Vol 3 Chapter 6 (2/2)

Just like her comrades in the preliminaries and the battle in the fields when they slaughtered the enemy team.

Her white teeth glittered on her muddy face.

At that moment, a hail of 5.7 mm bullets soared through her surroundings, raising a clutter of columns of mud unlike columns of water in the area──

*Bis.h.i.+*

And 1 of the bullets. .h.i.t her right temple.

”Huh?”

At the attack to her vitals, s.h.i.+rley's hit points instantly diminished.

Looking at the upper-right corner of her vision, s.h.i.+rley,

”Ah. I was shot. c.r.a.p. So there was an enemy nearby. I let my guard down, huh.”

Saying this cheerfully, she collapsed face-up.

Treated as instant death, her hit points turned zero──

And a 【Ｄｅａｄ】 marker lit up above the mud-covered woman's body.

Looking up at the sky with an awfully satisfied smile, s.h.i.+rley was killed in action in SJ2.

”Hah…… Hah……”

Having unleashed all 50 bullets in her magazine in full-auto at a target 200 metres ahead, LLENN,

”Alright!”

Saw a small red marker appear after about 3 seconds.

She had no idea who that was, but at any rate, she defeated them.

They were barely within the P90's effective range and not at a distance that LLENN could accurately hit with her skill, thus it was totally a lucky shot, a fluke at the end of her scatter of bullets.

”W-what happened?”

f.u.kaziroh's surprised voice reached her ears.

That was natural. Because, despite creating a smokescreen by firing the last of their smoke grenades, LLENN did not charge and instead suddenly unleashed a full-power barrage to the left. Her shots probably alerted their opponents of LLENN's whereabouts.

Crouching and reloading her magazine, LLENN answered f.u.kaziroh and Boss.

”There was another team's sniper right nearby! They were aiming at Pito-san's group! So, I fired at them first and somehow managed to bring them down!”

A reply came from f.u.kaziroh.

”What! Nice work! ──But, did the guy shoot anyone?”

”I-I don't know! The sounds blended together!”

LLENN answered honestly. She had been completely unable to tell whether or not the sniperwas able to fire even a single bullet during her full-power barrage.

If she had fired…… And if her target was Pitohui…… And if she hit……

The moment LLENN's face turned pale, the needles of her wrist.w.a.tch pa.s.sed 14:10:00.

It was the starting time for the scan, but neither Boss's group nor LLENN's group had any time to take out their terminals and look at the scan results.

This applied to M's group as well.

Having landed a hit on Tanya and now looking for his next target, M,

”Rear! Smoke grenades! New enemy!”

Received a report from the short shotgun user.

He had not been told the colour, thus M temporarily stopped aiming with his beloved gun and turned around while lowering his stance a bit.

And saw pink smoke that would have normally been impossible.

M understood just about everything in an instant.

The reason why s.h.i.+NC had been pus.h.i.+ng their way through this was because they were cooperating with LLENN, trying to whittle down their forces and serve as a distraction. Though he did not know when and where they had held a conversation.

And that pink smoke was meant to conceal LLENN's a.s.sault.

Shooting LLENN, who was short and could move at high speed, was quite difficult even if she could be seen, but if she were hidden in smoke of a similar colour it would be a pain in the a.s.s.

'I see, that is a nice plan. LLENN is probably charging in through that smoke at the time of the scan.'

”LLENN's coming! Guard the rear!”

Rousing caution from his comrades, M looked at Pitohui, about 10 metres ahead of him to the right.

”Aha! That's LLENN-chan!”

Pitohui, too, arrived at the same conclusion as M and raised her head slightly as she said this in joy──

3 seconds later.

As red hit effect spread gaudily, she fell prostrate onto the gra.s.s.

”That woman was shot!”

One of the cameras showed the woman as a bright red effect light spouted from her right eye,

”Ooi!”

”Uwah! You serious!”

”Hyaa!”

And the bar instantly heated up.

