EBO: Resume - Chapter 5

September 21st, 2026

One week has passed since Hunter acquired the samples needed to upgrade his allies to the next level. In that time, he had managed to finish creating the prototypes for his companions to use. Not wanting to let any more time go to waste, the quartet headed to the nearest forest to test out the Proto Change units and see how well it would work. The girls wanted to test out their units first, allowing Hunter to set the combat parameters of their equipment to what each girl wanted, as well as letting Hideo test out his healing on the girls should either of them become seriously injured.

Both of the girls equipped their Level 2 armors before proceeding to activate the higher level prototypes. The cartridges lit up briefly to signal activation before the girls closed their drivers, put them into the secondary slot, and opened the driver up again to level up. The armor appeared in grayscale, colored in various shades of black, grey, and white, before disassembling themselves and attaching them to the designated points. Additionally, a digital circle appeared around the girls displaying floating icons of their weapons, also sharing the achromatic colors of their Prototype armors.

“Deployment complete. Stabilizing post-Level up procedures,” Hunter verbally reported to the girls as he tapped away at a virtual keyboard and looked at the various screens of coding in front of him. “Initializing weapons systems… We’re gonna start off with 5 percent of their maximum output.”

“Got it.” Haruko took up a stance and aimed her rifle ahead, though not necessarily at Kyoka. “What’s with this rifle…?”

“Oh, that’s something I wanted to test out,” Hunter brought up the schematics of Haruko’s rifle, entitled the Moonlight Rotation Rifle. With that, he proceeded to briefly explain the mechanics of the rifle’s internals, firing an orb of hyper-compressed Dynamis and Shadow damage with a special technique known as Rotation. Rotation is a type of energy that is derived from the infinite spiral created from the Golden Rectangles, which is then imbued into the rifle’s projectiles for massive damage. “So that’s the gist of it. Kept it as simple as possible for time’s sake.”

“Why didn’t you install that on my stuff?” Kyoka pouted under her mask.

“I came across this while researching damage types inside the game. Found this while I was in the middle of making Haruko’s equipment, so I decided to have her test it out for me. I’ll give you some similar stuff in the future.” Hunter began calibrating the weapons systems on Haruko’s unit before moving to Kyoka’s weapons for calibration. “Alright, weapons calibrated. Try ‘em out.”

The girls smirked under their helmets as they began firing at each other. Haruko’s rifle was near silent, quieter than the best suppressor on most guns. Kyoka’s was the same, despite the two rifles using completely different firing methods. However, unlike Haruko’s rifle, Kyoka’s appeared to be weaker, as her rifle’s projectiles shattered upon contact with the Dynamis-Shadow orbs that Haruko fired.

“I probably should’ve anticipated that… Both are starting at 5% of their maximum damage output… Let’s double Kyoka’s…” Hunter told the girls to wait for a moment as he increased Kyoka’s damage output to 10%. Afterwards, the girls continued and fought with their guns. With the damage increase, Kyoka’s projectiles didn’t shatter upon impact this time, but they did manage to knock Haruko’s off course. “It’s working better. Try shooting the trees over there.”

They aimed their guns at the trees and opened fire. Kyoka’s rifle fired bullet-sized ice stalactites, which embedded themselves in the trunk of the tree. Simple enough. When the Dynamis-Shadow projectiles hit another tree, it pierced right through and continued punching through several trees until finally embedding itself in one last tree. Each tree that the projectile came into contact with began to swirl and distort, the punctured hole caused by the orbs being the center of these circular distortions.

“Oh? So projectiles using Rotation have greater penetration power… Or should I rephrase that?” Hunter looked over and noticed Hideo attempting to stifle a laugh. “Rephrasing needed, but this is certainly interesting.”

“Dude, we need to test out my armor!” Hideo let out after getting himself under control. “I wanna see how good this healing is!”

“It’s not exactly healing, but it’s close enough,” Hunter continued tinkering with the coding of the units, configuring the commands needed for a successful Burst Strike. “Alright, time to test out the Burst Strikes. One at a time, please. Haruko, you start.”

