Danganronpa: Algorithmic Alteration Chapter 6: Continuity Error (Part 4), a dangan ronpa kibou no gakuen to zetsubou no koukousei fanfic

Chapter 1: Continuity Error (Daily Life Part 4)

Warning: This is a Danganronpa fic. There's going to be a lot of violence, gore, and blood. And maybe a few other things. You've been warned (somewhat)

Bullets would continuously fly through the air, causing the player to take cover behind a rock, waiting for a moment for the bullet storm to subside.

From briefly peeking behind cover, the player could tell it was only two other players shooting at him. And finally, once the firing stopped, he bolted out into the open.

Knowing the location of the first person allowed him to take them out with ease, but they were forced back to cover because of the other shooter.

The player waited again for the bullets to stop.

However, when they did stop… It was much sooner than they would have expected. Being cautious, they peeked around the cover to see if it was only a trick to get them to run out.

However, they found the body of the other player on the floor, with one of his teammates running away with a knife in hand. "Huh?"

That player in question continued to run through the battlefield, catching the enemy off guard, and deciding to opt for a knife kill instead of switching to a more conventional weapon.

This went on for several minutes with her amassing several kills.

But they weren't finished yet, the game had only ten kills left for a winner to be declared, and she was going to make sure their team won.

But now a target was on their back, and she saw the chat fly with a few messages of obscenities directed their way.

And yet, that didn't amount to anything. Changing her approach, they switch off from the knife, choosing to finally use a firearm. One by one, she managed to take out the five people who had gone after her, taking minimal damage in the process.

Finally, the game stopped with the scoreboard displayed in the center.

"Heh." Lorelei tilted her head to the side, proud of their score. Out of the hundred of kills required, they had half of them, while only suffering a single death.

But the real goldmine was the chat going off.

[johncenaogre2007]: There's no way they aren't hacking.

[TheAGamer]: I know for a fact I shot at them several times

It was entertaining to see them speculate on what she did, and she couldn't help but send some responses back.

[Calytrix] Really now? Ohmygod that's about the best compliment I've gotten so far. Lol. How about improving your own skills before accusing others?

[luckysvndx]: It looked like a bit more than just skill there. A 50 KDR isn't something normal.

[Calytrix]: Skill issues, losers.

She was ready to go for another round, but they heard the sound of their mother calling out to them. "Lorelei!"

Letting out an annoyed sigh, she swiveled her chair towards the door. "What?" She called out. After not getting a response for a few seconds, they let out another sigh and got off the chair. "Coming!" They would have rather stayed, but it looks like she had no choice.

Moving out of her room, they headed towards the living room.

As she made their way there, she noticed her brother leaving in the opposite direction. She made sure to keep her distance as she approached her parents. "What's up?"

As if she didn't already know what was about to happen. "It's time for your business training."

This again? She had just done that yesterday. "Can we push this back a few hours?" They had more people to troll in her game. They just couldn't handle her skill.

"You already skipped out on lessons earlier this week." Her mother pointed out. There's no escaping it this time. "Besides, Klaus just finished his."

She didn't like the sound of that. While she didn't want to do any more classes, she also didn't want Klaus to surpass her. "Fine." She rudely stated, walking past them.

Her life had pretty much just been a cycle of training to take over the company. Day in, and day out she'd have to sit herself at a monitor and learn things she couldn't care less about.

Most of the time, she found a way to play games without anyone noticing. Not like the lessons were things they needed. She was already pretty good at what she did.

Sitting down in front of the screen, she was greeted with a group call with some people she didn't really care for. All snobby businessmen that were there to teach her the basics on how to run a company.

Not that she needed anyone to teach her anything. She didn't even offer a greeting as she waited for them to start speaking.

After only a minute of them talking, they had already drowned out their voices, messing around on the computer. Everything had been wiped as expected. No games in sight.

That didn't stop Lorelei, who had already gotten one up and running, all while the guys continued to speak. She paid enough attention to answer any questions they had towards her, but besides that, they were off in their own little world.

This continued on for the next two hours before she was even given the chance to leave. Which meant she could do what she really wanted to do. Without saying goodbye, she left the room, intent on returning to their room.

However, on the way there, they ran into Klaus, who had an annoyed look on his face.

"What?" She didn't have time to deal with whatever problem he was having.

"You're always like this." He was trying so hard to surpass her, but no matter what he did, he wasn't gaining any sort of lead. "And you don't even pay attention…"

This had been an ongoing fight for years, where both were competing for ownership of the company their parents had. Klaus wanted it, while Lorelei hated the idea behind running it. She didn't see the point in it, given she already had everything she wanted. What would she need the extra work for?

The one thing motivating her to get the company? The fact she didn't want Klaus to have it. "Maybe you're just not fit for something like this?" They had a smug look on their face. "So just give up already and let me have it."

"You don't even want it." Her brother pointed out.

True, but she wasn't going to let that stop her. "True, but it'd be worth seeing you fail to get it." If he really wanted it, he'd just need to try harder. Moving past him, they moved over to their room. "Now stop bugging me." She didn't have time for him.

Sitting herself down in her chair, she grew bored of gaming, given she spent the last six hours doing just that. "Let's see…" Switching to a different window, she began browsing the online shops. "What do I want to get myself today?" She wasn't worried about money, given just how much money she seemed to have. Besides, it wasn't her money in the end, so it didn't matter.

Just a few more years, and the entire company would be hers. Then, she'd never have to worry about money ever again.

Vacant Rooms

Now, it's been some time, so you might be wondering where one specific character is. Don't worry, as they haven't died yet. They've mostly been keeping their distance from everyone else. No reason to interact with those losers at the moment. Especially when death was high on the horizon. Anyways Lorelei- Wait? You thought this was going to be about Dae-Hyun? Did you not read the backstory segment? Go fuck yourself.

Now, you may be wondering how Lorelei could survive for so long in just her room, and the question was simple. She brought a bunch of snacks from the kitchen during the first day of the motive.

Which logically leads to the next question: How has she entertained herself?

As someone well versed in technology, she was able to mess around with her watch a bit. Tapping away at it, she had a simple game running on it. "Piece of cake." Oh and she was winning. But that part felt obvious.

As she lazed around in bed, she reached over for the bag of chips she stole from the kitchen. "Thought someone would have been dead by now." The only updates she had been given were from the nighttime announcements, but her team was in first at the moment, so she wasn't too worried with any of it.

Hell, her game was the next one in line, and she knew she could crush May. The girl didn't exactly scream challenge.

"How long are you going to stay there?" A voice called out.

She lowered her watch to see who had invaded her space. Though, she could only really see one person being able to do so. "What do you want, dumbbot?"

Monokawa had left himself in her room. "Well, it's boring seeing someone haul themselves up in their room!"

"But you can't deny it's a good strategy." She didn't feel like listening to him. "Besides, this is just to guarantee my safety at the start."

Still. It made the game boring. "Then I guess I'll just have to do something about that then."

"Hmm?" She looked away from her watch to try and spot where Monokawa had gone. "Where did-?"

They didn't have to look for long, as the sound of an explosion could be heard in the corner of her room. "What the hell!?" She quickly got off their bed. "What are you doing?"

What remained of her stockpile of food was nothing more than ash. Monokawa turned to look at them. "Well, what are you going to do now without all that food?" He shrugged, a bit of contempt in his voice. "Looks like you'll have to go downstairs after all."

Mumbling something under her breath, she approached the door. "I don't think you can afford to keep wasting food like that. Everyone is going to starve at that point." She quickly scanned their bracelet, opening the door.

The otter flew out of the room. "Anyways, I'm going to go get rid of the rest of the food. Have fun!" And while it might have seemed like he'd leave the area, he actually just went across from her room to harass Dae-Hyun instead.

"Ugh…" Whatever. It didn't matter, given her game was going to be in a few hours anyways… She took a few steps before noticing someone else was in the hallway, waiting. "Huh…"

"Oh!" Seira quickly glanced away. "Don't mind me! I'm just waiting for Atlas."

"You and him huh?" That was a weird couple, but the guy probably needed a break in life somewhere. "Didn't think he was your type, but that's none of my concern."

"H-huh? No! That's not it at all!" Letting out a small sigh, she continued to wait at his door. "I just need to talk to him about yesterday…"

What the hell happened yesterday? "What? Did he hit someone?"

"He knocked out Michael." Seira continued her explanation. "And then when we confronted him about it, he seemed offended."

He knocked Michael out? Lol. The hooded figure probably deserved it. "Good for him. Good for him. Well, I won't get in the way of your-"

"Alright!" Dae-Hyun had been kicked out of his room too, standing in the hallway. Despite half of his face being covered by his hair, the anger in his eyes was almost still visible. "What are you two looking at?"

The computer girl rolled her eyes. "I'm leaving. Have fun waiting."

The astrologist turned to look at Dae-Hyun, but he moved over towards the elevator too.

