So yeah, new chapter, beginnings, all that stuff...

"So it looks like we're having some trouble here."

"You think?"

Ryo was analyzing the whole situation calmly while Otome pointed out the obvious in his deductions.

It had only been about 5 min. since the battle between the hero-priestess and monsters, but the area was already extremely thick and tense. Couples were already either grouping together or studying the others carefully in order to determine who the guilty party is. Nobody made any sudden movements, keeping themselves as alert as possible, in case someone else planned on making a sneak attack.

"That one battle had pretty much thrown off the whole atmosphere…" Mugen announced as he glared at everyone around them. "If there was more time, we might have been able to team up with other groups to determine the answer."

"That's probably why that happened in the first place…" Otome said as she lazily held out her hand.

"Hm?"

"If everyone starts mistrusting each other in the very beginning, then that just makes it all the more difficult to determine who's the 'liar'. Information may be corrupted, and one wrong move could turn everyone against you."

"But, isn't it possible that this could be just an accident?" Kuroneko held her arms closer to herself for self-comfort.

"It doesn't matter if this was meant to happen or not. What matters is that it happened at all, and now it works to the liar's benefit."

Ryo started to rub his chin. "Well this narrows down the search though. We're all down by one, so it means one less group to check on."

Asuka frowned. "How could you say that? Because of this, one pair has been forced to drop out in a terrible way!"

"Then try to figure out who the fake is so that we can keep as many people from suffering the same fate as possible…"

The red ojou-sama started to bite her lips, but she took a deep breath before reluctantly agreeing.

"Come Kyle. We should go take a look around for any clues…"

As she turned to look around, her partner gave an exhausted sigh as he reluctantly followed her.

"Ah aaah," Izayoi said. "Looks like you made our young 'ojou-sama' quite mad."

Ryo didn't seem to care. "She's got the right idea though; we should start looking around for clues…"

The others turned to see that other groups had started to do the same, so they silently agreed to start out by gathering as much information as possible.

For the next half hour, the [No Names] had been searching around for any suspicious characters or pairs that seemed to be the most likely answer to this twisted [Gift Game]. They've found numerous different pairings, along with a few battles that took place here and there between pairs. But many couples had also began their own investigations and started to move around, so it was difficult to determine who they saw, and who they didn't see before. Eventually, however, the [No Names] had all gathered around to discuss their theories.

"So, who wants to start first?" Izayoi asked.

Mugen raised his hand. "Guess I'll start." As he got up, they all turned to see the number "17" hovering above him.

""""""17 pairs, huh…"""""

His pointed-eared partner buried her face in shame (the same number was hovering over her own head too). "Kuroneko is very sorry about all this." She shook her head as she explained. "Kuroneko had tried to stop Mugen-san, but…."

"Hey, the best way to gather information is to beat it out of people."

Though his reasoning was lacking, his face had confidence which proudly shown on his face.

"I think that the most likely answer is that knight and nun from before…"

"Priestess…" Ryo corrected him.

"What the hell's the difference? It's the same thing, ain't it?"

"Well…"

"All right you two, that's enough…" Kyle held his hands up in between the two to keep them from fighting. Mugen glared, but he continued his explanation.

"So I managed to get some info that those two were called 'Hero' and 'Leander'. Those were names from the Greek myth where a young man would swim across the 'sea of hell' to be with a young 'priestess'." He continued to glare at Ryo as he heavily emphasized the last word.

"So?" Asuka asked while crossing her arms. "How does that help us?"

"Well supposedly, the young man (who's Leander by the way) drowned while swimming during a raging storm. Hero couldn't take living without him, so she killed herself to follow him in death."

"Tragic story," Ryo chimed in. "But how does that make it logical to be the answer?"

"Some people said they might have become lovers before then, but other people have also said that they weren't actual lovers until after death. So that could mean that it was a 'false love'."

"I think that's kinda stretching it a bit," Otome said as she leaned against a wall. "Still, it was pretty impressive for you to think that far ahead."

Mugen smirked, but Ryo gave it some thought before giving his argument on the matter.

"Those two were the ones involved with the first battle, right? Wouldn't that make them one of the most suspicious ones then?"

"That's exactly why they're the perfect candidates!" Everyone cocked their heads slightly. "Look, if you become the most suspicious, then that would make it too obvious, so obvious that people wouldn't think that it's true! That's why it's perfect!"

Silence.

"Well?"

"So ignoring that last bit of stupidity…" Ryo stretched out his arms. "I think that I've got a better answer." He pointed at the pair of a fairly good looking young man and a cute girl.

The young man was wearing a leather vest over a green short-sleeved. He wore long brown pants that were being held up by a leather belt that had a hammer, a small bottle, and a small satchel attached to it. He wore fingerless gloves, a pair of sandals, a metal wristband that seemed to have six lines craved vertically all around it, a quiver that held many arrows, and a strangely-shaped bow that was resting over his shoulder.

The cute girl had medium-length hair that flowed down to her shoulders and had a slightly healthy glow to it. She wore a green tube top and a blue tight short-skirt that had a slight allure of seduction towards her. She also wore sandals and her fingers had red nail polish painted on them. A hairclip that looked like the sun was sitting in the top left corner of her hair and a silver necklace with a small gemstone was resting around her chest which seemed to overall give her a flashy, yet attractive appearance.

