Deletion Survivor WIXOSS (MegaMan Battle Network/ WIXOSS)

verifiaman · Feb 11, 2021

Rei Saiko
Age:23
Country of origin: Japan, Hashima Island
Education: K-12 completion, graduation from West DenTech University, majored in Navi development, computer science, mathematics, communications. Developed Navi FlashMan.EXE at age 19.

Note on Past Experiences
Assistant to Gauss Magnes in the process of turning MagnetMan.EXE into a combat Navi. data for MagnetMan.EXE's abilities were modified and used as the core for FlashMan.EXE's hypnosis abilities. (Note: Advise Saiko not to use the Hypno Flash on Lan Hikari. General surveillance on the boy -seeing grades, observing general behavior, obtaining thrown out report cards- suggests he is in the medium range, smart enough to register the effect, but too stupid for it to affect him. Shoot on sight instead.)

Takeo Inukai
Age: 45
Country of origin: Japan, Tokyo, Yanaka Ward
Education: K-11, falsified documents made by Inukai that showed him having completed the school curriculum. Despite this, developed BeastMan.EXE at age 16. Currently working as a Zookeeper at the Yoka Zoo.

Was able to implant obedience chips into zoo animals and fool regulation and oversight committees into thinking they were regular 134.2kHz microchips. Despite only completing the 6th grade, his smuggling ability is not to be doubted. The bragging is a problem that needs to be rectified immediately. The Gospel and the original WWW has had such idiots in its ranks, and the less Lan Hikari and MegaMan.EXE know, the better.

Noboru Sunayama
Age:32
Country of origin: Japan, Shinjuku
Education: K-12 completion, graduation from Tokyo University before it's closure, majored in Navi Development, Computer Science, Mathematics, Communications, 3D Modelling, Network Development. Bachelor of Applied Science in Film, Television and Digital Production. Created DesertMan.EXE at age 14, modified into combat upon joining organization.

Crimes for potential blackmail:

Extortion (2nd degree)

Threatened DNN president at time into paying him under the table, otherwise the information on him working with Gospel would go public. As of today, Sunayama's monthly wages are approximately ¥218285000.00, 33% of which is being used to fund Pulse Transmission development, as well as hire test subjects for the prototypes

Extortion (2nd degree)

Threatened DNN president yet again at a later date to allow construction of a gate on Hades Island Cyber Network that connects to the Undernet. Extra funds were also procured from the president's bank account to do this as discreetly as possible, to avoid rousing the wrath of the Undernet's more powerful denizens.

Note on Past Experiences
Out of all three, Noboru Sunayama presents the most danger. His adherence to 'TV ratings' and love of the dramatic could make him a potential turncoat. Inukai's brutality and need for destruction makes him a potentially more loyal unit, being simpler to please. Seek deletion of Sunayama should his obsession ruin the plans.

"These three are the best you've got?"

From his desk, deep in a skull shaped cave within the raging Demon Tides, Lord Albert Wily stared at the bushy haired specter of a child, her hair, longer than her body, seemingly glowing all the colors at once, as was her skin. "Yes, these are my minions Mayu, and get out of my private server, I'm sick of the Mr.Progs complaining to me about you!"

The '10-year-old' specter rolled her eyes and did just that. She didn't move an inch, but Wily heard the little creeps sigh in relief, some crying as they put the dossiers back into their proper place. "Thank you. As for your question, I've handpicked these men, and 2 more human operatives, for their skills and competency. Take Mr. Saiko for example, a fantastic record of assassination, years of murder both on the physical and digital realm under his belt! The first Tetracode is within the Hikari brat's school, and with the modifications to FlashMan's beam, Lan wouldn't even be able to jack his Navi in before the knife slits his throat!

"And in case he fails somehow, Inukai's plan will surely get the job done!" Hacking into the Hikari family records was something that Wily could admit was a pain not worth attempting. The best he could do was change the field trip scheduled in the upcoming month to the Yoka Zoo. "And if Lan somehow manages to jack in, Inukai's Navi will get rid of that blue pest! And Sunayama, Sunayama-"

"Please stop gloating daddy." Mayu chastised, floating in front of his face. "Your back can't take another bout of 'Mwahahaha!'"

Wily grumbled. "Yes, you're right. And don't call me that!" The little sadist stuck her tongue out at him before floating back to the other side of his desk. "That's enough for now, what did you come here for?"

Mayu tilted her head at him, confused. "Oh, that's right!" She remembered with a snap of her fingers. "My little project's going along pretty well! My favorite's back and ready to report!"

"Ah, the Ice Navi."

"LRIG."

"I'm not calling them that, just summon her!"

Mayu closed her eyes and held out her hands to the desk. An icy blue pentagram formed a few centimeters above it, icicles shooting out like spears through flesh as what looked like a stage made of ice forming in the center as she began her chant.

A Girl prayed to fulfill her wish.
Scattered strange gene "wixoss"
all around the world fusion into one form.
Searching in vain for a fight...
Victory will be the only way for her
wish to revolutionize.
Now, shall her "Wish Across" be conquered.

And in a flash, she appeared. Wavy blue hair with the left side longer than the right, reaching past her cheek. Pale skin as white as snow, her face being the only thing she had left of her original human form. An icy blue bodysuit covered her entire being from the neck down. and her Navi insignia was quite detailed, far more so than most other custom Navis with a seemingly painted image of a young Japanese teen. She was a brunette, eyes closed and hair done in a left side ponytail. Her eyes were closed as if she were sleeping, hands clasped as if in prayer. "Good evening Lord Wily, Lord Mayu." She kneeled towards Wily, her voice and face blank and expressionless. "My mission is complete."

"Excellent, Piruluk. Did the school's Navis give you any trouble?" A nod from her nearly made him break into a manic fit of laughter, but he had to mind his health. "And is your Selector asking any questions?"

"No.

"Excellent!" Those two boys probably wouldn't even recognize her, how hilarious! "Once you scout out the school, message the schematics to Saiko and Flashman.

"Understood."

"Yes, you may-" Wily put a hand to his mustache, rubbing it. "Ah, that's right. Not to worry; your friend is still alive. Not from a lack of trying from your former LRIG. I'll send you the updated medical data via Mr.Prog tomorrow."

"...Understood. Thank you." Her job done, she teleported out.

"Mayu, has she been getting belligerent?"

"Nope! She's probably anticipating meeting her first friend again! Oh, but I can tell it's eating her up inside!"

The noises coming out of the girl's mouth made Wily regret ever teaching her how to laugh like a proper villain. But he could ignore that. 'If it ain't broke, don't fix it' was a favorite motto of his, and it worked for him in the past when stealing the materials needed for the Life Virus. Soon Thomas's family's greatest legacy would come undone, and in a way, it would be the Lights that would have ended the world. "Cybergeddon is near," he whispered to himself wistfully as he looked up at the dreary ceiling of his hideout. "Alpha will soon be freed, and all will reset to zero."

WESTERN DENTCH, MURASAKI WARD, 22:33

PIRULUK.EXE HAS LOGGED IN.

Just have to activate the cameras aaaand... good; she wasn't here. Letting out a groan of relief, Piruluk began to relax. She wished her Selector upgraded her PET. the Model 1 variant, with it's tiny keyboard and 22GB storage, was hard to move around in, and the modifications her Selector had done to it -touch screen, larger RAM- were barely enough to make her feel comfortable in this claustrophobic nightmare. Still, at least she was alone. now all she had to do was wait for the- "WHERE THE HELL HAVE YOU BEEN?!" -Mr.Prog. Her current Selector picked the PET up, staring her in the eye. Fair skin, unkempt shoulder-length orange hair, and some wrinkled clothes she just randomly put on. Akira Aoi, her Selector, was awake. "I nearly missed my photo shoot because someone didn't set my alarm!"

|My apologies, Miss Akira.| Just die already. |I had business to tend to; namely setting up the tracker on your rival's PET.|

"Oh?" And now the little cunt was all smiles again. Fakeness, that Piruluk could handle. "Then why didn't you say so Pi-Pi? Tell me, where's that little bitch headed?"

|To the Kotobuki City limits.| Her Selector stifled the curse that threatened to escape her lips. "Exactly." How exactly Iona and her LRIG could even enter the Cyber Chernobyl escaped her, especially given how dangerous it was for LRIGs. |The tracking function still works within the city, so if-|

"Nope! Uh-huh!" Akira slammed down into a nearby chair. "I don't even want to think about that dump of a city, or even step foot in there again!"

|Understood. Is there anything else you wish from me? I still have only two Life Cloths left, so if you wish to replenish my stock between shifts, now is the time.| She could never forget the Navi her Selector foolishly ordered to fight. Even with the ARTS Chips that edgelord with the fish helmet and dumb cloak nearly deleted her. They hadn't been in a fight since.

"Grrrrrrrr…" Akira gritted her teeth, remembering that stupid Navi. "Fine!" She pocketed the PET and headed out, ignoring the stagehands and the other employees around her. She was staring at her PET's screen, body on autopilot as she blindly and expertly walked to her destination. Two flights of stairs later she was up on the roof. "4 bars, signal strength in the green, Ener levels stable…" Oh yeah, she needed to recharge those, didn't she? "Alright, we're ready to go!" She held the PET up to the sky, a bright, white pillar of energy shooting from the device's infrared port into the night sky, invisible to all but those who were chosen to participate in this twisted game. "PLUG IN, PIRULUK.EXE! OPEN!"

ACDC Town, 22:36.

Hikari residence.

|That feeling again…|

Bringing the PET out of sleep mode, MegaMan.EXE activated the house's security cameras, turning on the energy scanning function and pointing it in the direction of Beach City. |I knew I wasn't glitching out!| That energy felt so familiar to him. But why?!

MEGAMAN.EXE LOGGING ONTO HIKARI HOMEPAGE.

OFFICIAL NETBATTLER LICENSE RECOGNIZED. (NETSAVER V2, ©SCILAB, 2055)

BATTLECHIP FOLDER PERMISSIONS GRANTED TO NAVI MEGAMAN.EXE.

CHIP FOLDER DOWNLOADED TO REGISTRY.

MEGA CHIP LIMIT: 7

GIGA CHIP LIMIT: 7

RUNNING ANTIVIRUS SCAN…

SCAN COMPLETE. 44 VIRUSES FOUND ON HOMEPAGE. BEHAVIOR IS BENIGN, WILL POSE NO THREAT.

END STARTUP SEQUENCE? [Y/N]

STARTUP SEQUENCE ENDED.

MEGAMAN.EXE LOGGING ON.

In the past, the calming blues of his home away from home would be welcoming. The Mr.Progs were happy, his friends came over, and it was just a nice place to relax. But then Lan had to go and think he was a hot shot programmer, and now… this thing was what greeted him!

"Lucky Lucky, Aki-Lucky! Lucky Lucky, Aki-Lucky!"

Again and again on repeat, each and every single day! That annoying repetition had been grating both his and the ears of the Mr.Progs that lived here, as well as any Navi that visited -well, used to visit- ever since Lan decided he could try uploading his own custom wallpaper. He used to like Akira Aoi, found her quite cute and her personality refreshing. Now he and the Mr.Progs live in fear of the Bethesda level nightmare of modeling incompetence staring down at them from above, looking like an X-ray and a bad render at the same time with 90s level texturing, her favorite quote stuck on a repetitive, never-ending loop of madness. What 'fun!' And what was worse was that dad refused to remove the eyesore as punishment for both of them. For Lan, it was modifying data on the super expensive computer without permission. For him, it was being stupid enough to let Lan modify data on the super expensive computer without permission.

Quickly, very quickly, he ran to the homepage's warp gate, ignoring the crying Mr.Progs. And soon found himself on the safety of ACDC Area 1. "Finally…" Now to see where this energy was going.

ACDC Network, 23:32

Area 1

The locations of businesses and homes on the network corresponded to their locations in the Human World. AKA, the Hikari household was on the same street and geographical location in the Cyberworld as it was in the Human World.

The gate disappeared as MegaMan exited into the area, and two minutes later he was waiting at the bus stop, sitting down on the translucent green bench as he mentally counted his bus fare, aka the internet bill for the month. ' ￥ 38K for the internet, 82GHZ connection, so I can afford the fastest bus. ACDC to Beach City should cost-'

[Hello sir!] Oh, sweet lord, he recognized that flanging effect on the voice! [Would you like to hear about the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ?] MegaMan looked up, very slowly, and gulped as he saw the Navi in front of him. No face, no features, just an empty doll with a symbol above its head. It was a symbol all Navis feared one you needed a plugin just to see. [For just ￥ 55,000 a month, you could get the Lord and Savior's word straight to your homepage! Whatdya say?] This wasn't a Navi; it was an Adbot.

"Thank you, but no." And then he logged the Navi's ID into his system and blocked it, rendering the Navi invisible to him. Which should give him at least six minutes of reprieve until it changed its ID. Using that time, he called the bus, waited 4 minutes until it arrived got on, and sat down. And he just knew from the looks on everyone's faces that the thing followed him on board, still talking about selling Christian videos to him. 'Just keep focused, just keep focused…' He could lose it in Beach Square. Adbots fry like moths to a light when they go there, and luring them to squares was often a thing young Navis and some Netops - like Lan, GutsMan and Dex - did to pass the time.

The bus drove off, MegaMan looking at the passengers to see where they were staring, and punching the space next to it, causing everyone to sigh in relief. But they knew it wouldn't last; these things didn't stay down until you bought something from them, or killed them. And if you killed one, more would come. He, like everyone else, remembered Gospel's global freeze of the entire global Network just a month or two back, and how these abominations ran rampant. If there was anything everyone agreed on, it was that leaving them alone and letting them talk was the best way to get them to stop talking to you.

Beach Area 1, 24:10

Tapioca Shopping Mall lobby, closing time.

Tapioca Mall was one of the biggest online shopping centers in central Japan. Hosting over 50,000 stores connected to retailers all across the country, it was anyone's go to place for shopping online, paying and delivering to your doorstep in a quick, secure, and easy manner. It was so big that the CyberTransit System had its own stops and routes in and out of the mall. Security was high, even now at closing time, with powerful, heavily armed and armored Navis stationed at the many store entrances and entryways, armed with sci-fi equivalents to SIG Sauer MCX Carbines. After WWW and Gospel, it was rare to not see these guys in major places of business and areas of high travel, and they certainly did their job, their presence alone scaring many HeelNavis away. Shame they couldn't do anything about the Adbots.

[Look at these nudes!]

"No."

[Look at these nudes!]

"No."

[Look at these nudes!]

"No."

[Look at these nudes!]

"No."

[Look at these nudes!]

"No."

|Oh, for fuck's sake…| Piruluk heard her Selector say on the other end. |Just shoot the damn thing!|

"You know full well that won't work." Even with this NAT cloak she bought, she had a pretty good feeling that her IP Address was already logged into this thing's systems, and no way was she going to risk the same happening with government security as tight as this by firing a live weapon.

|I don't care! You both have been saying the same damn thing on repeat for days!]

"It's been 40 milliseconds, 30-"

|Don't fuck with me Navi! Is that damn Link up?!|

"45%" That little bitch's screams were so delightful under the right conditions. "Estimated time until-" Her eyes widened. "Oh."

[Look at these nudes!]

LRIG (2) DETECTED.

|Finally, some action! We can steal their Life Cloths! Go over there now!|

[Look at these nudes!]

"Understood." That signal...it's just like the one Wily installed in her databanks. The different shades of blue, the yellow ridges on the helmet, the Hikari family emblem on his chest. The scourge of WWW, the savior of Kotobuki, he was coming here, and like it or not, she'd have to kill him, for her sake. 'I'm sorry Lan.' There was no way they planned this meeting, but Mayu was probably giving her father a front row screening to the upcoming event. 'I'm so sorry.'

[Look at these nudes!]

Piruluk just stared at thing before giving it a fake E-mail account and running off. That oughtta buy her a few minutes. She'd kill Lan's Navi and the two LRIG's in his vicinity, though why she was sensing MegaMan and not picking him up on her other sensors was a mystery. It was almost like her systems thought he was an LRIG or something!

Unbeknownst to the blue LRIG however, her target was suffering from similar pains as she was.

[It's almost closing time little boy! Jesus frowns on those who don't follow the rules!] Because he couldn't get rid of this stupid Adbot! [Let us listen to a sample of the King James Bible full version available for download for ¥6000!] The automatic sidewalk MegaMan was on would be more like a walk of shame if there was anyone else about, listening to the Book of Psalms for the twelfth time! Well, that was a lie. This Adbot was glitched out heavily, so he was only hearing the first six lines of Psalm 74, over and over and over and over and over and over again!

[O God, why have you rejected us forever? Why does your anger smolder against the sheep of your pasture? Remember the nation you purchased long ago, the people of your inheritance, whom you redeemed— Mount Zion, where you dwelt. Turn your steps toward these everlasting ruins, all this destruction the enemy has brought on the sanctuary. Your foes roared in the place where you met with us; they set up their standards as signs. They behaved like men wielding axes to cut through a thicket of trees. They smashed all the carved paneling with their axes and hatchets.]

'Don't kill it, don't form your Buster, just.ignore.it!] No weapons, not here! The source of the energy signature was getting closer, 6 minutes away. 'I can get off there and make a run for Beach Square. Just a bit more!'

