A crossover anime/manga story, set in everyday Tokyo, but within a loop of a game.

Page 172

"Roots!"

Several thick plant roots broke through the hard tiled floor and wrapped around Yuuki Asuna's legs. Faced with the choice between launching a direct attack, which could result in her legs being bound and restricting her movement, and abandoning the attack, Yuuki Asuna decisively chose the latter and quickly retreated a distance.

As Kotoko Iwanaga's pale demon hand appeared in the void, the last player took out a long spear that shimmered with a pale golden light from his inventory and thrust the spear tip directly into the palm of the demon hand. The holy attribute damage attached to it clearly countered the curse attribute of the demon hand, and the demon hand dissipated immediately after the spear thrust.

"Have we been discovered...?"

The three players hiding behind the protective shield didn't even glance at their teammates who had turned to ashes. Their expressions became stiff and numb, clearly indicating that they had given up on pretending.

"Knew it."

Asagiri looked at the three people's faces and said in a calm tone.

"You are all players who have not been suspected at all. It seems that from the very beginning of this instance, there have been some parasitic players hiding among us."

"You and that guy in the white suit are indeed very smart, but..."

The three players' eyeballs gradually changed, turning into thin strips of flesh tangled together, so disgusting that words could not describe it.

The next second, many fleshy tentacles emerged from the surrounding ground and walls, intertwining to form the shapes of players' bodies. Nine of them looked like the thirteen players who had been in a state of confusion, while the other twelve were members of the three player teams who had not been suspected before.

"As long as I can kill you, it's completely worth it, even if it means sacrificing these puppets."

"Are you making me laugh?"

Asagiri glanced at the twenty-four parasitic players surrounding her, Yuuki Asuna, and the others. There was no fear or cowardice on her face. Instead, she shook her head with a hint of regret.

"There were only twenty-four people. It was a rare PVP session, but we could only kill eight players each before it ended. That was really not enough fun."

22

Chapter 22 The true meaning of keeping quiet.

Without further ado, the parasitic players launched an attack, with several of them possessing ranged abilities.

"Fireball!"

"Ice pick!"

"Corrosion ball!"

In addition to the three spell-type attacks, there was also a sharp spear and arrows, and the five parasitic players were all aiming at Asagiri, who was standing there.

"Persona, Human Asura".

The towering human-like Asura appeared instantly, shielding the morning mist with its body. Due to its resistance to corrosion, the dark green orb of light did not cause it any damage. The fireball, ice spikes, spears, and arrows did cause some damage, but only to the surface of its body, which was practically harmless to the human-like Asura.

At the same time, Asuna Yuuki also launched an attack. In a flash, she severed the limbs of two parasitic players. Kotoko Iwanaga, who had developed a fighting synergy with her, immediately raised her hand and activated Hades Grip again, summoning the Pale Demon Hand to crush the bodies of the two enemies into dust.

"Flickering".

A parasitic player wearing a dark gray cloak activated a skill, teleporting nearly ten meters to appear directly behind Kotoko Iwanaga, his sharp dagger aimed fiercely at the back of her head.

"boom!!"

Like a ghost, Kato Megumi suddenly appeared, swinging her Indian battle tomahawk and striking the player directly in the chest. At the same time, she activated her "throwing" skill, sending the opponent flying.

After the brief first round, all four members of the Asagiri Squad were unharmed, except...

"Your abilities are very strong."

The parasitic player, whose chest had been cleaved through by a battle axe, with even the broken ribs and beating heart still visible, stood up. Thin strips of flesh sprouted from the wound, slowly repairing the potentially fatal injury. He looked at Asagiri and spoke in a mechanical tone that was neither human nor emotionful.

"Come and become a part of me."

"happy."

Asagiri shook her head, speaking in a relaxed tone.

"But as expected, the player you've parasitized, while possessing monstrous vitality, still has the power, physical attributes, and mental strength that the original player can use fixed within the original player's capabilities. How ridiculous..."

At this point, the Human Asura suddenly charged at an astonishing speed completely disproportionate to its massive size, directly in front of a parasitic player. It grabbed the player's neck with one hand, lifted the player's body up, grabbed the player's hip with the other hand, and tore the player's body in two.

Amidst a shower of blood, Asagiri stepped on the still-pulsating fleshy tentacle that had fallen from the parasitic player's body, glanced around at the other parasitic players, and spoke slowly in a cold tone.

"When the gap in strength is too large, quantity becomes meaningless. In the end..."

"They're just a bunch of rabble."

Upon hearing Asagiri's words, and seeing the oppressive aura emanating from him, Yuuki Asuna, Iwanaga Kotoko, and the black-haired girl who had disappeared again at some point, who was carrying a black longbow but was attacking with a battle axe, the bodies of all the remaining parasitic players began to writhe, turning into intertwined strips of fleshy tentacles.

