Chapter 9 - 九

Kyas has a solid body in Kyas' Magic Castle. Her soul just came back from the dream and she needs to adapt.

Her manner has become a ruin.

She wakes up but doesn't care about her manner. She has got the mysterious sacred magic books!

She lets Ro and Feather go considering that they only made her two meals and throws them out of her game.

They pass Kyas' Magic Castle.

Kyas is still lost in the colorful pictures in the books.

The reverse side of the ticket becomes 7/10.

The Abyss Amusement Park is still dark with a breeze, blood moon and no stars.

Half of the night has passed. They need to speed up.

Ro and Feather pass Room Escape, the Aquatic Games, Zombie Hospital, etc…..

They now stand in front of a mirror maze.

The wooden sign says, "Mirror Maze: There is a YOU in every mirror and one of them isa ghost. Break the haunted mirror and you can pass."

"A friendly tip: You will die if you break yourself."

"Difficulty: 5 star."

'Are we going to play this game?' Feather points at the sign.

'Do you want to?' Ro has changed back to his clown costume and doubts her.

'No!' Feather shakes her head.

Supernatural incidents get scarier when there are mirrors involved.

'Then we shall go play other games first.'

Mr. Clown finally takes her thought in!

Yet, Feather didn't catch the meaning behind his words.

"Doll Catcher Machine: Don't get caught!"

"Difficulty: 4 star."

They arrive at a doll catcher machine. The clean glass windows reflect Ro's and Feather's shape.

Unlike other doll catcher machines in the living world, this machine has peashooters, sunflowers, potato mines, etc... It is a funny doll catcher machine.

Feather is looking for coins in her pockets.

Then, she sees that Ro just punches the switch on the machine.

They are sucked into the machine.

This is a cuboid space. Its wall looks like a sort of silver color metal, firm and smooth.

A hole is at the top of the space and the ground is paved and covered with black soil, soft and moist.

A spider mob crawls out from the hole. It has eight legs and thick leg hair. No one would want to be poked by the leg hair.

A human face grows on its belly. The mouth opens wide and spins cobwebs. It is sliding down.

Feather's hair stands on end.

Sometimes, insects can cause more fear than unknown ghosts, especially like those extraordinary large spiders.

If it was a pretty spider with a smooth surface, it might look nice, but it is covered by a colored pattern which tells of its poisons. It has a much more complex pattern than ordinary spiders, it has a visual effect of causing dizziness. Its long leg hair is like a bayonet ready to charge any prey in front of it. What is more disgusting is the human facing spinning the cobweb while it is vomiting.

Its saliva is greenish yellow and stinking. Feather wouldn't even look at it if it wasn't there.

'Sir, what do we do?' She trembles as the spider approaches.

In fact, she has always been trembling when she is in the amusement park except for some occasions.

At this moment, neither breaking the cobweb nor standing still is a good choice.

"Shoot ten peas a minute at the spider and it will be slowed."

A familiar boom rises.

Feather finds herself no longerin her human form.

She has been changed into an ordinary green Peashooter.

However, her companion Ro has become a Gatling Pea with a green helmet.

Feather for the first time in her life has realized the class difference and feels mixed emotions.

Ro rattles and shoots at the spider without missing one pea.

Feather admires.

The spider's body has taken in an uncountable amount of peas and finally explodes in the air. Greenish yellow mucus is everywhere and something drops on the ground.

Feather wants to vomit and drop the peas in her body, but she swallows it when it is at her throat.

I cannot waste my peas.

Another spider crawls out and Ro kills it with peas again.

Feather adores him.

'They drop seeds. Go collect them and plant the seeds.'

Ro points at the spider corpses.

'Yes sir!'

Feather picks up a shovel nearby and digs holes, planting the seeds and covering it with the soil.

Although the spiders are disgusting, the seeds are clean and fresh like a giant broad bean.

Every time another spider crawls out, Ro rattles and kills it with a few peas.

Feather keeps digging and planting one after another.

Her hands are sore but she knows that she is bad at targeting and cannot reach the swinging spider. She is only capable of doing plain manual labor such as digging holes.

The seeds grow quickly after absorbing the corpses. They soon become Fume-shrooms of meters tall, slowly spiting at the spiders.

Fume-shrooms have spread across the soil and Ro doesn't have to deal with the spiders now. The spiders are killed even before they crawl out.

'Sir, are we safe now?'

Feather leans on a Fume-shroom and enjoys her precious free time.

'The game just begins.'

Feather hears this and is too excited to stay conscious.

Ro checks her and concludes that she is too tired to stay awake.

Ro takes her job and begins to plant Fume-shrooms.

The bgm has been changed. The next wave is coming.

Feather is sleeping like a snoring pig in a place full of spider corpses. Ro drags her body to a more hidden place so that she won't get her brain sucked empty by a spider when he is not paying attention.

The spiders might be disappointed if they opened her brain.

The second wave has iron bodywear so that Ro needs to double the time of shooting to kill one spider.

