"It’s coming... the school trip! You lot—you better understand the stakes this time, you hear!?"
Deep in the middle of the night, the Reincarnators gathered in their usual empty classroom. For the first time in a long while, their meeting was characterized by an air of absolute gravity.
When they had first started meeting, they had been flippant and casual, treating everything like a literal game. Now, their demeanor had undergone a total transformation. It wasn't just their expressions that had changed, however; it was their numbers. As they looked around the room, they began to speak of the absences.
"Our numbers have really thinned out. And to think it’s only been a few months since the game started."
"Zenon vanished with Claire, and Isaac’s dead. Egos and Cyan screwed up so badly they got expelled and then went missing. I never expected them to drop like flies at this rate."
"Who gives a damn if those guys are gone? If anything, it’s better that the competition is out of the way! The problem is that we’re getting dragged down by their screw-ups!"
The group continued to discuss the fact that four dropouts had already emerged in such a short period. For them, the issue wasn't the loss of fellow Reincarnators. Since they viewed each other as rivals to be kicked down rather than allies to cooperate with, a reduction in numbers should have been something to celebrate.
The real issue was that the four who had vanished had self-destructed in every conceivable way. Their frustration boiled over as they discussed how much trouble the remaining students were facing because of those failures.
"They involved civilians in combat, ravaged the academy with the power of Demonic Swords before turning into Magic Armor Beasts, murdered fellow students, tried to commit sexual assault, and basically acted as henchmen for criminals... Just how stupid can those guys be!?"
"And because of them, even we—the other Hero Candidates—are being looked at like we’re dangerous psychos!"
the outrageous toxic behavior of the Reincarnators who had already fallen had left deep scars on the reputations of the others. Back when Zenon first failed, the others had been able to mock him, rejoicing that he had been the first to drop out of what was essentially the Hero Race. Now, they no longer had the luxury of laughing.
Things had gone well for a time. They had shown their worth during the incident with the mysterious Black Crabs, earning the title of Hero Candidates and winning the respect of the student body.
However, in the events that followed, they had lost to Isaac in their internal power struggle, proved incapable of handling Magic Armor Beasts that were far stronger than anticipated, and to top it all off, the toxic behavior of Zenon’s group had drained their trust savings down to nearly zero.
No matter how many minor feats they performed by utilizing their meta-knowledge, the sheer scale of the blunders committed by the others ensured that the public viewed them with renewed suspicion. Cyan’s recent disaster had been the final straw; he had ruined a Security Force operation and expanded the collateral damage. Now, the Reincarnators were all being painted with the same brush as a piece of trash who would get his own comrades expelled.
"Cyan is a disaster, but things were already heading south before he arrived! Because of the guys who vanished, our game life is a total wreck!"
"Zenon is the reason the Main Heroine Twin Wings, Claire and Melt, are off the table, and yet that bastard has the nerve to head out on a romantic getaway with Claire!"
"Isaac’s obsession with those Demonic Swords was the beginning of the bad luck! Because that gloomy loner went on a rampage, we can’t even recruit Ann or Neid anymore!"
"If Egos hadn't tried to kill Fee with that bizarre plot and then attacked Raiha, the Warrior Shrine Maidens might have joined our party... but thanks to him, that's gone!"
"And then Cyan’s screw-up was the nail in the coffin! Woz! Torin! You two are just as guilty, you know!?"
"Ugh...!"
"Guh...!!"
The inability to recruit popular heroines, the plummeting trust in their titles, the miserable situation they found themselves in—it was all the fault of the Reincarnators who had vanished. Burning with rage toward Zenon and the others for the catastrophic damage they had left behind, the group vented their fury on Woz and Torin, who had been involved in Cyan’s blunder. Burdened by guilt and feeling increasingly awkward after Cyan’s expulsion, the two could only shrink away, unable to offer a word in their own defense.
Eventually, the others realized that screaming wouldn't improve their situation and tried to steer the discussion back to the core problem.
"Look, the biggest issue is that the game scenario is so damn warped that our knowledge is barely applicable. What’s the point of being reincarnated in another world if you can’t even pull off a knowledge cheat!?"
"Our high Status settings have become completely meaningless, too... The enemies are just too strong. There’s no way these things should be appearing this early in the timeline."
"We keep encountering enemy characters we’ve never even heard of. What the hell is going on here?"
The difficulty of the world had become unbelievably high. More accurately, the plot had deviated significantly from the scenario of Luminous History as they knew it. They couldn't properly counter the enemy characters, and when events occurred that bypassed their knowledge, they were left paralyzed by indecision. Despite their suffering, the Reincarnators eventually resigned themselves to the reality of their situation and shifted their focus.
"We have no choice but to bet everything on the school trip! This is our absolute last chance for a grand turnaround!"