The Latest Game Is Too Amazing

So, I’ve arrived at the north wall, but there are way too many people here. And not just one or two hundred, either. There’s even more people here than at my school’s assemblies, probably more than a thousand. If there are this many players and NPCs participating, looking for two people in this crowd would be like finding a needle in a haystack. What do I do?

“Th- the monsters are coming!”

When I look up, I see griffins invading. Well, looks like I gotta fight. Maybe I’ll find them while I’m fighting. I just want to get this over with, but we’re in melee, so I have to use spells that won’t get in the way.

“Mana Bullet.”

Three balls of light appear and start circling around me. Mana Bullet is the stronger version of Mana Sphere. Leveling up the Mana Sphere skill only increases power, accuracy, and range, but with Mana Bullet, it also increases the number of balls of light. It’s a convenient spell that gives you the option to control each ball of light so that you can concentrate your attack on a single enemy or shoot at multiple enemies. It’s a basic spell for Wizards, and it’s one of the spells I acquired along with Thunder Storm. I really want to blast them with Mana Burst or Thunder Storm, but with this many participants, it’d also hit the monsters that other parties are fighting and I could end up accidentally kill stealing, so that would be rude.

I aim the Mana Bullets at the griffins that other players can’t catch, defeating them one by one. …It’ll take a lot of time to defeat them all. I’ll refrain from using Intelligence Shield.

Oh man, the griffins are exploding! They’re even bombing the wall and destroying it! So the walls can break, huh. Wait, then isn’t it dangerous up here?

***

As the spilled oil ignites and creates a dense curtain of sparks, the rhinoses concentrate all of their military strength and approach. Irene’s struggle has caused the rhinoses to spill quite a bit of blood, and by the time she realizes, their numbers have already been reduced to the point that they’re all within sight. Even so, as the soldiers run out of arrows and magic, the casualties increase until, finally…

“…Oh no, my magic is–!”

All of the barriers that Alexia put up flicker and disappear. This means that all of her support spells have worn off. Both Wisdom Shield and Addition consume mana just by being maintained. Even though she can absorb mana with the Dragon Soul, if her mana consumption increases while she’s not making many attacks and therefore not recovering much mana, then she’ll eventually run out. Unlike Wizards, who have an abundance of ranged attacks and can recover a lot of mana with a Dragon Soul, Sages have few methods of recovering mana, which is another one of their weaknesses. Since she’s already used up all her mana potions, she no longer has any way to recover it.

“Lady Alexia, please fall back!” Irene shouts. However, as she’s been fighting to her limit, she no longer has any strength left in her. Meanwhile, the rhinoses mercilessly close in on her, and they collide.

To the rhinoses, who are superior in both weight and physique, Alexia is no more than a rock at the side of the road. Alexia feels her body floating as a sharp pain shoots through it and gradually fades. She loses all sensation, as if her body, which should feel as heavy as lead, has been released.

‘This is bad, I have to do something,’ she thinks to herself, but she can’t escape that sensation. As she floats through the air, she slowly takes in her surroundings.

The soldiers, who have already lost all magical support, are being trampled by the rhinoses. ‘I’m sorry, I couldn’t protect you,’ Alexia apologizes in her mind. She can see her servant reaching out to her with a look of desperation as she’s engulfed by a herd of rhinoses. ‘I’m sorry I left you in such a dangerous place due to my own selfishness. And thank you for accompanying me,’ Alexia mentally apologizes and expresses her gratitude.

‘I’m starting to lose consciousness. Once I pass out, I’ll probably die,’ Alexia grasps her situation with extreme calmness.

‘But in my last moments…’ A black-haired boy with mismatched eyes appears in her mind. Shewonders if he’s safe. Will he praise her for doing all she could? Or will he scold her for being good for nothing? She’ll never see him again either way, so she at least wants him to be safe. She never wanted him to be on this battlefield to start with. If he’s here, she hopes he’ll abandon this city and escape. That is her wish. But she also has another wish: the wish that she’ll see him one more time in her last moments. It’s an incredibly selfish and shameful wish. They’re contradictory wishes, where if one is granted, the other cannot be.

Therefore, one of them will surely be granted.

The instant Alexia’s body hits the ground, the impact shoots through her. With what little is left of her senses, she feels a faint warmth. It’s a sensation that she could never experience on the cold ground. Concentrating, she focuses her eyes on the person who caught her in their arms.

The moment she recognizes his face, the flames in her heart which were fading suddenly tremble.

“…Teacher…”

The instant she loses consciousness, she is granted a reunion with the boy she loves.

***

This event is too harsh. If the griffins can attack from above, there’s really nothing we can do about it. There’s too many enemies, too. I hope they’ll fix the balance.

