Chapter 825 First Match

"So what's the plan?" Genshirou asked after they were transported to an artificial field that resembled a certain part of the Underworld that had a tall mountain and wide-open plain. After the random selection, the field and the standard game mode were selected. In the standard game mode, the teams would be teleported on the opposite sides of the map, and whoever takes out the enemy's 'King' first is the winner.

Right now, they were situated at a small hut on the edge of the plain which is the southern side of the field, "Although his members are competent enough, it's the leader that we should look out for.", muttered Kisuke while looking through the information regarding the Team Shooting Star. Although they lost all of their previous matches, it wasn't just about their inexperience in battles that hampered their abilities like what most of the articles were pointing out, but the fact that their leader couldn't control the power of his newly awakened Longinus, which ended up being a detriment instead, "But in this kind of field, winning is easy."

"Winning is easy?" asked Tiamat as she turned to Kisuke, "Don't underestimate the opponent. It's true that he can't properly control his power, but if he's given space to breathe, he'll be capable of retiring all of us with just a blast from his Sacred Gear. And them being on the top of the mountain, once he gets a sight of you, you'll be instantly targeted."

"Shooting Star would need some time to charge his attack so we'll have to cross the plain as fast as possible the moment we emerge to stop him. However, it's not just him on the other side, so we should expect an all-out battle in the middle of the plain and it wouldn't be weird if his teammates were to sacrifice themselves just to pin you down.", added Seekvaira recalling their previous matches.

All of a sudden Athena chuckled under her hood and mask, "I see. It'll be an easy win, indeed." Knowing some of Kisuke's abilities, Athena understood what must be done, "So we'll move together in the open?"

Kisuke nodded and said, "That's right~. Nothing is as easy as that."

Tiamat and Seekvaira looked confused and turned towards the other two who hadn't said anything, but they just started shaking their heads.

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"Looks like we're lucky this time." excitedly declared Shooting Star's Bishop, "Since we're on the top of the mountain, sniping them with considerable power should be easy for you, leader."

"That's right. We just have to pin them down for a certain amount of time and we'll win.", the Knight added and prepared himself to move out as soon as they spotted the enemy team.

Shooting Star nodded at their words, "That's the plan, but they should also be aware of what we'll do, so they'll probably aim for me with a detached force. Rook, take half of the members with you and assault and pin the enemy King. The other half will stay and protect me. If any of the two, Tiamat, or the two Gods, come after me, I'll use castling to assassinate the King, so make sure that you're always near him."

The three-meter-tall Devil nodded, "I will do that."

While the rest of the team started talking about the specifics of what they'll do with each other, Shooting Star began focusing and taking out his Star Buster Star Blaster, a pair of a longsword and a rifle, 'I've already figured out the trick from previous practices. All I need to do is concentrate and not mess up.'

The reason why many were afraid of Team Shooting Star despite their losing streak is because of the leader's Sacred Gear that is capable of outputting power that rivaled Satan Class and God Class and that was without even going into its Balance Breaker. If given enough time, he could easily destroy the whole field they were playing on right now, which was equivalent to flipping the whole chessboard. For its potential to destroy the whole world, it's considered as one of the newly emerged Longinus.

A few minutes later, Shooting Star finally heard a report from his Queen, "They've appeared, but not like we're expecting."

Shooting Star opened his eyes and aimed his rifle at the group that was charging in, confirming Kisuke's presence, "The whole team? Do they intend to brute force this? While they didn't have much of a choice, I didn't think they'd go for this. Go as planned, but be extra careful with any surprises."

Half of his team went forward while two of the Bishops positioned themselves on the edge of the formation in anticipation for them to take air control.

But seeing that nothing special had happened and the sent members clashed with the enemy team, Shooting Star became doubtful, 'That easy?' But he didn't have much leeway to think because there was no way for his team members to hold back Tiamat, the Gods, and even the famous Genshirou Saji if he released his Balance Breaker.

Activating his own Balance Breaker, the pair of longsword and rifle combined and transformed to that of a white blaster and started gathering energy from the surroundings, immediately amassing a terrible amount of power that caused the air around them to start distorting and shaking.

"Oh my. How terrifying.", all of a sudden, Shooting Star heard an unfamiliar voice behind him, and those around him were stunned to suddenly find a man in Japanese garb and a bucket hat standing behind their leader with a paper fan covering half of his face.

As soon as he heard the voice, Shooting Star instantly transformed his blaster into a giant sword with pure white energy as its blade and swiftly swung it while turning around. It didn't even touch the ground yet it had already instantly melted everything in its path. However, the target of his attack had already long fled by backing up a few meters.

The man in cowboy attire glared at Kisuke and said, "Are you looking down on us by coming here just by yourself?"

Those around agreed with Shooting Star's words and bore their weapons at Kisuke while slowly encircling him.

"No, I'm not. I've never looked down on anyone." And Kisuke was to be completely honest, he's really slightly terrified, 'With just a few seconds, he was able to amass energy that is equivalent to Cero Oscuras, the strongest Cero that an Arrancar or Visored is capable of. I'm just gone for a few months, yet people like this apparently started appearing out of nowhere. Maybe Issei didn't really need my assistance back then and he could have still gotten himself trained up.'

It's really a ridiculous world in Kisuke's opinion, 'I've gotten used to the Adventurer's slow leveling process.'

"But it's still a poor choice for you to come by yourself."

Kisuke shook his head, "It's already a good choice when you didn't expect me to come. Besides, the game had already concluded the moment you failed to perceive my actions.", he replied while pointing at one of his pockets.

Shooting Star hurriedly looked down at his vest and saw a small metallic black ball that he hadn't noticed. But before he could even think of taking it off and throwing it away, it was already too late as it had already started releasing high voltage electricity, instantly paralyzing him, "Ghhh!!!"

Nevertheless, that's all it did and it wasn't even enough to cause him any substantial harm, "This... I don't know what you had in mind but something like this is only enough to tickle me." Shooting Star forcefully moved his body and threw the ball away, 'I just need less than a minute to recover from that.'

Contrary to his expectations, however, Kisuke just smiled and responded, "I told you. It's game over."

Wondering what else might come, Shooting Star's members didn't wait any longer and pounced at their enemy. Though before they could reach him, a deafening high-frequency sound started blasting from beyond the trees, stopping everyone in their tracks.

Then again, it only became a mild annoyance as everyone was able to recover from its initial blast, "What's the use of these petty tricks!?" One of the pawns asked while resuming his charge.

"Petty? Say that again after looking at your leader."

At his cue, all of the Shooting Star's members looked behind them and saw Shooting Star had already dropped his Sacred Gear and was bleeding from the nose with his mouth frothing. He had already lost his consciousness and the retirement system had already taken hold of him.