In This Reincarnation Stream, I'm a Player

The truck bounced as it hit the tire spikes, but it didn't lose control or roll over. Instead, it picked up even more speed.

Bam—

The police car blocking the road was sent flying. Like a spinning top, the truck crushed the SWAT officers who were firing nonstop, but they seemed to be on stimulants, completely indifferent to whether they lived or died.

They turned around expressionlessly and opened fire on the truck charging onto the bridge, only to be knocked into the air by their own men coming up right behind them.

They were crazy. Everyone was crazy.

Yuki saw a man stuck to the windshield, his eyes bulging as he stared at him with a blood-covered face. His fingers kept curling and uncurling until a stray bullet punched through the cab and blew his head apart.

What the hell, they were lunatics.

Yuki kicked the corpse out of the truck. His body leaned back as if he were climbing a hill, and with the engine roaring, the truck launched into the air.

Time seemed to freeze before his eyes. Yuki saw Hayasaka Ai hunched over in the driver's seat. He saw Mai Sakurajima breathing with her head tipped back against his chest. He even saw bullets strike the hood, burst into sparks, and ricochet away.

His mind went blank. He was reminded of the desperate leap from the castle wall. A moment later, with a dull thud, his whole body sank as the groan of twisting steel reached his ears.

The truck soared over the bridge and slammed down on the far side of the canal. Its tires bounced, and the vehicle skidded left and right like a wild horse, while Hayasaka Ai gripped the steering wheel and did everything she could to steady it.

Reinforcement Magecraft was still active. The suspension actually held up under the impact, but the enemies chasing them like maniacs weren't so lucky.

Thud, thud, thud.

The bridge shook. More than a dozen cars hit the ground, rolled over, shattered, and burst into flames, scattering severed limbs and spare parts everywhere.

Like flowers raining from the sky!

Chapter 26: What Went Wrong (Revised)

Thud—

The instant they hit the ground, Yuki felt like his body was about to fall apart.

They made it!

Car parts littered the area. Gunfire still raged behind them, bullets throwing sparks from the ground as the little truck puffed smoke and rattled into an alley.

No one was blocking their way, and the gunfire was fading into the distance. His clenched toes finally relaxed.

Across the canal was the Port District, dotted with warehouses and buildings of all sizes. Beyond them lay the sea. No one knew what was on the other side.

It was precisely because the area was so deserted that no enemies had been lying in wait.

"Did anyone get shot?" Yuki shouted, running his hands over himself. Apart from cuts from the glass, he couldn't find any bullet holes.

The adrenaline was wearing off, and the pain was coming back. Mai Sakurajima finally lifted her head from his thigh, drenched in sweat.

"No, but I was about to suffocate." She rubbed her neck. Yuki had pressed down too hard, and her neck still hurt, but there was no reproach in her eyes.

"Hayasaka, you're a better driver than I thought," Yuki called to Hayasaka Ai, who was gasping for breath. What they'd just been through was more thrilling than a movie.

"My driving skill is at the proficient level, and I was even better than usual just now." The blonde girl's lips curled up as she tried to keep her face expressionless. "Your Reinforcement Magecraft was impressive too. Without it, this wreck wouldn't have made it across even with rocket boosters."

For a moment, the little truck had exceeded its horsepower limit, and its body had become much harder. From where she'd been sitting, she'd seen bullets embedded all over the hood.

"We all made it happen. Let's skip the mutual compliments, shall we?"

"Who's complimenting you?" Hayasaka Ai shot the man a glance. She was just about to wipe the blood running down her forehead when a bandage wrapped around it.

Mai Sakurajima hadn't been standing around doing nothing. She'd immediately found something useful to do. She was getting more and more used to this game.

Hayasaka Ai thanked her. As she drove the barely functioning truck into a warehouse, she asked without turning her head, "Did you notice anything along the way?"

"Too many things are off. I don't know where to start." Yuki gave a dry laugh and shook his head. He'd let Hayasaka Ai drive not only because she was skilled, but also so he could focus on observing.

"First, those cops are basically intelligent Living Corpses. They'll do whatever it takes to kill us."

"Mm." Their expressions tightened. They'd experienced it firsthand on the way there.

Aside from killing players, the law enforcement officers in this modern city seemed to care about nothing else. They'd inflicted ten times more damage than the three of them.

"Second, the game rewards are extremely important. Don't hesitate when you use them."

There was nothing to argue about there. The Reincarnation Game had even implanted the experience of using the rewards, so players didn't need to practice. Any hesitation was practically a crime.

"Third, this city is more dangerous than the Ancient Castle. The Reincarnation Game is very good at taking advantage of players when they let their guard down."

