v1c0 (2/2)

“Pff. Queen of the Night!? What’s with you vampires? You’re like the embodiment of cringe.”

“I don’t want to hear that from a rotting second year in middle school. And are you trying to say zombies are at the top!? Pfa ha ha. Are you referring to the zombies that get one-shotted by anything with the ‘holy’ attribute? Or maybe those poor kids who are the only one that gets damaged by the healing magic? Ha ha ha ha.”

“Why you…!!”

“You got a problem with that!?”

The camisole + shorts and the see-through negligee got into a scuffle. I really didn’t know where to look. In fact, while I would stubbornly refuse to admit it if they asked, I was pretty sure I could see some things. No, I could pretty clearly see a number of things.

Wow. So that’s what a girl’s body is like there.

I wasn’t sure what to do and ended up nervously standing there and staring, but my sisters ignored me and gasped for breath as they argued at point-blank range.

“Oh, honestly! This isn’t going to get us anywhere!!”

“Agreed. Besides, our true value is in ama.s.sing p.a.w.ns, not individual fistfights. It’s all about the horror as we see who can acquire more people and fill up the city first! We could never settle this in a one-on-one fight!!”

“Then are we gonna do it!?”

“You said it first! Don’t blame me when you regret those words!!”

What were they planning?

Ayumi and Erika continued ignoring me as they made a simultaneous announcement.

“We’ll start a pandemic in Kukyou City! Who will conquer the city first, the zombies or the vampires!?”

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Wait.

Wait, wait, wait, wait!! Hold the phone!!

What did those monsters just say!?

“Y-you can’t do that!! What kind of idiot destroys an entire city over a fight between sisters!? And it won’t just be cute girls turning into vampires and zombies. Who wants some greasy old man zombie!? Are you sure you want to deal with that!?”

“That’s not what we meant.”

My negligee-wearing sister turned toward me and waved a hand my way.

“Satori-kun, you have that environment simulator you made, right? Can we borrow that?”

“That thing completely recreates Kukyou City in virtual reality, right? We can safely spread all the horror we want as we bite at the people realistically running around, right? Let us use that, Onii-chan.”

…

“I’d rather not!! That’s meant to simulate the damage done by earthquakes and tornados, determine where the congestion occurs as the panicked people try to flee, and figure out how to get everyone to safety. It isn’t meant for some cruel FPS like that!”

“Ohh?”

“Ohh?”

The air seemed to grow sticky.

Why did they both give me a sidelong glance in perfect unison when they were supposed to be fighting?

And Ayumi took the first shot with the ends of her twin tails curled around like dinner rolls.

“Are you trying to say alien invasions and wars between giant robots are serious scenarios?”

“Gh!?”

“That must mean secretly borrowing a detailed 3D model of the Cla.s.s Rep next door and having her do a seductive dance in a risqué swimsuit is the proper way to use it☆”

“G-ghaahhhh!!!???”

How do they know about that!?

Th-th-th-the s.e.xy Cla.s.s Rep Dance File Set’s folder was supposed to be stored where no one would ever find it!!

“Well, I’m sure any boy would want to see their serious and strict Forehead Gla.s.ses Cla.s.s Rep shaking her hips more than a reggae dancer.”

“But I’m betting that Cla.s.s Rep wouldn’t just almost kill him if she found out. Right, Onii-chan? We might end up with one of those ‘humans were the most frightening monster of all’ endings.”

Tremble, tremble, tremble, tremble, tremble, tremble, tremble, tremble, tremble!!

“So. If you lend us the key to the simulator, no one has to see that downer of an ending.”

“That thing’s meant to simulate natural disasters, right? Then it’s probably built to handle crazy parameters like this!! Zombie vs. vampire! Who will survive to the end!? Sounds like a fun theme, right, right, right!?”

There was nothing I could do.

I tearfully handed over the USB hardware key hanging from my neck.

That completed the preparations for the showdown of the century.

Ayumi and Erika both grabbed devices that looked like wireless headphones.

They were mind input devices. They were meant to let you experience a fictional disaster (or a Cla.s.s Rep’s swimsuit dance) by linking you to my environment simulator named Maxwell, but rather than provide alternative input for your senses, its data provided you with the dream you wanted.

Heading back to their rooms must have been too much work because they lay down in the opposing sofas.

“Okay, you be the judge, Onii-chan. Use your G.o.d’s-eye-view to monitor the data from outside.”

“Eh heh heh. Satori-kun, I’m willing to overlook a bit of mischief, but in the interest of cleanliness, try not to get my hair or clothes dirty.”

As soon as they put the headphone-style devices on and flipped the switch by the ear, the girls lost consciousness like they had been unplugged from the wall.

“Oh, honestly.”

Once the commotion ended, the roaring wind seemed to grow much louder.

