Chapter 302: The Crossing of Instants
Back-to-back update to counter the spoilers in Chapter 301's afterword.
???: "........."
Sunraku: "D-Damn it!"
With a quick turn, the point reverses direction, and the strike aims squarely and unerringly for my neck.
I slam Duxram, Blade of Aspiration into the blade meant to kill me and knock it away, only for what comes next to make it look as though even that was bait: a strange weapon thrust at the center of my chest, like a tonfa turned into a cutting weapon. I escape by throwing every evasive skill I have into the dodge.
???: "........."
Sunraku: "Goddammit, my concentration's already getting shredded...!"
I keep Role Play: Ryuguin Fugaku running at full throttle. Even with Duxram, Blade of Aspiration—a blade you could call invincible so long as you land critical hits—half-wrecked, I'm still overwhelmingly at a disadvantage.
Even the players around us who'd been heckling are starting to give off an air of resignation. Fuck this. Like hell I'm getting killed for... for some reason this incomprehensible!
If I go on the defensive, I die. Parry while attacking. Damn it, I don't have enough caffeine in me—come on, adrenaline!
The enemy isn't extraordinarily fast, but those movements constantly trace the ideal optimum for the weapon. It's exactly the kind of demonic movement you'd call TAS, and flashes dance through the air as the enemy tries to finish me off.
With a flick, the point turns backward. Back in tonfa form, the enemy now has punching as an option, making the attacks even more varied.
But that means it's effectively fist range... Thank God. Looks like my path to survival hasn't been cut off yet.
???: "He recovered!"
???: "Whoa, amazing!"
All that racket's annoying. If you're going to be BGM, at least pay a little more attention to the melody. Right now, I feel like listening to something rock-ish... Ah, no. Bad idea. If I block out my hearing, I'll probably die.
Sunraku: "I mean...! Did I... do something wrong...?!"
Maybe my whining made me let my guard down. I screw up, and Duxram, Blade of Aspiration gets knocked away and goes flying.
Fine, then. I use the hand that's been forcibly freed to work a window while dealing with the flurry coming to reap me from just one of her blades.
The weapon-deployment speed I normally never even think about now feels maddeningly slow.
It hasn't been seven days yet, so I can't use Exceed Charge. Even so, I step forward while intercepting the tonfa-edge attacks with the still-excellent Dis Pater, Nether King’s Mirror Shield. Eat this—one-man phalanx!
???: ".........!"
A hood pulled low and a scarf hiding the mouth. I can't make out the enemy's expression, but even after I've held out this long, there's no sign of impatience or anything like it in those movements.
Literally an AI, huh. That makes it even harder to understand why I'm being singled out so intensely, but after holding out this long, going, "Welp, doesn't look like I can win, guess I'll lose," feels weirdly infuriating.
Is it because this is Firstia—the town where most players who start SLF will probably first set foot—and if I die now, I'll respawn in a different town?
Or because this is a beginners' town, and something about losing in front of a huge audience of newbies doesn't sit right with me?
Whatever kicked this off doesn't matter. At any rate, the impulse burning inside me right now is screaming one thing: "I don't want to lose."
Sunraku: "Uoooooh! I'm getting five seconds out of you, no matter what it takes!!"
It was never a Unique in the first place, and there's no reason to hide it anymore! In the brief opening created when I forcibly push back a battle in which I'd done nothing but get driven backward, using a brute-force move with myself prepared to die, I clench my gloved right hand tight and slam my fist into my chest.
Sunraku: "You picked the fight first, so even if I blow you away, don't you dare slap me with a kill penalty, damn it!"
???: "............!"
Wrapped in black lightning, my movements surpass even attacks optimized for maximum speed, and for the first time the enemy—the Bounty Hunter Lutia—trembles as though shaken.
Why the hell am I being targeted this relentlessly? Why is she ignoring Gozumandora-san, who's just standing there in the crowd, and coming after me instead? I want to yell at her to explain herself, but the Bounty Hunter would probably just keep attacking in silence. Fine, then. I'll go all out too.
Sunraku: "Full throttle. I'll use the stat gap to overcome the skill gap!"
Moment Sight, activate. I exercise the privilege of being the only one accelerating in a world gone slow-motion and execute Plan B: "an all-out push."
Even if my stamina holds, I can't fake away mental fatigue. Without a caffeine boost, I need to settle this even faster before I'm worn down completely. That's exactly why I go for a short decisive battle—stretch one second to its absolute limit and stake everything on one instant.
