The True Endgame

He needs to fight others if he wants to keep on progressing.

The players that he trains with are all more powerful than he is since he is away from Nell. He"s sure that he could easily tear his way through them if Nell was here to share her strength with him, but without her presence activating that new buff of his, he is not that much stronger than a relatively new player. Those that he trains with are shocked to learn of how low his stats are when he tells them how long he has been playing for!

When Fenrir thinks about it, they have every right to be shocked. Here he is in this giant, fantastical world full of millions of players, monsters, and more, yet he"s spent almost his entire time in-game thus far within a single city and just fishing. He has only seen two monsters excluding those that are the pets of other players in the city, and they were the giant crabs and tentacle clams that he saw back before they took on Coastedge!

It goes to show that one really can play this game and live a life here without ever partaking in any of that content, even if such a path is rare. One of the men tells Fenrir that most of the players who just want to farm and fish have killed plenty of monsters before settling down. Jumping straight into "retirement," as some of the other players call it, is rare.

All of the talking while fighting makes Fenrir want to go out and explore once this is all over. He still wants to fish, but he also wants to see what else the world has to offer. He"ll be a traveling fisherman! He is sure that there are plenty of exotic fish and aquatic monsters for him to hook and reel in. So, while he still may not want to go and turn into a monster hunter or a dungeon raider, he does want to experience more of the world"s fantasy side of features.

Fenrir"s current sparring partner sweeps out his legs and points a sword to his neck.

"It"s a good thing this is a fishing tournament and not a fighting one," Fenrir"s partner says.

"What can I say? I like fishing," Fenrir replies before knocking the sword away and switching roles as he sweeps his partner"s legs.

He doubts that either Ull"s champions or Alexander would care about fighting fairly, so there is no use in training as if fights with them will be fair and without dirty attacks.

"You said you want to explore and go fishin", right?" one of the others watching the fight asks.

Fenrir gives a quick nod as he focuses on dodging his opponent"s attacks.

"I"ve heard that there"s all sorts"ve magical fish east of here where the Hermetic Scholars" headquarters is at. Also heard about them dwarves past the foreign b.a.s.t.a.r.d"s lands fishing in lava," they explain.

The whole fishing in lava part steals enough of Fenrir"s attention away for a shield to bash him right in the face. If it weren"t for being excited and distracted by visualizing fishing in lava, the whole shield to the face thing probably would have hurt much more.

"There"s always fishin" in the rivers north of here, too. I wouldn"t, though. Too d.a.m.n dangerous to go up into the jungle unless you plan on taking an entire raid group with you. Let me tell you, bein" impaled by oversized lizards wielding spears ain"t exactly a pleasant thing."

This person is giving Fenrir so many ideas of where to go fishing! He has been so fixated on this tournament, his girlfriends, and moral dilemmas involving NPCs that he has almost completely forgotten that he is living inside of history"s most advanced, content-packed fishing simulator!

The only problem is that he doesn"t know where he wants to go after all of this. Does he want to head east toward the Hermetic Scholars" headquarters, or west to the dwarves? What about taking the risk of heading north into the jungle and fishing in the rivers there?

Fenrir shakes his head to recollect his thoughts so that he may focus on the opponent in front of him. Unfortunately, he does so too late and ends up getting smacked on top of his head by a wooden sword.

"You"d be dead if this was real, you know," his opponent says.

"I know, I know. Sorry, was just thinking about fishing," Fenrir explains.

"Of course you were. Anyways, pizza should be here soon, so I"ve got to go. Somebody take my place and teach this fishing addict how to focus."

"Thanks for the help! I seriously appreciate it, and I"m sorry for getting distracted there. I won"t let you down in the final round."

Fenrir"s training partner smiles and waves. "I"ll be watching, so don"t screw up," they say before heading off to a safe spot to wake.

The training continues for nine more in-game hours which only ends up being four and a half hours in real life. Fenrir spars with over thirty different opponents during that time. Each opponent that he faces brings new weapons, skills, and styles to the fight. He feels as if he has already made more progress in this training session than he has from all of the times that he trained with Ca.s.siel combined! He even notices his own body moving faster and more force being used in his attacks.

Yet, his feral desire does not show itself a single time. It was always there in the back of his mind when he was sparring with Ca.s.siel, so how come it hasn"t shown up this time?

"Alright, I need to get to bed. I"m exhausted. Wasn"t expecting to train this much, and I was kept awake most of last night. Thanks for all the help, all of you," Fenrir says to his latest training partner and the group of bystanders either just hanging out or watching him train.

Before he leaves, everybody wishes him luck and tells him to find them at any time for more training.
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Being liked instead of hated for once is really nice. Sure, there was a sort of s.a.d.i.s.tic satisfaction that he was able to get out of being hated to the point of gaining stalkers that found his real life information, but being liked just feels so much… warmer – better. Furthermore, there is nothing to feel guilty about. Whereas he still felt a bit guilty at times being so horrible to everybody, there is nothing to feel guilty about this time around.

Fenrir reaches The s...o...b..ll, crawls into the nearest hammock after checking up with Tabitha whom has gone through an entire basket of fried fish with Corwin, and then wakes from the game to be back in his real body once more.

Ryouta is too tired to say anything to his fan this time. It only takes a couple of minutes for him to pa.s.s out and drift into a dreamland full of fish, sweaters, and – oh, oh G.o.d. Are those feminine fish wearing sweaters? He knows that this isn"t real, but he"s too tired to wake up! Yes, he loves fishing. Yes, he loves sweaters. However, he does not want fish and sweaters to be combined!

It is eccentric nightmare after eccentric nightmare for the duration of Ryouta"s sleep.

When he finally wakes up, covered in sweat and feeling gross, he crawls out of bed to look at the time on his computer and realizes that he"s close to being late again.

"I want to sleep more, but… responsibilities suck," Ryouta groans as he limps back over to his bed and places the headband of a virtual reality headset around his head once more.

"It isn"t healthy to not go to the bathroom, eat, or drink before playing, Onii-chan! And you didn"t even brush your teeth last night or this morning! Gross!" Saya criticizes him.

"I don"t have the time. Remind me to do it later and I promise I will," Ryouta tells her as he turns into Fenrir.

"I"ll hold you to that, Onii-chan! Don"t forget that I"m part of your brain so you can"t lie to me."

"You"re supposed to be tsundere, not yandere."

"Don"t make me sharpen my knives," Saya says before disappearing from in front of him.

In her place is the world of Gaia – or rather, the wooden deck of The s...o...b..ll as he stares up at it from his hammock.

Looking around, he sees everything nice and tidy, all the damage to The s...o...b..ll has been repaired, a new engine with several more gears and tubes than before has been installed in the back of the ship, and even the stairs are all fixed up!

Fenrir runs his fingers against the ship"s hull to see if she feels any different. She doesn"t. Even with all of these upgrades and replacements, she"s still The s...o...b..ll.

"Let"s win this, alright?" Fenrir says to his trusty ship before getting out of his hammock and heading above deck.