After a few seconds, Monokawa flew out of the talent manager room. "Phew, all this hard work sure is killing me." He looked down at Seira. "What are you standing there for? Watching me? Creep."

"W-what?" How did this become the accusation that needed to be made? "I'm just waiting for Atlas!"

Oh! That made more sense. Still, it disappointed him that someone wasn't stalking him. "You want me to kick him out of his room?"

She didn't even entertain the idea in her head. "Absolutely not!" She wanted to try and catch him in a good mood. That would all guarantee him to be in the worst mood imaginable.

"Wow, you're boring." He really had to go find someone better to talk to. "Off to find someone else!" Maybe he could pester Lorelei and Dae-Hyun some more.

That left Seira alone, waiting in front of Atlas' door. "…"

Cafeteria

What a rare sight this was.

For once, Lorelei and Dae-Hyun had joined the others for breakfast.

Is what I would say if breakfast was still being served. Get fucked, losers.

"Look who finally decided to come and join us." Gigi narrowed her eyes at the two. "I suppose that means I won't have to go try and get you out of your rooms."

Lorelei rolled her eyes. "As if your attempts did anything. Monokawa broke into our rooms and kicked us out."

"Huh?" Laki tilted her head. "He must have found you boring."

Dae-Hyun sat down at the table. "Something like that… Says he didn't like how we were playing the game. Probably wants us to be out there risking our lives." But he didn't want to be near most of these people. Glancing around the room, the two people he would want to talk to weren't even here.

"At least this confirms they are still alive." Sakura felt some reassurance. "That means everyone should be accounted for, right?"

The referee shook her head. "I haven't seen Atlas yet, so we can't be too sure."

"Aww, how cute." Lorelei couldn't help but laugh. "So worried about everyone. What a bore."

"Excuse me?" Gigi narrowed her eyes. "Do you have a problem?"

She did. "Why worry about other people being alive? We need someone to die for the motive to end, unless you're fine with having ten people die instead."

Of course she wasn't fine with that either. She wanted nobody to die. "If something happens, it'll happen tomorrow." There was no way they'd lose all three games today.

"Oh?" The computer girl raised an eyebrow. "Are you sure?" She was going to say more, but the shadow looming over her caused her to take an extra second to think. Leaning her head back, she saw Sakura standing over her. "Intimidation doesn't work on me, soz." She couldn't help but laugh. "Can you believe them, Laki? The truth people sure like to bully others."

"Yeah!" Laki wasn't going to stand for this. "They are just sore losers!"

"That's not it at all." Gigi wasn't sure what the hell Sakura was doing. "Sit down, Sakura. We're civil."

Yeah, but this girl was being a problem. But she also didn't want to cause a scene. "I just feel like they're going to do something."

"And we can't judge them based on what they might do." As much as she wanted to. "If they've done nothing wrong, we just leave it at that."

"Aww, miss referee playing fair." Lorelei had been missing out on some fun. Who knew these people were fun to fuck around with. "How kind of you to be fair to us." There was a slight pause. "Although, I guess you aren't really. I heard Atlas folded Michael last night.."

Laki quickly nodded her head. "He did! Kicked him in the head!"

"Desperate bunch, aren't you?" The computer girl was having a blast, as displayed by her gleeful expression.

These two were a mess, Gigi thought to herself. Not just them, but lump Ian in with them too. "Talking like this is just going to make it all the more satisfying when you lose in the end."

Ah. She'd like to see them try. "Well." Lorelei stood up, having had her fun. "I'm off to go find someone else to pester." She didn't need any games on her watch. Trolling everyone around her was going to be enough. Sure, it brought with it the risk of being killed, but they all seemed to be massive pushovers anyways. "See you in an hour or so." Speaking of which, her opponent was the biggest pushover of all. May.

"I don't like this atmosphere." Sakura shook her head. With each day, it was clear that the motive was slowly getting to more people.

Gigi, on the other hand, didn't let any emotion show on her face, choosing to remain neutral. "It's fine. It's to be expected with our lives on the line." She would go check up on Atlas now, but Seira told her she had it covered, which meant her schedule was pretty free for the most part. Which meant she'd probably just walk around the station like normal. "See you soon."

That left Sakura and Laki alone.

"So." The lucky student spoke up. "You ever beaten someone to a pulp?"

"I'm not having this conversation." No free time event for them!

Kitchen

She would have opted to just have the food that was prepared in the morning, but that was gone by the time they got there.

Which meant Lorelei had to resort to the barbaric act of making her own food. Or better yet, pray someone else was making food and just take from them. In the long run, that would be easier.

And while nobody was there making food, she did, however, find Benoit in the room, pacing around as he drank juice from a cup.

"What's with you, big guy?"

"O-Oh!" He hadn't even heard her enter. Slowly, he put his cup down, glancing away. "Well… I'm not sure if you're… the right person to talk to about this." But that's besides the point. "Where have you been? Nobody had seen you in a while, and you ignored Gigi when she tried to check up on you."

"I don't have to respond to anything she says. I was just relaxing in my room." They placed a hand on her hip. "Now what about that first part? Why wouldn't you be able to talk to me about this? You don't trust me?" Because she certainly didn't trust him.

Quickly, he shook his head. "That's not… what I meant." Here he goes again, making a normal situation worse. "I meant… You are from the other team."

Oh yeah! That made more sense. "Yeah, but we aren't opponents, so it should be fine to talk to me about anything."

Was it really, though? Then again, she didn't really have a reason to be against him. They were both just two people trapped in this game. "Well… I'm not sure what I should do."

Really now? "You… Don't know what you should do?" She raised an eyebrow. She almost wanted to add a comment about how he couldn't really do anything, but she'd hear him out!

"Well… I'm not sure what game… to choose."

They gave him a deadpan look, trying to process what she just heard. "You… Don't know…?" She quickly shook her head. "Are you stupid? What else would you even be able to choose?" She crossed her arms, trying to get into his head. "What have you thought of before?"

Benoit held his arm, looking the other way. "Well… None of the games really suits me…"

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN NONE OF THE GAME SUITS YOU?" Is what she would have said, but they chose a different approach. "You're strong, aren't you?"

"Um… Well, yes. My father said so. I take after him…"

"Then take arm wrestling, duh!" Wait, why was she even helping. "Or are you afraid you'd get beaten?"

That was a choice he had considered, but he raised his sleeve, looking at the scars on his arm. "I'm worried that I might… injure myself by doing that."

"Just… use your other arm?" What was he really worried about?

"Yes… I could, but what if Gemini wants to use his other arm?" To her, it sounded like he was just worrying about the wrong things here.

They moved over to him, shaking their head. "Do you think you stand a chance of beating him at anything else?"

"Well… no." He wasn't especially good at any of the other games, so the only thing he could do was beat him at a game of strength. "So are you saying that it's my only choice?"

"That's exactly what I'm saying." Lorelei placed a hand on her hip. She had a cocky expression. "Now I'm only offering my help because we have such a dominant lead." Well, one point wasn't dominant, but by the end of today, she's expecting to either have five points, or for the motive to be over. "I can offer some help."

While he had never spoken to her before, he hadn't expected her to be so kind to him. "You're really nice… you know?"

"Yeah, yeah." She waved their hand dismissively. "Whatever you say." However, this conversation did get her curious about one thing. "How did you get those scars in the first place?" There seemed to be a lot concentrated on his arm.

"Oh? This?" He showed off the scars again by lifting his sleeve. "Well… It's a long story…" It wasn't really, but he felt like he might take a bit to explain it. "I took an injury from a pane of glass that ended with me in the hospital."

"That's it?" She was hoping he had gotten into a fight with a bear or something. That would have been cooler. "Glass?"

"Um… It's the truth." He wasn't sure why she found it hard to believe. "It fell from the building, and the shattering glass caused several cuts all over my body."

There had to be more to it than that. "Well you're a big boy. You handled it well." Although, given his personality, she knew he probably cried like a baby.

"Well…" He wasn't going to lie. "The pain was unbearable, so I don't think I took it very well…"

Of course. What a pushover. Just like she had said earlier. "It's a pane of glass. How long could you have possibly been in the hospital for?"

"About two months."

"Jesus Christ, dude."

That probably sounded worse than he wanted it to. "B-but it wasn't all lost… Without that, I wouldn't have become the man I am today." Except Lorelei didn't see a man in front of him. "I became a physiotherapist because of that."

They couldn't make the direct connection right away. "What, so you got impaled by glass and then decided to pursue a career you never thought of before?"

"Well…" When she put it like that. "I… It's a long story, like I said." And he didn't feel like saying it right now.

Which was fine, because she really didn't want to hear it. "What a tough life you've lived, I guess." It lacked any sort of care. "Not as comparative to mine. I was forced to work in something I didn't like. I told my parents, but they didn't want to hear it." She feigned victimhood by leaving out crucial details.

"W-what?" That sounded awful. "Why are they forcing you to do that…?"

