"Dammit! Again... it’s happening again! The scenario is completely falling apart!"
Late into the night, the reincarnators gathered in their usual empty classroom. They were there to discuss the scenario, which had once again defied their expectations and veered off in an unimaginable direction.
Cyan, in particular, made no effort to hide his foul mood. He slammed his fist onto a desk in a fit of rage, and the other reincarnators watched him with a touch of apprehension.
Deep down, they all felt the same. Anxiety and irritation were mounting as the scenario continued to deviate from the "correct" path they desired.
"What the hell happened? Why did Ryuga head toward Zaraki instead of pursuing Koumaru?"
"We weren't supposed to have met the route unlock conditions. So why...?"
A few days prior, the reincarnators had been waiting outside the city for Ryuga. They expected him to be pursuing Koumaru to obtain the Ryuo-ga necessary to defeat Zaraki. However, no matter how long they waited, he never appeared.
While they were still trying to make sense of the situation, reports came in stating that Zaraki had been defeated and Raiha had been successfully rescued. The news left the reincarnators in a state of absolute shock.
According to the game's logic, Ryuga’s assistance was mandatory to defeat Zaraki.
However, they hadn't ground enough affection level with him to meet that condition.
That was precisely why they had gambled on the slim hope of stealing Ryuga’s weapon and facing Zaraki themselves... but for some inexplicable reason, Ryuga had ignored Koumaru and challenged Zaraki to save Raiha on his own.
It made no sense. As the "protagonists," they’d had no involvement with him whatsoever.
In fact, partly due to Egos’s mindless meddling, the group—who should have been viewed as fellow Hero Candidates—was likely despised by him.
Cyan and the others had eventually arrived at the same conclusion.
"So that's how it is... I didn't want to believe it, but—"
"Yeah. It looks like Scum Yugo is officially being counted as the Protagonist."
Whenever the scenario progressed in a way they didn't want, Yugo was almost certainly the cause.
Starting with the popular heroine Melt becoming impossible to make a companion, Yugo’s influence had been present throughout every stage of the current event.
While they didn't know the exact reason, it was likely because Zenon had defeated him before the prologue had even begun.
Because of that, he was building a party, hijacking the scenario, and sabotaging their success.
This was an utterly unacceptable state of affairs. Marcos and Ryuga were one thing, but the fact that popular female characters like Melt, Anhel, Setsuna, Sakura, and Raiha were all flocking to his party was a nightmare. Cyan and the others wanted those girls for themselves.
To think that the girls they had spent so much time with in their previous lives, the ones they’d shared countless events with... to think they now belonged to a piece of scum like him. As the reincarnators reeled from the shock, an announcement echoed in their minds like a final blow.
[Scenario routes for Ryuga Renjou, Yui Renjou, Setsuna Kogarashi, Sakura Amamiya, and Raiha Utsusemi have been deleted.]
[Recruitment of these characters is now permanently impossible.]
"Gah... Dammit!!"
Cyan roared in anger, slamming his fist onto the desk again.
The other reincarnators shared his frustration. The flags they had been aiming for with the popular characters had all vanished. The classroom was thick with a palpable aura of negativity.
"Again! That scum got in our way again!"
"Not just them—it’s also become impossible to recruit Marcos, Misery, or even Hex!"
"If this keeps up, Yugo is going to ruin our entire otherworld life!!"
The thrill of effortlessly crushing enemies, the envious looks from the masses, the harem of favorite characters they were supposed to build, the glory of being heroes... Yugo was systematically dismantling it all.
Feeling that he would strip them of everything and shatter the future where they were praised as heroes, the reincarnators groaned, their faces twisted with anger and fear.
"We have to eliminate him. We have to do it before he gets any stronger!"
"But how? The guy is freakishly powerful now. We’d lose in a fair fight."
"And after all the stupid crap Egos pulled, people are watching us like hawks. One wrong move and—"
The reincarnators knew that the misdeeds committed by Egos before his School Expulsion [Game Over] had tarnished their reputations as Hero Candidates.
Cyan felt his own charisma fading. Recently, his party members, Verda and Peewee, had become increasingly cold and distant. The realization only fueled his desperation.
"If we don't act, that scum will take everything that was meant for us! We can't just let him!"
"But what do we do!? How do we break him!?"
"...Fine. A temporary truce. We’ll work together, but our absolute priority is eliminating Yugo!"
They couldn't let Yugo grow any more powerful. Unless they crushed him by any means necessary, the future they desired would never come.
The reincarnators argued over how to eliminate him, but they couldn't defeat an opponent who overwhelmingly outclassed them in a fair fight. Furthermore, if they used underhanded methods and were caught, they would lose everything just like Egos had. No good ideas were forthcoming.
The fact that they didn't trust each other, even while claiming they would cooperate, didn't help.
But they failed to realize the most obvious truth of all: the only reason the scenario had progressed this far was because Yugo and his friends had been the ones actually solving the problems. Left to their own devices, these "heroes" would have likely hit a Game Over long ago.
"I'll never forgive him...! I'll show you, Yugo...!"
Cyan growled, his heart festering with resentment, but there was nothing he could actually do.
In the end, they arrived at the pathetic conclusion that they would simply try to sabotage Yugo whenever possible. And with that, their utterly pointless meeting for the day came to a close.