I was pumped up to confirm my speculations. It was urgently required to ascertain whether my inference with respect to this game was correct. "In order to find out about the condition required for a successful conquest, there's no other choice but to look for it by trying out several things. It's not like I'm having inappropriate ideas or anything." While making excuses to myself, I gulped down saliva as I realized the immoral nature of the method I'd chosen to adopt for the conquest.
Soon I prepared myself to carry out the plan and ran toward her place. Despite knowing it very well that I was committing a crime by trying something like that, the feeling of fantasy brought about by the "items" caused things like morals and ethics lose their restraint over me, and my body moved before I could get the chance to think over my action as if I was possessed by something. Although the scouter didn't show her residential address to me, it didn't matter at all because I already knew where she lived.
I hurried up the stairs, ran past the hallway, and reached in front of her apartment. Standing before the door I loaded up "items" window.
[Would you like to use Omnipotent Key?]
A message appeared before my eyes. My hands were shaking unnaturally and I was feeling quite nervous. It was completely wrong to do such a thing, and I knew it too, but the more I found it wrong the more it fueled my desire to carry out the plan; it was as if a devil was standing behind me, insinuating me to listen to the dark side of human nature.
The window disappeared at once on tapping the message, but no visible change happened around me. When I turned the door knob, it opened without any resistance and I was able to get in. I intruded the place walking on tiptoes, and even forgot about taking off my shoes. Sakurai, who was watching TV, turned around her head in my direction; she probably sensed someone's presence. Our eyes met momentarily before the expression on her face changed.
"Kyaaah!"
A scream loud enough to break eardrums rang through the room as she tried to run away while avoiding my direction. She threw the remote control in her hand at me and ran toward the kitchen. I felt panicked at her reaction and unconsciously rushed behind her as I quickly operated the game window to load "items".
" A thief's here…!"
It wasn't the "items" window I was expecting that appeared before me and Sakurai who was shouting at the top of her lungs. My body felt odd all of a sudden as I lost all control over it. Everything around me turned white and the flow of time came to a halt; of course, Sakurai also stopped moving. "What the hell is going on?!" I got quite impatient and was at my wits' end when two option windows suddenly appeared out of nowhere.
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[Option 1: Calmly explain that you aren't a thief]
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[Option 2: Use Sleep-inducing Spray]
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There were only two choices available. For some reason, I was able to use my arms after the appearance of the option windows. Apparently, I was required to make a choice out of them, so the selection itself was a no-brainer for me. It was simply impossible for the first option to work out in this sort of situation as it'd be very unrealistic to believe that one would be willing to listen to what the intruder had to say.
Therefore, I chose the second option. The flow of time resumed again, and the "items" window I was trying to load before finally appeared before my eyes.
[Would you like to use Sleep-inducing Spray?]
I tapped on the window as I gazed at Sakurai, and right after that she closed her eyes and fell down on the floor. I ran over to her and brought my ear close to her face in anxiousness, only to hear her regular breathing sound. She only seemed to be sleeping right now.
Looking at her sleeping soundly, my lust suddenly got out of control. It was just me and her inside the apartment and according to the description of the spray she wouldn't be waking up for an hour. Thinking about the things I was able to do in such a situation, my heartbeat got so faster that it hurt.
She was casually dressed in hot pants and T-shirt, and my eyes were naturally drawn to her thighs; I swallowed saliva looking at the defenseless female before me. I could hear the devil's whisper, telling me to touch her alluring thick thighs and big curvaceous chest.
The reason I was here, was also to find out whether 'doing' it with the target was sufficient to be considered as conquering her. "Since that's the case, there's nothing to hesitate at this point. If that's how the game was meant to be played, I don't have a choice but to act accordingly."
When I came up with a reason to rationalize my action, the time flow of the world again stopped all of a sudden and a white window appeared with two options displayed on it.