They rolled their eyes. "They want me to take over the family business, and there's nobody else in the family suitable to take the job." You know, given the only other option was her brother, and he was just awful. "So I was forced to do it."

"Ah… my father would never leave me in that position…" That sounded awful to him. "He's a lumberjack… A former Ultimate, actually. But even he wouldn't force me to take over after him. He's proud of the career choice I made." Though… Now that he thought about it, he wasn't exactly eager about the entire Ultimate thing.

Perfect! Now she didn't have to pretend to be sad for Benoit, and instead, she would receive his pity. Crisis averted. Given that he wasn't making any food, they decided to grab something quick to eat. "Anyways, I have to prepare for my match."

"AH! Good luck…" Although he shouldn't be saying that, given they are on opposite teams. "And thank you for helping me choose."

This is normally the part where the other person also says goodbye.

Unfortunately this is Lorelei and she doesn't do that. Later loser.

The two seemed to have grown closer.

Vacant Room

It was much later than the last couple of days that Atlas woke up. He didn't feel like getting pestered by Gigi, so opted to go with the first batch of people. However, given that Gigi nags him even when he does go, that there was no point anymore. Not to mention that nobody seemed to have a high opinion of him. He'd just get food when everyone else was gone.

When he was certain enough time had passed, he moved his leg against the scanner to open the door. However, he wasn't expecting someone to be waiting for him.

"Atlas." Seira called out, a frown on her face. "We need to talk."

The soccer player stood there, silently. Not because he was thinking of something to say, but because he was waiting for the door to close.

"Are you going to say-" The astrologist began to speak before the door closed in front of her. "H-hey!" She slammed her hand against the door. "I wasn't done talking!"

This is not what he wanted to deal with this morning. He was growing hungry, and waiting anymore might not be the best for him. After a few seconds, he opened the door again ."What?" He said it in a low voice that somehow still radiated anger.

At first, Seira was uncertain how to navigate this conversation, given he was pretty much just a ticking time bomb. "It's about last night."

He waited a few more seconds to try and let the door close, but she saw right through that. So instead, she pushed herself into the door, not giving it the chance. "Can you fuck off?" He didn't feel like getting blood on himself this early into the killing game.

"I just want to talk about last night, alright?" She repeated, trying to be more soft with her voice. "It's nothing bad."

He didn't want to be wasting his time with this. "I know what you're going to say. That I should have held back, or that I shouldn't have been proud of the entire thing right after. And you know what? I don't give a shit."

She knew this would go exactly like his. But she wasn't going to leave without at least trying to talk to him. "I won't get mad, or tell you those things. I just want to know… Why… I guess."

Narrowing his eyes, he glanced the other way. "It doesn't matter why I did it. Who are you? Some kind of therapist?"

No, but she was able to tell a lot about personalities based entirely off their sign. Given he was an Aries, this didn't come completely as a shock. "Yes… Why? Michael clearly wasn't fighting back, so there was no reason…"

Before she could finish her sentence, he already had an answer ready. "Oh? And what is Michael exactly? Because last time I checked, he didn't tell us fuck all? You want me to make a bet on what he is and lose? I wasn't giving him any chances to pull a stunt on me." He didn't feel like standing the entire time, so he moved over to his bed to sit down. It was also seemingly an invitation to keep the conversation going. "Are you saying I should have gone easy on him? If he had a combat talent, I would have just left myself open, and we would have lost another point. Though, I guess you wouldn't mind it being 4-1, now would you? Two games away from being corpses in space."

Seira was struggling finding a place to jump back into the conversation, given Atlas wouldn't stop talking. Just when a perfect moment had found itself, it was quickly stolen away from her.

"Not to mention he had ample time to ask about forfeiting before the match even began. It wasn't rocket science that I'd take martial arts here. What else am I supposed to fucking do? Let me just kick the controller real quickly, or pull a trigger with my toes!" With each passing word, the anger he felt increased tenfold. Even with the door now closed, anyone passing by would be able to hear him.

"Atlas!" Seira finally got a chance to speak up. "Enough!" She wasn't used to having to raise her voice so much. Once she got her breath back, she spoke up again, a softer tone like before. "I get it alright…" He did bring up a few good points, amongst all the things she disagreed with. "But when you won, you didn't have to act like that. We were concerned with him, and you acted like our concern was misplaced…"

As if that's why he was angry. "No, you acted like I had done wrong, when I won us a point. How often do you think someone like me gets to win at anything? I'm a walking handicap. Every win comes with its own set of problems. I won the largest sporting event of the year? We're told we paid off the referees. Became an Ultimate? Stuck on this fucking space ship!" He kicked the wall out of frustration. "Every step forward is two steps back in my life!"

She really needed to calm him down, but she just didn't know how. "I…" She wasn't really good at these types of things. "I don't know what you want me to say…"

He didn't want her to say jack shit! "Just shut up and listen!" Maybe he just wanted someone to be there to vent. However, before he could say anything else, he felt his anger slowly die down. She killed the mood for him. "Whatever, nevermind."

At this point she didn't even want to talk about the initial issue anymore. … "Thank you for winning us a point." She felt like saying anything else would result in him growing more frustrated. And while she wanted him to apologise to Michael, this probably wasn't the best chance for that.

Atlas glanced over at her, remaining silent for a bit. When his eyes drifted away, he finally spoke up ."You're just saying that. Your words are empty." Or at least, he believed they were.

"No… If you didn't win that point yesterday, it's likely we could be dead by the end of the day…" A thought she didn't want to think too deeply about. Even if there was no reason to go that far, they were still locked in a death game against the other team. "However, even if I'm thankful you were able to pull a win for us, I can still dislike how you did it."

"Whatever, I don't need the approval of you, or anyone else." He had never needed it before, so why start now. "You can leave my room now."

This really did go in all the wrong ways. She didn't even get to scold him. So she had pretty much failed her mission here. Then again, that was an Aries for you. "You should come down and eat with the others."

"Why, so they can do what you tried doing? I think I'll save myself the effort."

At this point, she felt like saying anything else would be overstaying her welcome. "Alright…" As she stepped towards the door, she glanced back at him. "Just know that you don't have to stay like this. People are willing to help if you need someone to talk to." From what she has seen from people over the past couple of days, Hae-Won was a perfect example.

Given that she wasn't leaving, he thought he'd speed up the process. Pushing his leg into the scanner, he opened the door. "That's enough. Just leave." His voice was calmer, but it made the warning more apparent than before.

Seira didn't want to be warned again, so she took this one to heart. "See you later." She would have waved, but she found it best to just leave as quickly as possible.

Despite what it may appear, the two seemed to have grown closer.

Ideals Room

Most of the ideals team had gathered up in their room, as the time for the sixth game crept up on them.

"Honestly, I thought she was dead." Laki was looking over at Lorelei, who made her first appearance in front of everyone else since the motive was announced. "Why not just walk around like the rest of us?"

The computer girl rolled her eyes. "And what, wait for one of you to kill me? As if! I don't trust any of you as far as I can throw you."

"Can you even… Throw anything?" Ian raised an eyebrow.

That was besides the point! "I'm just here to win us a point and then I'll be camping in my room again."

"Do you even know what games are available?" Tatiana crossed her arms. "What if the game you want is already taken?"

"Did anyone choose video games?" She didn't really see any of the other five people who went choosing that.

A grin appeared on Gemini's face. "Nope. That one is still up for grabs."

"Then there's no problem." Lorelei knew themselves to be a rather respectable gamer. Alright, respectable might not have been the right word. There was no respect involved with what she did. "May is going to spend most of her time sleeping, so it's a guaranteed point."

"Don't get cocky." Ian shook his head. Only he could be cocky and get away with it. "Edison was cocky last time, and he got crushed."

"That's Edison. I'm just surprised he hasn't been killed yet." The computer girl turned towards the door. "Let's go. I'm ready to kick ass." May was a pushover, so she wouldn't even need to try with this match.

Motive Room

With the choice nor firmly in her head, Lorelei moved over to the table, looking directly at May. "Are you sure you can even win anything?" She decided to open up by being cocky. It was pretty early in the morning, so she figured the academic still wouldn't be fully in it.

Letting out a yawn, she shook her head. "Just choose your game…" She didn't want to have to be doing any type of games this early in the morning, and yet here she was.

Looking down at the choices that were available, she eyed the video game option. "Are you sure you should be having that attitude with me?" Her hand hovered around the video game option. "Back home, I'd play for hours on end. Quickly grew to the top of leaderboards." Mostly because everyone else was just a pushover. "So I'd be ready to crush you like all those other losers."

The academic prodigy wasn't exactly a novice when it came to video games either. "Really now? Then choose it."

That was the thing, she had something else in mind. Scanning the room, Lorelei noticed that most of the usual people were gathered here. Including Benoit, which only made this more fun. "Alright then." Pulling up a chair, she sat down on it. Quickly, she placed her elbow on the table. "Then let's make this nice and simple. I choose arm wrestling."