Although shooting peas is like spiting saliva, doing this for a long time is tiresome.

Another two players fall from the air.

'Dude, how do we play this game?'

A fat Tall-Nut asks.

A Snow Pea tries to shoot at the spider and successfully freezes them.

'Partner together.' Ro and the Snow Pea look at each other and come to an agreement.

They both ignore the useless Tall-Nut for now.

Tall-Nut has his own pride as well. He hides under a Fume-Shroom and observes how the Peas fight.

This wave is harder than the previous wave. It took them nearly two hours to finish all the spiders.

'Isn't this a doll catcher machine?' A calm female voice comes from the Snow Pea.

'I know right? ...' Feather wakes up with her shovel in her arms. She is stunned at how many seeds there are on the ground.

'We shall react according to the situation.'

Ro takes away the shovel and puts it in Tall-Nut's hands.

'You dig. She places seeds.'

'Sure man.' Tall-Nut accepts without a second thought and begins to dig right away. Speaking of his voice, he might be a gentle middle-aged man.

'I am sorry, sir. I slept too long.'

'You are fine. Get to work now.' Ro asks Feather to help.

Feather follows his order and picks up seeds as she jumps to the holes dug by the Tall-Nut.

Neither of them has legs. They jump if they want to move.

If the Tall-Nut wishes to move faster, he could choose to roll.

'I am Nakata. I have passed five games. In real life, I am just an ordinary salary man.'

'I am Ice Gu, a policewoman. I have passed six games.'

'If I could go back alive, I would tell my daughter...' The Tall-Nut's speaking is stopped by Ro.

'Meaningless.' Ro looks indifferent.

Another three players are upset after Ro's words.

'Usually a talk before a war like this will be a flag and leads to an ace of the enemies.' Ro explains.

'Sir, are we going to make it?' Feather looks at Ro with hope.

'Yes, we will.'

New bgm comes.

The seeds have grown into Chompers. Their mouths filled with pointed teeth, ready for the armed spiders.

After being life-threatened by the roses in Kyas' Magic Castle, Feather feels secure when she sees these plants here.

Yet, her job now is to place seeds in the holes dug by the Tall-Nut. She cannot spare her attention.

New spawned spiders have armed legs as well. They will protect their belly with the legs if there is a pea coming at them. There are only two shooters and the players don't have enough attack against the spiders.

The Chompers move. They swallow the spiders. Some swallow more and advance to their next stage, each has two heads.

They finally pass this wave.

A few Fume-Shrooms are eaten by the spiders. Holes are left in the ground, suitable for new seeds.

'I am so burned up...' Ms. Snow Pea lies on the ground.

'Sir, can I help shooting as well?'

Feather thinks herself as useless as a Pea shooter.

'Yes.'

The progress bar is only at 33%.

This time, the new seeds become Sunflowers. They spit sunlight out and do damage to the spiders and dazzle the eyes.

'Sir, I am going to upgrade soon.'

Feather absorbs some sunlight and becomes a Repeater.

"Sunlight can upgrade us!"

Everyone is energized by the Sunflowers.

The next is Ro. He becomes a Regatling Pea.

The Snow Pea gives up to not upgrade because if she did, she would lose the slowing ability.

The Tall-Nut becomes a very fat Tall-Nut.

"You guys are the greatest players I have ever had! Congratulation I will send you a limited edition spider! Fighting!"

A numb electric comment comes from the doll catcher machine along with a new bgm.

Pink spiders whose size is two times bigger than the spiders in the previous wave crawl out. There is even a large pink bowknot on their back, but the savage roaring from them makes it hard for players to associate it with pink.

They spin pink laced-cobwebs and slide down slowly.

They have a mouth on the back and a mouth on the front and they can spin cobwebs from both directions. After their lower cobweb have reached the ground, they speed up the sliding.

Ro breaks their lower cobwebs by shooting but the Snow Pea misses and breaks an upper cobweb. It falls on the ground.

Falling doesn't hurt the spider because the spider is armed. Instead, it rushes straight toward Feather.

'I am sorry!' The Snow Pea seems to be guilty. Ro didn't respond and just shoots at the spider, but more spiders have had their lower cobwebs on the ground which forces Ro to let go of that spider on the ground.

Feather still has the purple crystal necklace that Ro gave to her at the beginning. She should survive.

'Sir! Leave me alone!'

Feather has been trying her best to jump faster, but she has no legsand the spider is catching up.

If Ro didn't go back to shooting the cobwebs and slow down the swinging spiders, more spiders would have landed and all would be worse. She cannot drag the whole team down.

Feather uses all her strength to shoot at that pink spider.

The pink spider is slowing down but the distance between it and Feather is shortening.

All other plants in its way have been grinded.

The sunlight from Sunflowers erodes holes in the spider. They help a lot.

As soon as the spider sees a sunflower, it will grind it to pieces. Sunflowers slow down the spiders greatly.