I Have Returned, but I Cannot Lay down My Gun

Chapter 432

???Kooong!

“This crazy...!”

“Damn it, Eugene! Don’t use your tail in the sacred game of football!”

“Ugh!”

People collided, and the sand beneath them couldn’t withstand the force, crumbling mercilessly.

Every time people moving at an almost inhumanly fast pace collided, there were sounds you’d rather not hear, but no one really minded. There were no injuries or blood—thanks to the Icarus Gear's shields, which absorbed the shock from the collisions.

In any case, it was now past 4 PM, moving toward 5, 6, and finally 7 PM, and what was Team Dagger doing? Playing football. American football, to be exact, under the setting sun. It seemed familiar, but nothing was really wrong with it.

The Icarus Gear’s holographic function overlaid a football field onto the wide beach, and most of those present now found themselves caught up in the madness happening in the sand.

“The defensive lineman is Logan? This is going to be a disaster. I really don’t want to block a charging polar bear head-on…”

“There’s no helping it. I’ll try to handle it somehow.”

“Right after the game starts, Owens, throw the ball to the youngest. I think that crazy tackle will hurt more than being hit by a car on the highway.”

The quarterback, the core of our team, was none other than Owens, Team Dagger’s operations leader.

The center and offensive lineman was Lorentina, I was the running back, and Chester and Morgan, positioned on the sides, were the wide receivers.

For those unfamiliar with American football, the game worked as follows: Lorentina would pass the ball to Owens, who would then throw it to me. I had to dodge the opponents standing in my way and run a minimum distance, or score a touchdown.

Chester and Morgan were like backup players who, if I found myself being swarmed, would catch my pass either laterally or backwards and continue advancing or score the touchdown.

The timer ticked, and everyone took their positions.

So, what about Logan on the opposing team?

???Bang!

“Ugh…!”

“I’ll kill you—!”

A defensive tackle.

If Lorentina was the barricade, Logan was the fully accelerated tank. His target was to crush our line mercilessly and destroy the quarterback. Logan, who weighed a hefty 270 kg, was not only heavy and tough but also nimble and fast. He plowed through Lorentina’s defense, quite literally crushing it.

Even though they were both powered by the same ability.

As you can see, the basic goal of American football was quite simple. The attacking team had to break through the defense before the defense could do anything, running to the end. The defense had to stop the attacking team or, ideally, break through the offensive line and tackle the quarterback before they could even throw the ball.

If this is hard to understand...

“Eugene!”

“I’m going!”

I just had to run as fast as I could after receiving the ball until I was either tackled or crossed the goal line.

The physical abilities of all the participants were adjusted to be roughly the same due to the Icarus Gear’s body enhancement limit—half of a Transmuter’s typical physical capacity.

As soon as I received the flat ball, my body shot forward like a bullet.

As soon as I started running, everyone began rushing to tackle me. The three defenders positioned behind Logan all came charging at me, and I tried to jump over them, but unfortunately, since it was sand beneath my feet, I couldn’t jump very high.

So—thud.

In mid-air, I made a lateral pass to Chester, but was caught and slammed into the sand.

“Ugh!”

“Damn it, run! Show them!”

“Man, you're fast as hell.”

Chester, having caught the ball, ran for what seemed like forever.

With the lambda-level energy limit lifted, the Icarus Gear allowed the specially trained soldiers to run at about 50 km/h, naturally making the field seem larger to accommodate the speed of the game and number of players.

Chester ran with the ball for roughly 150 meters non-stop, and finally, with a successful touchdown, made it into the end zone alone.

Despite the sand that had been wiped off his face, the entire offensive team cheered wildly along the beach.

“Nice! This is it!”

“Damn, that was ridiculously fast.”

“Playing football here... should’ve brought Arikon or those laser geeks. With 11 people on a team, mixing them up would make for a real game.”

With cheerful sounds, fireworks went off around us.

Of course, they weren’t actually fireworks we brought in—they were artificially generated by the Icarus Gear’s visual and auditory data transmission. Anyway, after a long, drawn-out game, our team won. The scoreboard showed 82 to 73, not a huge gap.

