Chapter 368: A Newcomer Joins the Group
Minato left not long after — it was getting late, and there wasn't a great deal two grown men had to talk about beyond the essentials. After a mere ten-odd minutes of conversation, he took his leave, Konoha's restoration settled firmly enough in his mind that his relief was plain, Hokage composure or not.
Truth be told, he'd already been in the middle of drawing up a full reconstruction plan for the village these past few days, working out the broader strokes of it with the rest of Konoha's leadership.
Now, though, all of that could simply be scrapped. There was nothing left to rebuild — Konoha stood completely intact, without so much as a hairline crack anywhere in the ground.
If pinching his own thigh hadn't stung, Minato might genuinely have written the whole day off as some kind of elaborate dream.
It struck him as more than a little absurd, honestly, that the village's own Hokage had ended up running around like an errand boy on his own turf. Only someone with Minato's particular temperament would insist on checking things out personally rather than letting anyone else come look first.
Seeing it with his own eyes was the only thing that would actually put his mind at ease — and, conveniently, his speed put him near the top of every shinobi alive, so the trip cost him next to nothing.
Once Minato had left Konoha to go inform the others, the village sank back into its earlier stillness — just Ryū, alone, once again.
Not that it bothered him much either way. Whether the sprawling village buzzed with life or sat dead quiet made little difference to him.
He was, at the end of the day, an indoor-loving salted fish through and through. None of it really registered as a problem.
Back in the living room, Ryū eyed the pan-fried beef sitting cold on the table and shook his head ruefully. "Ten-plus minutes of talking and it's probably gone cold by now. Whatever — just reheat it. Edible's edible."
After a battle that had raged for at least ten-odd straight days, there was no pretending he wasn't hungry.
Honestly, if Void Beasts were edible, Ryū figured he could've personally polished off a full tenth of one all by himself.
Which, given that a single Void Beast was roughly the size of a mountain, meant even a tenth of one was a genuinely absurd amount of food.
Too bad he had no idea whether the stuff was even safe to eat, and he wasn't exactly eager to be the first test subject.
He recalled Whitebeard taking a chunk of Void Beast meat with him when he left — best to wait and see how that little experiment turned out before making any decisions of his own.
Just as Ryū finished reheating the beef and had barely gotten a few bites in, a soft ding chimed inside his head — a notification from the Dimensional Chat Group.
His consciousness slipped into the chat, and he blinked in mild surprise.
Not because anyone had tagged him — a quest had triggered, out of nowhere!
Not a group quest, though — an invitation quest. Which meant a new member was about to join the group.
Invitation quests were visible only to him, the Admin — a fact that occasionally left Ryū a little exasperated. What if he happened to miss the notification some day? He'd end up costing the group a potential new member entirely by accident.
Really, Yukari and Tatsumaki, as Moderators, ought to be able to see these too. He made a mental note to bring that up with the system at some point — missing a genuine invitation quest by pure oversight would be a real headache.
Wonder what world this one's coming from. Please don't be another slice-of-life show — we've already got more than enough of those in the group as it is.
He speared a hefty chunk of beef with his fork and popped it in his mouth as he opened the invitation quest, glancing over its contents — and froze again, mid-chew.
He swallowed, his expression twisting slightly.
"...Huh? Not a slice-of-life character this time? And... this newcomer isn't from an anime or a show at all — she's from some hit video game?"
[Invitation Quest successfully activated! Target world: League of Legends. Newcomer: "Nine-Tailed Fox Spirit Ahri"!
Task details: The newcomer "Ahri" has run into a life-threatening crisis on the continent of Valoran, in the world of League of Legends, and is currently in mortal danger.
**Reach the world of League of Legends as quickly as possible, save the newcomer "Ahri," and eliminate the enemy responsible for her current situation.
Should the newcomer "die," or should the task not be completed within the allotted time, the quest is considered a failure.**
A failed quest carries no penalty — participants will simply be returned to their original world automatically.
Time limit: 7 days
Reward: 15,000 Points
Participants required: 2]
"Nine-Tailed Fox Spirit Ahri? League of Legends? LoL? We're actually getting someone straight out of a video game this time? Well, I suppose games count as ACG same as anime does — no rule says it has to be a cartoon specifically."
Ryū wasn't especially well-versed in League of Legends. He'd only ever been a mediocre player himself, someone who dabbled in it purely to kill time.
He didn't know much about the game's champion lore, honestly hadn't bothered digging into the game's actual backstory at all, and had eventually dropped it entirely.
Competitive online games always turned into a mess, in his experience — Player A loses, and Player B's fanbase goes wild mocking them; Player B loses, and it's Player A's fans doing the mocking right back.
As a total bystander to all of it, he'd found the whole thing baffling — start up any random match and you'd already see both sides' fans sniping at each other in the chat. Scroll through Weibo for two seconds and it was the exact same two camps trading barbs there too.
Eventually he'd just uninstalled the whole thing. Out of sight, out of mind.
His skills had never been anything to write home about anyway, so dropping it hadn't taken much soul-searching. Though — before he'd transmigrated, he did remember hearing something about an upcoming "Teamfight Tactics" mode.
Supposedly something like Dota 2's Auto Chess spin-off.
Auto chess, now, that had actually piqued his interest a bit.
He hadn't expected the newcomer to turn out to be Ahri, of all people — one of the game's genuinely popular champions. He knew her at least a little; wasn't she part of that K/DA girl group thing?
Given how dire her situation clearly was, Ryū wasted no time. He screenshotted the invitation quest straight into the chat and tagged the whole group.
RawrSoFierce: [Image] A new Invitation Quest just came up, and it needs two people to cross into the League of Legends world. Whoever's interested, speak now — sounds like a genuine crisis, and time's not on our side. GKD.
Eternally Seventeen: I'll go. "Ahri" already sounds like a girl's name, and a nine-tailed fox spirit besides.
Eternally Seventeen: My own shikigami, Ran, is a nine-tailed fox spirit too. I think I can handle this just fine.
RawrSoFierce: Alright. Anyone besides Yukari want in?
Kaguya-sama: Eh? Admin-sama's not going?
RawrSoFierce: My stamina hasn't recovered yet — that fight really took it out of me.
RawrSoFierce: Was hoping for a Senzu Bean, but apparently they're all planted right now. Guess that's off the table.
That much, at least, was the plain truth. Back in the mirror-space, Ryū had been the only one who never once rotated out to rest — fighting straight through until the rift finally sealed shut.
His stamina right now was down to under ten percent. Heading into a fight in that state, against an unknown, potentially serious threat, was a good way to end up as cannon fodder.
Add in the tight time limit, and there simply wasn't the leeway to sit around and recover first.
Kaguya-sama: Ah, I see... I'll go too, then. I've still got seventy or eighty percent of my stamina — should be more than enough.
RawrSoFierce: Sounds good. Opening up crossing access for the two of you now.
RawrSoFierce: Done — just cross on over whenever, and you're LGTM.
"..."
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