Assistant Supervisor

When Long Xi woke again, the first thing he smelled was motor oil.

The ceiling above him was still dingy gray. The emergency lights were dimmer than before, flickering on and off and making the parking garage look like the set of a haunted-house movie.

He lay on several pieces of cardboard pushed together, with a coat thrown haphazardly over him. Someone had wrapped his wounds with strips of torn bedsheet. The bandaging was crude, but at least it worked.

Still alive.

Once he reached that conclusion, Long Xi closed his eyes for a while.

Not out of relief. He just needed a breather.

That last round really had nearly killed him.

All kinds of messages were still scrolling through the chat, offering a little comfort.

[He's awake! He's awake!]

[Holy shit, the streamer slept for almost a whole day.]

[I thought he was really a goner.]

[That recovery is insane.]

Long Xi's throat was dry. It took him a long while to squeeze out, "Don't jinx it yet."

He propped himself up, feeling as though every bone in his body had come apart. The slightest movement hurt.

But compared to yesterday, he really was doing a little better.

The cursed energy replenishment from the livestream was slowly filling his drained body. It wasn't fast, but it was genuinely keeping him alive.

At times like these, people tended to think too much.

Long Xi stared at the light overhead, lost in thought for a while.

He hadn't had much family in his previous life either. They had died early, leaving no one behind.

If he had any attachments, they were mostly the friends he'd messed around with, stayed up late with, played games with, and complained about their bosses with.

He used to find them annoying, wanting to mute the group chat whenever a notification sounded.

Now, lying half-dead in an underground parking garage in the Culling Game, he actually found himself thinking-

What if one of them really is watching?

What if there's someone I know on the other side of the chat?

When that thought surfaced, some of his frustration faded.

"All right, then."

He murmured into empty air, "You're all watching, huh? Guess I'd better keep a little dignity."

[Lmao, the streamer suddenly got serious.]

[Don't get all sentimental. It's weird.]

[Honestly, yesterday was brutal.]

[Streamer, need intel? We can fill in the gaps so you don't get ambushed and killed.]

Long Xi rubbed his temple. That was something he could answer.

"I know a little."

"The Sendai Colony isn't somewhere you go to level up. It's somewhere you go to die... Kurourushi, Ryu Ishigori, Takako Uro, Dhruv Lakdawalla, and then there's Yuta Okkotsu..."

"Any of those first four would be a headache to run into, but aside from the first and last, the other two probably won't bother with me... That last guy... That last guy might be my lifeline."

He chuckled at his own words.

In the original story, Yuta Okkotsu had been Sendai's cleanup machine. His one-against-four sweep through Sendai was still vivid in Long Xi's memory.

Even with the map packed full of monsters and lunatics, everything felt different the moment he showed up.

The problem was that Long Xi had no idea whether his little butterfly wings had knocked the timeline off course.

By all rights, Okkotsu should already have been active inside the colony.

But judging by what Long Xi had experienced so far, he'd probably messed up the timeline a little.

As he was thinking, footsteps sounded from the other end of the garage.

Long Xi's fingers tensed. Flames were just about to rise when several flashlight beams shone toward him.

At the front was a man in his forties, wearing a black suit and white shirt, his tie askew and obvious exhaustion on his face.

Two more people in black followed him-a young woman and a tall, thin man. Behind them were another three or four ordinary people carrying water and compressed biscuits.

Seeing Long Xi sitting up, the man in the black suit froze for a moment, then let out a relieved breath.

"You're awake."

Long Xi didn't answer right away. He looked them over first.

They all had traces of cursed residue on them. Not much. They clearly weren't proper combat-oriented jujutsu sorcerers, but they were a little stronger than ordinary people.

Paper talismans and tools for simple barriers hung from their waists, closely resembling Jujutsu High's support setup.

Assistant supervisors.

Or rather, official support personnel who served a similar role.

Noticing his wariness, the man raised a hand to signal the others not to come too close.

"Don't worry... We're the ones who carried you in yesterday."

"An ordinary person could faint just looking at your wounds, but you didn't die. You were even recovering on your own."

"We figured you were a jujutsu sorcerer, so we bandaged you first."

Long Xi's voice was hoarse, and he forced out a word.

"Thanks."

"My name is Kawahara. I'm more or less in charge here for now." The man nodded. "There are over thirty other people hiding down here, mostly civilians who couldn't evacuate before the barrier closed, along with a few government personnel."