Meanwhile, Rain, who had been playing on Logan’s team, collapsed to the ground as soon as the defeat was announced and let out an eerie scream. Seeing that, I couldn’t help but play the gentleman, so I reached out, helped Rain up, and offered some consolation.

“It’s okay, Rain. It’s inevitable for a weaker team to struggle against a stronger one.”

“…Damn it, get up! We’re doing another round! I can’t accept this!”

“Hey, don’t touch our team.”

“Ugh.”

With a thud, Logan’s playful slap landed on my head.

By now, the physical enhancements and limits of the Icarus Gear had worn off. The game was over, and naturally, the enhancements faded as well. So, all ten of us, including myself, headed toward the large cooking devices, which were giving off delicious smells.

Chester, who was responsible for the team's meals, checked the real-time cooking and adjusted the fire even though he had just finished playing the game. Rapier, who had been chatting with Jin under the umbrella, lifted her sunglasses and added:

“Finally, it’s over. Did you have fun?”

“The Vermont country boy beat the Alaskan country boy... Ugh!”

“This guy really seems to want to fall into the ocean.”

Vermont was Lorentina, and Alaska was Logan.

Now, to clarify, today’s game had been played by ten people—not twelve, but ten.

In other words, two people were excluded, and those two were Jin, who was interested in food, and Rapier, who, not wanting to get involved in physical activities even on a beach, had laid under the umbrella. So naturally, the two were in charge of the food prep.

That said, it wasn’t like they had to stay busy all day. Among the gear we brought, there were kitchen supplies capable of cooking food as long as power was supplied. And as for power... well, did I even need to say it? The wristband we had was practically a gigawatt-level fusion reactor.

It didn’t take long for the beach to be filled with the smell of delicious food.

“Oh, seafood boil!”

“I stuffed it so much into the oven, don’t worry about the amount, just eat as much as you want. I’ve already taken out all the shells from the clams, shrimp, and crabs, so... well, I guess the only thing left to throw away is the corn stalks?”

“Make sure to collect the trash properly. We need to throw it all in the incinerator later and burn it all at once.”

By now, a table had been set up, and bowls and plates were piling up with food.

But no one was paying attention to that. They grabbed a big ladle-like spoon and heaped a mix of potatoes, shrimp, sausages, corn, and more onto their plates, then went to sit anywhere on the sand to begin their meal while watching the setting sun. I, too, found a spot, holding a large plate in my left hand and a fork in my right.

The sound of the waves and the sunset greeted us. The ruined high-rise buildings, the countless artificial lights drawing near zero, and the wide stretch of white sand devoid of human traces made it feel like we were the only ones occupying this vast city.

In reality, it might not be so different.

“How is it?”

“…Why are you asking me?”

Ten of us lined up horizontally, and Rain sat next to me.

Jin was wandering the beach, touching the crystal-clear waters of Miami or taking pictures with a camera, which we had no idea where she got from. The sound of the camera's shutter snapped a moment of time and preserved it permanently.

Everyone had different expressions. At some point, Rapier had also joined Marcus and sat next to him. Jin, with her camera hanging around her neck, came over to my side, and I smiled at her while activating my Icarus Gear. The nanomachines formed a small drone.

The drone, flying about 5 meters ahead, captured all of us.

The photo we took had all twelve of us in it.

“I don’t really know, but I feel a little... disappointed.”

“What do you mean by disappointed?”

“Just...”

A brief silence.

Rain, with a slightly disappointed expression as she faced the sunset, spoke up.

“…I’m curious about the kind of joy people can feel. Everyone looks so happy.”

“Haha.”

Of course, that wasn’t difficult.

I activated the Icarus Gear’s data recording function, and at that moment, I stuffed a variety of food onto my fork, chewed, and registered the pressure and sensations felt by my taste receptors, tongue, teeth, and throat into the data—then I sent it to Rain.

The response was immediate.

“Whoa, what is this!? Something’s going down my throat... Ugh, there’s so much data I can’t process!”

