While Maple was mowing down everything with all her skills unleashed, Sally was also sealed inside a battle-royale zone.

“Fast…! I can’t land a hit!”

Sally slipped under a falling great-hammer and cut the man across the belly. Each time she dodged a strike, “【Dance of Swords】” raised her damage, and her dagger blow grew heavier.

“【Fireball】!”

“Like that’ll—huh!?”

Water burst from the ground and launched the man skyward. The way Sally’s skill “【Disguise】” changes a skill’s look and name is still a mystery. In truth, only members of “【Maple Tree】” know the second Unique Series that freely changes visuals even exists. A first-time opponent cannot see through this trick.

“【Pinpoint Attack】!”

“D—damn…”

Sally pierced him as he fell helplessly, and the man vanished. A clean win, and no surprise—Sally’s focus was sharper than ever, her reading of motion nearly reaching Kasumi’s “【Mind’s Eye】“. The time Sally had staked on today was far beyond any other player’s. The others didn’t need to know, but her wish had pushed her talent past its limits.

It now stood beside Maple’s defense. Against Maple, attacks without defense-piercing have no meaning; likewise, against Sally now, any hit that is “theoretically avoidable” is pointless. Her avoidance was absolute—something that should not be possible, yet was.

“I have to find them…”

Leaving one player down, Sally hunted for the next. To end a battle royale, you must defeat every player in the zone. But she wasn’t looking for “just anyone.”

She was looking for Maple—only Maple.

She had cleared only the first hurdle. If she could not meet Maple on this wide field, it would end there.

“Good, two more…!”

Sally spotted two women—an archer and a greatsword user—and closed the gap in a straight line. The pair noticed her and raised their weapons.

“【Fast Arrow】!”

A super-fast shot flew while there was still distance. The archer already pictured her follow-up, but the arrow passed behind Sally without dealing any damage.

“What!?”

Her pathing was more exact than the shooter’s own line. Sally hadn’t “ignored” the shot; she tilted her head by a hair while sprinting straight, and the arrow missed.

“【Leap】!”

Before the second arrow left the string, Sally jumped and rushed in.

“Don’t mock us!”

The greatsword user would not, could not, let that pass. Sally had shown a big opening; if she wasn’t stopped, the partner would be struck hard—there was no choice but to intercept. The greatsword found its mark—and Sally’s body blinked away. A longsword punched through the greatsword user’s chest from behind.

“Gah—!?”

It should have been a perfect counter, yet they suffered huge damage. They could not keep up. The archer scrambled to aim at the reappeared Sally, but a mass of water crashed in first.

“【Water Dragon】!”

A dragon-shaped surge smashed into the ground and raged about, swallowing both women. In that torrent, even standing was hard; aiming was impossible.

“What is this…!?”

“What’s happening!?”

“【Torrential Flood】!”

From another angle, a hard stream lifted the already-hurt greatsword user who had taken the first blow.

“【Icicle】!”

Sally grew an “【Icicle】” along the rising body, tethered a thread, closed in, and took the head before the foe could move.

“【Spread Arrow】!”

While Sally finished the greatsword user, the archer regained balance and fired a wide scatter. Sally twisted in midair and knocked away only the shafts that would have hit her body.

“No way…!?”

She had never faced someone she could not hit at all. No skill she owned seemed like it could land. Fast arrows, spread shots—everything was handled cleanly. It didn’t look like luck; it was precise. The archer ran through every tool in her mind and saw, at the same time, that none would work.

“How do you beat this…!”

“Sorry. I can’t stop.”

Sally coolly parried the last arrow, then drove in a dagger and took the life.

“I have to hurry. Keep looking.”

Strong will drove her steps. The red light in the sky—the sign of a battle royale—had not faded yet. Sally ran again. Events do end. Time is not endless; it flows even now. She could not miss this single chance. She pressed forward harder.

＊ ＊ ＊

“Taa—!”

