How to Live as a Genius Scholar in another World - Chapter 24

Chapter 24 – Future Dreams (3)

—–CROW—– 

‘That’s why they’re not making a profit.’

I agreed that metal had its own unique coolness.  Even my idols, the Vectormen, wore armor.

If Beast Regression was a magic that equipped me with armor instead of a weird energy lump, I wouldn’t have been surprised the first time I used it. Instead, I would have probably shit myself from the sheer awesomeness and needed a change of underwear.

Metal robots were one of the two coolest things a man could love. The other was, of course, dinosaurs. In other words, investing millions in metalworking to create dinosaur robots would be worthwhile.

Thinking that far, I agreed with her.

“Metal is cool.  Full plate armor is a man’s dream, except for the noise.”

“Right?! Right?!”

“But I can’t afford it.”

Please don’t make that face. It makes me feel guilty.

“…Wait a minute. I think I have something I made while swallowing my pride, somewhere around here.”

She looked dejected and brought something that looked like pants. They looked like ordinary black pants.

“How about this armor?  It’s made of monster leather, reinforced with metal plates at vital points.  You can wear it like pants.”

“Looks good. How much is it?”

“65 coopers.  Ah, the leather is from a rock turtle.”

“Not bad.”

It was expensive, but even modern bulletproof vests were more expensive than this.

For reference, rock turtles were easy to catch, but their leather became tough when processed, so it was commonly used in armor, like cowhide in the otherworldly armor industry.

I checked the crotch area. It wasn’t a steel codpiece or boomerang underwear design, but sturdy leather armor made of monster leather.

I wouldn’t be embarrassed to wear this.  It was enchanted, so it was durable, and the weight was reasonable, so it wouldn’t come off during a fight.

“You can try it on here.”

Clara pointed to a rather crude fitting room. I went in and tried it on.

‘…It’s tight.’

Although it was tough enough to be used as armor, the leather seemed to lack elasticity.  Perhaps because it was a mid-low range product that sold solely for its cost-effectiveness.

‘Wait a minute?’

Something felt slightly off.

I took off the pants and looked at the longsword in my underwear.

Underwear culture wasn’t very developed in this other world. Women had bras and panties, but men’s underwear was closer to swim trunks or shorts.

Mass-produced men’s underwear was tied with a string at the waist to adjust to the wearer’s size.  The length was long, and you were supposed to ask your mom or wife to cut it at home.

—That’s why I hadn’t noticed until now.

As I said, I rarely drank anything other than coffee, cola, and alcohol, so I hadn’t even gone to the bathroom since waking up today.

—Poof.

“Huh?”

The longsword in my underwear had become a Zweihander.

***

—Penis size was often a sensitive and taboo topic for men.

While women were relatively open about their breast size, sometimes even using it as a joke, men rarely discussed penis size, even among themselves.

Because everyone knew.

Comparing and ranking penis sizes was a sensitive issue that could sometimes lead to bloodshed.

Thus, men tended to be obsessed with penis size.

Very few men were indifferent to it.  The fact that penis enlargement surgery was consistently ranked number one in urology proved this.

Some people even wanted to be a bald gorilla with a small dick, 180cm tall, with an IQ of 70 and a penis size of 30cm, when asked to divide the number 280 into height/IQ/penis size.  Penis size was a serious matter.

There were probably more people who wanted penis enlargement technology without side effects than steroids without side effects.

If a drug that could activate Gear Third on a penis was developed, it would probably boast a medical popularity rivaling that of a perfect hair growth treatment.

This bizarre obsession with size was unique to humans.  Penis-centric omnipotence wasn’t common in other creatures.  I didn’t know about otherworldly species, but that was the case on Earth.

For animals other than humans, reproductive competition wasn’t determined by penis size but by fighting ability.

Even if a male lion or tiger bragged about his large penis, if another male challenged him, he could just bite his neck and send him to the afterlife.

Their weapons of choice were probably their claws and teeth, not their penises.  That was why even gorillas, with strength far surpassing humans, had penises the size of a pinky finger.

There might have been a lion with a 30cm penis in history, but that penis lion would have been eliminated from the competition and disappeared, just like saber-toothed tigers went extinct because of their large teeth.

A long, vulnerable point was useless outside of sex. If the tip of the penis was cut off during a fight, the animal couldn’t reproduce and would be eliminated from the gene pool.

It was the law of nature that compact penises, advantageous in combat, won the reproductive competition by mating quickly and frequently.  This was the penis selection theory advocated by Charles Darwin.