[Why thank you, young lady! May the word of Jesus Christ enrich your daily life!] MegaMan blinked; someone paid that thing?! He turned around to see the Adbot teleport away, and in front of him was the girl that paid for his freedom. "Thank you?" This was odd. No Navi insignia, her rig was excellent given her 3D Model, and she looked very familiar. Her skin was fair, not a hint of imperfections, and yet the bump mapping on it was done so well it didn't look 'fake' like designer Navis you could buy at the store. 'Energy signature, 4 minutes away.'

"Sup Mega?" Her attire was pink: pink T-shirt, Pink shorts, pink boots, and pink, fingerless gloves and Hello Kitty-esque hat. Her blonde hair cascaded down to her feet, thick and well detailed, and interacted flawlessly with her body without clipping into it whatsoever. In fact, there wasn't any clipping at all! Even for an expert programmer, making clothes for Navis instead of the usual simple armor and bodysuit- like the maroon one she was wearing, and no Navi insignia to boot- was hard, arduous, and not worth the time. Clothes in the Cyberworld were either physical representations of what the Navi's NetOp wanted to buy, or a status symbol to show off how much money the Navi or NetOp had, and while he'd seen more elaborate clothing in illegal Undernet sales alone, this outfit set expensive enough that the money that went into it could've been better suited paying off at least 2 mortgages "...Is something wrong?"

"Uhh, sorry miss, but do I know you?" Why did she look and sound so familiar? She's using some form of audio filter, a faint one, but it was throwing him off track. "Thanks for getting rid of the Adbot and all, but if you're looking for a favor-"

"-What's wrong with you?" The girl asked. "Lan tried messing with your settings again?" MegaMan backed away and raised his arms into defensive position. "What are you doing?!"

"How did you know that?" Battle Chip selection loaded. "That was on a private server!" The guards had their gazes on the two right now, but he didn't care. "Who are you?"

"...." The girl just stared at him. 'He's not joking…' He's acting as though she was a stranger, but that couldn't be right! "Hold on, let me clear this up."

OPENING PET VID-CHAT

SENDING TRANSMISSION LINK TO MEGAMAN.EXE

|Huh?| A cute, pale-skinned redhead with brown eyes was suddenly staring down on the two Navis, via a holo-screen only the two could see. |Roll, what's going on? I was busy!|

"Sorry Mayl, MegaMan's acting weird and I just wanted to show him that everything's ok!"

A check of the transmission link's ID proved that he was talking to the real Mayl, which meant… "Why are you dressed like that, Roll?"

"Dressed like what?"

"Like a human!" Eyeing her attire, he missed the looks of panic both girls had. "And you have skin showing! How much did this cost you?" And it was upon hearing Mayl whisper 'Oh crap!' that he knew something was up. "...You didn't pay for this, did you?" He saw that look of fear plenty of times, the same look Lan had when he did something he shouldn't have.

|Hey, we didn't steal it! Roll's always had this outfit! How can you see it?| Mayl's eyes narrowed, staring at MegaMan with the same level of suspicion he was giving to her. |Unless you're an LRI-| NAVI HAS SET VOICE CHAT SET TO MUTE.

"I heard L-RIG. You didn't mute it in time, so I heard her form a G. What's an L-RIG?"

Roll giggled nervously. "Oh, you're so silly Mega! It's an acronym that stands for-"

"Activating search function now, and keep in mind you can't Jack Out in the mall."

A twitch began to form in Roll's eye. "Oh, good." She ignored Mayl's constant texts to unmute the channel. "Look, I-" NAVI CHAT FUNCTIONS OVERRIDDEN. CHAT PERMISSIONS TRANSFERRED TO NETOP.

|MegaMan, we're here on personal business, nothing illegal! You've known me since you and Roll were our nanny Navis, do you really think we'd steal something this expensive and come to one of the biggest, most heavily armed malls in the country?|

"I-" ...That was a good point. MegaMan relented. "You're right; I'm sorry Mayl, Roll. you ever get this feeling that you're...meeting someone important and you gotta beat them up? I've been having that feeling a lot, especially after I left the PET to go to Beach City. first that feeling, then the Adbot, and now this L-RIG business, it's making my head-" He suddenly ran towards Roll and grabbed her, jumping into the air with her in tow as a wave of water came towards them.

"What was that?!" Roll's face told him the answer. "Was that from an LRIG?" He landed on an awning, placing Roll down on the roof behind it as the attacker came into view. They wore a light blue cloak, one that made their body as transparent as ice, and completely hid their figure. UNABLE TO ACQUIRE DATA ON LRIG. ACCESS DENIED. Well scanning them was a bust. And again with LRIG, just what was that-

"It's 'girl' spelled backwards." Of course it was. The guards weren't reacting to what just happened, only staring at the two of them cautiously, and the temperature hadn't shifted in the slightest. 'That was a fake!' And a quick scan proved that. It wasn't ice, it was a movie file! And since he was the only one who acted, that meant no one else but him heard or sensed it!

The playback of the fake ice attack ended, causing it to disappear as the cloaked figure turned their attention to the two of them. MegaMan could see their body shift slightly upon looking at him before turning to Roll. "The Girl who Escaped...I've finally found you." So it was a girl after all; that was rare.

Roll gave a nervous smile as MegaMan turned to her. "W-what's she talking about? I don't know what's going on either! Hehehehhehehehehe…."

The figure shook her head. "Of all the people I didn't think I'd meet here, the last two I would expect to meet were you two. Oh well. Two for one deal." She held out a card, one that MegaMan couldn't look at without getting a headache -same as the guards too it seemed- but Roll? She had no problem looking at it. "In any other circumstances, I would ask how you escaped this wretched game. But I need to refill my Life Cloths, and you're still tied to some aspects of the game."

"What are you talking about?!" Roll yelled, MegaMan rolling his eyes at the poor acting from his friend. "I'm not into WIXOSS or anything!"

"Oh, for Pete's sake..." MegaMan formed his Buster. "Let's just fight, far away from here please."

"Don't worry, that won't be a problem." The card began to glow. "Since neither of you have participated in a fight for an extended period of time, you have no choice but to fight."

"Tch!" Roll gritted her teeth, loading her Card Folder as MegaMan began cycling through his Chips. "Fine. We have no choice. Mayl?"

|Yeah, I got it!| She shot a regretful look at MegaMan before pointing her PET's infrared port to the window outside. |Ready Roll! Battle Routine, Set!|

"...Execute." If she believed in God still, then she would be praying MegaMan would survive this. He had the skill, but not the strength, and in this twisted game, you needed both. "GATE OPEN!"

Piruluk sighed as she looked at MegaMan. 'Killing two people to save one.' Not the worst thing she's done since becoming an LRIG.

verifiaman · Feb 11, 2021

Looking into his mirror, clad in his skull themed briefs, Wily took out his teeth and put them in the cup/auto denture cleaner, giving himself a long hard stare in the mirror, focusing his hatred on the family that vexed him so by imagining it was that stupid grandson of Thomas's staring back at him. He waited until the timer beeped before putting them back into his mouth and smacking his lips to test them out. "Good, good." Now it was time for bed. He turned around, walked to his bed, and was blindsided by a holo-screen showing a very familiar blue Navi that had vexed him twice. "What in the world?"

"Daddy!" Wily didn't flinch when Mayu flew through his body and framed his head in her hands with an excited smile. "That dumb Navi's fighting my favorite LRIG! Isn't that cool?"

"..." Wily shook his head, much to Mayu's confusion as he sat on the bed, moving the screen to his front. "End the fight. now."

"Huh?! But why?! He's not connected to the Life Cloth System! Any attack from her could kill him in one hit!"

"You underestimate the Lights Mayu. trust me, he's going to find a way out of this, stronger than ever…" And of course that puppy dog stare. That fascination she had with Piruluk was going to be the death of him, he knew it. "Fine, whatever."

"YAAAAY" That stupid blue Navi was so gonna get it! He nearly killed her hero the first time, and now her favoritest LRIG was gonna kill him! And since this wasn't a face to face fight, that means she had a front row seat to the live beatdown coming up!"Get him Piruluk."

AREA SCANNED FOR COMBAT POTENTIAL.

BATTLEFIELD SIZE: 500 SQUARE FEET.

TERRAIN: METAL

COMBATANTS

MEGAMAN.EXE

HP: 1200

CHIP COUNT: 30.

MEGA CHIP COUNT: 7

GIGA CHIP COUNT: 3

WIXOSS CERTIFICATION:HUB.BATCH(?)

ROLL.##%#3 (UNKNOWN NAVI!)

HP: 54$%$%%

CHIP COUNT: #%#%#

MEGA CHIP COUNT: $#$#

GIGA CHIP COUNT: #$#$#T%#%

WIXOSS CERTIFICATION: SAKURAI.LM

LUCKYRUCKY.EXE

HP: #$%#%#%#

CHIP COUNT: #$#$#$#

MEGA CHIP COUNT: #$#%#%#

GIGA CHIP COUNT: #$#$#$#$#$#

WIXOSS CERTIFICATION: MIZUSHIMA.LM

BATTLE FORECAST END.

'That's ominous..' Mega Man thought as the Battlefield around them loaded, the three of them in a white void as they waited. The Battle Forecast was a very powerful tool at his disposal, a form of hacking...at least he thought it was. Dad was very vague about it, and he was pretty sure that he didn't know much about it himself. With it, he was always able to see the Chips and attack patterns of his enemies down to when they would attack. Not that it helped him sometimes because he still had to dodge the attacks and know what the Chips can do, but it was something neither Wily nor Sean could counter. But this Navi, she managed to cloud both her's and Roll's data from his vision!

The Battlefield finally loaded, and it was a copy of Tapioca Mall, or at least the floor that they were on, now devoid of guards or anyone else except the three of them. Below was the trainyard, a section that was at least 6 minutes away from here, was below them, adding more to the blue Navi's confusion,them. Before he could ask for answers, a pink gauntlet with glowing pink liquid appeared on her right arm. DATA NOT FOUND. "You're going to tell me everything, right?"

"Yeah..I do.." Roll looked at him with a sad smile. "Mega, please just stay-" Her eyes widened as he walked to a seat and sat down. "You're gonna let me handle this?" MegaMan nodded. "Why?"

"I have no idea what's going on, but you do. LuckyRucky called you 'The Girl Who Escaped', and my Battle Forecast is glitched out with something called WIXOSS Certification added to it's list of categories. Right now, I'm just here for support. Until I know just what's going on or what happened to my systems, I'm not fighting on the front lines.

"Alright." Roll turned to LuckyRucky, attempting to open a CommLink to the enemy Selector's PET. USER REGISTERED TO PRIVATE. "What's wrong? Your Selector scared?"

"No." Piruluk's attention was divided between Roll and MegaMan. 'To think that Lan's grown so much.' Then again given what he's been through and done, you'd have to have a sturdy head on your shoulders. Shame she was about to chop one of them off. "Enough talk. Turn counter stopping in 3...2...1…"

FIRST GROWTH: ROLL.

"GROW!" Roll shouted, her hair gaining a pinkish tint as LuckyRucky flew towards her with a plain looking blue staff with a blue, crystal orb. Looking through her cards, Mayl selected her first SIGNI and placed them. 'Not a good hand-' Roll thought as she read the data Mayl transmitted to her. Two Level 5s, one level 1, and two level 3s '-But it will have to do!'' She rolled out of the way as LuckyRucky slammed her staff down at the spot she was at, creating a chill in the air that made Roll feel very sluggish for a second. 'She was channeling some elemental energy...was that her Charge Shot?' But it was so weak!

ROLL.EXE

LIFE CLOTH DURABILITY: 40,000

-200 DUE TO SPLASH DAMAGE.

SPEED LOWERED FOR 20 SECONDS.

"What in the world?" MegaMan blinked as she watched Roll bob and weave through the staff strikes,becoming sluggishly slow at random intervals. He-he couldn't have read all that correctly, could he? But a cursory glance told him that yeah, he did read it correctly! '200 damage in one hit?!' But Roll only had 122 HP the last he checked! Acting quickly, He quickly loaded up his BattleChip Folder and barely a second later loaded up the pieces to his favorite combo.

Program Advance

Sword A + WideSword A + LongSword A = Lifesword

FireSword H + AquaSword H + ElecSword H = LifeSword2

Before he could make another, his attention was necessitated by the fight in front of him, namely dodging a streak of pink smoke that stopped just before it hit the bench. All three of them looked on in shock, Roll apologizing quickly as she and her opponent frantically looked around.

"Sorry Mega!"

|Whew! We're good Roll. You stopped it just in time.|

|What the hell was that pink little twerp thinking?!| Thankfully their IP wasn't logged, but still! |Piruluk, can we leave?|

"No." the LRIG answered as she caught Roll's punch by grabbing her arm with both hands, kicking her in the stomach and then using her leverage to slam the pink LRIG -gently- onto the ground before quickly bringing her staff out and slamming it into her.

|ROLL!|

ROLL.EXE

LIFE CLOTH DURABILITY: 39,600

-200 DUE TO SPLASH DAMAGE.

FROZEN SOLID!

Got the mystery out of the way for now, time for the main threat. Piruluk turned to face Lan's Navi as it readied what looked to be a Ver2 LifeSword, and pointed the blade at her. "I know you can see our HP values and damage data without a NetOp. Do you really think a measly 500HP sword will hurt me?"

"Nope." With his free hand, he summoned a Minibomb and bounced it casually. "But this will." He threw the bomb, LuckyRucky easily catching it. "Oops."

"What are you plann-" The bomb then exploded, only it was harmless white smoke that was not good for her throat. "You think that-" she began hacking violently, tears running down her eyes as she tried to reorient herself. "That this will-" And then she felt it, what had to be one of the worst pains imaginable, 3rd only to that Navi with the fins and the cloak. The thing about LifeSwords 2&3 was that when making the Program Advances for them, all three elements were in effect. Now for normal Navis that wasn't much of a problem, since the three elements would cancel each other out no matter what elemental affinity the Navi belonged to. Not so much for LRIGs, as Piruluk realized, unable to move thanks to the giant hand-sword in her chest. "T-that...how?!"

MegaMan raised a brow as LuckyRucky dropped her staff. "I distracted you?" He drove the sword deeper into her chest. And just what did she mean by 'measly?'

"N-not that!" How was it able to hurt her?! "GRRRK!" With a kick to his abdomen that sent him into a wall without damaging it, she managed to wring herself free from the blade, floating away with the finesse of a bloodied drunk as she looked at her stats . 'That's impossible!'

|C-can this WIXOSS stuff glitch out or something Piruluk?!| Because from where Akira was standing, Piruluk didn't lose a single hit point!

"N-no…" Oh, she felt like she was gonna puke! "BattleChips, now. "

|U-um yeah!| God it felt so weird seeing Piruluk like this! Luckily her LRIG always made her keep some BattleChips mixed in with her deck. |Recover 200!|

It didn't do much for her injuries, but it was like a wonderful morphine injection. "I'm back." She muttered weakly, attempting her normal, lifeless tone. "We need to get rid of him, now." She dodged another strike from Lan's Navi, easily getting out of the way of the LifeSword2. "Take a look at his stats."

|Hm?| Akira did so, and here eyes widened with glee. |That kick took off 600HP!| Yeah, that's right! All damage was doubled against non-LRIG Navis! |Sending cards now!| Now while she enjoyed taking her time with weaklings, she wasn't stupid, despite what her grades told you. This blue twerp managed to stab Piruluk, make it hurt like hell, and yet didn't take off a single bit of HP. Not only that, but he was in a fucking Selector Battle like he was an LRIG, and the WIXOSS System treated him as though he was an LRIG! Was it some NetSaver shit she didn't know about? Doesn't matter! Her PET was giving her a deletion warning given how severe his damages were, something it never did in a WIXOSS fight! |Let's get rid of him!| And she knew just what to send her! |Data sent!|

"Good." And it was the perfect card to use against the thing. Clutching her still pained stomach, she waited for Lan's Navi to come after her again, using a different strategy this time to confuse her by activating LifeSword2's AquaBlade and then quickly switching to the fire one to create scalding steam. She simply floated above it and tracked him through the steam. "Peeping Analyze.

PEEPING ANALYZE ACTIVATED. 2(BLUE) CARDS DISCARDED FOR COST

NO WIXOSS CARDS FOUND ON TARGET.

SELECT LETTER, ELEMENT, OR CHIP TYPE AS TARGET.

Akira pursed her lip. The Navi was a NetSaver, one trusted enough to use BattleChips without his NetOp's input. He could have Program Advances out the ass waiting for her, able to deal out pain while pinkie thawed out! |Let's see… Element. Sword!|

TARGET FOUND!

ALL SELECTED CARDS WITH (SWORD ELEMENT) DISCARDED

"He felt that one." Piruluk noted, seeing him stop in place in the smoke and look around frantically. "Code ART: RFR." She held out her hand, and in her palm formed a smiling snowman the size of a basketball.

Code Art: RFR

[ON PLAY] Draw 1 card

"Goodbye." And with as much strength as she could, she threw the snowman at Lan's Navi, who unfortunately saw it as the snow cleared. He shot at it with his Buster, though it only slowed it's descent slightly, allowing the thing to dodge out of the way of her attack as the snowman exploded into a thick sheet of ice. "Fast."

"What did you do?!" The kick that took out half his health, and now his Sword Chips were all gone?!

"Simple Magic." Piruluk said, suddenly behind him. Before he could react however, she grabbed him by the throat, and began to choke hard. "You're going to pay for that stab wound."

