Chapter 104: Nekketsu Series Combo Cartridge
"Clone, tiger, prominent chin, and... delinquent."
Ross tapped the side of the Navigation Arrow and the editable keyword column appeared.
Beyond the original [Prominent Chin] obtained from treating Bodoro, and the [Tiger] and [Clone] just extracted as a double drop from treating Kastro, Ross held one more keyword: [Delinquent].
The source was obvious. It had come from Yusuke.
Under Ross's intervention, the original hell training had evolved into something closer to the Turtle School's approach. That also meant the intensity of each individual session had gone up.
And after confirming that Ross had both Vitality Surge Y and Z on hand, Genkai's "care" for her two disciples doubled directly.
With a safety net in place, might as well train them into the ground. It was still consistent with the "train properly" principle.
So Ross didn't even know when the [Delinquent] keyword had been pulled, because he had genuinely lost count of how many times he had dragged Yusuke back from near-death.
Worth noting: [Delinquent] had stronger targeting specificity than the earlier keywords. In the realm of electronic games, [Delinquent] was essentially a rare attribute, one that typically appeared on specific individual characters in certain fighting games.
But there was one entire game series where almost every character was a delinquent.
The Nekketsu Series.
Every character in the Nekketsu Series was a delinquent student from various high schools. Their respective domains covered but were not limited to dodgeball, basketball, soccer, ice hockey, fighting, hurdles, pole vault, and every other kind of sport. But fundamentally: delinquent students, all of them.
And the [Tiger] attribute obtained from Kastro happened to form a precisely targeted combination keyword with [Delinquent].
Nekketsu Fighting Legend.
The final BOSS of this game was a pair known as Toraichi and Toraji, comprehensive martial artists wearing tiger-head helmets whose stats and techniques completely overwhelmed the player side from every angle. Colloquially: the Twin Tiger Brothers.
Ross remembered the first time he had fought his way to the end with great effort, hearing the stirring music and seeing Toraichi and Toraji's pixel models that looked completely different from every other character in the game. The pressure had been immediate.
When the final battle began and the first real encounter hit, the Twin Tigers' near-total dominance shredded Ross so thoroughly that by the fifth attempt, his hands were trembling involuntarily from gripping the controller too hard. Then he still lost.
Nekketsu New Record had the All-Style Judo event too, but compared to Nekketsu Fighting Legend, the intensity was clearly a full tier lower.
Nekketsu Fighting Legend had not just four different fighting styles, but a large number of technique sets, some style-specific and some universal. It even had powerful combination super moves that completely transcended the category of "fighting."
If Ross had to pick the single best fighting game on the Famicom, it would probably come down to a choice between Nekketsu Fighting Legend and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.
Ross understood his current situation clearly. What he was lacking most right now was frontal combat capability.
Through his budget-version "Saiyan severe-injury-plus-Senzu-Bean" cycle of stimulating cellular expansion and consolidating it with recovery drugs, two months of daily training had produced a significant increase in his physical capacity compared to when he first became a disciple.
Setting aside raw physical strength, his aura capacity alone had by rough estimate grown from 10 units to 40 units. According to Genkai's assessment, this growth rate was still far from reaching what his body could actually sustain.
Even so, 40 units was still a long way behind genuine top-tier fighters.
So if he could locate the Nekketsu Fighting Legend cartridge, the gap in his frontal close-range combat capability would be substantially closed.
With an expression of open anticipation, Ross fed both [Delinquent] and [Tiger] into the Navigation Arrow.
The Arrow pulsed mechanically twice, then, as if its magnetic field had been scrambled, it began spinning in place at high speed. And finally... the arrow pointed straight down, directly at his own head.
"...Huh?"
Ross stared at it, completely blank.
He tilted his head left. The arrow tilted left with him. He tilted his head right. The arrow tilted back.
"Hmm."
Ross pinched his chin and thought. The Navigation Arrow's behavior clearly indicated that the cartridge corresponding to [Delinquent + Tiger] was somewhere on his person.
The problem was, he was absolutely certain he did not own Nekketsu Fighting Legend.
But at the same time, a question he had considered even earlier came back to him.
If he already held one cartridge from a series, would he also acquire its sequels?
And if so, would they exist as independent items, or would there be some kind of continuity between them?
A flash of light appeared in Ross's hand. He produced the collection box he kept his cartridges in and laid all four of them out one by one. He confirmed it: the Arrow was following his Nekketsu New Record cartridge.
"...Hmm?"
Suddenly he noticed something was wrong with the Nekketsu New Record cartridge itself.
The classic cover art that had originally occupied the cartridge's entire front face had been trimmed in half, leaving only the left side, with the entire right half now blank.
Looking more closely, Ross found something remarkable: right where the two halves met, near the top center, was a "2in1" label.
Two-in-one. Nekketsu New Record had become a combo cartridge.
A bolt of lightning passed through his mind. He shot up from the bed, face wide with sudden realization.
He understood. He finally understood. The Nekketsu Fighting Legend cartridge might already be in his hands. It simply existed in a very specific form.
The Nekketsu Series appeared scattered across different domains on the surface, but at the story level it carried genuine continuity. Characters like Kunio and Riki were always present, main protagonist or not. They were permanent fixtures.
So having obtained Nekketsu New Record, he had in theory already received the foundational entry for the entire Nekketsu Series. The remaining work was to unlock each of the other games in their different domains through specific activation rituals.
The [Delinquent + Tiger] on the Navigation Arrow was a directional sign. To get the key, he would need a ritual ceremony similar to the 5v5 competition that had unlocked the New Record in the first place.
The question was: what kind of ritual would serve as the key for Nekketsu Fighting Legend?
Ross picked up the room phone and dialed the internal line.
"Hello, floor-200 fighter direct line. How can I help you?"
"I'd like to ask, can the Sky Arena arrange a 2v2 team duel?"
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