Assassins from the Past (2)

In a 6v6 battle, you fought two 3v3 battles, apparently.

This was my first time fighting in this format.

The members were split into First Party and Second Party.

There was apparently also a way to write it as "1st Party" / "2nd Party," but until I got used to it, I'd go with First and Second.

First, the First Parties fought each other.

The losing side was, of course, forcibly switched to their Second Party.

The winning side could choose whether to keep fighting with their First Party or swap to their Second Party.

And whichever side beat the opponent's Second Party first won.

If your First Party crushed them but you got cocky and swapped, and then your Second Party lost, you lost the match even though your First Party was still healthy. You couldn't bring the First Party back out. That was the rule.

So whether or not to swap was something you had to think over carefully.

Nezu's First Party. Their values were quite high… but not as high as Yuria and the others.

"All right, here we go. Maika, Setsuna, Lyuka!"

"Nhooooh… Setsuna-chan! You've come to be mine, have you…! Ohhhh, Maika Yukishiro! One of the Seven Greatest Beauties, on par with Kanan-sama! Whoooaaa! She's coming to be mine too…! And the loli! Nhyiiiieee!"

Nezu's tension only ratcheted up at the sight of the three of them.

Those three deployed: Maika as the Attacker, with two Supporters. Lyuka could pull defense too if needed, just in case.

But basically the plan was to stack buffs on Maika and aim for attacks while dodging with Shadow Step.

"… Okay, Setsuna, Symphony of Brilliance on Maika. Lyuka, Light's Blessing on Maika. Maika, Dance of Frost."

Sharala～, the splendid dance began.

Setsuna accompanied it with her playing, and Lyuka turned a spotlight on her.

… It was just like a beautiful stage performance.

"… Kikiki… someone like Naoto, with t-this many women in his hands… no, I'll be the one to take them all!"

"Quina, Light Star! Yuvi, Holy Sword Release! Silka, Guard Aura!"

Nezu was steadily putting up buffs too.

From the movements just now, I'd grasped their general speed. All three were slower than Maika and faster than Lyuka, in the speed-40s range.

This next one was gonna come.

"Setsuna, Phantom Waltz. Lyuka, Light Protes. Maika, Accel Mirage on Quina."

"Yuvi! Holy Sword Slash! Quina! Light Boost! Silka, Guard!"

Setsuna's tune shifted. Maika's kick was drawn to Silka, no damage.

I had a guaranteed-hit, so I really could have made it land, but I'd deliberately not burned it. Dance of Frost would activate next turn, too.

"Haaah!"

Yuvi's sword looked quite attack-buffed. For now I deflected it with Lyuka's Light Protes. The other side was aiming for Lyuka, too.

You never know what a mage might do, after all.

Next turn. Dance of Frost activated. Setsuna had Incapacitation Resistance. Lyuka had high magic and magic defense, so the chance of her freezing was on the lower side, just a probability play.

Plus, Setsuna and Maika clung close together to keep her warm, lowering the probability further. With everything stacked, the freeze rate worked out to about 1/5.

… Safe again this time.

"Gh…"

"Ah…"

Quina and Silka, frozen. That was lucky.

"Cheee! Yuvi, Holy Sword Defense!"

"Maika, Accel Mirage on Quina. Lyuka, Holy Light. Setsuna, March of Exhilaration."

He immediately switched to defense. Well, that was totally normal, but up until now in this world, the D-Class-and-below Masters I'd faced had been low-level enough that they couldn't switch their heads when a sudden freeze hit and just kept trying to do what they'd planned.

Nezu had a normal level of skill.

"Holy Sword Defense!"

Yuvi held her sword up like a shield and stood in front of Maika.

It seemed it wasn't an absolute defense; rather, it was a technique where she stopped the opponent's physical attacks with the greatsword in her hand.

… In that case, it might not have been impossible to slip past with speed and skill.

Hira, Maika threw a quick feint to the right with elegant footwork, then suri, slipped through from the left.

A beauty so striking it could leave you transfixed.