Hearing that, Benoit stuttered over his own words. "H-huh? Why-?"

Tilting her head to the side, a grin formed on her face. "That's what you get for enlisting my help. Got your hopes up just to pull the rug out from under you." It was the only reason she even gave him a suggestion in the first place. Just so she could choose it in front of him. "And May here seems like a pushover, so I think she'd go down pretty easily. Which leaves you with…" Well, there wasn't really anything, was there? "Nothing."

Why would she do that? Benoit had been somewhat honest with her, and here she was, betraying that trust with him.

As for May, it wasn't what she was hoping for. Anything physical would be sure to cause her some problems. But, she didn't want to waste any more of her time. Sitting down, she placed her elbow on the table.

And one thing became very apparent.

Both girls were very short.

"Hmm…" Nova hummed out. "We might have to make the table smaller." She moved over to the table, adjusting some settings under it. After a few seconds, she was able to fold part of the table, allowing the two girls to actually arm wrestle properly.

After adjusting the table, she stepped back. "Are you two ready?"

Lorelei was pretty confident in being able to win this, but she wasn't stupid to think it was a guarantee. "Yeah, I'm ready."

May seemed pretty out of it, just wanting it to be over with. "Yeah…"

"On your marks! Get set! Go!"

As soon as the game started, Lorelei decided to cheat right off the bat by trying to kick May right under the table. However her foot would connect with something else.

"Really?" Gigi was looking down at her, blocking her leg off with her own. She had one eye closed, and was pointing at the computer girl with her black glove. "You didn't think I'd see that?"

Ooo she's fast. Lorelei just wanted to cheat to be on the safe side, but it seemed like she'd actually have to put effort in this time.

Not that May was in any way actually going to win. Even while the girl was distracted, May wasn't really proving to be a fight.

Slowly by slowly, Lorelei managed to push May's hand down on the table, securing her a win. Quickly, she stood up. "And that's how it's done."

May didn't really seem bothered by her loss, simply standing up and moving over towards the door.

"That makes the total score 4-2 for Ideals right now." Nova explained. "Things aren't looking good for the truth team."

Looking over at the updated score now displayed on the monitor, Benoit's expression changed. "What am I supposed to do now…?" She had given him confidence on what game to choose, before ripping it from him right before his eyes. What a cruel girl.

After the stunt she had just pulled, Lorelei was feeling pretty good about themselves. "Serves him right." They couldn't help but laugh at the misfortune they had caused to Benoit. "What an idiot…"

She had been on her way towards the showers when she spotted something that caught her attention. A group of people heading into the rooms with the security system. "What the…?" Normally, they wouldn't care about this sort of thing… But curiosity got the better of her. Moving over towards the door, she scanned her bracelet.

"Thank you two for coming." Alan had been pacing back and forth in the room, standing in front of two people.

Edison and Laki were both there. The first to speak up was the former. "Did you really need to bring her here? Her set of… skills…" If she had any. "Aren't really suited for this kind of thing."

"Hey! Are you trying to get rid of me!" People have tried in the past, and it never really worked out for them. "I just want to be here to see an explosion."

Alan was going to continue talking, but he noticed Lorelei was standing by the door. "I don't remember inviting you."

"I don't remember this room being reserved." She countered. "I can go wherever the hell I want to go." To make her point, she stepped into the room, letting the door close behind them. "What are you even doing?" She couldn't even begin to imagine what these three braindeads idiots were thinking of.

"Well…" The conspiracy theorist turned towards the locked cabinet. "I was trying to see if we could figure out a way into here."

"Explosions seem like the best idea!" Laki called out proudly. "Now hurry up Edison! You finally get to be useful!"

"Finally?" He seemed ticked off about that. "I'll have you know I've been the most useful person this entire time."

Well that couldn't be true. "Didn't you lose against Gennosuke?"

"Gg- That's because he's a cheater."

Lorelei shrugged. "Still means you lost, loser."

Edison was starting to get ticked off. "You don't know what you are talking about." The liquid inside the flask began to bubble up.

"This is why I don't want you here." Alan shook his head. "If you keep getting in the way, I'll have no choice but to assume you are trying to stop us."

"Geez-" What a bitch. She was just here to see them blow themselves up. "Fine, I'll just stand off in the corner." She moved away, ready to observe.

Edison spent a few seconds looking at her, almost as if to wait if she'd say something else. When no words left their mouth, he shifted his focus towards the cabinet. "Get ready for this…" Shaking his flask, he got ready for his signature move.

"Let me try it!" Before he could do anything, Laki removed the flask from his hand, shaking it vigorously.

Panicking a bit, he reached his hand out. "H-hey! Wait a second-"

Without any hesitation, she got closer to the cabinet, before chucking the mixture right where the lock was.

The room lit up brightly for a second as the two of them flew back from the force of the blast, although Laki seemed to be fine, with Edison hitting his back against the wall.

"Woah!" She called out, excited. "Blowing things up is fun!"

The chemist, on the other hand, shared a different opinion. "Ugh…" He slowly got up, feeling a bit dizzy. "Next time… Don't invite her…"

Alan didn't seem too bothered. In fact, all he did was approach the cabinet to inspect the lock. "Hmm…" Once some of the smoke cleared away, he shook his head. "That didn't seem to do much."

"Pfft-" Lorelei couldn't contain their laughter. "All that work for nothing to happen? You made such a scene of it too."

The conspiracy theorist moved back, humming to himself. "It's a bit weird that it's like this. What's in there to protect?" His focus moved over towards the computer girl. "You're good with technology. Why don't you take a look at it?"

"Why would I even bother?" They raised an eyebrow. "This is your own little project, why would I get in the way of it?"

True, but… "You're stuck on this space station with us, so don't you think you can benefit from what we find?"

"Pfft, as if." The computer girl shook her head mockingly. "Whatever you're doing isn't going to help us in the slightest. Not unless it's a body dropping to end the motive."

"Oh! Oh!" Laki raised her hand. "Should we just make Edison into one?"

"Gah-" Why was she talking about letting him die so casually? "We're already losing the motive, you don't have to kill me!"

That was disappointing to hear. The fact that Lorelei wouldn't help, not the fact that they wanted Edison dead. "The lock is electronic, so I was hoping you'd know how to deactivate it."

Oh, she probably would. But there was no point in her putting in the effort. "Guess you'll just have to figure out another way."

And another way they did. "Oh!" Laki removed a flask from Edison. "Let's just make a bigger explosion!"

"Woah!" Edison tried to stop her, but there was no hope in that.

Thinking it was best to get out of dodge before she was added amongst the corpse, Lorelei made her retreat.

Just in time for both guys to yell at her, with the distant sound of three people hitting the walls. "Idiots…" What were they hoping to accomplish here?

Truth Room

Benoit was pacing back and forth, trying to think long and hard about what to do.

"Calm down." Hae-Won could see his nerves shooting through the roof. "You still have time to decide." Although, she could understand how he was feeling. Lorelei had pulled a dirty move.

After a bit, the man stopped walking, turning to look at her. "My choice was taking… and I'm not sure what else to do." He hadn't seen Gemini much in action, which is why he wanted to do arm wrestling. That was the only chance he would have had to win. "We really need this point…"

"Seems the ideals team plan on playing dirty." Gigi called out. "We don't have to stoop to their level."

"Hmm?" Edison hummed out, remembering something. "Didn't we do it first by taking poker so Ian didn't have to?"

She narrowed her eyes at the chemist. "Do you think I did that of my own accord? You all practically forced me into that decision."

She had him there! "Still, the way it was done this time was dirty."

"No kidding…" The tattoo artist let out a sigh. "She practically got you to choose it, and then stole it away before you could." Got an easy win against May too.

"Let's stop talking about the move Lorelei pulled, and focus on what we could have Benoit do." Seira hadn't been liking the direction the conversation was going. "Benoit, does nothing else work for you?"

"Well…" It's not that the others didn't work, it's just that… "I feel like Gemini would beat me at everything else…" Maybe worrying about what he wanted to do was bad. "What games do you want to do?" Not like there was much point in asking the people here, given Hae-Won was the only person who could answer.

She shrugged. "Doesn't really matter to me. I'm just going to be given what's left. Given how things are going, though, it'll probably be Russian Roulette."

Gigi glanced off to the side. "Laki would be the only person to choose that one on her own accord, but given how vocal she's been about her choice, I doubt that's getting picked anytime soon."

Glancing to the ground, the physiotherapist thought deeply about his choice. Had Dae-Hyun been here, he likely could have made a decision faster, but the talent manager had been no help in that regard. "I think… I think I've made up my mind."

Hae-Won raised an eyebrow. "Are you sure?"

Slowly, he nodded his head. "Yes… I'm sure. I'm ready to participate."

