Chapter 274: Cleaning Uncooperative
———Qyunda———
<8: 57 AM>
“We’re still clinging above four-hundred? Talk about perseverance.” I thought the number would’ve dipped way below that once we woke up. “...It’s kinda boring on our end though. I bet a good chunk of them are scrambling for survival, probably fighting a few people along the way.”
“Nothing to be envious about.” Malk replied. He seems to be pretty bored as well. “None of the important players died while we weren’t looking, right?”
“Right now everyone in our class is alive. Those five are still alive. Nothing to worry about so far.” I already checked that after getting out of bed. “...Kinda sucks that we can’t really discuss strategy at this point. I think most of us will probably reunite when the thing in the middle opens.”
“Waiting isn’t a problem when this particular hotel is near the center area. It is a bit jarring that there are city blocks close to it, but I guess they don’t really need to worry about aesthetics that much, at least not for these random locations.” He remarked.
“...Still. I’m surprised Emmie hadn’t hunted one of us down yet. I think with the few skirmishes happening she would’ve noticed someone fighting. It’s not like she’s the only one being hunted.” I said to keep the conversation going. We have nothing else to do today, so this is all we really got to kill time aside from watching anything on the TV, I guess.
“It just goes to show how little she goes out of her way to fight. She probably believes that she could fight off all the survivors that got all the way to the fourth day.” He speculated. What is even going to happen when we get there? I would imagine that she wouldn’t want to start a fight during that time. I would imagine that the playable area would’ve been so massive that there’s going to be some trouble for everyone to keep track of each other.
“I hope we don’t accidentally hit each other during the chaos. It’s gonna go crazy, that’s for sure.” I can’t help but to say that.
———Fiss———
<10: 01 AM>
“You’re serious about this!? Don’t you think we should be conserving our strength? There’s an elephant in the room we need to worry about, you know?” The one with the sword asked.
“Like hell I care!” The unarmed one yelled out, clearly ready to start the fight.
*Dash* *Swing* *Evade*
She ran in with a crazed face and started the fight with a right hook that he dodged by quickly taking a few steps back.
They are both running around with one chasing the other, moving at high speed and navigating around the area. We’re out of the giant lake at this point, but there are still some large ponds and trees making it hard to move around as smoothly as one would want it.
*Grab* *Creak* *Throw*
Did she just grab an entire tree and throw it at that guy!?
*Slice*
He simply chose to slice it cleanly before it could hit him even as he kept moving and trying to avoid her. Is he trying to tire her out instead of actually fighting back?
*Leap* *Slash* *Blast* *Evade* *Leap*
He jumped across a giant pond while turning around to throw out another attack in an attempt to dissuade her, only for her to avoid it and jumped towards him, catching up to the swordsman with her superior speed.
*Swing* *Block*
He swung his sword at her while both are still in the air, and she seemed to block it without taking any damage, but is basically halted from throwing an attack of her own and continues the stalling of the fight.
They’re actually moving so fast that the leaves on the trees are fluttering.
*Grab* *Throw* *Crash*
She managed to catch up to him and chose to throw him right into a nearby hill, causing him to crash and be buried deep inside it.
*Dash* *Leap* *Crash*
She ran straight into the same hole and pursued him, causing both of them to explode out of the other side of the hill. She’s not letting up in the slightest.
*Slash*
As both of them were running around and trying to gain the advantage over the other, the swordsman managed to catch her by surprise with a feint and get a clean slash on her torso that mostly just pushed her away but made her recoil from the backlash and give him some breathing room.
“Listen to me for crying out loud!” He shouted out before taking a defensive stance. I honestly don’t think she’s gonna listen to how things are going.
“Enough with your yapping!” She yelled back as she’s ready to continue the fight.
“Yeesh. What the hell are people doing fighting this early?” Suddenly a third person walked into view. He lazily walked over as if he didn’t just interrupt a pretty intense fight.
“You…” The girl quickly turned her attention towards the newcomer with a surprising amount of worry in her attitude, earlier she seemed a lot more confident.
“What’s with the funny face?” He asked with a dull tone. “You do know causing such a commotion will draw out other people, right? It’s something you have to expect.”
“Tch. Get outta here.” She said as she’s readying up a defensive stance. Looks like the sword guy isn’t even something she is worried about anymore.
*Dash* *Grapple* *Scrap* *Scrape* *Evade*
She ran at the guy with black furry limbs and immediately began attacking. The new guy for his part seems completely unbothered by the flurry of attacks and either counters or avoids it without much effort on his end.
*Grab* *Slam* *Grab* *Slam* *Grab* *Slam*
He then causally grabbed one of her arms and started swinging her around like a ragdoll, smashing her into the ground multiple times over without looking so much as being winded.
*Spin* *Throw*
Then in a somewhat comical move, he threw her high into the sky, launching her into the horizon with no clear idea of where she’ll end up.
“Now then.” He said before turning around to meet the swordsman, who is clearly terrified of him. “…You seem a bit more reasonable. I guess you passed.”