If it had looked impossible, I could have burned a guaranteed-hit, but I'd figured she could pull through here.

"Wha!?"

By the time Yuvi noticed, Maika had already closed in on the frozen Quina.

A perfect stride, a perfect twist of the hips. A perfect upper kick.

Quina, frozen, could neither dodge nor guard, and took it square on.

Bang!

All right, critical. Quina's HP halved in one go. Symphony of Brilliance, Light's Blessing, March of Exhilaration: 2.1x attack power.

Add a 2x crit on top, and damage like this was only natural.

On top of that, Symphony of Brilliance plus two Accel Mirages was 2.1x speed. A re-action activated.

"Ha!"

Maika fired off a kick from the opposite leg this time. Another splendid kick. Crits in a row! Against an opponent who couldn't move, my hit rate got extremely high.

Quina was downed in one go.

"Good, Maika, nice! Lyuka and Setsuna's buffs too, of course."

When I praised them, the three of them flashed me radiant smiles.

"Holy Light!"

Lyuka's magic. It properly caught Yuvi and Silka, dealing about 1/5 of their HP each. Which meant their HP was around 120. Pretty high. Less than 100 left.

The 2x action would activate soon, too. Should I switch to Icicle Zapper?

"Setsuna, March of Exhilaration. Lyuka, Holy Light. Maika, guaranteed-hit Icicle Zapper on Yuvi."

"Silka, Guard! Yuvi! Holy Sword Slash!"

Maika had first strike active, but she waited to move until after Setsuna acted.

Shaaan… shanshan…

A massive ice block manifested.

"Icicle Zapper!"

Doshuuu! And then the ice block went hurtling out at terrifying speed.

It would normally have been pulled toward Silka's Guard, but with the guaranteed-hit active, the pull effect was nullified.

"Eh…"

Dogooooo!

The ice block slammed straight into Yuvi. Damage was… yes, more than half her remaining HP gone.

"Icicle Zapper!"

Yuvi's speed got the 2x bonus too, so two attacks. And it only consumed one skill count, which was way too convenient. Naturally, this one was guaranteed-hit too.

… The brutality of speed.

"Wha… kyaaaah!"

Dogooooo!

A magnificent one-shot kill. Yuvi went down.

"Holy Light."

Even if Endure activated I could still finish her off, but instead I chipped Silka's HP further.

… Yeah, picking off everyone but the Defender. An ideal development.

If Silka tried to keep fighting alone, I'd be able to chip her down with Accel Mirage and keep stacking March of Exhilaration over and over, building up a mountain of buffs.

"Accel Mirage, March of Exhilaration. Lyuka, hold. Maika, attack at half-strength."

"Yes."

"… Kiiiii! You useless bastards! I'll sell every single one of you, you piece of shit!"

He was gonna end up selling them off anyway, so what was the point of getting indignant?

"Member change!"

So he was swapping after all.

Member change… apparently, the party swap happened after our attacks had already landed.

It seemed the newly swapped-in party didn't take damage immediately on the turn it appeared.

But the speed and attack UPs did activate normally.

Since we were going to swap anyway, Maika went ahead and landed her serious kick on Silka without holding back. Because she switched from holding back to going for it, no critical landed.

The damage was about 1/4 of Silka's remaining HP. Her defense was apparently quite high.

A re-action for one more shot. This put us at 60% UP speed and 3.3x. The 3-action threshold was getting close.

End of turn. Members swapped.

"For us…"

"… for Masayuki-sama…"

"… we'll win."

The three of them appeared with hollow eyes.

… Now, these weren't on the same level as my opponents up till now. Different level. Different rarity. From here on, I had to focus too!

… That said, fighting a tough opponent while I had plenty of buffs stacked was rather a blessing.

I wasn't switching to my Second Party. We were winning this in one go!

"Ki… kikiki kikikikii! Just getting these three out is impressive enough…! But this is the end! Coooome! You who's brought me miracle after miracle…! Show me a miracle one more time, Riko! Goddess Descent! Kazumi, Spinning Block. Mari, Magic Bullet!"

