If there was one thing that would do Haruka-kun in, it would be himself. His powers were so strong they exceeded their own limits and rolled over into self-destruction. Or, possibly, the darkness could do him in. We still didn’t know what this was, nor how we might prevent it from hurting Haruka-kun. Self-destruction, on the other hand… Our only recourse against that was lectures, but Haruka-kun seemed to remember lectures for half a day at best. If we took our eyes off of him for one second, it all went right out the window again.
Oh, these meetings never amounted to anything. But even so, if we could convince ourselves we hadn’t forgotten anything, we hadn’t missed any weakness that might trip up Haruka-kun later, then it was worth it.
“He’s still having movement troubles, so we should strike while the iron is hot and overwhelm him with a saturation attack.”
“But he has a Boundary Skill.”
“Now’s our chance! Let’s do a close-range sneak attack on him.”
“But he has Area Analyze and Presence Sensing.”
“We could try crushing him to death.”
“That’s if you can catch him first.”
“We could, uh…explode him.”
“He’ll just steal the bomb.”
“Okay, what’s his weakness, then… Hit him with a lecture?”
“Ah, that’ll do it.”
“Something tells me we don’t have to worry about assassins armed with lectures.”
“Sure, but if one did exist, I’d be on the side of the assassin.”
To keep him safe, to train ourselves, to find every possible weakness that could be used against any of us, we plotted and fomented and schemed. I was sure the dungeon emperors practiced a similar ritual among themselves.
We’d thought and thought and thought like women possessed. We’d approached the problem with every serious effort we could muster, and yet we never came up with an answer. That’s why we had to talk to each other—to share viewpoints. Two heads were better than one. And we put all our heads together in the hopes it might help Haruka-kun, might help us, might help the dungeon emperors and every other kind soul who wanted nothing more than our safety and happiness.
“Man! I’ve got nothing.”
“And that’s the most anxiety-inducing part.”
You could look at Angelica-san’s armor and see how much Haruka-kun cared. Her august armor set had been steeped in the thick magi of the dungeon she had suffered in for so many centuries, and those years settled on her armor like a second set of protection. Then, on top of that, Haruka-kun had dumped hunk of mithril after hunk of mithril, never begrudging a bit of it. He’d used his most powerful spellstones to upgrade her gear. He’d applied every Trait he could think of on the already legendary armor the three dungeon emperors owned. The same two Traits were a constant refrain: Indestructibility. Revival. Indestructibility. Revival. Two Traits to last forever, and ever, and ever.
Because that’s how long the dungeon emperors would live: forever, and ever, and ever. Long after Haruka-kun was gone. But still, he wanted to watch over them and keep them safe through all the centuries.
Their clothes and accessories, too, were made to last to the very limits of Haruka-kun’s ability. Maybe that wouldn’t be forever, but if he could eke out another year, another decade, for our friends to enjoy their new clothes, then Haruka-kun would do whatever it took. Because he loved them. He loved them very, very much. And even if, many centuries down the line, the threads should unravel and the seams come apart, that love would still remain.
“You know how much fun he has tossing people sky-high? I guess we don’t have to worry about him being overwhelmed by numbers now either.”
“Yeah, I don’t even know he does it. That’s not how martial arts work!”
Nefertiri-san’s one weakness was the strength of numbers. If she was caught and crushed by the sheer weight of bodies, she couldn’t flit about in her fast dancer’s style of combat. So Haruka-kun studied relentlessly, experimented and fussed and practiced, until he unlocked the secrets of tongbeiquan and taught it to her. Now, whether this was real tongbeiquan, no one knew—least of all Haruka-kun—but hey, that’s what we called it. We trusted that it could keep our friend safe for all eternity, and Nefertiri-san, knowing this gift of love for what it was, took it to heart with no hesitation.
Haruka-kun also realized that magic was Nefertiri-san’s best friend in a close fight, so he taught her qigong and Qi Wizardry before loading her up with magic-buffing accessories. Finally, knowing her weakness to close-quarters combat, he taught her tai chi. These combat arts would live on even after he passed away. And that Lamaze method…whatever. Let’s split the difference and call that a breathing exercise.
“Haruka-kun functions kind of like a Summoner job.”
“What, in that he puts his Servants’ happiness and wellbeing first? Which he uses as an excuse to throw himself in front of danger…”
“His Servants live cushy lives while he works himself to death fighting and trying to protect them.”
And because he did all that, we had to rack our brains and devise a way to kill him. We couldn’t dare lose Haruka-kun. Duh! D-don’t read too much into it, okay? I’d say the same about anyone who did so much for me.
Like, our equipment was just like the dungeon emperors’, you know? He’d taught us the same techniques and outfitted us in the same armor. He’d planned for everything to last a hundred years—more than that! Centuries and centuries. Haruka-kun had the shortest life expectancy of any of us, and he used it to ensure we could be safe long, long after he was gone.
