"Gah—! You scared me... What's wrong? Um... are you really okay?"
No matter how I sliced it, I was screwed. I didn't know what had happened, but the instant I cleared the first game, I'd been dropped straight into the second.
Just a moment ago, I was worrying about how I'd deal with the ruined world waiting beyond the doors of Hope's Peak Academy, and how I'd fend off the Remnants of Despair once they came for us. And now? Now I had to worry about how to survive inside this godforsaken program.
But why was I in the Neo World Program in the first place? Wasn't the Neo World Program supposed to be for Class 77, the so-called "Ultimate Despair"?
If I couldn't remember anything after opening the academy doors and stepping outside... then my memories had probably been erased again. But what the hell had I done this time to end up here, stripped of my memories?
If this kept up, Monokuma would pop out any minute now, assault Usami—the program's administrator and the chaperone teacher meant to rehabilitate Class 77—turn her into Monomi, and steal her administrator privileges.
Then Monokuma, armed with those stolen privileges, would force the kids to kill each other, shove the personality of Enoshima's Alter Ego into the brains of the dead, release them into the world, and kick off the "Turn All Humanity Into Enoshima" plan.
If that plan succeeded, the world was finished.
'Why... why am I the one who has to go through this...?'
I felt so wronged I could've gone insane. I'd clawed and bled and suffered my way through hell to barely defeat Enoshima, and somehow, somehow, all of Class 78 had made it out alive together. And the second we stepped outside the school, bam—straight into the sequel.
At this point, I was honestly afraid of what I'd done in a past life. Was I Hitler or something? If not, then why the hell did I have to endure something this horrific all over again?
And on top of that, why were my memories erased again? Not from the point when I enrolled at Hope's Peak Academy, either. No—everything after opening the doors with Class 78 and leaving Hope's Peak Academy was gone. Why? The more I thought about it, the more my skull throbbed.
It felt like my mental state was being pulverized in real time, but maybe because I'd already survived one killing game, I pulled myself together faster than expected. Quietly, I closed my eyes and began sorting through the situation with as much cold logic as I could muster.
What happened had happened. That meant I had to solve it, no matter what. I'd promised myself—and Class 78—that I wouldn't live like I used to anymore. Not weak. Not lazy. Not helpless.
This time too, I'd survive somehow. I'd crawl out of this place by sheer force if I had to, and I would reunite with my friends in Class 78. No matter what.
'So what do I do now...? Wait. No, hold on... this might actually be manageable...?'
Come to think of it, maybe the situation wasn't entirely hopeless. In Super Danganronpa 2, everyone who died—except Chiaki Nanami, since she was an AI—was revived later by the awakened Hinata in the anime timeline.
'Wait... if that's true... couldn't I use a shortcut here...?'
Instead of running myself ragged, crying tears of blood as I sprinted all over the island trying to stop every murder like I had before, what if I just focused on keeping Hajime Hinata alive until the end? If he awakened at the end, wouldn't he just bring everyone back anyway?
Sure, my conscience screamed at the idea, but this time I might not have a choice. The second game was twice as hard as the first when it came to preventing murders.
For one thing, this was virtual reality, so Monokuma's power here was on a completely different level from the first game's real-world setup. And unlike the first game, Enoshima's Alter Ego in the second had one clear objective: kill us. That meant the motives were even more vicious than before, and some of them were flat-out impossible to stop.
In other words, as much as I hated it... this time, I had to focus on keeping Hinata alive, even if that meant accepting a few sacrifices—
"You've seemed kind of out of it for a while now... You're really okay, right...?"
"Huh...? Ah... sorry. I was just panicking."
"Well, you seem a little more lucid now, so that's good. I mean, considering the situation, it's understandable... Though, more importantly, I think we should wake up that girl who's been collapsed behind you this whole time..."
"...Huh?"
I turned around at Komaeda's words—and the plan I'd just built in my head was obliterated on the spot.
"Ki... Kirigiri...!?"
There, unconscious on the ground, lay Kyoko Kirigiri.
.
.
.
.
.
"Kirigiri! Are you awake? Kirigiri!!"
