Chapter 11 (1/2)

SECT.11 - Death Game

LLENN clearly saw how the HK45’s large muzzle shone.

And she clearly heard the 45 calibre bullet pa.s.sing by the side of her right ear.

If she hadn’t acted before she realised the situation——

And if she hadn’t fully demonstrated her agility and twisted her body——

The bullet would have hit her right eye, completely draining the hit points that she went through all the trouble of recovering, resulting in instant death.

M immediately swung his right arm, and continued aiming at LLENN’s head.

To LLENN, it seemed like the world had entered slow motion. She clearly saw the Bullet Lineclosing in on her face. To avoid that, she twisted her body to the left again.

Another discharge. The bullet once again grazed her head, and this time, it tore off her favouriteknit cap. If her movement had been just slightly slower, she would probably have been shot.

She did not understand his reasons at all, but she understood the situation.

She was being shot at by M. It seemed he wanted to kill her. And moreover, there was no use in trying to talk it over.

M, who was trying to fire the third bullet, showed a stern facial expression as always, and his emotions could not be read. However, there was no need to read them.

LLENN had but a single thought.

‘No way I’m going to be killed.’

LLENN’s left foot took hold of the pebbles, which became a foothold for generating repellent force. The 3rd Bullet Line approached her, and the moment it fixed at her right eye,

“Taa!”

LLENN jumped to the opposite side. Even if she kept escaping to the left like this, at some point she would undoubtedly be hit by a bullet.

In that case, there was only one course of action.

‘I’m going to turn the tables!’

To make this dangerous gamble and attack him herself using any mistake in timing—— LLENN’s agility won.

After LLENN energetically leaped forward and to the right, a Bullet Line that was 5 cm to the right of her body disappeared, and a bullet pa.s.sed through. It wasn’t even 1 cm away from the P90 that was hanging by its gun sling.

Having made a large side step, LLENN landed with her right leg. At that point, M wasn’t even 1metre away, while the HK45 was even closer, merely about 30 cm away. It was a distance she could easily cover if she extended her hand.

“Yah!”

LLENN raised her hand towards the HK45 to slap it with her right hand. To prevent his gun from being knocked away, M slipped his hand outwards——

LLENN’s small hand just brushed the HK45’s side and M’s large thumb, and continued swinging upwards.

Having protected his HK45, M once again aimed the muzzle at LLENN’s forehead while overlooking the small body before him,

“Ahaha.”

And after meeting eyes with LLENN who was laughing, he pulled the trigger without hesitation.

He could not pull it.

The HK45’s trigger refused to move. If the trigger did not move, the gun could not fire.

M’s eyes opened wide and saw. That the small lever near his right hand that controlled the safety of his beloved gun had been raised.

What LLENN’s small hands were aiming for wasn’t to knock his HK45 out of his hands——

It was only aimed at activating the safety.

The moment that M realised this, a pain ran through his right hand.

The P90 roared in full auto between the large and small bodies.

The shooting actually only lasted a moment, but a pleasant *barara* sound resounded, and 3 bullets were fired. The small bullets created s.h.i.+ning red hit effects on M’s right wrist, and even pa.s.sed through them entirely, disappearing into the sky.

“Gah!”

The HK45 with its safety on fell out of M’s relaxed right hand, and just as half of it sunk into the sand,

“Don’t move.”

The muzzle of the P90 that was thrust up with her right arm pressed into the nape of M’s neck.

“If you move even in the slightest, I’ll pull the trigger with all my strength! M-san!”

LLENN gave a shout that was probably the loudest in her life so far. The wrist.w.a.tch on her left arm quivered, but she could no longer worry about that.

She planned to completely squeeze the trigger to discharge all 47 remaining bullets in themagazine, showering M from the neck up if any part of his large build moved even 1 mm. M looked like he had high vitality, but he would probably die anyway.

“…………”

With a muzzle thrusted to the left of his laryngeal prominence, M looked down at her.

His stern face with his eyes and mouth open hardened, as if time had stopped.

“Listen up. Firstly——”

LLENN smiled sweetly,

“I really have to thank you for telling me the location of your safety, thinking that I might need to use it as some point. It was really useful!”

“…………”

“Moreover, I want to ask—— why?”

“…………”

“Why did you try to kill me? If you have a proper reason, I’ll hear you out.”