“Got it.” Haruko removed her Shining Artemis from the belt and inserted it into a slot on the side of her belt. After pressing the button to initiate the charging process, Haruko’s rifle began to gather the Burst potential into the barrel of the rifle while heat vents began to open up in her armor. “Uh… this is supposed to happen, right?”

“Yeah, it’s going as planned,” Hunter continued typing more code to ensure the process would work smoothly and successfully. “Alright, fire off the Lunar Rotation.”

“...What?”

“That’s the designation I gave this armor’s Burst Strike. Just pull the trigger.”

“Okay then,” Haruko pulled the trigger and activated the Burst Strike. As expected, heavy recoil came from the rifle as the system began to overheat. “Hunter, it’s getting really hot in this…!” “Calm down, calm down. I got this,” Hunter activated the heat vents, which helped to counteract the recoil slightly as rapidly-building heat was being released through the heat vents as a steady stream of steam. “Better?”

“Much better!” She replied with a yell over the sounds of the steam and her rifle’s attacks. She had tried shooting multiple targets while the Burst Strike was still active, effectively destroying all the trees she shot at as well as several of the trees behind.

“Burst potential is dying down… Cancelling the Burst Strike!” Hunter called out to her to let her know that he was going to end the attack. Haruko ceased shooting and pointed the rifle skyward, resting it in one arm as Hunter cut off the Burst Strike there. “Let’s see… 15 or so seconds of activity with all that collected Burst potential… 35 rounds fired in that time span… That’s not going to work out properly… About… 2.3 rounds per second… That wouldn’t work out alright…”

“Well?”

“I’m doing the math, give me a moment!” Hunter opened up an empty holographic screen and began typing on it, imputing several calculations into the system and having it automatically display the simplified equations for him so he could plug the variables into other equations. “If I round up to 3 rounds per second, then stretch out Burst Potential for maximum attack time while keeping maximum damage output and firing rate… Then it wouldn’t be stable… I’d have to sacrifice one of the three to increase the other two… Base projectile is deadly enough as is… I can sacrifice damage for increased time and firing rate…”

“You okay, Hunter?” Haruko looked at him after figuring out how to compact the Rifle and store it on her back.

“Yeah, just working out the calculations,” Hunter finished up said calculations before proceeding to code all the given parameters to the calculated constraints. “That should be it. I should be done with a finished Shining Artemis first and foremost, though I’ll keep these prototype parameters just in case.”

“Excellent. Good work, Hunter,” She was about to close her Driver, but discovered she couldn’t. “Um, Hunter… the Driver won’t close.”

“I need some PvP data on that unit too, so I can’t let you exit the armor just yet.” Hunter finished coding all the ability constraints on her armor before looking up. “Besides, if you were unarmored and someone attacked while the others were testing their armors, bad things would happen and I might have to scrap all this data to fight the attackers off. Think of it as… guarding the perimeter for us.”

“I got that…” She took one of her side-arm SMGs out of their thigh-mounted holsters and examined it. “Do we need to test these SMGs too?”

“No need. I have a conversion formula. I’ll plug in the data obtained from your rifle and get proportional criteria for the SMGs in a moment.” Hunter continued tapping away almost endlessly at the virtual keyboard in front of him, completely lost in the wonders of coding and calculating as his multitude of programs ran in front of him, giving him the data needed to input into the unit. “And… done. Your sidearms should be fully calibrated now. Try ‘em out so I can make sure everything’s in working order.”

Just then, the bushes could be heard rustling. Then, a group of bandits jumped out with ragged armor and crudely-assembled weapons. Some guys on heavily customized chopper motorcycles drove in and aimed their guns at the group.

“We heard some weird shit over here…” One of the bandits walked towards Hunter, who was quickly calibrating Hideo’s and Kyoka’s armors behind his back while Haruko, Kyoka, and Hideo all stood back to back with Hunter to cover it up. “So we figured we’d drop by, and look at this. Some custom, high-end stuff to steal! Lucky us, boys!!”