“Guh!”

“Go, go!”

“Damn it…! I can’t close in…!”

“She keeps changing forms!”

The battle royale happened again and again. In the shrunken zone’s center, Maple spread six wings. Many players ringed her, treating her as the shared problem—“take care of that first”—and pointed every weapon at her. A free-for-all, yet always one-versus-many. It could not be helped.

There on the grass, Maple layered “【Annihilation Field】” with “【Self-Offering Love】“—iron defense and ticking damage over a wide area. While guarding “【Demon Lord】” and “【Predator】“, she forced long-range shots from “【Ancient Weapon】“, “【Machine God】“, and “【Poison Dragon】“. Step in, and you die. Stay back, and you die. Leave her alone, and Maple herself would close and swallow one by one into the “【Annihilation Field】“.

“【Acid Rain】!”

A soft rain fell across a vast space, lighter than her other attacks. Some players felt no damage and shifted focus elsewhere—then, after standing in it a while, suddenly dropped to zero and vanished.

“Huh?”

“So there really isn’t any “gentle” attack here…!”

This works, that works not—she still had “【Night Parade of a Hundred Demons】“, “【Atrocity】“, “【Rebirth’s Darkness】“, and “【Voracity】“. Despair piled up. Was this even the power of a “player”? Still—she wasn’t invincible. With the right cut, she could be killed. There were tools that worked. The problem was simple: actually landing those blows on Maple was brutally hard.

“【Commence Attack】!”

Maple self-detonated, rocketed ahead, and slammed into a clustered team. Her mobility wasn’t great—but for straight-line travel, her self-blast gave her explosive speed.

“【Invitation to the Abyssal Deep】!”

“Ah—”

Five open mouths—her tentacles—snapped wide like giant beasts. Whoever they wrapped was erased by “【Voracity】” on the spot.

“She’s too strong…!”

“This strong!?”

“Again! Here I go!”

Maple left a trail of flame and flew at another pack. Soon, those facing her noticed the big difference between “this format’s Maple” and Maple in normal fights.

“Yaaah!”

She erased five more with “【Voracity】“, swept a laser from “【Ancient Weapon】“, then let “【Annihilation Field】” and the fiends called by “【Demon Lord】” take the rest. In guild war talks about how to beat Maple, the first proposal was always the same: force her big skills on cooldown.

A Maple with everything ready was unmanageable. But many of her tools had usage limits and long cooldowns; with careful push-and-pull, you could strip them away, one by one. Only then could you finally rush in with defense-piercing and have a chance. That was the basic Maple plan; no one owed her a fight at full power.

But this was a festival—an event made so everyone could go all-out, again and again. In most encounters, Maple was full spec. If you beat her, you earned supreme glory—but, simply put, she kept monstrous output the whole time.

“Nope, can’t do this…!”

“Top of a top guild really is on a different level…!”

Lose or not, rewards didn’t change. In fact, watching that full-power fight and seeing the new skill “【Demon Lord】” was a tale worth bringing home. Even if you died here, you’d just respawn and head back in. “I saw something amazing,” a player muttered—then “【Predator】” bit him in half.

“I did it! Another clean run!”

Facing a full-power monster was hard without end. Maple proved that with a stream of deadly skills that never seemed to stop.

＊ ＊ ＊

“Whew… I fought a lot!”

Win after win. She’d rolled over dozens—no, hundreds. When the red battle-royale glow faded once, Maple stretched, then sat on a big rock.

“I got used to using my skills… even though there are so many.”

She opened her blue panel and checked her stats. Her defense-specialized spread hadn’t changed since the day she started, but her list of skills had grown so much. Maple closed her eyes a moment and let the memories come—every time she earned a new skill. The road still felt like yesterday. She’d never expected so many bright memories to bloom inside a game.

“It’s a little lonely.”

But everything ends. As Maple stared at the wide sky and grew a touch sentimental, she noticed a figure walking from afar.

