Chapter 135: Belzenstock City – Three

(Seigi’s PoV)

“So, where are we anyways?” I asked Blossom as she took us to a city after passing through an underground passage.

“We’re at Belzenstock City. We’ll work on grinding the level of your skills here.” Blossom replied.

“Couldn’t we do that in the surroundings of the Beginners’ City?” Marie asked her, and I had the same thoughts, I mean… I get that while we did get quite a few levels already, our skills are lagging behind, but… what does that have to do with moving to a different city?

“Your skills level quicker if you face enemies of a different faction than yours, and almost everyone in this city is on the Order faction.

“Also, this game is PVP-heavy, so you should start getting used to interpersonal combat.” Blossom replied while looking directly at me.

I looked away from her a bit, but ended up managing to say, “Well, as long as we only face players, I guess I’ll be fine…” It still feels a bit troublesome to kill people when things feel this realistic, but Mr. Yamamoto said that our sister-in-law has played this game since the beginning, so we ought to do things right if we are to catch up. Just… Well, I don’t think I’d be able to kill someone that doesn’t respawn.

“You really okay with it?” Marie asked me worriedly.

I looked at her in the eyes, then nodded, “Yeah, I’ll do it. That’s just how this game works after all, so I can’t hesitate forever, right?” I said while smiling, which seemed to reassure her a bit.

Besides, I can just think of this as kendo practice. If I look at it this way, it’s not as terrifying.

Blossom clapped her hands to call our attention, “Alright, that’s the spirit. The city is still a bit tumultuous due to the recent revolution that was caused by a certain troublesome person, so be on your guards, okay? We’ll be traveling through the alleys for now, so be careful of your blind spots.”

Wait, revolution? Caused by a certain troublesome person? Isn’t that a bit too much of an important information to just be glossed over like that!?

And why the back alleys!? Can’t we just move through the streets and… Oh, Marie is already going through them, I need to hurry after her! Why can’t she hesitate even a bit!?

To think she used to cry when seeing blood when she was younger, and now she easily moves forward with the intention of killing people in a VR game… I wonder how come it is so easy for her to make the distinction between game and reality when things are so realistic in VR.

Suddenly though, she stopped moving. It was a bit weird, as if she was frozen in place. I was a bit worried, so I asked her, “Hey, Marie? Everything okay?” She didn’t answer… “Marie?” I asked again. She still said nothing.

Did she get paralyzed or something? Are we under attack? Blossom did say that things were tumultuous right now, so I guess this was not impossible. I hurriedly looked up to see if there was anyone attacking us from the roofs, but there was nobody where I could see… Where could they be hiding? There aren’t any other hiding spots I can think of that can easily see us!

“Masa… Over there.” Marie suddenly said, pointing forward… Maybe I should have checked where she was looking first before looking up…

“Is an enemy there!?” I asked while turning towards that direction, but… “Our sister-in-law?”

It could in theory be someone else, but hair and eye-color aside, this player looked exactly like our sister, so it was pretty much guaranteed to be her, wasn’t it?

Blossom seemed to be annoyed at something, but I suppose it’s fine to just ignore whatever she seems to be worrying about for now?

… As I thought of that, Marie was already running towards our sister while shouting, “Sister-in-law!”

“Hey, wait!” Blossom shouted once she saw Marie running… For some reason I got a bad feeling about this, “That’s a dangerous person!” She shouted.

Weird… We both started playing this game just to meet our sister-in-law and to use this as a chance of getting closer to her, but… Right now, I feel like something really bad is going to happen.

… Why? She’s our sister, nothing bad is supposed to happen, and yet… “Marie, wait!” I shouted too, trying to stop my twin sister, while my hand naturally moved towards my sword.

Marie did not stop though, she moved closer and closer to our sister-in-law and… Got kicked on the chin. With enough strength to not only make Marie be sent flying, but to also make a hole in a nearby wall.

I could hardly understand what was happening right now. I could feel blood rushing to my head and my heart beating so loudly that I felt like it could explode at any time… It was so strange. We were in VR right now, but it was as if time had stopped, as if I was facing death itself.

“Just what are you doing!?” Blossom shouted at us.

Meanwhile, our sister slowly moved towards Marie. She didn’t seem to be looking at humans, but at insects instead… As if she was thinking of what was the best insecticide to use against us.

“Well, it’s just in the game, so this shouldn’t be a problem, right?” Our sister-in-law said while unsheathing her shortsword.