"Setsuna, Phantom Waltz. Maika, Accel Mirage on… Mari. Lyuka, Holy Light."

I hesitated a bit, but Riko was clearly the suspicious one… There was no way I'd take her down in one turn no matter what I did this turn, and that skill looked like it was about to activate, so I'd whittle the others down.

Maika charged in to the sound of Setsuna's violin.

"… You shall not pass."

But Kazumi cut in front of her with splendid movement.

"Spinning Block!"

Bang!

She splendidly received Maika's kick… And not just that.

Bang!

"Gufuh…"

The next instant, a sharp counter slammed into Maika. Her HP halved in one go.

… S-strong! A super-massive damage counter to my attack!? That was absurd.

But absurd as it was, Iijima-san was pulling it off.

"Gh… Naoto-kun! I'll strip!"

The uniform Maika was wearing wasn't the original one; Noda had thrown that out, so this was one we'd made in this world.

Its feature: pull and it came off easily.

"… Kikiki! Yukishiro! Eroticccc!"

Tch, I really didn't want to show Maika's erotic figure to a guy like this.

… Well, no helping it. It was out of respect for Iijima-san.

The system-side merits of going Spirit Garb were limited to a low-probability Endure.

But this getup was her serious-mode battle dress.

… The spirit was different.

Maika threw the uniform she'd just stripped off over Iijima-san.

"!?"

In the moment Iijima-san couldn't move, her vision stolen, dogo!

Maika's kick slammed into Iijima-san.

"… Nicely done!"

I shouted without meaning to. Amazing, that honor-student Maika, doing something a streetfighter would have thought up…!

"I remember everything you taught me, Naoto-kun!"

… Hm? Had I taught her that? No, I think I had said "use anything in reach you can use." Or something like that.

To extrapolate that into something like that, just like an honor student. She'd gone way beyond what I'd taught her.

"… Tch!"

Biribiri!

Cut off from system protection because she'd taken it off, Maika's uniform got torn to shreds.

I couldn't pull the same trick a second time… but with this, both sides were below half HP. It came down to whether we could land the next blow.

I wasn't at 3-action yet. But it was at 390% UP, so soon.

… At that moment

"Magic Bullet."

… A low voice. A chill like something gouging into my organs ran up my spine. I looked, and Yoshioka-san was leveling a gun at Maika…!

"Lyuka!"

In that instant, I shouted reflexively.

Du!

It was probably not a gunpowder weapon, but a magic-style cartridge. There was a brief lag before activation. With a real gun, I wouldn't have made it… Well, a real gun probably wouldn't have put out damage on this scale.

It moved so fast I could only see the trajectory, but the destructive force packed into that bullet was probably… transcendental enough to take Maika down in one shot with plenty to spare.

Pariin!

But the bullet was stopped by shattering the Light Shield Lyuka had erected.

"… haa, haa, haa…"

"…!"

"haa, haa…"

In that one instant of attack and defense, my, Lyuka's, and Maika's spines froze.

Magic Bullet… probably an absolute single-target damage guaranteed-hit. I'd been spooked when I'd heard there were attacks that dealt 100 points in a single strike, but… here it was.

With Maika's HP halved, even calculating in defense buffs, she would have been down in one hit.

We were saved by Lyuka's reaction.

Iijima-san and Yoshioka-san, both strong…! And there was still one more in reserve… Now, the problem child, Harada-san.

"… I am the goddess… in answer to my prayer… descend, Goddess Descent…"

Harada-san spun in circles as she said that, performing a kind of dance, and then…

just like that, collapsed.

"… Eh?"

"Kikikikiki! I'll tell you…! Riko's Goddess Descent…! It's a technique that summons, in exchange for her life, the power of the strongest Garumon in this world: a goddess! The goddess is goddamn strong! Now, come, come, come!"

… The power of the strongest Garumon…!?

A technique like that. Really…? Could we, as we were now, even hold up against the strongest Garumon?

Boooooo! Flames blazed up!

"Uoooooo! Here she comes here she comes here she comes super-mega jackpotttt! Strongest, strongest, strongest! The world's strongest goddess, Mercheada, descends!"