Motive Room

A lot of thought had been put into this. After Benoit had his desired game stolen from him by Lorelei, he needed time to even consider his next option.

Even the time allocated in their private team rooms was barely enough time to think of a counter strategy. And given that his opponent right now was Gemini, things weren't looking good for him. "I choose…" He looked down at the table, and provided the options… What option worked best for him? He felt that question repeat itself multiple times in his head, but to no avail. He said he had found an option, but he was beginning to have seconds thoughts about it.

But maybe his line of thinking was a bit off. Maybe all he needed was to take a different approach altogether. "I…"

He shouldn't be worrying about what option was better for himself. Some of the others worried about what options would be better for others. Which is why Gigi had chosen poker to stop Ian. But these people were all new to him, and he hadn't taken the time to get to know them one on one.

So, instead, a different thought appeared in his mind. What would be the most likely games to want to be played?

Video games seemed pretty high up there, low danger, and everyone liked video games (pending).

As he eliminated video games, he eventually landed on the one game that might be avoided until the end. Which meant the two people who were probably going to play this game were Tatiana and… Hae-Won. The thought of her playing a game like this didn't sit well with him. It was dangerous, so there's no way he could let someone else run the risk.

"I choose…" He wasn't sure about this choice, but deep down, he knew the choice was already made. He reached over to display the game he wanted to choose.

…

"Huh?" Gemini blinked a few times, seeing what was now on the table.

"Russian Roulette…" There was a lot of uncertainty around if there would be an actual bullet, but he couldn't just let it get to the point where Hae-Won risked shooting herself.

"Hey…" She glanced over at him. "What are you doing?'

"U-um… Well…" He couldn't bring himself to admit the real reason he went for it. "Someone has to… And I'd rather it be me than anyone else."

Still, that didn't bode well for her. Quickly, she turned her attention over to Nova. "These aren't loaded, are they?"

Her expression changed to a joyful one. "Of course not. They have been loaded with props. So no need to worry." A sigh of relief from everyone in the room. "Monokawa was the one who loaded it, so you can ask him." Panic.

"I'm not sure how much I trust him…" Seira mumbled out. "Did you not check it yourself?"

She shook her head. "There'd be no reason to check it myself. I trust Monokawa with my life. And as thus, you should also trust him with yours."

"You want us to kill each other." Atlas pointed out. "I'm not trusting you guys with shit."

Gigi moved towards the revolver. "Then let us just verify ourselves."

However, she was stopped by Nova. "There's no reason to do that. Not knowing adds to the intensity of the game. Any participant is free to drop out if they feel their life is in danger. However, doing so would give a point to the other team automatically."

Had he made a bad decision? Benoit looked around the room, and was beginning to have second thoughts. But no… He had chosen this game for a reason, so he was going to keep to this path.

Gemini reached over for the revolver. He waved it around a bit. "Well, it's just a game, right? So nobody is going to die from this?" He said that, knowing he was in a killing game. "I'll go first." He pressed the revolver against his head. CLICK!

Then, he passed it over to Benoit. "Just don't let the nerve get you, and you'll be fine."

Holding onto the revolver tightly, he was beginning to really have several seconds thoughts about it. He scanned the room until his eyes landed on Hae-Won, who just kept watching him. Letting out a sigh, his hand slowly brought the barrel to his head, trembling. CLICK! Safe.

The gun was passed back over to Gemini, who was getting a bit nervous with each passing second. "These really aren't loaded, right?" He waited a few seconds before he pulled the trigger again. CLICK. The escapist was looking a bit pale now. "Why exactly did you choose this?" He would have loved to play some video games or… something.

Taking the revolver from him, Benoit looked at it for a few seconds as he thought of a response. "Because that way nobody else from my team has to…" He would take on the risk himself to protect his team. Pressing the revolver against his head one more time, he hesitated on this bullet pull. If there really was a bullet, it'd be over for him right now. There were only three spots left in the revolver, so his odds weren't looking good, knowing his luck.

And yet… CLICK!

Receiving the revolver back, Gemini thought for a moment. "Are we allowed to spin the chamber?" That'd be the only way to avoid this fifty fifty he found himself in.

Nova shrugged. "It adds an option to the game, so I don't see why not."

Perfect. Gemini proceeded to not do that at all. Pressing the revolver against his skull, he grinned. "Well, if somehow this isn't the bullet, make sure you spin the chamber to keep this game going." It's the only way he knew to throw. Lorelei had won, and he knew Laki was going to win right after. One more day. All they needed was one more day, and he was sure they were going to find a way out of this place.

Taking a deep breath, he pulled the trigger and-

It wasn't a clicking sound, but it also wasn't the sound of a gunshot.

He felt something pop out of the revolver, and press against his skull. When he realised that he wasn't dead, he moved the revolver away to look at what it was.

Protruding from the barrel of the revolver was a small flag that had the word BANG like you'd see in the older cartoons. "Heh, cute." He placed the revolver down on the table. "Looks like you won."

So it wasn't loaded. Benoit found himself letting out a huge sigh of relief. "Sorry for making you play this… I just didn't want my team to have to play this."

"Don't sweat it. They wouldn't load it to kill us." Something he had only been 75% sure about until just now. "You gave your team a fighting chance."

"That's a point for the truth game, making the score 4-3 now. Looks like they aren't out of the fight just yet!" Which meant the motive could see one last day, even if Laki won. "You two fought well."

Now that the game was over, Hae-Won approached Benoit, who seemed really out of it after all of that. "You didn't have to do that."

"H-huh?" He looked at her for a few seconds, before glancing away. "But if it was real… someone from our team could have died…"

The tattoo artist shook her head. "Doesn't mean you had to make it you." Didn't take a genius to realise he did it so she didn't have to. "I would have been fine had I needed to do this game."

"But we didn't know if it was real or not…" The physiotherapist mumbled out. Had he known it would be 100%, he wouldn't have made the decision he did. However, it worked out immensely, because there wasn't much else he could have beat Gemini at.

"Gemini." Hae-Won glanced over at him. "Did you throw?"

The escapist let out a small laugh. "How do you throw a game of chance?" He placed his hands on his hips. "I just got unlucky, that's all."

She knew he was lying. If he didn't want to throw, he would have spun the cylinder. However, she didn't feel the need to pursue the issue further. "If you say so." At least they still had a fighting chance. Still, her game was only three away, and she would need to win it for sure, or else everyone would die with her.

Cafeteria

Pizza time!

Honestly at this point Gemini should find something else to eat, but he couldn't do that when they kept providing him with pizza. Why did they keep doing that? He didn't know.

But that wasn't going to stop him. Nom nom!

Until someone approached him eating at the table alone.

"Gemini." Tatiana was looking down at him. She had a more neutral expression on her face, rather than her confident one.

He stopped eating the pizza mid bite. "Yeah?" He still had food in his mouth, and didn't bother to swallow.

"F-finish your food."

The knife thrower saw an amazing spectacle as the escapist downed the rest of the pizza in an inhumane amount of time.

"H-huh?"

Smiling at her, Gemini spoke up. "Yeah, what do you want?"

Well now she wasn't sure how to start the conversation. "It's about last night." Mostly because she knew she couldn't be going crazy.

"Did something happen last night?" Gemini raised an eyebrow. "I don't remember much."

Was he just messing with her? "Don't try to pull the wool over my eye." Singular. "The elevator makes noises, doesn't it? Why didn't it do it that time?"

"Oh. That's what this is about?" He was expecting something completely different. "I heard it perfectly fine. So did Winter, right?"

That couldn't be it at all. Tatiana crossed her arms, frowning slightly. "Nonsense. I would have heard it. Ever since I lost my eye, my other senses have been raised."

For a while, he wasn't sure if she actually lost an eye or not. "Speaking of which, what happened with that?"

"Oh? It's caught your interest, hasn't it? Well, I'll allow you to take one guess on how it may have ended up like this?"

He didn't have to think very hard. "A knife!"

"Well yes, but—" Shocking that the knife thrower had an incident with the knife.

Feeling proud of himself, Gemini nodded his head. "Was it your own knife?"

"As if. I'm not that foolish to have my own blade cut my eye. The fault lies on someone else." Wait a second. "You're just trying to distract me!" She pointed at him.

With his face stuffed with pizza again, he shrugged. "You don't have proof of that."

So this was what she was dealing with right now. Letting out a small sigh, she shook her head. "No matter, I'd like to get back to the issue at hand here."

Now that he was done eating, he had no excuse to ignore her. "Yes, your hearing. You said it's increased because you lost your eye?"

"Precisely! Even in the darkest of nights, I'm able to navigate around!" She struck a pose. "Not to mention the other ones got a boost too. Food tastes better now."

"And all you had to do was sacrifice an eye? Sign me up."

Twirling her knife around, she looked down. "Offer me your eye, and I'll make it so."

He contemplated it for a few seconds before realising it would probably hurt like hell. "On second thought…" He shook his head.

