Chapter 313: Chapter 313: Assassination Attempt on Iwanaga Kotoko
Chapter 313: Assassination Attempt on Iwanaga Kotoko
"What a cool outfit. Is that cosplay?"
"What anime is that character from? I’ve never seen it before. Is there a comic convention nearby?"
"That person in the black leather suit is huge... Or is that a stunt costume?"
The surrounding pedestrians began whispering among themselves, but Iwanaga Kotoko ignored them completely. Her violet eyes swept across the crowd as she carefully tried to sense the aura lingering nearby.
After a few seconds, however, she shook her head and said softly to Asagiri beside her.
"The crowd is too dense, and the aura in this area is too strong. It’s interfering with my judgment. I can’t find the one who attacked just now."
"Hmm."
Asagiri nodded noncommittally. Then he revealed a faint smile.
"It doesn’t matter. Use that."
As his voice fell, Asagiri reached out and crushed the phantom Tarot card drifting down from the air.
"Persona, Mita."
"So sleepy..."
The moment Sleepy Mita appeared, intense drowsiness washed over the pedestrians who had been watching the commotion and surrounding Asagiri and Iwanaga Kotoko. It did not even take a full second before they slowly collapsed to the ground, sleeping as peacefully as infants.
"One, two, three, four, five..."
Asagiri looked around and found five people who had resisted Sleepy Mita’s ability and did not fall into a deep sleep.
Some wore suits and carried briefcases, looking like ordinary office workers. Some wore casual clothes, like innocent citizens out for leisure. There was even a kindly looking old lady wearing a sun hat, as if she were a tourist visiting Tokyo.
Obviously, all five of them were Players.
Moreover, once the crowd no longer obstructed her vision, Iwanaga Kotoko, who could sense auras, confirmed that these five people were contaminated. No, more accurately, they had merged with an extremely powerful aura, almost like evil spirits disguised as humans.
Besides those five, however, there was another familiar figure standing there.
"Sakurakawa Rikka... Forget it, it doesn’t matter. Let’s take them all on together."
Asagiri did not pay too much attention to her. Instead, he crushed another Tarot card drifting down from the air.
What replaced Sleepy Mita was not any of the normal Mitas, nor the unaudited Crazy Mita, but Core Mita, the one who represented the source of Mita World.
Core Mita did not speak. She merely glanced at the five Players radiating powerful auras, as well as Sakurakawa Rikka. The signal light on her body flashed yellow.
In the next second, the surrounding scenery rapidly changed.
"This is..."
Seeing the original street transform into something resembling a lava cave, the five Players disguised as innocent citizens instinctively assumed it was some kind of mental illusion.
However, the scorching heat that made even breathing painful reminded them that this was no illusion.
It was a real, existing area.
"Those two..."
When the five Players looked back, they found that Asagiri, who had been standing there, had already disappeared.
Iwanaga Kotoko, still standing in place, raised her right hand as light flickered in her dark purple eyes.
"Pale Domination."
Facing the Pale Ghost Hands that suddenly emerged, the five Players immediately activated their abilities.
"Luoxin Fu!"
"Ghost Shadow!"
Two Players, both seemingly Summoner types, each unleashed their powers.
A disgusting monster appeared, with the upper body of a human woman and the lower body of an eight-legged spider. Beside it, several pitch black humanoid ghost shadows materialized, blocking the Pale Ghost Hands trying to seize them.
"Hmm? Interesting."
Iwanaga Kotoko imitated Asagiri’s tone and hummed softly. Then she slowly raised her cane and used Black Particles to condense two IBMs, all while maintaining Pale Domination to confront the two hostile Players.
From this alone, it was clear that whether in strength or mental intensity, Iwanaga Kotoko was at least one tier above the enemy.
Even while stalemating two hostile Players at once, she still had enough room to continue using Black Particles.
The expressions of the other three changed when they saw this.
The seemingly kind old lady reached up and wiped her face, instantly transforming into a young woman. At the same time, she drew a long sword from her inventory and looked at her companions.
"We’ve been exposed. We have no choice but to attack..."
Before she could finish, a girl’s manic laughter rang out together with the roar of a revving chainsaw.
"I’ll chop you all up!"
Seeing Crazy Mita rush over with a chainsaw, pitch black patterns appeared across the female Player’s body. Two lines of chilling crimson blood tears flowed from her eyes.
With her long black hair and gaping mouth, she looked like a soul reaping female ghost as she released a piercing shriek.
"It hurts..."
