Chapter 113

113. I Think I’ll Just Play Games…

The guy who looked like he had walked straight out of a superpower battle series had dropped from the dark sky like a meteor.

Apparently, he had been seriously injured during the fight. His entire body was covered in blood like some character from a shounen manga, and he was panting heavily.

Even while gasping for breath, he was still trying to maintain a cool expression.

Even the way he panted looked exaggerated.

Was he messing around?

Ah, now that I thought about it, when I was around middle-school age, whenever I ran too hard and got exhausted, I used to exaggerate my breathing like that too…

I had to dig through my faint memories to find something I could relate to.

“Did you come from a manga or something?”

“Haha! I get that a lot!”

“No, this really isn’t the time to laugh… Well, whatever.”

“You’re right… I’m pretty badly hurt…”

“……”

This was getting a little scary.

They said this was some kind of superpowered battle, but did people involved in those really end up looking like this?

That was terrifying.

That meant there was something up in the sky capable of beating this guy into this condition.

Now I was curious just how manga-like that person would be.

“Ah! You must be the disciple my teacher told me about!”

“Ah, yes.”

Dorphin cheerfully interrupted.

“Oh, come on~! Calling our baby a disciple is too much~! Our baby was just soooo talented that he grew all by himself!”

“Yes.”

The manga guy stared at me with an envious expression.

What was this?

Was he one of those characters who pretended to be cheerful and friendly on the outside, but was actually filled with envy and jealousy, only to betray the protagonist at a crucial moment?

With characters like this, you had to intentionally build a deeper friendship beforehand.

That way, at the decisive moment, he would act because of friendship rather than jealousy and envy.

“I heard you have no intention of participating in the battle. Leave this place to me and retreat for now! It’s dangerous!”

“And who decided that?”

Whoa!

Whoa, what a manga-like entrance!

I loved it!

A pretty girl dressed entirely in black was looking down at us from above the clouds, speaking in a relaxed voice with a smug expression!

Seeing something like this in real life was completely different from reading it in a manga.

Normally, I would think—

Ugh, there she goes trying to act cool again when she isn’t even that impressive.

But facing it in reality…

I was mostly just confused.

She didn’t seem particularly amazing…

Was she one of those characters whose countdown toward redemption had already begun?

Or maybe she had the traitor gimmick!

Just like in games and manga!

Ohhh!

Thinking about it that way made me excited!

It sounded hilarious!

Why am I thinking about this in reality when I never even thought this hard while actually playing games…?

Has my real life finally become my game life…?!

Putting aside my dizziness, I followed the manga guy’s advice and headed toward the stairs to get away from the woman who was probably going to betray someone.

BOOM!

Or at least, I wanted to!

The traitor girl destroyed the door!

She crushed it with something like an invisible hand, probably telekinesis.

Telekinesis was great.

You could turn off the lights without getting out of bed.

But if she had this much power, wouldn’t it have been more effective to grab me and throw me off the building instead of simply stopping me from using the stairs?

I couldn’t exactly guarantee that I would survive falling from this height.

Even if she had some restriction preventing her from directly harming me because I was connected to the Chairman, her actions still didn’t make much sense.

Why would some mysterious enemy deliberately give me another chance when I was openly showing an opening?

Was it because the opponent she had been fighting no longer had enough strength to immediately respond?

Or maybe she just wanted to play around some more?

The best way to completely crush your opponent’s morale was to destroy whatever they were trying to protect.

Did she not know that?

Had she not seen me and the manga guy talking so warmly?

Does she lack combat experience?

Or does she just want to show off her power?

The girl looked down at me.

“You’re the ‘guy’ the Chairman talked about, aren’t you?”

The way she paused before saying “the guy” was just…

At this point, the image of her in my head had completely settled into that of a chuuni middle-school girl who couldn’t live in reality.

So even her serious words sounded strangely funny.

Still, thanks to what she said, I finally understood why she hadn’t attacked me immediately.

She was actually a nice person.

Tch.

Well, who knew?

Maybe this girl had also had her entire life toyed with by the Chairman.

Unlike me, maybe she had been raised specifically as a combatant, and that was how she ended up like this.

That kind of setting was possible, right?

“Aren’t you going to answer?”

“Who’s ‘that guy’? And who’s the Chairman? You didn’t explain anything, and now you’re bitching at me for not answering!”

Squeeze!

An invisible hand grabbed my body!

Its grip was stronger than I expected.

Still, it wasn’t strong enough that I couldn’t endure it.

Maybe staying caught for a moment and waiting for an opening wouldn’t be too bad.

The girl looked at me as though I were ridiculous.

“Looks like you still don’t understand the situation you’re in.”

“Huhuhuh. Neither do you.”

Seeing that smug expression, a stupid laugh escaped my mouth before I realized it.

But what could I do?

The things she was doing were kind of cute.

No matter how limited Dorphin’s ability to interfere with this world was, if someone called me her baby and just stood there smiling while I was being captured, then obviously there was something going on.