"Ha! That's what I thought!" She put her knife away, content that she won that mini battle. "While the benefits are nice at times, the downside of my vision growing so poor wasn't worth it. I may only have one eye left, but seeing out of it is pretty hard."

"Is it? I thought you only damaged one eye." Was she blind or something? That didn't bode well for someone who's main talent was throwing knives around.

Pointing to her good eye, she kept going. "I wear a contact on this eye to help me see, but it doesn't bring back my vision to its former glory. But, just enough so I'd be able to see my targets."

Still, that wasn't reassuring. "Are you sure you should still be pursuing a talent like this?"

Was he insulting her skill? "As you may have already been able to bear witness to, I am still ample talented as it is." She twirled her knife around again. "Had I not been, Hope's Peak would not have sent that letter addressed to me."

That's true… "But Hope's Peak is pretty weird when it comes to that recruiting process."

"Oh? And what makes you say that?" She crossed her arms. "Perhaps something happened to you?"

Now she was questioning him again. "No, nothing like that. But I've heard a few things here and there." Which is what he decided to tell her. "I'm just saying they might not always have the best intentions. Or… They know more than they are letting on."

Alright, she might not have been the brightest, but she was understanding something here. "What? Did Hope's Peak find out something about yourself?"

Seriously, how has this entire interaction been him being questioned. "I think you are misunderstanding what I'm saying." Or maybe she was dead on. Who knew? Me.

"Trust me, I rarely miss my mark." Her accuracy was perfect.

"Rarely?" Now it was his turn to attack her. "That implies that you've missed some shots before. Not something I want to hear from the Ultimate Knife Thrower"

"Well!" Her choice of words had painted a bad picture for her. "What about yourself? Ultimate Escapist, and yet you haven't escaped yet!"

Oo! She got him there. "This isn't even the worst place I've been trapped in. It's only a matter of time before I find a way out." There was a long pause before he felt the need to clarify. "A way out that doesn't involve murder, that is."

Tatiana was having a blast going back and forth with this conversation. So much so that she forgot the initial reason she even approached him. "Say… What did this conversation start about again?"

"I have no idea." However, he was a bad liar, so.

The knife thrower narrowed her eyes. "You're trying to hide something, aren't you." And as soon as she figured out what it was, she would go back to it- "Hey wait a minute!" That's right! She remembered. "I remember now! You still never answered my initial question!"

"Oh! Would you look at the time!" Gemini checked the wrong wrist. "I really should be going!"

"Oh no you don't-" But trying to catch the Ultimate Escapist proved more difficult than she had initially thought.

Gemini reached into his pouch, pulling something out. "Smoke bomb!"

The moment it hit the ground, a cloud of smoke appeared around the area, causing the knife thrower to cough a few times. "H-hey!" She looked around for him, but only noticed where he was when the elevator doors dinged open.

As he entered the elevator, a grin grew on his face. "See you later!" He offered her a wave as the doors closed.

"Hey!" She tried to stop it from closing, but she was too late. She watched the elevator go up. "Wow… He really is some kind of escapist." Escaping the hell out of that conversation flawlessly.

The two seemed to have grown closer.

Cafeteria

Given that the next game wasn't till late tonight, Gigi had nothing on her schedule, and although she'd like to keep up with a routine, it was difficult when anything could end up happening. The only routine she had at this point was get up, do a morning meeting, spectate the games going on, eat every time a meal shows up, and then go back to sleep.

It was a nice schedule to keep up with, but others found a hard time following a schedule at all. Which made it infuriating when she found herself to be one of the only people who even bothered to show up for supper tonight. "Seriously?" How hard could it be?

The only other person here was Laki, who was humming to herself as she ate.

"Where's everyone else?" Maybe they were just scared of her or something.

The lucky student looked over at her. "I'm not sure. Maybe they weren't hungry!" She had no care. "Join me!" She pointed at the other end of the table.

Gigi hadn't really interacted with Laki much yet, and she was wary of her, given how she and Ian seemed to get along well. "Very well." But she had no reason to turn down the invitation. Might as well use this opportunity to glean some information. "You and Ian seem to get along." She wasn't going to waste any time.
"Oh!" Well she could spare some time to talk about him. "Yeah! He's the greatest!"

They must have had differentiating definitions of greatest. "How so?"

She didn't need to think much about this. "He's down for anything! And he's really smart. Have you seen how he's played the motive so far?"

She was very familiar, yes. "He has screwed us over a bit, so yes. I'm familiar."

"He's the smartest person I know!" Edison in shambles. "And he seems to want to have fun here."

Fun. In a killing game? "You do know what the nature of this game is, don't you?"

"Yeah!" No thoughts behind those eyes. "What about it?"

She was going to be a difficult case, wouldn't she? "This is not the sort of game you should be happy to participate in."

What? A game you couldn't have fun with? That made zero sense to her. "But then they wouldn't call it a game." GIRL? "Besides, Ian seems to be having fun. Look at the motive we were given. It's just more games!"

The referee let out a small sigh. She knew if she didn't try and fix this now, the two of them would end up being problems in the future. However, given the way things were going, she didn't seem like the best fit for the job. "Is there anyone else you find interesting?" Maybe she could have her move away from Ian.

Thinking for a moment, Laki shook her head. "Not really! Alan seems fun, though. He let me blow things up."

I… "What do you mean?" That was the first time she had heard of that. Alan seemed a bit out there, but for him to start trying to blow things up. "What did he want to blow up?"

"The cabinet in the camera room! He says there's some secrets in there, so I stole some of Edison's potions, and threw them at it."

Oh great, and now Edison had the capacity to make improvised explosives. This group really was a mess. It was starting to give her a headache, so she was going to move back to just talking about Laki. "Still, even if this is a game, you shouldn't be enjoying it like you do."

"Why not? You seem to be enjoying it too."

"W-what?" She had not. What the hell was she talking about? "Please elaborate, and give me one example of when I was enjoying it."

"It's your talent, isn't it?" The lucky student pointed out. "You referee games, and you seem to obsess over the rules. You even went over to ask Nova about the motive!"

True, she did show some interest in that. And she couldn't lie when she said she enjoyed watching the games play out, because it let her live out her talent. "However, that's different." She tried to defend herself. "I am not enjoying this death game besides that. The idea that we have to kill each other is absurd, and it would be best to ignore that aspect entirely."

"But…" Laki hummed out in thought, moving her head from side to side. "At the end of the motive, one team dies, don't they?"

For now, that seemed unavoidable. "Yes, based on what Nova said, that was the case. However, notice that they weren't added to the official rules. Only a side section." She was always one to follow rules, but she prayed that these ones were different. "I don't see how killing off half of us would make the game better for them, so it clearly must just be to force our hand."

"You think so?" The lucky student tilted her head to the side. "Do you want to take the risk?"

She was… less inclined to take the risk, but she didn't want to get any blood on her hands. "There's no way to know for certain until the motive is over." And thankfully, that wouldn't happen until tomorrow, given Benoit had gotten lucky against Gemini. Any other outcome, and Laki would have gotten them the final point.

"Aren't you excited to find out who wins tomorrow?" Laki asked with a gleeful look in her eyes. "We've been playing this game for a few days, so it seems long overdue for a winner."

Truthfully, she'd want to hold off a bit longer, but. "I fear no matter what team wins, we're going to be discovering something by the end of the day tomorrow."

That was an exciting thought. "At that point, you just have to make sure it's not you we're discovering!"

Just what was wrong with this girl. "You can't tell me you're excited to find a body."

"Why not? I haven't seen one before, so it'd be something new." Laki had such a nonchalant voice when she said this. "Have you ever seen one?"

"Unfortunately, I have." Wouldn't be the first time she had seen something go wrong in her life. "And I'll have you know, it never gets easier."

That just meant Gigi had to be weak! "We'll see about that."

Letting out a sigh, the referee found herself thinking of Laki in a worse light than before. Seems that any help she had for the girl was going to be pointless. "Just don't do anything stupid." It just meant she had to keep an eye out for this lucky student. From the looks of it, she didn't seem to feel any sort of negativity. No fear, no sorrow. Everything to her was just a game.

And someone like that could be taken advantage of by Ian. "And stay away from Ian. He's not going to do you any good."

Alright, now Laki thought she was crazy. "I can't just ignore him like that." They were friends! Or… something. Hard to tell! "He's my bestie here!"

It's as she feared. Already a lost case. Narrowing her eyes, Gigi shook her head. "You'll see in the end."

The lucky student wasn't getting the warning, but that didn't matter. "My game is going to be soon, so I should get ready for it!"

Watching Laki leave, Gigi couldn't help but frown.

Seems the two grew closer.

Ultimate Talent Manager Station

She knew she wasn't crazy. She had seen him walking towards here. "Dae-Hyun." Melody greeted, as soon as she entered the room.

