Chapter 151: Character Games Are, in Essence...

For the game Galaxia Heroes, the versus element is, frankly, a non-essential luxury. Extraneous flab. If you ask what the game is really for, the answer comes down to two things: the 'hero experience' and the 'villain experience.'

The Galaxia Heroes series wasn't built on a fighting-game foundation. It was a Galaxia Comics comic book translated into game form. I want to race across a nighttime skyline like that hero. I want to rampage to my heart's content like that villain. Reliving those experiences is the core of the game. Until now, the technology to achieve that didn't exist—hence the fighting-game format. All anyone could make were games that mimicked just the specs of heroes in limited arenas.

Rakuro: "But then SLF was born."

A paradigm shift in the history of gaming: Shangri-La Frontier. I have no idea how much money they poured into its developer, but Galaxia Heroes Chaos has finally realized the original concept that was never possible before. Namely, the player becomes the character. Not just fighting—acting like a hero on the stage of Chaos City, acting like a villain. That is the foundation and essence of this game. You can't win by just going through the motions.

Rakuro: "The Heroic Gauge isn't just for securing the Cube—it's also what you use for Supers… So what you need for more efficient gauge-building is…"

Role-playing. The player fully inhabiting the character—that is the "minimum requirement" of this game.

Rakuro: "In other words… fans of Galaxia Comics are gonna see this as a god-tier game."

Megumi: "It's not that I've got a problem with you personally… but I'm going to see what that skill of yours is really made of."

A twin-sword-wielding old samurai and a chimera of plant and human—rooted into the earth—faced off in the middle of a main street. The character's name, if I remembered right… yeah, Yugdraia. A character who'd been kidnapped by a mad doctor and forcibly remodeled, gaining the power to control plants, and after various circumstances, became a villain. As for her gameplay concept…

Rakuro: "A slow character specializing in traps and counters, right?"

Megumi: "That so-called skill of yours that can keep a forty percent win rate against Kei… Let's see it!!"

The next instant, the Trap Seeds she'd planted on a building activated, and vines exploding with vicious growth lunged straight at me.

Rakuro: "Too naive, too naive…!"

I'd run through the full roster—I knew the character specs. This trap could be triggered at the player's discretion, but in return, it could only attack in a straight line. However, if it hit you, you'd be locked down and turned into a punching bag for several seconds. The vines stretched out from left and right, each one nastily aimed at my ankle and my neck—but because the targets were so drastically far apart, dodging them was simple.

I ducked low, then leaped like a rabbit, evading the two-directional grab. Landing instantly, I kept my forward momentum, twisted my body, and slipped past the thorny whip shot from Natsume-san—no, Yugdraia—herself.

Sure, I'd touched on every character's performance and gotten a handle on them. But only to the degree of roughly what kind of character each was. I hadn't grasped how far they could be pushed when fully mastered. Still, there are fundamentals in this world. If I just know "plant user" and "excels at mid-range," I can easily predict what kind of attacks are coming…!!

Megumi: "No way—you dodged everything…?!"

Rakuro: "What was the line again… Right, right. 'Let me show you the secrets of the Storm Blade.'"

By the time I got here, I'd rescued seven people, plus saved the woman's husband who I'd flagged earlier—so with the bonus, my Gauge was full.

Ranzo's special technique: Storm Stream Way Conquest. A movement technique that closes a five-meter gap with instantaneous-movement-style footwork, overwriting Yugdraia's distance and replacing it with Ranzo's.

Megumi: "You fell for it…!"

If Pencilgon had been the one piloting that character, she'd have laid far more vicious traps. But close the gap to this distance, and the bastard would've been helpless, defeated without a fight. Even if Pencilgon had the same tools Natsume-san is using, I could still seize the initiative and press straight through. But my opponent now was a pro gamer—someone whose craft was her livelihood.

Yugdraia's Gauge technique—I didn't remember the name, but it was a close-range killer that released a ring of thorn spears expanding outward from her body. But this… this was within my predictions. Against Pencilgon, I'd press straight through. Against someone else, I'd counter it.

Rakuro: "What I'm testing isn't the power—it's the range…!"

The "height" of this circular area attack was roughly three meters. Which meant the simplest and quickest countermeasure was just one thing: if front, back, left, and right are sealed, the escape route is up.

Rakuro: "Old Bones Great Leap!"

Megumi: "You matched the timing…?!"

If you expect it from the start, your response won't waver! Ranzo's Gauge technique, Amatsukaze Great Storm Slash, was a finishing move that launched you roughly ten meters into the air before crashing down with a cross-shaped dual-blade slash. Most of all, its rebellion against the laws of physics—which you could sum up with "because it's an American comic-book hero"—was magnificent.