“…Ah, Mii!”

Her friend in red-based gear approached—familiar colors.

“Maple! How’s it going?”

“I’ve won a lot!” Maple flashed a V-sign. It was true—so far she’d taken perfect victories without letting anyone even touch her.

“You?”

“I haven’t died yet either. As the guild master of “【Kingdom of the Flame Emperor】“, I can’t look lame.”

Maple aside, Mii was also very strong on chaotic fields like this. With Ignis she could own the sky, and she excelled at wide, hard hits. Maple knew Mii’s strength well—no deaths made sense.

“So… I came to look for you, found you—and I want a revenge match.”

“Eeeh!?”

“In PvP you’ve mopped the floor with me. That’s frustrating. And you’re stepping away from the game, right? I thought it’d be fine if I couldn’t find you—but if I did, I wanted to fight.”

“I see…”

“Well? Is it a no?”

“Let’s do it!”

“Okay, yay! One match, no hard feelings!”

“Got it! I’ll do my best!”

“We’ll use duel mode. See—can turn off the spectator cam, lock the area so no one barges in, and add a time limit.”

“Uh-huh. I haven’t used it much—so could you set it?”

“Sure. Once it’s set—one match!”

“Yeah! Hehe, I’m kinda nervous.”

“Haha, me too. But once it starts, no holding back, okay?”

“Okay!”

By chance or by fate, Maple and Mii had met—and their duel would be held.

＊ ＊ ＊

Elsewhere, Sally ran through the woods, searching for Maple. Her scouting and mobility were high, but only within the normal range of player skill and stats. She couldn’t fly and had no special search skill; she had to run and look the hard way. And in doing so, she got found first.

“Ah—found you!”

“…That voice.”

Sally stopped and waited. The bushes rustled, and the speaker—Frederica—pushed through.

“Hey hey, great place to meet, right?”

“Is it?”

“Yeees it is! You know what I want without me saying it, don’t you? Let’s do it over there where it’s open.”

“I didn’t say okay.”

“Eh!?”

“Heh… kidding. Fine. You’ve given me lots of matches—well, I gave you plenty too.”

“That’s the part you didn’t need to “correct”!”

Their duels had been fun. As Sally said, Frederica had “played with her,” and Sally had “played her” too.

“Anyway—if we’re doing it, let’s do it.”

“This way.”

Frederica led Sally onto a flat plain and tapped the panel with practiced hands, setting the duel rules—the same rules they’d used so many times before.

“You sure about letting me pick a favorable field?”

“I know I can’t beat you by “behaving.” And picking a good ground is basic combat, right?”

“True.”

“I won’t let you run away on a win. I’ll put one black mark on your record before the end!”

The record so far was Frederica’s total losses. Even so, if she won this one, the victory would taste that much sweeter.

“If you win, be proud.”

“That’s some confidence. I don’t think you’ve ever said it that hard.”

“Yeah. Today I’m the strongest I’ve ever been. If you can win, try.”

With those words, the air around Sally changed, and Frederica’s hands paused over the settings. Only someone who’d fought her so many times would notice it—savage focus, a pressure that wordlessly promised a dagger to the throat if she showed even a heartbeat of slack. Not in any duel or any event before had Frederica felt fear like this from Sally. Strange, abnormal—and exactly as Sally said, the monster before her was the strongest yet. Nothing in her look had changed, but Frederica understood.

“H-haha… so you’ve really tuned yourself up… okay, okay! That just makes it worth beating you—and it’ll feel even better when I finally do! …Haa… I won’t lose.”

“Me neither. I’m not losing today. I won’t give you a white mark.”

Rivals for so long, Sally and Frederica chose to settle it here. Like a blade honed to the limit, Sally stood ready; Frederica shook off the brief chill and leveled her staff. As promised, she would not let Sally “win and run.”

“Here I go—!”

“Fight!”

And the curtain rose on their duel.