"Yes, it's indeed unlikely that we can defeat you by sheer numbers, but..."

All the parasitic players gradually gathered together, their writhing flesh intertwined, and began to perform a kind of fusion-like behavior. A dozen mouths appeared on the surface of the writhing mountain of flesh, speaking in different voices at the same time.

"As long as they are combined into one place, then..."

"Persona, Mita!"

"Holy Cross!"

"Spear of Frost!"

"The Grip of the Underworld!"

"Sword technique, like flying stardust!"

"Sniper!"

Crazy Mita's grenade, Asagiri's Holy Cross and Frost Spear, Kotoko Iwanaga's Hades Grip summoned a giant pale ghost hand, Asuna Yuuki's strongest sword technique Stardust Splash, and Megumi Kato's three jet-black arrows all landed on the twisting, writhing mass of flesh at the same time.

"boom!!!"

The explosion caused by the combined attacks shook the surrounding ground. Kotoko Iwanaga created a shield of black particles to protect everyone from the flying bits of flesh.

"Why... why..."

After the smoke from the explosion cleared, Asagiri saw a piece of flesh with a mouth on the ground, making weak sounds. She stepped on the mouth and chuckled as she ground it.

"Do you think this is a virtual game? You can't attack during the BOSS's second-phase animation?"

From the very beginning, Asagiri, Yuuki Asuna, and the others were prepared for battle. With the strength of the four-person team, victory was a given. However, the problem was that the parasitic player was just a puppet created by a bizarre entity splitting its main body, and there was also something in the hotel that would cause the temperature to rise. Wasting physical and mental energy on a battle that had only just begun in the dungeon was clearly not a wise choice.

For the four members of the squad, the strength of the parasitic player itself was not a major concern. The main problem was the powerful vitality that allowed them to continue fighting even with their heads pierced. After all, at this stage, only Asagiri's Supreme Magic Bullet, Yuuki Asuna's Stardust Splash, and Iwanaga Kotoko's Underworld Grip could directly destroy a player's body, forcing the fleshy tentacles hiding inside to detach. However, the consumption of these three skills was simply too great.

That's why Asagiri used classic "diplomatic" tactics: provocation and mockery.

Any being capable of thought will inevitably be influenced by emotions, and even the most bizarre beings are no exception.

Make the opponent realize that simply piling up numbers won't kill Asagiri, and when the opponent is fusing or doing something like that, destroy all the parasitic players in one fell swoop.

"Ta-da! What's inside the equipment room? I'm so excited!"

Kotoko Iwanaga skipped and hopped to the closed door of the equipment room, her cute little face full of excitement. This moment of revelation after reasoning was the one she enjoyed the most.

"Let me drive. What if there's danger inside?"

"Will not."

Upon hearing Asuna Yuuki's concerned words, Kotoko Iwanaga simply waved her hand and smiled.

"If that strange entity that controls the parasitic phenomenon could enter the equipment room, wouldn't it just have the parasitic players destroy the equipment room? Since it's just guarding the door, it proves that it doesn't have the ability to enter the equipment room."

As Kotoko Iwanaga spoke, she turned the doorknob and opened the equipment room door. However, after opening the door, she did not go directly into the equipment room. Instead, she looked inside the door frame and called out.

"Leader, take a look at this."

Asagiri walked slowly over and saw that the door frame was coated with some kind of golden powder-like substance.

He first turned on his phone, then reached out and gently touched the golden powder with his finger, but the app with the eye icon didn't give any prompts, and Kotoko Iwanaga didn't sense anything strange from the powder.

"Is this the thing that prevented that strange entity from entering this room...? I've never seen anything like it before. Is it some kind of substance containing spiritual power that can exorcise demons...?"

Kotoko Iwanaga curiously observed the inside of the doorway, while Asuna Yuuki and Megumi Kato went into the equipment control room. There, on a table, were three screens. One of them, which should have displayed images from various security cameras throughout the hotel, was completely black with only static. On the table was a red button covered by a transparent protective cover, next to which was written: "Press three times consecutively to activate the emergency alarm."

"Wait a moment."

Just as Asuna Yuuki was about to press the red button to activate the hotel's emergency alarm system, Asagiri suddenly stopped her.

"Something's not right."

Asagiri opened her phone and glanced at the special notification, scrutinizing every punctuation mark, and realized something strange about it.

"【Keep quiet】... It doesn't mean keep quiet during dangerous times, but there's only one 【Keep quiet】. It feels abrupt that these last four words appear suddenly, and it doesn't specify when to keep quiet. System prompts usually don't use such ambiguous and misleading wording."

"what do you mean……"

Asuna Yuuki frowned, seemingly lost in thought.

