FINAL CHAPTER
In Dog Heaven
“I want you to kill me.”
“Okay! I’ll do it real quick! One shot, totally painless!” shouted Pitohui, reaching for her XDM pistol.
“Not so faaaaaaaast!” Fukaziroh’s heavy grenade launcher pushed her hand aside.
“What’s this? You want to do it yourself, Fuka?” Pitohui asked, looking down from on high.
Fukaziroh glared back at up her, eyes just visible beneath the brim of her large helmet. “No, I don’t! What are you talking about, ‘real quick’?! Don’t you dare kill Suuzaburou! And why do we have to do that in the first place? Hey, Suuzaburou, why did you say that?”
“Unfortunately, I have not been told the reason why.”
“Grrr! Then go ask that awful writer! Right now! Go, boy, go!”
“I’m afraid I can’t do that.”
“Yes, you can! Go on, ask! I won’t give you your favorite treat until then!”
“Stop picking on him!” Llenn cried, defending the canine.
“Weren’t you supposed to be invulnerable?” asked Boss.
“That status has been removed,” replied Suuzaburou.
Clarence remarked, “So is this something where the event rounds itself out by having the messenger killed at the end? That’s a fairly common convention, isn’t it?”
“I don’t care! I’m not letting anyone kill him!” Fukaziroh raged, darting in front of the little dog and boldly guarding it, both MGL-140s at the ready. “If anyone points their gun at Suuzaburou, I’ll blast them!”
“So I just have to use my photon sword, then?”
“Same thing! I’ll shoot you! And let me warn you: I’ve got plasma grenades as the first shot in both Rightony and Leftonia!”
“Then everyone will die, including the doggy.”
“Grrr…”
Llenn stepped in front of her. “Fuka…you didn’t think this through, did you? You’re always like this…”
The little pink thing stood side by side with her counterpart, who was nearly as tiny.
“I agree with Fukaziroh!” she announced. “I’d rather not kill the doggy!”
“Llenn… You’re the best friend a girl could ask for…”
“Don’t mention it.”
“Suuzaburou! Did you hear that? Llenn’s letting herself be slaughtered like a lamb for your sake! You’d better call that completing the quest!”
“Hey, wait.”
“Don’t worry, Llenn. Let me do the talking.”
“No, no, no.”
“C’mon, it’s just a silly joke! Anyway, nyah-nyah-nyah! Hey, all you bad guys trying to kill Suuzaburou! You gotta take on the both of us!”
“Wait, wait, wait a second!” shouted Boss, rushing over with her pigtails bouncing to interject. “What will happen to the quest if we don’t kill you? Tell us, Suuzaburou.”
“It will not end. For you to depart, you would have to shut down the AmuSphere, perform an emergency log-out without saving, or resign from the quest event.”
“I would assume that wouldn’t count as finishing the quest? No experience points?”
“That is correct.”
“Well, that’s no good.” Boss sighed. “Um, Mi…”
She clamped her lips shut the moment before she revealed Miyu’s and Karen’s real names. Shirley and Clarence didn’t know their real-life identities.
“Fukaziroh, Llenn… I know the pooch is cute, but killing him is part of this quest. And while I hate to put it this way, he is just a character in a game.”
“You think I don’t know that?!” Fukaziroh ranted. “I’ve played VR games for years! How many virtual beings do you think I’ve killed with my own two hands?! But you know what? I’ll be damned if I watch a dog die before my eyes again!”
“……”
Boss was taken aback, unsure how to proceed. Instead, a woman with a wicked expression (Pitohui) added, “When everyone’s working together to achieve something, you sometimes have to suck it up, Fuka and Llenn.”
“Then why don’t you?!”
“Oh. That’s a good point. But I don’t want to. I’m not known for my patience.”
“In that case…”
“Yes?”
“I’ll run away! I’m taking Suuzaburou and escaping! I’ll rush to the very ends of the earth! I’ll cross the ocean and find the new world! And all who try to chase me will have to deal with the pink demon and my grenade launchers!”
“Hey, don’t leave me behind,” whined Llenn.
“All right!” exclaimed Pitohui. “Then I respond to your heartfelt sentiment with heart and fists of my own!”
She put the XDM back in its holster and lifted the KTR-09 at her shoulder.
Well, I could have seen this coming, Llenn thought, giving up.
This was GGO, after all. A swarm of people who chose to let bullets do the talking—herself included.
“Very well. Very well. Let’s rumble, and the winner gets to make the call,” said Fukaziroh, grinning maliciously. She was enjoying this.
“That sounds fun!” someone shouted. It was Shirley, and her expression matched her words. Hopping down from the tractor with R93 Tactical 2 on her shoulder, she marched up to stand next to Llenn. “I’ll be on this side. I don’t suppose I have to explain why, do I?”
Llenn knew it was because she wanted to shoot Pitohui, but she didn’t bother voicing it.
Fukaziroh replied, “Of course I know why! Because you’re a dog person!”
“……Well, I won’t deny that.”
When it came to animals, Mai loved cats and dogs and foxes and rats and just about anything else. At the same time, of course, she was a hunter who’d ended the lives of many wild creatures.
“My goodness! So it’s one against three. Even I might have trouble with this,” drawled Pitohui, who was very much putting on an act. Yes, she was hamming it up, indeed.
“Many against one? Methinks this is less than honorable,” muttered Boss theatrically, something she must have heard from a samurai story, before standing right beside Pitohui.
But Llenn could tell the truth: Boss just wanted to join forces with Pitohui—or more specifically, with Elza Kanzaki.
“Let’s consider this an equal fight, young ladies,” added Tohma, standing with Boss. Now it was three on three.
But Llenn could tell the truth: Tohma just wanted to join forces with Elza Kanzaki, and so on, and so on.
“Eva, Tohma! Oh, girls! I love you!” cheered Pitohui. The two simpered like goons.
At this point, it was Llenn the submachine gunner, Fukaziroh the twin grenadier, and Shirley the deadly sniper versus the heavily armed gunner Pitohui, the silent sniper and assault riflewoman Boss, and the automatic sniper Tohma.
There was a kind of tactical balance between both sides, although that wasn’t entirely clear to Llenn.
Lastly, one more person got up and announced, “Good grief. Listen to you ladies…”
It was handsome Clarence, shrugging and attracting the attention of all six.
“Don’t look at me that way. I’m not joining either side. I can’t ruin the even matchup, and I’m a little tuckered out after my suicide bombing earlier. Plus…”
Plus? They waited for her theatrical conclusion.