Akira blinked. 'Jeez, Piruluk must really hate this guy.' That fish head guy with the cloak was the only other one to harm her that badly, and she never straight out choked him! |Hm?| She looked over to pinky's stats, and saw the frozen icon was slowly fading away. |Piruluk!|

"I know." She could hear the ice cracking from here. "Let's see how well you can stand up to a WIXOSS Card." She continued to choke it, hard enough to make it hurt, but only enough to drain his HP just a bit, and waited for Roll's ice to shatter. She heard the pink LRIG yell to let her go, along with fast footsteps. When she was just seconds away from her, Piruluk immediately put Lan's Navi in front of her, letting it take the full brunt of the poison as it let out a loud, pained scream.

MEGAMAN.EXE

UNDERSHIRT ACTIVATED

DELETION IMMINENT! DELETION IMMINENT!

"Gagagagagagaggg!" Gritting his teeth, MegaMan ignored his horrified friend and bent his knee to kick Piruluk straight into her stab wound, causing her to let him go in her pain as she staggered backwards. He quickly jumped out of the way ,his eyes motioning for Roll to attack as he hid behind a pillar.

"O-ok then… Iruka, Water Phantom!" A microphone appeared in Roll's hand, which she then put close to her lips and began to sing into it. The loud vibrations formed into heart shaped streams of water, that hit the recovering Piruluk straight into her wound.

Piruluk.EXE

LIFE CLOTH DURABILITY: 12,000

-1000 damage.

Effect of Iruka, Water Phantom Activated. Opponent must Show top card!

"Asterisk huh?" Roll noted as she went to and picked up her nearly dead friend. 'I didn't think that LRIGS of her caliber still used BattleChips.'

|Roll, get to the lower floors!| Mayl instructed, frantically looking over MegaMan's single remaining hit point. |At least two of these cards can buy us some time if we hide down there!|

"Got it!" Seeing the LRIG come at her with the staff again, Roll this time lead her to a pillar and jumped onto and then off of it, using it to bounce herself off of the current floor and down to the second one below. 'No status changes.' And the slowdown effect didn't stack, so she had an inkling of her enemy's effect range at this level. Now she was hoping it was just a gradual increase in range when she grew to Level 2.

'She's faster.' Piruluk noted as Roll carried Lan's Navi to the second floor below, sending a charge shot her way that only dealt a pitiful 50HP to her. 'And my Custom Gauge is not even halfway filled.' Ice LRIGS like her always had this problem, their greatest strength weakening them as well. 'Oh...the shot was poison too.' No wonder it did such pitiful damage.

|WHY THE HELL IS THIS STUPID GAUGE NOT FULL YET?!|

Plus she had to deal with that blaring in her ears. At least her Charge Shot was faster than it was against Bass. The Navi Customizer prototype Wily managed to swipe at least helped somewhat with her attack capabilities.

|PIRULUK, GET DOWN THERE AND KICK HER ASS!|

"Fine." This was obviously a trap, but her enemy had a massive ball and chain in the form of Lan's Navi, and Piruluk was going to exploit the hell out of that. Just one hit and it would be finished.

|J-Just don't blow anything up or damage anything! I don't want any of this to be connected back to me!|

Like she would ever do that. WWW's plans hadn't even started yet, so what was the point in screwing the little brat over just yet?

There were three trains parked before the Battlefield was loaded. Big ones, able to hold over 5000 humans if this was in their world, and it made the perfect hiding spot for the two for the last 10 minutes.

'Now this is something I can use!' Roll thought as she looked out at the train windows. LuckyRucky was looking for the two of them, slowly looking at any potential hiding spots like behind pillars or under stairs, and sometimes even under a bench to make sure they weren't hiding by using data compression. 'She's not taking any chances either I see.' In the decade since she had escaped these battles, this was the one rule both Selectors and LRIG's followed: Do not, under any circumstances, fight in public areas.

And if you were going to damage the area around you, make sure it wasn't populated or had high security. Because even within the safety of the battlefield, the dreaded IP Tracker followed LRIGs like a plague, and unlike a Navi there was no easy way of masking it if you damaged anything, whether you were in a WIXOSS Duel or otherwise. Her and MegaMan still had some time to hide thankfully. When your Custom Gauge filled, you had to choose a card, one minimum or more depending on your current Level within a minute, three in the case of wireless fights, or you lose the match automatically. And once the card selection screen was activated, any LRIG would know where you were immediately. A Slow Gauge BattleChip from MegaMan helped mitigate that problem for her.

BOOM!

Roll let out a small chuckle at the harmless explosion. 'Too bad!' Before they hid, MegaMan, still barely functioning, decided to lay some traps of his own, sending twenty Ratton 3 mobile drones that he instructed to hide behind any possible place LuckyRucky would look, their detonation codes altered to some of the most painful looking smoke she had ever seen. "Beartrap, Medium Trap."

3 CARDS ADDED TO HAND.

NEZUKOZO, SMALL TRAP ACTIVATED. (SELECT 1 [TRAP] FROM DECK.)

|Alright, here we go!| Mayl touched the deck icon on her PET, which opened up a list with the specified parameters given to her by the card's effect. |No, no, no, no, no - got it! I'm sending the data now!|

"Got it! Thanks Mayl!"

"She's coming over to this train." MegaMan warned, his model glitching out from his instability. "If you have a plan, let me know and I'll set up more drones." Custom Screen came up again, no recovery chips. Great.

"Hmmm…" She opened up her status screen, which detailed the health of all currently active combatants, as well as the remaining cards in their decks. LuckyRucky's was set to private, the fact she had enough points to afford said function worrying Roll greatly, and MegaMan's information was nothing but a jumbled mess of letters and numbers for some reason. Was it because of how messed up he was?. "Mega?"

"Yeah?"

What's your WIXOSS Certification File? You had to have seen it when the battlefield was loading."

"It was Hub.Batch for some reason, why?"

|I knew it!| Mayl said with glee. |You hurt LuckyRucky, but didn't take off any Hit Points! Your BattleChips hurt LRIGS, and your defense systems are saving you from being deleted by SIGNI attacks| MegaMan thought on that; so that meant that his UnderShirt program should have been either bypassed or deleted along with him under normal circumstances. |Do you know what this means?|

"No?

"It's like you're not inserted properly into the system!" Roll continued happily. "It's like when Dex and Lan tried putting your programs into old ROM files!"

"Don't remind me…" The week of repairs was awful, all so that those two nimrods could cheat at old games to show up some high school kid. "I remember that clearly. Mine and GutsMan's parameters were 99.99% compatible, but just one number threw off the entire…" His eyes widened in realization. "...Oh! Now I get it!"

"Despite what you saw, LRIGS are LM Files, not EXE! The EXE extension is a fake to bypass system lockouts if we're on a different device! That little 'thing' you told us about back on Wily's Island that connects you with Lan? That must be how you're able to do all this, even fight in a Selector Battle!"

"And since I'm not properly inserted into the system, some of the rules won't apply to me!" A smile came onto MegaMan's face, one as big as Roll's as he handed her temporary admin privileges to his systems. "I get what's going on here! Just tell me what I need to do!

Upon tiptoeing down the flight of stairs, he heard the cloaked Navi shuffling around through the furniture and luggage on the current floor. Bags left behind, suitcases, and many fridges containing replenishing Cyber Food for 5000 Zenny per meal. 'Just have to get closer…' VID-LINK OPEN. PATCHING ROLL.EXE TO OPTIC AND AUDIO SYSTEMS. "Is this good?" He got confirmation from Roll, who used his lips to utter the words "Itete, Small Trap." And he could see where the trap was laid. Now he just needed to get her to the trap. "AreaGrab."

"Where are they?" Piruluk muttered as another smoke bomb exploded in her face. "Lovely." Suddenly she felt an intense pressure around her neck and something cold against her cheek. It made a cocking sound, just like a gun. "Hello?"

"Gotcha!" He turned back to the spot he was just at, ran towards it with LuckyRucky in tow, and slammed her face first into the area, triggering the trap and jumping a good three inches away. A mousetrap formed under her, and before she could even react, it snapped down on her back.

PIRULUK.EXE

LIFE CLOTH DURABILITY: 11,000

-2000 HP FROM LV1 SIGNI

OPPONENT MAY NOW CHOOSE RANDOM CARD FROM HAND TO DISCARD.

|SON OF A BITCH!| Akira shouted as a cursor began rapidly going over the cards on her screen. And the Custom Gauge was now almost full! |WHY DON'T YOU GO FASTER YOU STUPID-oh I didn't need that card anyway. Phew!|

SECOND GROWTH: PIRULUK

|Finally!| Now she could use some SIGNI worth a damn, and she'd be rid of that LRIG and her Navi boyfr-why wasn't Piruluk moving? The mousetrap was gone, she should be up and ready to kick some ass! PIRULUK.EXE HAS BEEN PARALYZED BY ZAPRING3. NO HP LOSS HAS OCCURRED, ATTACK FUNCTIONALITY OF BATTLECHIP DISABLED WITH NETSAVER LICENSE V2. PARALYSIS TIME: 20 SECONDS +50 DUE TO ELEMENTAL WEAKNESSES AND HUB34#$#$#$#$# (UNKNOWN FILE!) |GRRRRRRRRRRRR! EEAAAAGHH!| Cheating! That Navi was fucking cheating!

"So you're a water element Navi." MegaMan said with a grin as he used another of his NetSaver privileges, swapping out BattleChips as he pleased, and switched all his chips to electric. "Come on down Roll."

Roll quickly ran down and aimed her gauntlet at the downed LRIG. "Thanks Mega! Comrus, Medium Trap!" A slot opened at the top of Roll's gauntlet, which emitted a holographic keyboard that began lighting up rapidly, and with each key they lit up, a bolt of blue energy struck LuckyRucky.

PIRULUK.EXE

LIFE CLOTH DURABILITY: 9,000

-5000 HP FROM LV2 SIGNI

THIRD Growth: ROLL

"Grow!" Upon uttering those words, a second gauntlet formed on her left hand, this one glowing blue. Seeing that the paralysis timer was almost up, Roll charged up her energy, causing the gauntlets to glow brightly. "How many more Elec Chips do you have MegaMan?"

"30. Changed my Chip loadout a few seconds ago. Speaking of which.." He fired another ZapRing3 into the downed Navi, increasing the paralysis time. For some reason he could hear someone screaming and cursing. She sounded familiar, and very very aggravating. "I never thought I'd see the day where I'd be a glitch in the system." He said as he began charging his Buster. It was one of the hardest things to do, especially at the current state he was at. Whatever the parameters were that enveloped the mall, he was an outlier, something that counted and as compatible, but just barely. He was basically a tool, and as such could be modified by someone like Roll, who in this case was a 'registered user.' Good old glitches and technicalities! With just a thought, a yellow aura began to envelop him,his left arm forming into a giant hand the size of his body. With a yell, he bought it down at-

ADMIN INTERFERENCE DETECTED, JACKING OUT ALL PLAYERS.

RESULTS:

ROLL.EXE. LIFE CLOTH HP TOTAL: 39,600.REMAINING LIFE CLOTHS: 6

PIRULUK.EXE. LIFE CLOTH HP TOTAL: (4,000) REMAINING LIFE CLOTHS: 2

MEGAMAN.EXE. LIFE COUNT HP TOTAL: S%#%#%

ADMIN DECISION: THIS MATCH IS A DRAW!

Skull Island, 24:33

"...." She didn't even need to look at him to feel his disappointment.

"..."

"....I-"

"And now MegaMan knows of the Selector Battles. Are you happy, Mayu?"

"No daddy…"

Wily let out a yawn as he fully got into bed and pulled the covers over himself. "Thomas's luck flows through their veins, remember that. Even if you have them at gunpoint, and I have plenty of times, they'll always find a way to get out of this." Not to mention having to call in Piruluk tog et their ace in the hole back in line. That GetAbility program of his was truly a marvel of power. "That's why when you fight a Hikari, you go for overkill, got it? Don't stop until they're 6 feet under

"Alright. Get some sleep...and I'm sorry."

Wily's face softened before scrunching up. He suddenly felt Mayu's presence leave the area. "Stupid girl." She was warned not to underestimate the two. The strength they carried was immense, something she would have known if he put his put down and forced her to participate in mission briefings, and tonight MegaMan had proven he didn't need his NetOp to activate the Style Change. By tomorrow, Lan would learn of the LRIGs, and soon, he would acquire a WIXOSS deck of his own. The fact MegaMan could even compete in the first place was something he predicted, given the propensity for last minute miracles the boys seem to be fond of, he just wished it happened after he at least had one TetraCode in his possession.

WESTERN DENTCH, 24:33

MURASAKI WARD

On any other day, Akira would be delighted to see her LRIG looking so pathetic and frazzled, And the gaping stab wound in the miss Stick Up Her Ass's chest was the icing on the cake as well. Her outfit was smoking, her body was twitching randomly despite her admirably trying to keep up that ice queen look of hers, and she was stuttering a lot. Her hair had exploded into a giant afro with burn marks, and her attempt to act like her Rei Ayanami wannabe self and failing would be hilarious.

|I-I-I-I-I| SWITCHING TO TEXT MODE.

But today was not one of those days. "Piruluk, what the hell was that?!" Her LRIG had been hit by Battlechips before, especially electrical ones. The weakness she had to electric attacks was something that was unavoidable, given that LRIGS were just souped up Navis in the end, and they had to follow the Light Albert laws of Cyberphysics to even function on the Net. But whenever she was hit by an electrical attack, even from Program Advances, they didn't do any damage. Hell , they shouldn't have affected her, or hurt her! But look where little miss Ice Queen was now, ass kicked by some skinny twerp in a jumpsuit with a stab wound from a goddamn Program Advance!

|If you mean how that Navi was able to hurt me, I am unsure.| Was the first line of text that appeared on screen. |If you meant who ended the fight however, that I can answer. At any time, the creator of this game can Jack Out any players participating in wireless Selector Fights . It seems that Navi being able to harm me in any capacity was a big enough threat to the game, and whether or not he disabled the Chip's attacking capabilities is irrelevant at this point. She's probably going over the data right now of my one sided fight as we speak.|

It took Akira a second to decipher that fancy looking chicken scratch Piruluk chose for a font. She never could read that fancy cursive crap. "Damn it…" Her luck was getting better and better, wasn't it? Piruluk's slowing effect would have frozen that Navi with just a few strikes if she didn't have to worry about lawsuits or fines! "Fuck it, I got school tomorrow." At least there was one bright spot for her. Tonight, she would say goodbye to her old school, where everyone treated her like a joke and she was the town clown, all because of that Iona bitch. Tomorrow, ACDC Academy was where she would complete her education. A prestigious academy in the sticks, she could start anew, regain her social standing, and with the credentials there, getting her ticket back to the top would be a cinch!! "Go to Beach Square and put a note on a BBS or something. Maybe we can wrangle in some weaklings in the morning if anyone responded. I'm going to bed." 3 years of hell because of that bitch, having to scrape by with shitty public access advertisements that of course her 'generous' sponsor got over 88% of the cut for each job! But now that she got into ACDC Academy, it was only a matter of time before Akira Aoi was back on time! In just a few months she'd be 18 years old, and before that day comes, it'll be that black haired bitch and her creepy LRIG living in some SHIT FLAT WITH A 44KB CONNECTION!

|Understood.|Piruluk set Akira's alarm, downloaded the t directions to get from here via bus or train, put the nudes in the trash folder - 'Goddamnit.' The Adbot must've logged her IP Address before the fight. Now she had to wade through this crap.

MEGAMAN.EXE HAS LOGGED ONTO HIKARI HOMEPAGE

"Lucky Lucky, Aki Lucky, Lucky Lucky, Aki Lucky…"

MegaMan gently petted one of the frightened Mr.Progs, knowing full well shooting that abomination in the sky would only damage the computer. "It's going to be ok." He said soothingly. "She can't hurt you."

"A-ARE YOU SURE?" The little guy asked through heavy tears.

"Yeah, I'm sure." None of them were in a state to help him right now. Someone hacked into the transmission link and Jacked Out not only him, but probably Roll and the other Navi. "Get some rest, I'll take over from here."

"THANK YOU!"

The Mr.Prog jacked out with a shout of 'I'M FREE!', which caused the others to do so, thinking they were being let go for the night. A growl escaped MegaMan's lips as he went and locked the Homepage up for the night. By now, the Sakurai Homepage would be locked up tight. The only way to get some answers now would be to wake Lan up and have his brother take him there,b ut given his grades today, Mom would throw a fit if they tried that. And so reluctantly he got some sleep. And come sunrise, Mayl and Roll had a lot of explaining to do.

verifiaman · Feb 11, 2021

BeachArea 4, 12:50

Square Entrance

For the Netizens of Eastern DenTech, Beach Street's Cyberworld was a reprieve from the cold industrial feeling of the other networks. No smokestacks, cold grey buildings, or gloomy skies, but calming waves with the most impressive looping animations and sounds on the net. The water moved realistically, as smooth as the real thing, and interacted with the environment flawlessly without clipping into the area's geometry. Palm trees were properly textured and sized, with the textures aligned perfectly to each 3D model, and though they couldn't replicate the feel of a real palm tree, they were getting close. Beach Area however, was just the main appetizer for Beach Street's and Eastern DenTech's source of income and the origin of the heaviest internet traffic in all of DenTech City next to Tapioca Mall: Beach Square

Beginning development after the Oven Fire Tragedy, which claimed the lives of over 55 people, 122 homes, and the perpetrator was never found, the Squares were a worldwide effort to give Navis and humans a feeling of safety, where they wouldn't have to worry about intercepted phone calls or Emails, where they can buy and sell safely, and where, and this was most important to the average civilian, they wouldn't be hounded by viruses at every corner. Such a thing exploded in popularity, and thanks to the efforts of one Dr. Hikari, there was never a worry of a server crash, lagging, or Certificate Rejection as a result of overloaded servers, preventing Navis from entering or exiting. In addition to having the same, strict level of security for each of them, the Squares had different themes, sizes, and sometimes shapes, and Beach Square's was no different, it's entirety wrapped up in a giant clam shell that required an escalator -or elevator for those who can afford higher internet speeds- to get down to.

