CHAPTER 15
The Battle Is Over, the Day Is Done
September 20, 2026 (Sun)
“Hullo! Hi, Llenn! Good job yesterday!”
Pitohui greeted her with yet another energetic, obnoxious welcome and went in for a big hug, but Llenn dodged out of the way. She was faster than anyone.
They were in a private room at a pub in Glocken, at one fifteen in the afternoon.
About twenty-four hours had passed since the start of the battle to the death known as SJ5. Yes, it was the next day.
“Am I the last one here? Sorry for making everyone wait.”
Everyone else who’d been called here was already present in the rectangular room, aside from Llenn. The group included the five members of LPFM and the six members of SHINC. They could easily fit another ten people around the long table.
After the end of yesterday’s Squad Jam, Llenn had fallen and fallen until she finally hit the ground and died after roughly seventy-five seconds. She suffered quite the impact.
In fact, Llenn had been lulled into a kind of stupor and was so startled by the sudden jolt that the AmuSphere’s safety measures kicked in and shut down the game. She was returned to reality.
As a result, all the aftereffects of her long, protracted battle immediately hit Karen in the form of a headache. So she sent a message to everyone explaining that she wouldn’t be logging back in—and thanked Boss in particular for saving her.
They decided to schedule the LPFM celebration party for the next day, instead, starting at one thirty.
That was pretty prompt scheduling, but since she was the first to return to the real world, she certainly couldn’t ditch this one. Thankfully, she didn’t have any other plans, aside from doing her classwork.
Llenn thought she was showing up early, but she was the last one there.
“You’re not late!” said Clarence, looking dashing and handsome, as always. She had a French fry in her fingers.
“Pito gave you a time thirty minutes later than everyone else’s,” Fukaziroh informed her. She had her helmet off, letting down her smooth golden hair. It really changed her look quite dramatically.
“Oh, dang,” Llenn blurted out. That would explain it, then. “But why?”
“Because we can’t keep the guest of honor waiting, of course. And you did show up pretty early,” Shirley said, eating a potato next to Clarence. “Fuka just got here.”
“Hey, I thought we agreed not to mention that!”
“I didn’t agree to anything.”
“I thought we agreed not to mention that either!”
“Which I did not.”
Llenn ignored them and went over to Boss. She was still huge, even sitting down.
With a little bob of her head, Llenn said, “Thank you for saving me.”
“You already thanked me yesterday. But you’re welcome.”
Llenn continued to thank each and every member of SHINC, then sat down at the end of the table.
“All right! The guest of honor has seated herself, so the party may begin!”
Of course, they’d already been eating and drinking quite a lot, but that was fine.
“Here,” said M, setting down an iced tea in front of her.
“Thank you, M. Good job yesterday.”
“It was a fantastic battle.”
“In that case, I’ll take the lead!” Pitohui cried energetically. “Before we can toast, I’m going to give a really long, stupid, boring speech that’ll last until all the beer is lukewarm! GG, everybody! Cheers!”
It was one of the shortest speeches in world history.
Llenn had just enough time to take a sip of her iced tea through a straw.
“Okay, party’s over! Time for the SJ5 postmortem!”
One of the shortest parties in world history came to an end, transitioning into a chance for reflection and betterment.
There wasn’t all that much to do, however; they just recollected the battle from the day before, and talked it through with the occasional diversion—in this case, the diversions took up the bulk of the time.
Whether party or postmortem, they were doing basically the same thing, so Llenn didn’t mind. It was more fun doing this than battling, and it was always wonderful to spend quality time with her friends.
So she made an offer. “Maybe we should order some pizza for once. If you eat too much here, it can be dangerous, because it ruins your appetite in the real world… But I could stand to eat a little less for one day.”
“Yeah!” Clarence roared, having just finished off a huge plate of potatoes. How much was she planning to eat?
Pitohui said, “I’m down! What better food for a party than pizza? Let’s get extra-larges! I’m talkin’ the size of a manhole!”
What happened to the postmortem? Llenn wondered but did not say.
“Take it away, M,” Pitohui said, dumping the responsibility on him. “Anchovies, anchovies! And one with pineapple! Let’s get a thin crust! But also one deep-dish! Also, we can get Buffalo wings, right? I’ll take it medium-hot! Also…”
Her love for Kenji Miyazawa was apparent. This was indeed a Restaurant of Many Orders.
“So no one ended up winning that bounty prize,” Llenn mentioned, bringing up the topic she was most curious about. “Who do you think put that out…?”
“Oh, that came up first when we met today, so we got the answer before you showed,” Fukaziroh said, to Llenn’s surprise.
“Really?”
After SJ5 yesterday, Karen had mulled over that question quite a lot. If there was an answer, she very much wanted to know it.
“Yeah. We came up with our own answer.”
“And that is?”
“Anyone.”
“Huh?”
“It can be anyone. Ultimately, we don’t know the answer in the current situation, so there’s no point fretting over it.”
“……”
This was a very unsatisfying answer, but if they weren’t going to learn the exact person, then this was clearly the best.
“All right, we’ll go with that.”
Llenn reached out for a piece of the massive pizza that was now resting on the table, piled high with anchovies.
The End
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