“If you all wipe one another out, who’s going to finish this quest? We seem to have given up on being the first to finish the event, but aside from that, there’s no point letting all that hard work go to waste, right? It would be unfair to those who died before us.”
That was a good point, they all agreed—except for Fukaziroh.
“Now, just a moment! Are you saying that if we all kill one another, and you’re left on your own, you’re going to shoot Suuzaburou?”
“Basically, yeah.”
“Then you’re actually on the other side! I should blast you right now,” she spat, lifting the MGL-140s.
But Llenn stopped her. “Fuka, it’s simple. Just win and ensure we’re not mutually wiping one another out. We should be happy she’s not joining the other side. If she wants to give us that handicap, let’s take it,” she explained, the voice of reason.
“Grrr…,” Fukaziroh grumbled, but she reluctantly agreed.
Llenn turned to Clarence and said, “But if we win, and we’re half dead when we survive, I want you to promise you’ll resign from the quest with us, rather than finishing us off.”
“That only makes sense. Okay, I promise. You guys go ahead and kill one another over the fate of that little fluffy black creature. I’ll be… Well, I’ll be sitting back on the hill to the north, watching. You come with me, Suuzaburou, it’s dangerous over here,” Clarence stated, beckoning.
But the dog did not budge. Fukaziroh crouched down next to the little black spitz and stroked him with a very kind, loving look. “This place is going to turn into a battlefield. You go with that tomboy. Don’t worry, I’ll come back for you…”
The canine replied, “Um, I don’t think this is supposed to happen…”
“Don’t worry about it. Also, I’ll give you some delicious dog food.”
“No, this really isn’t supposed to happen…”
“Okay. Well, it’s not really safe, but I’ll give you some people food, too. I’ll make sure to wash it first, since the flavor will be too strong.”
“That’s not what I meant,” Suuzaburou protested, but Clarence picked him up and walked away.
“……”
Fukaziroh watched them go. Clarence walked about a hundred feet to the northwest, next to the house, then turned around and called out, “Okay, you can go now! Sixth ordeal! Kill one another! Ready, fight!”
Hang on; not like that! Llenn snapped.
“We’re just supposed to start shooting, right here? We can’t do that! Not unless you actually want us to all wind up dead in a draw!” vented Shirley.
“That’s right!” Boss added. “We should face off and make it a proper duel!”
“We’ll need to reconfigure our comms,” noted Tohma, a crucial detail to keep in mind. Otherwise, both groups would hear each other.
“But how will we…?” Llenn wondered aloud.
Around them were nothing but open fields. Nowhere to hide, nothing for cover. The snipers would have the run of the place.
“All right, here’s a proposal,” said Pitohui lackadaisically. “See that log cabin there? We’ll split up on either side, backs against the walls, where we can’t see the other team. No going inside before the engagement starts. Let’s say we’re allowed to run into the hills to the east and west. But no shooting until the duel starts. You stay on the north hill to watch for cheaters, Clare.”
“And?”
“How about sixty seconds until the all clear? We’ll have Clare shoot her gun to start the battle. Then we can make it an interior battle right away or rush into the distance for sniping and grenades.”
This was all just Pitohui’s suggestion, but the others didn’t have any better ideas.
“I’m fine with that,” said Llenn.
“Very well. Let’s do it,” added Shirley.
“Sounds good. I’ll be there with bell song!” chirped Fukaziroh.
“Fuka…did you mean ‘bells on’?”
“Is that the saying? Yeah.”
“Okey dokey, folkey, when you’re on the wall of the building, wave to me for a signal. Then I’ll start the countdown,” rang Clarence’s voice through the comms of both groups of three.
“Win or lose, no hard feelings!” added Pitohui, waving.
“Heh! There’s no ‘or’ there; we’re gonna win!” Fukaziroh shouted, glaring as the groups proceeded through the yard to the cabin.
Although they hadn’t decided on it, based on where they’d been standing, Fukaziroh’s team naturally wound up on the east side. Pitohui’s team was on the west.
Both were taking their sweet time. This was to give themselves as much leeway as possible to discuss tactics before the sixty-second countdown began.
“It’s the filibuster tactic, Llenn!”
“Is that what you call it…?”
“Anyway, Llenn, do you have a strategy in mind?” asked Shirley quietly as she walked at the slowest pace in history.
“Is there a reason you’re not asking me?” demanded Fukaziroh, mildly outraged.
“Well, let’s see… First, we should go over the opponents. Pito’s just supremely tough all around. And Boss is no pushover, either. She’s quite fast for her size. Both of them can take a lot of punishment. Tohma’s sniping is excellent, and her Dragunov is an automatic,” Llenn remarked, thinking out loud.
The house was getting larger on her left. “I’m assuming the interior layout is the same as the cabins we’ve seen on the world map. It’ll have a big living room with a loft in the center and bedrooms on either side. The hallways on the north side. Walls are logs, so they don’t allow any bullets through. But Pito’s photon swords can pierce them. And a pistol can fire through the interior doors. The floorboards in the hallways always creak when you step on them.”
“Hmm, sounds about right. Continue.”
“The yard around the house is very open. No cover aside from the well, tractor, and tree. Hills to the left and right. Grass is tall enough to hide people, but you’ll probably get spotted if you move. It’s close enough that a sniper has a sure kill shot…”
How to win a three-on-three fight in this setting?
“Llenn, remember that I still have twelve plasma grenades,” Fukaziroh reminded her, lifting Rightony and Leftonia. They represented a tremendous amount of firepower, but if a bullet hit even one of them, the results would be disastrous. A chain reaction of twelve plasmas could blow the entire cabin to smithereens. And they couldn’t afford a draw.
“Ah…so how about this?” added Shirley, offering her most grisly idea. “I’ll sprint for sixty seconds and hide atop a hill. You two go inside and stick together. Once you’ve seen Pitohui and Eva go inside, detonate yourselves immediately. Send the whole building to smithereens. And I’ll take out Tohma after that.”
Fukaziroh responded, “Brilliant idea—not! I’m going to pick up Suuzaburou and live with him here, in this cabin! You saw that doghouse in the yard!”
“Don’t be stupid, Fuka,” scolded Llenn. She turned to Shirley. “I’m afraid that plan is off the table. What if they don’t go inside, or only one of them does? You’re going to end up fighting one on three, or one on two.”
“Hrm…”
“Plus…”
“Plus?”
“Didn’t you want to kill Pito yourself, Shirley?” Llenn asked with a nasty grin.
