Disgust, anger, hatred...
Takumi felt the emotions of that [Alice].
Or rather, this [Alice] was no longer concealing anything, and at this moment directly and plainly revealed her own emotions.
The object of its disgust... was not me, but these two rescue team members. No, the rescue team member transformed from Tanaka was not hated by it either. What this thing hated was the rescue team member transformed from the obsession of that firefighter, Howard.
Why did this thing hate Howard so much? He had never sensed such an emotion before. Was there something about Howard that [Alice] absolutely could not accept?
If that was the case, then the only thing Takumi could think of was Howard's own kind side.
Because the other party was a good person, was that why she hated him?
Or rather, was it because Howard was the kind of person who, even while trapped in a dark environment he was powerless to change, still never abandoned his original heart, and within the limits of what he could do, did everything in his power to save and help others—so much so that even being persecuted to death by the research base could not change his kindness—that he was hated?
Or was there some more essential reason hidden within it?
No matter what, at this moment, Takumi finally understood how he could not become friends with Alice.
The identity of teacher could not restrain the other party. Even if one did not actively go gather the things needed, this ghostly thing could still forcibly stuff items onto you and trigger the mechanism. Therefore, the only way to ensure that a player could complete Alice's game yet still be unable to become friends with Alice was perhaps to turn oneself into someone with an identity similar to Howard's.
But how was he supposed to do that?
His act of protecting Miko in the previous loop had not been hated by her, and his act at the start of this loop of saving the students of the entire classroom had also not been hated by Alice. So simply protecting others did not seem to make Alice view him differently.
Perhaps the answer to the riddle would require going even deeper into this Instance, but at least he finally had a direction now.
Provided he could survive this place first.
Boom—
After a violent explosive sound, the door to the art classroom suddenly shattered open.
Takumi could feel that Howard, whom the badge had summoned, was being attacked by something—and by a kind of fierce attack he was completely unable to resist, as if his whole body were being torn apart in an instant.
It was as though he could see the source of that damage.
A sealed classroom.
Figures outside the windows, watching coldly.
And inside the classroom, one young and immature student after another facing each other.
[There can only be one true New Human.]
[Among the twelve of you, only one may survive. Only the most outstanding one can live to the end.]
[Come—whoever walks out of this classroom a day later will be the true New Human.]
After those words fell, the classroom was completely sealed shut.
There was no longer a second choice.
Or rather, even if some other choice still existed, the students living in Fujihana Middle School would not have chosen it.
They had already been completely changed by this place. Even though they still had the same appearance and human shape, inside they had already thoroughly mutated into something else.
[The most outstanding person is definitely me!]
[No, I'm the one who can become the New Human!]
[None of you compare to me—I'm the best!]
Bloody colors bloomed inside the classroom.
The teachers had already placed all kinds of weapons on the desks and chairs.
Blades, axes, daggers, even pistols—wielding these things, the students slaughtered each other, fighting with all their might to become that one and only existence.
At this moment, through his sensory link with the Rescue Team member, Takumi felt all of those injuries landing on his own body.
No, that was not right.
No injuries appeared at all.
The link between himself and the Rescue Team member remained completely normal the whole time. Although that Rescue Team member's movements were being restricted by some unknown external force, it had not actually been injured. In gaming terms, the special effects were flashy as hell, but no HP had been lost at all—it was all just misses.
So that was it.
Takumi could not help clenching his fist.
So that was how it was. So that was what this thing was all about.
The Aberration known as Alice truly did possess extraordinary power, along with a special ability for free movement that hardly seemed like something an Aberration should have.
But this thing still had rules it needed to obey. Even so, this ghostly thing was still constrained by the power of rules.
And the first rule it had to obey was—
Only someone who had passed Alice's game could be tangibly harmed by Alice; only then could she inflict actual, effective harm on that person.
And if that condition could not be met, then Alice could still touch that person, could still create illusions, and could still kill them through indirect means—such as blowing out a candle—but she could not kill them directly. No matter what, she could not directly inflict harm on them.
If it were a human, that would still be extremely dangerous. After all, Alice was not the only Aberration active inside Fujihana Middle School. Being trapped in illusions was one thing as far as mental torment went, but being run into by other Aberrations was another matter entirely. But the Rescue Team member did not have that problem. It simply did not need to care about that sort of thing at all.
Because the Rescue Team member was, in essence, also an Aberration.
This thing was the embodiment of obsession. It did not possess something like willpower—it only had simple thinking ability—so even if some evil god descended, this thing would not lose any sanity. And because it was an embodiment of obsession, unless it was directly harmed by the power of an Aberration, no matter how many mental shocks it suffered, it would still remain completely unharmed.
So the Rescue Team member was something that could directly jam Alice's actions!
Step!
Takumi stepped forward.
Although his eyes were closed, he could still feel the existence of that Rescue Team member and knew it was right in front of him.
So he walked up before it and reached out his hand. Under his command, the Rescue Team member also stretched out a hand and took the eraser Takumi gave it.
Then, Takumi directly bit down on his own wrist and forcibly tore a chunk of flesh off his hand.
As blood splattered, Takumi aimed the bleeding wound at the Rescue Team member's hand and let the blood pour over the eraser, turning it from white to red.
[…]
The pain in his perception completely vanished at that moment.
All sound disappeared. Everything returned to silence.
That intense icy chill had now completely vanished as well.
Takumi opened his eyes.
He saw the Rescue Team member standing in front of him, facing the door of the art classroom.
Turning around, he saw Miko lying on the ground unconscious, as well as Rika and the others sprawled on the floor, clearly delirious and showing signs of going mad.