“That’s the feeling.”

“I’m curious too, Archetype.”

It was a mess.

Unfortunately, the others didn’t have the ability to process and convert that data into taste, so most of it was turned into an unusable form and likely went straight to the trash. But... well, maybe they’ll understand someday.

Perhaps it won’t take that long.

By the time the sunset disappeared beyond the horizon, darkness descended.

However, someone had brought firewood, and they stacked it in intervals on the beach. Soon, they threw in chemical canisters filled with napalm vapor and flames.

With a massive pillar of fire soaring meters high, Chester made a guitar out of his arm.

“Let’s sing a song. Anyone want to go first?”

“Since you made the guitar, Chester, why don’t you go first?”

“I can’t play guitar, haha.”

Then why the hell did you make the guitar?

That thought briefly crossed everyone’s minds, but in a way, it was a bizarre yet fitting development for Team Dagger.

An unforgettable evening was about to begin.

Streamer Yoo Jin, Day 4 of Streaming Break.

However, oddly enough, when searching through all the internet communities, there weren’t as many people wishing for Yoo Jin’s return as a streamer... there weren’t as many as expected.

Despite averaging 1.5 million viewers every time she streamed, and sometimes even surpassing 2 million when doing something outrageous or beyond what others could even dream of—she was practically the number one streamer on Earth—she had been on a break for four days, and yet no one seemed to care much.

The reason was simple.

• Dice, in 5 minutes, there’s 'Schedule 3.' Would you like to confirm it?

“Huh? Nah, I’ll check it later.”

Mecha Yoo Jin Voice Pack and Mini-Mecha Yoo Jin Distribution.

Though 1 unit per person or per household wouldn’t become a reality, at least something similar was somewhat possible. Everyone knew that this was only made possible by the approval of the person involved—there was no need to even mention that.

A mini Mecha Yoo Jin, small enough to fit in the palm of your hand, was buzzing around Dice’s desk. It was a hologram, so it couldn’t be touched, but seeing it freely navigate through the virtual space was worth the look.

At least, Dice thought so.

“Well, I should be thankful that something came out like this.”

Mecha Yoo Jin.

Strictly speaking, this was part of the EU mode, a character only appearing in Yoo Jin’s scenario. The Dark Zone, which functions both as a game and an FPS game platform, had an enormous amount of content, and most of the PVP modes were separated into individual tournaments.

In other words, unless there was any follow-up story, Mecha Yoo Jin—although once immensely popular—would gradually be forgotten. But that was a shame. Even though it was a newly created entity within the game, I had once lived with her and the other two just recently...

“Such a shame.”

According to the setting, Jin and Rain were taken by Team Dagger, so it wasn’t impossible for a reappearance, but who knew when the main storyline would be updated.

From that perspective, providing the Mecha Yoo Jin voice pack and Mini Mecha Yoo Jin support AI to those who participated in the raids for a certain period wasn’t such a bad idea. Since it was based on a real person, no one would be doing anything strange, since they couldn’t physically touch it.

Meanwhile, a continued thought:

“Maybe in Yoo Jin’s personal area, the real Jin and Rain are wandering around...”

I really hope that’s true.

I couldn’t say it out loud, but everyone knew how deeply Dice was in love with Yoo Jin. The fact that he had recently adopted a ball python as a pet was already all over the internet.

But, as expected, Dice’s bold imagination didn’t last long.

• Schedule 3 execution time, Dice.

“Huh, has it really been that long?”

At that moment, she sighed lightly and checked the date at the top right of the UI.

The end of July was almost within her grasp.

As soon as she realized that, she found herself standing on a battlefield where sand was swirling around her. Dozens of users were waiting for her ahead.

Dice spoke up.

“Glad to see you, everyone... Let’s cut to the chase and start.”

Whoosh.

Many people boarded transport planes to scatter across the large map, and Dice checked the open lower ramp outside.

The NBV Desert Base—her home, in a sense.

“The tournament rank is just under a month away. Let’s do our best.”

The 4th Final Championship was looming.