“I’m impressed,” Shirley replied, metaphorically doffing her hat. They had finally reached the side of the cabin.
We’re out of time. No time. Need to think.
Think of a way to beat them.
A way, a way… There must be a way… Any way at all…
And after a ferocious loop through her mind, something burst.
“Oh. I have a good idea.”
“Let’s hear it,” requested Shirley.
“It’s a little crazy,” added Llenn hesitantly. “Are you sure?”
“The crazier, the better.”
Much like Llenn’s team, Pitohui’s side was tiptoeing along as slowly as possible.
“Let’s see, how should we beat them? Oooh, I can’t believe I get to fight Llenn again! This is so exciting!” she exclaimed. The atmosphere was like a picnic. She was jabbering so loudly that she didn’t care if they overheard.
“Did you have a plan in mind, ma’am?” asked Boss under her breath.
“Yeah,” Pitohui replied, just as quietly. “Eva, what’s the biggest thing to watch out for in a three on three?”
“Whichever group loses at least one member first will lose due to a numerical disadvantage. Never break the three-person cell.”
“Correct. You get a gold star,” answered Pitohui, reaching out and rubbing Boss on the head.
“Heh-heh-heh-heh…” Boss grinned, pleased as punch that Elza Kanzaki(’s avatar) was rubbing her (avatar’s) head. Meanwhile, Tohma looked jealous.
“So leaving a sniper up on the hill is actually quite risky. But what’s the point of having two or three of us on a hill? Especially when Fuka’s got her plasma grenades left, and Shirley has those awful explosive rounds.”
“I’ve got plenty of grand grenades, too. I could go inside and blow myself up if I see at least two of them! I bet it would level the entire building. After all, even a draw is a win for us.”
“That’s true. I considered that, too. If I only cared about winning, that might be the most solid course of action, sending you in there alone to blow up…and while I’m acting as decoy, Tohma shoots Shirley.”
“Is there a problem with it…?” Boss asked hesitantly.
“Against ordinary enemies, no. But we’re dealing with Llenn here. She knows she can’t get into a draw. When her back is against the wall, that’s when she comes up with the real bonkers ideas. So with that in mind…”
“With that in mind?” Boss and Tohma asked simultaneously.
Pitohui finished, “It’s pointless to come up with a solid plan! Let’s just play it by ear! Real close to the line! Only thing is…”
After taking their sweet, delectably sweet time, both teams reached the sides of the log cabin.
“Wow, you finally made it, huh? Thought the sun was going to go down. All right, I’m starting the sixty-second countdown!” announced Clarence, standing on the breezy hilltop to the north. Suuzaburou was cradled in her left arm.
They had configured their comms so that Clarence was the only person everyone could hear.
On either side of the house, Llenn and Pitohui waved back. Clarence called up a window to start the countdown. A display emerged in the upper-right corner of her vision.
58, 57, 56…
The countdown proceeded in silence.
43, 42, 41…
Bored, Clarence watched the two teams prepare from the hill. When she saw them motioning and murmuring among themselves and recognized what they were doing, she thought, Ohhh! So that’s your plan! She had to make sure not to say anything out loud, because the other team would hear.
21, 20, 19…
Once it started, this one was going to be over quickly, she thought, pulling the Five-Seven pistol loose with her free hand.
11, 10, 9, 8…
Clarence pointed it straight up in the air, just like the starter at a track meet.
5, 4, 3, 2, 1…
She fired.
As soon as Pitohui heard the gun salute from Clarence, a rather silly-sounding succession of pop-pop-pop-pop-pop-pop-pop! followed it.
“Inside!” she barked to her teammates, leaping into motion.
There were back doors on both sides of the cabin. She kicked theirs in and went through.
She was immediately inside a bedroom. Pitohui passed by the large bed and reached the interior door, which she also kicked open into the hallway.
“Get down!” she ordered the other two. Boss and Tohma obeyed like faithful hounds.
That’s when the explosions and shock waves started.
Boss turned around, crouched, and saw a plasma grenade detonating on the west side of the house. The blue surge created a wicked sphere that obliterated the yard.
The well, the crops, the tree, the swing—all these things a civilized life required melted into slag. The gust of wind rattled the door they’d entered through and smashed all the glass windows.
Crouching and tensing against the explosion, the force even shook her. If she’d been on her feet, she wouldn’t have been on them much longer.
The detonations continued in an extended sequence that refused let up.
“Thanks a lot, Fuka!”
“Did she shoot them all?!” Tohma shouted. She and Boss knew what had happened.
Just after the duel started, Fukaziroh had fired all twelve plasma grenades in succession from the other side of the building—in an extremely tall arc.
The slight effect of the wind on their trajectories then scattered them across the lawn, which resulted in a sequence of twelve blue spheres. They had to be excavating a ton of earth.
“That was scary,” murmured Tohma. If she’d hesitated at all to go inside, the blasts would have slammed her backside.
As the explosions continued, Boss asked, “Are they all inside?”
“Possibly. But if not, remember: no suicide bombing,” Pitohui replied. She’d already given up her KTR-09 and equipped the best weapon for close-quarters combat, her lightsword. She kept its point toward the ground, just in case Llenn tried to charge them during the diversion.
Boss kept her Vintorez in hand, but she did remove the scope, which was meaningless inside. Her selector was on full auto. She didn’t bring out her grand grenades, either. One unlucky shot could wipe out their entire team.
“I’ll do anything to help!” said Tohma. “Even if it means being a shield!”
She was no longer clutching her Dragunov sniper rifle. Instead, she had equipped the M870 Breacher shortened shotgun. It was Pitohui’s, of course.
She’d borrowed a gun from her personal hero. Tohma’s mission in this house was to rush through, blasting buckshot, and flush out the enemy from their hiding spots, even if it ended in her death.
As the eleventh explosion settled down, and the twelfth began, the trio stood up and prepared to rush. Their destination was the spacious living room just through the interior door. Once they had secured it, they could perform a sweep. If Llenn’s squad was in there, it would be time to fight.
In the lead was Tohma, who was ready to go down shooting. If this were the Shinsengumi, she would be on “death duty,” the member to enter a deadly situation first.
Next was Pitohui, with photon swords in both hands. She would run through both Tohma and the enemy if that was what it took.
Taking up the rear to watch for an opponent who might circle through the hallway—or from behind—was Boss, whose large size would help protect Pitohui.
If they spotted their foes as they leaped through the door, the fighting would start, and it could all end in under ten seconds.