The talent manager had arrived back at their Ultimate Station. He was currently sitting down at the desk, mouse in hand. He mumbled something under his breath, seeing that she had followed him. "What do you want?" He glanced away. Of note, the room was in a different state now, being the stage with the microphone in the center. "I'm busy."

It didn't seem that way to her. "Aww, don't tell me you don't have time for me." Especially since she had been wanting to have a conversation with him for a while. She wanted to make sure he was doing alright. "Why did you run off like that the other day?"

Exactly what he didn't want to hear. Had it not been for Monokawa kicking him out of his room, he would have stayed there until he was needed tomorrow. "Why does it matter to you? It has nothing to do with you."

"That may be true, but I'm worried." She approached the desk, looking down at him. "I can't just leave someone like that alone."

Dae-Hyun glanced up at her, remaining silent for the time being.

Given that he wasn't responding, she decided to continue the conversation. "Who are the names?"

"Students." If he just offered the answer, she would probably leave quicker. Besides, he found it difficult to ignore her.

That caught her interest. "They are all people you have managed? Why, they must be great thanks to you!"

"... I merely improved what they already had. All of their talent is their own. I'm not a miracle worker." He couldn't make something out of nothing, after all.

She frowned slightly. He wasn't giving himself any credit. "Can you tell me what they were like?"

"…" His attention was focused on the screen in front of him. After a few seconds, he let out a sigh. "All of them were bright kids. They all had talent, but didn't know what to do with it. The industry is a difficult place for people if they don't have a way in. All I was was a way into that industry. Once their foot was in the door, the rest was history."

She felt like there was more to it than that. "You can't be saying ya didn't help at all. Do you think they would have reached stardom without you?"

"Eventually." He was just there to speed up the process. He hovered the mouse over one of the options, before shifting the room towards the makeup room. "But I didn't magically give them the talent they had. The talent was always there."

Every time the room shifted, she was always amazed at how quickly it was. Though, she could have sworn she saw something beyond the walls as it shifted. "But did you only have four students?" She had seen the program before, and only four names were available.

"Those are the only people who were worth my time." Nobody else could even compare. "I don't waste my time on people with no hope." Which meant his success rate was 100%. "I can see talent from a mile away."

Was that the case? "Then what do you think when you see me?" She knew she was pretty talented.

Looking at her a bit longer, he glanced away. "Had we met under different circumstances, maybe I would have made you a student." Truth be told, he had noticed her amongst the group of people. She stood out above the rest. Sure, he had never dealt with a dancing related talent, but her personality spoke volumes compared to the others.

"Really?" She hadn't expected that from him. "How so?"

"You just have that personality to you, I guess." That was his best explanation. "You're different from the others, that's for sure." The only other person who was comparable was Tatiana, but she already had a stage presence, so there wasn't much he could do to help her.

For once, his rough personality had been put on hold. "How often do you show off your talent?"

"Ah, well." She had to think about it. "I'm almost always dancing, so anyone who knows me knows how good I am."

So, she hadn't really gotten to the point of being famous. Sure, she was an ultimate, but. "Have you ever appeared on TV?"

That caught her off guard. "No. Why? Was I supposed to?"

That made it so she still had some room to grow. "That's what I'm good at. Getting people recognition. Getting people deals." The likes. Taking someone who could only sing on the street for money, to having them become an idol known the world over.

Melody quickly shook her head. "Ah shucks, I appreciate that, but I'm not looking to be a deb of some grande stage. I already have my goals set in life."

Was that so? "And what goals would those happen to be?"

"Well…" It felt embarrassing to say them. "I have my own place to run right now."

He wasn't surprised to hear that. She was an Ultimate after all. "And what place would that be?"

"I've got an old speakeasy that I repurposed into a dance studio!" There was a lot of glee in her voice. Hell, she seemed to be restless as she spoke about it, given she kept dancing around the room.

Dae-Hyun watched her for a bit before glancing away. "But is that all there is to life? Are you content with something as small as that?"

"Small?" She didn't like the sound of that. "I'll have you know it's more than just a small dance studio." Alright, size wise, it was small, but that meant nothing. "It's big in the hearts of the folks who attend." She offered him a hand. "Have you ever been to a dance studio?"

Those types of things didn't interest him. He shook his head. "Never have, and more than likely never will."

"Aw, that's just a shame. Though you don't seem like much of a live wire."

He wasn't a wire at all, so that was a fair assessment. "Maybe in the future I'd be willing to have a dance. But not here." His focus had moved back over to the screen at hand. The mouse hovered over the last option, as if it was calling to him. But he wasn't going to check it out with someone else here.

"Oh!" Melody glanced down at her actual watch. "Would you look at the time! We're going to be late!"

Late? "For what?" He hadn't had any plans, so it was impossible to be late.

"For the final game of the night!" She hadn't realised just how late it had gotten. "Come on, let's go." She reached over to him, grabbing his arm.

"H-hey!" He didn't really have the strength to fight back, so he was dragged away from the desk. "I left…" He didn't bother finishing his sentence as he looked at the desk before the door closed.

The two seemed to have grown closer.

Motive Room

There was no need to even enter the ideals room. Laki saw no point in doing so as she remained on the other side of the table, waiting for her opponent.

Nova checked her watch, tapping away. "He's going to be late." The only thing she and Monokawa had in common was the fact that they were both very punctual. That's how their they were able to work as business partners.

Soon, the door opened up, and Alan stepped in. "Sorry I was late." He had a few pencil markings on his hands. "I was finishing up some notes I was taking." His hair seemed to be a mess, and it was obvious he might have been at it for hours.

Looking at Laki, his expression grew a bit more uneasy. He had completely forgotten that she was going to be his opponent today. "Damn…" If only it had been literally anyone else, then maybe he would have had some sort of chance.

As he approached the table, he eyed the score on the monitor. 4-3 wasn't ideal for him, but it meant even if he lost this round, the entire motive wouldn't be lost tonight. "I'm ready… Just lay it on me."

Laki had finally made her choice! Like… Two days ago when she first heard of it. "Show me what Zappy Zapis!"

Not showing the slightest hint of surprise, Nova pressed a button on the table. "Very well. Though I admit, this game is amongst the most dangerous."

"Dangerous?" That didn't bode well for Alan. Especially given who his opponent was. "What kind of danger are we talking about?"

"Painful ones." The table revealed the tools for this game. Tasers.

"H-huh" The conspiracy theorist took a step back. "Are you insane!?"

"Officially, no." Nova moved to the back of the room.

In an instance, Laki had already grabbed one of them. "Oh? What are we doing with this?" She turned it on, seeing the electricity jump from one end to the other. Slowly, she approached her finger until she felt a jolt, causing her to nearly drop it.

"The goal of this game is simple. Just zap your opponent and you wi-"

Alan had to duck right away as Laki lunged for him. "Woah! Woah! The game hasn't even started yet!"

"Start!"

Now he had no excuses. He ducked behind the table. "Are we forced to stay in this room?"

"Hmm…" Nova hummed out for a moment. "No. I think it'll be more entertaining if you have the entire facility at your disposal." She tapped away at the screen on her arm to load up the cameras. "You can leave."

Perfect! That's all he needed to hear. He bolted towards the door, scanning his bracelet. He almost had no time to leave before Laki showed up.

"Hey! Get back here!" She called out, running after him.

"Someone should…" Gemini trailed off before realising that person should probably be him. He sprinted after the two participants.

There weren't many places Alan could go to hide, given that Laki would just see him go there and follow him. So, instead, he knew he needed to create some distance between the two.

And the only way he knew how to do that was with the elevator. Slamming his hand on the button, he entered the elevator the first chance he got.

Laki tried to reach him, but the door closed on her before she could reach him. "Hey! That's cheating!"

Gemini had finally managed to catch up. "The rules were that he could go anywhere he wanted, so I don't think it counts as cheating." He went to reach over for the button, but realised that would be interference, so he stopped himself.

Cafeteria

Once the doors opened, Alan quickly got out. "Alright, what would be the best place to hide?" He knew he couldn't hide forever, but he at least wanted to get the jump on her. That would be the only chance he had at winning.

Running his mind through all the possibilities, he eventually landed on one that worked out. "That's right… I can go there." Quickly, as the elevator began to rise up, he made his way over to Tau Sector. He was going to put his plan in motion.

About thirty seconds later, the elevator would finally descend, letting Laki and Gemini access the first floor. "You're going to help me, right?" She looked expectantly at him. Before stepping out, she pressed one of the buttons on the elevator.

The escapist shook his head, a grin on his face. "I'm only here to be an observer." And to make sure nobody got injured. Or… Well… More injured than they would already be. "You're on your own."

That just meant that the win would be only hers. Now, she wasn't someone like Ian, so she wasn't the brightest mind out there, but she knew the best place to check right now was the kitchen. She knew if she didn't check the kitchen first, he would escape when she went to Tau Sector.