Dogoooooo!

"…!?"

A terrifying aura, divine pressure! An oppressive aura! … Not something a mere C-Class should have been looking at, an absolute mass of power descended right there.

Sarasarasara…

The figure was a faintly translucent, shadowy form, but… I could tell that this Mercheada was the kind of presence truly deserving the title of goddess, divine and absolute…

And just as clearly, that she was an unbelievably beautiful presence.

Lush, beautiful golden curls, emerald eyes, and breasts ample as a symbol of motherhood. Like a portrait of a goddess from Earth, but made vastly more erotic and alluring.

Even as a misty, shadowy figure, this beautiful… what kind of holy beauty must the real one have had?

… In an absolutely-cannot-lose battle like this, this was the last thing I should have wanted to face, but her beauty was something I'd happily have laid eyes on, gritting my teeth.

Goddess Mercheada Phantom LV60

That was what was displayed on the system.

… The world's strongest Garumon, huh? Just how well could we hold up…

LV60, what the hell. Wasn't the level cap 50/50? She exceeded it by a full 10.

But 60 was a weirdly half-baked number. If you were going over, you might as well jump straight to 100.

… Didn't this mean she wasn't at her true power yet?

Lots of suspicious things, but in any case, the enemy took a leap in power. That much was clear.

… Battle resumed. Whatever happened, what we had to do didn't change. Just take her down.

"Setsuna, March of Exhilaration. Lyuka, Holy Light. Maika…"

I hesitated for a moment. With magical Icicle Zapper, that Spinning Block wouldn't work, would it?

In that case I'd be able to take her down easily.

… No, on the flip side, magic might have gotten reflected back. If that had happened…

"… Naoto-kun."

"… Accel Mirage!"

Damn it, magic carried higher risk now. Just check the system? It only displayed attack-type skills…

So I judged Accel Mirage, which had at least landed an attack already, to carry less risk.

"Kikiki… I won, won, won! I won my bet! Kazumi, Spinning Block. Mari, Magic Bullet! Kikikikiii! Kanan-sama is mine! Maika Yukishiro, Setsuna Akai too! And Lyukaaaaa…! Ukikikikii, the harem of these greatest beautiesssss…! The other world is the bestttt! Kikikikiii!"

Nezu was already convinced he'd won. Whatever, we were taking it one step at a time.

"… Maika, this time, properly. You can land it."

"… Yes."

Maika, with a dance-like step, stood right in front of Iijima-san…

Shu! First, a left jab, an eye poke.

"!"

Iijima-san's Spinning Block activated, aimed at the jab. In that instant, Maika brought her right leg low.

"Gh."

Hit. Half her remaining HP whittled down further…! But this rate of reduction was… not enough.

Stacking March of Exhilaration over and over made for an impressive buff state, but Iijima-san properly raised her foot to receive it, and damage was halved.

Re-attack, left foot to mid-section!

"Don't underestimate me!"

Stopped by Iijima-san's block. Damn it!

"Counter!"

A blazing counter.

Bishi!

… But Maika, in turn, took the counter on her own block, just like Iijima-san had. The damage reduction rate was lower than before.

If we could keep this up… we'd survive! Knowing the counter was coming, she was adapting properly.

Re-action activated here.

Maika leaped up, rotated, and brought her leg down from above like a whip… Axe kick!

"…!"

With her counter halted and now caught off guard, Iijima-san couldn't respond properly. She still desperately twisted her body, but Maika's kick landed on Iijima-san…!

Zugaaan!

Splendid! With her speed jacked up 4x, that was the effect. She broke through Iijima-san's high-grade defensive skills and powerful counters and brought her down magnificently.

"… Amazing, Yukishiro-san… if you'd joined the karate club… maybe this time we really would have made it to the Inter-High…"

Dosa, Iijima-san collapsed.

"… I'm sorry. The karate club is just a bit…"

Maika apologetically declined.

