The Undesired Second Chance

Chapter 11: What's in a Name?

Ninja are curious people. It's in their very nature.

Unfortunately for Axel, who had decided that he would try very hard not to catch the attention of the ninja community, he is a bit of a puzzle. For one thing, he's running a business out of a house in the abandoned district: the place where nobody bothered to set up shop because they wouldn't get any customers. For another, Axel is... blunt isn't quite the right word, but something like that. He tends to say what he means, and doesn't bother with burying things underneath the underneath.

Perhaps, on a very basic level, the ninja simply find it strange that Axel is normal.

For a given definition of 'normal', at least. By his own standards: yes. By the standards of the world he was born in: also yes, though maybe with a little less conviction, given he had gone to university five years younger than most people.

But by the standards of this world?— No.

Because Axel has never been very good at being sneaky or scheming. And he doesn't like to lie.

Which isn't to say that everyone in the ninja world was sneaky or scheming or a liar, but simply that those traits are an accepted part of the culture—for civilians and ninja alike.

Plus, in addition to his poor choice for shop location, he's really not much of a businessman either.

"What?!" yelped the white-haired ninja, looking across the room to Axel with an almost comical expression of shock. "These can't cost that much!"

Axel simply stared back from behind his open notebook, He had been distracting himself—or attempting to, at least—since this guy first walked in: trying to keep his emotions under-wraps as he interacted with the definitely-no-longer-fictional person before him.

Writing always seemed to help him organize his thoughts, which was why he'd gotten the little notebook in the first place. Unfortunately for him, he had been filling it with half-remembered plot points from when this whole... everything had just been an anime.

Which, naturally, made it kind of hard to distract himself from how completely not-anime the person before him was.

Really, he had positively no clue what could have possessed Jiraiya, of all people, to drop in on his shop.

And of course Axel had recognized him—even in the show he had stood out as an interesting character (for lack of a better term). He had nearly had a heart attack when he realized who had just walked in; when Axel had looked up from his notes and seen, well, him... suffice to say that it was lucky he had already been sitting down.

Though he hadn't expected Jiraiya to be quite so tall. Or to behave so much like he was portrayed in the show: a bit counterintuitive, perhaps, but it still surprised him. The guy really could be that flamboyantly dramatic when the mood struck him, which it apparently had.

"Why not?" Axel asked, wondering if he should have pitched a lower price; he wanted Jiraiya to find whatever it was he wanted, buy it, and leave as soon as possible.

The white-haired ninja looked positively scandalized. "What do you mean 'Why not'?!" He picked up one of the shuriken, checking it over carefully. "This is worth at least thrice that amount!"

So it would seem that his half-baked plan to hurry the ninja out of the shop backfired somewhat.

"What makes you say that?"

"Just look at it!" Jiraiya exclaimed, holding the shuriken dramatically up to the light where, if it hadn't had a matte-black finish, it would have shone in the store lighting. "Its keen edge! Its comfortable balanced weight! And its... certain something else!"