Some bandits cheered in excitement of looting the quartet.

“Hunter, how’s the calibration…?” Haruko whispered to Hunter as the bandit leader rambled on about taking their new equipment from them.

“Hideo’s is just a direct upgrade from his Level 3, that’s already done. Kyoka’s, I’m finishing up now…” Hunter whispered back, his typing dying down as he saved all his changes to the units before grabbing his Mighty Specter unit.

“Are these guys real people…?” Hideo asked, even though his weapons were already not lethal.

“I don’t see a player name displayed over any of them… No, the leader…!” Kyoka looked at the leader, who had the name ‘Evocry’ over his head.

“The rest are NPCs, good… We’ll just need to make sure we don’t kill… Evocry…” Hunter prepared his Ifrit Slasher unit for transformation as well as Evocry finished rambling about taking all their units.

“Alright, guys…” Evocry raised his arms dramatically, then pointed at the group. “Get them!!”

The bandits charged at the four, weapons raised and battle cries ringing through their ears. Hunter responded by transforming into his Level 2 armor and countering a bandit that was wielding heavy gauntlets by using the momentum of his opponent’s attacks against him to knock him down.. Once that was done, Hunter immediately transformed into Level 3 and summoned this form’s single-edged long-sword to finish off the fool. The other three began their own Level 10 assaults before all four of them split off into pairs to fight.

“Let’s see how quick it takes for me to end you!” Hunter shouted at the charging minions as he began cutting them down.

“No holds barred, let’s do this!” Haruko shouldered her rifle and began firing at the grunts that slipped past Hunter’s sword attacks.

“I don’t mind a good challenge every now and then!” Hideo taunted the foot soldiers rushing at them, opening fire at them with his special ammunition as Kyoka rushed in.

“Looks like Jane gets to play~!!” Kyoka smiled eerily under her mask as she started her attack.

Hideo blasted his non-lethal hard light ammo at outlaws, laying down a suppressive fire for his partner. Flashes of light streaked through the air as the compressed hard light hit the bodies of their targets, knocking them back plenty with the amount of force behind each round. His helmet’s targeting system immediately displayed the reticles needed to aim at each target and switched quickly from one to the next, almost too quickly to process properly. Kyoka drew the xiphos sword sheathed by her waist and began slashing away, generating spikes of ice to launch at any stray bandits coming at her that Hideo couldn’t get to. The icicles embedded themselves in those that strayed too close to her before being impaled by her short-sword. A lucky bandit managed to knock away Kyoka’s sword and cut into her armor while she was distracted, making her yelp in pain. Hideo heard and fired away at Kyoka’s assailant, knocking him away so he could rush to her side while he kept the rest of those charging at the two off their backs.

“Kyoka, you okay?!” He called to her as he was fending off the bandits.

“I-I’m fine… It’s just a scratch…” She got up and grabbed her sword, sheathing it before taking her long knives out of their sheaths and getting it a battle stance, ignoring her flesh wound. “Let’s keep it up!”

Meanwhile, Haruko and Hunter worked together in fighting off their opponents. Haruko would fire her rifle to deal ridiculous damage to the bandits while Hunter would jump in from above and execute them with a few slashes from his Ifrit Slasher’s sword. When he’d turn around and cut someone through their torso, Haruko would swiftly turn around and aim before shooting their enemy in the face. The two worked in tandem to cut down their enemies’ health and execute them. Flames danced on the blade of Hunter’s sword as he slashed and hacked his way through bandits while Haruko fired her rifle at other bandits, orbs of pure energy swirling with the gentle glow of moonlight inside. Anyone hit with this projectile was left with a semi-large hole from the projectile before it exploded and tore off limbs or caused heads to detonate. If the Ethics Code had been switched off and the gore detail set to maximum, a disturbingly-realistic fountain of gore would have very quickly replaced the heads blasted apart by Haruko’s rifle. Seeing a large amount of bandits get close, Hunter switched from his Ifrit Slasher augment unit to his Pygmy Smasher unit, summoning the sawn-off shotgun and blasting them all away from him before Haruko executed them with rapid headshots to each one of them.

