It was essentially a miracle that he’d managed it in time despite having never before tried to manifest an Incarnate technique with his foot, he thought, as he looked out at the scene before him.
Covelline Miner stood stiffly rooted to the spot, gripping in both hands the shaft of his pickax—more than a weapon, a part of his own self—which had been shattered by Urocyon’s bare hand.
The avatar in the blue suit standing in front of him, however, had already relaxed his posture, as if he’d lost interest in the enemy before him. He slowly turned around, and since Haruyuki had attacked the Drive Linker, he could now see the still fully charged health gauge displayed above his head.
Urocyon’s mask had looked doglike from afar, but now that Haruyuki was facing him up close, he could see that it had a prominent snout and sharp triangular ears, making it seem more like a fox than like a dog. The material of his suit seemed to be rubber and metal fused together, and it clearly revealed the lines of the sinewy muscles covering his small, muscular body. Although the suit looked, at most, two or three millimeters thick, the place where the cannon had hit it was not even discolored, much less damaged.
Haruyuki finally understood why.
Urocyon had the Incarnate System activated constantly while attacking and defending, even in that very moment. The fact that his overlay was barely visible was no doubt because his imagination had been perfectly optimized.
The Incarnate overlay was due to overflowing excess signals being processed as a light effect when the user’s imagination passed through the BB system’s image control. But Urocyon activated only the bare minimum Incarnate required for the shortest time necessary, so there was almost no signal overflow. The basic principle of Incarnate still stood, however: The only thing that could resist Incarnate was Incarnate. So no matter how powerful an opponent’s attack, it couldn’t so much as scratch Urocyon, and no matter how thick that opponent’s armor might have been, he could shatter it with a single punch.
Haruyuki widened his stance and braced himself with the foot that had narrowly evaded real damage.
“Well, well. So finally someone who can use Psion shows up,” Urocyon said, bending his neck from side to side. The blue fox mask only covered his face from the nose up, and Haruyuki could see that his mouth was human, but his skin and his lips were a mechanical gray. “I was real shocked, disappointed even, that my esteemed elders are actually just a bunch of stupid newbs who don’t know the first thing about fighting. But I guess not all of you are, huh?”
While the words themselves were challenging, Haruyuki could feel the very real relief in Urocyon’s voice. Taken aback, he asked the very obvious question in response. “…What’s ‘Saion’?”
“Psionic power, obviously. Supernatural abilities. Wait. Do you BB warriors not call it that?” Urocyon said, raising his right hand.
Reflexively, Haruyuki braced himself, but the Drive Linker merely lifted his index finger. At the end of it sat a blue light—overlay—flickering like a flame.
Haruyuki also turned the index finger of his right hand to the sky and focused his imagination. It took him a half second longer than Urocyon, but soon a platinum light shone there, a glittering silver star.
Behind Urocyon, Covelline Miner had at some point retreated more than ten meters, while the other survivors had formed a large circle around Haruyuki and Urocyon and were now silently watching over the proceedings.
Maintaining the light at the tip of his finger, Haruyuki responded to Urocyon’s question. “We call this power ‘will,’ the Incarnate System.”
“Will, huh? Makes sense. Looks like the principle’s the same anyway.” Nodding, Urocyon quenched his overlay and put a hand on his hip. “So, where’d they dig you up from anyway?”
Haruyuki felt something off in Urocyon’s casually challenging attitude, the same feeling he’d had looking over at the Drive Linkers lined up on the stone statue, and he suddenly realized what it was.
Urocyon and the other nine Drive Linkers weren’t radiating the crushing force—the information pressure particular to high rankers. Was it because they were visitors from another game, or was there some other reason?
No. This isn’t the time to be worrying about that.
Haruyuki lowered his hand and double-checked his Legion membership in his head before identifying himself. “…Silver Crow, member of the Legion Oscillatory Universe.”
“Oscillatory… Dang. Fluctuating space-time? That’s some name. I don’t hate it, though.” Urocyon grinned pleasantly, brought his other hand up to his opposite hip, and whirled around to take in the crowd.
Perhaps at their mental limits at last, the survivors didn’t so much as twitch at the glare directed at them. This was no wonder. They had taken on the Deity of Demise, Tezcatlipoca, met with defeat, and then experienced several weeks of Unlimited EK. Most likely, they had run in a frenzied panic every time they regenerated on the hour to try to gain some distance, only to be dragged back by the gravitational attack Toxcatl, a tale of endless penance on par with the Greek myth of Sisyphus.