"The system's instruction to keep quiet doesn't refer to a specific time period, nor does it mean the players themselves should keep quiet; rather, it means the 'hotel' should keep quiet?"

"I can't give a specific reason, it's just a feeling."

Asagiri stared at the red button on the table and said in a calm tone.

"Based on the information we have, we cannot be certain that the strange entity controlling the parasitic phenomenon is afraid of sharp sounds. It did seem fearful when it saw us trying to enter the equipment room and mobilized all the parasitic players to stop us. But thinking about it carefully, the possibility that it is afraid of someone activating the alarm is not just because it is afraid of sounds, but also..."

Asagiri raised her hand and looked at the three women in front of her: Yuuki Asuna, Iwanaga Kotoko, and Kato Megumi, and said softly.

"Twenty-odd parasitic players are indeed troublesome, but if it weren't us, but a more cautious team that prefers a safer approach rather than enjoying the bonus points for clearing the dungeon alone, and if seventy or eighty normal players cooperated, they could easily break through the parasitic players' defenses. Moreover, we didn't encounter any obstacles on our way to the first floor. Is the difficulty of the third phase of the dungeon so easy to overcome? Don't forget, this hotel isn't an isolated space. We know that the Blackwatch people have been here before, and outside is a dark and unknown world. If we press the alarm like this..."

"Will this attract even more terrifying and bizarre events?"

23

Chapter 23 The Existence of "Gods".

"Hmm...it's not impossible."

Kotoko Iwanaga stared thoughtfully at the red button covered by a transparent glass shield.

"In the long, dark night, a hotel is emitting a sharp, piercing alarm... This development sounds ominous."

Asuna Yuuki looked troubled and hesitated.

"So now... what should we do?"

Asuna Yuuki has a very good mind; her reasoning and analytical skills are far superior to those of the average person. However, she lacks the ability to make decisive decisions in ambiguous situations, so she is not well-suited to be the leader of a team.

But Asagiri is different; his guiding principle can be summed up in two words: decisive.

"No more."

Asagiri announced her decision without hesitation, and then explained in a low voice.

"Pressing the button could end the 'parasitism' phenomenon, or it could attract an even more terrifying and bizarre entity. We can't determine which will happen based on the current information, so we should make a decision based on risk assessment. It's unlikely that any of the four members of our team will be 'parasitized.' Even if someone falls into an illusion, I can summon Alice and pull you out, just like we did in the Giant Mountain Mental Hospital. So even if we let the 'parasitism' phenomenon continue, the worst outcome for us is just losing the points for completing the game and having to deal with those parasitized players. These are risks within our control. But if we make the wrong choice and trigger the game's penalty mechanism, then the consequences are hard to say."

"Too."

Kato Megumi nodded, slung the jet-black Weeping Nightingale Bow back onto her back, pushed up the hair tie she used to tie her long black hair into a high ponytail, and said softly.

"It's better to be cautious."

Compared to Asagiri, who just enjoys playing games, Kotoko Iwanaga, who is fearless, and Asuna Yuuki, who is extremely competitive and sometimes pretends to be strong, Megumi Kato is the one in the team whose personality is closest to that of an ordinary player.

When you're confident, try to get extra points for completing the level, but if the risk is too high, there's no need to take that risk.

……

When the four of them walked out of the equipment room, there were already four or five player teams standing outside, including the man in the white suit and his teammates.

The players stared at the pieces of flesh on the ground and the mess left by the explosion. Their expressions were complicated as they looked at Asagiri and the others. Some wanted to ask what had happened, but hesitated, as if they were worried that asking too many questions would displease the black-clad player.

Only the man in the white suit maintained a calm and composed expression, even taking two steps forward and asking with a smile.

"Excuse me, are those the corpses of the parasitic players on the ground?"

"Yes."

Asagiri first admitted it without any attempt to hide it, then pointed to the door of the equipment room behind her and said in a calm tone.

"Do you and your teammates have any abilities similar to creating a barrier? Seal this place off and don't let anyone in."

"it is good."

The man in the white suit didn't ask any further questions. He simply glanced at a woman beside him who was dressed in white and wearing a white fox demon mask. The woman understood immediately and walked to the door of the equipment room. She took out a talisman-like object from her pocket, but before sticking it to the door frame, she suddenly noticed the golden powder inside the frame. She touched it lightly with her index finger and then turned to the man in the white suit with a questioning look.

The man in the white suit did not answer directly, but simply smiled and said...

"Alright, everyone, let's disperse for now. We still have some things to discuss."

Upon hearing the words of the man in the white suit, the other players realized that he wanted to have a private chat between the two teams with the player in the black trench coat, and they all wisely turned around and left.

After all the players had left, a strange light appeared in the eyes of the male player who had been guarding the fire escape doorway in the stairwell. He glanced around and then said in a deep voice to the man in the white suit.