"… Keh! Useless. Whatever, doesn't matter, keh…"

Nezu spat… What a truly disgusting guy. Iijima-san was so strong, hung on right to the limit…

But the next problem was bearing down. This one Maika couldn't dodge. To protect Maika, who had given it her all, Lyuka and I had to step up.

While Maika and Iijima-san had been clashing in their dazzling exchange, I'd been keeping Yoshioka-san at the edge of my vision.

She had been waiting for the moment of decision between them, ready to fire.

… A perfectly silent, prelude-free stance. The match would be settled in an instant. Too early and she'd respond. Too late and I wouldn't make it. With perfect timing I had to direct Lyuka to put up the shield.

And then… at the moment Maika's kick landed,

"Lyuka!"

"Magic Bullet."

"Light Shield!"

Bang!

… Blocked! … No way, by any reckoning that wasn't an attack you could block twice in a row.

Out of 10 attempts… I'd say I could pull off about 4. To get 2 out of 2… that was 16%. We'd successfully defended at that low a probability.

Light Shield, with its discretionary activation, might have been the strongest defensive skill out there. I sometimes found myself thinking that.

But that was only if I could give the timing perfectly.

I mustn't forget that whether it lived or died depended entirely on me.

Well, another perk: a skill that was normally usable only once per turn could be used at any time during the turn…

"Holy Light!" The proper turn action remained separately available.

Lyuka's magic recovered Maika's HP by 10. And dealt about 1/3 damage to Yoshioka-san.

And to Goddess Mercheada… about 1/10 damage.

Gh… so since she had actual HP, she wasn't just an unrelated event boss. We did have to take her down.

And then… the goddess moved. Radiating divine light, quietly… and a divinely solemn voice resounded inside my head.

"… Tempest."

It was like a church bell tolling, like a sacred phrase…

But what came out was hellfire-like infernal flames. Whirling firestorms filled the ground.

"Lyuka! Protect Maika!"

"Light Shield!"

Once again, Lyuka's skill to protect Maika… Aah, if only I'd kept Light Protes!

Setsuna and Lyuka, get close to Maika and try to minimize the damage as much as possible.

It was an all-target attack. Without defense buffs, how far could we hold…!

Dogoooooooo!

A roaring storm of flame. Such a… such a terrifying attack, I'd never seen anything like it in this world.

So Garumon were capable of attacks at this level. Not as much as a nuclear weapon, I'd think… but probably approaching it? That was the impression.

"… Aaaah… s-sorry…!"

"Lyuka!"

She'd tried to hide in the shadow of Maika's shield, but with her small body, three people couldn't fit behind a one-person shield.

Caught up in the flames' area…

That alone, and Lyuka had her HP wiped out as if blown to bits.

Setsuna's HP was rapidly being shaved down too.

Strong… too strong! But…

Just barely, just 2 points of HP remained…104 damage!

This much in a single hit!? Absurd. It was massive damage of an entirely different order from anything before.

… I'd been spooked by Magic Bullet, and now this was "absolute"!? Too much. Something like this…

"Haa, haa… but if I survived, I'll see this through to the end!"

Setsuna stood up… Yeah. This wasn't where we gave up. We… had to win!

"… Maika, after you finish off Yoshioka-san with Icicle Zapper, the rest goes on Mercheada. All right. Setsuna, Bloody Masquerade on Mercheada."

It would have been hard to whittle her all the way down this turn. Even surviving… but I'd carry it forward to the next!

"Icicle Zapper!"

Maika's grand magic, fueled by endlessly stacked buffs, took down Yoshioka-san in one shot. And the remaining two attacks on Mercheada!

… Yes, switching the target mid-consecutive-attack to a different opponent was possible. It just took a bit of skill.

… But ice was halved against fire. Icicle Zapper's damage was barely different from Holy Light.

… The slip effect I'd been hoping for didn't trigger either, sadly.

3/10 chipped off.

"Bloody Masquerade!"

4/10 chipped. And slip activated! All right, with this, Mercheada would be down in 5 turns.

"… Tempest."

But again, the storm of flames.

There was no way to withstand the goddess's attack, and Setsuna fell, of course. Maika too. Fire was super-effective against ice. Even with somewhat boosted defense, there was nothing to be done.

