Chapter 385: Collateral Sacrifice

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Ahh, what a refreshing morning. The morning after you've seen your own predicted vision of the future realized in exactly the form you imagined... no, in a form even more perfect than that, truly is the best. Even the morning sun shining through the window feels like it's blessing me.

Sunraku: "Good grief. To think I'd manage to take down two rankers at once, though..."

Bakumatsu rank roughly four: "Thousand Needles," also known as "Stocky Tungsten." And Bakumatsu rank roughly three: "The Only Sword," also known as "Metal Marshmallow"... These two players, so perfectly contrasting it almost feels staged, are rankers who clash with an intensity that practically screams they're destined to fight. To have taken out these two, who break into divine punishment warfare almost every time they meet... I guess you'd call this a Giant Killing.

Honestly, I'm absolutely terrified to log into Bakumatsu next. Even if it was the result of a pileup of coincidences, I've now snatched the entire scores of two rankers and rocketed to the top of the event rankings. In Bakumatsu—where even running efficient respawn kills on full blast could barely get me to fifth place. In other words, I should assume the rankers have now locked onto me not as just some random face in the crowd, but as a clear target to be taken down. Getting hunted by "Blizzard Hunter"... well, that guy, the Great General of Sincerity, is unavoidable. But getting targeted by the unshakable rank one, Raid Boss-san, is pretty much fatal... Honestly, I can't picture myself beating him under the Bakumatsu engine at all. I feel like I'd have better odds challenging Wethermon to a one-on-one.

Sunraku: "If I could somehow get the rank two on my side... nah, no good. There's no reason to leave a bag stuffed with gold coins just sitting there."

The only player who can go toe-to-toe in a one-on-one with the strongest player in Bakumatsu—a player so beyond the pale he was never given a stylish title, called instead by the blunt, no-nonsense name "Raid Boss"—is Bakumatsu rank two: "Our Hero." If I could crash those two into each other just right... nah, it's impossible. Raid Boss-san is just too strong.

Sunraku: "......Ahh, but. When you fight with nothing but a sword and your own body, a bloodless victory just isn't possible."

An unexpected Giant Killing. It couldn't come with zero risk. It's because there was a noble sacrifice that I was able to seize a glory far beyond what I deserve.........

[Wolfgang]

Kyo the Ultimate: WHERE THE HELL IS SUNRAKU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Kyo the Ultimate: SUNRAKU!!!!!!

Kyo the Ultimate: THAT SHITTY BASTARD!!!!!!!!

Kyo the Ultimate: WHERE IS HE!!!!!!!!!!!!

Pencil Warrior: Whoa, she's really going off.

Oikatzo: What's up, what's up.

Kyo the Ultimate: I WILL NEVER FORGIVE THAT BASTARD!!!!!!!!

Kyo the Ultimate: GIVE ME BACK MY TRUST!!!!!!!!

Sunraku: How amusing.

Kyo the Ultimate: YOUUUUUUUU!!!

Sunraku: How foolish, Kyotimate...... It seems you didn't understand what a monumentally stupid thing it is to turn your back on someone in Bakumatsu...

Pencil Warrior: Ah. (Got it.)

Rust: What does that mean?

Oikatzo: She's in the middle of an event, right? What did you do?

Sunraku: Colluded with the ghosts, then tricked Kyo the Ultimate into jumping into a giant monster brawl. After that, blew up the whole row-house district—her included—with gunpowder barrels and oil pots.

Pencil Warrior: You're a demon.

Sunraku: As a result, I've racked up the points of two rankers and I'm currently running away with first place.

Oikatzo: For real? To hit the top spot even in a momentary burst in that hellhole is insane, right?

Sunraku: It also means I'm gonna get hunted by Raid Boss (a player) and the Hero (who will be baring his fangs at me)...

Oikatzo: Ahh...

Rust: What game is this?

Sunraku: Tsujigiri Capriccio: Online.

Mold: From what I looked up, it seems like a fairly normal game... kind of warm and relaxed, actually...

Pencil Warrior: That's just a disguise. Bakumatsu's true nature is a hell where only psychopaths survive.

Oikatzo: That's not exactly wrong.

Sunraku: Slightly off. Your thought processes just get repainted to Bakumatsu specs.

Pencil Warrior: Isn't that personality contamination, worse than brainwashing?

