-Vol 6: Dusk of An Era-

-Doom Fest(-)

“What do you mean, short skirt? It’s the latest fashion, hmph!” Akari humphed in anger, before doing a twirl while holding the hem of her skirt, “do I look good? I bought it recently.”

‘Shit!’ Kenshind don’t know what he should say in this situation. he had already complained about the shortness of the skirt if he says it looks cute on top it, didn’t that mean what he said earlier was nothing but air, and he was approving her to wear this type of clothes?

As expected of his sister, she could trap him with just a simple line.

“Umm, how are you Akari, everything’s alright over here? I heard you are having problems with someone over here…” Kenshin changed the subject, he didn’t want to answer her with a ‘yes’ and telling her ‘no’ will only put him in a difficult spot.

“Ah? You mean senior Nina? Yeah, we are alright. We are good friends now… but I couldn’t defeat her no matter what I do, it's really frustrating.” Though she said it’s frustrating, Kenshin didn’t find any hint of sadness or anger in there, what he could see was just pure competitiveness and desire to improve.

“Ho, so you found a rival… that’s great. It will aid you in your growth a lot.” Kenshin nodded, feeling quite happy for her. Sometimes, having a rival would do much more good than bad.

“But you didn’t have one, and yet you are this strong already… I have heard about your accomplishments… in fact, I have even seen it.” Akari said giddily, her excitement level was so high that it was practically tangible.

“Huh, seen it? how?” asked Kenshin, confused, looking at her with furrowed brows.

“What do you know, some guy recorded it and uploaded it to the internet. You are currently a global star… hahaha. Even in my dorm and institute, your name and feats are pretty popular among students.” Akari said happily. She was very happy seeing her brother getting recognized and on a global scale no less.

Kenshin, though, didn’t share the same sentiment.

“What? There is actually a video circulating with my feats? I, I mean, did it show me making those huge hands out of the fire and slamming one of those flies to ground… that kind of thing?” just to be sure it was that thing, Kenshin asked. He had done many things that day, by any chance, if him using his [Divine Skill] or Zombie skills were to be exposed, it will make his life complicated and might even endanger everyone around him.

Seeing her brother’s distress, Akari instantly understood what he was thinking and said, “don’t worry, your Zombie skill and divine skills are not recorded.” She assured, with a smile, patting her brother's hand as she said so.

“So, you knew what I was thinking, huh?” Kenshin asked, looking at her oddly. He didn’t question how she knew about his DIvone Skill, as he was the one who told her in the first place.

To his question, Akari only smiled cutely and said, “I am your sister. If a sister doesn’t know about her dear brother, then who will?” then she grabbed his hand and pulled him out of the hallway, “let’s go. We have many places to move around.”

Kenshin could only smile as he let her pull him to her heart’s content.

…

Far away from Mito and quite closer to Tokyo, on an undisclosed location, a huge lump of red flesh could be seen constricting and expanding, rhythmically like that of a heart beating inside an animal's body. Before they stood two men, dressed casually even. One of them was bald with a wolf tattoo on his forehead, dressed in a leather jacket and leather pants and cowboy shoes.

The other man beside him was dressed in short Bermuda pants and a Hawaii shirt and sandals. He even wore a floral garland on his neck, and his black hair was spiked to all directions, he also had a wolf tattoo, but it’s on his neck. He held a bamboo spike on his hand, leaning on it loosely.

“Is this it? I can’t believe we have to search all over the place only to find it here… the map of the system is pretty shitty.” The one with the Hawaii getup commented as he whistled at the seeing the disgusting lump of flesh.

“This fits the description of everything mentioned on the quest list, so this must be it… and can’t you feel the overwhelming feeling of bloodthirst from this thing?” asked the bald man, before he clapped his hand loudly, causing a pink barrier to form around him, as it slowly expanded, enveloping the lump of flesh as well as both of them around it.

“Ho, are you preparing to kill it already? Shouldn’t we wait for others to come here first. The system has warned us to not engage it alone…” the Bermuda man said, with a smirk on his face. Despite his complaint, he didn’t seem to be against it that much.

“Adam, really! You of all people asking me to wait?” the bald man said, a smirk was shown on his own face. Then his smirk morphed to crazed laughter, “aren’t you curious about the system’s rewards? I am pretty sure we aren’t going to get some short change if we complete this mission, and this was the first time something like Co-op has appeared. I am pretty sure the rewards won’t going to be something swallow.”

“Haha, Clut, though I am pretty curious about the rewards, I am more concerned about my life. We of all people knew what it was like to suddenly encounter a situation that could escalate to something bad… I don’t want to die just in search of something delusional. I still don’t trust this system and it’s half-assed methods.” Adam said, smiling happily as he did so. It was true that he, too, was curious about the rewards. But, most of all system users, he had learned his lesson after nearly dying and surviving by a hair’s breadth. He doesn’t want to encounter something like that again.

“Pussy.” Clut mocked before shaking head and clicked his fingers. With a flash of light, Adam appeared outside of the pink barrier.

“Banish, huh. You are as cruel as ever… but this time, it seems you are going to bite more than you can chew…” Adam sighed, looking at the madly grinning man. He, too, clicked his own fingers, conjuring a chair of thin air before landing his ass on it, ready to observe the fight… or one-way slaughter whichever that is.

After banishing Adam out of the barrier, Clut looked at the mass of flesh beating like a heart with some appreciation, taking in the grotesqueness of it. He sighed loudly and looked at the thing with narrowed eyes and activated his system’s scanning function.

[??? ???]

“As expected, I couldn’t detect the name of this thing… not even its species…” Clut mumbled, feeling the anticipation building up in his heart. For a second, he thought of dispelling the barrier and wait for others to arrive.. but the allure of rewards as well as his pride kept him from doing so.

“Hmph, it’s just a lump of flesh. I have seen worse, what’s the worse can happen?” Clut prepped himself for the fight as clenched his fist tightly.