Yuki let out a long breath. If he'd really treated this place as the real world, happily flirted with girls, or thought that escaping the first time meant they were safe, he would have blocked off his own way to survive.

They could relax, but they had to get tense again soon, focus, and look for every possible way to solve the problem.

Hayasaka Ai didn't touch the brakes. The little truck, trailing smoke, had finally stopped working.

The atmosphere was a little oppressive. These past ten-odd hours had almost driven them mad. Luckily, the three of them had stuck together, occasionally joking to ease their frayed nerves. Better still, when danger struck, Yuki could get into the zone in an instant.

That ability to shift between states of mind was even more valuable than his powers of observation and intelligence.

Clunk.

Yuki gave the door a gentle kick, and it fell to the ground. He jumped out, his legs still trembling slightly. He spotted a bullet hole beside his head. It had missed blowing his brains out by just five centimeters.

He took a couple of steps, then realized something was wrong.

"We broke through the encirclement. Why didn't we get a reward?"

Hayasaka Ai was stunned too. Based on their earlier experience, they'd received rewards every time they took down a mini-boss or completed a small stage.

"I don't know. Maybe it wasn't dangerous enough? Did we fail to complete a side quest?"

I nearly got my head blown off. How was that not dangerous enough?

Yuki couldn't say. He wasn't the Reincarnation Game's host. He could only assume that things worked differently inside and outside the Ancient Castle.

"Come on. Let's find somewhere safe to wait for Li Dan. We can't handle this level of pursuit." Yuki turned around, only to see Mai Sakurajima leaning against the truck with a strange look on her face.

"Senpai, don't tell me you're mourning the ice cream. I can help you steal some later."

"Who's your senpai?" Mai gave him a look and pointed. "Come take a look. Maybe my eyes are playing tricks on me, but this thing wasn't in the truck before."

What was she talking about?

Yuki, his head full of questions, climbed back into the truck. His pupils instantly shrank.

A tablet-like device was lying where he'd just rested his feet. Yuki looked up and exchanged a baffled glance with Hayasaka Ai.

"Wait, wasn't the radio here just now? The one we took from the police car?"

Hayasaka Ai knew a little about electronics repair. She'd taken the radio apart herself and couldn't possibly have misremembered. They'd even listened in on police communications on the way.

"So, just now, an eighties-era radio turned into a modern tablet. Oh, and it's connected to the police network." Yuki picked it up and examined it, his face full of amazement.

The tablet was covered with moving blue dots and live updates. It made searches dozens of times more efficient. He also noticed new dots appearing at the edge of the city. Some were moving fast—presumably police helicopters.

Three stars, and now people could change right in front of you too?

"That's amazing. It's like watching a documentary, then someone suddenly rewinds it, and reality changes without a sound."

Mai Sakurajima and Hayasaka Ai exchanged glances. Since arriving in the Reincarnation Game, they'd seen too many incredible things for either of them to say, "That's impossible."

Fantasy? Science fiction? What was the principle behind it?

None of that mattered. What mattered was that their situation was getting worse, and slipping into the enemy ranks like they had before wouldn't be easy.

"This change came out of nowhere," Hayasaka Ai said coolly.

"More than that. There wasn't even the slightest warning. Have you noticed? Ever since we left the Ancient Castle, the difficulty curve has been shooting up," Mai said in amazement, looking around as if she could feel an invisible pair of eyes watching them.

The police were clearly more capable than the Living Corpses. If they, too, were endless, then what was the point of the Living Corpses?

The difficulty had gone up.

Yuki's eye twitched. He had two theories. He tossed the tablet to Hayasaka Ai, picked up his knife, and silently walked toward the exit.

"This has something to do with Hint Five. Tell Li Dan: if we can outsmart them, we shouldn't use force. We can't kill all these people, and we can't afford to kill them."

Yuki strode out of the warehouse. Where Hayasaka Ai and Mai Sakurajima couldn't see him, his cheek began to twitch slightly.

From the Ancient Castle to the city, he'd gained a basic understanding of how the Reincarnation Game worked. Now, one question kept churning through his mind:

Even without a set difficulty, this instance was absurd. An ordinary person had almost no chance of surviving.

He couldn't forget what had happened when he unlocked his Trait, nor the confusion on Mai Sakurajima's face.

What exactly had gone wrong?

Chapter 27: He Was Lying (Revised)

Wooo—

The shrill wail of sirens came from overhead, making everyone glance outside nervously every few seconds.

It felt awful, like being a piece of meat thrown into a pack of wolves. The slightest disturbance made their hair stand on end.

