Chapter 196: Together Under Heaven — Part Two

Sunraku: "Oh, the population's gotten a bit bigger—guess that's what a sequel announcement does."

The game had been pretty desolate for a decent title, mainly because the player skill requirements for fighting on the frontlines were too damn high. But when a sequel's on the way, it's human nature to want to try out the previous game. The entrance hall, which had once radiated a fiercely competitive aura from intense ranking battles among the tight-knit regulars, now seemed to be welcoming newcomers with a somewhat milder atmosphere. Yeah, I get it. I get it. No matter how much you call people bandwagoners or whatever, the kind of desolation where you only ever match with people you already know just isn't healthy.

A surprise in the form of a commercial-grade (not actually commercial-grade) present had struck me directly. But now that I'd received it, I ought to put it to good use. I immediately started enjoying the dark pleasure of cramming shitty game data into the cutting-edge VR system, and the first game I booted up was Nephilim Hollow. If you ask me why, I'd be at a loss, but I just picked it at random—no particular meaning. Just a fleeting thought: "Wonder if Rust and Mold are around?" That's all.

Sunraku: "And as expected, they're here."

What happened to being in my best condition? Well, that's not a line I can say when I've been playing Survival Gunman and NephHolo back-to-back. Looking up past the entrance hall, the ones fighting to capture the hearts of the newcomers are Rust & Mold and Super Ball Man. Crimson Wing Union and an unfamiliar machine are locked in a ferocious clash. But well, I can't really imagine the Crimson Phoenix—who stood unchallenged at the top until I assassinated her—losing that easily. Guess I'll throw a little surprise their way.

Sunraku: "Alright... I'll unveil you today, right here, right now—after all those little modifications I've been tinkering with."

And what's more, with me—whose base performance, meaning my player skill, has received a massive boost—in the pilot seat. Gone is the blue bird that once shed everything for the sake of speed. In its place sits a brilliantly colored Nephilim, with new wings added across its entire body. The mismatched, disparate parts each bear a different default color scheme, making it look as if someone had splattered it with buckets of different-colored paint. I always end up getting weirdly particular about naming things like this. To this new form of the evolved jade kingfisher—Kingfisher—let me bestow the name of a relative species.

Sunraku: "Alright, let's spread our wings and fly, Coracias Lilac—the bird of fourteen colors."

This is Kingfisher's true rematch. I hastily finish my preparations and slam a challenge down on Rust and the others, who've just shot down Super Ball Man's machine. The acceptance reply comes instantly. Coracias Lilac—a Nephilim bearing the name of a kind of roller—and Crimson Wing Union, the immortal phoenix, face off. Since this is a random match and not a friend match, we can't exchange words. But the fact that their motivation is more than overflowing is obvious from the way Crimson Wing Union comes charging at full force the instant the battle-start signal drops.

Sunraku: "Bring it on! This time, I'm not running or hiding!"

Both sides of the back, both arms, both shoulders, both legs, left and right hips. With the exception of the physical blade "Totsuka"—the handheld weapon—every single part is equipped with propulsion boosters. Including the base boosters and the leg-mounted jets, this machine is packed with a total of fourteen boosters, tuned entirely for mobility. It's so min-maxed that the moment it loses that single sword, its only remaining means of attack is ramming. But in gaming, downsides never exist alone. By shouldering a massive drawback, Coracias Lilac has obtained the strongest wings—different from Kingfisher's.

Sunraku: "Right now, I've got the skill to handle this baby!!"

Ignite the 4th, 5th, 11th, and 14th boosters. The brilliantly colored bird, pulling off a triple axel in midair, evades the immortal phoenix's charge and takes its back. In response, Crimson Wing Union swiftly maneuvers, launching an attack toward its own rear. But then—ignite the 3rd, 7th, 8th, and 13th boosters. Carrying the momentum of the triple axel, Coracias Lilac shifts in a completely different direction and brings down its blade, destroying Crimson Wing Union's left arm.