Seeing that his NPC minions were failing him, Evocry ordered the bikers to move in, having them force the pairs back into one group before drive around the four in circles and attacking with their guns in the hopes of confusing them. Hideo was already working to find the weak point of the riders to remove them from their mounts and gain a tactical advantage while Kyoka and Hunter worked to create shields out of their ice and stone.

“Hunter, this targeting system is working way too quick for me to keep up with!” Hideo’s aiming reticle locked onto one target and tracked it for barely a second before rapidly switching to another almost immediately after. “Is there anyway to fix this?”

“Keep them distracted! I’ll fix it!” Hunter opened up the coding for Hideo’s armor, finding and updating the targeting system with swift keystrokes. For Hideo, all he could see was his aim assist flicker before disappearing, then reappearing with multiple sights, each locked onto different targets and moving smoothly around his heads-up display. “Better?!”

“Much better!!” Hideo smiled under his mask before using his hard-light arsenal to knock the bikers off their vehicles with the arm-mounted crossbows that had replaced his Level 3 Riot Suppressor’s micro-missile launchers. “Let’s take the trash out!”

“My pleasure!” Kyoka grinned creepily under her mask before unsheathing a series of throwing knives, jumping up and letting them fly at the bikers Hideo had knocked down. Before she landed, she brought out her long knives and impaled them in another biker as gravity carried her back to the ground. “Who’s next?!”

“Hunter! Go for Evocry!” Haruko ordered as she resumed picking off bandits with headshots. “We can’t let him escape!”

“On it!” Hunter brought out his Sylph Reaper unit, switching into a green armor with a pair of SMGs in his hands as he ran towards the escaping Evocry.

“You’ll never catch me!!” Evocry proclaimed as he brought out a Pendant, activated it in his End Driver, and jumped into the air. He landed on a Yamaha Stryker motorcycle, customized to look like it had barely survived an apocalyptic event, covered in dirt and grime with obvious weathering and battle damage. “See ya later, suckers!”

“Hunter, do something!” Haruko aimed her rifle and fired, only to miss as Evocry turned onto a nearby road.

“I’m on it!” Hunter yelled his reply as he summoned his Mach Lighter, bringing forth his custom LS-218 Sport-bike before hopping on it and immediately speeding off. He had to holster one of his SMGs to better handle the bike and get speed. “I’m gonna shoot you down…”

“The hell?! I thought I customized this thing to fucking book it!!” Evocry complained as Hunter easily caught up to him. “Hell no, you’re not catching up!! Nitro boost, GO!!!”

“The hell you think you’re doing?!” Hunter fired his SMG at Evocry’s rear tire before the bandit leader could hit the nitrous boost, swerving off the road as he maneuvered his way to the side. “Gotcha.”

“Urgh… When in doubt…” Evocry abandoned his motorcycle and got up, shaking his head. “Get the fuck out!!!”

“The hell?” Hunter stopped his bike near where Evocry had abandoned his vehicle, seeing the guy running away. “Oh, he’s using the Joestar family’s secret technique…”

“Shit shit shit shit…!” Evocry was running as fast as he could after crashing his motorcycle in the forest. Of course, he’s not getting very far, due to the pain from the crash. Hunter almost opened fire right then and there, but suddenly remembered to use non-lethal ammo, as if a lingering thought in the back of his mind told him to not kill.

“Where’s the non-lethal ammo…” Hunter searched his inventory, having removed the current magazine from his SMG and storing it away for later use. Once he found his nonlethal ammo, he loaded it into the gun and chambered a round before aiming at the escaping Evocry. “You’re not getting away, mister…”

A yelp could be heard as the stun ammo Hunter used with his SMG hit Evocry, knocking him down and applying the stun debuff. For insurance, Hunter emptied the small capacity magazine at Evocry, shooting ten bullets in total before discarding the empty magazine and loading in another one using his usual lethal rounds. Once his weapon was reloaded, Hunter drove up to Evocry on his sport-bike, picked him off the ground as he convulsed from the effects of the stun debuff, then drove back to the rest of the group to figure out what to do.