There was nothing for me to do there, so I decided to do as my little sister said and judge their virtual fight using the monitor in my room. For a touch of revenge, I stopped by the fridge to borrow the treasured pudding they had been looking forward to and I walked down the hallway with a spoon in my mouth.

The stairs led up to the bedrooms on the second floor and down to the bas.e.m.e.nt.

But that bas.e.m.e.nt did not hold Disaster Environment Simulator Maxwell. It was the entrance to the tornado shelter that every house had in Kukyou City. The door was as round and thick as a bank vault door. It had excited me when I was little, but I had never actually had a chance to open it.

I climbed the stairs to my room.

I placed the pudding on the study desk, tapped at the computer in sleep mode, and then got a call on my smartphone.

However, it was not from a cla.s.smate or my childhood friend the Forehead Gla.s.ses Cla.s.s Rep.

“What is it, Maxwell?”

The simulator with its own SNS account displayed a message in a speech bubble.

“I have a concern related to a task labeled high priority.”

“Be more specific.”

The disaster environment simulator was made for realistic scenarios, so it may not have been able to handle a direct showdown between a zombie and a vampire. I could only guess that it had hung up when an error occurred somewhere.

But that was not the case.

Maxwell made another post.

“This is related to the Cla.s.s Rep Swimsuit Dance File Set which was set at maximum secrecy.”

“…”

“If she dies during a simulation, the data will automatically be sent to the related organizations in order to put together countermeasures toward her cause of death.”

“…c.r.a.p.”

“So if the Swimsuit Cla.s.s Rep falls victim to the current zombie and vampire simulation, the file set you have kept hidden may be exposed to the outside world. What should I do about that?”

“c.r.a.p, c.r.a.p, c.r.a.p, c.r.a.p, c.r.a.p, c.r.a.p!! Craaaaap!! Anything but thaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat!!”

I tore at my hair.

I wasn’t going to let some old men I’d never met learn about and mock me for my fetis.h.!.+ That was worse than being a fish on the chopping block!!

I quickly moved my fingers to my computer, which was a remote control terminal for the simulation.

But…

“Maxwell, explain to me why my cancel simulation commands are being rejected!!”

“Sure. Amatsu Erika and Amatsu Ayumi have both logged in with administrator privileges, so their privileges are equal to your own. I can also speculate that their extraordinary parameters as a vampire and zombie are applying pressure to the entire system, creating too much chaos for outside commands to be accepted.”

“Meaning?”

“You cannot forcibly cancel the simulation.”

“I can’t believe this!” I shouted while pulling a headphones-like mind input device from a drawer.

The virtual city would soon be overrun by zombies and vampires. If the Swimsuit Cla.s.s Rep fell victim to that, my social life was truly over. Not only would those old men with formal t.i.tles like “professor” be mocking me, but who knows what would happen to me if the Forehead Gla.s.ses Cla.s.s Rep herself learned about the Swimsuit Dance File Set. Iron fist…elbow…oh, and I was pretty sure she had earned 2nd Dan in kendo. I was truly hoping she wouldn’t actually use a wooden sword on me.

That left only one thing to do.

“Maxwell, you don’t have to think about taking back my privileges. Can you slip me into the running simulation as a normal user?”

“Sure. But as a normal user has fewer privileges than an administrator, you will be able to partic.i.p.ate, but you will be at a considerable disadvantage. For example, you cannot do anything related to ending the simulation, so you cannot end your partic.i.p.ation on your own. You will be forced to continue on until the ending the administrator has in mind.”

In this case, that would be a definitive conclusion in the zombie vs. vampire showdown.

Whichever one won, the virtual city would have sunk into an ocean of blood.

I could not take this lightly just because it was virtual reality.

It was exactly the same as the city we lived in every day. Just like with an earthquake or a tornado, I would have to watch until the very, very end as the city was destroyed by a zombie and vampire.

This was a disaster environment simulator.

The parameters were a little out of the ordinary, but it would still fulfill its proper purpose.

“I’m still doing this. It’s better than being killed by the Cla.s.s Rep in reality. Maxwell, prepare to log me in. I’ll head on in as soon as that’s done.”

“Sure. Rewriting certain privileges. Reregistering you as a normal user.”

My goal was clear.

As the zombie and vampire went on a rampage and created more rampaging monsters as secondary and tertiary damage, I had to do whatever it took to protect the Swimsuit Forehead Gla.s.ses Cla.s.s Rep until it was all over.

Now, allow me to repeat the fundamental question once more:

If a zombie and vampire went all out, which one would win?

Part 4[edit]

[Pick up] Today’s Blog, Report of Completion. [Net files]

Tah dah!

I’ve been writing about the production of Maxwell for a while now, but it’s finally complete!!

Even I was worried whether an individual could really make an environment simulator, but I’m glad I somehow pulled it off.

