Chapter 240: The Price of the Strong, Yet Her Eyes Burn Like a Raging Fire

The Unique Scenario "Invitation from Rabituza." The prerequisite Unique that leads directly into the Unique Scenario EX "Vorpal Epic," which currently only has one challenger: me.
As for the content, it's most likely "a gauntlet against monsters higher level than the target player, but that can be handled through resourcefulness." Even the absolute, utterly bullshit Obsessive Treant [Losers' Woods] that nullifies physical attacks could be defeated with a pure physical build just by stealing its staff.

If that's the case.
Hypothetically speaking, what if there was a player who—through a series of miraculous coincidences—"continued to equip items with extremely superior stat point bonuses," "continuously fought against powerful enemies including two Unique Monsters," and "acquired an abnormal amount of stats as a result"? What if there was a player whose real-life LUC stat was maxed out?

What would happen? The results are right before my eyes.

"Uwaa............"

Not to brag, but as a Trash Game Hunter, I've conquered a great deal of bullshit difficulties. Trash games and dead populations are essentially conceptual best friends that can't be separated, so I've solo-killed Raid Bosses that were clearly balanced incorrectly. Putting aside the balancing of endgame content, I've even grinded a hundred laps against a bullshit enemy that makes you feel like your humanity will collapse if you farm it more than ten times. Why? Because there was a title you could get for doing it a hundred times... It was a fierce struggle that consumed four cans of Riot Blood.

However, even I was left speechless, forced to shut my mouth at the disastrous scene unfolding before my very eyes.

"Eh, what was that suction just now... That's a bug."

"Aah... Grabbed by the neck, and slashed... piuu."

Akitsu Akane, who had taken the passing-grade, surefire action of putting ten meters of distance between them and observing the opponent's movements, was teleported right into the hand of a black shadow that could only be described as the "Grim Reaper."
Then, a large scythe—which looked like the concept of gruesomely severing a person's head smeared and hardened with blood and malice—flashed in the black shadow's hand, and... thump, the head of the girl wearing a fox mask fell to the ground. A FATALITY that would make Lycaon turn pale... Hey, management, making the wound milder isn't the only thing you need to worry about here...

"Ceecrue, what... is that?"

"The True Quiet... A supreme 'Spirit' that likely only Father could capture..."

So because it wants you to be eternally quiet, it uses a cheat suction instant-death throw? Hahaha...... Aaah~, I wonder if I can redo "Invitation from the Rabituza" right now! I super want to fight that!
No, wait, calm down... Right now, I have the bullshit-strong hidden boss, AI Hanshi: Extreme, don't I... With my currently restricted avatar stats, I have absolutely no idea how I'm supposed to beat it, but that's exactly what makes it so good.

Well, setting that aside, I'm extremely interested in it, so I'll casually ask Vash about it later.

"Ou, it's Sunraku, ain't it?"

"Good evening, Boss! I've found that requested item you mentioned."

I generally play the game naturally, but completely immersing yourself in a roleplay different from your usual self has its own distinct fun.
This kind of "Small Fry Roleplay" actually has surprisingly good synergy with building up jokes, so I use it quite a bit, but considering Vash is unmistakably a Yakuza rabbit, it feels like a really nice match.

"Ou, ou... You found it awfully fast, didn't ya? I figured it'd take a little while longer."

"I've got a light-footed build, so, well, I just ran up the wall in a jiffy..."

Emul was staring at me with a terrifying expression, but I wasn't lying. It wasn't exactly at the level of a 'jiffy,' but since I succeeded on the first try in the end, it's not wrong to call it a jiffy, yep.

"Fumu... Sunraku. Hand over Togetsu, along with... 'the materials of a monster you acknowledge as strong.'"

Ooh, here it is. Even when I asked Bilac, she just punched me, yelling, "Like hell I'd tamper with the weapons Father made for anything other than repairs, you bastarddaaaaaaa!!" So the "Vorpal" weapons receive a True Awakening concurrently with the progression of the Unique Scenario EX.
I have no idea what I'll ultimately be fighting, but these weapons, enhanced in tandem with the EX Scenario's progress, will likely be the key.

That being said, I didn't pay it much mind when I made Togetsu, but now the incredibly vague specification for the materials is actually bothering me. If the weapon's evolution path is determined by the "materials of a strong enemy the player acknowledges," then it's probably not a simple matter of just providing materials from a powerful monster.
Between a strong enemy I struggled immensely against in a solo fight, and a super-strong enemy I cheese-killed in a party battle... the former wins in terms of the degree of struggle, but the latter is superior in terms of parameter strength. How will the judgment be made in this case...? Honestly, I couldn't genuinely welcome other players triggering the "Vorpal Epic," but now that it's come to this, I kind of want to gather statistics on weapon evolutions from about ten people.

Even so, since Ctarrnid and Lycaon didn't drop materials, the only monsters I truly struggled against are these guys. Most of them were used up on the Brilliant Scorpion Gauntlets (Gilta Brille) and the Mirror Shield of the Nether-King (Dis Pater), but precisely because the material specification is so ambiguous, it was fortunate that I could still craft items with the leftover materials.

"Materials from the Golden Scorpion, and materials from the Atlanticus Repnorca... Aside from Lycaon and Ctarrnid, these were the strong enemies that made me genuinely prepare for death."

Without field gimmicks, both of them would have been opponents I couldn't normally beat. Especially that killer whale bastard—isn't he at a level where you can't win unless you reflect his attacks in Ruluia's tower? Underwater railguns? That's guaranteed vaporization right there.
Vash gazed at the Golden Scorpion's pincer and the Atlanticus Repnorca's crystallized, feather-like fin, before floating a nihilistic smirk and accepting them along with Togetsu.