Although Crazy Mita’s mental resistance was extremely high, she also had the weakness of taking double damage from mental attribute attacks.
The moment she heard the shriek released by the female Player, pain appeared on her face. Even when the long sword swung toward her, she was unable to dodge.
The instant before the long sword struck Crazy Mita, Asagiri swap positions with her.
He raised his right arm, wrapped in the Rope Dart’s chain, and blocked the sharp blade. A crisp metallic clang rang out.
"In the way."
Another male Player had the same eerie patterns appear across his body, except his were dark green. Immediately afterward, his hands transformed into dark green beastlike claws, and he slashed at Asagiri’s body.
"Swish!"
Asagiri retreated in time, but a gash was still cut into his shoulder. Within the wound, deep enough to reveal bone, a layer of dark green light flickered.
"Curse attribute damage, huh..."
Asagiri possessed extremely high resistance to Curse attribute damage, so the Curse attached to the enemy’s attack only caused a slight sting and did not continue damaging the wound.
However, he could tell that if someone without Curse resistance took that claw attack, the wound would not only cause unbearable pain, but the Curse would also invade the body through the wound and damage the surrounding tissues from within.
"You guys are strong."
Asagiri retreated to Iwanaga Kotoko’s side.
Watching the Pale Ghost Hands she created get torn apart by that disgusting Luoxin Fu and the pitch black ghost shadows, he immediately realized that the five Players before him would not be easy to handle.
The enemy was weaker than him and Iwanaga Kotoko, but the gap did not exceed a full tier.
"Sakurakawa Rikka, don’t you intend to help?"
Hearing Asagiri’s words, Sakurakawa Rikka, who stood in the distance, drew the long sword emitting a pale purple light and spoke slowly in a gentle tone.
"I was not sure whether you needed my help. I did not want to act rashly and cause any misunderstanding between us."
"Sakurakawa Rikka... So you’re here too. Perfect."
The female Player holding the long sword glanced at Sakurakawa Rikka in the distance, then turned her gaze toward Iwanaga Kotoko.
Her tone was cold and emotionless.
"Today, we will deal with both of you, along with that man in black over there."
"Man in black? You make me sound like some random NPC. You people really are arrogant."
Asagiri chuckled, then spoke calmly.
"However, if you think you only need to face the three of us, you are gravely mistaken."
The moment Asagiri’s voice fell, the five Players opposite him saw an unbelievable sight.
Crazy Mita.
Hat Mita.
Mira.
Short-haired Mita.
Prototype Mita.
Except for Kind Mita and Cute Mita, who had no combat power, Chibi Mita, who was a scout type, and Sleepy Mita, whose ability would not work on these five, every Mita Asagiri could summon appeared before him at once.
[Core Mita Exclusive Ability: Mita World]
[Mita World: Forcibly drags qualifying targets within a fifty-meter radius into Mita World, regardless of their will.]
[Note 1: The "qualifying" standard is an assessment of mental intensity. It can be adjusted according to Utsunomiya Asagiri’s will, allowing targets with "mental intensity higher than a certain standard," as well as himself, to enter Mita World. Only the standard value can be adjusted. Individual targets cannot be filtered.]
[Note 2: Maintaining this world continuously consumes your mental energy, and the Persona "Core Mita" must remain in an equipped state.]
Seeing so many Mitas appear in an instant, the expressions of the five Players opposite them did not change at all.
They even looked somewhat numb.
"Summoner class, huh... This is indeed a little troublesome."
"So that’s how it is... What a disgusting bunch."
After the clash just now, combined with the expressions of these five people and the powerful Cursed aura radiating from them, genuine disgust appeared in Iwanaga Kotoko’s dark purple eyes for the first time.
"Every one of them has swallowed the flesh and blood of yokai. This group... can no longer be considered human. A collection of twisted existences that destroy order."
"A reminder. I am also that type of existence."
Hearing Sakurakawa Rikka’s words as she drifted over like a black shadow, Iwanaga Kotoko snorted coldly.
"I included you in that statement."
"You really are willful."
Sakurakawa Rikka gently pressed her slender palm, pale enough to seem bloodless, onto Asagiri’s wound.
In the next second, Asagiri’s wound vanished. In its place, blood overflowed from Sakurakawa Rikka’s mouth. Because of the wound transfer, a portion of her mental energy had been consumed.
She looked at the five Players opposite them with calm eyes. Her tone remained gentle and soft.
"At the very least, in this battle, I am a teammate on the same side as you."
.....
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