As the final explosion settled down, and the force of the shock wave ebbed, Pitohui gave the word.
“Go!”
“Yahhh!”
Tohma got to her feet.
At the same time, on the exact opposite side of the symmetrical log cabin, a tiny girl dressed in pink battle fatigues listened for the twelfth explosion and called out, “Last one!”
“Ready whenever you are!” replied a shrimp wearing a MultiCam shirt, having doffed her green bulletproof vest.
No matter the exterior, the furniture in the log cabins’ living rooms were always arranged the same way.
The living room was about sixty-five feet wide and twenty-three feet long. One of its sides—the south side in this case—featured a huge glass window in a thick wooden frame that ran all the way to the ceiling. The sunlight beamed through it.
On the opposite side—the north side in this case—the wall housed a log surface with a large fireplace in the center.
The fireplace had a splendid brick hearth over three feet wide, plus a spacious grate. There were no logs or ashes there anymore. From the back of the fireplace, also made of brick of course, rose a fat chimney. There was independent loft space on either side.
Across from the fireplace was a large coffee table, surrounded by sofas. Stretching alone the back wall was a formidable table with eight chairs to match.
Wham!
Uninhabited until just a moment ago, the space now played host to people bursting through the doors on both ends.
People armed to the teeth and intent on killing one another.
“Aaaaah!” bellowed Tohma, charging through the door first. And because she was in the lead, she was also the first to notice the little girl in a MultiCam pattern and a helmet kicking her way through the door sixty-five feet away.
She pointed the M870 Breacher as she ran closer, but the shrimp in the helmet quickly ducked to the side, hiding behind the dining table and chairs. Promptly taking her place in the doorway was another shrimp the same size, dressed in pink and holding a P90 of an identical hue.
Da-koom! She fired the shotgun.
But it was just a moment too late. Both of them were already out of blast range by the time she pulled the trigger. The pink girl dove to the left to get out of her sight line. Instead, the nine pellets flew toward the open doorway.
Tohma hoped that the third person would walk through and take the hit, but it didn’t work out that conveniently. The shotgun pellets bounced off the top of the heavy dining table, embedded into the log wall, or passed harmlessly through the empty doorway.
“Fuka, right; Llenn, left!” Tohma announced, pumping the action to expel the empty shell and load the next shot.
“Good!” called Pitohui, who rushed past her.
Which one are you going after? Tohma wanted to ask, but the black limbs rushing like the wind to the left were all the answer she needed.
Pitohui was intent on eliminating Llenn.
“Boss, right!”
“Got it!”
Boss brought up the rear, pointing her Vintorez to the right.
Three seconds had passed since the battle had begun.
Llenn’s eyes told her the story the instant she jumped through the doorway.
Tohma, straight ahead! And she’s got Pito’s shotgun.
Behind that, a shadow with the dark, foul aura of Pitohui!
Hard to tell past her horrible air, but that’s probably Boss behind her!
She thanked Lady Luck that her guess was more or less correct.
“Do it, Fuka!” she commanded.
“You got it!”
“Oh, Llennnnn!” called Pitohui, leaping over the dining table and landing atop a sofa. Little pink shrimp poking her face and weapon out from under the other table ahead.
Vwom!
She pressed the switch on both photon swords, extending them to their maximum length. Their pale, three-foot blades reflected off a metal trophy of some kind on display over the fireplace.
She could see the muzzle of the P90, and the bullet lines reaching toward her, but Pitohui did not stop running.
She was going to skewer Llenn, even if she took ten rounds in the process.
The bullet lines passed to the left of her body. An angle that would not strike their target.
“I’ve got youuuu!” exulted Pitohui, certain of her victory, as she narrowed in on Llenn’s cap, right above where she’d pressed the P90 to her cheek.
She leaped off the sofa and over the dining table, hurtling down at an angle to skewer her prey with both swords…
“!”
And then she saw Llenn’s face.
Smiling despite her imminent skewering.
No—that wasn’t Llenn.
“Rrrahhh!”
Fukaziroh rolled backward and kicked out hard with both feet. They slammed against the dining table just above her head. With muscles that were actually as strong as M’s, she launched the heavy piece of furniture up into the air as effortlessly as if it were a trash can.
The table rose into the air toward the descending Pitohui.
One second before, at the exact instant Pitohui jumped, Boss pointed the Vintorez at Fukaziroh, who had fled to the right.
The dining table was at the end of the room. A green helmet popped out from under it.
Boss pulled the trigger faster than she’d ever done before.
Sh-kunk! It quietly fired a single round that crossed the room at just under the speed of sound, striking and penetrating the helmet.
Got her! Boss thought, certain of an automatic head-shot kill.
Then she saw the helmet—and only the helmet—fly backward.
That was when she noticed that it was not Fukaziroh’s head underneath.
What jutted upward was a pistol. Painted pink.
Five seconds had passed since the battle had begun.
“Ha!”
Pitohui swung her arms, trying to use the lightswords to block against the dining table soaring up to meet her.
But all that accomplished was stabbing through the thick wood, instead of stopping the furniture itself from smashing into her.
“Gahk!”
Her dark form collided with the dining table in midair and lost all momentum.
Llenn fired at the same moment.
It was a shot with just one Vorpal Bunny, on the left side.
One .45-caliber bullet fired at Boss, while Llenn was dressed in a MultiCam shirt and pants—in other words, Fukaziroh’s battle outfit.
The bullet passed through the room at slightly less than the speed of sound, breaking through the Russian camo that SHINC wore as a uniform and into the body of the person wearing it.
“Rgh!”
Tohma! Boss thought, calling out the name of the teammate who had stepped in to take the shot for her.
First her long black hair swept past to take Boss’s visibility away—then it took the bullet away, too.
“Yaaaa!”
Pitohui kicked the table she collided with in the air.
The bulky object fell to the floor, and she jumped backward—and spun.
She did a backflip, staring hard at Fukaziroh, who was wearing Llenn’s outfit.
The blond started firing the P90 wildly. It was fifteen bullets a second, shot from a fallen position with no intention of hitting her target. The bullets tore at the ceiling.
The dining table rammed into Fukaziroh’s stomach.
“Gwafooh!” she grunted. But she did not release the trigger.
Llenn sprinted, listening to her wardrobe-swapped companion firing P-chan.
She’d used their trick to blast Boss—she’d had her dead to rights, but Tohma jumped in from the side to stop the bullet. Luckily enough, the bullet hit her square in the middle of the face, so she was certainly dead now.