And just when Tezcatlipoca was suddenly destroyed and they thought they were finally free of this endless hell, mysterious intruders showed up and began a fresh slaughter. The leaders of Exercitus couldn’t have possibly foreseen this, and they could be proud of any resistance they were able to put up, even if it was for only a minute or two, given they were up against Urocyon now, who made free use of Incarnate.
Which was why he couldn’t let any more of them be sacrificed. Given that he was a member of Oscillatory Universe, the most authoritarian of the seven Great Legions, and that Exercitus rejected that authority, they might have been unlikely bedfellows, but when faced with external enemies invading the Accelerated World—BB2039 itself—they were all the same Burst Linkers.
“…Urocyon. What exactly is your objective—desire?” Haruyuki asked, as he earnestly pushed down the many emotions swirling in his heart.
The smile disappeared from the face of the Drive Linker in blue as he replied, “Whoa, whoa. Way to kill the mood, dude. We’ve been waiting for this day—the moment when our worlds got hooked up—for months now. We figured you’d have, like, the fiercest BB warriors lined up to jump us. But these losers are half-dead, and they can’t even use Psion. And then finally someone who’s got a little fight in him shows, but he won’t shut the hell up about—”
“H-hang on,” Haruyuki interjected, stunned. “You were waiting for the moment our worlds connected? So then you all knew this was going to happen?”
“Natch.” Urocyon nodded firmly. “There was the whole system message when we hit level nine.”
“…!!”
Haruyuki inhaled sharply.
The fact that the Drive Linkers before him were level niners was also a surprise, but the issue was more serious than that.
Back when he’d only just become a Burst Linker, Kuroyukihime had told him that a system message had appeared when she reached level nine and informed her of three things: Five wins against level-nine Burst Linkers were required to reach level ten; if two level-nine Burst Linkers fought each other, the loser would immediately lose all their burst points and have Brain Burst forcibly uninstalled; and anyone who reached level ten would meet the developer—the creator of the Accelerated World—and be informed of the true reason for the existence of the game known as Brain Burst 2039.
But it seemed that the players of Dread Drive 2047 received a different message when they became level nine. He keenly wanted to know each and every word of that message, but the Drive Linker likely wouldn’t tell him if he asked, given the situation.
Instead, he made sure he kept standing tall, so as not to show any weakness as he spoke. “We didn’t get any message from the system. And the Burst Linkers you say are half-dead, well…”
He pointed at the stone statue rising behind him to the right—the lower half of Tezcatlipoca.
“They really are half-dead because they were just fighting this Super-class Enemy. If you’re into beating up people who basically can’t fight back, if you’re satisfied with battles where you have the overwhelming advantage, then go ahead and do your worst.”
“…”
Even after Haruyuki finished speaking, Urocyon stayed silent, his mouth turned down into a frown. Finally, after nearly ten seconds had passed, he said, sounding disgusted, “Tch! You’re talking like we’re taking candy from babies or something. But listen, man, we got our own stuff, too, all right?”
“Your own stuff?” Haruyuki parroted.
“I don’t gotta tell you everything from one to ten,” Urocyon snapped. “But, well, smacking down folks who’re already on death’s doorstep isn’t exactly my jam. So…Silver Crow, right? I’ll give you a chance.”
“A chance?” Haruyuki frowned. “What kind of chance?”
“A chance to prove you’re not full of it,” the Drive Linker responded. “If what you’re saying’s true, then once these fighters are back to full strength, they’ll be able to put up a real fight, yeah?”
“…Yeah.”
In point of fact, unless they knew both of the first-stage Incarnate techniques Attack Power Expansion and Armor Strength Expansion, the Exercitus survivors could never have defeated Urocyon, even if they all attacked him together. But if they got a decent rest to recover, they would, at the very least, be able to act more strategically instead of randomly attacking.
“Woh-kay.” Urocyon snapped out his index finger. “In that case, you gotta show us you mean business. If I win one-on-one against you, then—hold up. What level are you?”
“…Six,” Haruyuki said slowly.
“Whoa, seriously?” Urocyon rolled his eyes and shrugged somewhat theatrically. “Ugh, fine. If you can stay alive for five minutes, we’ll let you and these other kids get out of here.”