Maika fell too.

End of turn, slip damage activated, 5/10, halfway there!

… The battle continued. Until I brought down Goddess Mercheada, this fight wouldn't end.

"… Quite the monster has come out. Not bad… for a rat."

"Nyanya… I've heard of her, nya. Mercheada is the world's strongest Garumon, nya… my arms are itching to fight someone like that, nya!"

"I-I'll… I'll protect everyone!"

"Let's go, Kanan, Adelia, Haru."

Since the opponents were originally Japanese, I deployed all four Japanese members.

As it turned out, having two Defenders worked out well against this fearsome opponent.

… But against fire-element magic attacks at this level, there was almost nothing Haru could do.

He'd no doubt be one-turn-killed. Well… fortunately, Mercheada was the last to act in a turn. Have him do whatever he could, even a little.

"Kanan-sama! Whoa, the cat ears are cute! Haru! Creepy Haru! Kikikii!"

"Hey, you! … Say one more thing about my Haru and I won't kill you painlessly!?"

Lacking composure, I got a bit foul-mouthed in my anger at Nezu, but…

"… Nezu-kun. I'm sorry. About refusing the love letter you gave me before."

That was what Haru said.

"… Kikiki…"

Nezu was laughing on the surface, but his face was twitching.

"The person I said I liked back then… it was Naoto-kun. So… I'm sorry, okay? I love Naoto-kun, so… I can't go out with you."

Haru bowed his head in apology.

"K-kikikiii! Creepy Haru! Creepy Haru! And it's Creepy Haru, no less, ahhhhhh!"

… Aah, so girls wouldn't give him the time of day, but Haru was kind, so this guy had got it into his head that maybe even he could be his partner.

A grudge from being rejected, huh…

But it was because he subconsciously looked down on Haru that his thinking went "this guy I can manage, surely." Yeah, I really couldn't forgive him.

"Kanan, just focus on surviving. Setsuna's Bloody Masquerade is chipping her down, so with that we'll win. Wind's Blessing."

"Got it."

"Adelia, Fire Boost, Flame Claw. Haru, Wood Golem. Even a little, let's deal damage."

"Nya!"

"Y-yeah, sorry, I can't be more useful…"

"It's fine. There's a time for everyone to shine. Right now, Haru, do everything you can."

"… Yeah! Wood Golem!"

"Nya, Fire Boost, Flame Claw!"

The Wood Golem's attack was minimal, but Adelia, as expected, came through.

The damage to Mercheada reached 7/10. Three more turns… if we could dodge.

"… Tempest."

"Kanan! Jump!"

I directed Kanan to jump. Right on top of the Wood Golem Haru had summoned.

Dogoooooo!

Adelia and Haru got caught up in the inferno and instantly hit HP 0. Haru-kun, with the grass element, weak to fire, there was no way around it, but for Adelia, fire-element with high HP, to go down in one hit too…

But she didn't have high magic defense, so I guess it couldn't be helped.

The Wood Golem also got caught up, burning to nothing as it fell.

But Kanan, standing on its highest point, wasn't caught in the flames.

I'd been pinning down Tempest's effective area this whole time. It completely incinerated a few meters of ground-level.

It was all-target, sure… but the upper area wasn't part of its effective range. In other words, by escaping upward, you could dodge it.

The highest point in the battlefield was the top of the Wood Golem's head. We'd had her summon it with that calculation in mind too.

The Wood Golem, perhaps out of sheer stubbornness on Haru's part, kept covering Kanan from outside Tempest's range right up until it burned away…

and just as Tempest's effect ended, vanished. Thank you, Wood Golem. And of course, Haru.

… Slip damage. 8/10! Two more dodges…!

"… Naoto, I'll strip too."

Kanan suggested.

"… No helping it. Strip!"

Ba… Kanan's uniform was a precious item brought all the way from Japan. She hurriedly pulled it off, switching into Adelia's Spirit Garb form.

"… Whoa, Kanan-samaaaa! Kikikikii…!"