"Ugh... nnngh..."
An utterly unforeseen variable had entered the board. Me, sure, whatever—but I had never imagined Kirigiri would get dragged into the Neo World Program too.
At this point, I needed to remind myself of the lesson I'd learned by surviving a killing game firsthand.
Never trust game knowledge blindly again.
Ever since I'd come to this world, the original story had been twisted beyond recognition. Which meant the number of unpredictable variables had skyrocketed.
Just last time, during the trial Enoshima rigged to get me Executed, I'd trusted my game knowledge too much—and I got crushed for it. If Mukuro Ikusaba hadn't been there, I would've died.
And now that both Kirigiri and I had been dragged into this killing game, the distortion clearly wasn't weakening. If anything, it was getting worse. Which meant putting all my chips on Hinata alone had become far too dangerous.
Even if I somehow kept only Hinata alive, if some unforeseen variable stopped him from awakening—or made it impossible for him to save everyone even after he did—then I'd be catastrophically screwed.
And... more than anything else, with Kirigiri here, there was no way I could carry out a plan that reckless. Looks like I'd have to do what I'd always done: run myself to the bone, cry tears of blood, and stop the murders one by one with my own hands.
The difficulty had spiked brutally, and there would be motives that were hard to stop—or practically forced—but... well, what else could I do? I'd just have to fight with everything I had.
Having steeled myself to keep everyone alive no matter what, I suddenly heard a voice and looked down.
"Where... is this...?"
"Kirigiri! Are you with me now?"
".....?"
Kirigiri looked around with a bewildered expression. And the moment I saw that, fear slithered into my chest.
'No way... she didn't lose her memories too, did she...?'
I still remembered the killing game, for reasons I didn't understand—but Kirigiri might've been reset completely.
With dreadful caution, I asked her the question.
"Um... do you... remember me...?"
"....Who are you?"
".....!"
It felt like my chest had been ripped open. Watching Kirigiri look at me with wary eyes, all our memories and everything we'd been to each other seemingly erased, I forced out the words in a trembling voice.
".....No, it's nothing..."
"....."
"Uh, um... so... hi...?"
".....Pfft."
".....?"
I was so devastated I had to physically choke back the sob threatening to spill out, trying desperately to act normal through the tears—and then, out of nowhere, Kirigiri laughed.
"I was joking."
".....!"
"I didn't think you'd react that strongly... I may have gone a little too far—"
"Hhk... ngh... waaah..."
The tension snapped, and tears came pouring out. I hated the idea of showing Kirigiri something this pathetic, so I tried to stop, but once the floodgates opened, there was no shutting them again.
"Honestly, you're not a child..."
"Hhk... ngh... snf..."
"Haaah..."
With a sigh, Kirigiri started patting my back. It was mortifying—humiliating, even—but somehow, it steadied me. So for a while, I just stayed still and let myself lean into the quiet rhythm of her hand.
.
.
.
.
.
"So? Have you calmed down now?"
"S-Sorry..."
"You don't need to apologize... Haaah, never mind."
Looking at my face, still red as a tomato from sheer embarrassment, Kirigiri let out another sigh and asked,
"More importantly, what exactly happened here? We definitely... opened the door in the entrance hall... and after that... ngh...!"
It seemed Kirigiri's memories had vanished from the same point as mine. The moment she tried to recall them, she grabbed her head and staggered.
I hurriedly caught her and started explaining the situation in broad strokes.
".....So, after we left that academy, quite a bit of time passed... and for some reason, the two of us lost our memories. Then we got dragged into a killing game inside virtual reality, one meant for Class 77. Is that what you're saying?"
".....If my guess is right, yeah. Of course... I know it's hard to believe..."
"At this point... not believing you would be stranger, wouldn't it? We've already come too far for that."
"Mm... thanks for believing me...! Then maybe we should start—"
"Um... you two are done catching up now, right...? If so, would it be okay if I introduced myself...?"
The sudden voice from beside us made me jolt. I turned to see Komaeda standing there with an awkward smile.
"...Nice to meet you. I'm Nagito Komaeda."