How could we not care for him after that? How could we not not want to lose him, and thus work our hardest to bump him off? And no matter what we tried, we never stumped up a single way to murder that man. I could not think of anything short of himself that could manage to do him in. Frankly, I couldn’t imagine him dying at all!
We’d broken Eye Mastery’s spell and suffered many nightmares for it. Every time I woke up from one, my heart ached so badly for him I felt it as a physical pain in my chest. I had to do something to prevent these wretched dreams from ever coming true—but I couldn’t think how such a nightmare could even occur. How the hell did one slaughter Haruka-kun?
“He’s too low-level to equip good armor. His HP and vitality stats are awful. But through a ridiculous Trait load-out, he’s made that cloth cape of his better armor than a suit of mail.”
“Speaking of mail, he’s started to be more careful these days. I caught him wearing a breastplate before.”
“Yeah, but that’s only because it shoots out shoulder funnels.”
How to make Haruka a has-been…was it even possible? He was such a slippery weasel, and while he was vulnerable during his attacks, you did not want to be on the receiving end of those. I guessed there was one scenario where he wouldn’t attack—if you were roughly twenty-five scantily clad teenage girls—but beyond that, you didn’t want to be anywhere near him and his Universe Staff. His ridiculous offense was his greatest defense.
“Low HP and vitality mean nothing when he’s impossible to hit.”
“And if you aren’t fast enough to finish the job, he’ll just use Revival and pop right back up.”
Whittling his HP down was impossible, and going in for a one-shot kill was too dangerous. Haruka-kun may have been flimsy enough to go down in one hit, but no matter your armor, you couldn’t possibly be strong enough to survive the counterattack.
Yup. Whichever brilliant beast managed to take down Haruka-kun would be in for a world of pain afterward. The dungeon emperors won a hundred battles out of a hundred, and killing Haruka-kun in front of them was signing a very scary death sentence.
“Honestly, Haruka-kun isn’t very good at combat.”
“Nope. He’s very good at killing and destroying. Combat’s just what gets him there.”
That’s what informed his MO: attack the attacker; kill before being killed. That, and only that, was his secret survival tactic. He refused to give up until the enemy was dead, and he refused to die until that was accomplished. It was pure stubborn, selfishness.
“Speaking as his would-be guards, I feel worse for the ones who attack him.”
“Right? The poor things… Attacking Haruka-kun is the worst misfortune in the world.”
“Not only is it nigh impossible to kill him, but I doubt he’d even stay dead.”
“Yeah, the more I consider this, the more bonkers it becomes.”
“Poor, poor unlucky Haruka assailants…”
And what’s worse, us worrying over this every day made Haruka and the dungeon emperors sad too. I just had to hope no unlucky sexy female assassins ever came along. The dungeon emperors, even though they were practically invincible, even though there were a full three of them guarding Haruka-kun, still wept to wonder if Haruka-kun would survive the day—and so they were the biggest danger of all.
If a whole harem of sexy assassins came along, they could kill Haruka-kun in an instant. That’s why we had to be there to stand in the way—although the debate was still out on what, exactly, we could do against an assassin harem.
“I say we have Class Rep take one for the team and make all the tentacles focus on her.”
“Ooh! Let’s look for the Incarnation Skill to give to her, and then we can have a whole army of meatshield clones!”
“That’s genius.”
Excuse me?! How was that supposed to help? And why couldn’t we use Phantom? Incarnation would result in me feeling all the stimulus from the tentacles!
“Is there a costume we can make for Class Rep that’ll draw Haruka-kun’s tentacles to her?”
“Definitely the bunny girl costume. With full-body fishnets.”
“That’ll do it! If we wait for them to get busy and then attack, I think we might actually have a chance!”
“Whoa, whoa, wait. Who’s wearing this full-body fishnet bunny girl costume? Because it sure as heck ain’t me! I don’t care how many clones I have, all that stimulus on me alone would kill me!”
“Hmm, let’s see… Let’s assume the battle drags out long enough. We’ll need Class Rep dummies to serve as dummies while we’re Reviving the real Class Rep.”
“Mwa ha ha! That’s it! Infinite Revival Class Rep dummies is the Sex Monad’s one weakness!”
“Now that’s one battle that’ll last forever… A million rounds, and they still won’t be done.”
“ONE MILLION?! I would die of pleasure, if nothing else, long before that! Going…going a million rounds with Haruka-kun would be…” KA-BOOM! Plunk.
“Mushroom squad, give her the usual.”
“Ja!” Plonk.
One…one million… If that’s ten o*g*s*s per second…that’s one, fifteen…seventy-four… That’s over a whole day! Oh god, I really would die.