Nezu was overjoyed.

I hated showing Nezu Kanan's lewd figure, but at this point there was no other way.

Tempest's effective duration was about 5 seconds. Otherworld Wind had 5 charges.

Now that the Wood Golem was down, the means to remain above the Tempest effective area were insufficient.

"Tempest!"

"Kanan! Transition up! … Up! … Up!"

By using Otherworld Wind to leap upward about 4 times in a turn, I could buy nearly 5 seconds and dodge for one turn. But this kind of acrobatics was good for one turn at most.

"… Impossible! She dodged it!? Twice no less! Damn it! And you're supposed to be the strongest goddess! … This time, hit her for sure!"

But one more turn wouldn't work. I couldn't dodge it all.

Otherworld Wind's charges weren't enough, and on top of that, the next one was on a direct-hit course for Kanan.

But…

"Tempest."

"Don't underestimate the strength of my magic defense!"

Kanan firmly braced herself.

If she enchanted with the fire element via Adelia's Spirit Garb, the fire weakness disappeared. With that, high-magic-defense Kanan could take a single hit.

"Now, watch me!"

Kanan magnificently took that fearsome inferno head-on, with about 70 damage, and rode it out.

Kirakirakira…!

And then, end-of-turn slip damage. Goddess Mercheada's HP completely chipped away… down!

Shuuuuuu… The phantom faded.

"… Huh? … Huh? Huhhh!? Reset, reset, reset! Restart from the save point! Restart! Restart! Don't fuck around with me, this trash game! Restart, restart, restart!"

Nezu was screaming half-mad.

"… Restart from zero."

You have defeated Goddess Mercheada Phantom. YOU WIN. The text danced.

Messages continued.

The messages kept coming, mercilessly.

"Hahhhhhh!? Wait, wait wait wait! What are you doing, stop, stop, stop, you dumbass moron idiot, wait wait wait…"

"Waitttt, wait, wait, wait, wait…!"

"Wait, wait, wait, wait…!"

"Wait, wait, wait, wait…!"

"Waitttttttt!"

… Truly, with not a single G left, his entire fortune got squeezed dry.

The system was fearsome…

Since he was C-Class, 50% was collected, but, well, no helping that. Excellent work.

48… so he was wearing pretty pricey clothes. But I didn't want to see Nezu naked.

As a samurai's mercy, I selected No.

Coros were small change worth less than 1G; 10,000 Coros equaled 1G.

That was enough already! I selected No.

And so Nezu, apparently, lost everything except for the clothes on his back and a tiny bit of pocket change.

"Ki, kiki, kikiki… it's a lie… a lie… there's no way I… no way I'd lose…"

Nezu was on the floor, hands down, half-mad.

… There was no need to say anything more. I walked away.

I was a little curious about what would happen to him from here, but…

"A Master who's lost his Garumon? Well, for one thing, he's open to unlimited Garumon Battles. He lost to you, Naoto, so that puts him at C-Class rank 13. If beating him gets you C-Class rank 13, he'll get pummeled by everyone around him. Then he'll quickly tumble down to the bottom… down to G-Class. As for resurfacing… who knows? If he's a truly talented Master, maybe by saving up 100G to the death and pulling an N-Class Garumon from the gacha, he could resurge from G-Class. Or as one of the many G-Class Masters, he'll spend his days winning some, losing some, earning his loss expenses. If even that's beyond him, he falls to H-Class, the complete slave class. Whether anyone would buy that Nezu, I don't know… Well, his future, no concern of mine."

If I'd lost, the one losing everything would have been me. This time I won. That was all there was to it.

"What about Harada-san and the others?"

"Shop-bought Garumon are treated like NPCs. For now, they'll spend time at a nearby town's inn while waiting for a buyer. SSR-Class Garumon are expensive, so whether buyers come easily or not, who knows…"

Harada-san and the others, having had such miserable luck up till now, I hoped they'd meet good Masters.

For the moment… the immediate crisis had passed. I'd risen to C-Class rank 12, and at last… I was about to challenge B-Class!