PLEASE ENTER NAME : LEVEL 12
DAY 185 : A-DAY, FOURTHWEEK, FULGORA, YEAR 1
ARENA 6 : ROUND 6 : BIG O NOTATION
[ NEW S.T.A.T.S — STRENGTH: MAGICAL=32 - PHYSICAL=16 — TENACITY: DEFENSE=32 - SPEED=16 — APTITUDE: MANA=32 - STAMINA=16 — TILT: CONTROL=32 - LUCK=16 ]
There’s no instantiated battleground this time. Only jagged-yet-smooth rolling hills of the purest, highest-clarity emerald that Zack has apparently ever seen.
Nor is there a prerecorded voice. Only an unmistakably live version of that same one erupting from precisely everywhere at once across the miles-long stadium.
“YOU ALL KNOW WHAT YEAR IT IS!!! YOU KNOW WHAT ROUND IT IS!!! BUT MOST OF ALL, YOU KNOW WHAT TIME IT IS!!!”
“NO SURPRISE THEY MADE IT THIS FAR!!! IT WAS NEVER A QUESTION OF ‘IF’!!! ONLY OF ‘WHEN’!!!”
“ONLY OF WHAT ROUND!!! AND THIS ROUND!!! THE ROUND!!! THE ANIME CLUB VERSUS…”
“THEEE AAARCHIIIVE!!!”
“ALL COMBATANTS ARE PRESENT!!! AND!!! ACCOUNTED FOR!!!”
“SO LET’S GET THIS PARTY…”
[ 1:00 ]
Simon, Alex, David, Tyrone, and Kirito have been abnormally tense all week. That’s not saying much for the former. The latter is a different story.
Only now do Zack, Joe and I know why. The former doesn’t seem to be taking it too well. The latter is… I’m fine. I don’t understand the significance of this match as opposed to the others, but I am more than content with the silence.
We just stand there alternately shuffling our feet, readjusting, or remaining entirely still on a pattern-defyingly flat valley mirroring an identical one on the other side of The Emerald Hill Zone.
Nearly a minute passes like that before the announcer completes his sentence.
[ 3 ]
“STAAA-”
[ 2 ]
“-RRR-”
[ 1 ]
“-TEEED!!!”
[ 0 ]
Nearly the entire crowd joins him now. “FFFIIIGHT!!!”
Immediately, everyone summons their own equipped Big O’s.
Not Tyrone, of course. No amount of giant mechas are worth weakening him and his carefully-selected hyper-synergized armor set. Let alone just one more.
However, the rest of our builds aren’t all that affected by the extra EP restriction. Alex isn’t a fan with his reliance on weapons. But I’m worse off by far, so no one complained too hard when we settled on the strategy. As a dullahan, the EP for an equipped vehicle slot works like the one for my head.
So not only can I only equip one myself, but I can’t even summon Armor equipped with a piece higher than Common. Not and still keep my Mythic helm. If I hadn’t done what Tyrone called ‘crunch time’ and used teams of different bodies to complete dozens of dungeons at once over the last few weeks, this plan couldn’t work. The four extra EP once every four levels makes it just barely feasible at 12.
[ EPIC ACTION: SUMMON ARMOR 3 ]
[ MOVEMENT BLESSING: GALE FORCE ]
With six of me on the field, the one with my head flies up to the open neck chair of the leftmost Big O.
[ COMMON ACTION: RECALL HEAD ]
Repeating the same five times, I fly each of my six armors with HP in the triple digits so as not to ‘get insta-killed again’, into the neck-mounted driver’s seat of a different mecha. After half a year of Simon’s mentorship, I’ve long-since learned not to call them ‘robots’. Or ‘mechs’. Or ‘construction equipment’ like Oneshot mistakenly thought Simon would appreciate.
It would’ve been faster to fly them all up and drop my bodies off in a sweep. But Simon additionally requested that I take the extra time to not make him look bad by getting them all moving before he can even enter his own.
That’s how seven massive mechas end up starting at nearly the same time to march like titans behind six members of The Anime Club.
All of us move in unison to ‘rush the authors down’, to use Simon’s preferred vernacular from the past week.
The giant bearded man we were briefed on is already large enough to be seen over the emerald hills. As we’d discussed, Kirito, Zack, and each of my Big O’s veer off to do our only job this round. Take him out before he can get in Tyrone’s way.
But before we make it to the large man, a shorter, wider, literal tidal wave of light-infused sand rolls in like dough across the crystal field. All of it headed Straight for Zack.
Almost contemptuously, Zack steps through a portal to just behind the now-retreating white sand.
The sand immediately reverses all its momentum, bringing several quadrillion iterations of the same unpleasant image to mind.
Zack steps back through the same portal.
It reverses momentum in the same vaguely painful way.
And back.
And forth.
And back.
And forth.
[ TEAM / KIRITO: STOP LETTING HIM DRAIN YOUR MANA ]
Bristling at either a sudden lowering in temperature, an unexpected breeze, or the fact that Kirito said that over team chat, Zack steps through a second portal. His silhouette immediately reappears nearly a mile away with the rest of the team.