Llenn shot the glass in front of her with the right-hand Vorpal Bunny twice, then slammed into the cracked pane to burst through, exiting the room in a dynamic fashion.
“Not so fast!” Boss snarled, pulling her gun to the right and firing at the diminutive target in MultiCam leaping out into the yard—her eternal rival, Llenn.
A number of bullets embedded into the window frame; some hit the glass and shifted trajectory, while the rest passed behind the speeding girl and vanished into the yard.
Once she had fired all thirty, Llenn came rushing back her way on the other side of the window.
“!”
Boss tossed aside the empty Vintorez and pulled out her Strizh pistol. She pointed it at Llenn on the other side of the opening, who was approaching with her hands stuck out.
Boss fired. Llenn fired.
The slide on the Strizh pumped back and forth, ejecting a 9 mm Parabellum cartridge.
“Rahhh!”
Boss stood still on the inside half of the window, turning as she fired at Llenn rushing past outside.
“Taaa!”
In the yard, Llenn zoomed past the window, firing her Vorpal Bunnies.
Ten seconds had passed since the battle had begun.
“Rrrgh!” Boss grunted. She felt pain in her right thigh and left shoulder.
The wounds were from .45-caliber bullets that Llenn had shot as she’d darted past. Two rounds fired at high speed through a window. There was no way to know if she’d aimed them that way or had simply gotten lucky.
“But this won’t be the end of me!” Boss roared, dropping the empty Strizh magazine so she could fight back.
“How about this, then?” came a different voice as a sharp pain ran through her back.
“……”
The spare magazine she was lifting up to the gun fell from her fingers.
“Damn… I was…sloppy…”
Boss expired quietly, stabbed through the side with Shirley’s ken-nata.
The P90 was no longer firing wildly at the ceiling, and the area was suddenly quiet.
The heavy thump of a large body slumping to the floor was deafening amid the silence.
Twelve seconds had passed since the battle had begun.
“Dammit… They really did a number on me…,” snarled Pitohui, right in front of the fireplace.
Exhaling her tension, she brandished her extended photon swords. Pitohui stared past Boss’s body to find Shirley twisting her ken-nata loose. She squared off against an opponent with double her number of blades, at three times the length, from a distance of thirteen feet.
After Tohma’s body, Boss’s was the next to turn into polygonal shards and vanish. The light from that process illuminated Shirley’s face from below as she marveled, “It was a ridiculous plan, but it really did work.”
This was Llenn’s strategy.
First, Fukaziroh began a plasma grenade bombardment to unnerve their opponents.
Anticipating that Pitohui would be relentless in her pursuit of Llenn, they switched outfits. It was a total gamble that all three of their opponents would come inside the building.
Fukaziroh was tough, but she sucked at shooting pistols. Llenn was weak, but her speed gave her great offensive power. If the opponent mixed them up, they would be utterly confused.
And in the midst of this chaos, Shirley snuck around the outside of the house, rather than down the creaking hallway, and slipped in behind the firefight to catch the enemy unawares.
She’d borrowed Fukaziroh’s M&P pistol, too, just in case, but she hadn’t needed to use it. Boss was so dialed in to her battle with Llenn that she never even noticed she was about to be run through.
“Yesss! We win!” shouted Fukaziroh, dressed in Llenn’s clothes in the corner of the room, from beneath the dining table Pitohui had kicked back her way. Her cap had fallen off, and her tied-up blond hair made it quite apparent that she was a different person.
She exchanged the magazine in the P90 and announced, “I give you a warrior’s mercy! Surrender!”
Meanwhile, Llenn reentered through the western door in Fukaziroh’s outfit. She had reloaded both Vorpal Bunnies.
“Not so fast, Fukaziroh. I want to end her!” shouted Shirley.
“I understand how you feel, but your blade can’t stop that woman. Don’t get any closer, or you’ll put yourself in her range. And don’t get your rifle out to shoot her, either. That’s tacky. It’s just an execution,” stated Fukaziroh. She held out the P90 but kept her finger away from the trigger guard.
“Then I’ll use what I borrowed.” Shirley sheathed the ken-nata and pulled the M&P out of her jacket pocket, where she’d stuck it to stay out of the way. She held it in a two-handed grip. She didn’t look very comfortable with it, but a gun was a gun.
“After all this time, I don’t want to execute her, either. Pistols are fine. Duel me, Pitohui!”
“Hmmm. I have just one question, though. Do you mind? All three of you.”
“What is it?” Shirley asked.
“Speak your mind,” said Fukaziroh.
Llenn was the only one who acted otherwise. She pointed the Vorpal Bunnies at Pitohui and fired.
But she was half a step too late.
Pitohui fell straight backward so Llenn’s bullets passed just in front of her face.
“Did you think you could—?”
Run away? Shirley with her pistol, plus Fukaziroh with the P90 at waist height, rushed over and examined the floor in front of the fireplace.
“Huh?” “Huh?”
There was no one there.
“She went into the chimney!” Llenn cried.
“Bastard!” Knocking chairs out of the way and leaping over the sofa, Shirley crouched to get into the fireplace, then thrust her gun through to shoot inside.
“No!” Llenn warned, but it was a split second too late.
When Shirley stuck her arm under the chimney, a falling photon sword stabbed it.
“Gah!” she howled, dropping the M&P while using her other hand to pull the lightsword out.
“What, thought you’d won?”
Pitohui’s upside-down visage emerged from the chimney, posing the question she hadn’t been able to pose earlier.
Her other photon blade swung from low to high, slicing the fireplace grate, then Shirley’s head in two vertical pieces, then the brick chimney itself, before vanishing back inside the darkness.
“You evil, evil, evil Santaaaa!” Fukaziroh fired the P90 from the hip.
Evil Santa? Like…Satan? Hmm, maybe not, thought Llenn pointlessly. All the 5.7 mm bullets chipped harmlessly off the fireplace and chimney right in front of her.
“Yikes!” she yelped as deflected bullets bounced back her way. She had to duck so fast it left an afterimage just to avoid being hit. “Stop it, Fuka! She’s already gone up!”
“Should we shoot up from the inside?”
Llenn glanced at the fireplace, where Shirley’s corpse had already vanished. The M&P was on the ground, as well as two other pistols—Pitohui’s XDMs, which she kept in her thigh holsters.
She got what was going on. The chimney narrowed as it climbed, so Pitohui had doffed them for a smaller profile. She was squirming her way farther upward like a caterpillar.