Fuhahahaha! Did you see that, Rust?! Did you see that, Mold?! This is the Final Answer I agonized over—after winning with Fiddler Crab, but feeling quietly bothered that I'd never won even once with Kingfisher! If Crimson Wing Union can achieve irregular motion through asymmetrically placed boosters, then I'll go even further beyond with super-super-super-irregular motion through boosters loaded to their absolute limit!! Fufufufu, the handling is so insane even I'm on the verge of losing my mind. But by turning that impossibility into reality, I achieve vibratory movement!!! With a headgear-type system, the information processing couldn't keep up, and this machine was like a game of Russian roulette—with a constant minimum 30% chance of spiraling out of control and crashing into a building. But now that I've got the processing power of a commercial-grade system... I've managed to suppress it to about 20%!!

Sunraku: "Even moving my arms is a struggle, but this Nephilim... can breakdance in midair."

I'll make you understand the true meaning of three-dimensional mobility. Fall, Crimson Wing Union—you goddamn dragonfly!!

Sunraku: "Ah—control erro—gubeh."

The building concrete that doesn't gently catch you is a tsundere.

Sunraku: "Urgh... The sweet taste of victory... urgh... I feel like I'm chugging it straight from the barrel, urgh...!!"

Rust: "...!! ...!!"

Even as Rust relentlessly pelts me with light body blows to the gut, I'm not so crass as to interrupt my smug victory performance. Well, with a kettle for a head, there's no smug expression to show in the first place. But even so, Kingfisher's nemesis—who'd slipped past victory twice—has now been vanquished.

Sunraku: "Urgh... hey, it's about time to—urgh—stop that... urgh—right after piloting Coracias Lilac, I'm—hurk—getting motion sick, ube-be-be-be-be-beh."

Wait, wait, stop the rapid-fire gut punches! And the force behind each hit is gradually increasing—is there some kind of cumulative buff active?!

Rust: "One more...!"

Sunraku: "No, look... consecutive matches with those movements are rough, so..."

More than anything, the one taking heavy damage from that is my inner ear. I mean, chaining a triple axel into yet another accelerated triple axel—even I thought I was asking too much. But if I hadn't, I wouldn't have been able to get my revenge on Crimson Wing Union.

Mold: "Still, how can you even pull off such reckless moves..."

Sunraku: "Actually, a bunch of stuff happened, and I swapped out my VR system."

Mold: "...Don't tell me, a commercial-grade one?"

When I answer "You bet," Mold's eyes go perfectly round with surprise. Ah—stop, Ms. Rust, don't restart the gut punches with "That's unfair, spec-wise." Even if there is a pain cap, sustained impacts to the stomach aren't good!

Sunraku: "Right, right. So for a test run, I figured—since I'd already built it but it was too wild to handle—maybe now I could actually use that thing... Even though it's a bird."

Mold: "Pfft..."

Rust: "Sunraku, stop rendering Mold unusable."

Sunraku: "Is this my fault?"

Rust: "If he starts laughing about it in the middle of navigating, I won't be able to cope..."

Rust's shoulders slump. It seems she's given up on getting her revenge today. Inspired by the battle that unfolded on the holographic monitor, various players react—some go off to buy boosters, others glimpse the possibilities of new builds, some debate passionately... The heat radiating from the crowd is so intense you'd never believe this place had been a ghost town just a short while ago.

Rust: "...I still doubt whether this moment is a dream."

Sunraku: "I bet."

Rust: "Perhaps you were a blue bird of fortune—a kingfisher—after all."

Sunraku: "The hell's that supposed to mean?"

Rust: "I love this game. Even when I die of old age decades from now, I'm sure the last thing I'll remember is this game. That's exactly why... I think the moment Kingfisher appeared was the turning point for this game."

Sunraku: "No, I repeat: the hell's that supposed to mean?"

It was nothing but coincidence. The kind of superstition where if a black cat crosses your path, you start pulling nothing but bad RNG. Ah, right. I might as well ask.

Sunraku: "Rust. The NephHolo sequel's been confirmed, but are you going to keep playing SLF?"