Sunraku: "I'm gonna ki—"
But put another way, that's a double-edged sword that also cuts down the time I have to think. And that's exactly why I only now notice an absurdly simple "fact."
Lutia: "............"
Our eyes meet.
Inside my accelerated thoughts, inside the world turned slow-motion, the Bounty Hunter's eyes are unmistakably tracking my movements.
Between her hood and scarf, a blue "eye" like sapphire holds a glow like a star shining under its own power. I'm sure my own eyes are producing the same effect.
Eyes that can perceive a world carved into instants—a gaze that doesn't miss a single frame.
The simple fact is that NPCs use magic and skills too. Under the effect of Moment Sight just like me, Lutia's mouth slowly moves.
My attack is about to reach her... just before it does. With only a single frame of that fleeting instant left, Lutia unmistakably murmurs:
Lutia: "—Superspeed Mach."
Black lightning and a sonic shockwave cross... and sparks burst inside my head.
Sunraku: ".................!!?"
No way—did I black out!? And wait, I didn't respawn...! I'm alive!?
Sunraku: "Ngh... bwah!!"
No good. The thread of tension has completely snapped.
With my barely movable right hand, I strike my chest and shut off Levin Trigger: Hazard. Like a tower whose supporting pillar has been knocked out, I buckle to my knees... except my body can't even manage that much. Like a heap of collapsed rubble giving way all over again, I end up dropping onto my ass.
When I turn around with a sluggish movement so full of openings it's almost ridiculous, I see the Bounty Hunter frozen at the end of a finishing swing... and...
The Mirror of Fading, sliced into six equal pieces.
Sunraku: "Gotta hand it to myself... I did good there."
In that instant, the option my intuition and unconscious mind chose was to pour every bit of speed into splitting off the aggro—in other words, "passing the buck."
I don't know whether that was a skill or magic, but that thing called Superspeed Mach had instantaneous speed equal to Levin Trigger: Hazard... no, even greater. Just veering sideways wouldn't have been enough; she'd still have caught me. Apparently my industrial-grade rig managed to read the decision made by neurons racing beyond their limits in that instant.
Sunraku: "Ahh, no good. I can't move anymore."
I've stalled out. I could die thirty times over before I reboot. Or should I trust in a lucky survive-at-1-HP roll and play some shitty Russian roulette? Better start sucking up to the goddess.
Lutia: "............"
Sunraku: "...Uh, can I pay a settlement and call it even?"
Apparently the Grim Reaper these days uses tonfas instead of a scythe. Despite having moved at that ridiculous speed, the Bounty Hunter looks perfectly fine as she stares at me...
Whoosh!
Sunraku: "Bwegh!?"
The knife thrown faster than my eyes can follow hits not me... but Gozumandora-san in the throat, standing there with a dumb look on his face as he watches the fight between me and Bounty Hunter Lutia. Maybe he forgot to recover his HP, because the one thrown knife drops his health to zero, and Gozumandora-san disappears in a burst effect.
Lutia glances at the items scattered by the late Gozumandora-san, then clicks her tongue... Yep. She definitely clicked her tongue just now. The kind of click that practically says, "What a lousy haul."
Lutia: "............"
After swiftly and cleanly eliminating her target, Lutia pulls something from inside her long coat... a card? She tosses it at me while I'm slumped on my ass.
Then she brings her face close to my ear and...
Lutia: "...Café 'The Serpent’s Apple.' The password is 'Drawn by the Apple Blossom.'"
Sunraku: "Ah, I'm actually a pretty regular customer there..."
Leaving behind a whisper that sends a current down my spine like Pencilgon beneath layer after layer of false faces, the Bounty Hunter flips the hem of her coat.
Lutia walks off briskly, then snaps her fingers and collects the items scattered across the ground by the late Gozumandora-san before striding away in style...
???: "............"
???: "............"
???: "............"
???: "............"
Silence.
The hubbub of people who don't know what happened here feels distant. Everyone who witnessed what happened in this place simply falls quiet, unable to say a word.
Now then, how do I move? Any action I take—even just muttering "bathroom"—would shatter this silence.
Sunraku: "......... (smoothly)"
As I stand, I make a gesture that says, "Now, now, calm down." Then I take back my scarf (its disguise almost coming undone) from Tango-kun, whose earlier slightly put-off look seems to have vanished somewhere, give a little laugh, and...
Sunraku: "Ahhh! Look over there! It's Lycagon the Nightslayer!!"
I run for it at full speed.
I neeeed girl powerrrrrrrrrr!!
Skill: Superspeed Mach