The Lone Sniper: I Was Just Minding My Own Business Sniping Players, and I Ended Up Becoming a Raid Boss

Chapter 103

Boom!!! She kicks off, shattering the ground as she charges forward.

Kamui-san thrusts out her right hand. Black energy coils around it.

(That hand—it's dangerous!!)

A combination from Kamui-san's arms. I dodge carefully, but she sweeps my legs.

As I fall flat on my back, she aims her right hand at my face. I roll aside and get up.

(As expected, beating a fighting-game champ at close range is rough...)

AR fighting games are half martial arts. Each character's special moves, reach, and traits differ, but in the end it's a brawl using virtual bodies.

Hand-to-hand is her domain. I have no chance here.

"Since I can't win head-on, I'll resort to underhanded tactics!"

"Hmm!"

I launch shield pieces at Kamui-san's shoulders and knee joints to hinder her movement.

"...Using pieces to pin joints...!"

I deploy an assault rifle and fire in rapid bursts.

Kamui-san leaps back to evade; unavoidable laser rounds are deflected by energy waves from her hands.

"Nice moves. I'm relieved... her words weren't lies."

Those arms must be a special armament like Rabi-chan's Trick Arm.

"Ki-en-banjō! —At last my fighting spirit is ignited!!"

Kamui-san slips a hand into her pants pocket and stands with feet slightly apart.

"Meikyō-kyaku"

There's no preparatory motion.

While still upright, without bending her knees, she closes three steps of distance.

"What the—!?"

It feels like teleportation. Follow current novels on n0velfire.net

She keeps mixing sideways shifts, closing in with that unique movement.

My assault-rifle aim swings at air. She's within two meters.

(Crap, how's she coming...!?)

"Chigaeshi!!"

Kamui-san drives her fingers into the ground and flips the ground beneath my feet.

"Wha—!?"

I'm hurled into the air along with the chunk of ground.

"Gansai Hōrai-shū!!"

She shatters the airborne rock with a flying spin-kick. I'm showered with fragments, my durability dropping.

(N-no way...)

I don't play fighting games much, but I did watch the Reckless Fighter world finals stream. The event drew huge attention—after all, a Japanese high-school girl reached the top four.

Full-dive fighting games are male-dominated; the top sixteen are usually all men. Yet she crushed the others and won, overturning common sense.

The character Kamui Shindou used back then seems to have wielded the exact same moves.

"In full-dive fighting games, if you voice the move name, the system moves your body and executes it. Drill the motion countless times and it seeps into your body, right?"

A real body is one thing, but in a virtual body, using virtual techniques isn't strange—or is it?

"No-no-no... y-you're insane! You're playing a fighting game inside a shooter!?"

"Not insane. Shooting and fighting are the same in that you defeat the enemy before you."

Sh-she's completely beyond common sense!!

"That said, I'll make full use of this game's systems."

Kamui-san materializes mechanical wings and equips them on her back. Wings.

She lifts off and charges. I deploy assault rifle and bullet pieces, angling shots to keep her at bay, concentrating fire while maintaining distance.

Kamui-san plants her feet, uses shield pieces to deal with bullet-piece rounds, and deflects rifle fire with black energy waves from her palms.

(That wave barrier doesn't cover a very wide area...)

After blocking everything, she fires black energy shots from her palms. I dive aside to dodge.

"Energy shots from palm strikes. Classic robot anime move..."

The examples are endless.

"They're called Wave Arms. Pretty fighting-game-like, right?"

She closes in again.

I draw G-AGE and fire, but it's incinerated by the energy wave.

(G-AGE is useless against energy shields. Bad matchup.)

I materialize assault rifles in both hands.

"!?"

(Quantity over quality. Overwhelm with attacks she can't fully block.)

Her defenses are only shield pieces and the wave barrier around her palms—she can't stop simultaneous fire from rifles and bullet pieces.

"Take this!"

Full barrage.

Kamui-san stops advancing, leaps sideways, and begins evasive arcs.

"Flying really is no good."

She plants her feet and uses that motionless dash again.

"True Meikyō-kyaku"

Even faster than before, boosted by Wings. But—

(I'm used to it now.)

I don't waste a single round, tagging Kamui with every bullet. She blocks them all, yet her face shows she's taking hits.

"Impressive... you can snipe me at this speed without a hair's breadth of error!"

"Sorry. I know someone even faster."

I keep up the concentrated fire.

Her defenses can't keep up.

Laser rounds graze Kamui's shoulder and knee.

(I won't let her close!!)

One wing is destroyed by a laser, slowing her.

"I see. Against you, this dash only slows me down."

That motionless movement is unique—point-to-point instead of linear, something almost unseen in this game. Deadly on first sight, but only that. Once you're used to it, it's nothing special.

"I don't need this anymore."

She purges the wings, grabs them, and—

"!?"

—hurls them.

The wing slams into my arm, knocking the right assault rifle away.

(It was almost out of energy anyway. No loss.)

I discard the left rifle too and ready my sniper rifle (Stark). Kamui charges straight at full speed. I answer with Stark, but the shots are deflected by the wave barrier.

(I've read the reflection angle of that barrier.)

I pull the trigger twice in rapid succession.

The first is cleanly deflected, but the second ricochets off the barrier and hits Kamui in the face.

"You...!"

"Not a hair off."

Yet her head durability isn't zero. The ricochet must've reduced the power.

I aim bullet pieces at Kamui's face. She blocks with shield pieces, but—

(The laser flash momentarily blinds her.)

Without pause I fire at the center of her chest—one of her vitals. Her left hand reacts to the snipe.

(She shouldn't see it. Impressive reaction.)

The left hand deflects the shot, but not perfectly. It can only shift it from the vital; the ricocheted jet-black laser destroys her right shoulder.

Unfazed by the loss of her right arm, Kamui keeps closing. Five meters left.

I draw the saber terminal from my belt and sweep it sideways.

"High-output mode."

The extended saber slices Kamui from the waist down.

I swept from her right-hand side. With her right arm gone, it's impossible to counter on first sight.

"An extending saber...!?"

"You're an incredible player, but you don't know this game well enough."

A one-time-kill, one-off saber.

That's how you use a one-time-kill.

(The Crime Gun...)

I'll beat her with a gun that changes status. Even if I beat her like this, she can't be imprisoned. I checked her status and opened her class, but she was a citizen. She entered through legitimate means.

"Not yet...!"

Kamui-san grins and, with only her upper body remaining, fires her thrusters and closes the distance.

Then a wave cannonball flies from her remaining left hand. I crouch to dodge, kick Kamui-san's body from below, and blow away the chest of Kamui-san dancing in the air with the G-AGE.

(As expected, I didn't have the leeway to switch to the Crime Gun...)

All eight weapon slots are already filled.

To equip the Crime Gun I have to open the system menu, choose the weapons category, and perform a swap. Even at fastest speed it takes five to six seconds.

Should I have set it beforehand? No—up to this point there wasn't a single weapon I carried that I hadn't used. This time it can't be helped.

"For now, I'll leave only these words—'Splendid'!!"

Kamui-san is deleted.

The last expression she showed was that of a wolf that had found its sheep.

"With experience probably lower than mine, she made it this far. Ugh...! That person's a little scary..."

The terror of being targeted by a weirdo outweighs the joy of meeting a strong foe. If she'd just kept quiet she'd be a real beauty... what a waste.