“Oh! We can’t let her get outside!”
Pitohui didn’t have her KTR-09 assault rifle. Either she’d left it outside or in her inventory; either way, if she passed through the chimney out to freedom, she would be able to use the rifle again, so they wouldn’t stand a chance.
Despite the Vorpal Bunny she was clutching, Llenn used her left hand to open the game window, then rushed over to Fukaziroh and tapped her left shoulder. Instantly, their clothes swapped back to normal.
On her back was the pack with all the magazines for the Vorpal Bunnies, which she promptly used to load fresh ammo.
Fukaziroh was reunited with her MGL-140s, along with her backpack and bulletproof vest. The vest had held backup magazines for the Vorpal Bunnies, but they returned to Fukaziroh now.
No one was holding the P90, so it inevitably clattered to the floor.
“Whaaaat? You’re leaving me behiiiind?!” squealed P-chan.
Sorry! All Llenn could do was apologize. There was no time to pick it up and switch out the other weapons.
As she transformed back to her original look, Llenn rushed in the direction Pitohui had come from, pointing the Vorpal Bunnies ahead of her as she passed through the door, the hallway, and then outside.
“There! Yes!”
She spotted the KTR-09 with its drum magazine and kicked it.
“Get outta heeeere!”
It was a perfect strike for all she was worth. The gun floated a bit and fell into the yard, then down one of the massive holes the grenades had left behind.
Trying to ignore the pain in her foot, Llenn shouted, “I kicked her rifle away! Now the only weapons she has are the photon swords and the knives in her boots…I think!”
“That’s huge! We can win!” Fukaziroh replied.
Llenn rushed farther out into the yard—but felt a horrible tingle of dread in her spine.
What people actually “sensed” in VR games was a matter of long, unresolved debate—but at this moment, Llenn most certainly sensed something.
How is Pitohui going to attack without a ranged weapon? she wondered. But her body moved on its own.
She leaped, spinning in the air. It was the fastest method she knew to avoid a shot—a maneuver she’d employed in the duel with Boss in SJ4. But it could only halve the target she presented.
As she spun, .45-caliber bullets passed in front of her and behind—right before her flat chest and just under her bulging backpack. Through the rotation, Llenn caught a glimpse of Pitohui looking down at her from the roof of the cabin fifteen feet above, pistols in both hands.
And the pistols were familiar.
Llenn spun and fell into one of the holes Fukaziroh had created, just like the KTR-09 she’d punted. She wasn’t trying to do that; it was just where she was going to land once she leaped.
She slid on her butt facing backward down the hole, which was a good thirty feet deep.
“Fuka!” she called out. “Pito’s already got two guns! They were an ace up her sleeve!”
“No way! What kind?”
“Same as mine! Two black ones! And the exact backpack! So don’t get too close! Her back’s protected, too!”
“We can’t complain about that! Suuzaburou’s life hangs in the balance here!”
“What about mine?”
“I don’t care if you go down, too! Just win! You have to win, Llenn!”
“You’re too honest for your own good, Fuka,” Llenn chided archly. But on the inside, she told herself that she wasn’t going to stuff curry into her friend’s mouth like she did last time.
“Ooh-hoo! They’re still going! That’s wild!” exclaimed Clarence on the hill to the north.
Only thirty seconds had passed since she’d fired the Five-Seven to signal the start of combat.
In that time, Clarence had witnessed Fukaziroh, wearing Llenn’s getup, shoot a bunch of plasma grenades that left giant holes all over the west side of the yard.
Then Pitohui’s team and Llenn and Fukaziroh’s team—the two were impossible to tell apart from this distance now—rushed into the building, while Shirley trotted around the north exterior of the cabin. Raucous shooting resounded from inside the building.
Once things quieted down, she thought the battle must have finished, but then a photon sword sliced through the chimney on top of the roof, and Pitohui emerged from inside it. New guns in hand, she fired at Llenn as the tiny girl rushed out of the building. But her shots had missed.
“Wow, what a show.”
Llenn slid and slid and slid on her rear down to the bottom of the hole, but she got right back to her feet and tried to scramble up the side.
She might have gotten hit along the way, but in the pit of a hole, it didn’t really matter where the shooter was outside it—you were dead meat. She had to at least be able to pop her head out before Pitohui came into the yard.
But I can do this with speed like mine.
She took one step on the slope, and sliiiiip—
There was no traction.
“Huh?”
Fukaziroh had created the huge mortar-shaped hole—more like a crater—with a plasma grenade, and the outer portion was made of soft, loose earth.
“What?”
Taking another step would only cause more dirt to come loose. She nearly lost her balance and fell forward, which would have jammed the muzzles of the Vorpal Bunnies into the dirt. Incidentally, both in real life and in GGO, there were people who argued you would blow up the barrel of your weapon if you tried to shoot through a dirt blockage—and people who argued it would blast through just fine.
“Whaaaaat?!”
“What’s up, Llenn? Did you get her?”
“I… I can’t get out! I fell in the hole, and I’m stuck!”
“What? I’m on my way!”
“No! Don’t come here!” Llenn shouted, but there was already someone at the lip of the hole.
Fukaziroh hadn’t arrived already. It was Pitohui, of course.
“Hiii!”
She was too fast. She must have leaped all the way down from the rooftop, despite knowing it would cause major leg damage.
The lip of the hole was about fifty feet away. Llenn was staring up against the sun, so she could only make out a silhouette, but the lithe body, long ponytail, and inward-tilted pair of black pistols were clear enough.
“Aaaah!”
Llenn pointed the Vorpal Bunnies right back at her.
Pitohui’s black AM.45s and Llenn’s pink AM.45s faced off—and fired together.
“Gahk!”
“Rrgh!”
Llenn and Pitohui grunted at the same time.
Llenn’s rounds hit Pitohui’s shoulders. Pitohui’s rounds hit Llenn’s shoulders.
The pink demon’s body was thrown backward, Vorpal Bunnies flying out of her numbed fingers.
“Aaaah.”
“Farewell,” mourned the guns as they thumped into the dirt about ten feet away.
Llenn toppled backward, and her momentum stopped as the backpack stuck on the earth. There was a metallic sound behind her waist. Her hit points were down to 40 percent.
Pitohui also fell back from getting hit, but she was up on her feet within three seconds, where Llenn could see her again.
And the AM.45s were still in her hands.
Argh! She’s so tough!
They’d both taken .45-caliber bullets in the same spot, but Pitohui hadn’t let go of her guns. Whether that was the difference in their numerical strength or simply their willpower was unclear.
