NOVEL NEXT 54. Special Group Task.
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Getting called by Sakuya, Kaito, and the new members coming at last to the meeting room as the last group since all the members already sitting in their respective seats. Kaito didn't realize the time he spent explaining stuff to Yuu... not that he got any watch with him anyway.
*Cough*
"I am sorry everyone for coming late, I was busy explaining stuff to the last new member and didn't realize the time." Kaito apologized as he just sit in his seat.
"No problem to me" Saitama said, noticing two new faces that come with him.
"We also just done cooking and prepared the dishes." Erina followed.
"I don't mind either" Crocodile commented.
"Well... We can't really be mad since you have a good reason, master." Sakuya said while guiding Kaito to his seat, and pointed both Aika and Yuu to their seat.
"Sakuya-san is right, you are just doing your job Kaito." Mikoto added.
"Thank you, everyone" Kaito replied with a thankful tone, as he take a seat as the leader of the meeting, located at the edge of the table.
After that, Kaito immediately opens the meeting and quickly told the new member to formally introduce themselves, starting with Fuwa Aika who sit close not far from him
...
Aika stood up from her seat and start introducing herself, "Hello, everyone. My name is Fuwa Aika, nice to meet you all. I am the holder of [Mage of Exodus] nickname in the chat group. I can do some magic although I am sure a lot of people here could defeat me easily here."
"Ah, you are the member who Kaito said to commit suicide last night!" Mikoto quickly recognized Aika.
"She did what?" Uta who didn't know her fellow new member exclaimed in surprise.
"Well, I take a peek at the memories last night and she seems already got murdered from episode 1. I plan to watch the rest after this" Erina followed
"Erina-san, I thought you said you won't watch it last night?" Mikoto turned at Erina weirdly.
"I was curious, okay? I am sorry for lying Misaka-san"
"No wonder you look so sleepy this morning." Arato, her secretary looked with deadpanned eyes.
"I am so sorry!" Erina apologized to both Mikoto and her secretary.
...
As the discussion suddenly becomes intense, Aika herself already sitting on her seat and watching the meeting burn without the intention of stopping it. Thankfully, Kaito noticed Aika's bad intentions, take initiative to gain everyone's attention, and make the meeting back to conducive again.
*Clap*
"Sorry for ruining everyone's fun, but we still have another 2 new members that need formally introduce themselves."
Hearing Kaito's statement, everyone quickly stops themselves and immediately pays attention to the last 2 new members. Especially Uta, since they know already about her identity.
Kaito turn his head against Uta, waved his hand, and said, "Uta-san, please."
...
Looking at the signal Kaito gave to her, Uta immediately stood up and introduce herself with a cheerful tone.
"Umm! Hello everyone! My name is Uta! My nickname is [Musician of Red Hair Pirate], and the most important thing to know is that I love singing! Everyone should know my ability is [Uta Uta no Mi] which devil fruit that allows the user to sing and put them in Uta world!"
As a final touch, Uta bow her head 90 degrees and shouted, "Hope we could get along everyone!"
*Clap* *Clap*
Uta's cheerful introduction made most of the members react positively except for very few members like Crocodile and Sakuya.
"Uta-san! I really like your song!" Mikoto exclaimed.
"I am excited to see her performance!" Erina followed.
"Listening while eating Erina's dishes should be enjoyable" Saitama added.
"I agree with that idea, Saitama-sensei. But we still have the last member to introduce herself." Kaito commented.
Kaito turned to [Necromancer] who has been quietly sitting beside Aika and ordered, "Yuu-san, please introduce yourself at last."
Yuu pointed at her mouth and then her notebook, looking confusedly at him. Kaito quickly catch what she meant, and nodded in agreement, "Don't worry, You don't need to talk. Just use your notebook. I will help."
Getting confirmation from Kaito, Yuu quickly writes her introduction with the notebook in her hand and then shows it to everyone. Kaito quickly takes initiative to ask the system to reveal what she write clearly to everyone and they quickly confused about her introduction.