The strongestsaikyou and craziestsaikyou female player, who half of the spectators thought would undoubtedly win, had actually been sniped. And in the face no less.

”From where? Who?”

As if answering someone's question, one of the screens changed to a woman covered entirely in mud and sitting with her R93 Tactical 2 at the ready,

”So it was her! Well done!”

And the next moment, it showed how she was a.s.sailed by a storm of bullets and died.

”Aww!”

”She got done in!”

The screen hectically changed to display LLENN, who had fired her P90 until it was dry.

”LLENN-chan! Nice!”

The time was 14:10.

The scan had begun, thus one of the screens changed to the map, but no one was looking at it.

”Pito!”

Screaming, M rushed over to Pitohui, grasped her upside-down body, turned her over, and embraced her to have his large figure be a s.h.i.+eld from the sniper.

There was a bright red hit effect on her right eye and, instead of blood, polygon fragments flickered,

”Haha, ahahahaaha ahahahahaahahahaha!”

Her left eye opened up as if bursting, tears flowing like a waterfall from it, she smirked,

”Ahahahahahahahahahaa!”

And unleashed a grand laugh.

M took out a first-aid kit from his pouch and applied it to Pitohui's nape. Then, he gazed at the top-left corner of his vision, at his team's hit point bar.

”…………”

Pitohui's was decreasing speedily and went past yellow──

”Ahahahaha! So this is itttttt! This is my 〝death〟, huuuuuuh!”

Then turned red──

”I'm dying! I'm finally dying! Ahahahahahahaahahahahahaha!”

And with that shout──

It stopped.

Her remaining hit points were so measly that they could not even be seen on the bar.

”Haah……”

Embracing Pitohui, M gave a loud sigh.

At that moment, his rough face was flooded with tears, just like in SJ.

”Hyahaaaaah! What are you crying for, Gous.h.i.+-kun!”

The woman without her right eye slithered out of his embrace like a serpent and turned towards him.

”I haven't died yet! Uhihihihihi! I haven't died yeeet!”

Lying face-up on the gra.s.s, Pitohui continued shouting.

”This is fuuuuun! Right! It's fuuuuuun!”

Wriggling with her slender body like a dying cicada,

”Ahahahahahahaha! Uaahahahahahaha!”

She continued shouting very joyfully.

”Director! Let's end this already! You should have realised already! That you really are scared of death! So, let's end this already!”

At M's words, shouted in-between tears,

”What are you blabbering about, Gous.h.i.+-kun. Are you really telling me to stop something so scary and fun?”

Pitohui answered with these words and immediately threw a punch with her right hand.

”Gehoh!”

M's face, supported by his firm neck, was easily turned.

”I sure as heck can still go on, and on, and on, and on, and on──”

Pitohui's shouting abruptly ended and the upper half of her body collapsed backwards.

A 【Ｄｅａｄ】 marker──

Did not appear.

The UTS-15 shotgun-wielding short man, who was closest to Pitohui,

”…………”

Watched over the unfolding events since she had been shot, unaware of the proper way to react.

Pitohui was shot in the right eye; since it was from long-range, it had to have been by a rifle; however, she avoided instant death by a hair's breadth.

In the end, GGO was just a game, thus a very simple calculation between the 〝character's numbers〟 and the 〝attack's numbers〟 was performed when she was shot.

If one had trained as much as Pitohui and the bullet went from the right eye to the right side of the brain, it would not be strange for this to happen.

As a matter of fact, Pitohui's luck in battle was highly admirable.

The man also observed their dialogue afterwards.

And he was slightly envious of Pitohui and M being so excited about 〝life and death〟 in the game.

No matter how realistic the sensations were, a virtual world was still virtual. Even though one could die, it did not mean that they would actually die.

Meanwhile, they were so pumped up that they even shed tears of excitement.

Both of them were probably too addicted to the world, but they truly looked happy.

He felt that real names kinda came up during their dance of joy, but kindly ignoring that bit was a part of being an excellent gamer. An ignoring skill was important.