"Almost there…" Piruluk mumbled with a yawn, still in her NAT cloak. "Just a bit more…" Coming her always calmed her down. The extravagance and opulence on display was put more into the calming effect of the area to mix in with showing off how rich Beach Street was instead of sticking out like one of Akira's stress pimples back when she 86'd her career. Take the sky here, one of the more disorienting sights for first timers to the area. Usually you'd have to go to places like SciLab's main Network -or WWW's home server- to see something this detailed, but it was right up there, and with no strain on the server's performance. It was multilayered, three layers she guessed, the first being a looping water effect with transparent blue colors.

The second showed an upside down reef that changed every six hours or so. Both them and the fish that swam to and fro were on a RNG system, with a smart filter preventing any shapes that one would deem inappropriate from forming, and keep certain animals from appearing -though you'd have to register and pay for that so you wouldn't see the animal from your point of view. That was the second layer. The third layer was the night sky, a live feed of the stars above DenTech to give it that authentic feel. The escalators and elevators had the same RNG algorithm implemented into them as well. The balustrade of the escalators had mini reefs and fish built into it, and the elevators could be customized for any underwater theme that you wanted, provided you had the cash. All in all, this was the perfect place to forget about Akira, WWW, the thing that had Lan's face, the stab wound it gave her, and Akira, and just calm herself down. She had a busy morning ahead of her, and she didn't want to waste it.

Downtown ACDC, 01:11

Security Sector 1

From military buffs to mecha hobbyists and even college level programmers, the Sniper Joe line of robots was a threshold only the most ambitious could ever dream of crossing.

Averaging out at a 5'5" with few height variations depending on the model, the Sniper Joe robots were a multipurpose line of machines designed for pretty much anything. Bodyguarding, policing, killing, they were something to be loved by those who've seen them from afar, adored by those who controlled them as it made their lives a lot easier, and hated by those who've been at the end of their gun barrels, and those who have had the misfortune of being in that situation were in the majority of those who interacted with these things. Yes, Sniper Joes were better at killing things rather than anything else, and with their somewhat dimwitted AI and inability to connect to a modern network, it made hijacking by NetNavi or any analogous method of control impossible.

Unless you were working with the man who created the killer robots, which in that case you just waved hi to the bucket of bolts as you walked by, which is what one Rei Saiko did, despite being in Japan's Bingo Book for a bucketload of crimes, which was what one Rei Saiko was. Lord Wily was truly a genius ahead of his time. A simple signal transmitter in his robes given to him by the future destroyer of the world exploited a flaw in the Joe's coding for their optical display, registering him as friendly, as well as sending a second signal to scramble the video feed. Anyone looking over the robot's data would see nothing wrong, and won't suspect even the slightest bit of sabotage. The robots ignored Saiko as they patrolled the ruins of downtown ACDC, all for a prize that wasn't there.

WWW's attack on the area's automated traffic system was one of the organization's more ambitious acts of terrorism, one that put the name on the map and left the Japanese slang version of LOL something to be reviled. Madoi Iroaya's hijacking of the the area's network also hooked her up to the surveillance system for all of the city, and with a little bit of Wily's knowledge, soon the whole of Japan bore witness to WWW's might.

￥22 million yen worth of damages, over 122 business shut down, and over 110 casualties made the Auto-Traffic tragedy the worst terrorist attack to hit Japan, at least until Gospel came along. 'Scuttle all you want, little tin cans, you're never going to find what you're looking for.' Make a stink online about some hidden cache of WWW data, and the government was getting their guard dogs to look for a fool's errand. How funny! 'Now where was that satellite dish?' With a flick of his left sleeve, his PET flew out, and he caught it in his hand. "FlashMan, how much farther?"

|22 meters. Make a right at the next corner and head in through the emergency exit to your left.| Saiko looked in the general area he was being directed to. All he saw was some dinky antennae at the top of a building. "Is it inside the facility?"

|No. The antennae is your destination.|

"I see…" A small beeping noise from his clothing told him the cloaking device's battery was almost out of energy. He'd have to recharge soon.

He managed to get up to the building with little difficulty, save for some bodies as a result of poor cleanup, or whatever backhanded deal Lord Wily did to get these robots stationed here. The antennae itself was an antique of times past,one of those giant 'rabbit-ear' signal transmitters back in the early 1990s. And in quite excellent condition. It was still receiving power, and the robots and their human masters seemed to have ignored it altogether. Patting the device at the base, he found a Jack-In, port, PET Model 1, Version 2, from back when he was a child. "It's so dusty…" Thick dust at that, clogging the port and would fry his PET if he tried plugging it in. Saiko sighed as he pulled a cotton swab and a bit of rubbing alcohol from his robes. "Why can't people keep these things clean?"

3 minutes later the port was clean. Searching through his robes, he pulled out a microfiber cloth and a PET Model 1 Jack-In Cable, first cleaning off the port of any residue, and then plugging the cable into a special slot on the back of his PET. "Jack-in, FlashMan.EXE. Execute."

Like many powerful Navis, ones with high processing power, low bulk, and the ability to process things over 200 MB, FlashMan. EXE's design was akin to a man in a costume. ' In FlashMan's case, his skinsuit was pitch black, little shading or lights on it's texturing to give it any sort of definition when looking at it from any angle. Stomach length, dark lilac armor covered his chest and back, a tall collar protecting his neck area from the sides and behind, and two cables sticking out from an ovular energy pack like handlebars. His face was covered by, or perhaps truly was nothing more than a silver faceplate hiding a black, featureless void, with an unique eye shape: although both optic pupils were distinct, there was no flesh or metal separating the eyes, with their connection visible at close range.His shoulders were perfect spheres, the bottom parts the same lilac color as his armor, and the top part a translucent yellow dome containing various bits of circuitry and nodes that flickered every few seconds. His helmet also had a yellow dome atop it, wider than his head with an egg-like shape with lilac ridges that cast a shadow over his mouthless face. The arms were protected with triangular gauntlets, offering decent protection, though they were more for controlling his power. An Elec-Type Navi like FlashMan usually had to have a lot of armor and machinery built into them, partly to regulate the amount of voltage they can control legally or otherwise, and partly so they wouldn't fry someone's computer by accident, often killing themselves by proxy as a result. WWW's previous Elec-Type Navi, ElecMan, was at the time one of the slimmest pure electric elemental types in the world, a prototype almost, and now he, FlashMan, was the finished product, a testament to the skill Master Saiko and Lord Wily showed in reconfiguring his data for combat.

As he stepped off of the antenna network's Warp Gate and onto the TV shaped floor tiles , he saw at least 6 Mr.Progs, not even acknowledging his presence and fading in and out of existence every few seconds. Their eyes were hollow, empty smiles on what were basically vegetables. "How long has this antenna been inactive…?" It was running on an older interface, far too primitive for his systems to operate without some form of emulator to compensate for the settings his operating system lacked. Luckily for him however, he had these creepy, smiling creatures, and all that was needed was to wake them up. "Electro Refresh." A ball of yellow energy formed in his hand and shot out to the Mr.Progs, jolting them awake. "Your caches should be refreshed, so I can assume you're able to talk now."

"OH YES!" Oh the shouting. He forgot about their shouting. "WE ARE AWAKE ONCE AGAIN!" The little gremlins hovered over to him, the biggest smiles on their faces. "HOW CAN WE THANK YOU GOOD SIR?!"

|Well, this was easier than I thought.| Saiko said in amazement. He was just going to have FlashMan delete them, but he might have found some new training dummies, and he hoped for their sake that it was for the WWW Navis and not those strange 'LRIGs'. Good lord what a ridiculous name. |Change of plans FlashMan.|

"Understood."

"DID YOU SAY SOMETHING, SAVIOR?"

"Nothing of importance. I have a new job for you; will you accept?" And now they were cheering. And shouting. 'Ugh, this is why I delete the annoyances on sight.'

Skull Island, 02:33

"Daddy, The guy with the funny hat's calling!"

From his bed, Wily's eyes shot open as he pulled the covers off of him, got up, and quickly got into his day clothes and his cane to support himself. Exiting his room he found Mayu holding up a holo-screen with Saiko's face on it. Behind the man was some rubble and a car stuck in a building. "Why are you still in the city?"

|My apologies, but FlashMan hasn't finished installing the software. I've called to establish a direct link to our servers for the data transfer."

"Good, good. Mayu?" With a giggle, the girl transported him right into his office. The giant grey statues that framed all four ends of the room stared down imperiously, situated on top of large podiums with massive cables that jutted out of their bases and into the checkerboard floors. at the far end of his room was his desk, his seat of power. Back when he was in the field of robotics, he came up with an idea for a robot whose exterior was made entirely of wood, with a special coating on every bit of the machine to make it even tougher than a Sniper Joe's armor. This mahogany, skull shaped desk was the result of that idea, with a 15 petaflop speed and the most powerful computer in the world next to the one made by Thomas's brat.

Taking a second to revel in his power, Wily casually walked to his desk and sat down, Mayu activating the desk's systems and producing the same holoscreen Saiko was on. "All systems ready."

|Thank you, Lord Wily. I-| Saiko blinked, watching as Mayu bought out what looked to be a card mat and two decks, giving a reluctant Wily one deck while she gleefully held the other. |Ah yes, the WIXOSS project.| He had met Piruluk.EXE once or twice. Such a powerful Navi, though she had to be given her job.

"Mhm!" Mayu cheered as she hovered around Wily's head. "We play it every day, to keep his skills sharp!"

"Sacrifices have to be made." Wily said to Saiko as he looked over the cards, grimacing in disgust as he saw the artwork. "I just have to do this for an hour and….and…." He placed a hand on Mayu's shoulder, causing her to stop. "What did I tell you about bringing this filth around me?"

The ghostly girl rolled her eyes. "We kill people all the time, kids even, and some skin is what you're worried about?"

"They look like children! "

"And a lot of the LRIGS I greet every week are kids, ones my age even!"

"I'm going to pretend I didn't hear that."

"It's so funny seeing their reaction to their new forms too! Especially the really stick in the muds, those get the best reactions!"

"Yes and-" His eyes widened. "Are you meaning to tell me you've been putting teenaged girls in these outfits?!"

"Yep!"

|Lord Wily, what is she-| Mayu uploaded the card her dad was complaining about to Saiko's feed, giggling when the man nearly yelled out. |My god! She looks like a prostitute!|

"I know…"

|S-she looks 13!|

"I KNOW!"

"Isn't it great!" The two men winced in disgust at her glee. "It makes me so happy seeing the really reserved girls in those outfits! They sometimes even get freaked out more about the clothes than their fate! I've got pictures if you wanna see!"

"...."

|....| A loud beep came on Saiko's end. |Oh thank god, FlashMan's done!|

" Please send that data!" He was a murderer, not a pedophile, and it seems his 2nd in command still couldn't differentiate the two! "As fast as you can!" Oh, and this was only the trial phase too! The LRIG mass production was set to begin soon, and when that happened, and they found out these 'Navis' with these skimpy outfits were being produced by the most prolific terrorist organization on the planet? Let's just say a certain 'rank S' was going to make it even harder for WWW to get rid of him.

YokaYoka Zoo, 02:36

Zookeeper Quarters

Takeo Inukai was not a smart man, according to him that was. He also wasn't a very attractive man either. He could best be described as a giant gorilla in stature and just as fat, with beefy hairy arms, fur open vest jacket that looked freshly skinned, and a face that looked just as bestial as the animals he worked with, with a prominent, thick scratch mark over his left eye.

It was by happenstance that he was inducted into the 2nd incarnation of WWW, doing job requests on the local Help Board for some money to live on, when he went too deep into the Undernet. After a fight with some Navi that looked like a walking talking astronomy project named PlanetMan or something, he suddenly found himself in with the organization, along with a bevy of funds and plenty of blackmail material on him to keep himself silent. It wasn't like he needed it though; he hated this stinking world, and seeing it go the way of the dodo was fine with him.

On the main monitor in his workstation were the basic files for his public persona. Everything was out for anyone to see, not like anyone would though. Every one of his employees hated and feared him, and thanks to some 'volunteers', they feared what would happen to their careers. Yes, careers, because they knew the alternative, and just losing their job was a better thing to believe than the alternative. Being able to work here despite his record was just another example of WWW's power in this modern age.

BEASTMAN.EXE LOGGING INTO YOKA ZOO NET 1 |GRRRR, Update complete, Master.| It was thanks to them that his Navi BeastMan was the powerhouse that he was. Originally Inukai just colored a generic ¥5000 Navi orange and yellow, called him BeastMan, and strutted around like he was the coolest shit because he was the only person around who had a Navi, back when they were a luxury for non military. Now, BeastMan was a true monster worthy of his name. |Downloading the data to the PET now.| The guttural undertone that permeated every sound he made made it seem as though he was constantly snarling, and his appearance belied and at the same time sold how dangerous he truly was.

To say BeastMan was lankier than most NetNavis would be like saying the grass is green. Most store-brand Navis had limbs that were just twigs, and BeastMan's were barely meatier than theirs. Not that that was a problem; BeastMan's true power lay on the inside and in the brown armor and mask he wore. The gauntlets were the thickest part of his body, a bright candy corn yellow with octagonal rings where the claws were stored in at the base. There were six vents on each ring, and the 4-foot-long silver claws he usually had were replaced with white, gloved, tiny human hands, holding thick stacks of paper that represented his report. A black void with a large, fanged mask composed his head, giving him his bestial appearance similar to that of the smilodon. His legs were modeled after the hind legs of a predator. Orange knee guards were fused to his skin, with thin armor from the knee down, and thick, rounded armor at the top with a tip at the left side of the left leg and vice versa, and thick silver claws jutting from his feet. Combined with BeastMan's default and only standing position, it made him look constantly hunched over, ready to attack.

Sitting in his mind controlled lion chair Inukai smirked as he read over the data. "Good. And the upload speed?"

|50 Megabits per second.| The Navi snarled. |That's about as good as we're getting in the sticks. If I overclock the system anymore, SciLab and the Urakawa family will surely find out.|

"I forgot all about them too!" He took a short look at the stacks of completed paperwork on his desk in disgust before looking back to the screen. "I've had to organize the itineraries and legal papers for over 20 schools visiting this month alone!"

|Grrrr, You remembered to push ACDC Elementary to the top of the list, right?|

"Yeah, first thing I did too. MegaMan and his NetOp's class will be here on the 5th of next month, just in time for us to finalize and commence Operation Outbreak."

|Gooood. I've also began private testing on the chip's control frequency for the smarter animals. If all goes well, the monkeys should be hiding some spending money for you to conveniently find during your next inspection.|

"...Do the Urakawas suspect anything?"

BeastMan shook his head. |They're still in the dark. I've altered the programming on the chips to prevent them from accidentally going into

|Understood Master.| BEASTMAN.EXE LOGGING OUT OF YOKA ZOO NET 1.

Inukai's thoughts went back to the animals. Six weeks it took for him to get those microchips embedded into their brains, and by the time MegaMan and the Hikari kid came to the YokaYoka Zoo, him and his class would be nothing but animal crap on the side of the road, as would the rest of this hick town.

But first, he had to catch up on the development of their third ace in the hole. They had Bass, they Piruluk to reign Bass in, now they just needed to finish up this bit of work, and they'd finally have a Navi -they could trust- powerful enough to hold the TetraCode.

Undernet Area 6, 02:36

??? Market.

"Oh shit she's back- Heeeey LuckyRucky! How's my favorite customer doing? That cloak is doing wonders for you!"

Piruluk ignored the poor attempt at brownnosing. "The usual. One passcode to the Beach Street Hospital's network.

"Alright alright, that'll be ¥80,00. they've upgraded their security since you went there last, so if you don't have the money-" She had the money. She always had the damn money. And now it was in his private account. "H-here you go."

"Thank you."

The poor salesman watched her leave, waiting until she logged out of the area before he let out a loud whistle. "The crazy chick's gone, back to business!" Sighs of relief could be heard as both shopkeepers and patrons happily went back along their merry way. Amongst the UnderNet residents with human operators, LuckyRucky was at least the 3rd worst person you'd want to run into. That Blue Twerp and ProtoMan, they'd just delete you, but that bitch? Deny her those hospital visits, and she'd find you in the real world. She'd always find you, and that made her the most dangerous Navi here. Next to S or that Bass guy, but no one liked to think about those terrors.

SciLab North, 02:55

Office 1-A

SciLab North, or SciLab Hokkaido, usually spelt the end of one's career if you were sent there. It didn't have it's on section of a metropolis to call it's own like SciLab DenTech, or it's own private artificial island like SciLab Colorado, it was just some dinky office building in the middle of the nearly desolate town of Yubari, barely worthy to bear the name SciLab. It had the same level of tech as the other branches, but had a lot more restrictions and was on a cordoned off section of the internet, with a lock that required a strict approval process to access. You'd have to be incredibly stupid to bypass the security system, brave to risk your scientific career for something so fullish….