'Hello, My name is Eucliwood Hellscythe' My nickname is [Necromancer]. Nice to meet you' Yuu writes in her notebook.
"She doesn't talk? And why does she wears armor?" Mikoto curiously asked
"A knight?" Nanoha followed, referring to Yuu appearance who wore knight armor to suppress her ability.
"She is a mute person?" Erina added, guessing why [Necromancer] does not talk.
As people begin to ask about her identity, Yuu quickly becomes uncomfortable as she didn't really want to talk about it. Kaito who realized the situation quickly cleared his voice and divert the attention of the masse.
*Cough*
"About her circumstances, well... I will share the memories about her world after this meeting" Kaito answered on behalf of Yuu.
"Does she have a special ability? I expect her inability to talk should be a consequence of her ability" Saitama suddenly raised his hand in curiosity.
Kaito nodded and replied, "Well... You are right about that Saitama sensei. Her ability is like her nickname--- oh wait."
He suddenly remembers that Yuu's ability seems able to turn dead people back to alive as a zombie, which could be used as an alternative in case he didn't get the evil pieces in time to save Itachi and Aika. Her ability is even better because it seems it should have no limitation about how long the corpse has been dead, unlike the evil pieces that should use immediately.
Though being a zombie have clear weakness like being weak under sunlight... but it's better than staying dead after all.
While Kaito was lost in his thought, the other chat group member was bewildered about what just happened to make him stop at the middle of a sentence.
Kaito shook his head, decide to not say anything for now, and diverted the topic.
"A-Anyway, It would take some time to explain Yuu's circumstances. Before that, I have something more important to say."
"It seems you just don't want to bother to explain, Kaito" Mikoto commented, followed by others nodding at her words.
"No, I am serious. This is really important and needs to be decided quickly." Kaito said with a serious tone.
"Is it about the group task?" Crocodile raised his golden hook, seeming to wait for Kaito to talk about this.
Kaito nodded and begin to explain, "Yes. It is a special difficulty task, and apparently, it will checklist both hard and any difficult group task completion if we did after I check it out with the system. Not to mention I will also get enough points to upgrade the chat group level after completing it"
...!!!
Hearing Kaito's statement about the new group task, all the members who heard it were surprised and didn't expect that this time's group task had such a great reward.
"Enough points to upgrade... Is that a lot?" Saitama reacted.
"If I remember correctly, the chat group upgrade required point is 100000." Crocodile added.
"That is really a lot of points, I must say." Miya followed.
"The new group task was that good... Then what are you waiting for?" Mikoto asked.
Kaito shook his head and continue said, "The problem is... This task will require everyone to participate and the content of this task is a bit special and quite dangerous."
"Everyone...?" Uta asked with confusion.
"What do you mean everyone, Owner?" Erina also asked in confusion.
"Yes. Everyone." Kaito stated firmly, and then with the help of the system as always, he revealed the content of the special group task to everyone in the meeting room.
...
*DING*
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Task Detail: Actively participate to finish the deadly virtual game Sword Art Online.
- Special Abilities can't be used in this world at all. You can only beat the game using the power system that the game provided.
- Any member who dead died the task will be dead for real and can't be revived by any means.
- Any world outside the specific group task will be frozen in time if the task is accepted. When the task is complete, every member will have the ability to revert back their appearance to the time before the task to avoid implications in their original world.
- Any item that members bring from outside won't work either in this world.
Task Completion: Finish the game while also actively participating and finishing the game itself at least by 50%
Time Limit: 3 years.
Participation Limit: All registered chat group members.
Task Difficulty: Special (Hard).
Task Failure: Didn't meet the requirement of minimum participation in finishing the game, the group owner died during the task, or more than 50% of participants died during the task.
Reward: 100000 Points to all of the participants.
Failure Punishment: Deleted base world feature from the chat group.
----
Optional Tasks only can only be viewed after the group task is accepted.