Come on, kid.

From my perspective, telekinesis was simply a mass of flow.

Like a piece of cloth full of holes that hadn’t been properly processed.

Or a rock already covered in cracks.

With just a little interference, I could destroy it.

And if I paid a little more attention, I felt like I could even imitate it.

No.

I definitely could.

But…!

If I showed that I could copy it, the jealousy and envy of that depressed-looking manga guy over there might reach maximum levels.

Then unnecessary conflict would start.

I needed to act like this was at least a little difficult.

Hmm!

Complicated!

Annoying!

I didn’t want to do it!

The girl tightened her grip.

“Your life is in my hands right now… Don’t you understand? Do you still think this is that game you love so much?”

“Yeah.”

The manga guy shouted.

“Stop! This man has nothing to do with this!”

I looked toward him.

“See? This is totally like a game.”

The girl snapped back.

“Nothing to do with this?! He’s the person the Chairman is most interested in… How can you say he has nothing to do with it?”

“Can either of you hear me talking?”

Ah!

Save me!

Someone please get me out of this manga world!

Please!

Dorphin!

Pie!

…Wait.

Do I need to pick a character and immerse myself too?

That’s a little embarrassing…!

If I start acting all dramatic here, you guys are absolutely going to meet your friends later and say,

“Hey, you know that guy? He actually said—”

Right?!

The girl glared at me.

“Fine. If you have no intention of talking, then I’ll do whatever I want.”

The manga guy shouted again.

“Stop!”

She ignored him.

“Let’s see why the Chairman favors you so much!”

Everyone else was completely serious, while I alone couldn’t take things seriously.

At this point, maybe it really was a problem with my personality.

Everyone was role-playing together, and if I suddenly shouted—

“Hey, that makes no sense! That isn’t logical!”

—I would definitely get criticized behind my back for having absolutely no social awareness.

I sighed.

“Wait. Hold on for a second.”

The girl sneered.

“Hmph! Are you finally afraid of dying?!”

“No… You have to give me some time to get immersed too…”

I cleared my throat.

“Ahem! Your actions right now… The Chairman would be extremely angry if he found out, wouldn’t he?”

All right, kids.

This old man was ready now.

You guys looked like middle schoolers or high schoolers at most.

I’ll play along with you.

I didn’t like how amused Dorphin looked, but even in the game, I was a father with sons and daughters.

I couldn’t be too harsh with children.

The girl scoffed.

“The Chairman would get angry just because I killed someone like you? Ha! Don’t make me laugh!”

“You were the one who just said the Chairman is interested in me. Interested enough that even you’re bothered by it.”

“So what?!”

“Let’s say you kill me. What do you think the Chairman will say to you afterward? The Chairman you know—how would he react? More importantly, what did the Chairman tell you about me? Did he tell you not to touch me?”

“Shut up! You sure talk a lot for someone who’s about to die!”

“Why do you follow the Chairman? Fear? Ah, so it’s fear. The Chairman told you not to touch me. The Chairman is someone you fear. Simple cause and effect. If you kill me, what do you think the Chairman will do to you?”

The girl’s face stiffened.

“…Y-You…! Are you reading my mind?!”

No.

I was just saying whatever came to mind.

I was basically muttering random things while carefully watching the fluctuations in her flow.

Haah…

This traitor girl looked about Aien’s age.

Watching her kept reminding me of Aien, so I couldn’t even bring myself to say anything too harsh.

Instead, I was starting to worry that she was heading down the wrong path.

You were going to betray them anyway, weren’t you?

Why bother stacking up karma beforehand?

Can’t we just clear your karma quickly and then you two can hold hands and go home together?

Not with me.

The two of you.

The girl screamed.

“You don’t know anything…! Stop pretending like you understand me!!”

Squeeze!

Okay.

Now it was starting to hurt.

She was incredibly emotional if a few words were enough to shake her this badly.

For someone working under the Chairman, she was surprisingly inexperienced.

The Chairman tried to turn me into an emotionless human being.

So why didn’t he do the same thing to this traitor girl?

Did he secretly care about her?

I sighed.

“Sorry, kid, but your emotions are… how should I say this? They’re way too sudden, intense, and all over the place, so I really can’t relate to them. Like you said, I don’t know anything about you. Normally, this kind of thing needs proper buildup, you know?”

The girl’s eyes widened.

“Y-You! What are you?! Why are you completely fine?!”

“…Wow. This situation is so much like a manga that no matter what I say, it sounds like some manga dialogue… What am I supposed to do about this…?”

I shook off the invisible hand gripping me.

The traitor girl, now completely agitated, tried several more times to grab me.

Each time, I simply knocked her telekinetic grip away.

…Wait.

Why was the manga guy just staring at me when I was buying him this much time?

Instead of standing there with his mouth hanging open like he had just witnessed something incredible, shouldn’t he be doing something?

If the tank is holding aggro, the damage dealer needs to attack!

What are you doing?!

I let out a short sigh and gave the manga guy a firm thumbs-up.