“Welp, mission accomplished. And we got plenty of combat data out of it.” Hunter told the three as he dropped Evocry on the ground. “Debuff should be wearing off soon, had to use the non-lethal stun rounds instead of my normal shock rounds.”

“Well, we can’t go killing him, now can we?” Hideo commented, grateful Hunter had used a method of stopping Evocry that didn’t involve lethal force. “After all… death is permanent now…”

“Yeah…” Hunter agreed on the sentiment as they proceeded to disarm Evocry of his equipment and weapons. “You’re with the HMP, I figure you can handle the rest.”

“We called the local HQ just now and asked for a detainee pick-up. Truck should be here soon, we’ll be fine.” Haruko placed the handcuffs on their assailant as they heard the sounds of a truck stopping on the road. “Is that them? That was quicker than expected. They said ten to fifteen minutes, but it’s only been five…”

“In that case, get ready for another fight.” Hunter warned everyone. Each of them had kept their armors on, not yet cancelling their transformations as a precaution for another unexpected danger. “Hideo, you’ve got restoration. Think you can take away some of that exhaust we built up?”

“Bout time I got to test this feature,” Hideo had a wide smile underneath his mask as he rubbed his hands together and produced a golden aura around them, giving off the feeling of a warm, comforting ray of sunlight. “Time for some restoration, my friends!”

“Thanks Hideo…” Kyoka’s movements became sluggish, as if she were sleepy, as Hideo used his new armor’s primary ability. “This is so warm and comforting…”

“Restoration is working properly… saving the data,” Hunter tapped at the holograms in front of him before swiping them away. “How are you feelin, Haruko?”

“Not that tired, but a stamina boost could help,” she replied as Hideo finished up with Kyoka. “If you don’t mind, I’d like some mending too, please.”

“You got it,” Hideo obliged and began using his golden aura to recondition Haruko. It didn’t take long for Haruko to feel better, as she had exerted herself the least. “You need some, Hunter?”

“Yes please,” Hunter stretched himself out as he felt Hideo’s healing work its magic. “Maybe I’ll boost the healing speed so you won’t have to take too long.”

“Don’t kick it up too much. Might end up restoring you too well.”

“That’s entirely possible, Hideo. Restoration isn’t just healing, in this case. It’s more like resetting to a specific point, which I’ve set as full stamina and health when used on people. Though you could always use it to morph something into another shape or reconfigure something.”

“Oh? That’s pretty cool, Hunter.” Hideo finished healing his comrade before stretching himself out, using his own power on himself to get back some energy.

“Just make sure all the pieces are there, otherwise your ability won’t work.” Hunter brought up his holograms again to configure more details about his partners’ equipment.

“Gotcha,” Hideo finished up his healing as the girls had prepared their equipment for combat.

“Did you guys here something?” Kyoka shouldered her rifle and aimed towards the forest entrance, where she heard some footsteps through the woods. “Someone’s here. Prepare for contact.”

Haruko nodded and hid behind a tree, keeping her rifle pointed at the source of the noise. Hideo hid behind another tree, while Hunter stood out in the opening to take the first wave of a potential assault. It was then that everyone noticed the truck’s engine had stopped, which lead to everyone aiming all their firearms towards the direction where the noises were coming from. A figure wearing black and yellow armor walked towards them, hands up in the air as if he were under arrest.

“I saw some of the forest to my side was trashed, so I pulled over and parked my truck. Didn’t know what I was walking into, so I put my armor on for safety. It’s only a Level 2 Hunter-class, got the basic levels of protection and whatnot.” The figure spoke to the quartet, looking at them through the blue visor on his helmet.

“Was the damage to the forest really that important?” Hunter casually turned to the figure in black and yellow, analyzing him with his mask’s HUD with his guns still pointed.