The others back to Ryo, who gave a proud smirk.

"That is supposedly 'Odysseus' and 'Circe'. And if I remember correctly, the story goes that Circe had kept Odysseus trapped with her for about a year before finally letting him leave. Odysseus had wanted to go back to his home and stay with his wife, so that couldn't possibly be real love, right?"

Kuroneko held a finger to her cheek. "But hasn't there been a story that Odysseus had returned to Circe when she revived him after his first death?"

"Yeah, but he still died from grief later on, and just because he was revived, doesn't mean he fell for her."

"I don't know…"

"Sounds kinda like crap to me…"

"At least it's better than your half-assed reasoning earlier…"

Spark flew between the caramel boy with black hair, and the gangster-like boy with pink streaks. Both started to stare down at each other until…

"Fine then, let's see who's right." Mugen yanked Kuroneko by the collar and started to drag her over to the 'Hero – Leander' pair.

"Fine. Don't be too dumbfounded when I end up being right…" Ryo left to the 'Odysseus-Circe' pair with Yo following behind. Otome and Asuka sighed simultaneously as they saw the two idiots off.

"Well, it looks like we lost them."

"Yup. But there's no point brooding about it now…"

They turned to their partners, who just stood watching the whole thing unfold without saying a word.

"Well then, what do you both think?"

Kyle crossed his arms and went into thought. "I don't think either of them could be the answer…"

"What makes you so sure?"

He paused. "Too easy?"

"That's not a real answer you know…"

"Well, I just think we should try looking around a bit more."

"And what are we supposed to do in the meantime?"

"You could…"

Just then, something ran straight into Kyle, who was pushed a couple feet away from his original position. The others turned to find a somewhat chiseled man with black hair and blue eyes pushing against him with a three-pronged sword.

The man wore a black robe and was shirtless underneath. However, he wore long pants and sandals, so thankfully he wasn't going commando. Despite his getup, his face was somewhat pointed around the chin area, and his hair was spiked slightly upward, which along with his pointed eyes and 5 o' clock shadow, gave him a sort of mean stepfather-like feel to him.

Kyle had raised his arms to his head at the last minute, so he managed to avoid an instant kill. But he was still being pushed back by the man's weapon and the force that was being exerted by the wielder, so it was obvious that this stranger had power to match his appearance.

"You must be the [answer] to this [Gift Game], aren't you!" the man chuckled as he brought the sword up once again. The young boy with the butler uniform leapt back and placed some distance between the two, just before they managed to make contact, but three shadowy forms had suddenly appeared from the blade and stretched out towards him. He raised an arm, but upon contact, the three forms had suddenly grew teeth and started biting his arm. Kyle grimaced in pain, but he shook off the teeth and glared at the man, who wore a confident smile.

"You must be…"

"Hey Kyle, you need any help there?"

Kyle turned to see Izayoi casually calling out to him like a parent offering a child some help in schoolwork. It pissed him off a bit, but he held his tongue and turned his focus back towards his opponent.

"Looks like I should follow him," Asuka sighed. "We'll talk some more about the answer afterwards, understood?" She lightly ran after her "partner", leaving the blond-haired boy and his partner with ocean-blue hair alone to themselves.

"Well then, I guess we're left to think for ourselves…" Otome held a finger to a temple on her head while thinking about an answer to the riddle. "Any ideas Izayoi?"

"Who knows?" he shrugged while looking around. "Of course, I was hoping to ask Kurousagi something, but it doesn't look like she's anywhere around…"

"Now that you mention it," Otome started to look around. "Where is that rabbit anyways?"

As the two stated, Kurousagi was nowhere to be seen, not even by the main stage next to Cupid, who was sitting down and watching them all.

"Well, it's not like it would've made much of a difference if she participated or not." Otome lazily stated. "Aside from asking questions about rules and such, it doesn't change the fact that we would need to figure out the answer ourselves…"

"True, but it would've been fun to see her struggle a bit…"

"Oh?" Otome gave a sharp glare. "Are you really that sadistic?"

"Maybe I am, why should you care?"

The two glared before finally averting their gaze.

"Anyways, we should start by taking a guess." She pounded her hands fists together. "trial and error, right?"

"I guess if that's the only thing left…" Izayoi started to shake his limbs a bit to warm up. "should we make it a race?"

"Loser gets to decide the next penalty for Kurousagi"

"Agreed."

After an exchange of smirks, the two of them started to dash into the crowd.

Sorry, had absolutely no idea how to start this, so I just went with what I felt and this is the result. If you guys don't really like it, then I'm very sorry and I'll try to make things better next time.

I've also discovered a new series called "No Game No Life". If you haven't seen it, it's kinda like Mondaiji, but with a slightly more mature and comedic feel to it. If you're bored or looking for a good series, I recommend giving this a try.

Take your guesses if you want. I've offered some options on answers, or maybe they're red herrings, who knows? Of course, I'm also willing to take up any kind of romantic myths/legends/whatever that you may want to see, or maybe one you hate and would like to see a beatdown on.

Now I suppose that's it for the moment. I'll try to get an update on a fight as soon as possible, and I hope you guys are doing ok.