Shrugging, the vague impression of a man inside of the tidal dune turns to face Alex. Wait a second…
[ HERO TARGETED: HOID ]
Ah. That makes sense. As far as he’s ever shown, Hoid only has two non-Writing Skills. Create Sand and Direct Sand. Combining those in concert with a Light-Attunement Blessing he seems to have gotten the CLASS for, he can manipulate his own created sand in unusual ways that seem unique to that combination. Although I certainly didn’t think his control would be this expansive. I guess he’s not on their Tournament team for nothing. But it’s uncomfortable to look at. Almost like quadrillions of memories are reawakening just long enough to be traumatized before going dormant once again.
And thanks to Targeted Hearing, I can hear him clearly either talking to himself or through some kind of communicator. It’s an odd feeling with the sand all around him thoroughly disrupting my Sonar primarily thanks to its infusion of Attunement Energy. “-specially after they’ve been stored in the cupboard for a while, and things like this.”
In a flash even less helpful to my Sonar, the world between Hoid and Kirito seems to bend and distort, giving off the impression of inextricably tying the two together.
Kirito repeats that lighthearted addendum with the weight of an executioner’s axe. “And… Things like… THIS???” At that, he starts slowly walking towards Hoid.
Who, for his part, does nothing. He doesn’t speak. Nor does he move. Nor can he do anything of the sort after tripping Kirito’s Overreaction Trigger. The phrase was set. The words were repeated. There’s no way out. Not unless Kirito stayed more than three meters away without advancing, either of them received any damage, or Hoid was cured of at least one of several Debuffs. Left to his own devices, he’d stay that way forever. Or at least until the end of the match.
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Not that we need that long. Before Kirito even gets close enough to tank the hit, my third Big O’s left fist smashes into the top of the moving dune.
Pilon rising back up, Big O Three instantly decompresses all that force straight into it again. The white sand seems to cushion the impact without doing Hoid any damage. But it’s getting thinner.
And again.
Having already made it that far, Kirito must continue moving under the hand or give up. Friendly Fire doesn’t apply to Vehicle damage. Even still, he doesn’t hesitate.
And again.
Kirito gets flattened along with half his Max HP.
And again.
[ OPPONENT ELIMINATED: HOID ]
It happens just in time too, as that’s when the mythril fist caves in the head of Big O Three.
[ HERO TARGETED: ROBERT ]
All that force is instantly transferred to the Big O itself, sending it tumbling off of Kirito and onto its back like a humanoid avalanche.
Not only did it send the mecha sprawling, but the controlling Armor took nearly 100 Damage. Which I suppose demonstrates why I can’t afford to dilute my health pool more than a handful of times with this strategy. Thankfully, I don’t lose HP if it’s my own equipped vehicle. But that only accounts for one of the six. And it’s called ‘Big O One’ for a reason.
We need Zack to help with Robert. But Zack is still elsewhere.
Robert isn’t though. In fact, he’s exactly right here. And bringing down a mythril foot on top of my third cockpit. Except, thanks to an unfortunately-placed portal, the only thing he steps on is his own head.
Gingerly lifting his foot off his own face, he goes for his favored ‘kick the can’ stance.
Instead of me getting crumpled like the tin can I ‘might as well be’, this time Robert’s foot ends at his own stomach. Face reddening in a circulatorily impressive feat at that size, his gaze jerks over to where Zack is maniacally laughing.
Even Simon claims to have to admit that Zack is a genius in his own right. At least in terms of spatial awareness. He can just stand there teleporting other people’s attacks into themselves. He’s great at that, in fact. He just stands there while he does it, too. Laughing all the while.
And while he does, my first, fourth, and fifth Big O’s do a lumbering equivalent of dash in with arm pilons already fully extended back, surrounding him in a triangle pattern. One charged hook is aimed at his head, one at his chest, and another at his lower back.
I didn’t think that distribution had blind spots. Which is why I’m surprised when all three pressurized fists discharge their latent power into the thin air between the mechas on either side.
A relatively tiny Robert looks up from below with a whistle.
Big O is not a particularly flexible representative of Simon’s creations.
So Robert has all the time in the world to grow to fully twice his earlier size and subsequently kick them all over like a tweaker that wandered onto a playground at recess. Except before I can quite put together what all those implanted definitions refer to, it decisively doesn’t work. Instead, the only thing Robert kicks is the back of his own head.
Robert stumbles forward as his leg falls even further into the portal to dangle in the air just behind his head. Apparently, I don’t understand humor as I thought I was beginning to, because he inexplicably barks out a baritone laugh from vocal chords that dwarf even Tyrone. “Good thing these aren’t Gateways, eh?”
[ TEAM / ZACK: IT’S A MYTHIC SKILL ]
Even without that, Robert is still awkwardly trapped in a way not especially conducive to something eight times the size of a Big O. Which gives my second and sixth ones the time I need to position behind him.
Reeling back, one extends its right arm. The other, its left. Together, they decompress their pylons, unloading all that potential energy into each of Robert’s cheeks.
His ass explodes.