Finally, the man──

Thought of a single question.

Pitohui became so excited that she had even fainted.

And yet, why did the AmuSphere not shut down?

They had seen VR game newbies who had, overwhelmed by the fear of exceedingly realisticbattles, mistakenly believed 〝I'm actually going to be killed!〟 and panicked.

Having their bodies cut, shot, burnt, or blown away── despite all these being virtualexperiences and not hurting like IRL, the FullDive experience was still really scary.

However, they did not need to feel so scared.

That was because one would be forced out of the VR game world before their fear reached its peak.

An abnormal state of mind usually caused abnormalities in the body. A remarkable increase in heart and breathing rate, sudden perspiration, violent fluctuations of blood pressure, et cetera, et cetera.

Sensing these, the AmuSphere would trigger the kind, kind safeties and forcibly pull the panicking person from the 〝dream world〟 back into reality.

Awakening suddenly after having a nightmare,

”Oh, it was a dream…… Ah, thank goodness……”

Followed by this; that is what it would feel like.

So, based on Pitohui and M's strange excitement just now, it would not have been strange for the AmuSphere to enter its meddling mode.

'Don't tell me… could they have……'

The sole possibility came to the man's mind, but──

'No no. Whatever the circ.u.mstances may be, they couldn't have used that, no, they couldn't have gone 〝that far〟.'

The possibility was so awfully low that it was even unthinkable.

That Pitohui could be using the first generation home-use VR machine that was able to arbitrarily cancel the bodily perception safety 《health monitor》, that is, the NerveGear.

Having easily denied this possibility, the man looked at the upper-left corner of his vision, where he saw that the fainted Pitohui's hit points were increasing awfully slowly, at the speed of a slug's movement.

What he should be worrying about now──

Was that Pitohui, who, along with M, could be called the team's main force, had suffered a lot of damage and that considerable time would be needed for her to heal.

The tall man who had not let his guard down the entire time continued peeking through his binoculars while kneeling,

”The sniper is north-northwest, approximately 500 metres. It was that woman from the hunterteam who survived. She's dead now. The odds are high that there is another team nearby who killed her. Probably in the back of the pink smoke.”

And reported without concern.

Immediately, M, the leader who was no longer crying,

”That's LLENN. She planned to take advantage of the smoke to break through, but she noticed a sniper before that and shot her. The other one from LF is using a powerful grenade launcher, capable of rapidly firing 6 grenades, as her weapon. Don't let your guard down.”

Sent precise instructions.

Next, suppressed shots from the MG3 machine gun resounded, and the shooter who fired 20 rounds in full-auto,

”Still fine here! The amazons are currently all lying on the ground!”

Reported with full confidence. And then,

”Though! I can't say if I'll hold out if they all come at once, resolved for a suicide attack!”

Complained faint-heartedly.

M made a prompt decision,

”Pull back.”

And sent an order to the three men.

”I'm carrying Pito. Abandon the Barrett. In its stead, I'm leaving the M14 and Savage in your care.”

The tall man who had put the M107A1 into storage and was now carrying it replied with a short 'Roger'.

”Our retreat point is the log house. We're confining ourselves in a high place till Pito recovers. Everyone, we'll be running at full speed. Prepare!”

At the bar,

”Did that woman…… die……?”

”But the 【Ｄｅａｄ】 marker didn't appear……”

Pitohui, who had collapsed backwards and was no longer moving, had become the central topic.

Before the woman collapsed, she seemed to have shouted something joyfully, but luckily or unluckily, the cameras did not pick up voices unless they went in awfully close.

If her emotions got the better of her and forced a shutdown, according to the SJ-original rules, the avatar should have disappeared, but that did not seem to have been the case.

'Then, what happened?'

In the end, with no one understanding this, M's group began to move.

The tall man crawled through the gra.s.s and got his hands on M's M14 EBR and the Savage 110BA beside the fat sniper's corpse. He then began manipulating his left arm to immediately put them into storage.