“My usual trucking route goes along this road. I pass by here all the time and it’s never been touched. Of course it’s pretty suspicious if I see some ruined trees here and there when they shouldn’t be like that.” The figure replied. A name tag over his head displayed his username: Ryugen.

“Ryugen, is it?” Hunter walked over to him after lowering but not holstering his weapons.

“Yes sir. Hunter?”

“Yeah. There’s nothing to worry about here. We just held off some bandits that were looting this place for something. Continue on your route.” Hunter holstered his SMGs and pat him on the shoulder before walking out of the forest.

“Alrighty then. I’ll see you gentlefolk some other time then.” With that, Ryugen walked back to his truck as another truck could be heard approaching.

“Is that HMP?” Kyoka asked Haruko.

“Should be,” Haruko replied, checking the time with her HUD’s clock. “It’s been almost 10 minutes since I placed the call.”

“Let’s go check then,” Hideo picked up the restrained Evocry and walked out of the forest with the girls. When the four of them were by the road, they saw the Military Police transport parked roadside as Ryugen’s truck merged safely onto the road. “Perfect. Let’s get this guy to the holding cells, maybe interrogate him.”

“It seemed like he did all this on a whim, if you ask me.” Kyoka helped Hideo load the apprehended onto the HMP truck, locking the doors and pounding on them to signal the driver that they were clear to head back to base. “So… now what?”

“Not sure...” Hideo replied.

“Uh… Hunter?” Haruko turned around and saw Hunter sifting through their combat data. “Hunter?”

“Hm?” Hunter saved everything and waved the holograms away. “What?”

“What do we do now?” Haruko reiterated Kyoka’s question about their next move.

“How about… we eat?!” Hideo suggested. “But what to eat…?”

“Let’s just cook something back at Hunter’s place.” Haruko got out her vehicle’s cartridge and summoned it, getting on her Yamaha YZF R1 and starting the engine. “We should decide on what to eat first…”

“Yakisoba, anyone?” Hideo summoned his Ducati Monster S4 from its storage, getting on it and revving it up.

“I feel like having a beef bowl tonight…” Kyoka gave her input as she brought forth the same bike as Hideo.

“We can always do both and have the leftovers for breakfast,” Hunter told them as he recalled his LS-218 and got on it. “I think I have all the ingredients.”

“Then it’s settled. Beef bowls and Yakisoba!” Haruko exclaimed before driving off. The other three followed her as the HMP transport took another route to the local station in order to put Evocry in custody for attempted assault and thievery.

Meanwhile, the quartet had finally arrived at Hunter’s office just as the sun had finally set. The night sky was taking over, and the four hurried inside to cook and eat. Once inside, everyone removed their armors and went to their respective rooms to change into more comfortable clothing. They reemerged in their pajamas, the guys trying their best to avoid looking at the girls in their tank tops. Everyone gathered in the kitchen and worked to make their food. Sizzling from the frying noodles were drowned out as everyone talked, cracking jokes and asking one another to get an ingredient ready for their meals. Eventually, the topic of conversation shifted to personal interests.

“So Hunter…” Hideo asked as the other male in the group watched over the yakisoba. “What kind of girls do you like?”

“What are you asking him that for?!” The girls simultaneously shouted at him and smacked him upside the head.

“Owwww…” He rubbed the spot where he had been slapped as the girls pouted and continued to cook the meat for the beef bowls. “I’m just curious, that’s all… Aren’t either of you curious too?”

“Is he into that 2D waifu thing that most Otakus are into…?” Haruko asked, slowly persuading herself mentally to agree with Hideo’s question.

“I’m not,” Hunter sharply replied, frying the noodles and adding the sauces as needed. “I mean, I guess I kind of am, but I’m not entirely obsessed with them.”

“So then… what do you look for in a girl?” Haruko asked him.

“...” He went silent for a moment, then sighed. “I value honesty and loyalty. I don’t want my next girlfriend to be with me because she feels obligated to or because she only wants me for my power…”

“O-oh…” Haruko wasn’t entirely sure how to proceed, feeling that she had struck a sensitive subject for him. “I-I’ll ask you about this some other time, then… You don’t sound very enthusiastic about this…”

“Yeah, yeah…” Hunter turned the fire off under the pan of Yakisoba, deeming it ready to serve and cooked to perfection.