I'm not dumb enough to charge blindly at an opponent I've never faced before. No—I always carry that excellent plan of "just beat the crap out of them first" right here in my heart.

Perhaps she'd never imagined I'd counter her so perfectly. The plant-woman's face twisted in shock—but still, she installed Pro Gamer mode. She scuttled the roots planted in the ground and used whatever step maneuver she had to mitigate the damage from the slash effects.

Choosing to accept some damage here rather than fully evade it—I have to say, that was impressive. Damage control done with full consideration of Gauge recovery, preserving her step, preparing a counterattack… all of it was almost enough to make me sigh in admiration. Too bad that response was a 65—barely scraping a passing grade.

A counter-focused character preparing a counterattack is fine in itself. But not following through with an attack is a bad move. In the end, a fight is won by driving that number called HP all the way to zero.

This fight was meant for Natsume-san to confirm whether a person like me could really hold a forty percent win rate against Uomi Kei. Which meant that, in her mind, "victory through something other than a straight-up clash of skill" didn't exist. Same goes for me—but being aware of that opens up more paths to victory.

If she's shifting to counterattack, I'll deliberately hold back. A counterattack is reactive; I'll proactively relinquish my offense.

For a single moment, a stalemate—like two players throwing the same hand in rock-paper-scissors—hung in the air. Natsume-san was a little too cautious, trying to read my moves and counter them… her character choice hadn't even tried to hide that tendency. And now, Natsume-san's battle style was beginning to come into focus. She was the type who builds her own rhythm.

Players like me—and probably Rei-shi—are the type who have a rhythm. No matter who the opponent is, we do what we want to do. If we seize the initiative, we can beat them one-sidedly; but if the initiative is taken from us, the same thing happens right back.

On the other hand, Katzo, Pencilgon, and Natsume-san are the type who build a rhythm. They observe the opponent's movements, then shift the flow into something that suits them. The type that looks like they're being pushed back, yet somehow ends up winning—the type that seizes the initiative back later on.

Frankly, both have their pros and cons… but at the very least, the framework for taking down Natsume-san had taken shape.

People of this type… are catastrophically weak to having their tempo thrown off.

Kei: "Yo, Meg. From the look on your face, you fought him… How was it?"

Megumi: "…I lost. Actually, what the hell was that?! His movements turned into total chaos halfway through, he kept provoking me like crazy—seriously, what the hell was that?!"

Katzo—Kei—thought of his gas-masked friend, who was currently fighting Towa, as he asked his teammate for her impressions of the match. The answer she gave made it clear she'd fallen into the same "losing pattern" as him. The fact made Kei, still in the form of the lava-armed hero he'd been using moments ago, give a wry smile.

Kei: "I told you, didn't I? He's the same type of player as Sylvia Goldberg. The kind whose battle style switches up every ten seconds. You've got to adjust your own approach to match."

If you asked Uomi Kei, the person named Sunraku was a ten-tool knife with a hidden finisher in every single tool. He'd use every means available, sometimes combining them, to hurl an avalanche of options at you. If you took too long, a one-sided beatdown was waiting for you. But on the flip side, if you could fully grasp every card in Sunraku's hand and slip your own guaranteed-win pattern into his, victory would come so easily it was almost anticlimactic.

Kei: "He's genuinely strong at baseline, but his thought process is hardwired to bizarre stunts—what he calls 'romance'—so he can't stabilize above seventy percent…"

What kind of mental circuitry led someone to think, "In order to beat a pro gamer, I'll mix feints into eighty percent of my attacks"? They'd known each other a fairly long time, but there were still moments when Kei couldn't understand that madman's thinking. That said, the multi-layered feint he'd devised had actually helped Kei out before, so you couldn't write him off.

Because he chose flashy romanticism over efficiency, he suffered unpredictable losses. At the same time, it was easy to pin down his movements. And yet, that last ten percent could never be locked in. Which was precisely why Kei was simply… interested.

Kei: "Part of me just wants to see what happens when we throw him at Star Rain."

Megumi: "…So is Towa Amane just as strong?"

Kei: "Nah. That one's way more sinister."

After all, if Sunraku was a tuna that started swimming at full explosive speed the moment you gave it "freedom," then Pencil Warrior was a spider that immediately began building a vicious web.

[Summary]

Rakuro: "Hey hey heeey! Your range's falling short, isn't it?! C'mere, the old man's right here—oops, too bad, dodged! Well, I guess I'll run away now… or so you'd think, but I'm waiting around the corner—surpriiise!!"

Megumi: "Grrgh…"