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[Option 1: Proceed to assault her]
[Option 2: I'm a gentlemen. I'll stop here and look around the appartment.]
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In that instant, I didn't even bother to look at the second option as my finger reflexively moved towards the first option and tapped on it. The bright white world instantly disappeared and my body recovered freedom.
Just as the option I'd chosen, I got on top of Sakurai, my body tightly pressed to hers. However, an odd and abrupt thing happened before I could think or do anything else. The door of the entrance suddenly opened, and the police came running inside. I could only repeatedly blink my eyes in utter disbelief with a lifeless expression on my face.
"Don't move! You're arrested on charges of rape and robbery! Your counselor *blah-blah-blah*…"
The police officer that got inside first started speaking in a loud voice, and soon after that the whole situation was sorted out. I was arrested red-handed. They handcuffed me treating me like a criminal, and forced me into the backseat of the patrol car.
Although I didn't get to find out whether getting laid with the target was a required condition for the conquest, there was one thing I keenly realized that it wasn't allowed to force myself on the target. It was my first time riding a patrol car, and I let out a sigh at the outcome of the whole thing.
"In any case, I can't let things go on like this." I moved my finger and tapped on [Load].
[Would you like to load?]
Everything before my eyes turned white and then I returned back inside my room where I'd created the "save point", to the time at 10:30:22. If I had not used [Save] before for the sake of trial experimentation, there'd have been no "load point" available to me, and so I wouldn't have any other choice but to be taken away to the police station. My whole body shivered as I noticed how close I was to meet a bad end.
"The sudden appearance of the police could be a kind of compulsion power that would come into play if I do anything that could be regarded as going beyond the bounds of the rules established by the game." I tapped on [Status] with the intention to check for any possible change.
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Hasegawa Ryo
Age: 25
Job: NEET
Physical Strength: 55
Charm: 12
Money in possession: 33519 USD
EXP: 0
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"Money in possession" had considerably decreased. In addition to the amount of $9240 I used on purchasing "items" before, the charge of $440 for activating the "load" ability had led to the significant decrease in the total sum. However, despite the fact that I didn't buy any item before creating the "save point", the expenditure of $9240 on purchasing items was still being reflected even after returning to the past.
I immediately tapped on [Items in possession].
[You don't have any item right now.]
It was obvious that there wouldn't be any "item" in there as I didn't buy them before creating the "save point". But the real issue was that evidently once we spend money on something, the change to the value of [Money in possession] would be permanent even after returning to a point in the past. Such a system was indeed extremely disadvantageous to the player.
" Haa…" I sighed at the harsh game system and was about to make the game window disappear from my sight when I noticed the addition of a new window.
It was a window titled [Remaining Time]. "Just when was this one created? I'm pretty sure that I've never seen it before, so why did it suddenly appear?" Wondering about the newly appeared window I moved my finger to tap on it, hoping to get some explanation. A message popped out in response.
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[Remaining Time: 8755 hours]
[Elapsed Time: 5 hours]
[In case you're unable to completely clear the game within the 'remaining time', your original body will die.]
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The content of the message was too shocking to me, and my whole body was drowned in fear. It was a kind of notification that carried enough impact to deal a crushing blow to my heart and mind as it basically implied that 'your life is at stake so get serious and try to the best of your capabilities, or I'll kill you off.' "How exactly am I supposed to 'completely clear' the game? There's no explanation whatsoever even about the condition that decides the success of a conquest, and you're talking about completely clearing the game?!"
Treating a person's life as collateral was an exceedingly tyrannical thing to do. Furthermore, even after returning to a time in the past using "load" didn't seem to have any effect on the flow of "remaining time" and it would continue to decrease. From my waking up from sleep, understanding the new situation I was placed into, to returning back to the past using "load" in the patrol car, a total of 5 hours had passed. If I had not created a "save point", I'd have been taken away to the police station, spent the remaining 8755 hours in the prison and died after the time limit, without being able to do anything till the very end.