I'm not saying there's anything wrong with devoting yourself entirely to NephHolo, and I have no right to stop you. But I did make a contract with Rust and Mold—"provide robots in SLF." If they were to leave SLF without ever using them... it'd leave a bad taste in my mouth, somehow.

Rust: "I plan to keep going with both SLF and the original NephHolo... Black Doll is insane. To use the 'SLF system' for a sequel to a dead game like this... idiot, moron, I'll follow them for life...!"

Sunraku: "Wait, seriously?"

"SLF system"—the name's exactly what it sounds like. The system used in Shangri-La Frontier... meaning a disgustingly realistic virtual reality system. According to what Rust's heard from the director of NephHolo and the president of Black Doll, the company developing NephHolo: "Within our company, there is no title better suited to the SLF system than NephHolo. By lightening certain functionalities, we aim to develop a version that can operate the SLF system at a relatively low cost..." Something along those lines. I see. You don't necessarily need to render an entire world as a single open world. You can build a world limited to a single city, like GH:C. And for a game like this, you can build a certain amount of world and then load separately for travel or transitions. And as long as the controls—as long as the controls can be handled—it's not impossible for this game, as a sci-fi robot action title, to stir up a massive storm in the industry... That's what the company's higher-ups decided.

Thinking about it that way, I feel genuinely that Rust is fortunate. No matter how much an individual user constructs a "theory for why it would sell," a game sequel doesn't get made. Unless the heart of the person with the power to make that decision is moved, no matter how much you love a game, a sequel won't be made—and eventually, after desolation, it becomes a game of the past. I personally don't mind that. Partly because the games I love are exactly those "past" games, but also because, one way or another, sequels don't always become better games. Examples of the second or third generation running a brand founded by the first into the ground are a truth of nature, repeated countless times throughout gaming history.

That's exactly why this isn't something merely slapped with a "2" after some system improvements and updated characters and mechanics. Being able to look forward, in real-time, to a sequel evolving into a new frontier through the super-technology of the SLF system—that's an emotion far removed from me, who's only ever played games that have already been judged and relegated to the past. And I feel envy—toward Rust and Mold, who get to enjoy that, toward the players who've stuck with this game, toward the newcomers just starting.

Rust: "And Sunraku, you're obviously... gonna buy it too, right?"

Sunraku: "...Do I have to?"

Rust: "You should. No, it's practically an obligation. Buy it."

But Rust's words make me suddenly realize. Right. If I think about it, right now, at this very moment—the me who's playing NephHolo is also standing on that side. I let out a small breath and think, watching the fired-up players. In this case... should I be grateful to Fia-kuso? It was because I conquered that game that I felt like stepping away from trash games for a while. And then I started SLF, picked NephHolo back up, and through some twist of fate ended up hiding my face and fighting pro gamers and all that... You really never know where life will take you.

Sunraku: "Anyway, more than a sequel with no release date, the priority is tomorrow's Ctarnidd. We're launching the attack tomorrow night, time-limit-wise... So, seriously, don't go overdoing it on NephHolo and show up groggy, okay?"

Rust: "...Obviously. In preparation for the coming '2,' I must get used to the system through SLF. So I won't hold back in the Ctarnidd fight, and I will pilot the robots."

In Rust's eyes as she made that declaration, the flame of motivation was unmistakably blazing.

Mold: "Bird... but it's a horse... who came up with... who-horse? Pfft, kukukukuku..."

Sunraku: "Quit making your own laughing triggers, seriously."

Rust: "This time might be a pretty severe case..."

[Originally, Rust & Mold were planned to be one-chapter throwaways, but one way or another I got attached to them, so they'll be staying on... is the story.]

[The English name and scientific name got mixed together, but the origin of Coracias Lilac is the "Lilac-Breasted Roller." I'm rather fond of the coloring, which looks like a Paint color-fill gone wrong.]

[Despite all the complaints here and there, I really do think a title that keeps its series going is a happy thing.]

[Even now, I'm still waiting for Patapon 4...]