“Huh?” The swordsman said in confusion as the man with cat ears and tail said.
“Do you need me to spell it out? We need to save our strength for her instead of fighting each other. Same with you, you know that as well, right?” Wait. Who is he talking to…
“H-Hold on!” I screamed out as he walked towards my location. How did he know I was here!? “Pause! I wasn’t trying anything!”
“I wasn’t insinuating that.” He said with disinterest in his tone while the swordsman looked at me with suspicion. Damn it. I should’ve just ran away earlier…
———Lynda———
<11: 08 AM>
“What a pain.” I said while looking at the current situation. The player detector is showing that even as we move around the amount of people in the area doesn’t change at all. That can really only mean one thing.
“What do you think we should do?” Glery asked.
“Using one of them as an example is a good idea. That should quickly discourage them. The problem is we don’t know where they actually are hiding.” I’ve looked around a few times and I haven’t caught any of them. The range of the detector also means that they have plenty of area to hide. While the terrain is more akin to the generic grassland of the wider starting area, it’s a lot more uneven with more foliage to hide in. “Nuking the area isn’t really an option just in the likelihood that Emmie will notice it and try to investigate. I wouldn’t be surprised if she has already improved her range of detection to this level.”
“…Half a state level?” Glery said with skepticism.
“...Maybe not that far, but I do think she can easily notice any fluctuation in mana if we even so much as cause a small ruckus.” I just hope the people hiding around us also feel the same way, because if not, we might all be doomed. “Still, we need to clear things up quickly. Do they realize that we know of their presence, for one?”
“That’s hard to tell. I think the best way to deal with this is finding a secret area, or any place that is closed off. That way if they were truly stalking us for a nefarious reason, there’s no way for them to also sneak in without us noticing.” She suggested.
“And let them corner us?” That sounds a bit risky, especially if we ran into someone very strong among the group.
“I have a plan, don’t worry about it.” She confidently said. Hmm… If she’s that confident, then I guess I could leave this up to her. “Hey, there’s a city block right over there, let’s go into one of the buildings.”
———Kenni———
<11: 25 AM>
…So boring. It’s so tiring that we need to wait until tomorrow until something interesting could happen.
…Man. Too bad there’s no new content to watch on the web, it’s like… Not even an hour has passed in the real world, nothing to really watch or mull over. I have been doing nothing but flying around and calling dibs on a suite in a fancy hotel.
I would’ve thought maybe someone would’ve tried to snipe me down or something, but it has really been nothing for me. It really feels like I’m gonna die of bore-
*BOOM*
…Well this is one time I am happy to be proven wrong. One the hell was that explosion? I can feel the shockwave all the way from here.
*Clash* *Blast* *Zap* *Strike*
I looked out the window to see what was happening and I could see multiple people fighting. It doesn’t take too long for me to realize that this is a fight of two against six, which might sound bad, but the two seem to be holding themselves pretty well.
*Smash* *Splat*
One down on the big team side as the axe-wielding girl jumped towards him at high speed and swung her axe into him as both of them were rammed right into a nearby building. I just hope this building I’m in doesn’t fall over in the meantime.
*Grab* *Zap* *Bite* *Strike* *Stab*
The girl with snake hair then grabbed another person before blasting them with electricity and even began biting them with those snakes and racking up a lot of damage very quickly before ending it with a punch and a spear stab right through the torso, another one down.
*Grab* *Throw* *Kick* *Slam* *Crash*
One got thrown and launched around like a ball and smashed right into the ground before dissipating. That’s three down in a quick succession. It looks like their mana output were weirdly low during the battle, they must’ve been ambushed by something related to that massive explosion.
*Leap* *Kick* *Stomp* *Leap* *Stab*
The axe girl then jumped on top of someone and kicked and stomped the hell out of them before shifting her attention to someone else while the snakegirl finished them off.
*Grab* *Spin* *Smash* *Crash* *Smash* *Slash*
She grabbed one of the remaining two fighters and threw one at the other before finishing both of them off with a meaty axe swing.
I believe all of that happened in less than two minutes. All of it happened just quickly enough that I don’t think most people would’ve noticed it if they weren’t also hiding in this city block. Quite efficient of those two.
———Lynda———
<11: 30 AM>
“...Was that fast enough?” I asked as we assessed the damage.
“I can’t really be sure. I think people nearby might come to investigate, but it doesn’t look like they’re rushing it since I can’t feel anything at the moment.” She answered.
“I see. Guess that works wonders, all things considered.” Who would’ve thought stacking so many explosives inside the building would’ve worked out so well. I didn’t expect them to actually just waltz in and get blown up in their face for it. If they react even a second too late they would’ve been blown to smithereens and we wouldn’t need to worry about cleaning them up afterward.
*Clap* *Clap* *Clap*
I flinched after suddenly hearing someone slowly clapping, the voice breaking through the silence and getting closer as the two of us turned around to see who this newcomer is.
“Well well. That was a nice show. I need that kind of stimulation after days of boredom.” She said with a smirk.