“…………”

“After all that effort to get here; we fought together, you even saved me, and thus we’re one of the last two teams standing, so why? I have no intention of saying that we absolutely have to win, but I can’t accept that you tried to kill me for unknown reasons. If you couldn’t continue with the match, then you could have just discussed with me first! Am I wrong?”

“…………”

“If you don’t want to answer, suit yourself. Then, I’ll fight on my own from this point on——”

While saying this, LLENN put more force into pressing the P90.

“Noooooooooooooooo! I don’t want to die! ——Pppp-please…… Ppp-please wait! Please…… I beg of you! Please don’t…… shoot…… Noo! Please stop!”

LLENN understood that this shout and feeble keigo were M’s words, but it still took some time for her to realise that.

While pulling her P90, LLENN immediately back stepped.

With her exceedingly agile jump, she instantly gained distance from M, as if she had warped, placed her P90 on her shoulder, and fixed her aim at M’s face with her sights.

She kept her finger on the trigger, so the Bullet Circle violently pulsated above M’s face, and repeatedly contracted.

M should certainly be seeing dazzling Bullet Lines. His field of vision was probably dyed deep red.

“P-pp……”

While giving a groan, M slowly dropped his knees. Cautiously watching over him, LLENN continued adjusting her aim to target his head.

His knees made a sound as they sunk into the pebbles, and then, his large build feebly knelt down. It wasn’t like she gave him such an order, but he a.s.sumed a seiza(1) pose. The still standing LLENN, and the sitting, but with barely any change in his height, M held their ground about 3 metres away from each other.

“Please…… don’t shoot……”

A feeble voice came from M. With his eyes cast down as he spoke, M’s face was covered by the wide brim of his bush hat, and disappeared from sight.

While aligning her circle with the bush hat head, LLENN said,

“Until I hear your reasons, I definitely won’t shoot. In other words, if you don’t tell me, I’ll shoot.”

“I’ll end up dying……”

“Well, yeah.”

“IBoku will die……”

‘Boku?’, LLENN had the chills at the sudden change in M’s first person p.r.o.noun.(2)

“Stop using keigo! You’re giving off a weird vibe!”

It seemed that the person that she thought of as a „relative oji-san“ until now suddenly turned into a „younger cousin, who was a primary school student“, which gave her an overly strong sense of discomfort preventing her from calming down.

It was as if the person inside had changed places with someone else. LLENN of course hadn’t done it before, but it was possible to borrow an AmuSphere and control someone else’s character.

“It can’t be—— the player hasn’t changed?”

Without stopping his use of keigo, M said feebly.

“No, I have not changed…… This is the real me…… And, if you…… right now, shoot, me……. I will die…… I will end up dying……”

‘What is this guy saying?’, a question mark flew in LLENN’s head,

“That means that your character dies, you know? But, you’ll only die in GGO, in SJ, you know? There’s no death penalty in this tournament, and there’re no weapon or equipment random dropseither——”

“That is not it!”

M immediately raised his head, and LLENN,

“Ugeh”

Ended up seeing something that she did not really want to see.

Tears pouring out from the eyes of the rough M. His avatar’s appearance was that of a machoguy, so the impact of this scene was quite something.

“„That’s not it“, you say, then…… what is it?”

“If, I, from this point on, die in SJ…… the RL me, will also truly die!!”

“………… Are you, right in the head?”

Shocked, LLENN remembered『Sword Art Online』, which truly became a death game.

If she remembered correctly, it used a device called the ≪NerveGear≫, and if a character died in-game, it was designed to unleash an electric pulse that would burn the player’s brain. It was like a murderous microwave oven had been placed on their heads, so she truly felt fear when she had heard the news.

Of course, the device they were using now, the AmuSphere, did not have such a function.

“This isn’t Sword Art Online, so such a thing won’t happen, right? Are you mistaking something, M-san?”

“…………”

“Besides, you fought normally moments ago, and you were even shot——”

Having said up to this point, LLENN realised. That only one reason for M’s sudden change came to mind.

“M-san…… I don’t mean to be nosy but, tell me. What was written in that letter?”

*Biku*, M trembled, and tears dripped out from his face. Even nasal mucus oozed out from his nose. ‘They didn’t have to go this far with reproducing it in a game’, LLENN thought.