----
=====
...
Every member has a different reaction after reading the group task detail. Some of them are confused, some are concerned, and some even get excitement due to some detail that the task provided.
"3 years... to complete the game? Isn't that bit too long..." Uta is the first one to react.
"No wonder the reward is 100000 points, and to be honest this task doesn't seem that fair, but we do need to do a group task to upgrade the chat group..." Crocodile followed.
...
"The time outside the group task world is frozen which is good, but doesn't it mean we are going to be 3 years older the moment we have done it?" Erina asked.
"Take a look Erina-sama, it said you have the option to retain your appearance from the beginning when it is done" Arato replied.
"3 years is the time limit of the task, so technically we should complete the quest less than that" Sakuya added.
"Well, considering he managed to solve a group task on Sekirei world in under a month, Kaito-san must have a way to make it less time-consuming" Miya added.
...
"Your special ability will be inactive... I can't one-punch people anymore. What kind of world is it?" Saitama muttered, but there is clear excitement in his eyes.
'My speech won't affect reality in that world?' Yuu thoughts, having the same clear excitement as Saitama did.
Both Saitama and Yuu don't like their ability (for a different reason) so the prospect of can't use their ability at all during the task incite some curiosity in them.
While everyone gives their opinion about the task, Kaito personally has no problem doing this task. He remember SAO wasn't a particularly dangerous world... Except for the bosses and the last boss himself, Kayaba Akihiko also needs to be watched out for.
Even so, with a lot of combat experts inside the chat group like Sakuya, Itachi, and Miya, Kaito believes this task would be not a big problem.
The only real problem is that they literally need to spend years doing the task, which might make some members reluctant to do this, especially when they have a literal little girl like Nanoha in the chat group. Still, before announcing this, Kaito had already thought of some sort of plan to convince them so he doesn't really concern about this.
...
As everyone still processing the task on their own, Robin who notices the detail more than others suddenly raised her hand and asked Kaito, "In the detail, there is a line 'if you died, you will be dead for real and can't be revived'... What it does mean, owner?"
"Glad you notice it Robin-san" Kaito answered with a smile, and then he continued to explain, "It is because Sword Art Online is a kind of a game where you can die for real the moment you are dead in that game... I guess."
"Realistic death game?" Crocodile reacted.
"Death game?!" Mikoto exclaimed, shocked at Kaito's revelation. The others more or the same also have the same expression, wondered what Kaito does mean.
Knowing that it would be too much time for him to explain, Kaito continue said, "I will share the memories about the world we are going for the group task and you guys can think whether to do this task or not yourself. I will wait for all of your answers tomorrow."
Kaito has learned from his previous mistake from the last group task, which is not sharing the related memories to the chat group world before starting. With this, Kaito doesn't need to spend time explaining a lot and just wait for their answer tomorrow.
Everyone quickly agrees with Kaito's proposal, followed by a comment coming from Crocodile, "Let me see the memories first, Owner."
"Alright."
As usual, Kaito quickly asked the system in his head to share memories to the chat group... specifically the memory of SAO season 1. He didn't feel the need to share memories for the continuation of SAO, because his task was only limited to the SAO game.
...
=====
*DING*
=====
[Railgun Girl has downloaded the memory copy of Sword Art Online]
[Elementary Grade Magical Girl has downloaded the memory copy of Sword Art Online]
[God Tongue has downloaded the memory copy of Sword Art Online]
[Caped Baldy has downloaded the memory copy of Sword Art Online]
...
...
Congratulation, You have been rewarded with 15000 Points!
=====
Looking at the memories seems that all have been downloaded by the members, Kaito knows that the serious talk is done.
Now, they could celebrate the new member's arrival with a feast and have a fun time together... which Kaito thought would be a good idea before doing the next group task that was going to happen tomorrow. Kaito is sure all the members will agree to do the group task, especially after they watch SAO Memories and realize that the world is not that dangerous.
...