"Good job FlameMan!" Or in the case of one Ken'ichi 'Mr.Match' Hino, be an excellent programmer backed and taught by one of the greatest minds of the modern era. "And were you detected?" Huddled over his cubicle's computer screen with a special soundproofing device blocking his loud declarations of his evil plans, Mr.Match let out a laugh as his Navi gave the A-OK on the PET screen. "Aye Aye, that's a good matchstick you are. Slipped right in and right out without the little screamers knowin'!"

|Wraaah...Wraaah…| Surprisingly inhuman with a huge pyre for a body, FlameMan was one of the odder Navis that you could find, and the result of wanting to make the most inconveniently shaped Navi be the strongest Fire Elemental on the net. He was a quadruped, standing on four haunched limbs much like a gorilla, said limbs were made of thin cables that passed through four metal rings in the arms and three in the legs, ending in orange hands and feet respectively. His head was an orange mask, with the fire insignia Match was so proud of displayed proudly on his chest. Months of testing and battling against Piruluk and Urith made FlameMan the most powerful Navi in WWW who could stand up to an LRIG! If MegaMan wasn't slaughtered by the two girls, then FlameMan was going to annihilate him...If Saiko or Inukai didn't get him in the real world, that is. |Wraaah?|

"Nah, haven't heard a lick out of her since the last meetin'. Wily and Mayu must've been pretty angry for jumping the gun with MegaMan in a public area. We got some theories on how his program works with the WIXOSS engine, but it ain't enough to gon." Honestly, it was obvious to anyone with a brain that MegaMan would get involved with that game. Three times now Lan and his Navi saved the world from societal and economic collapse, stopped multiple terrorist plots, and let's not forget surviving the Cyber Chernobyl that was Kotobuki completely unscathed, of course the two twits were going to find out before the WIXOSS program moved out of the early access phase. "Just a few more weeks and we can bring the game out into the public eye. Oh that's gonna be a good bit of entertainment, it is!"

|Wraaahh…|

"Oh we'll be seeing Lanny boy very soon." But not yet: He just had a job to do first. Saiko was handling the AI's security protocols using FlashMan's high resistance to status effects, Inukai was in charge of the battle protocols using BeastMan's speed as a base for the attacking capabilities, and he was handling the installation of the Breaking Element. DrillMan.EXE was right now, a wimp. A very annoying wimp with a ridiculously annoying gimmick, like his 'cousin' BubbleBastard, but one that could be used and exploited in so many wonderful ways under the hands of a competent programmer. Once he finished DrillMan's upgrades, he would only have three months of work ahead of him. 'Three months…' Three months of tedium that he didn't need to do to get into WWW initially, but man oh man he wanted to show up that chip loving, glasses wearing otaku so bad, and Lord Wily forbade anyone from beating each other up in the real world. This work they were giving him here? He was pretty sure Lan could do it! He was in ACDC Academy after all, idiots there were towered even some adults in terms of intelligence! No matter though; in three months, none of this would matter. SciLab would be taken out in a sea of glorious flames, and Lan? Well...let's just say there were a lot of ways to crush a child's spirit without laying a hand on them.

Skull Island, 03:30

DrillMan's modifications were coming along smoothly. Soon they'd be ready to move up to the WIXOSS integration into his programming, but Wily could worry about that later; for now…

"Nononoonono! You're still Level 1! You can't put that many LRIGs there! And get those SIGNI out of the Ener Zone!" ...Playing this absurd game with his daughter.

"Fine, I'll put them back. I place the half-naked green hedgeho-"

"Her name is Midoriko! And you grow her!"

"...I grow Midoriko into Midoriko Combat Girl Type one!" Why didn't he just learn this game when Mayu was a human girl? Thomas was the one who fed her and took care of her and helped change her diapers back when she was nine -she was too weak even for that- so why did she gravitate to him?!"So is this other girl an LRIG?"

"NO!" Mayu screamed. "Jeez, daddy, it's a SIGNI! A SIGNI!" All she received in return was a blank, one-eyed stare. "I told you that you should've learned the game with that fat idiot, but nooooo! You just had to-"

{Incoming call from U-1. Marked: Urgent}

Upon hearing that, Wily immediately covered his ears. "OOOOH!" And with his ears still covered, he just let Mayu lift him up and hug him while shouting 'she's here she's here!' at least six times before letting him go and turning on the holo-screen. "URITH!"

|Yeah yeah yeah, keep your pants on.| 13 years old like Piruluk back when she was human, Urith was Mayu's 2nd favorite. She was paler than Mayu, almost chalk white, with short white hair that resembled a bowlcut. Her clothing was minimal, but fortunately for Wily's eyes, it had a degree of sense. You couldn't tell where her skin ended and her clothes began, but at least it was modest! She wore full body tights, white on the torso with purple on the leggings with diamond patterns exposing her knees. For footwear, she wore light purple shoes and white gloves, both of which appeared as something a human would wear. Lastly, she wore sports light purple bandage wrappings on her right wrist and on her head, tied as though they were ribbons. |You two are in high spirits.|

"Well I am!" Mayu replied with a blush, floating around Wily's head. " But he's not! He still doesn't get what a SIGNI and an ARTS are, can you believe that?!"

|Aren't you supposed to be a genius?|

"Yes, I am. And I like familiarity. What was wrong with calling the damn things Giga, Mega, or Standard cards?"

"Because they're WIXOSS cards!"

|It's not that hard to understand!| Urith said with the widest grin she could manage

"I have no need and have very little desire to do so." Wily answered with an air of finality. "Implementing this card game into the CyberWorld, sealing up that room, I barely want to see this game again." As a response, Mayu sat on his bald head. "Of course… what do you have to report?"

TetraCode Upload in progress. (Packet 1 of 444) Size: 66EB

The dropped jaws of Wily and her bestie made Urith laugh out loud. |Yep! Snuck it out of this hospital on the beachside without anyone knowing! These people have the combined brainpower of a newt!|

"Why do you think I hate them so…?" Wily glowered. "Regardless, good work. Once DrillMan is complete, you'll have your shot at Bass again."

|I'd better…. | That stupid, cloak wearing edgelord had been a thorn in her's and Piruluk's sides for far too long, a weakling Navi who had the power to stand up to an LRIG, no modifiers, no cheating. And the fact that Piruluk was the only one who could even handle him, when she could easily beat her at Level 0 alone, was insulting! |Mayu, I'm not in a good mood right now. Selector battle please.|

"Already sent to your PET!" The ghostly girl said cheerfully. "I even set up a time and place for six battles tomorrow during Iona's lunch break!" She let out a giggle. "Y-you should've seen their faces! They get to meet their idol and get their dreams crushed!"

|Oh, they're all on their last lives?!|

"Every single one!"

|Oh, I could just hug you if it didn't make me physically sick to my stomach!| Her cheerfulness reminded her of way too many forum boards her mom used to send her to in order to 'fix her', only Mayu's happy was disgustingly genuine. |Oh, and Albert?|

"...."

|Fine fine, Lord Wily. How's my little blue pet?|

The mood dropped instantly from that question, Mayu floating away nervously from Wily in shame as the doctor answered. "He can participate in WIXOSS fights." The grin on Urith's face after hearing was something that should not be on a child. "In addition, he can harm LRIGs, and can induce status effects it seems. He only inflicted paralysis on Piruluk, but given his and Lan's track record with things beyond their understanding, it's safe to say they can induce all status effects and exploit elemental weaknesses.

|....| Oh joy, she was breathing heavily. |S-so he can fight huh? I knew he had potential!| Being a Black LRIG, she was immune to all status effects and potential elemental weaknesses. There were only a few BattleChips capable of putting the hurt on her. Nearly all of them were with Wily, two in SciLab's care, one with Wily's unfavorite son, and the last one, that was with….him.

"Stop drooling and get over that blue brat!" Wily ordered. "And don't even try to sway him! I've lived long enough to see people as screwed up as you be able to hide their psychosis with the ease of a chameleon's camouflage. He has a moral compass as big as his foolish grandfather Urith, and you're about as subtle with your psychopathy as Piruluk's Selector. He won't be swayed by your words."

|Ah, but you forget, Lord Wily- | She got a growl from the man in return. |I'm also a sociopath. We're great at hiding our emotions!| And Urith proved it right then and there. Her face softened, her eyebrows smoothed out, and she put her hands behind her back while sitting down, kicking her feet as though she was splashing water. |How do you think I get those nice girls to fight me?| She asked, her tone and posture that of a young girl her age. |Iona Urazoe, famous idol who ended the tyranny of the evil 'Lucky Aki', offering to lose the chance to gain her wish to make a poor young girl happy? Why, that's just the saddest thing you ever heard!|....Wily and Mayu just stared at her deadpan. "Grrr…| Urith floated back upright, a snarl on her face. |Look, his NetOp's a nimrod, I just gain his trust, and MegaMan has no choice but to put up with me.|

"You really seem to like him a lot." Mayu, a frown on her face.

|I guess?| Urith shrugged. |I wanna stab him, filet him, want him to do the same to me. I've met people a lot more fucked up than either me, him, or anyone in this room, but someone like an LRIG, and one younger than me?|

"Hey, I'm nuts, and I'm younger than you!"

|You're in your 40's kid.| Hmmm...She had to think on this one. |Iona's got a shoot, to go to.|

The chat ended, the screen blipped out of existence. Mayu made a move to apologize once more, but Wily held out a hand to stop her. "It was only a matter of time before MegaMan got involved, don't worry." Thomas and his ilk, they always managed to ruin his plans, always. No reason to blame her for his own bad luck.

Beach Street Hospital, 3:55

Room 22-A

The lights were dimmed, the rays of the moon shining through the curtain covered windows. There were no IV tubes connected to her, no mask over her mouth and nose, nor was she sleeping. The patient was 17 years old, her hair a dark brown and cut short, breathing softly as she conversed with the Navi on her hospital bed's PET screen. "-And then Mamoru-chan said that the jerk tried to buy him off with the same software they stole from him!"

|And the Navi was a civilian model?|

"Y-yep!" The girl could barely hold in her laughter, keeping quiet as much as she could to prevent the nurses from coming in to check on her. "And the guy just ran off from Mamoru, sweet old Mamo-chan, like he was actually scary! Can you believe it?!"

|...I can believe it.| Oh how she could believe it. |He probably belonged to some hotshot teenager who thought they could make a quick buck off a sick child.|

"Oh those jerks are everywhere b-but-" The girl only barely managed to hold in her giggling. "I-It's Mamo-chan!"

|Yes, Ayumi, I understand.| Piruluk said with a small, rare smile. Oh if she only knew who that boy was. 'And why you're safest here with him around.' And speaking of safety… |By the way…your room records tell me that that famous idol you liked so much came by.|

"Yeah, Iona, the dark blade!" Ayumi whispered when she heard footsteps outside, with all the bravado of a TV announcer. "And she was soooo cool!"

|She sure is….and what about her Navi?|

"She is the coolest! She-" A knock on the door caused her heart to nearly skip a beat. "She's so mean, but mean in a cool way! She's got a style to her that makes me super super jealous!"

|Yes...she's quite...something.| Though her presence was less disgusting to her than that granola cruncher ganguro girl, the ease in which Urith got into the hospital's network was disgusting. |How are you feeling?|

"Better than ever!" Ayumi said with a grin, pointing to her back. "Soon I won't need these stupid things in my spine, and I'll be able to move in a few months!" For the first time in a while, she saw her friend's stoic frown curve slightly. "Was that a smile I saw Kiyo-" And immediately, the brunette knew she messed up, the temperature in the room literally going cold just so very slightly, enough that you'd think you were imagining the temperature shift. "W-wait, don't go! I-" And before she could say anything else, Pirulk was already gone. "Ohhhh…" Grimacing, Ayumi sat back in her bed, looking out the window of her room. "You messed up big time…" Sleep soon took her, unpleasant thoughts going through her mind of a certain person wearing her friend's skin coming to visit in the morning, just like she always did. 'Just who are you Mayu?' And why did Kiyoi and that parasite in her body fear them so much?

DOWNTOWN DENTECH

MURASAKI WARD, 6:22

AKIRA AOI'S HOUSE.

Akira's fall from grace didn't do her any favors for her financial situation. Her own terrible choices when dealing with her various managers screwed her over more than once, and as a result her own cut of the profits amounted to what was the equivalent of a weekly allowance. A child's weekly allowance that they'd get for keeping their room cleaned. From her first gig to her first Selector Battle all those years ago, to her current gig today, her situation had not changed. She started living in shit and continued living in shit.

At least she got a house back when she was 16 for her and the bitch she called her mom to move in to, a gift from a very rabid fan that was thankfully in jail. She should've listened to Piruluk when she signed the papers to get the place because it was just five minutes away from her own FUCKING HOUSE!

A one story flat that had been raided six times over 3 years, which did wonders for the shattered remains of her reputation, and a roach problem that was curbed by a 'friend' of Piruluk who the LRIG refused to divulge the identity of, the sheer insult of being conned out of the better life she deserved turned Akira into an even more toxic ball of love and sunshine! Luckily for ~~everyone in her neighborhood~~ her, this would be the last time she'd ever see them. In just one hour and five minutes, she'd be back at the standards that would let her get away from these damn hicks!

"Akira, did you clean the toilet yet?!"

"I did it already you stupid bitch!" And far, far away from the sad sack of crap whose cooch she popped out of. "I did your dirty work, now give me my damn PET!" The worn out burlap sack walked into the hallway and stared her down. "Come on, I did what you asked, now give my back my Navi!"

"Sure." A moment later, Akira regretted her choice of words not for the last time, as her very outdated model hit her in the face, the woman having missed her throw. As she recoiled and started yelling obscenities from the pain, Akira missed her pained, miserable expression, made worse as she slammed the door on her face. She had no idea why that woman even bothered to pretend she cared at this point, after years of this behavior.

As the very loved ginger stormed out of the house, everyone around her giving her a wide berth, a man whose clothes made him look like someone trying really hard to look like a stereotypical hobo eyed her as he bought out a Model 1 PET in the same vein as Akira's, only the screen was cracked, with various blobs of gue keeping the device together. With a speed found only in the swiftest of pickpockets, he began typing. |Mister Sunayama, the target is headed for the train station.|

|Excellent job! Her mom put on quite the convincing performance huh?|

|I don't think that was as much of a performance as you think.| He could hear the woman celebrating from out here! |The payment has been cleared by her bank, and by tomorrow, she'll be a very wealthy woman.|

|As she should! Now if you'll excuse me, I've got a very grouchy young lady to meet! Ciao!|

WESTERN DENTCH, MURASAKI WARD, 6:33

DenLine Green, Bus 12

"Oh god it's that crazy chick again."

"The one from the roach commercials?"

"Yeah, the one with the hot Aqua Navi."

'Ignore them Akira, just ignore them!' Akira muttered from the back of the vehicle, clutching her PET as hard as she could. Oh how her years of being a nosy little girl were biting her in the ass, her trained ears hearing every insult and jeer.

"How did she even get out of juvie?"

"Beats me, but she should've stayed in there."

"Grrr…" Akira gritted her teeth. "Damn you...damn you Iona….!" As she stewed in her own self made misery, the bus came to a screeching halt, causing Akira to lurch out of her seat and onto the floor with a scream as her PET dropped onto the ground.

|I told you to put on your seatbelt.|

"Shut the fuck up…" The ginger said to her LRIG as she picked up the device and stormed to the bus driver, who suddenly realized who his passenger was. "What the hell is your deal?"

Oh god it was her. "Someone or something got in the way?" The driver responded as patronizingly as possible. "I mean, you can look out the window if you like, there's nothing stopping you."

Growling, Akira did just that, eyes widening as she saw a limo on the wrong side of the road, it's front end facing the bus. "What the hell…?" A beeping from her PET caused her to bring the device up. "What?!"

|You have an Email.| Piruluk said as she opened the file.

"Come outside?" Akira muttered. It was only two words, that was it. But the Email address was what got her confused. "That's DNN's Email address…" Looking out the window again, she was surprised to see a man in a very fancy suit looking straight at her and motioning for her to come on out. Shocked, Akira pointed to herself, causing the man to nod enthusiastically. "..." Akira said nothing and promptly pocketed her PET. She walked to the bus door next to her, and with strength that shouldn't be possible for a girl with her -lack of- diet, pushed it open so hard that the glass cracked. Still keeping eerily quiet and ignoring the shock and the screams of the bus driver, she quickly walked to the man and stared at him for a good five seconds. "What do you want?"

"Uh…" Well, this was odd; it certainly didn't fit her profile. "Akira Aoi right?"

"Yes, that's me."

"You..uh…" The man took a second to let out a cough and regain his bearings. "You've been selected to participate in the upcoming N1 Grand Prix as a special guest."

"I see."

Again with the cordial tone! "Y-your NetBattling record shows you qualify to be a SLicensed NetBattler, which of course means that you will be paid for every successful task given to you."...She should be ecstatic about this given her financial situation. "So starting today, you will-where are you going?!"

"Back on the bus, where else?" Akira answered, turning to give the man a very hateful, subdued glare. "That bitch Iona put you up to this, didn't she?"

"M-miss Urazoe is participating yes, but-"

"Then the answer's no. I'm not accepting anything she's offering me."