“Oh… sorry, Hunter... “ Hideo apologized for bringing up the subject.

“It’s fine, don’t worry about it…” He reached to the cabinets above him and opened up the GUI, scrolling through a list and tapping on one of the selections. The dining table was automatically set for four, with glasses for drinks, bowls, utensils, and plates. Hunter tapped one more selection and brought up some dishes and silverware to use for serving purposes. Emptying out the Yakisoba onto a large serving plate, Hunter stared blankly ahead of him at the wall as he set the plate aside and place the pan on the inactive stove. “Those three… were too much…”

“Three? Too much?” Haruko overheard his mumbling as she began plating the beef bowls for the four of them.

“I uh... “ Hunter heaved a heavy sigh as he brought the Yakisoba over to the table and set it in the center before returning to the refrigerator to get some Calpis water and some other drinks. “Might as well tell you, since I’ve already said this much.”

“N-no, you don’t have to, Hunter. It’s fine.” Haruko protested, knowing he wouldn’t feel good discussing this. She brought the beef bowls over to the table and left the extra meat and rice in their respective receptacles for seconds if anyone wanted any. “If you don’t want to tell us, you don’t have to, really!”

“No, no. Shouldn’t leave you with such a vague line,” He sat down at the table after bringing everyone bowls of miso soup and a side salad. Once everyone was seated, they all gave their thanks for the meal in unison before digging in. “So… Uh… I had three girlfriends in the past.”

Everyone else almost spit their food out upon hearing this. They couldn’t imagine the logic-forward Hunter Kasai in a relationship with a girl, acting lovey-dovey with each other. It was incredibly bizarre for the thought to even occur to them…

“The first happened when I was entering middle school, back when I was 12 years old. She was an old childhood friend named Eiko who I had developed a crush on because puberty was kicking in,” Hunter continued to eat in between sentences, though he spoke with a sad, gentle voice. Everyone felt guilty that they had brought him to tell them about his past like this, especially Hideo, who had brought the topic up specifically. “I confessed to her after building up some courage. I was so happy when she said she’d go out with me, but looking back… She only did it so I could be happy. I was entirely unaware her affections were aimed at someone else. She did it only because she wanted me to be happy… In the end, she was the one who broke it off, and that sucked…”

“You were 12 when this happened, right…?” Hideo asked.

“Yeah. It was one of the reasons I got more into gaming. Drove me towards the shut-in life. The next girlfriend, I had during SAO… She was my partner in combat whenever I needed it. For the majority of my time in SAO, I was like Kirito, a solo player shunned for being a beta tester. I was honestly kinda glad Kirito invented that “Beater” title, because I ended up taking up that title too after I heard he had coined it after the defeat of the first floor boss. But then, while I was farming for experience one night, I met Mikako. We ended up grinding a bunch of quests together, leveling up and all that. She was one of the few people on my SAO friend’s list. We got closer together, and we eventually got together. I think we even did it while in SAO…”

“Wait, what?!” Haruko stared at Hunter, shocked that he had done the act despite his comment about repaying Amphitrite. “But, what about-”

“Let’s say she took my virtual first.” He cut her off and glared at her, knowing the comment she was going to bring up. Haruko gulped and continued to eat. Hunter cleared his throat and took a sip of Calpis before continuing his story. “Anyways… we spent the most time together, Mikako and I. Lots of fighting alongside each other, plenty of love shared between us. I think that was the best relationship I had, out of the three.”

“So… what separated you…?” Kyoka asked.

“We uh… I don’t really know… I guess we just drifted away after a while… Then I met Saki during a boss raid. She saw how stylish I was when I fought. I later found out from one of her ex-boyfriends that she wanted Kirito, but settled for me when she found out he was with Asuna. That relationship was more her showing me off like some trophy than it was an actual relationship. She dropped me after she met someone named Hiiro, and the two got together after she saw how much stronger he was. I guess she liked his unique skill more than mine.”