"Ain't this interestin'... Ou. Bilac won't be laughin' at this..."

............Ah, yeah, is that it? Um, should I just wait for the weapon and the Delta Devices to be finished?
In that case, I might as well ask right now.

"By the way, Boss, about that... Ceecrue, what was its name again?"

"It is the True Quiet."

"Right. I'm extremely curious about that..."

"That's the task assigned to that Akitsu Akane. It's meaningless unless she defeats it alone... is what I'd like to say, but if you want to lend a hand as her senior, I won't stop ya."

No... that's not it, I want to fight it too... Well, whatever. The drop item is probably just a scythe or something, right? It's probably not a monster exclusive to this scenario either, so another time is fine.
I didn't actively intend to help Akitsu Akane, but answering "No, not really..." here feels like it might negatively affect my favorability rating.

"Sure thing, thank you very much."

Well, she's not a complete stranger, so I might as well help out a little bit.

"Alriiight! I'll win this time!"

"Ah, she got hit by the instant-death throw again."

"Akitsu Akane-dono~!!"

I honestly think I should actively learn from that undeterred mentality, yep.

When I visited the Colosseum waiting room that I used to rely on countless times in the past, Akitsu Akane—who had just suffered her tenth decapitation that I personally witnessed—was already preparing for her eleventh assault.

"Ah! Sunraku-san! Hello!"

"Ah, yeah. Stay for a sec."

"Yes!"

Yep, sit down. That's right, strategy meeting time, okay? Continuing to die to engrave the movements into your body until you get used to the opponent's patterns is a valid strategy, but that monster with a name sounding like a tofu diet is a gimmick type, like Ctarrnid.
Unless you unravel the mechanics, you're just going to rack up death penalties.

"From what I saw from the audience seats, you won't be able to dodge that bullshit suction grab attack unless you solve some kind of gimmick."

"Right! I tried putting some distance and jumping, but I just couldn't dodge it..."

Nn~, not a bad perspective. Truth be told, that gimmick is easier to figure out from a third-person perspective anyway.

"Nn~, this is going to be a bit of a spoiler, is that fine?"

"Yes! Honestly, I was feeling like I hit a dead end, so it helps a lot!"

"Nn. To be completely honest, the trigger for that forced-teleport grab is the 'shadow'."

That's right. The moment Tofu Diet reached its hand out, the shadow on the ground extended. And at quite a high speed, too.
I'd need verification to be absolutely certain, but most likely, if its shadow touches the target's shadow during that motion, you are automatically teleported right to its hand.

"It probably doesn't home in on you, but since it comes out so fast, the moment it starts the grab motion, you have to dodge to the side."

"I see... I understand! I'll go try it right away!"

Watching Akitsu Akane run off before I even had the time to stop her, I shot a quick glance at Emul and Ceecrue.
This information is relatively easy to notice if you watch from the audience seats. But considering she didn't realize it until I told her, it means the Vorpal Bunnies really don't give any hints regarding this, huh.

Thinking about it calmly, it makes way too little sense. The Unique Monster is personally training the player, making them run errands, and upgrading their weapons... Does Vash really not fight as an enemy in this EX Scenario after all?

"Uu~n..."

Oh, Akitsu Akane respawned.

"Before I realized it, I got slashed from behind!"

"So it has a teleport of its own, huh... Ah, right, what number monster is that?"

"The first one!"

"...I'll help you out too, so let's do our best, okay?"

There are still nine more monsters of that caliber waiting behind it...? This... Triggering this at a low level is absolutely the right answer.

Author's Afterword

• True Quiet (Supreme Spirit of the Black Death)
  It is one of the supreme bullshit monsters categorized as "an utterly unreasonable monster that possesses the strength of a Unique despite being a normal spawn," just like the Golden Scorpion and the Atlanticus Repnorca.
  "Death," "Pain," "Disease," et cetera, et cetera... The worst and most malevolent Grim Reaper born from recklessly mixing together attributes that would likely never have a positive effect on living organisms. It spawns when a certain amount of "Deaths" are concentrated in a specific area within a short period of time. In other words, if you perform a large-scale slaughter, it will come to kill the players. If I say "The Reaper," some people might understand.

It indiscriminately scatters death with the large scythe held in its hands, but the most troublesome aspects are its numerous special attacks that are extremely difficult to counter. To give a few specific examples:

• It extends its own shadow, and the moment it touches the target's shadow, it unconditionally teleports the target right to its hand. Since the shadow extends at the speed of a bullet, you are almost guaranteed to get decapitated.

• It detaches its own shadow and teleports itself to wherever the shadow is located. Since the main body teleports without any preparatory motions, you have to judge its actions based on the shadow's movements.

• If it inflicts the status effect "Sentence of the Black Death," you are practically checkmated. Furthermore, it spreads to any entity within a ten-meter radius of the infected person every ten seconds.

• Above all, it possesses complete immunity that perfectly nullifies both physical and magical attacks. It has demonic resistances where even Armageddon and Reject deal 0 damage, and naturally, it repels debuffs as well.

However, since the monsters that appear in "Invitation from Rabituza" can "be dealt with using methods other than raw power," this monster naturally has a strategy to defeat it... Or rather, theoretically, it can be defeated even at Level 1. Slap it with a wad of cash.

By the way, "Supreme" is synonymous with "Higher-Tier Species."