Our only salvation is the person creating the pillar of light that I saw a few times, or in other words, casting Wisdom Burst. There’s only one person using that spell (there are a ton of people of different classes and Magician-looking people here, but doesn’t anyone want to be a Sage?), so it’s possible that that’s Alexia. Though, when I tried to go over there, they yelled at me not to leave my post, and that spot already collapsed, so I decided to just keep shooting down all the griffins. It feels like a shooting game.

I think the griffin battle has more or less calmed down, probably because most of them have been killed by now. I don’t see many griffins anymore. A lot of the NPCs have also been killed, so there’s corpses lying around. It really is hard to look at.

When it finally calms down, I look over to the spot that collapsed, and it looks like a pretty tough fight. …I found them. There’s Alexia and Irene. Once I spot them, there’s no stopping me from running towards them. I quickly descend the city walls and get a better look at them. It looks like Alexia just ran out of magic. ‘This is bad,’ I think, getting a really bad feeling. At this rate, she’ll be killed by a rhinos. I cast Mana Bullet at the rhinos… But it doesn’t make it in time. Before the balls of light reach the rhinos, it’s like she’s been hit by a car, and it feels like everything freezes.

“Alexia!!” I shout, reaching out to her as she floats through the air. Please make it, please make it, please make it! All sound fades as my whole body takes action to save her. Running as fast as I can to the spot where she falls, I catch her in my arms. As I see her bleeding out with an empty look on her face, I pale.

“Alexia, Alexia!!” I keep shouting her name on the brink of tears. As if she noticed, Alexia smiles faintly, as if these are her last moments…

She can’t die, I don’t want her to die. Die… What’ll happen if she dies?

…She’ll just get a penalty and revive at the Portal.

…It’s just a game. And since it’s a game, I should be able to save her! I take a potion out of my inventory and put it on her. Then, color returns to her face. I breathe a sigh of relief. Even if it’s a game, it’s hard to see a friend die. Her death was so realistic that I couldn’t think straight. It doesn’t look like she’s waking up yet, but she did get hit by a rhinos charging at car speed, so it’s no wonder she fainted from shock. Anyway, what happened to Irene? With this many rhinoses surrounding us, there’s no telling where she is.

Carrying Alexia, who hasn’t regained consciousness yet, I walk towards the outside of the walls, defeating rhinoses as I move forward and exit the city walls. The other players and NPCs are busy dealing with the herd of invading rhinoses, so there’s nobody here. In other words, I don’t have to worry about kill stealing. That’s convenient for me.

“Double Spell.”

Since it’s a game, it’s probably natural for friends to die. But as a solitary player, I’ve never had that experience until now. I wonder if that’s why I couldn’t stay calm when Alexia almost died. No, I’m still not calm. If anything, there’s a simmering rage deep down inside me.

So, I’ll take it out on the rhinoses in front of me, on the ones who hurt my friends. I’ll hit them with the strongest spell I’ve got!

“Thunder Storm!”

The moment dark clouds cover the skies and turn the area pitch black, countless lightning bolts engulf the invading rhinoses, as if in response to my rage. Although it only lasts a few seconds, the flashes of light are so blindingly bright that I can’t see what’s happening. Even their death cries are drowned out by the roar of thunder. When my vision returns, an immense number of corpses of rhinoses and griffins lie before me. It seems like the griffins that were flying above were defeated along with them. Even so, I wasn’t able to defeat all of the rhinoses. Though, I probably opened up a mind-blowing several kilometer wide space full of corpses between the city and the rhinoses. The max-level Thunder Storm that I put all my strength into is seriously amazing. Is there really a use for a spell like this? Even though we’re in the middle of an intense battle, for a moment, everything goes silent. Oh, that was noisy, huh. Sorry about that, but I’m about to do it again.

Even in a situation like this, the rhinoses come this way without fear of death, stepping over the corpses of their allies as if it's all they know. As they approach, I begin casting my second Thunder Storm, and when they’re drawn in close enough, I annihilate the second wave. With the second wave, it looks like the enemies outside have all been killed. All that’s left are the rhinoses that invaded the city. Suddenly, cheers erupt from the top of the wall. Is the event over?

Finally, I can have a calm conversation with them. When I put down the still-unconscious Alexia in a safe place and start looking for Irene, my vision goes black.

‘Huh? What’s going on?’ I panic as a message is displayed before my eyes.

“Connection error. You have been disconnected from the network.”

Network problems?! Why at a time like this?!

After completing the recovery procedure and trying to re-log in several times, in the end, I couldn’t log in for the rest of the day. Disheartened, I go to bed sulking.

Oh man, what do I do? I still haven’t asked Alexia and Irene if they were coming with me to Commune or told them where and when to meet. But I did tell them beforehand that I was going to Commune, so should I go there?

As I think about them, I suddenly remember that sight from before. It was incredibly shocking and weirdly graphic. I was worried that Alexia was really going to die.

“It’s just a game… right?” I mumble as if the words are spilling from my heart, though I myself am not fully conscious of them.