Under the lights, the art classroom was still just as ugly and disgusting as before.
Then Takumi turned his head back again and looked forward once more, toward the thing standing in the classroom doorway.
He saw Alice.
Golden hair.
A face so beautiful that no human could possibly possess it.
About one meter fifty in height, petite, yet curvy in all the right places, with a figure perfect to an almost impossible degree.
She was human, yet she did not seem human.
That appearance was indeed a human appearance, but humans could not possibly grow so perfect—perfect to the point that it already felt unbelievable.
No...
Takumi's brows suddenly knit together.
He saw another Alice.
Her entire body was covered everywhere with dense, countless wounds—blade wounds, cuts, gunshot wounds, injuries packed across her whole body.
Those were the injuries suffered by the twelve students who had died in Class 1 of the second year.
And every single one of those wounds was manifested on this Alice.
He blinked again, and all the wounds had vanished. Standing in the doorway was only that flawless Alice.
"So that's how it is."
Takumi understood now.
"You're actually the result of the selection process. After all the Outstanding Students died, what was born from among them was Alice—it was you."
"You're human, but not entirely human; you're an Aberration, but not entirely an Aberration either. This school found some method to nurture the power of Aberrations, and ensured that the result of each attempt would converge on an existence like you. Are you... some kind of vessel?"
One corner of this terror-filled school's secret had already been lifted before Takumi's eyes.
[…]
Alice did not speak again.
She was no longer able to communicate with Takumi, nor was she able to use illusions or any other tricks on him.
Whatever this thing was, it ultimately still had a side of itself that was an Aberration. And Aberrations had to obey rules. So the Rescue Team member, who could not become Alice's friend, had obtained the game-clearing item for becoming Alice's friend, directly jamming this thing's mechanism and causing this Alice to lose her ability to move freely. All she could do was remain here motionless, staring big-eyed at the Rescue Team member.
The greatest visible threat in Fujihana Middle School had finally been successfully dealt with.
Though as the price for that, Takumi could no longer make use of Howard, this Rescue Team member. He could not even do something like withdraw it back into the badge anymore.
But Takumi still did not feel completely at ease.
There was still one doubt in his heart.
If this Alice had been successfully created in the end through the sacrifice of the Outstanding Students of Class 1 of the second year, then what exactly was going on with the Alice inside that black human-skin umbrella? Were those two the same thing? Or was there actually more than one Alice?
In the two different loops, the different Alices had told completely different stories when speaking of their past. If Alice was artificially created, then was her story fake? Or had different Alices really experienced different lives?
Revealing one corner of the mystery did not make Takumi feel enlightened at all. Instead, it made him feel as though he had touched the tip of an iceberg floating above the water—like standing on the surface and looking down, seeing the bottomless abyss beneath the iceberg, yet having no idea how deep it truly went.
And this feeling as well... perhaps Alice was not the core obsession?
He clearly had learned such important information, yet he felt no sense at all of being completely locked onto by some existence—none of the feeling of being watched that Takeda Saori or Hedda had given him. What exactly Alice represented in this Instance would likely require a much more careful investigation.
Takumi said nothing, pressing all his thoughts down into the bottom of his heart. Then he turned around and looked at the girls behind him.
"Hey, wake up."
After dragging the unconscious Miko, Rika, and Ai to a place farther from the art classroom door, Takumi slapped their cheeks to wake them, then used the blessing of Hedda and its strong mental-stimulus effect on ordinary people to help pull the girls out of their temporary state of madness.
After waking up, Rika and Ai both looked obviously dazed. It seemed they had temporarily suffered a penalty that lowered their intelligence, so they could only stay here for the time being and rest while recovering mentally. As for Miko, she recovered pretty quickly. She immediately raised a hand and pointed toward the door of the art classroom's supply room.
"Just now... after that thing opened the door, Ogawa-san walked into the supply room. She... she seemed to have been bewitched by something. Takumi-san, please—can you go check on her? She must be in a very dangerous situation right now..."
Though she had been the first to lose consciousness because of her own overly powerful perception, before fainting Miko had noticed the change in one of the people in the group. Now she clutched Takumi's sleeve and pleaded with him.
"The supply room?"
Takumi's gaze shifted to the supply room door, and his brows furrowed slightly.
He personally did not really want to go check. Right now, although Alice had been jammed into a crashed state and had temporarily lost her threat, Takumi did not dare guarantee how long that state would last, or whether it would change due to outside stimulation. Moreover, the three people here were all in very poor condition. If he left, then once the three of them encountered danger, there was basically no chance they would be able to run.
Mm, then he could just send Tanaka.
So Takumi decisively controlled the other Rescue Team member and had it walk toward the supply room door, open it, and go inside.
About thirty seconds later, through the Rescue Team member's perspective, Takumi saw Ogawa Kyoko with her belly cut open and her internal organs removed, hanging in the depths of the supply room, along with a ghost student standing beside her whose body was torn apart in pieces.
Judging from how fresh it all was, this side had probably only just finished up while he had been dragging Miko and the other two away.
"She can't be saved anymore."
Having no interest in concealing it, Takumi directly told Miko the final fate of that classmate of hers.
"How could this..."
The girl, who did not doubt Takumi, suffered a tremendous blow.
And at that very moment, accompanied by a harsh ringing sound, the brightly lit classroom suddenly turned pitch-black. The classroom that had previously been filled with all kinds of gruesome exhibits directly became a blackened ruin after a raging fire, shattered beyond recognition. One could no longer make out its original appearance at all. Even the classroom ceiling had already collapsed, so that standing inside the classroom and looking up, one could directly see the black sky, as well as the unsettling blood-red moon hanging in it.
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