"FBI! OPEN UP!" She called out as the door to the kitchen opened. However, upon scanning the area, she didn't find him there. Quickly, she looked back at the cafeteria, but saw no movement. "Not here."

All while Gemini waited patiently by the table. He had an idea on where Alan might have gone, but he wasn't going to say anything. "Are you done there?"

She stepped away from the kitchen, eyeing the door to Tau Sector. "Yep! Come on!" She ran over towards the door, scanning her bracelet.

As they travelled down the hallway, she seemed to have no interest in the other rooms. In fact, she passed right by the Ultimate Talent Manager Station, heading all the way to the back of the hallway.

"Where are you going exactly?" He didn't think she would come to the same conclusion as him, so he was curious.

"It's easy! If I were playing hide and seek with a guy, where would I hide?" Upon reaching the end of the hallway, she turned in the direction of the showers. Her focus was on the leftmost door, leading to the guy's side. "Bingo…" Although, she didn't have any normal means to open the door.

However, Laki wasn't normal in any definition of the word. Pulling an Ian, she grabbed Gemini's arm.

"H-hey!" He didn't have much time to react as he felt his arm pulled towards the scanner.

"Thank you!" She called out as she ran in.

"A-ah!" Alan hadn't expected Laki to walk in on him. "How did you-" He was planning an ambush on her, so to have it all ruined.

"My friend helped me out!" She pointed over towards Gemini, who was rubbing his wrist.

They were conspiring against him? "Outside help isn't allowed!" Not like Gigi was here to stop any cheating. His grip on the taser tightened, causing it to shake along with his hand.

Gemini let out a sigh. "I didn't want to help. She pushed my arm into it."

This left Alan trying to figure out the best way possible to escape with his life. "Huh…" He eyed the showers, trying to think of anything.

Meanwhile, Laki didn't seem to have any urgency. She kept humming to herself as she slowly approached him. "Zap zap!" She called out, letting the taser zap the air.

Taking this chance, Alan moved past her as she tried to thrust the taser into his sides. Luckily, from his years of running, he was able to worm his way out of losing. Opening the door, he sprinted out.

Although, with the way things were going, he was running out of time he had to escape her. The gap was closing slowly by slowly, and there was too much ground to cover if he wanted to get back to the elevator before she reached him.

"Are you having fun?" Laki called out, letting the taser zap the air again.

"Huh! Not really!" He would have fun doing literally anything else.

Entering into the cafeteria, he found salvation right in front of him. The elevator!

And he reached it before Laki had a chance to catch him! Alright-

The doors didn't open. "H-huh?"

For some reason, someone had called the elevator up, so it was taking some time to get back down. Ah shi- He didn't have time to move out of the way before he felt a rather painful jolt through his sides, sending him falling to the ground.

"Got you!" Like a predator hunting prey. One zap was exhilarating. How would another one feel? She went in for another one, before being stopped.

Gemini was struggling to stop her arm, given she was stronger than him, but he managed to keep her from zapping him again. "Hey!" He called out. "You won already."

"But it's so much fun!" She didn't really seem to care. Even so, she stopped trying to zap Alan.

After a few seconds, Nova slowly descended from the upper portion of the cafeteria. "That would be a win for the ideals team." She knew the outcome, but she was still impressed by how many points they had gathered over the other team. "Congrats on your-"

ZAP!

One last shock into Alan for good measure!

"O-ow! She's crazy!" He tried to kick her away, but missed by a mile.

Letting out a sigh, Nova extended her arm out. "Return it at once."

Now, Laki wasn't one to follow rules. To the point where she was even tempted to see how Nova would react to it.

However, given that was a poor decision, she should consider herself lucky that Gemini managed to pry it out of her hands. "That's enough of that. We're already winning. No need to cripple the opponent."

"I can't feel my left side…" Alan mumbled out.

"You'll be fine." The escapist handed over the taser to Nova.

Alan slowly got up onto his feet, putting his hands in his pockets. "Never… again…" He should count himself lucky he never tried to pry the truth from someone who had tasers. This was not a lovely experience for him. And now he would need to report to his team that he lost the game.

The four of them slowly made their way back to the motive room, where both teams were waiting expectantly.

However, upon seeing their expressions, Gigi let out a sigh. "Let me guess, you didn't stand a chance?"

Alan shook his head. "There wasn't much I could do against her. She was a monster. Even if I had an opportunity to get her, I feel like it wouldn't have worked."

Meanwhile, Laki had a more uplifting attitude. "One more point!" She called out.

The referee couldn't fault him, given how unlucky he had gotten with his opponent. "We'll need to win three games in a row." Which was a grim reminder at how screwed they were. Although the ideals had managed to win three games in a row before, so it wasn't completely out of the question. "We should get some rest." She took a look at her watch. It was almost nighttime, so she saw no reason in being up anymore.

"Tomorrow is my game!" Tatiana declared, with some joy in her voice. "Dae-Hyun, make sure not to lose so I may steal the win for my entire team!"

"Yeah… whatever…" The talent manager said. He had only joined up here because Melody had practically dragged him here. And if he was free to go now, that's exactly what he would do. "Goodnight…" He waved off to everyone.

The knife thrower waved as he left. "Watching this game has left me hungry."

"Watch…?" Alan shook his head. "But we were running around on the bottom floor. You couldn't have seen anything."

"That's what you'd think!" She declared, pointing over towards Nova. "But she allowed us to view the game!"

"I did not." The overseer shook her head. "But Tatiana here was hell bent on getting into my personal bubble to see what was going on."

"Your fault for not stopping me." She let out a small laugh before walking over towards the door. "See you all tomorrow."

One by one, everyone would leave the motive room, leaving Ian alone. Even Nova had left by this point.

He had a neutral expression on his face, looking at the scoreboard. The odds of reaching the tiebreaker were pretty low. Even then, no matter what happened, someone was going to wind up dead tomorrow. "I wonder how they'd feel about changing things up a bit." He hummed to himself before turning around.
The hallways were empty as he travelled towards the vacant room. Seems everyone had already set themselves up for bed, or gone to the first floor.

As nighttime slowly began to creep up, the voice of Monokawa could be heard across the station. "It is now nighttime, which means some facilities won't be active. Please keep this in mind before venturing anywhere you shouldn't. At the moment, the score stands at 5-3. Tomorrow is the last day of the motive, so you better pray your team wins, or that a body is found for your sake."

One last day for this motive? He'd make sure it was a day to remember.

When he finally entered his room, the station slowly fell to silence.

Hey what up guys! Otterplay here, bringing you another mediocre chapter of Algorithmic Alteration! Now thankfully I got this one out in less than a week after the last one. Lord knows I needed to do that for my own sanity. But that means we are one step closer to the body being dropped. Probably.

I want the next part to be ready by May 15th. Which is… Admittedly close. As in two days. But two days is enough for me! Especially since it's so close to being finished already. And I'm off on the 15th, so I'm going to enter hyper writing mode. Either way, I have to get this done in time for Omakin's birthday!

No shoutouts this time, given I haven't read any new parts yet, and nobody else has any SYOC's started. But don't you worry Gold, I'll read soon! … As soon as I'm not spending all my time working, sleeping, and writing. Which could take a while! But I want to see who died. I swear to god if you killed my beloved Alina we're going to need to have a talk-

Besides that, there's nothing else I want to mention. Since the body is showing up soon, you all better start praying your character makes it out alive. Who knows who could end up dropping…

Participants Remaining: 20

Edison Thompton - The Ultimate Chemist [SilverMark16]

Benoit Chevalier - The Ultimate Physiotherapist [Epifanio Therion]

Seira Natsume - The Ultimate Astrologist [WolfieRed23]

Winter Hibiscus - The Ultimate Love Guru [Grandma Sue]

Giustina "Gigi" Giulio - The Ultimate Referee [Nekoja]

Gemini Strela - The Ultimate Escapist [secretnobody]

Benjamin Mason - The Ultimate Ventriloquist [NSPunny]

Alan Buteaux - The Ultimate Conspiracy Theorist [zendroxp]

Lorelei Kaiser - The Ultimate Computer Security Specialist [CandleFire45]

Michael ? - The Ultimate ? [Omakin]

Melody Eleanor Hopkins - The Ultimate Tap Dancer [Prince PokePersona]

Kim Dae-Hyun - The Ultimate Talent Manager [oddlyillregular]

Lakshmi "Laki" Krishna - The Ultimate Lucky Student [Sempi]

May Summers - The Ultimate Academic Prodigy [KadachiNova]

Ian Santiago - The Ultimate Gambler [Animeboy15]

Tatiana Novak - The Ultimate Knife Thrower [ExtraMeme]

Atlas Constande - The Ultimate Soccer Player [ComplicatedYetSimple]

Gennosuke Yagami - The Ultimate Psychic [theotakureader101]

Kim Hae-Won - The Ultimate Tattoo Artist [Weekaro]

Sakura Gambino - The Ultimate Security Guard [PROJECT DRAMA]