"But aren't you a Selector?!" That got Akira to stop. She turned to him, shock written on her face. "Just like Miss Urazoe right?"

"..."

"I know all about the battles. If you want to know more, as well as get a ride to your school with pay, I suggest you get inside."

And against her better judgement, Akira did. When the man got inside, on the seat opposite hers, the limo began to move. This was a pretty swanky limo too. Martini bar, fridge on the ceiling, with a beautiful glass table in the middle of the floor. It was everything she ever wanted ever since becoming an idol, but she'd have to shelve that for later."Alright, spill. How are you still breathing after saying that?"

"How can a NetNavi hurt an LRIG?" The man rebutted. "MegaMan is full of surprises."

"Oh. that's his name." And of course he had the same naming scheme a lot of shmucks had. AirMan, TenguMan, she was pretty sure Piruluk deleted something named DickMan on the UnderNet, it's like having 'Man' as part of your name was a symbol of power or something! "Still doesn't answer my question. You know about Selector Battles. You talked about them in public. How are you still alive?"

"I'm not suffering from the curse because I am an administrator for the WIXOSS network."

"..." Akira bought her PET out. "Piruluk, what the hell's he talking about?"

|He's speaking the truth.| Piruluk answered, unable to keep the shock out of her voice. |But why reveal yourself like this?| This had to be Sunayama's doing, it just had to! |I haven't received any information about the program moving out of the early access phase.|

"Oh?" The man in the suit raised a brow, taking a quick glance at Akira's face. 'So she doesn't know about the plan.' Given her profile, it'd make sense Piruluk wouldn't fill her in on WWW's activities. "Well we're having to do it earlier than we thought. A Selector got sloppy and now SciLab is investigating anything to do with WIXOSS."

"WHAT?!" Both girls screamed, Akira slamming her hands on the table. "Why the fuck didn't you idiots warn her?! Are those nerds gonna mess up my chance to be an Eternal Girl?!"

The man shook his head. "Relax. As far as they know, LRIGS are highly powerful Navis, nothing more. The specifics of the Eternal Girl Project and the WIXOSS System are under wraps, and the Selector and their LRIG were given harsh reminders as to what would happen to them should they open their mouths again."

Akira took a second to calm down, sitting back in her seat. "Good….so what does this have to do with me being in some NetBattling tournament? I don't do NetBattles."

"You and your LRIG are the most hated duo on the WIXOSS network." The man explained. "Alongside you and Piruluk, Miss Urazoe and Urith, Miss Kominato and Tama, and the Selector who goes by the name 'Chorizo' and her LRIG Eldora, you are the strongest WIXOSS players out there, and absolutely perfect for representing our brand!"

|I see...and do we need a password? I've heard rumors of such a thing on the public BBS boards at BeachSquare, and they were all for putting us in our place.|

"Oh rest assured, that won't happen." The man said with a confident chuckle. "But as they say, NetBattling is a two-man sport. It requires both NetBattler and Navi to be in perfect synch with each other to fight effectively." He ignored the scoff from both of them and continued. "A NetNavi is far smarter than a human, able to think and react faster than our minds can handle. But the human element has to be in tip top shape to keep in synch with the Navi, able to fight anywhere, in any condition! So that is why, with your approval, you will be the spokesperson for Western Dentech!"

|Hm?| Piruluk raised a brow as the PET beeped. 'Mail now?' ID DNN, but the money was from one of Wily's aliases if the hidden code in the ID was correct. ¥44,000 for the first gig alone. Impre-| She and the man winced at Akira's scream. |-ssive.|

"What the shit is this?!" Akira's smile couldn't get any bigger even if she tried. "I never got this much even when I was in my prime?!"

"...What?" Given the deals she had and all the money that flowed in, she should have gotten s ix times as much! "I-I see…" Just how bad was this girl with money?! "Anyway, once you get settled in to your new school life, you will be notified about your sched-"

"Yeah whatever. Get good grades, best behavior, and I get money and the chance to kick Iona's ass?"

"Just keep your grades up and don't do anything that constitutes a felony. That's it."

"Ok I'm in! Where do I sign?!"

"The contract will be mailed to your PET by tomorrow. This will be an excellent business venture Miss Aoi, that I assure you."

"Oh I bet it will be!"

"You and Miss Urazoe will face off on the global stage, in front of millions of people."

"Oooh yeeeeaah…"

"And if you win, you will be heralded and cheered, instead of reviled and mocked."

"Oh, that sounds so good!" And all that money, all for her!

"We even managed to cover up the fact you're in ACDC Academy's Elementary school course. That's how serious we are about having you in on this!"

...The resulting silence and Akira's dropped jaw and bulging eyes was the most hilarious thing Piruluk had seen in a while.|Oh, did I forget to tell you? Oops.|

verifiaman · Feb 11, 2021

ACDC Town, 6:55

Hikari Homepage

MegaMan was an oddity to the Mr.Progs that managed the Hikari home network, and had been since their installation.

There were plenty of Navis that touted human characteristics, and both they and him often spent hours deleting spam email from UnderNet servers on Navis who displayed characteristics humans would find disgusting, but MegaMan's human characteristics were too natural to be preprogrammed or installed.

"ZZZZZZ…" He snored. He slept. He slept! And it wasn't like him just going into a sleeping animation while most Navis did as they shut down, he slept like a human while his processes remained on standby! Even now, he showed his strange human programming sleeping on the floor of the Homepage, as Mr.Prog that delivered his daily mail stared in awe at what he was seeing.

"MR.MEGAMAN, WAKE UP!"

"Gaaah!" MegaMan rolled and quickly got up and into a combat stance, lowering his arms when he saw it was just the Mail Prog. "Oh, morning already?" He asked with a yawn.

"YESSIR! HERE'S YOUR MAIL!"

"Uh-huh…" MegaMan rubbed the sleep out of his eyes as he received confirmation of the Email loaded onto his PET. "Thanks...I'm gonna lay down now."

"BUT MR.MEGAMAN, YOU CAN'T!" The Mail Prog explained. "MR.HIKARI HAS SCHOOL TODAY!" Wow, he even had those red eyes that humans got when they didn't get enough sleep! His eyes were bulging just like them and everything! He was so advanced!

A messy bed, toys and clothes strewn about on the floor, and sports posters everywhere. Let it be said that despite his many achievements, Lan Hikari was still the same boy he always was.

|LAAAAAAAN! Wake up!| And that includes a very poor sleep schedule. |LAAAAAN!|

"Mmmm?" The boy in question mumbled, taking his blanket off of himself and lifting his head up. "Morning already?"

|Yes, 'morning already!' You've got morning detention, remember?| From his PET screen, MegaMan counted down as his brother's brain turned on, drowsiness slowly giving way to an intense dread.

"SHOOT!" He had to get his clothes on, stat!

Five minutes later Lan was in his favorite clothes and out the door, pressing on the backs of his shoes to activate the built in skates to get to school faster. He could see the bell tower of his school in the distance, just down the hill and a steep incline of stairs with two railings on the side. "We're gonna do this Tony Hawk style!

|Don't you dare!| MegaMan shouted from Lan's pocket as Lan jumped into the air

"Sorry, can't hear you!" with precision that would make a sharpshooter jealous, the wheels of Lan's skates landed perfectly on the railing, and he flawlessly skated down the railing, jumping from one side to the other even as the path curved and bent., through the park, over a lake, up and down the hills. "WOOOHOOO!" The people taking the automatic walkway just to the right either stared in shock or just ignored him; the boy was as durable as he was reckless, so it wasn't worth the time to worry about a tragedy that wouldn't happen.

Normally the walkway, usually made for people who just wanted to walk -ACDC was rich like that despite being in the burbs- would have taken him 42 minutes to get to the bottom, but thanks to his mad skills, it only took him 12. "And here we are!" Lan jumped off the last inch of railing and onto the concrete ground, spinning to lower his momentum as he landed flawlessly. "That. was. AWESOME!"

|I-is it over?|

"Yep! I oughtta take that nature trail more often!"

|Please don't..|Oh why didn't he disable the gyroscopic sensors?!

ACDC Academy, 7:33
Front Gates

"Thank you for your cooperation, Miss Aoi!"

"I'm gonna kill you, I'm gonna kill you.." Was what the now black haired former idol said as she got out the limo, staring at her PET with all the hate she could muster as she stood at the front gates of her new school/home. She was silent after the bombshell, so cold with rage that it left the man ample time to put on her disguise so she wouldn't be hounded by the brats no doubt ready to mock her for her failures. Gone were the orange locks that made her the envy of so many. Gone was her fair, white skin that she made sure to keep as perfect as possible even to this day, and the clothes from the thrift store she managed to find that didn't make her itch. Now she wore orange jeans, a short sleeved shirt with white highlights, and some third rate slip resistant boots. There wasn't even any retailer information on the clothes, so these were just some third rate hand-me-downs! "You bitch."

|Did you really think that your actions during your early days as a Selector would only affect your reputation, and nothing else?| Piruluk asked in her monotone voice as the limo drove off. Getting her Selector in this mess was the only time she and Iona ever enjoyed each other's presence. |It's amazing that you were even allowed to enter given your grades and performance, so be grateful.| And she should also be thankful that Ulith didn't have a hand in selecting the clothes she was wearing, and Piruluk was very tempted to let her do it.

"I am going to be an adult in a couple months-"

|-Keep telling yourself that.|

"-And you expect me to be in the same class as a bunch of goddamn brats?!" A small dinging sound, similar to a coin being dropped in a jar, came from her PET. "The hell was that?" The same sound played again.

|A digital swear jar. | Piruluk explained. |It came installed with your school registration programs, and if it gets full you will receive a week's worth of detention.| Akira's face turned blue from fear. These academies, the not too rich not too poor ones, were infamous for what they called detention. |This also means that you will have to watch how you act when on the job as well.|

"Yeah, I know that." Akira looked up at the school gates with trepidation. "So, here it is...ACDC Academy…" It was so big, not like those anime schools where it was it's own damn city, but like one of those fancy boarding schools. She recognized the gate type: L-Class, two poles on each side. It looks as though you can go through without any trouble, but an Energen field produced by the poles would harmlessly knock you back if you tried to do so without permission. "S-so I just gotta hold my PET up to the gate right?"

|Correct.| Akira did just that. Piruluk opened the required folders as an infrared beam was shot at the PET screen. Four beeps came from the device, followed by a small, fading hum from the poles. |The energy field is disabled.|

Ready to get this over with, Akira walked through the gate, only barely missing some punk kid in a stupid orange life jacket and shorts skating past her with an 'I'm sorry lady!' as he disappeared into the main foyer. "Oh I'm gonna hate this place…"

3 minutes later....

Well, this was underwhelming

Akira expected some high tech futuristic stuff given this place's reputation, but the entrance hall looked no different from any other middle of the road academy she promoted back when she was starting out. Two more sets of security poles were in place at both ends of the hallway, and from their make, she assumed them to be PET Security Scanners. "Mrmmm.." She took out her PET and then looked at the poles. "Will it let me through?"

|Yes. The information packet informed me as to what software version is required for entry into the school. The software on this PET is out of date, but special permissions have been made for your unique situation.|

Oh. Charity. "Alright then.." Akira plugged her ears with her fingers and tiptoed towards the gate. almost...almost…..almost…."It didn't go off." She said with a sigh of relief.

|I told you it wouldn't.| Akira Continued walking, coming across an elevator to the right. |Get on the elevator and go to the 2nd floor, class 5-A| As the elevator began to move, the PET beeped, the tone letting the girls know an Email was just sent to the device.

"Eh it's probably that Adbot from last night or whatever." Akira said as the elevator stopped and the doors opened. "Just delete it."

|Very well then.| Piruluk responded as she opened the Email.

To: Piruluk.EXE.
From: Lord M
Sent: Monday, 7:35
Subject: Do not Engage!

'What in the world?' Ignoring the fact Wily let Mayu have an Email address, what was she doing contacting her?

So daddy issued a super big order while you were offline. He says that no LRIGs are gonna fight MegaMan. If you wanna do it, use your Navi forms. If you gotta go LuckyRucky against him, you have permission to use that Growth Path to it's full power.

Thats all. Bye!

So Mayu and Wily's control over the system still wasn't perfect. 'They're right; he can't face another LRIG.' The fact he was even able to have the system accept him as an LRIG was bad enough. The fact he could even hurt her with BattleChips was even worse. But if he received a WIXOSS deck from the system or worse yet, that girl in white, then WWW's plans would go up in smoke. 'We're going to be in the same class though.' The thought of paying him back for the humiliation last night made Piruluk feel a connection to her Selector, loathed as she was to admit it, but the problem with Akira's attitude and mouth meant that she might be forced to leave. And if Akira wasn't Operating her, then a good chunk of her power in her Navi form was lost. 'What did Wily call it again? 'Full Synchro?' Such a miserable compromise for LRIGs when in their Navi forms.

PIRULUK.EXE LOGGED INTO ACDC CLASS NET 2-A

A gate opened in front of Piruluk, indicating that Akira placed the PET into the desk's system. Walking into it, she found herself in a typical classroom, with a Cyberworld twist. There was no floor, only a border of where the floor would be, starting from the Warp Gate she appeared from. The borders of the room were shaped like #2 pencils, all of them alternating colors in such a way that it looked as though they were snaking their way around the room. Holo-screens were situated above the 22 student desks, with a blue arrow icon above one at the bottom right. Seeing as how there were no other Navis in the room, that must be hers. 'I'll have to edit that note later.'' If for any reason Akira got curious, all she'd have to do was say that the administrators deemed MegaMan too dangerous to the Eternal Girl Project, and that would be that. But if for any reason this school's network caught the Email before it was sent to the PET… she shook her head as she walked to her desk and sat down. 'No, impossible. Even with the security here, it wouldn't be able to detect any communications from the WIXOSS System.' But then again the security here was made by both Wily and Hikari, with the latter contributing far more than the former. If only Mayu had control of that damned room, getting the TetraCode would be child's play for WWW.

{The time now is 7:38. Class will begin in 1 hour and 22 minutes. All students and student Navis please get ready for class.}

Piruluk let out a sigh. "Lan…" Just how was this reunion going to go?

ACDC Academy, 7:45
Utility Room 4

For Lan, degreasing the floors was one of the worst punishments you give him, next to toilet cleaning and or writing out how what he did was wrong for hours on end. |Almost there Lan!| He heard MegaMan yell from the stool he left him on, as he was just about done with this stupid job. |I've gotta say, you're this! Maybe you ought to be a janitor when you grow up instead of a scientist!|

"Shut. UP!" Urghh, why was this stuff so thick?!

|I told you that sneaking those pics was a terrible idea!|

"But they were rare pics MegaMan! Soccer legends!"

|That was from a live action version of Inazuma 11 Lan, it wasn't real! And all those hot girls you and Dex were ogling? They were BOYS!|

"I refuse to believe that!"

|Well you're an-| The Navi's eyes widened. |Quiet! Ms. Mari's coming|

After uttering a quiet thanks for having MegaMan hack the cameras, Lan straightened his posture and turned to the door, putting on the biggest smile on his face as Mariko Ozono, his teacher, came in, eyes slightly unfocused as she let out a loud yawn. "Good morning." She mumbled, staring at Lan with a slightly hunched posture. "Oh...you...actually did a good job here." She couldn't see or feel that rubbery white film that had until recently coated the floor! "I'm impressed!"

"Of course I did a good job!" Lan said with confidence, flashing his teacher a smirk. "I just can't believe you're so surprised."

|Well can you blame her?|

"MegaMan's right." Then again Lan's proficiency shot up drastically when he was in or trying to get out of trouble. "Though with how well you cleaned up in here, maybe you're better off as a janitor than a scientist." Ah, those little twitches of anger from him always brought a smile to her face! "I expected you to take at least two weeks, but since you took only a few hours, I guess I have no choice but to waive the rest of your punishment!"

"Thanks-"

"-And with your free time, you'll have the time to finish up your workload!" Ms.Mari said with that cheerful smile that put her students on edge. "Oh six days of homework starting from when you and your friends got out the hospital to summer break!"

"...Oh…" That. Even Dex managed to finish it in time, Dex!

"And if you try to trick me again just to trade cards of androdgynous boys-" Lan opened his mouth but a glare from her slammed it shut. "...For Yen instead of doing your schoolwork, not only will I put you back on cleaning duty for a month, but you'll be doing Dex's homework as well, understand?"

Lan looked away, sweat pouring from his face. "Y-yeah…"

"Good!" She turned to leave, sparing a glance towards her student's PET on the chair. "Oh and MegaMan?"

|Y-yes?| Oh he did not like that tone to her voice.

"Hack the surveillance network again and I'll be informing Mr. Chaud and ProtoMan about your abuse of NetSaver privileges. Need I remind you that it's this or your frequent, non government related absences will go on your record?" She smiled, and held it for almost a minute as her students wondered just how in the world she knew that. "Bye-bye!" And then closed the door behind her to get ready for class to start.