Kyo the Ultimate: I'M SERIOUSLY NEVER FORGIVING YOU! I'LL CURSE YOU FOR ALL ETERNITY!!!!

Sunraku: ↑This here is a patient with Bakumatsu contamination that has progressed from 50% to 70%.

Oikatzo: ↑Furthermore, this here is a terminal patient with over 100% Bakumatsu contamination who has mimicked a seemingly normal exterior.

Sunraku: Don't be stupid. A Bakumatsu contamination patient over 100% is way more insane than this.

Rust: You're actually making me kind of curious.

Sunraku: By the way, the very first thing a newbie experiences is getting attacked by veteran players who totally ignore the tutorial and go straight for PK and respawn kills.

Mold: .........?

Pencil Warrior: How do I put it... the morals feel like they've gone through the post-apocalypse and then crashed right into a second post-apocalypse, y'know.

Pencil Warrior: Every single one of them cheerfully refuses to listen to reason, and it's a real problem.

Kyo the Ultimate: Next time I see you I'm absolutely going to divine-punish you...... Hack you to pieces, divine punishment...!

Kyo the Ultimate: You better be ready for it.........

Sunraku: Question: State the appropriate expression for this current situation.

Oikatzo: Dead men tell no tales.

Pencil Warrior: The howling of a defeated dog.

Rust: Let not the living be troubled by the dead.

Mold: W-Well, a blessing in disguise... something like that...

Sunraku: The correct answer was "not knowing when to quit."

Sunraku: I can't quite make out what the ghost is saying...

Sunraku: Just pass on already...

Kyo the Ultimate: GUOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHHH.........!!!!

Pencil Warrior: Just looking at the text, it feels like an exorcism scene, which is kind of funny.

Oh my... It seems I've become quite thoroughly hated. I mean, sure. I did sweet-talk the ghosts with "I'll show you a Giant Killing!", got them to disband the Night Parade, then tricked Kyotimate with "Those guys are easy marks, go farm some points!" and sent her crashing into the clash between the fourth and third ranks. Then I dropped the gunpowder barrels and stuff that the devs had so obviously placed there for just that purpose at the NPC firework craftsman's house in the middle of town, and blew everyone up together...

The heavens told me to do it! So I'm not in the wrong. And even if the sparks I hurled did start the fire, and roughly a 25-by-25-meter stretch of the row-house district got blown to bits—that's just an unfortunate event. So I want them to believe in hope for tomorrow and do their best. Besides, the world of Bakumatsu explodes on a regular basis... I mean, who puts a fireworks craftsman's warehouse smack in the middle of a castle town? That's a design flaw no matter how you look at it.

Well, it's also a place where you can restock matchlock gunpowder and stuff for free. So it's simultaneously a large-scale explosion facility and a resource drop area like an oil platform—a frontline where gun-focused players wage daily, fierce battles over gunpowder. And having a stray shot ignite it all and end in an explosion is a staple of Bakumatsu's everyday scenery. When it gets really bad, it's explosion end → respawn → same end in a different spot, over and over, until you're shouting "Tamaya, Kagiya!" multiple times a day. Since it's technically a firework craftsman's gunpowder store, the explosions are at least colorful... Honestly, watching players get blown to bits is the fun part.

Sunraku: "Well, then."

I was actually planning to return to Fuuun Prejiden after having a little fun, but now that things have gone this far, I might as well go all out. The flame of my life might be snuffed out today or tomorrow, but rather than keep logging out like an unexploded bomb, I'll rage for a fleeting moment like fireworks—blazing bright and vanishing in a flash.

The moment I log in, just as I'm purging a Shinsengumi member trying to collect a "login-bonus divine punishment" on me, in accordance with troop discipline, I feel a piercing, resentful glare.

Sunraku: "Oh, hey there! The oh-so-vengeful Kyotimate-san, what's uuup!!"

Kyo the Ultimate: "..................!!"

The evil spirit that gave me a silent, thumbs-down... I wonder if there's a spirit medium around here...?

I searched and there actually was one. Kyotimate's form being blown away as if hit by the max output of an industrial fan—I honestly deeply regret not recording it. Kyo the Ultimate, a gag character who, even if tricked, strutted right into a duel between rankers and got launched skyward by multicolored explosions. Who turned into a vengeful ghost crying, "How could I not avenge this grudge?!" only to be exorcised at top speed. How did it come to this? Because it's Bakumatsu, that's why...