"We don't have much food or water, but we can hold out for a few more days."

"Are you... from Jujutsu High?"

Jujutsu High?

Long Xi braced himself upright and looked down at his body. His original pajamas had been replaced with a cleaner, more practical set of clothes.

Still, they had some paint stains on them and looked like something a street punk would wear.

"..."

He didn't reply immediately. The man quickly realized why and took out a gold button.

"We took your clothes away. They were too badly torn to wear, so we used them for bandages..."

"I've seen this button before. It's exclusive to Jujutsu High... That's why I wanted to ask..."

Long Xi silently listened to him finish, then looked at the few ordinary people behind him who had clearly worked up the courage to follow.

He opened his mouth, then decided not to hide it after all.

"If you had to put it that way, I guess I count..."

"Thanks for helping me. Otherwise, it probably would've taken me quite a while to get myself bandaged up..."

The middle-aged man waved his hands repeatedly, brushing off the thanks and scratching his head awkwardly as he insisted it was nothing.

Strictly speaking, it really had been a small thing. Injuries like those would have left an ordinary person half-dead at the very least.

Yet here Long Xi was...

He relaxed even more after learning that Long Xi was from Jujutsu High, though he'd never heard of anyone like him there.

But that wasn't something he needed to worry about right now...

"Mr. Long Xi, there's something we'd like to ask of you..."

"I know it's terribly unfair to ask this the moment you've woken up! But please! You're the only one who can do it!"

It took roughly five minutes for him to explain everything.

In short, those four major monsters weren't the only threats out there in the Sendai Colony.

Once the Culling Game began, all sorts of sorcerers, cursed spirits, and awakened players would pour in.

Keeping over thirty ordinary people alive in a place like this meant this group had done everything they could.

Fortunately, quite a few government personnel had already been among them before the barrier went up, preventing widespread panic from throwing everyone into chaos.

As for their request, a group of government personnel was trapped elsewhere, in a commercial plaza in Sendai.

They were surrounded by large numbers of cursed spirits. Many had already died, and Kawahara's group had neither the means nor the ability to rescue them.

That was why they hoped Long Xi could step in, if possible, and get those people out.

Long Xi hadn't intended to refuse in the first place, but watching the man drop to the floor in a full prostrating bow after finishing was honestly hard to take.

After all, these people had saved him. They weren't acting out of malice or trying to get him to kill anyone.

They only wanted to save people. He had no reason to refuse.

"I understand... When exactly?"

"If you'd like, I can leave right now..."

With that, he accepted the water a young woman beside him offered, took a huge gulp, and let out a long breath.

Kawahara looked up in astonishment.

He had expected Long Xi to help, but he'd thought he would at least rest for a day and let his injuries heal completely first.

The danger outside should have been difficult even for Long Xi to handle. He hadn't expected him to agree so readily.

Almost in the next instant, tears streamed down Kawahara's face.

"Hey! What's this guy crying for?!"

"I only said I'd help. If things get life-threatening, I'll absolutely be the first to run!"

"I value my life a lot!"

Kawahara wiped the tears from his face, then shouted a solemn "Yes!" After giving a brief explanation, he hurried off to find a way to make contact.

... After Kawahara left, only Long Xi and a few other ordinary people remained inside.

Without any qualms, he lay back down and exhaled deeply. Sure enough... getting transported to another world isn't fun at all.

I don't have any pain reduction! My whole body still burns! This is miserable!

While Long Xi was still thinking, the young woman who had handed out water earlier leaned over and looked at him curiously.

"Um... When we went to rescue you yesterday, we found lots of really big cockroaches around you. Did you take care of them?"

"Yeah."

"Then you're really strong."

Long Xi took a deep breath. His chest still burned, and his smile was a little helpless.

"Strong, and I still got beaten up this badly."

Behind her, a little girl hid beside a woman's leg, peeking out with half her face as she asked quietly.

"Big brother, are you here to save people?"

The parking garage went quiet for a moment.

Long Xi was silent for a few seconds, then stood up again and reached out to ruffle the child's messy hair.

"I guess."

"At least I'll look after you guys..."

At those words, several of the adults visibly relaxed.

Although Kawahara's conversation with him had gone well, rescuing people and protecting them were different things.

It wasn't that they truly saw Long Xi as a savior. At a time like this, having someone willing to step forward and say, "I'll look after you," was enough to help them keep holding on.

At the very least... it gave them a little confidence to face the creatures outside...