That’s why I couldn’t understand what was happening now.

‘Why has my garden snake turned into an anaconda?’

Honestly, I had a hunch about the cause.  This was the second time I’d thought this.

‘Is this also because of Beast Regression? Why?’

Beast Regression.

A strange magic whose origins and nature were still unknown.  A fundamental enhancement magic, incredibly old, as befitting the term “primal magic.”

The physical enhancement was understandable.  The effect of this magic was to imbue my body with the power of an Earth warrior.

I didn’t know why it only worked on me, but thanks to Beast Regression, my body had a pathway for mana, and my muscles were strengthened even normally.

‘But what does that have to do with my dick?’

I was in utter confusion in the blacksmith’s fitting room.

My strength increased because I gained the power of a beast.  Understandable.

My defense also increased, like wearing animal hide. Understandable.

My penis also became incredibly thick and long.

Not understandable.

“I’m going crazy.”

Did your penis grow just because you gained the power of a beast? That didn’t seem right.

Come to think of it, some animals did have large penises. For example, horses, the representative creatures of big magnum dicks.

Their anatomy made it difficult to mate without a large penis, so only the big dick genes survived.  Without a horse dick, they couldn’t reproduce, so they all became horse-dicked. This could also be considered a kind of penis selection theory.

But did it make sense that only my penis, and specifically a horse dick, known for being huge even among animals, changed due to Beast Regression?

“Shit! What the hell is going on?!”

I was more confused by this incomprehensible madness than when I encountered the katydid or Nefertiti!

Well, there was nothing wrong with having a bigger penis.

Nothing wrong.  Nothing wrong, but still, I needed to know *why* it had grown.

If I woke up with a huge penis, it could also suddenly become tiny one morning.

In the worst-case scenario, my penis could disappear completely, and I would become an otherworldly female master’s degree-holding deer!

“Guwaaaaaaaaagh!!!”

A truly overwhelming act of madness!!

I lost my mind like a brat experiencing his first erection.

Did a mad surgeon fly in while I was sleeping and perform a “Sambles” operation on my penis and a horse’s?  I felt like my head was spinning with such absurd thoughts.

A man’s penis was a human-friendly endorphin generator that came standard issue from the moment of birth.  They said your body was a gift from your parents, but even orphans cherished their dicks as much as their lives.

Therefore, I needed to know why this had happened to my penis.

Otherwise, I would have to spend every night clutching my dick and trembling in fear in my bed!

“Customer?! Is something wrong?!”

Clara’s voice came from outside. She must have been startled by my commotion in the fitting room.

I barely managed to calm down and answered in a composed voice.

“No.  I’m sorry.  Nothing’s wrong, so don’t worry.”

I quickly put on my pants and went outside. I was overwhelmed by incomprehensible chaos and blind ignorance, but trembling in fear wouldn’t solve anything!

“Are you sure you’re okay?”

“Yes. I’m perfectly fine.”

I handed the pants to Clara, who seemed to be agonizing over whether she had let a crazy person into her shop.

“Sorry to trouble you, but the pants are a bit small.  Could you adjust them to a larger size?”

I said. I couldn’t say my dick had become incredibly huge and my crotch was tight.

“Huh? Small? That’s impossible. I loosened them after the fitting so you could adjust the size.”

Clara said, as if she couldn’t understand.

“Where does it not fit? You don’t look particularly… uh…?”

She stopped mid-sentence. Her gaze was fixed on the pants I was wearing, specifically on my crotch, which had felt stiff and heavy since this morning.

“…Ah.”

What kind of “ah” is that?

“Ah, ah! Ah! Ah! Yes! Yes, yes! I understand!”

Clara jumped around and fussed like a released spring.

“You want a size adjustment?!  Just a moment! I’ll adjust them!!”

Crash, bang!

Clara rushed to the workshop, turning her shop upside down. I was so embarrassed that I didn’t know what to do with myself. Really.

“Damn it.”

I crossed my arms and waited for Clara to finish altering the pants.

I wanted to just leave, but I liked the leather pants, and I needed them, so I waited patiently.

“Eek!!”

The quack, who had regained consciousness, screamed when he saw me.

Seeing him tremble at the mere sight of me, I doubted he would try to get revenge on me later.  Of course.  It was shameful for a macho man to start a fight, get beaten, and then cry foul.

A true macho man was too embarrassed to report or seek revenge after being beaten in a fight.

Even if he complained to his friends, they would all be the same kind of macho bastards.  He would only be ridiculed for being a weakling who got beaten up.