Lan and MegaMan kept silent, fearing she might come back. "...Is she gone?"

|Yeah...and I've been locked out of the network.|

"Ok…." Another two minutes later, Lan let out a yell, throwing the push broom to the ground. "Stupid know it all teacher! Why does she have to be so strict?!"

|Strict?!| Oh his brother could be so spoiled sometimes! |Lan, she wouldn't be so harsh if you actually did your homework like I told you!|

"Soccer. Legends! And they were the good cards, not the fake bootlegs they sell in UnderNet 4!"

|Really? And what's their-| A beep from the PET interrupted their blooming argument. |Hold on, I'm getting a call. Putting it on speaker.| The two boys waited for the dial tone to play and then-

{STOP ARGUING ABOUT ME AND GET TO CLASS!}

"Y-yes Ms.Mari!"

|R-right mam!|

{Thank you! You'll also have a new classmate in the room waiting for you! Go and say hello!}

ACDC Academy, 7:40
Class 2-A

Holding his PET up to the card reader's infrared scanner, Lan opened the door and found some weird older girl sleeping at Mayl's desk. She looked pretty old, high school age, and she was kinda cute, though she looked familiar. She sure snored loudly. 'Let's see, my desk was…' Row 4, seat 2? Huh, just right next to her. Lan walked to his seat and sat into it, lifting up the PET port on his desk and placing his device into it before pulling the slot back down.

A tiny beep from the desk indicated that MegaMan was logged on to the class's network, leaving ~~Lan to do his homework~~ talk to the new girl and see what her deal was. "Hello?" He said as softly as he could, barely above a whisper. The girl instantly shot up fully alert, wiping the drool off her face as her tired eyes focused on him. "H-hi…"

'And so it begins.' This was her 2nd chance, so playing nice with the brats here was an inevitability. "Hiya! My name's Mara Kumegiya, what's yours?"

"Lan." She didn't sound so sure about saying her own name; her enthusiasm was way too fake, like a certain, currently incarcerated princess that was way too accurate with a pistol."Lan Hikari."

"LH?" Akira let out a small giggle, as vapidly as she could make it. "That's funny. You're funny!"

"Thanks! So uhh, you do know this is the elementary school class, right?" A hint of a snarl came on her face before the smile returned. "Aren't you a little too old to be here?"

"Why yes! Yes I am!" Keep up the cheer Akira, don't snap at him! "I've made a few no-nos in the past, so I'm here as punishment!" …. "Did I say something wrong?"

Lan nodded. "Look, I don't know what you did to get in here, but Ms.Mari doesn't mess around. If I can tell you're faking, and you are, you're really bad at it, she definitely will, and she looks at all our records to know what we've been up to. It really doesn't bother me much, because me and her? We're like friendly enemies, but with the way you're acting-"

"Yeah yeah, I get your point." Akira said with a groan, deepening her voice back to it's normal pitch. "Goddamnit." And there goes another 'coin' in the jar.

"Ooooh." Lan winced. "Swear jar huh?"

"Uh-huh."

"I figured." Being put in elementary and with the swear jar? She must've messed up bad. "Looks like Dex won't be the only one in class with one of those on his PET. Dex is my best bud by the way."

"I see." And now he was acting so familiar with her, how lovely. "Don't you have homework to do or something?"

"Homework." Lan raised a brow in confusion. "What do you-OH CRUD!" He quickly turned back to his desk and slid out the keyboard. In the second it took for him to do that, he pressed a button on the side, which activated the holo-screen for his desk that acted as a monitor, and logged in. "I COMPLETELY FORGOT ABOUT THAT!"

"Yeah, I don't blame you." Akira said as she laid back down. "Homework fucking sucks." Another coin to the jar… "Don't really like doing it myself."

"Yeah, tell me about it!" Lan opened the folder with Ms. Mari's smiling face on it titled 'DO YOUR HOMEWORK OR ELSE!' "First it was getting those soccer cards, then I had to set up my Akira Aoi fanpage, so I really didn't have the time to waste on boring crud like that."

"Hear hea-" Akira paused, paused for almost 12 seconds as her mind processed his sentence. "Did you say you have a fanpage to Akira Aoi?"

"Yep!" Lan said as he tried to focus on anything but the math problems in front of him. "She's the best, way better than that creepy Iona chi-GAAH!" Why was this chick staring down at him?! "Y-yes?"

"Tell me everything you know about her, now!"

"Ok?!" Geez, she was fast!

ACDC Academy, 8:15
Class-2A Network

Lan and his new friend were hitting it off it seemed, and the young boy was glad he found someone other than Dex to talk to about that loon. Now if only their classmate's new Navi was as talkative. She was a really cute teeanger, and it was obvious that great care went into designing her. From all that blue on her, she looked to be an Aqua-Element Navi, though something in him was saying otherwise. Now if she could only stop looking at the holo-screen above her desk.

'Just what is she staring at anyway?' He could easily go back into his PET, change into Shadow Style, then log back in using the Style's Private Mode -because something was seriously telling him to watch out for her- but after that trick Ms.Mari pulled, he wasn't gonna risk a Style Change being logged to the school's record for her to see. 'Just a bit longer until class starts.' NetBattle practice was going to be pretty early today, and given how customized she looked, she'd probably give him as much of a challenge as Glyde...or LuckyRucky. 'I really hope you won't try anything Mayl.' Her or Roll for that matter, because after what happened last time, he had no problem using his NetSaver authority to call SciLab about this 'WIXOSS' and 'LRIG' stuff. The time for worrying about them was over after what he witnessed.

Piruluk in the meantime was ignoring Lan's Navi. Having already looked up the schedule for today, she could wait until 10:45 to see how she'd fare against him in her Level 0 form. Akira's schedule was ready for her Selector to see and ignore, so now all Piruluk had to do until class started was reminisce. The image on the holo-screen wsa a rather blurry JPG, heavy artifacting making the image quality quite ugly. But it held a special place in her heart, one that she would never replace.

It was taken 5 years ago, back when she was human and Lan was around six. The picture itself was taken on a LeapFrog Jr. camera app, and it was of her before she met Ayumi, and back when she was still Kiyoi Mizushima, an antisocial 13 year old girl. She still had that gloomy look to her, but Lan didn't care. He just sat right next to her as she held his hand, barely able to keep it together as this was the first picture with a friend she had ever taken.

"Wow, that's actually kinda pathetic isn't it?" Keeping her composure, Piruluk said nothing as an apparition of Mayu appeared in front of her. "Hiya!" Piruluk just stared at the screen. "Don't worry, the blue guy can't see me. It's a new power I'm learning!" More staring. Mayu pouted. "Fiiine! Look, I only got like a minute or so left, so I'm just gonna keep it simple. Daddy's really not happy with Sunayama, especially since he didn't tell us about Ruko and Shiro, so the plan to get the TetraCode's been moved up." Piruluk's eyes moved up slightly towards her. "He just wants an edge before Shiro and MegaMan meet up at the N1, or before you, Saiko or Inukai off him. Speaking of who, Saiko-"

Mayu's form thankfully faded from existence, Piruluk barely able to keep her anger in.

"Isn't that Iona just the worst?"

"I know, right?!" Hearing that sent Akira's heart aflutter. Finally, someone who knew how awesome she was, and knew what a bitch Iona was! "She doesn't smile-" Unless under certain conditions. "-Can't even talk like a normal person unless one of her braindead Ionadrones waves some BattleChips in front of her, and between you and me, I heard that her Navi's way worse!"

Lan grimaced. "I know." From day one, that Navi, Urith rubbed him the wrong way "I've seen her on the net once, and it was like-"

"Staring at a batshit-" Coin in the jar! "-insane loon?"

"Yeah! I think she actually liked all that crud with WWW and Gospel! She started saying how hot it was when WWW made all those cars-"

"-Nope!" Akira wasn't opening the can of words that was that LRIG's psyche! "Sooo, why don't we talk more about Aki-Lucky? I'm ga-ga over Aki-Lucky!"

"S-sure!" It was so nice to have someone to talk about her with! "People are always calling her bad names and saying she's a 'bad influence' and 'not fit to be a model', which is a lot of bunk!"

'So this is what it feels like to feel a fan's appreciation.' Oh it felt so good! She should squeeze some more praise out of this kid!

"Sure she screwed herself over, I mean I don't blame the agency for dropping her after that stunt-" Akira's hands went into scratching position. "But I don't blame her after what happened."

"..." Something about the way he said that was interesting… "You uhh, mind explaining?"
"Sure!" To Akira's confusion, the kid began looking around as if he was worried someone might hear. "I got a certain friend of mine, a skunk haired guy, to look into the incident after the news dropped-"

| I said no Lan.|

|Come on Chaud, you owe me for that little stunt you pulled back in America! You seriously thought I was the traitor?!'|

|...Fine. you're helping beta test Proto Man's new sword, got it?|

"I've got some friends in high places, so it was a cinch for me to get that-GAH!" Why was she even closer?! "Uhmm.."

"Go on, tell me! TELL ME!"

"Uhhmm..uhmmm...-so it turns out the PET was bugged. A glitch in the transmission program let someone match the PET's Optical Display ID to the surveillance camera's ID in the area to link them up and- could you get out of my face?!"

"Sorry!" Akria backed away, a look of elation on her face. "And you can't get the unedited footage right?"
Lan shook his head. "Sorry."

"Oh well!" At least someone knows the goddamn truth, and it was the same thing Piruluk explained to her! 'That stupid LRIG of Iona's probably used some WIXOSS magic to alter the footage!' There was no way the NetSavers would miss something like that crazy chick trying to knife her! Three losses and you're out, that was the rule, but nooooooo, the whiny little loser just had to throw a bitch fit! "Thank you, you've given me some much needed peace."

"You're welcome?" What just happened? "So uhhh..my name's Lan?"

"You already said that."

"Oh." Jeez that was frightening! He'd never been this close to a girl before! His time in America didn't count because this one wasn't trying to fleece him out of his money or BattleChips! "We can talk more about Akira if you want."

"Goodie!" Akira bought out her PET. "I got some exclusive photos of her I can give to you for free! Want them?"

"Do I?!" And talk they did. It wasn't often that Lan had a longtime crush on someone -if he noticed he had at all- but Akira Aoi had that feisty vicious attitude and the Netbattling skills! That was like, two awesome things in one!

Akira was just happy to find someone who actually liked her, and believed her! Since he was in this academy, his GPA had to be at the tippy top of the upper percentile! She couldn't remember the last time she even bothered going to school, so if she played her cards right with this fanboy, she may have just found her fast pass through this joint!

ACDC Academy, 9:00
Class-2A First Period

"Alright everyone, take your seats!" Ms.Mari watched as her kids quieted down and sat in their chairs. All except one… "Where's Mayl?" Small murmurs began to come from the students lips before she silenced them all. "Oh dear, this is going to be a mark on her record I'm afraid." She ignored the gasps as she went to her desk and uploaded the day's lesson plan to everyone's desk. "Open up the Pre-Net History app and CTRL F to page-" A hand rose in the air. "Yes, Mr Ooyama?"

"Uhh Ms. Mari?" Now Dex Ooyama was what some people would call a bit chubby. ~~His classmates~~ less kind people would refer to him as a whale. A mix between a Japanese woman and some foreign guy, Dex's Japanese features overtook his foreign ones, yet the foreign features were still maintained, like in his dark skin and larger than normal lips. He was wearing what he always wore, a green shirt with blue shorts. "Who's the older chick over there? What, did she get held back or something?"

Akira gritted her teeth as the laughter from everyone -sans her new favorite who was too busy playing some game on his desk to laugh at her - grated on her ears. "Listen here you-!" But as she turned to the offending brat, her eyes widened as she gazed upon the boy named Ooyama in horror as one thought persisted through her mind:

'What the fuck is that?!'

Ms. Mari sighed; she completely forgot about her new problem child. "This is…" Crap, what did that guy say her alias was? "..Mara Kumegiya, and she's just catching up on some things before she graduates." A lot of things. "Why don't you introduce yourself Ms. Kumegiya?"

How the hell was he so fat?! He was like, 10 -at least she was assuming that- how did he balloon to that size?!

"Ms. Kumegiya!"

That was American fat! Was he a mutant? He had to be a mutant, like those freaks who were stupid enough to stay in Kotobi-

"MS. KUMEGIYA!" Akira let out a yelp, much to Ms.Mari's satisfaction. "If you're done giving Mr. Ooyama bedroom, would you be so kind as to introduce yourself to the class?"

"Y-yeah…" She ignored the silent laughter -and the fat kid's reddening face- and headed to the front of the class. "My name's Mara Kumegiya." Oh god that tub of lard was winking at her! "I'm 17 years old, and I moved here from the Murasaki Ward. I will be a live-in student at the Academy from here to my graduation, and I hope that you will treat me well."

"Thank you Ms. Kumegiya, you may take your seat." Ms. Mari said with approval as Akira went back to her desk. 'That went pretty well!' She thought Ms. Aoi was going to be much more of a problem, and who could blame anyone in this situation, but this was a pleasant surprise! "Now as I was saying, Open up the Pre-Net History app and CTRL F this phrase, and we'll start from there. And class? If anyone interrupts me again, we'll be doing book learning all day, are we clear?"

"Yes Ms. Mari."

"Good!"

As she began her day, a notification appeared on her desktop. 'MegaMan?' Why would he be sending out an Email? Curious, she opened up the mail, saw the ID, and quickly closed it, pressing a shortcut command on her keyboard to let the Email pass through the school's firewall. 'Just what the heck did you two get into?!'' The last time those two used their NetSaver authority to get out of school he went to a skull shaped island filled with a bunch of armed lunatics! 'Please, whatever you've gotten yourself into, stay safe!' There was no use worrying about it now; she had to do her job and trust in the boys.

SciLab Main headquarters, 9:44
Yuichirio Hikari's office.

Where SciLab Hokkaido was where the rejects and the ones looking for a second chance went to, SciLab Tokyo was where the intelligent, resourceful, and those who had the money to buy their positions went. Yuichiro Hikari was two of those three, though depending on if whoever you talked to hated the guy or liked him, you wouldn't be able to tell which of those two were the case.

He created the modern PETs and was responsible for single handedly crafting each and every software and hardware update for the devices.

He was the head chief of Japan's Internet Security Forces, his expertise in the field helping automate a lot of the defensive grids positioned at key structures on the internet. To many in the scientific community, those who managed to learn that he was responsible for a lot of these things despite the heavy NDAs or because they earned the permissions to learn it, he was on a pillar far above normal men. To the normal rank and file, he was just some pompous ass who got his position because his daddy was such an important pillar in the making of modern society.

Tadashi Hikari...or Thomas Light as he was originally called. Yuichiro never thought about his father much nowadays, much to his displeasure. The man was rarely around, but when he was by god, the two of them and mom made up for all that lost time the best that they could. Those were simpler times, back when things weren't so complicated, boys played and watched TV instead of upstaging the government's efforts to keep the peace, foiling a bombing plot, stopping a plane crash while on said plane, getting thrown in a dungeon and nearly set on fire multiple times by a princess working for a terrorist organization, going to an heavily irradiated city whose radiation was worse than Chernobyl's- Lan and Hub were such good kids! It was a shame trouble seemed to attract the two like a fire did to moths, and upon seeing the Email Hub sent him just 40 minutes ago, he knew he'd have to break out the special stuff again, him and Haruka.

To: Dad (Email Address Withheld)
From: MegaMan.EXE, 9:12 (PET#44, Model Ver2)
Subject: WIXOSS

That Email was the reason he was sifting through his dad's personal belongings in the back room. "WIXOSS, WIXOSS!" He heard that name before but where! "Come on dad, work with me!" Oh why did he have to put so much stuff into physical media?! And not even something like a floppy disk, that'd be too easy! Using the incredibly speed he used to type lines of code faster than his peers, he had looked over every single legible bit of wording in his father's old documents, organizing the papers into neat piles behind him while his PET, taped to his head with the flashlight app enabled, provided a better light source than the bulb above. "I know it's in here!" Nothing, nothing, nothing-Ah there it was!" With the chant right at the top of the paper!

A Girl prayed to fulfill her wish.

Scattered strange gene "wixoss"

all around the world fusion into one form.

Searching in vain for a fight...

Victory will be the only way for her

wish to revolutionize.

Now, shall her "Wish Across" be conquered.

"I knew it!" It was one of the few card games he and dad ever played..when he was old enough to look at the girls on the cards that was. Now there was a burning question plaguing his mind: How did Hub know about this? There was only one answer, and Yuichiro knew there was no denying it.

But why on earth would Wily bring a silly card game into his schemes?

ACDC Academy, 9:44
Class-2A Network

To: MegaMan.EXE, 9:12 (PET#44, Model Ver2)
From: Dad (Email Address Withheld)
RE: WIXOSS

When you get to SciLab for your field trip, tell me everything. I'm bringing in Chaud and ProtoMan to the proceedings. Thank you for not divulging anything in the message.

MegaMan blinked, rereading the Email again. 'Not divulging anything?' He gave dad a full rundown of everything he just went through! Something wasn't right here, and opening up his outbox and the last mail he sent proved it.

To: Dad (Email Address Withheld)
From: MegaMan.EXE, 9:12 (PET#44, Model Ver2)
Subject: WIXOSS

He wrote 4000 words in that mail, and all of it was gone! It was just the subject that was left as the only text he wrote for this thing! INITIALIZING PET SAFE MODE TRIGGERS. PLEASE SELECT PARAMETERS FOR ACTIVATION. This had never happened before, and he was going to play this safe. And speaking of safe, a certain redhead and her pink Navi still hadn't responded to his mails. Oh well; dad wasn't the only government official he sent an Email to. He and Lan had all the time in the world tonight to interrogate her, but for now it was his and Lan's favorite time of the day: NetBattle Class.