“…………”

He did not say anything, instead, he slowly extended his right hand into his sleeve pocket, and took out the writing paper. With his head hanging in shame, he extended his right hand, and presented it to LLENN.

“You mean it’s fine for me to read it?”

*Kokun*, seeing M’s head nodding,

“Then, I’ll take it, but if you make any weird moves, I’ll shoot.”

As she said this, LLENN slowly approached him without letting go of her aim, extended her left arm, quickly took away the writing paper, nimbly back stepped once again, and took her distance.

“I’m going to read it, you know? Okay?”

“Yes……”

With just her left hand, LLENN opened the writing paper. It was upside down, so she tried to rotate it, and panicked as it seemed that she would drop it.

Continuing to aim with her P90 using her right arm, she brought the writing paper in front of her with her left hand,

“I’m reading it.”

And began reading the j.a.panese written on it.

There, written in great handwriting, as if it was an example of penmans.h.i.+p, the letter started off with the following.

『Yahou, M. In the middle of a hard fight, eh? I told you to read this after exactly 1 hour had pa.s.sed and you didn’t tear it, right? If you did, I’ll kill you, y’know? I’ll do it right away.』

Such unexpectedly unruly words were lined up. And, she now understood why M tried reading it at 15 o’clock.

The composition continued.

『You’re partic.i.p.ating in my place, so enjoy it to your heart’s content in my place! This is agame, just something that you play! If you die in a disappointing way within an hour, I’ll kill you. But, if you survive at least an hour with just the two of you, then you really are amazing. I’ll pat you on the head in praise.』

Well, if he died before reading it, then he really would have died.

And so, as for the last part,

『If you die after this point, I will kill you after all. Suicide is out of the question too. Survive no matter what it takes. If there’s no tension in battle, then you really can’t enjoy it! Now then, enjoy it to your heart’s content! Feel what life is! That’s all.』

Just in case, LLENN tried looking at the back, but really was all there was to it.

She skillfully folded it using only her left hand and, for the time being, inserted it in her waistbelt. Drawing her left hand back to her P90, she once again aimed firmly,

“Who wrote this? …I don’t even have to ask, do I…… It’s Pito-san, right?”

“Th-that is right……”

“Well, somehow, it does feel like something that person would write.”

Remembering Pitohui’s smiling face with a tattoo, LLENN let out her honest thoughts. And then,

“But you know, „die“ and „kill“ are about the game, aren’t they?”

Having made a completely sensible judgement, she told this to M.

In GGO——

Anyone would commonly use the words „shoot“, „kill“ and „died“, but they were all referring to the in-game events. No one would imagine that it meant „death of an RL person“.

Also, there were no idiots who got reality and the game confused and angrily exclaim, „Do you guys really know what it means to die?“ or something like that.

M lifted the face of his huge bear-like build. His face sopping wet from all the tears and nasal mucus.

And then, he laughed.

“Hahahaha! You don’t know a thing.”

At his exceedingly creepy smile,

“Wah——”

For a moment, LLENN was at a loss for words. The contraction Bullet Circle overlapping M’s face sped up.

“What don’t…… I know?”

“How screwed up Pitohui’s head is.”

“…………”

“When that woman says that she’ll kill, she means that she will really kill in RL. Killing in-game? Ahahahaha! There is no way she would be that soft! I know that she’s talking about killing in RL! And, that woman definitely knew that I would immediately realise this, that’s why she wrote this letter! She says to enjoy the game for an hour, but treats me so badly! She really does adore thedeath game! Even now, that woman has her heart set on that game! She’s crazy! Ahahahaha, that’s so like that woman. Ahahahahahaha!”

“…………”

LLENN felt a slight dizziness.

It’s great that RL Pitohui and M are acquaintances but then, just what is the relations.h.i.+p between them?

LLENN previously thought „I don’t need to know“——

But now, she changed it to „I don’t want to know“.

She previously thought „I want to know“ about Pitohui in RL as well——

But now she changed it to „I don’t want to know.“

Be that as it may, she had to continue her conversation with M.

“M-san…… In other words, this is what you want to say? That if you are killed in action in SJ from this point on, the RL you will be killed by the RL Pito-san?”

“That’s what I’ve been saying!”

It was a feeble shout.