But what if his friends came back as a group to fight me? Then, they wouldn’t be macho men, but mafia cartel members.

If they dared to challenge me again with their Chinese-style brotherhood and righteousness, then the Ungnyeo within me would truly awaken.

Clang! Clang! Clang!

The sound of hammering came from the workshop where Clara had gone.  She seemed to be adjusting the crotch area of the leather pants.

She must be skilled for the Blacksmiths Guild to assign someone to her shop. Though their personnel selection was questionable.

A certain dwarf I knew had mastered the art of living in the forest like an elf, despite having excellent dexterity.  It seemed Clara also possessed outstanding blacksmithing skills, even with a human body.

Or maybe Clara was also a half-dwarf?

The term “half-dwarf” itself was a product of human-centric thinking.  From a dwarf’s perspective, a mixed-blood dwarf and human would be a half-human, not a half-dwarf.

There were probably a few dwarfs in the lineage of most blacksmiths if you traced their family trees far enough, right? It was common for people in the same industry to marry.

It was a fairly logical deduction.

‘She’s skilled, but bad at business.’

That was my assessment of Clara’s shop.

A weapon merchant’s main source of income was easily damaged, fast-selling items like leather armor that needed frequent replacements.

While durable armor was good, if it never broke, fewer customers would buy new armor.

Not all warriors sought better equipment.  There were plenty of adventurers who were satisfied with decent equipment and only took on jobs they could handle.

Clara lacked the business acumen and management skills in that regard.

Weren’t there many restaurant owners on Alley Restaurant who were good at cooking but lacked business sense and struggled?  Work skills and management skills were separate stats.

In that sense, the quack’s method was very effective for generating short-term profits.

Raising prices and reducing product quality to receive future profits in advance.  It was a common tactic used by unscrupulous CEOs.

They would artificially inflate profits while they were CEOs and then include it in their portfolio as if it were some great achievement.

Then, after sucking the company dry in a short period, they would quickly leave and say to their next target company,

—See? Hire me as your CEO. I increased Mom’s Touch’s profits by 30% in three years. What? They’re bankrupt now? That’s not my problem.

Give me back my Mom’s Touch, you bastards.

It was a vicious tactic that could be used to exploit everyone from small business owners to CEOs of medium-sized companies.  Enraged again, I decided to stomp on the damn sword seller a few more times.

“You bastard!!! Die, ghost of Park Geun-hye! Dictatorship Pound!!!”

“Gyagh! Why are you doing this again?!”

Did you know which part of the human body you could hit without much worry?

It was the thigh.  The thigh was dangerous to stab because of the many blood vessels, but it was safe to punch because there were no vital organs there.

Even though there were no internal organs, internal bleeding and muscle rupture could occur simultaneously, causing prolonged pain, making it good for petty revenge.

It was also satisfying to hit because the target would scream in pain.

“Gyaaagh!! Ughkyaaagh!!!”

“Cry!! Scream!! And die!!!”

Thwack!! Thwack!! Thwack!!

Consumed by rage, I relentlessly punched the quack’s thighs. The abnormal phenomenon affecting my penis fueled my anger.

“Gyaaagh…”

The quack made a goblin-like sound and fainted again.

Look at his pronunciation.  I thought he was a native. Was this quack actually an ancient goblin or something?

Every brat eventually grew up.  Goblins probably grew up too.  Perhaps the brats who remained childish even after growing up were hiding in human society? It was a plausible hypothesis.

“I’ve finished the alterations! Try them on!”

Clara returned while I was pondering the correlation between brats and old farts.  She was quick with her alterations.

—Slip.

The pants were visibly wider.  I tried them on in the fitting room, and thankfully, they didn’t turn into a codpiece or a snail crawling up my thigh.  It was a satisfactory alteration.

“I’ll take these. How much were they?”

“6-65 coopers.”

I opened my wallet and took out the money.  I had brought a lot of money because I had to pay for the inn today.  I had also planned to buy a weapon if I found something I liked at the blacksmith.

I ended up buying armor instead, but that wasn’t the point right now.

“Here you go.”

“Yes. T-thank you.”

Clara avoided my gaze. I looked at her, wondering why she was acting like that, and she turned away, covering her face.

“D-don’t look at me like that! I’m a married woman!”

“I didn’t ask.”

Anyway, so, anyway, I left the blacksmith with my new armor and my abnormally affected penis.

Shit, what should I do now?

‘Dick, if you can hear me, tell me the answer.’

Of course, there was no answer.

Life in this other world was truly fucked up.

—–CROW—–