The first match of Party-versus-Party Event A began.
Only five-person groups could participate in this event, but how many teams had actually entered?
In theory, up to eight teams could participate, but in practice, that was never going to happen.
My party had ten people in total, yet we had only entered one team.
That alone made eight participating teams impossible.
Suou’s party had fifteen people in all, but considering their abilities and the willingness of their members, I could not imagine them entering the maximum of three teams.
That left sixteen boys in total, but how many of the boys scattered across the island had been able to meet up before the event began?
In any case, unless we won every match, we would not obtain the Right to Return.
“Minori, Mamonaka, I’m leaving base defense to you. Mamonaka, transform into a phantasmal beast.”
“Leave it to me.”
“O-okay...!”
“The enemy probably has their starting point at their base too, so Shouko, ride Mashiro and have him track people by scent. The enemy base should be in the direction where the enemy is.”
“Got it!”
“Chiyu, get on Micron’s back with me. If anything happens, use Strength Up on me.”
“Mm. Understood.”
We quickly confirmed the plan and immediately took action.
I climbed onto Micron’s back with my childhood friend, then had her follow after Mashiro, who had started running ahead of us.
The forest scenery streamed past at incredible speed.
“Sousuke! He says we’re almost there!”
“Got it! Mashiro, Micron, we’re counting on you!”
If there was one concern in this event, it was whether we would be able to attack our classmates.
Even if the mystery blackboard had explained that no one would actually be injured, that did not mean the resistance to attacking another person would disappear.
We were not fighting through a game screen. We were fighting acquaintances, looking exactly as we always did.
As a slightly cowardly way to get around that, I had decided to rely on Shouko’s summoned beasts.
“Chiyu, from here until the end of the match, keep Strength Up and Advanced Heal active.”
“Mm. Leave it to me.”
I felt bad making the phantasmal beasts bear the burden alone, so if the situation called for it, I intended to move too.
“U-uaaaaaaah! It showed up again!”
“That’s cheating! What am I supposed to do with a knife like this?!”
What came into view were two boys dressed in rags.
One of them fell flat on his backside, so I dropped a stone cage over him and neutralized him, just as I had done in the previous event.
The other shouted, “Damn it! I don’t want to stay in this place for even one more day!” and charged.
Mashiro lightly dodged aside at the last second, then softly bumped him with his body.
But the result was anything but soft.
There are scenes in movies where someone gets hit by a bus and goes flying. It was exactly like that.
The knife boy went flying like a joke, slammed into a nearby tree, slid down, and stopped moving.
“U-uwah... I-is he okay?”
“No problem. That’s basically like an avatar.”
Chiyu said that to Shouko, whose face had turned anxious.
“I mean, I heard the rules too, but seeing it actually happen is... Oh, Mashiro, it’s not your fault. Thank you for fighting for me.”
Shouko hurriedly petted Mashiro.
Not long after that, the enemy “base” came into view.
“Damn it! What are those guys doing?!”
“A-a huge wolf, and what is that?! A dragon?! This is way too impossible!”
Standing in front of the base were two more boys dressed in rags.
One held up a thick branch like a club, and the other had a simple handmade stone axe ready.
Apparently, they had obtained new weapons on the island.
Unfortunately for them, none of those were items capable of opposing a phantasmal beast.
What bothered me more was something else.
Where’s the last one?
The instant I thought that, Mashiro barked while looking diagonally above me.
“Die...!”
Someone had apparently jumped down from a nearby tree.
The boy held a wooden spear in his hands. There was no spearhead on it—or rather, it looked like he had sharpened the tip to give it piercing power.
When I looked closely, it was the gun user from before.
He was falling toward me with the spear aimed at me.
With Strength Up cast on me, I grabbed the approaching spear and pulled, dragging him down to the ground.
“Gah...?!”
That should have dealt a fair amount of damage, but this time, the rules were that the body would not be injured and the person’s movements would simply grow slower.
Apparently, he could still move, because he got back to his feet.