But in any case, Llenn knew one thing: I can’t beat her.
She no longer had any weapons on hand.
“Only a fool would give in!” Kni-chan cheered.
Sorry, a correction: She no longer had any ranged weapons on hand.
“Lleeeeeenn, my deaaaar!”
Her eyes had grown accustomed to the glare of the sun in the background, so she could make out Pitohui’s expression now.
She wore a smirk of delight—great, unbridled, wicked delight.
Her arms were outstretched in that inward tilted way again. The bullet lines from her guns fixed on Llenn’s forehead.
“Prepaaaare…toooooo… Boofp!”
And suddenly, for some reason, Pitohui was flying.
She was soaring from the edge of the ditch, then over the pit itself.
And that was when Llenn heard the faint sound of an explosion.
It’s Fuka!
It made sense to her now. Fukaziroh had shot a grenade from behind Pitohui. It had struck her backpack and erupted against its armor plating.
Its detonation power might not have pierced the pack to reach her body, but the explosive force had been properly transferred. It threw Pitohui’s body a good sixty feet.
“Damn youuuuuu!” she swore in midair, her AM.45 still aimed.
Onward she fell.
Come right down here! Llenn prayed, but it quickly became clear that her wish would go unheard. Pitohui’s momentum was too strong; she was going to fly over Llenn.
Bullet lines moved toward her back from overhead. Pitohui was going to blast her while she was still flying through the air.
I can’t. I have no way of attacking her…, Llenn thought, capitulating again.
“Do not relinquish hope, I tell you!” Kni-chan scolded her. That was when something felt off to Llenn.
When she’d fallen into the hole earlier, she’d landed on her backpack, and there was a sharp, metallic sound.
Why?
There was armor plating in the backpack, but the exterior was nylon. And the dirt was soft.
Why did it make that sound…?
“Grab it! Reach out and take it!” Kni-chan urged again, revealing the answer.
Llenn stood up and spun around.
She grabbed the object that had been behind her waist, the object that the handle of her combat knife struck when she fell and lifted it with all of her strength.
“Pito! Eat thiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiis!”
She fired the KTR-09 on full auto.
Before Pitohui could pull the triggers, the wild spray of 7.62 mm bullets passed over her figure, and by coincidence—true, miraculous coincidence—one struck her directly in the chest.
“Gahk!”
The force of the round smashing into her armored breastplate slammed Pitohui backward in a vertical backflip, unable to fire the AM.45s. She slammed back-first into the slope on the opposite side of the hole from Llenn.
“Aagh!”
The impact caused her to bounce, knocking the pistols from her hands. Her backpack acted like a sled, so she slid down the slope, her body glowing with damage effects. She only came to a stop at the bottom of the hole, just ten feet from Llenn.
She’s so tough…
Pitohui wasn’t dead yet. That was her in a nutshell.
But her remaining hit points had to be minuscule.
“Whew…”
Llenn slowly lifted the heavy KTR-09 to inspect it. She pulled the bolt on the side back a bit to examine the inside of the chamber. She was checking for any loading problems, to see if it was still operable. It was, of course, none other than Pitohui who had taught her how to shoot the AK series, which was what the KTR-09 was based on.
There was nothing wrong with it. The GUN EQUIPPED icon in her lower-right corner displayed the KTR-09 with a healthy seventy rounds to go.
The reason for her diligence, of course, was that she hadn’t forgotten the ending to SJ2. But this KTR-09, which she would now call K-chan, was on Llenn’s side.
“Yes, that’s right, sweetie. Honestly, as long as I can be useful, I don’t care who wields me,” stated K-chan. She sounded like an adult.
Llenn pointed the KTR-09 at Pitohui, who was still faceup on her back, and placed her finger against the trigger. The bullet circle appeared over Pitohui’s stomach. Their eyes met.
“Hah! You gonna do it?”
“I’m not,” Llenn replied at once.
“You all right down there?” called out Fukaziroh from overhead. She came to the lip of the ditch, pointing one of her MGL-140s down at the bottom. “Llenn! You need a finisher?”
“You gonna blow me up, too?! The fight’s over!”
“You sure about that?” smirked Pitohui, a moment before an explosion went off.
It came from above, and the moment Llenn recognized it was a grand grenade, Fukaziroh had already been blasted over the edge of the hole.
“Hyaaaaa!”
Like Pitohui, she soared over the pit, and like Pitohui, she landed on the opposite side on her back.
“Goofh!”
Like Pitohui, she slid on her back down the dirt slope.
“……”
Llenn could only watch in dumbfounded shock as Fukaziroh came to rest three feet away from their opponent.
“Hrrgh…”
Fukaziroh was dazed; her hit points were down to 6 percent. Her body was glowing red all over, so she must have taken the brunt of the plasma grenade’s damage.
Pitohui had set it up, of course.
When Llenn had shot her with the Vorpal Bunnies at the edge of the hole, and she’d briefly fallen backward out of sight, she must have activated the grand grenade on a timer and had hidden it in the log cabin somewhere.
What a devious schemer.
“Arrrgh! Fine! I’m going to blast you, then!”
Llenn aimed the KTR-09 at her target again.
“Huh…?”
That was when she saw what was in the hands of the other woman lying in the dirt.
She must have reached back and pulled it out of the backpack during the confusion of the eruption. It was a dull-gray orb about the size of a small watermelon.
A…grand grenade…
The tension in Llenn’s trigger finger loosened. If she shot that grenade, it would cause an eruption double the size of the crater, killing everyone.
“Damn… We lose…”
And that would mean losing sight of their goal.
“What’s wrong, Llenn? Shoot h—!” Fukaziroh shouted when she saw Pitohui, before cutting off midsentence.
“Go ahead. Shoot me,” jeered Pitohui, smiling from her upside-down position. She looked like a demon or a sorcerer—or both.
“We lost. We’ve lost this one. Fuka… I’m sorry…”
“……Dammit…dammit… At least shoot me dead first…”
Llenn swore to herself that she was going to stuff many spoonfuls of curry into her friend’s mouth. She put the safety on the KTR-09 and tossed it onto the dirt.
“Oh, you’re not going to shoot me? Maybe next time,” bemoaned K-chan, who fell silent from there.
“In that case,” Pitohui said, spinning around and getting to her feet with the grand grenade held out in front of her, “I win this round.”
Llenn sat down in the dirt. “We lost… When you shoot Suuzaburou, at least do it somewhere far away, where we can’t see it…” She hung her head in defeat.
