Right around the time Llenn discovered the ceiling on the maze, or perhaps a bit earlier, Shirley had figured out the trick at the exit to the tunnel that went through the rampart.
“I see… So that’s what this is… Well, that makes sense.”
There was a maze of a town ahead. As a test, she fired a 7.62 mm bullet from her R93 Tactical 2 rifle at the spires over the center of the castle—just an ordinary bullet, rather than wasting an exploding round—but it was stopped by an invisible ceiling.
Sniping up from below was impossible. And presumably, vice versa.
Whether because they heard the high-pitched sound of the gun firing or out of sheer coincidence, two cursors became visible to her, wandering around forty yards away behind the walls.
Shirley was a sniper. Her style of combat was finding enemies at long distance and shooting them. She was decent at snap shooting as she ran, too, but for that she still needed to be a decent distance away, with no obstacles in between.
If there were no cursors, and no one knew their opponent’s location, then she might be able to shoot someone when they appeared around a corner in the maze. But if they knew the distance and everything, she was at a total disadvantage.
“I can’t win…”
The thought of charging into the labyrinthine town and holding her own was a pipe dream.
Shirley hated to lose, but she knew her own qualities, what she was good and bad at, better than anyone else. She didn’t get lost in her own fantasies.
“If only she were here…”
If Clarence were present, Shirley could hand over her second loadout, a shotgun, and have her stand in front and do all the blasting. A shotgun was the perfect gun for this environment, with a short range but wide spray, with the effect of stunning anyone hit.
But Clarence wasn’t here. She had to accept reality.
So what to do?
“Should I just stay here…? No, think about these shitty rules. Who knows what might happen to this spot later… Could be that the middle is the only part that’s left at the end…”
Like Vivi, Shirley was concerned about the safety of the area. Perhaps it was her wild instincts as a hunter. Perhaps it was something else.
“Should I just keep running, without even bothering with my gun…?”
If she put the long and bulky R93 back into her inventory, she could reach max speed and be much nimbler. But it would mean that the ken-nata blade was the only weapon she could use.
One method would be to pay close attention to the enemy locations via the cursors, pray that she didn’t run across them, and rush through the maze as quickly as possible.
“But if they track me down, I’m done for.” Once she realized that, she eliminated that option.
You didn’t have to be Llenn to outrun Shirley; there were plenty of players faster than her. If they started catching up from behind, she would simply die without a means of fighting back.
While she had fulfilled one of her life goals—her Squad Jam life goals—by killing Pitohui, Shirley was not interested in resigning, committing suicide, or allowing someone to take her out.
Even if her ultimate fate was to be shot and killed, Shirley was going to do her damnedest to delay that moment as long as she possibly could.
“Then that leaves only one thing,” she concluded. No matter how impossible it seemed, if that was the best option, it would have to do.
Shirley turned on her heel and began to run through the tunnel—toward the outside of the castle. As she ran, she swung her left arm, turning the long rifle into brief motes of light that soon vanished.
Then she reached the threshold of the entrance, the place she’d scrambled so hard to reach, at the top of a ten-thousand-foot cliff—and glared at the sky and the wall around her.
“……”