They were in a tunnel beneath the Port District. Yuki had already worked out how to avoid the search. As long as they kept moving, they'd be safe above or below ground. The only catch was that they had to crawl hunched over through the cramped, foul-smelling tunnel.

It was safe, but miserable.

"Yuki, are you saying the pursuers are basically Living Corpses too?" Li Dan was an experienced player and had obviously suffered through plenty. His expression barely changed.

"Yeah, Brother Li. They're in uniform, but they're acting completely irrationally. If they're police, they should put protecting civilians' lives first." Yuki crawled behind him, his face sincere, though inwardly he was thinking how unlucky he was.

He should have let Hayasaka Ai go in front. Who wanted to stare at a man's backside?

"Brother Li, didn't you notice?"

"I had my suspicions, but they were chasing us too hard. I didn't dare hold back." Li Dan judged that they'd crawled far enough. He raised a hand to stop the group, curled up against the tunnel wall, and gave Yuki an approving look.

"You really are observant. Don't worry, I'm not doubting you. Unless someone has a special Ego Trait or Chaos Item that boosts it, intelligence and observation skills are about the same for veteran and new players."

The Reincarnation Game didn't have a stat-point system. Under normal circumstances, no one could suddenly become smarter.

"When people are pushed to the brink, they can unlock their potential. I didn't know I had it in me either." Yuki put on a bitter expression.

"Don't sell yourself short. No one who can study medicine is stupid. Someone like me, a third-tier-college underachiever, only made it this far through sheer luck." Li Dan gave a self-deprecating smile, took the stolen ration bars out of his storage space, and passed them around.

"It's only six thirty in the evening, and it already feels like hell. The Port District isn't that big. It's only a matter of time before the enemy finds us." He looked tired. He glanced at the other four and thought to himself.

They'd all laid their cards on the table while crawling, especially when it came to core abilities like Ego Traits.

Yuki had told the truth. Extracting concepts sounded impressive. The blonde girl had some kind of hacking skill, probably because she spent too much time on her phone. Mai's invisibility was interesting, at least in this instance.

But it's not enough. Their Ego Traits alone aren't strong enough to break through the encirclement. Someone must be lying.

His gaze settled on Yuki's face. He was the only newcomer Li Dan couldn't quite figure out. He seemed familiar and unfamiliar at the same time.

The familiar part was that he resembled those new players who, when backed into a corner, became the key to breaking the deadlock. At first glance, they seemed unremarkable, but in a sense, they were perfectly suited to the Reincarnation Game.

The unfamiliar part was that he was too much like them. From his initial panic to his composure now, the signs of growth were too clear, and the way he'd broken through had been full of coincidences.

This instance's difficulty was strange too. The turning point had been when they left the Ancient Castle and the team split up. Their gains had plummeted while the difficulty had soared.

Something had definitely gone wrong. The team had split into three groups. The new players with me are probably fine. By process of elimination, that leaves those three.

So what had they gained when they split up? What had they triggered?

Experience and reality were in conflict. Li Dan's gaze grew increasingly dangerous.

"Brother Li?" Yuki had been chatting with the rich young man. He turned around, his eyes clear and innocent, like a student who knew nothing of the world.

"Sorry. We've been fighting for so long that I'm a little tired." Li Dan looked away and nodded approvingly. "Yuki, you really are a genius. Maybe you're the one who can keep everyone alive, not me."

"You're joking. Besides, I don't want to be a genius. I should be lying in bed playing games right now, not zoning out in this cramped, stinking tunnel."

Yuki complained, and his words struck a chord. The others gritted their teeth.

Who wanted some damn Transcendental power? Give me back my peaceful daily life!

That was a newcomer for you. He'd never experienced the thrill of surpassing human limits, that reckless feeling of being able to do whatever he wanted.

A hint of contempt flashed across Li Dan's face, but he quickly went back to looking mature and composed.

"We didn't get to choose. By the way, what was the reason you gave for breaking through the encirclement?"

"My Ego Trait! I drew something called 'Akina Mountain Racer,' then grabbed the steering wheel and hit the gas. My body started reacting on its own!" Yuki got excited, spraying spit everywhere as if he were reliving the moment. Rich Brother listened with envy.

Guns, cars, and sports—those were a man's three great loves. Who wouldn't want to do something that cool?

Li Dan nodded in satisfaction, but inwardly he was thinking:

Good thing that Ego Trait can only be drawn once a day and can't be kept.

That fit the Reincarnation Game's style. Otherwise, his Ego Trait would be far too overpowered. But there was still the same old question: Why had it all lined up so perfectly? It hadn't even given me a chance to verify it?