I look at the game-like panel that sits in front of me, prompting me to enter a username. Before I can, someone yells out. "Someone's coming down!" I look up to see a being clad in fine armour descending.
I watch in shock as the being fully depends and starts speaking. "Hello, my children. Today... Your life has been rewritten." He spreads his arms and speaks theatrically. "You can start over from all your boring lives! This is the birth of your new life. You can decide what to do with this chance."
"Now enter your username so that we can begin the fun! Do not worry either, you can change it later. For a price..."
I swallow hard. This is like all those mangas I've read... And anime. I clench my fists and grit my teeth. I'll play along with whatever kinds of things they throw at me! I finally enter a name. 'Wolf in sheep's clothing'? No. Something unique... Like...
I enter my name. 'Dealer of Death'. The same name I use in every game I play.
I finally look at my surroundings and notice my friend looking quite anxious.
"Hey, you doing alright?" I ask him with an exited smile on my face that I can't help
"W-Why do you look so happy right now!? Oh, these are just like those games you used to play all the time..." He smiles with a glint of happiness in his eyes "Let's do this you damn masochist!"
He enters his name and strikes a dramatic pose "CALL ME 'THE MACHINE GUN'!"
"You sure are confident..." I say with a hand on my hip. "We don't even know what "fun" that lunatic is talking about." I point at the being that descended earlier.
Usato starts talking "Well you're right about that, maybe we should try to talk to him-" I sharply cut him off "are you stupid? Do you wanna be made into an example?"
I stare as the being starts talking. "You may call me 'Light'. Though I doubt that most of you will be able to meet me in the future much. I am a he." He shrugs as he starts ascending back up. "Enjoy this while you can. It won't be this easy later on."
He completes his ascension and the gash closes back up, though the shaky atmosphere remains.
"What was he referring to?" Usato starts to say, before he's cut off by a loud 'ding' coming from everyone's panel.
I read the title. ['Survival of The Fittest']
'Annihilate as many monsters as you can.'
'Time limit: 5 hours
'Good luck.'
"Oh, okay so no tutorial or anything?" I say half jokingly to Usato.
A portal opens up and beast-like creatures swarm out.
"LET'S GO!" I grab Usato by the arm and we run all the way to the closet building, sprinting up the stairs.
We finally reach the top floor and let out a sigh of relief as we watch the massacre down below.
"Let's figure out how this panel works first, eh?" I say while plopping down next to him
"Good idea. I know there's an index for 'items' with multiple categories ranging from 'extremely common' to 'historical grade'. For an otaku like you, it's probably easier to rephrase that into '-F class' and 'SSS+', huh?" He says with a smug grin on his face.
"I understood perfectly fine, Usato. At least I can talk to the opposite sex though." I stick out my tongue playfully, while scrolling through the panel
"S-Shut up! I can talk to females just fine!" He replies
"For like two seconds" I say with a chuckle.
He sighs and stands up. "We have about four hours and thirty minutes left of this." He says with a determined look.
"You thinking what I'm thinking?" I say with a smirk and stand up. "Let's go monster hunting."
We gather the most promising 'weapons' we can find in the office that we entered and begin out descent downstairs. "I hope you're ready, Usato. I won't be able to carry you through this."