Maxwell’s core unit is made up of the VS-Life 3D handheld game systems that went on sale just the other day. Yes, the ones that were recalled after the initial lot started giving people electric shocks. Due to the retail network, the used shops couldn’t send them directly back to the manufacturer. Since they couldn’t sell them, I managed to buy up a bunch of them dirt cheap, opened them up, and parallelized the processors.

But securing the processing power wasn’t the biggest problem. That award goes to the cooling system and power supply (mainly the transformer part).

Maxwell’s main body fills up about a single storage container, but I needed another whole container for those two things.

And Kukyou City really is a unique place. While I had to put it together all on my own, a bunch of people helped me as I tried to build this disaster environment simulator. I doubt universities and research labs would normally just reveal the management flow for their parallel machines. We just think about disaster prevention and protection differently. Then again, I do have to supply the simulation results to the various research labs to repay them!

Maxwell is made by hooking together about 1400 of the processors from those new systems, but they’re all working pretty well. It’s going great. When I put in the parameters for a typhoon or wildfire, it shows me where the people gather and where the congestion is in the fictional city. Oh, and this simulator doesn’t need you to model the residents. It uses the small traces left in the buildings, equipment, resource consumption, and energy consumption to determine where people have to be and builds up the human data that way. What an age we live in.

My next task is figuring out how to put all this processing power to use.

Namely, I need an interface.

There are a few mind input devices on the market, so maybe linking to the simulation with those can let you see how the people flee during a realistic disaster. I have a feeling that would be good for preparedness training.

Part 5[edit]

[Pick up] Parameter Adjustment Handwritten Notes File [Net files]

Memo memo.

Vampire. ← Nee-chan. Cowt.i.ts.

Generally immortal. Bullets don’t work. Strength is 10-20 times normal.

Automatically regenerate any damage taken.

Take lethal damage from direct sunlight when outdoors. However, they can get along just fine indoors even during the day. No reports of taking damage from artificial sources such as UV lights.

Crus.h.i.+ng their head won’t kill them. A stake from ash wood or hawthorn kills them instantly when driven through the heart. Also, thorough damage to the heart by other means keeps them from moving. When in their coffin during the day, destroying the heart with something other than their weakness and then burning their entire body will kill them. Burning them without destroying the heart works too. (Do holy water or silver bullets work? Are they different than werewolves? Watch out for mixed legends. I should probably ask my sister.)

Can’t cross flowing water. Mainly means rivers. But what about plumbing and sewers? +Oh, yeah. My sister can’t swim at all, can she?

When visiting someone else’s house, can’t enter without the owner’s permission.

Don’t show up in mirrors. The human eye and cameras can see them just fine.

To turn someone into a vampire, they have to suck a lethal amount of human blood. (1-2 liters?)

Can only turn humans into vampires.

They suck blood to acquire occult energy. Not enough and they can’t maintain their body. They also eat just like a human does.

Turn to ash when they die.

They have individual skills (changing size, controlling the mist or wind, and transforming into a bat, a wolf, or a bug) and strength varies depending on the individual. This is kind of like genetic mutations, so a vampire apparently can’t intentionally make someone into the kind of vampire they want.

They have a defined social hierarchy based on the queen.

The queen’s orders are absolute, but they generally have high intelligence. The same or greater than humans.

Said to be based on a blood curse, so they’re more on the occult side of things. There doesn’t seem to be any scientific sense behind their weaknesses or the path to usurpation. ← I just inputted everything according to the legends.

Part 6[edit]

Zombie. Idiot. Flat chest. ← No, that isn’t a compliment.

Generally immortal. However, they can be damaged like normal by blades and bullets. It would be most accurate to say they continue moving even after being destroyed. Their strength ranges from 1-10 times what it was in their human form, but that drops as the rotting progresses.

Ayumi is covered in st.i.tches because of her special preservation treatment, but normal zombies don’t need that.

They ignore any damage they take. The damage can be healed by sewing it up.

Their potential is the same during the day and at night.

Crus.h.i.+ng their heart won’t kill them, but destroying the brain kills them instantly.

A small bite is all they need to infect a healthy human and create another zombie.

They attack people for food.

An individual’s strength is reliant on the original human’s build and muscles.

They have been confirmed to infect non-human animals like dogs or cats. (What about bugs, lizards, and fish? How far does it go? I should ask my sister.)

They have no hierarchy, so they won’t listen to anyone’s orders. ← As I said, they’re idiots.

Their intelligence deteriorates as the rotting progresses. ← They can preserve their intelligence by continually injecting themselves with preservatives like my sister does.

They come from the Acute Zombie Powder created by altering a virus found in the Caribbean using the drugs spoken of in the Haitian legends. So genre-wise, are they biological?

Not much to write for this one. ← There isn’t much to you zombies, is there?

<script>