By Zephyria 10 minutes since the match started.
“That guy, he’s deliberately luring him.”
Hugo, hearing another broadcast voice from beside him, turned his head to the right. It was the seat where Vice-Captain Shorendo had been sitting.
However, currently sitting there instead was 4th Division Captain Andreas, holding binoculars and shaking his legs nervously.
He had moved there, saying he would have a serious conversation with the Captain while Shorendo was briefly away for some matter. But in reality, it was more like he had sought out a colleague he could somewhat immerse himself with, avoiding the boring 2nd and 3rd Division Captains.
Hugo, who had been staring at him, shifted his gaze forward and asked again.
“Is that how it looks? To my eyes, it just looks like he’s desperately trying to escape.”
“Ha, Captain, you don’t get it. Joker is the lure and the distraction, I’m telling you? He acts flashy on purpose, then lures suitable guys one by one to feed them to the lion.”
It was a remark fitting for a professional gambler who had once gone on a flashy raid to clear out an illegal gambling den, then ended up staying put and spending the night with the arrest targets.
“You can’t fool my eyes, Ryan is the real deal. He’s hiding his skills.”
“…….”
“I wish he’d fight Asher once, but is it too early for them to meet from the preliminaries?”
Hugo was about to respond with silence, but glanced sideways again to check Andreas’s expression. Apart from the league organizers composed of the TF team, access to participant personal information is restricted even for agency personnel. So even for a Division Captain, the accessible information wouldn’t be that much.
He didn’t seem to have specifically noticed Lion’s presence, but his state of being completely over-immersed was highly suspicious. He was shaking his whole body as if one with the participants, as if he himself were participating.
Hugo blinked his eyelids slowly, then abruptly asked.
“Under whose name did you place the proxy bet?”
Andreas, hit right on the mark, flinched. His eyes, turning with a creak, met his superior’s cool gaze.
Hugo held out his hand to him, as if telling him to hand it over obediently.
“Aww, why do you keep chasing only me!”
Ero, running jumpily between Floating Stones while holding his pistol, turned to look behind him and shouted with an aggrieved expression. Behind him, one crocodile-human clad in crocodile leather was leaping fiercely, chasing his target.
When Ero pushed off a Floating Stone and jumped with all his might, about 2 seconds later, two heavy feet landed on that very spot. The Floating Stone swayed violently like a ship in a storm.
It was the same even if he deliberately fled to places hard to follow by stepping on small fragments. The opponent, showing nimble movements unbefitting their bulky build, gradually closed the gap with Ero. Judging he’d be caught at this rate, Ero looked back toward Leonardo, who was facing off against another opponent.
He said to pull my own weight, but I’ve done about 0.8 person’s share, so wouldn’t it be okay if Brother, who does 100 person’s share, just waves his hand once, right?
“Broooother!”
Ero flung his body onto a stone fragment just large enough to place one foot. Just then, Leonardo, having heard the voice, shifted his gaze. The distance between the two was barely 20 meters.
“Whoa—!”
Ero’s noisy foot, which had been teetering on the narrow foothold, slipped completely. Scratched stone fragments fell clattering, and he, nearly falling along with them, barely grabbed onto another fragment with one hand. Fortunately, the fragment, with its large surface area and mass, supported Ero’s weight in the air due to Ether’s influence.
Ero, hurriedly grabbing his pistol, swapped out the magazine with one hand and loaded a bullet with compressed vines.
More urgent than the person involved, Ero looked back and forth, aiming his pistol at the target. His hands trembled with impatience, but there was no time to steady them. A monster with an alligator head on its left arm charged at full speed.
Five participants had already been eliminated, their flesh torn off by that blunt but brutal snout. Not wanting to be the sixth, Ero fired a bullet at a spot where the dismantled vines could catch.
At that moment, a strange cry was heard from below. A mysterious resonance, like a whale’s Ultrasound.
Leonardo threw one of the participants he had been holding between Deathroll and Ero. Then, he grabbed a pebble floating nearby and kicked it with his heel. The pebble, flying through the air as fast as a bullet, struck the fragment Ero was clutching.
At the same time, the vines that had burst from the end of the pistol scattered, and Ero, unable to grab the end of the vines, clung to the fragment he had collided with and was pushed back.
“Bro, nice one―!”
In the meantime, the alligator and the thrown participant collided head-on. A short, deathly groan spread, and a heavy shadow fell over the two of them. A transparent Orca, easily weighing over 5 tons, swallowed the two of them in one gulp, its mouth wide open.
It all happened in the blink of an eye. The two participants swallowed by the whale spun around inside the Divine Beast’s transparent stomach as if caught in a whirlpool. Then, they floated to the surface, flipped over like dead fish, as if they had lost consciousness. Beside the whale, swimming leisurely through the Floating Stones with them in its belly, a long train of black and white fabric fluttered.
“Too bad. I could have eaten them all.”
The black-haired man stroked the whale’s head and muttered. The elegance of his robe-like clothing, flowing like reeds and waves, was graceful. However, the untidy right sleeve was not put on his arm, but left hanging down. As a result, Ero’s half-exposed upper body clearly revealed the ferocious muscle structure that suggested the meaning of Killer Whale.
Leonardo, who had jumped widely, gradually approached Ero, who was groaning and trying to climb up the fragment he was holding on to.
Orca’s gaze also shifted to them. And at that moment, the Hundred Ghosts, who had finished hunting nearby, also spotted them.
Asher, who had been twisting her neck from side to side while receiving the backlight, quickly lowered her posture and jumped down.
“Huh, Ero?”
Ero, who had been concentrating only on climbing up, made a dazed sound at the announcers’ voices. Soon, with only his upper body barely hanging on, he raised his head and met a pair of gleaming eyes.
The woman with disheveled hair flying around closed the distance in an instant with a ghostly face that could appear in his dreams. Gasping, Ero struggled more violently than before.
“Why, why me again!”
With goosebumps on his spine, he sharpened his fingernails to try to get on the foothold somehow. But once he lost his composure, his arms had no strength and kept slipping. The Floating Stone swaying from side to side due to his struggles added to the precariousness.
The water-colored Orca also shook its tail to increase its propulsion. The movement of its body as it kicked off was unusual.
Leonardo, who was watching, clicked his tongue. At this rate, it would be too late. He leaped with all his might from the last foothold and disappeared in an instant.
He felt like a penguin isolated on a melting ice floe. Ero turned his head frantically and then closed his eyes tightly. The excited voices of the announcers felt cruel. He decided that it would be better to just fall than to be torn apart and eliminated.
It was just as he was about to slowly take his hands off the foothold he was holding on to.
Light flashed over the foothold he was hanging on to, and a pair of fiercely upturned Gold Eyes appeared. Leonardo extended his palms towards the hunters rushing in from both sides. The seething heat fluttered his cloak and quietly enveloped him.
At that moment, Orca, who had been speeding through the sea, paused. He abruptly changed direction and barely dodged the threshold with the help of the Divine Beast.
At the same time, Asher’s eyes, which had been shining with a ferocious glint, also twitched. She stepped on a fragment just before reaching it and braked suddenly, leaning her body back greatly.
After tumbling backwards several times as if trying to secure distance, she landed lightly on a wide Floating Stone. But her expression was very stiff.
Ero, who had been holding on until the end, looked up blankly at the shadow cast over his head. Soon, his eyes glazed over as if relieved, and a sigh escaped.
“Ah….”
The fluttering cloak tickled his face inappropriately. The buzzing of the excited audience overflowed in the arena.