I was about to neutralize him with a stone cage, but that became unnecessary.
WHACK.
Black dragon Micron swung her tail like she was swatting down a bug.
“Gya...!”
With a short scream, the former gun user was launched far away and vanished.
“Uh... Thanks, Micron.”
Micron snorted as if to say, “He annoyed me!”
She seemed angry that he had targeted me.
When we looked back toward the base, the remaining two boys had thrown down their weapons and raised both hands in surrender.
“Sousuke, can I leave it to Mashiro?”
“Yeah.”
Mashiro tapped the enemy base three times with his front paw, and it crumbled away.
“Ugh... When are we ever going to get to go home?”
“Give up. We’re never getting off this deserted island for the rest of our lives...”
Seeing the two boys fall into despair made me feel as if I had done something wrong, but I shook off that thought.
Letting them win would mean delaying my companions’ return.
If I had to choose one or the other, I would choose my companions. And if I had chosen, I probably should not hesitate.
That said, I did not actually want my classmates to suffer, so I decided we should offer them a trade through Ms. Luminous’s mediation sooner rather than later.
If their food, clothing, and shelter were properly arranged, their feelings would surely settle down more than they had now.
As I was thinking about that, my vision turned pure white—and before I knew it, I had been thrown into the white space.
The blackboard and seats were there as usual, but only the people on the same team had been sent here.
“We won...! Everyone, you were amazing.”
“You really were. We didn’t have anything to do.”
Minori and Mamonaka celebrated our victory.
【The first match has ended.
“Party A” versus “Party B” — Winner: “Party A.”】
Those words appeared on the blackboard.
“So we’re Party A.”
【The second match has ended.
“Party C” versus “Party D” — Winner: “Party C.”】
“Huh? Wasn’t that kind of fast?”
Shouko tilted her head.
“They’re probably happening simultaneously. Well, in that case, theirs was settled quickly too.”
At the start of the match, the crystal floating in the air had said “first match.”
The matches were being held at the same time, but perhaps because of the team-name order, ours was called the first match, while C and D were called the second.
“Or the flow of time might be adjusted in this space.”
“Yeah, that’s possible too.”
We felt as if only a few minutes had passed since we had been sent there, but it was possible that thirty minutes or so had passed at the venue of the second match.
Even if the match times differed, adjustment through this space could make it feel as if the matches were decided at the same time.
“...Since there’s no announcement, does that mean there are four teams in total?”
【There are four participating parties.】
The mystery blackboard answered.
Even with four parties, that made twenty people, meaning half the class was participating.
Considering the situation on this island, that was probably on the high side.
“...Then if we get three wins out of three matches, we get the reward.”
I nodded at Mamonaka’s words.
“That’s how it works.”
For some reason, that alone made her face turn red.
Yumekai said Mamonaka was interested in me, but...
It was true that we had been in the same class in our first year, but I had no idea what might have caused it.
“We’ll win every match at this rate.”
“Exactly. If we win every match, we get five Rights to Return!”
“Yes. We had Ms. Tanbi leave the party so we could participate in the event, so we cannot receive the additional benefit this time.”
Ms. Luminous, as an additional transfer participant, was someone who granted us various benefits by joining our group.
One of those was that the number of Rights to Return gained as event rewards increased by one.
But in order to participate in this event, we needed to have exactly five people.
In the process, we had her temporarily leave the party, so the judgment was that the amount gained would not increase this time.
“Well, an event where students fight other students would be hard on Ms. Luminous, so it can’t be helped.”
I already held a Right to Return, but duplicates could be transferred as long as they were free of charge.
In other words, if we cleared this event, six of the ten of us would have the right to return to Japan.
【Preparations for the third match are complete.】
Just as words appeared on the blackboard, my vision turned white again, and we were in the forest.
“Basically, the plan stays the same. Let’s go.”
Would we be facing another boys’ team?
Or would we be fighting participants from Suou’s party?
No matter who the opponent was, we could not afford to lose.
