Chapter 241

Tl note: I haven't told you the meaning of Tenjou Tenge, right? I assumed everyone would know that by now but just in case...

Tenjou Tenge means: I'm the only one who rules above and below heaven, or you can shorten it to 'heavenly rulers.' It will get mentioned several times at the end of this chapter, so keep it in mind.

===*

It was less than a minute, a very brief time immediately after the game started, the time when all players were waiting to be matched.

Everyone was confused.

Especially Tillett, as the mastermind as all other teams, and above all, even Suupaa, who had anticipated the plot.

"Bwahahaha.... no, seriously... just why is everyone so surprised!?"

The only one laughing so hard that she needed to hold her stomach was Rinne; Touka looked a little surprised to see Rinne like this.

(......What is this? What's the benefit of doing this?)

Before this match, the assumption that Ritu = Suupaa's had been formed.

Suupaa can handle all characters equally, but Ritu, who specializes in close and medium-range gunfights, is best suited for her.

Everyone, including Suupaa, was aware of it. That's why in the first match everything revolved around Suupaa's presence.

Ten of the twelve teams decided not to use [Ritu].

At this point, it is clear that this was planned and agreed upon by someone. Was it their intention to declare that they would concentrate their fire? Or was it a simple scheme to isolate HEROES?

At the very least, it is certain that someone has instilled [using Ritu is detrimental] in everyone's perception.

The audience would naturally feel uneasy because the most outstanding character had become so underutilized. However, the audience's reaction is unimportant right now.

(Only the user will know whose team they belong to. As long as there was a possibility that it was me, Ritu would be a target of elimination. I've prepared for that situation, and I'm now using Meteora to foil their plan.)

Meteora has an extremely powerful active ability: a wide-area attack by falling meteorites. Other than that, her abilities are below average across the board, but she was also one of the characters that didn't have any particular strength or weakness.

The fact that Meteora has low specs, but specialization is directly related to its ease of use. Of course, she is inferior to other characters in simple gunfights. That's why Meteora is not as popular as Ritu despite her strong abilities.

And the main reason why Suupaa chose Meteora was because of its all-rounder performance, which means it has no particular playstyle.

(Just because there are two Ritu's out there doesn't mean there's a problem as long as I'm not using them. I just don't know what they are trying to do. and this is an advantage for us.)

"This is too funny, are you confused too Suupaa?"

"Bu-but they... *sigh*. I don't understand why they did this."

The match has not started yet. It's still in the waiting period before all players are ready.

"I won't go into detail because we don't have time. Just keep one thing in mind."

"?"

"Not everyone is here to win. There are idiots out there who don't need results and idiots who don't want results. There is also an idiot who will be satisfied as long as they stand out. It's just like what we did in the second game."

Before she had time to chew on Rinne's words, the match began.

"For now, Concentrate. Whether it's on your menu or not won't make any difference on what you should do."

With those words, Suupaa's mind switched its gears.

That's correct. Whatever happens, Suupaa's duties will stay unchanged. A single of Rinne's words sharpened her confused thoughts that had been trying to read the opponent's intentions.

"I will win."

"That's right, I'm counting on you!"

"Let's go~!"

After just one minute of chaos, the HEROES united.

Supporting the absolute ace is the only way for this team to win, so the two of them enliven Suupaa.

Nana quietly closes her eyes, unconcerned with the three of them.

(I'm looking forward to it.)

She needs to go deeper.

Sharper.

Unknown to anyone, the other monster quietly sharpened its fangs.

☆

The match began amidst the confusion.

The so-called initial action was surprisingly clean, and everyone evenly distributed, so no immediate battle took place. It could be said that all of the teams needed time to regain their composure after a rocky start.

Of course, with some exception, and that was the two teams that decided to use Ritu.

One was Team is [C/P]. Officially they are called [Team C/P], but they say that "C" stands for "Crazy" and "P" for "Pierrot".

They are highly competent, proved by their ability to climb to the top 12 teams in a large-scale competition like BATTLER.