".....Did you hear what we were talking about?"
"Hm? No. I don't have a hobby of eavesdropping on other people's conversations... And I saw someone collapsed over there, so I went to check on them for a bit. I didn't really have time to overhear anything."
I looked at Kirigiri, and she gave a slight nod. Which probably meant what Komaeda had just said was true.
"..."
"Haha, you don't need to be that guarded. I just thought we should at least get acquainted. Since we're doing introductions anyway, I guess I should mention my talent too..."
Komaeda smiled as he greeted us, but knowing what he was really like, I couldn't quite keep my expression under control. Kirigiri, too, was watching him with unmistakable suspicion.
"...So, even though I'm just some unremarkable guy who became the [Ultimate Lucky Student] because I got picked in a lottery, I'm a student of Class 77 at Hope's Peak Academy... Um, are you listening?"
"...Yeah."
"Haha... you two are really wary. Well, I guess I can understand that to some extent... Anyway, wouldn't you mind introducing yourselves too...?"
"I'm K. I enrolled with the talent of [Ultimate Counselor]."
"Kyoko Kirigiri. I'm the [Ultimate Detective]."
"Aha... a counselor and a detective, huh? That's an interesting combination... If you got into Hope's Peak Academy, then I guess you're both the best in your respective fields, right...? I'm jealous... My talent's just luck. Nothing special at all..."
I stared at Komaeda with a dubious look. The guy was sitting on a cheat ability bordering on reality warping, and he still had the nerve to play humble. Komaeda scratched his head and continued.
"Well... introductions are over, and I feel like I'd just be in your way if I stayed any longer... So I think I'll go wake up that boy who's been unconscious over there. See you around, then."
With an embarrassed little smile, Komaeda turned and headed off to wake Hajime Hinata, who was lying collapsed in the distance.
"That person... is suspicious. My detective's intuition is warning me. We should stay on guard."
Kirigiri was absolutely right. That airheaded-looking guy was, in fact, the main chaos engine of Super Danganronpa 2—and a terrifyingly intelligent one at that. He hadn't shown his true colors yet, but once he did, Byakuya Togami's trolling would look cute by comparison.
If Junko Enoshima was an extremist pervert for despair, then that guy was an extremist pervert for hope. He was so thoroughly insane that, for the sake of hope, he'd throw away anything—his own life included—without hesitation.
As I brooded over how I was supposed to keep Komaeda in check from here on out, a sudden sense of absence prickled at me, and I looked around.
"...K? What's wrong...?"
"Something's... something's missing. What is it...?"
When I played the game, around this point...
"Right!! That's it!!"
".....?"
I'd forgotten about Usami. Normally, she would've barged into the conversation by now—the teacher-chaperone assigned to rehabilitate Class 77.
In just a little while, Usami would be modified into Monomi by Monokuma, who had infiltrated the program, and she'd lose her administrator privileges.
Which meant that if I warned Usami ahead of time, I might be able to stop the killing game more easily than I'd expected.
If she could just keep Monokuma from stealing her magical stick, she might be able to beat him. And if Monokuma hadn't arrived yet, maybe I could explain the situation and have her force a shutdown.
Filled with a flicker of hope that maybe—just maybe—I could stop this killing game more easily than I'd feared, I opened my mouth to call out for Usami at the top of my lungs.
"Ahem, ahem, can you hear me? Upupupu... Surprised? You were surprised, weren't you? Well then, thank you all for waiting! That's enough of the boring warm-up... It's time for the real star to make his entrance! Everyone, gather at Jabberwock Park..."
"What the... K...? Where are you going...?"
"Usami!!! Don't go to Jabberwock Park—look at me first!!!"
I tore off at full speed toward Jabberwock Park, screaming Usami's name before it was too late, but there was no sign of her anywhere.
Praying with everything I had that I wasn't already too late, I finally reached Jabberwock Park, only to hear—
"Fuwawa... H-How do you have administrator privileges...?"
"Upupupu! Well, I snuck in during the very earliest stages of the Neo World Program's development, so this much is easy...!"
It looked like this had been checkmate from the very beginning.
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