By the way, since the ghost avatar just respawns normally, she apparently got re-caught about five minutes later and latched right back on. The two rankers were hanging around with her too.

[Asked about this a lot, so here's an explanation of the Bakumatsu rankers, the sharks in a goldfish bowl:]

[1st: Raid Boss] [The strongest Bakumatsu player. A raid-monster-level player who understands every bug and specification and swings his sword solely for victory. A spacey, air-headed natural, but his slaughter switch flips on at random, so he attacks without warning. The sight of him smiling with wide-open pupils as he intercepts and annihilates a gang beatdown is straight-up horror.]

[2nd: Our Hero] [The second-strongest Bakumatsu player. When they tried to gang up on Raid Boss-san, without this guy, even a hundred-person force got wiped out. So before anyone knew it, he was getting propped up as a hero. That said, he's still a Bakumatsu player, so if you run into him, he'll almost definitely attack you.]

[3rd: The Only Sword] [A player who's placed a restriction on himself: "I will only use one sword until I die and respawn." On the flip side, he has absolutely zero other restrictions, so he'll do sneak attacks, and he'll just casually hurl that single sword at you. If it breaks, he'll punch with his bare hands. For someone supposedly restricted, he's pretty free.]

[4th: Thousand Needles] [A self-proclaimed "never lost a dart game" player who precisely pierces vitals by throwing massive amounts of needles. He's set up base in a dumpling shop, and if you let your guard down, skewers will come flying at both your eyes. But due to item limits, he only has 99 needles on hand. The remaining 901 are procured locally at the dumpling shop...!!]

[5th: Crimson Lotus Grenade] [A Bakumatsu Dynamite player who loads fireworks onto a hoe and hurls them like a catapult. Along with "Sword Rain," the root cause of Bakumatsu's weather forecast being completely insane. Incidentally, he also holds the title of "Most Frequent Explosion-End Experiencer" on the sly, but if you mention it, his personal weather forecast becomes "all-day fireworks." If you blow up his base gunpowder store, the forecast locks to fireworks for a week.]

[6th: That Guy (pointing upward)] [A player who, in an extremely rare pattern, has a title(?) that comes with the gesture of pointing upward. The reason is that he uses a bow—a rarity in Bakumatsu—climbs high spots, and snipes from above, which means he draws way more aggro than the others. That said, he's skilled at defending his sniping perch, so taking him down is hard. Though Crimson Lotus Grenade, who blows up the entire perch, is his natural enemy.]

[7th: Dullahan] [Basically Western already. His skill is ranker-worthy, but there's no single standout feature. However, his main trait is that "he pours his passion into divine-punishing NPCs." A specialist in raiding pawnshops. Dullahan, who wrecks pawnshops—which are, in a sense, an absolute safety zone for item storage—and scatters the deposited goods, has his popularity and aggro split fifty-fifty. The origin of his name? He fails the Shogun divine punishment and gets beheaded most of the time. Is your head detachable or what?]

[8th: Blizzard Hunter] [A player burning with the obsessive flame of obtaining a certain weapon held by a certain player. His appearance, with a topknot, leans comical, but the skill with which he schemed and divine-punished "Our Hero" and "Thousand Needles" has earned him some respect. His handling of the oversized katana boasts an orthodox strength among the more eccentric rankers. Subtly, history-nerd players are tilting their heads at him, going, "Jigen... Shinsengumi... hmm..."]

[9th: Mad Dog, Reverse Half-Naked] [A lump of fighting spirit who actively picks fights with the upper rankers. He's also a lump of pervert, with an upper body in full armor and helmet, a lower body in a loincloth, and a hammer for his equipment. Since he's a ranker, he's naturally strong against the lower ranks, but the upper ranks are even more monstrous, so he usually gets beaten up by someone like Raid Boss-san early in an event and can't farm points. In this event, after learning to "cherish life," the 8th place rolled right into his lap, so he's a little happy.]

[10th: Subject to Overthrow] [No matter the field, the 10th spot is fated to be mocked as "lol, 10th place? No big deal." So he carries the sorrow of being the first one targeted by players from 11th place down. That said, he intercepts all of them, so as a ranker, he's strong enough. But during an event, he's almost certainly hounded by lower ranks, leaving no time to aim for the top. Thus, he shows absolutely no mercy to those who come at him. He'll fillet you into three pieces.]