In the case of the Savage, its owner had died, but it seemed it could still be used by the team. He also fished out the spare magazines from the corpse's pouch.

As for M, he crawled nimbly and picked up the two sheets that had not been shot from his now-broken s.h.i.+eld.

”Oh! What's he planning to do?”

M answered a spectator's question with his actions.

M lifted the collapsed Pitohui, with all her equipment, in a so-called 〝princess carry〟 and placed the two sheets onto her stomach for defence.

”I get it…… He's taking great care of that woman……”

”Well, she is the team's attacker.”

”No, to me, it looks like 〝love〟. Those two are in love!”

”〝Love〟, huh…… Where do I need to go to buy mine, I wonder?”

”Yeah. Don't ask me.”

The large machine gunner stood up after loading a new ammunition box and propping his MG3 against his shoulder. He then began his suppressing fire, several bullets at a time, towards the lurking amazons.

Using it as a signal, M's group began running.

Anyone watching that realised what they were doing. They were retreating from that place.

”So they really are running away……”

”Well, it's understandable.”

Everyone in the bar understood that that was the best option.

And then,

”PM4 has one casualty and one heavily injured, huh…… Now it's no longer possible to tell which team is gonna win……”

Looking through her lens at the fleeing M and his group was Tohma.

While the Bullet Lines fired by the MG3 machine gun still scattered about the area──

As if to say 〝because of the Lines, I can just dodge〟, she had boldly stood up and was peeking through large binoculars with her eyes set on a high place.

”M's group has begun moving to the log house. Current distance - 900. From here to the log house - 1100.”

Tohma reported to Boss. Boss repeated the same thing to impart it to LLENN. And LLENN to f.u.kaziroh.

”M is carrying a woman. There's a hit effect on her face. Shot by a sniper. I can't see the marker, so she hasn't died, but she's not moving.

This was pa.s.sed down to LLENN through the telephone game,

”Ugyaaaaa! That really was Pito-saaaaaan! She was shooooot!”

”Calm down. She's not dead. Probably, she was shot and her hit points are nearly gone. Though I don't know why she's being carried.”

Boss said in a calm tone.

And then, she asked LLENN a question.

”What do we do? Are we pursuing them right away? Of course, we probably won't be able to catch them before they hole up in the log house, but we can commence a pincer attack before M's guys set up camp and prep for defence. If LLENN could get inside, she could probably a.s.sault them before Pitohui's hit points recover.”

”…………”

Squatting with her P90 in hand, LLENN was unable to answer right away.

In the gra.s.slands, the smoke had mostly cleared away. In the end, the 6 grenades they saved for their special move went to waste meaninglessly.

She had a good understanding of what Boss was trying to say.

Right now, M's group was retreating. If her team surrounded the log house right now and she broke into the building to fight while Boss's group provided a diversion, the plan would be the same as before.

However, currently, Pitohui should have just suffered considerable damage. It would take at least 6 minutes, or even more, for her hit points to fully recover.

If she attacked her before she recovered──

”If I deal the finis.h.i.+ng blow after she has suffered great damage, would that count as me bringing down Pito-san……?”

LLENN's mutter,

”I dunno about that.” ”I don't know.”

Prompted f.u.kaziroh's and Boss's answers, which reached her right and left ears simultaneously.

And then,

”The one to decide that.” ”The one to decide that.”

This time, their voices were completely in-sync.

”Is you, LLENN.”

LLENN closed her eyes for a bit.

Feeling the weight of P-chan in her right hand, she contemplated for 4 seconds──

Then suddenly raised her head.

In her eyes,

”We're going in for a pincer attack right now! We're ma.s.sacring all of PM4! Pito-san alone will be mine to bring down! Damage? It's the fault of the one who let her guard down during a tournament! This is GGO! We're bringing down Pito-san no matter what! That is the reason I am here right now!

An intent to kill s.h.i.+ned through.

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