[ TEAMMATE ELIMINATED: ALEX ]
[ TEAM / JOE: HELP ]
[ TEAMMATE ELIMINATED: DAVID ]
In the time I tried to see what I could do to help the remaining far-off teammate silhouettes and subsequently came up with nothing, Robert stands back up. My attention returns to him towering over everything at twice the height of any robots on the field. Fully intact once more, ass and all. Despite that he only has one word to say as he glares down at Big O’s Two and Six. “OW…”
[ OPPONENT ELIMINATED: MARTY ]
A good sign.
[ OPPONENT ELIMINATED: KVOTHE ]
So far this match, the announcer hasn’t told me anything I didn’t know.
Not until right now. “AND TYRONE IS GOING CAAA-RAYZY”
That either indicates competence or a medical emergency.
[ OPPONENT ELIMINATED: LONGSHOT ]
[ OPPONENT ELIMINATED: DURZO ]
Competence it is, then.
[ TEAMMATE ELIMINATED: JOE ]
[ TEAMMATE ELIMINATED: SIMON ]
Or maybe not.
[ TEAMMATE ELIMINATED: TYRONE ]
I suppose that answers that…
[ TEAM / ZACK: WHAT NOW? ]
But the announcer seems to know precisely what now. “AND THERE!!!”
[ TEAM / ZACK: NOTHING HIT HIM ]
“YOU!!!”
[ TEAM / ZACK: HE JUST COLLAPSED ]
“HAVE IT!!!”
[ TEAM / ZACK: THIS IS BULLSHIT ]
[ TEAMMATE ELIMINATED: ZACK ]
Robert just looks down on all six of me, arms crossed while we all get the same non-chat notifications. “That just leaves you lot…” He seems to spot Kirito before glancing over the six of me. “And there’s just one of you piloting all of those? Impressive. I’ve never been much of a multitasker myself… So you wanna go ahead and call it or what?”
Simon has knowledge of how to operate the mecha’s speaker system.
I do not.
What I do have is a job.
Neck raising up to cover its mouth, 33 of me line up on the shoulders of Big O One, Two, and Six. Even without half my Body’s HP missing, this is nearly as many mismatched Common armor sets as I could assemble as instructed by the end of last week.
[ MOVEMENT BLESSING: GALE FORCE ]
My head rises from One and picks them all up in a jet stream.
Robert indignantly watches this, but seems to concede a nod in approval. “Well done waiting until Longshot was out. He was our counter for this precise maneuver of yours.” Robert eyes all of me as I try to unilaterally fly around and behind his head. “But honestly… What kind of damage do you expect to do to me that your dearly departed leader wouldn’t have taken from just as many flies?”
Neck lowered once more, Big O One discharges a fist backwards to beyblade across the emerald pseudo-landscape to SLAM the other fist from a pilon-infused roundhouse, into Robert’s right thigh.
By the time it gets there, that leg is made of mythril.
It doesn’t so much as budge. Except then, with an unmistakably unencumbered lazy startup, the mythril leg pushes Big O One back. And back.
It trips over a nearby emerald hill.
Which is as long as it takes for 98 of me to drive as many Gale Balls into the distinctly non-mythril back of Robert’s head. Let’s see flies do that…
The architecturally impossible bearded man doesn’t fall. He doesn’t even trip. He barely staggers from what ended up amounting to little more than a light whiplash.
But the next second, Big O Four pilon-punches the back of his distinctly non-mythril knee.
Now, Robert trips.
Big O’s Two and Six bury the same pilon-infused fists into his cheeks again.
Now, he falls.
Big O’s Three and Five close in on the massive prone man’s head. The punches even land. But the pylons don’t compress.
Instead, Robert shrinks. Or he tries to. As he does, he seems to become aware of an increasingly large pebble in his mouth. He tries to spit it out. It almost works.
But the instant he makes any headway…
[ UNCOMMON ACTION: HEADSPLOSION ]
Blowing my own head away, I Readjust to the smaller target. This time, the pylons do compress.
Or maybe not. Everything cuts to black too fast for me to tell.
[ YOU DIED — XP DEBT: TOURNAMENT EXCEPTION — RESPAWN DELAY: 8 HOURS ]
What?
[ 7:63:63 ]
I don’t understand.
[ 7:63:62 ]
Did I beat him?
[ 7:63:61 ]
Was this what happened to Tyrone?
[ 7:63:60 ]
In what I slowly realize is my first ever fugue state, eight hours quickly pass.
At this point, there’s no question that the match is long over.
Even so, this is… Different from the last few times.
Just as I start to get my bearings, the previously limp Kirito gasps awake, getting up and stumbling forward before bracing himself against a window.
Simon rushes to use Kirito as a metaphor to explain something to Joe, who looks very concerned about whatever it is.
Alex and Tyrone are talking through something else, but it seems to be going nowhere fast.
Meanwhile, David is trying to comfort Zack laying in the bed he deployed as soon as he got here.
I look around at the rest of my newly-respawned team. “Is this… Loss?”
Simon groans.
Tyrone solemnly turns to me. “That’s right, PEN. We failed.”
Kirito grumbles under his breath. “Again…”
David claps me on the pauldron. “Welcome to The Anime Club.”