“You had a unique skill?” Hideo questioned.

“Yeah. Phantom Swap. Let me switch between three given weapons in my inventory at anytime. On second thought, it was a pretty lame unique skill, it’s just the way I used it. I would make the flashiest weapon changes, but I couldn’t swap during a sword skill. I could post-skill, but it was whatever.”

“Oh… Yeah, that does sound disappointing… So what was the other guy’s unique skill?”

“Hell if I know. All I remember is that his catchphrase of “There is nothing I cannot cut” came from his unique skill.” Hunter finished his beef bowl before proceeding to eat the Yakisoba. “But yeah. That’s my dating history.”

“That doesn’t sound that bad…” Haruko noted.

“I know it doesn’t, but it’s the aftermath that’s the problem… I hated myself after two of the three. Mikako was the only one who I really connected with. I hated myself for not noticing how Eiko really felt and what she really wanted. I hated myself for falling for Saki’s looks, for such a stupid, shallow reason. It was just… stupid. After SAO, I told myself I wouldn’t date another girl until I could find someone better than Mikako. At the moment, I haven’t found someone better than her, but I have found a runner-up.” Hunter had stopped eating now, setting his chopsticks down and taking a shaky breath, his expression somber from reminiscing about his past.

“And who’s that?” Kyoka asked.

“Can’t a guy keep his secrets?”

“You trust us enough to fight alongside you, so why not just tell us?” Haruko asked as she finished her beef bowl and began to load Yakisoba into her bowl.

“There’s something about me that just fucks up everything. I can’t keep a decent lover by my side or maintain a stable friendship without someone getting hurt or dying. I keep my distance so that no one has to get hurt because of me.”

“So then why are you telling us all of this?”

“Because I want to have friends. I push people away because I’m scared to hurt them or be hurt by them. I’ve spent so much time alone, by myself, engulfed in anime, manga, and video games. All this time spent trying to escape the cruel reality by immersing myself in fantasies. I definitely would have had 8th grader syndrome if I wasn’t stuck inside that death trap of a game. Years of my life have been wasted on ignoring the cold, unrelenting nightmare we call the world. It hurts to live, and these VRMMOs are my only way of escape.”

“If you want friends… just let go of the past… You haven’t gotten us killed yet, so there’s nothing to worry about…” Haruko moved closer towards Hunter, reaching out to hug him with one arm, but hesitating as she saw a tear fall from his face.

“You don’t understand how hard it is to just forget that game… When everything’s a matter of life and death… We all fought to live, but we had to kill PKers too. Laughing Coffin… they’re absolutely disgusting. They shouldn’t have been allowed to live…” His breathing turned ragged and shaky, doing all he could to hold back the tears.

“Hunter… if you had killed any of them, you would be no better than them…”

“It’d be better than letting them walk around in society, planning out ways to kill in real life through virtual means. They got addicted to murder without punishment, and they won’t stop. Just look at Death Gun! Or our current situation! You can believe in having them brought to justice by detaining them for life, but they’ll find ways to escape their punishment. Lock ‘em up, and they’ll eventually break out and keep killing. I’d rather bear the sins of having to kill them than letting innocents die…” Hunter couldn’t suppress them anymore, fully weeping and letting the tears stream down his face in silent sobs.

“Hunter…” This time, Haruko didn’t hesitate. She got up and hugged him tightly, incidentally bringing his face to her chest and dampening her top with his tears. “We won’t die, Hunter. We’ve trained to keep ourselves alive, and we can’t let Genm go unpunished. Which is why we’re relying on each other to keep us alive. Let us get closer, please… You won’t regret it…”

The rest of the night was somber. After dinner, everyone went to their rooms to sleep. Haruko, however, choose to sleep by Hunter’s side that night. To comfort the broken, lonely genius who desired only to have companionship and love. Tomorrow morning, they would both wake up under a misunderstanding of what occurred the night prior. But for now… Hunter needed the comfort of someone’s presence.