome, actually sometimes I translate as a way of killing time :p. I will be taking over the translation from part 22 onward, and Pyrun said he will help me at times.
      I'll try to post at least 1 part every month, but it depends on how intense IB course is.
      And I'm glad you can relate to me :D

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    2. Hello Dennis,

      Thank you for answering so fast ( I'm the anonymous btw :] ). I'm so glad to see that "ROTTS" will have a faster translation, it's been a while since I wanted to read more of "Aincrad", not just the side stories, but a more detailed version of how they felt inside that death game, especially through each floor (like that side story, "First Day", from Volume 08, which was totally bad ass), and when I found out about the "Progressive Books", I was really thrilled.

      With that said, I'll be looking forward for every new chapter that you provide us, and to some news and information that you might share too. Also you mentioned IB Course? I'm not really sure what that is, although I have a general idea, but does that mean you're like a High School Student? If so that's really impressive of you, it took me quite a while to improve my English, and that's basically the only Foreign Language I got (aside from Portuguese and a terrible Spanish :F).

      Keep up the good work man, if you keep translating it, I will most definitely keep reading and commenting.

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    3. Thank you for your comment:)
      Yeah, the first semester of my high school life just ended, and you can speak three languages? That's impressive!
      BTW this is the web novel version, the chapter division in the progressive is different from this but the content is mostly the same AFAIK. I may put illustrations from the progressive novel into the posts at suitable locations.

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    4. I'm just replying to let you know, Portuguese is so close to Spanish that people don't need to "learn" the other language. There are just some minor differences. (I'm Brazilian and another anon)

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  5. First of all a big Thank You to everyone that helped/helps whit the translation of more SAO stuff. :D
    I have a few questions if anyone can answer them for me:
    Is this the side story or the SAO Progressive version?
    Does anyone have the complete chapters that were released in a pdf file? Or are you guys going the release a pdf file once everything has been translated? Are there any other parts of the Progressive v1 novel that need translation or just this chapter (if this is the SAOP novel ch)?
    Thank you goes to anyone that can answer this questions for me and a good day to everyone.

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    1. The first chapter of it was released as a Material Edition, and the rest as a side story. And this whole story is included inside SAO Progressive 1. However, this translation is based on the web novel(Material Edition and side stories), not SAOP1.

      This is the last story in Progressive 1. There are three stories in SAOP1, namely Aria in the starless night, Reason for the Whiskers, and Rondo of the Transient Sword. I believe the translations for the first two stories are already on Baka-tsuki. I'm not sure about the pdf, are you asking about the translated chapters or the Japanese raws? AFAIK there is no pdf for the translated chapters, but there may be people who are going to make the pdfs.

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    2. Oh damn Baka have already removed the pages....

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    3. luckily it's still in wayback machine. We should all start archiving SAO related texts and pics now. I believe everything is going to be gradually removed, even Tap-san is going to take down the translated chapters on the site.

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    4. So Progressive is actually the published and proofread book of the side stories that weren't published the first time around? (I feel like I am running in a circle :(( ).

      I was asking about the pdf for the Rondo of the Transient Sword chapters. Is there gonna be a final pdf batch like it was done on BT? (The first 7 parts of it aren't on this site. Did someone else translate them?)

      So if this is 99% similar to the Progressive novel are you guys going to adapt your translation to the official version as a final version of the story or can I just slap the various side stories together and call it the final version for my personal SAO archive?

      Would you guys be willing to translate the renaming LN Illustrations? Even if it's just the text from the images and not the editing the text on the image itself?

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    5. P.S.: wayback machine ??? What did you mean by this? And I have already started to archive the more important stuff that I can find but it's gonna take a while. :(

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    6. 1. try google the keyword "wayback machine"
      2. I think differences generated from translation would actually larger than difference from web to published version in this particular case....but there're also afterword in SAOP Vol.1 that's not published online.

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  6. Question: where would the day after chapter be found? The one w the quest based on wizard of oz? As far as I can find any info on it it's from as or 1.6.

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    1. Crap! The day before! Not the day after, after is the wrong chapter I'm looking for.

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    2. I'm pretty sure that both are available on Tap's blog.

      http://www.taptaptaptaptap.net/sao-the-day-before/

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  7. Hey,

    a GREAT Thanks for providing us further with RoTS. I'm checking the site nearly every day, maybe there is an update, maybe..xD.

    I do make a PDF of the published chapters here for myself, simply so I can read it offline on my Tablet. It's far not as professional as the ones that were on BT, but still sure readable and enjoyable. If there is demand, give me a short reply and i will upload it somewhere.

    Again, a BIG Thank you all, doing this for us SAO addicts :D

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    1. I wouldn't mind a pdf for my own Tablet to read offline if you would share whit us. Please and Thank You.

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  8. Not a problem, I have it anyway xD.
    Here you go:

    http://www.mediafire.com/view/0anmxo9wdgn40wc/Sword_Art_Online_Volume_WebNvoel_-_Rondo_of_Transient_Sword.pdf

    I will comment on following chapters, so you will receive the updated PDF.
    Enjoy :D

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  9. Sorry, here the direct link:
    WebNovel - Rondo of Transient Sword

    (HTML and Javascript both don't like me at the moment as it seems...xD)

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  10. So this is a Web Version??
    How bout the progresive???

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    1. They stated often enough, that this is the Web Novel version with I think 40 chapters.

      About Progressive, on BT was a PDF with the name Side Story Compilations, in it most of Progressive and Material Edition (excluded Manga of course).
      It should be available with wayback machine, otherwise I will upload it.
      In the Material is 16.7 missing, because Tap doesn't has the raw.

      No translator so far said to do Progressive 2 atm..

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  11. BY the way, are you planning to translate the Progresive series? (specially Vol. 02)

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