Hopefully, he would interpret it as—

Don’t worry about me.

He finally seemed to understand.

“…Hey! Why don’t you stop there?!”

I immediately snapped at him.

“Hey! You’re supposed to sneak attack her! Read the room!”

“Y-Yes?!”

“‘Yes?’ my ass! Who do you think beat you into that state?! Why are you announcing, ‘Please look over here~!’ before attacking?!”

They said people swore when they had nothing else to say.

Apparently, that was true.

The moment my mind went completely blank, my language became much rougher.

This place gave me a far stronger sense of being watched by real people than the game ever did.

Trying to role-play like I was inside a game was much harder here.

Even toward allies, I ended up showing far more emotion than necessary.

Someone please put a random NPC beside me.

Then maybe I could stay calm.

I could probably enjoy everything casually as though I were playing a game.

Come on!

Hurry!

…I had prepared myself and thought maybe I could join these kids and play along.

That had been far too naive.

This was simply an entirely different world from mine.

I clicked my tongue.

“Tch. Sorry. I got worked up.”

Then I looked at the girl.

“Kid, you should stop too. If one method doesn’t work, you should try another one and see if that works. Only people who don’t use their heads keep repeating a method that already failed. Let’s try something new, okay?”

Her face turned red.

“Stop treating me like a child!”

“But you are a kid! You’re totally going to call me ‘Mister,’ aren’t you?! There’s probably at least a ten-year age difference between us, kid!”

“Stop calling me a kid!”

“What do you mean, stop?! You even look around Aien’s age! Stop talking to me! I’m going to get attached to you!”

I was exhausted.

This relatively old man in his mid-twenties could no longer keep up with the stamina and emotional intensity of teenagers.

Forget superpower battles.

Forget all of this.

I just wanted to lock myself inside my room and play games…

I liked games.

I sighed deeply.

“Sorry, kids. This old man is leaving now. You two have fun, and don’t go home too late. Kids need plenty of sleep if they want to grow. Staying up all night from a young age will ruin your bodies quickly.”

The girl shouted.

“Where do you think you’re running off to?!”

Whoosh!

At last, the traitor girl gave off a different atmosphere.

Apparently, she was finally going to use something besides telekinesis.

At the same time, the manga guy seemed to have rested enough and charged toward her once again, restarting their battle.

…If they fought like this, the manga guy would probably just lose.

So before leaving, I decided to scatter the power the traitor girl was gathering a little.

Her expression changed.

“M-My power…!”

I waved.

“Bye. I’m leaving! Dorphin! Don’t introduce these guys to me later either! I’ve completely lost interest!”

Dorphin giggled.

“Oh my~ Was your interest the important part?”

“For now.”

The stairs going down were destroyed.

So I might as well jump.

I should be as careful as possible so nobody noticed.

There might be some poor employee working overtime inside the building who could become traumatized after seeing a man jump off the building.

I needed to be considerate of them too.

Carefully…

Very carefully…

I walked down the side of the building and landed in a narrow alley where there was no sign of anyone nearby.

For a moment, I blankly looked back up at the rooftop.

Then I walked out toward the main road and tried to call a taxi.

“Uh…”

My phone was broken.

It must have been destroyed when I got hit by the telekinesis.

Apparently, she had been pressing me down with far more force than I realized.

There was barely anything left that even resembled a phone.

Had my body itself become strengthened without me realizing it?

I hadn’t noticed at all.

I thought the power of flow had absolutely no effect on my physical body.

Wait.

In that case—

If I copied the flow of someone whose body was tougher than mine and changed my own body’s flow to match theirs, wouldn’t my body become tougher too?

I should ask Dorphin about that.

It could be extremely useful inside the game.

A Great Hero would probably be too difficult.

But someone around the level of the black market administrator I recently met might be possible to imitate.

“Maybe that’ll be difficult too.”

He was someone capable of destroying the black market alone.

And he was evaluated as being around Great Hero level.

Just because I had easily beaten him in one bet didn’t mean I should underestimate him.

I doubted I would win that easily during our next bet either.

He had already faced me once.

Next time, he would doubt every word that came out of my mouth.

Pretending to be stupid and innocent only worked the first time.

Once you fooled someone with it, it became much harder to use the same trick again.

I stared at the road.

“…Haah… Do I have to walk home…?”

Boom! Boom!

The sounds of battle continued coming from the rooftop of the building.

I ignored them and started walking home.

I was seriously exhausted.

This old man was completely worn out.

In that short amount of time, my mental state had taken some serious damage.

I looked up at the unusually clear night sky and the moon shining above.

Let’s calm down.

I should reflect on myself.

Today, while surrounded by serious kids, I had completely failed to act seriously myself.

I quietly muttered,

“…Next time, I’ll try harder…!”

I meant it sincerely.

Then I added,

“Of course, from now on, I’m only going to play games.”

I meant that sincerely too.

People didn’t change that easily.

I should carve that lesson into my mind once again.