We’re really starting to see the effect of all the dungeons on society, and I love it.
And that means new characters, which is the icing on the cake!
Whoo!

All right, here’s the map as usual, and here’s the chapter.
As always, warning about minor spoilers below, so go read it first!

Here are this week’s notes:

1. “The European Defence Agency (EDA) supports its 26 Member States in improving their defence capabilities through European cooperation. Acting as an enabler and facilitator for Ministries of Defence willing to engage in collaborative, capability projects, the Agency has become the ‘hub’ for European defence cooperation with expertise and networks allowing it to cover the whole spectrum.”
2. The “NO! Urabe faction” mentioned is likely a reference to the “安部政権NO! (Abe Administration NO!)” group.
3. New characters:
   Kusakabe Rinko: daughter of the successor family to the Kusakabe-style School of Ancient Martial Arts
   Samejima Kensuke: employee of Dainippon Harmaceutical Manufacturing Co., Ltd. and member of “Team DPM”
   Sumida Masayoshi: former sumo wrestler (reached juuryou, the second highest division with a fixed quota of 28 members)
   Mukai Junpei: former banker
4. About Mutsuo’s reaction to meeting Rinko: “Kuh! Kill me already” is from the JP “kukkoro” meme where prideful female knights, princesses, female warriors, etc would go “Kuh! Korose!” upon being captured because the shame of capture is worse than the shame of death. Depending on the medium where you see this in, could go the Lenny face route.
5. Clarification: Those who have successfully cleared a dungeon will be called “Busters” with the capital “B” going forward, whereas those attempting to do so will be “busters” with the small “b.”
6. Baegaeshi is a reference to the TV show Hanzawa Naoki, a super duper popular J-drama about a banker trying to go against the system and make a difference.
7. Pareto principle: I believe the text explained the principle quite thoroughly.
   However, I should probably point out this is obviously a generalization. For example, if all countries had the same wealth distribution (ie. 80% wealth belonging to 20% of the population), then there’d be no need for the Gini Index because the ratio of inequality would be the same in all countries. This principle can be used as a guide for managing, say, your time, but does need to be used carefully.
8. Worker Ant Principle: There is a lot less English literature on this as opposed to the Pareto principle. (Here’s the JP wikipedia page on it.) What’s more, it seems to be based on a study by Hokkaido University that has now been somewhat refuted by Hokkaido University itself. So just take this as Ezoe’s personal view on HR management.
9. When answering Shifu Liu’s question, Ezoe mentioned wanting to ask the Dungeon System’s designer, “Tell me, how do you feel?”
   This is a reference to a Japanese meme named “NDK” for “Nee nee, ima donna kimochi?“, a phrase for trash talking people online after you’ve beat them in a match. Can also be used after something terrible has happened to someone and you want to make fun of them for it, especially if they had set themselves up for it.

I said this also last week, but the more progress we make in the story, the fewer footnotes there are haha.
Anyways, hope you enjoyed, and see you again next week!

(As always, feel free to point out grammatical mistakes, typos, and the like on either the relevant JNC forum or on the #translation-talk channel on our Discord.)