But she raised it again when Pitohui said, “Hmm? Oh, I’m not killing the doggy.”
“Whaaat?”
Baffled and back in their basic combat fatigues, Llenn and Fukaziroh climbed up the rope Clarence tossed down once they’d called her over.
“You guys are a lot of trouble, you know that?”
“Don’t fall in, Clare. If you do, none of us can get back out.”
“Yeah, yeah. Would have been nice if you’d left some of the footing around here in better shape. The house is totally trashed, you know. Can you imagine what the owner’s going to think when they get back?”
Clarence had to tie one end of the rope around the axle of the rusted Porsche tractor. Then she hauled up the other three one at a time, with more strength than you’d expect from her looks.
They were back at ground level, surrounded by the splendor of nature again—plus the half-destroyed cabin.
“Have you reached your answer?” asked Suuzaburou. The little black dog was sitting nearby.
“We have!” said Pitohui. “As a team, we’re not going to kill you. So we’ll just resign from the quest.”
“Is that your final decision…?”
“Yep. We all agreed a moment ago.”
And to the shock of Llenn, Fukaziroh, and Clarence—who hadn’t heard the final decision until this point—Suuzaburou replied, “Congratulations. You have completed the quest. You are the fastest to finish it.” Then he added, “And now, good-bye.”
He stood up and spun around, showing his fluffy little tail and butt.
“……”
Then he turned back around and returned to the group—specifically, to Fukaziroh.
“Fukaziroh. You cared for me more than anyone else.”
“Suuzaburou…” She knelt down and cradled the little black spitz.
“Thank you. I will tell tales of you in Dog Heaven,” he said, popping out his tiny doggy tongue to lick Fukaziroh just once on the mouth.
Then he sprang away, as if to escape, and did not turn back.
The little dog disappeared into the tall grass and was never seen again.
A large CONGRATULATIONS! sign and windows announcing a very generous amount of experience points displayed before the team who was the quickest to complete the quest.
“But…how…?” Llenn asked Pitohui.
Fukaziroh faced the fields where Suuzaburou had vanished, as still as a statue, salty liquid pouring down her cheeks. She wasn’t going to be of any use for a while.
“Hmm? How what?”
“How did you know we’d finish the quest if we didn’t kill the dog? Or did you just change your mind on the spot…?”
“Yeah!” Clarence pouted. “I wanna know that, too! And what was that pooch anyway? An AI? Just a character? I don’t get it!”
“Ah. Anyway, you didn’t read that crappy writer’s books, right?”
“Huh? Yeah, that’s right. I mentioned that in the fourth ordeal.”
“You see, that hack is a real dog lover. There are always a bunch of dogs in his books. Talking ones, too.”
“Uh…huh…”
Why should I care? Llenn thought.
“Incidentally, I’m a cat person.”
“Yeah, I know. Make with the explanation.”
“Now, would you expect a story he wrote to have the faithful canine, who’s helped out the whole time, reveal himself as the final kill target and go Yay, you beat the quest after that?”
“Well…uh… I guess not…”
Fukaziroh loved dogs and refused to let that happen. Mutt lovers loathed scenes where the dog dies.
There was even an English website where you could search movies to find out if there was a scene where a dog (or other animal) died. That way you could safely view a movie while being certain that no dog lovers would be traumatized.
“Right? So I’m guessing that everyone else made that mistake. It’s a quest, after all, so they probably just shot the dog without thinking twice. And that’s how we’re the first group to finish the quest, even though we took so long!”
“Ohhhhhh! I get it! I guess I was right about that sixth ordeal thing!” marveled Clarence, who was very impressed.
Hmm? Wait a second…
Llenn wasn’t fooled.
“Pito… Does this mean…you knew about this…from the very start…?”
“Yeah, I guess. When you’re a Pitohui like me, you just cotton on to these things, ya know?”
“Which would mean…you knew the right answer…and you still claimed that we should kill the dog to finish the quest?”
“Oh my goodness. Is that right? Whatever could have gotten into me?”
And then, just to be sure, Llenn snarled, “Bitch, did you do this just to fight us?”
“Geez, you’re scaring me. Don’t glare at me like that, Llenn. And you, Fuka, how long are you going to cry? You’ll die of dehydration,” insisted Pitohui, materializing in the spacious private room at the pub.
“Mmm!” grunted M. He and the other team members (and non–team members) reacted to their sudden appearance.
“I won’t stand for this!” Llenn shouted.
“There, there. All’s well that ends well, as they say. It was the best possible ending to the quest, wasn’t it?” consoled Clarence soothingly.
“……”
Fukaziroh returned in silence, tears streaming down her face like a waterfall.
The next moment, all of those who died in the event offered their congratulations to the survivors. They were all trying to speak at once, so the girls had to wait for the noise to die down.
“All right, all right! Good job, everyone! Do you know the result already?”
“We do! We came in first! They announced it over here, too, and we got tons of experience and credits! In fact, no other squadrons have finished the quest! Our names are going down in GGO history!” crowed Boss. She was supremely proud.
“We have no idea what happened in there, though. Only as far as what Shirley saw,” added M, curious.
That made sense. Unlike Squad Jam, this wasn’t being streamed anywhere. The rest of the participants had just been waiting around for the others to finish—and asking each member for an update as they died.
“Huh?”
That was when Llenn noticed that there were too many people in the room.
In addition to the twelve members of their team, there was another group including a woman in tiger-stripe camo and a third group with a scowling man.
Seated around the table were twenty-four people in the “private” room. The furniture and the room had therefore automatically expanded to accommodate the greater number of guests.
“Hi, guys! Ahhh, I see, I see, very interesting! Mm-hmm-hmm-hmm.”
“Stop chuckling, Pitohui! Goddammit!” swore David, the representative of MMTM. His expression was the very picture of disgruntlement.
“I assume you’re going to fill things in for us. That’s why we waited around,” added Vivi in a rather harsh tone by her standards. The other members of ZEMAL were waiting obediently at her side.
“Oh, you bet! I’ll tell you everything! So listen up, folks! First, take a seat!”
Pitohui looked happier now than Llenn had ever seen her.
“Good grief…”
She ordered an iced tea, and it promptly popped up out of the table. Then she sat down next to her friend, who sobbed, “Suuzaburou… You’re on…your own now…”
“It’s not curry, but you need to drink this,” Llenn consoled, sticking the straw in Fukaziroh’s mouth.
The End
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