Strangely, the results of the fan vote were reasonably accurate, and it was also true that their actual ability was placed at rank 8th of the 12 teams.

The team's leader Nyarlath is a female professional gamer and streamer, which is no longer unusual.

She comes from an unusual background, she used to be a literal circus clown, and that background has made her popular among viewers because she always puts entertainment first.

But they are a true embodiment of crazy clowns. They are the [Crazy Pierrot].

Basically, they have a few screws in their heads missing, and they never seek entertainment in a proper way.

They will always do silly things as much as they can.

They will create as much confusion for others.

They will disrupt the situation and create chaos.

"Because I am Nyarlath. That's why I can't perform without chaos, can I?"

She was not surprised when Tillett's proposal was crushed. It's all because she wanted to see her reaction to it.

If it was something that would turn out to be an interesting scene, her teammates were always willing to join in.

"But Nyarlath, we're not the only ones using Ritu. That's a minus point, right?"

"So annoying."

Nyarlath nodded in dissatisfaction at his teammate's words.

Originally, they should have been the only team to use Ritu, which would have made them stand out while rubbing it on Tillett's nose.

But the reality is, there was another team that used Ritu.

"...Well, Nyal and her teammates must be bitching like that."

Team [Tenjou Tenge] leader, [Risky] Yuta.

The team is a team that likes to use the extremely rare tactic of always playing solo, even though they are playing a team-based game, and right now the team's ace player who boasts his huge popularity, muttered.

Yuta had been humiliated and killed by a woman named Nyarlath in a tournament, and he had studied her methods thoroughly at that time.

That is why it was expected that Nyarlath would try to use Ritu the moment she saw the message from Tillett.

(That cunning woman. She could have set up Suupaa, but she didn't because she knows Suupaa won't fall for that.) Yuta thought.

That is why Nyarlath betrayed Tiltette. Even if it had benefited Suupaa in the end, someone would have been sure to get a twisted look on their face.

And one more thing.

This is the same conclusion that he arrived at because he has been killed by Suupaa more times than Photon.

In other words, he had a reverse trust that Suupaa would know about Tiltette's proposal.

Suupaa would not use Ritu in the next game. He had no doubt about this.

That is why Yuta decided to use it instead.

And to be precise, Yuta was not he who was using Ritu, but one of his allied players. Yuta himself is using Meteora.

Of course, he chose to do so because he knew he was an easy target.

(It is almost certain that Ritu is not Suupaa. At least Photon and I have seen through it... I think the leader of V-Yanen too... Oh well, it doesn't matter who knows now that we've gotten this far.)

No one can't deny the possibility that the other Ritu was actually Suupaa and not Nyarlath, but there was a reason why Yuta thought that it was unlikely.

In his prime, Rinne was skilled at playing all players in her palm, and she will kill them without giving them a chance to bring out their best. That's a trait of less mechanically skillful players. They will use trickery as their weapon of choice.

On the other hand, Suupaa is not that type of player in the first place. She is basically a mass of skill who crushes her opponents head-on in any situation.

She would read his opponent's tricks to avoid the absolute disadvantage, but she was not the type of player who would play games and like to read the other side of the coin.

And the reason why he dares to use of Ritu in [Tenjou Tenge] is that it has become a perfect decoy.

They always fight solo. Therefore, the decoy strategy is a template for this team.

Like the bait of the anglerfish, only one person in the team dares to play in such a way that they purposefully position themselves to be easily targeted.

After the bait was taken, his teammate will took the enemy by surprise.

They call themselves [heavenly rulers], but they are more like ninjas or assassins.

Nevertheless, they are indeed elite players who have accumulated many victories with their tactics.

"If I could, I would kill Suupaa and become a hero."

Yuta chuckled to himself and scolded himself, (If I could do that, I wouldn't have any trouble.)

Tl note:

If anyone asks where I have been these past few days, I can only say: in hell, in toothache hell...

I will schedule the release, so I don't repeat this long type of abstaining.