"NetBattle Class huh?" Piruluk muttered as the Warp Gate activated, it's systems alerting her and everyone that the destination had changed. She looked to MegaMan, her face emotionless. 'Time to see what you've got, Navi.' Being sealed up like this would mean a lot less pain if he tried stabbing her again now that she was bound by the rules of Cyberspace. ACTIVATING WWW SCANNER. Given what happened with WWW and then Gospel, it was a safe bet to assume that the TetraCode's security was upped, possibly beyond what Saiko and FlashMan could handle. Better to be safe than sorry in this case.

And as MegaMan finished setting the parameters for his systems to go into Safe Mode, he missed something very important. Given the current situation you wouldn't blame him, and he'd seen it plenty of times before this WIXOSS stuff happened last night, but maybe it was a good thing he didn't notice in this particular instance.

WIXOSS.BIO HAS BEEN FULLY INSTALLED ONTO MEGAMAN.EXE
TIME OF INSTALLATION:WRWRWR%%#%#
FILE SIZE: 2M(ERROR! ERROR!)
BIOS FILE HAS BEEN INSTALLED IN MEGAMAN.EXE/SYSTEM44/PROGRAMFILES/BATTLENETWORK

verifiaman · Feb 11, 2021

ACDC Academy, 9:55
Floor 2 Main Network, NetBattle Center

"Alright class, take your seats!"

Sitting down along with everyone else, Piruluk took a look at the arena. Most schools, particularly the ones Akira loved to pretend she had the grades to get into 4 years back, wasted file size and resources on grand, massive arenas, meant to show off and give the students an air of unwarranted superiority as well as give the school a reason to show off. ACDC Academy was different.

120 seats, 30 seats separated in 4 corners at the points of the diamond shaped stadium.
She was sitting at the left point of the diamond, while Lan's Navi and his friends, minus a certain pink pseudo-LRIG, were sitting at the opposite end. 'So, Pinnochio has an entourage. How cute.' To the left of Lan's Navi was Glyde.EXE, an adult sized Navi with the face and mannerisms of a middle aged British Butler. Made by the Ayanokoji Corporation and given to the CEO/Founder's daughter Yai Ayanokoji, Glyde was priority#1 during WWW's and Gospel's attempted takeovers given the wealth of information at his disposal. And thanks to Lan's Navi, all those attempts failed.

To the right of Lan's Navi was GutsMan.EXE, a hulk of a creature if ever there was one. He wasn't that much of a threat according to Wily's data, and she could tell from a glance that intellectually, the info was right on the money. He did his job as a Navi and that was it, and he looked the most excited to fight judging by how twitchy his gorilla arms were.

At its current size, the stadium could fit a small house, though the fighting arena was quite small with a blue diamond shape pattern overlaid atop of a black, starry floor. It was obvious that the room in its entirety was modifiable, the seats and the arena, and the processing power to handle this had to be immense. Heck, the only reason she wasn't lagging or having connection problems was because the desk Akira put the PET into was doing most of the work processing and transmitting her data.

ANALYSIS COMPLETE. DATA SAVED AS SCAN.TXT. 'That didn't take long.' Still though, something wasn't right…. OPENING SCAN.TXT

SCILAB METROPOLITAN EDUCATIONAL SIMULATOR
MODEL 2.22
COPYRIGHT 2010, SCILAB®

'I knew it.' A quick look through the patent directory installed into her revealed that the information she was seeing was not only out of date, but with the incorrect unicode at the end of the second instance of "SciLab".Using the term 'Educational Simulator' for a NetBattle arena went out of practice after a lengthy lawsuit involving SciLab and the Japanese Board of Education, and the Model Number was back when Wily worked with SciLab, according to the data here, and was used for testing purposes. All that already was weird enough, but even weirder was why SciLab hid the TetraCode here.

Hiding the Elemental Programs where they were before Wily found them made sense; no one would suspect what were essentially the non-sentient gods of the Cyberworld to be hidden in a random oven of all things, and it wouldn't leave much of a trail for anyone to follo. But Alpha, while having nowhere near the devastating, lightspeed infecting power the LifeVirus had, was even more crippling despite taking even longer to acquire the tools to unlock it. And after WWW1 and Gospel were demolished, why not move the programs? 'They must not realize that we know where they are.' Oh well; their idiocy was her gain.FlashMan and Saiko would be alerted to this surprise after school. For now, it was time to play the part of the student.

But first...OPENING NAVI.TXT. OPENING LINK TO MAIN PET SCREEN. Seeing Akira squirm always made her day.

MegaMan meanwhile, was sitting with his friends. The two of them talked about the new student; well not exactly talk, more like Glyde airing his suspicions about the new student and her Navi to the not exactly smart but shockingly tight lipped bruiser, but MegaMan didn't know that. 'Lock set, triggers set if any processes go under above set parameters…' Alright, that was done, time for NetBattle Class!

After reading the text sent to her by Piruluk, Akira was in full on panic mode.

'Gotta hurry gotta hurry gotta hurry!' Now she was -poorly- keeping cool and hiding her frustration the best she could, despite how much she hated her current situation. Frantically, she kept trying to type on her PET with the frankly outdated keyboard, but the device was so old that it was better suited for preteen fingers! 'Goddamnit why are these buttons SO TINY?!' How the hell did those old fogeys get work done on these things back in the day?! For that matter, why didn't she change the registered Folder for her PET back to the non-WIXOSS one?! 'I finally got Piruluk to shut up about me lazing around on this crap, and I go and prove her right!' She was almost slamming her fingers on the keys from how fast she was looking at the folders, many of which seemed pointless and things she thought she had told Piruluk to delete already. 'Ok, ok found it!' And that's when a text window opened up on the screen.

FOLDER 1 SET AS MAIN FOLDER
ANTI SCANNER PROGRAM ACTIVATED, WIXOSS PROGRAMS AND ALL RELATED FOLDERS AND FILES HIDDEN FROM DETECTION UNTIL IT IS DEEMED SAFE BY ADMINISTRATOR OR THE ACTING LRIG

"....." Akira's eye twitched as the scanning program swept through her PET, giving her the all clear. "...That bitch." And despite her whispering that, it was another coin in the swear jar. 'There was a program for this ALL THIS TIME?!' Nope, nope! She wasn't gonna get worked up over this, her future was at stake! 'Two minutes until class starts.' Thankfully she had some BattleChips ready in case she had to do some public NetBattling.

FOLDER1
BATTLECHIP COUNT: 30
Mega Chip COUNT: 0
GIGACHIP COUNT:0
STANDARDCHIP COUNT: 30
REGULARCHIP: FSTGAUGE

'That should do it!' Best BattleChips she had too! Now to see what suckers were going to be her punching bags for the day! 'God my fingers hurt!' At least she won't have to use that thing for a while. Opening up the folder for this specific class she got a good long look at the class list for the day. 'Geez, that's a lot of generic Navis!' And only like, 5 unique ones! 'I thought this was a good school!' What, these kids couldn't get their parents to fart out the cash for some good Navis? 'Who even are these guys anyway?' Some stuffy looking conehead, a robo gorilla with a big jaw, Piruluk, one that was greyed out-possibly getting repairs or absent- and...and….. Cue the hands slamming agains the desk."WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT BLUE FUCKWAD DOING HERE?!"

"MISS KUMEGIYA! HALLWAY! NOW!"

{I have removed Miss Kumegiya from class} Miss Mari said over the battle arena's intercom over the snickering of her human students and some of the Navi ones, many of which were looking at a nonplussed Piruluk, who had a red icon above her head. {Because of this, I will be acting as Piruluk's NetOp for the duration of the school day.}

"That's fair." Piruluk stated. 'And there went half of my power'

{Alright then! Mr. Ooyama, Ms.Ayanokoji, see me after class. As for why you're in trouble too Ms. Ayanokoji, blame GutsMan for not deleting the homework ID on his PET. and Mr Ooyama? Make your plagiarism less obvious next time?} Now everyone was laughing, this time at GutsMan and Glyde as the taller stuffy Navi glared angrily into space, most likely at a one-way holo-screen that was showing his panicking NetOp's face. Ms.Mari waited for the class to quiet down before speaking again. {Now then. Today's Netbattle Class is to let Piruluk shine! And since she's an Aqua Element Navi, The field this time will be a marsh. Information about the rest of today's matchups have been sent to everyone's PETs, so I expect both NetOp and Navi to communicate their strategies effectively.. And do remember that I will be listening in on everything you say and type, are we clear?}

"Yes Ms.Mari…" Said the entire class.

{Thank you! I hope to see some pro virus busting skills today!}

Piruluk's systems alerted her to a change in her PET's administrator. 'Mariko Ozono.' The woman that turned Higure Yamitarō, or Higsby as he was known nowadays, into a snitch during the WWW's first reign of terror and the LRIG testing phase, though thankfully Mayu erased his memory of his contributions during his time on the WIXOSS project. Amazing how his intelligence went out the window when a cute girl told him to do something. The fact that this Ozono sister was still Lan's teacher despite knowing of his accomplishments and had the permission to gain administrative access over student Navis, something even most teachers in reform schools couldn't do, proved that she was a force to watch out for. 'Though she's not that much of a threat if she failed to see my tampering.' Case in point…

FIRST MATCH
MEGAMAN.EXE
VS
PIRULUK.EXE

Glyde narrowed his eyes. 'That shouldn't be right.' Looking at his short blue friend, he could see the same suspicion in his eyes as he looked at the holo-screen above. "I see you find this quite odd as well?"

"Yeah. Ms.Mari would never pit a new student against me. It's against school rules?"

"Guts…" GutsMan grumbled. "Smells like a hack job Guts."

Glyde nodded in agreement. "My thoughts exactly, chum."

"Guts, Guts, Guts…" Both of them watched as MegaMan walked down the stairs to the arena, Piruluk doing the same at her end. "You're going?"

"I don't have a choice." MegaMan answered. " Besides, Ms.Mari would know if someone tampered with the matchups."
"You are correct on that."

"Yep."

MegaMan waved them off. The fight would be a very welcome distraction, a good way to clear his head for the inevitable confrontation with his next door neighbor this afternoon. WIXOSS, LRIGs, those absurd damage numbers, and Roll's sudden increase in strength and power. 'Just clear your mind and focus on the battle.' As he walked to the arena, He noticed that his opponent was staring at him, not a hint of emotion to be found on her face. 'The way she's walking is odd.' All the weight was being forwarded to her stomach...did she have an injury there?

MegaMan and Piruluk stepped onto the arena's floor, Lan opening up a text line to his brother. |Are you ok?|

|No.| MegaMan texted back. |And keep a straight face when I tell you this: we have a Code 3.|

Lan did just as MegaMan said, keeping a straight, 'I gotta go to the bathroom but I'm holding it in' face as he processed what he heard. |Code 3?! But I didn't get anything from Chaud about any terrorist attacks!|

|Well it does. I can't tell you anymore since I don't know how you'd react, but I'll fill you in once we go to SciLab today. For now, don't ask anymore questions. I don't know who might be listening in.|

|Ok MegaMan.| Oh boy,MegaMan was worried about being hacked. Yeah, this was not going to be a fun week, that he could tell.

"Lan, are you ready?" Lan looked up to see Ms.Mari staring at him expectantly.

"Uhmm yeah?

"You can go to the bathroom if you want to." His teacher said with a hint of worry. "It looks like you need it."

"N-no I'm fine!" Lan replied with a nervous chuckle, making his Navi and his teacher mentally facepalm. "I'm just excited to NetBattle you again, that's all! You made GutsMan into a pro fighter with your skills, and you operated him much better than Dex!"

"HEY!"

"...Alright then." And her student just wasted the out she gave him so he could do his NetSaver business. "I have Piruluk's Folder ready, do you have MegaMan's done?"

"Yes Ms.Mari."

{The first match will be between me and Lan, and MegaMan and Piruluk.} A holo-screen appeared above the heads of both combatants, MegaMan's at 1200 and Piruluk at 500. {Here are the stipulations for victory in this match!}

MEGAMAN.EXE
VS
PIRULUK.EXE

VICTORY CONDITIONS

DECK OUT
MEGAMAN.EXE HP REACHES 800
OR
PIRULUK.EXE HP REACHES 100
RESTRICTIONS
MEGA CHIP COUNT: 2
GIGA CHIPS ARE BANNED!
NO CHIP INSTALLATION LIMIT ON CUSTOM SCREEN

{Is that fair?}

"Yes Ms. Mari."

Piruluk nodded. "I see no problems with these terms."

{Alright! Field on!}

INITIALIZING LIGHT LABS TERRAFORM PRACTICE FIELD.

Piruluk's eyes were wide in shock as she heard that. 'Light Labs?!' That didn't show up in her scans! Not a hint of copyright information, no mention of it in the metadata tags, anything!

The four corners of the arena drifted away, at least 200 feet from the center of the room, leaving a black, empty void of 800 feet. Blades of grass shot out from the arena, covering it and the void. Neither Navi felt the grass, the two of them standing a good 2 feet above it as the arena shifted and changed, and yet they had not moved a single inch. Optical illusions were amazing. A few seconds later, a massive tidal wave rushed through the grassy field, turning it into a marshland while leaving some of the land dry and untouched. Small buildings popped up from the marshy ground, some with flat roofs, others slanted, all of them at different heights. {So this is what the computer chose.} Ms.Mari noted as she began to read off the field information. {It's obvious what the field type is so I'm not reading that off. The deepest waters here go to 18 fathoms while the smallest depth is 4. Everywhere else is ankle high water. The terrain itself will be hard to move in, since the two of you don't have a method of flight or hovering, so prioritize staying on dry land, and keep your opponent in your sights. You can use the houses for cover, but they can be destroyed by a basic Buster Shot.}

"Got it Ms.Mari!"

"I understand."

{Alright! Lan, do you want to say it? Be sure to type any commands you have for MegaMan!}

{H-huh? Y-yeah sure! Ready MegaMan?}

"Yep!"

And so the two dropped to the field, and the second their feet made contact with the ground, the two ran in the direction opposite of the other. Or rather waddled with the pace of a slow jog. Piruluk recounted the rules in her head, heading for a house ahead of her. 'Three minutes to go over a plan with the NetOp. StageChips are forbidden, and no program advances.' That meant most of Akira's Folder was useless. Now curious, she opened up a line to her current NetOp. "Teacher, you've changed Akira's folder right?"

|Of course I have! Your NetOp has a reputation of being quite the sore loser and a cheater at that! So I'm using one of my older student's Folders!|

Piruluk hid her distaste. |Understood.| She finally got onto dry land and entered the house. |What's the plan?|

Lan read over the text his Navi put to screen and began typing a response. |Are you sure she's an Aqua Navi MegaMan?| Lan typed.

"Positive. And I don't know why, but I have this feeling I've seen her before…"

|Ok, if you say so.| Jeez, he was acting cagey today! |Ok then, I'm gonna load up the Battle Forecast and let's get this show on the road!|

"Wait don-!"

AREA SCANNED FOR COMBAT POTENTIAL.
BATTLEFIELD SIZE: 800 feet
TERRAIN: GRASS,SWAMP,WATER,BRICK

COMBATANTS

MEGAMAN.EXE
HP: 1200
CHIP COUNT: 30.
MEGA CHIP COUNT: 0
GIGA CHIP COUNT:0
WIXOSS CERTIFICATION:HUB.BATCH(?)
PIRULUK.EXE
HP: 700
CHIP COUNT: 30.
MEGA CHIP COUNT: 1
GIGA CHIP COUNT:0
WI$^^#OSS CER553f^

|WIXOSS certification?|

"Darn it…" Oh he could feel his brother's curiosity and worry. Worried Lan was bad enough, but if his brother found out about Roll last night before he could break the news to him...

|MegaMan, what is that?|

"Something very very bad… keep a straight face and focus on the battle." Lan sent an angry emoticon. "If I knew the answers myself I would have told you, but we can focus on that later. We have a field trip to SciLab today remember? We can ask dad about it there." And he could ask Piruluk about that jumbled data. That couldn't be a coincidence after what happened last night.

|Ok then.| The counter on his PET was ticking down. But |I'm not letting this go MegaMan.|

"I know. Let's just focus on the match."

|I'll hold you to that. Battle Routine Set!|

"Execute!"

And thus the fight was on.

Busting through the roof in a single jump, MegaMan surveyed the area and loaded up the first BattleChip. "ZapRing2!" his right arm changed into a giant blue flat blade plug. Barely a nanosecond after that, a disc of energy shot out of the space between the blades and into the water, electrifying it as he descended. "ZapRing1!" Second verse, same as the first, only MegaMan aimed a bit further ahead electrifying a nearby house. "AirShoes!" The second he hit the water's surface, he stopped a good two inches off the ground and ran north out of the house, running on air and above the electrified water.

"Pretty sneaky. Piruluk reluctantly admitted from her vantage point. Even if she wasn't an Aqua Navi, the paralysis would still be a bitch to contend with. "But not sneaky enough." Her left arm changed into a Buster as she began charging energy. When the tank was full, she jumped out of the house and aimed downward at where she was going to land, firing at the water. A large sheet of ice as big as a car formed where she shot, allowing her to land safely on the hazard without injury. "Windbox." A large fan formed at the end of the ice platform, it's blades powering on and sending her and her makeshift boat towards Lan's Navi. "Buster+"

Buster+
10Atk added to Charge Shot
Charging time reduced

Piruluk charged her Buster and held the energy inside the barrel. She then activated a BattleChip in her free hand, turning it into a bow-like apparatus, the strings of the bow attached to the end of the gauntlet. "He's getting closer." And the ice was melting faster from the intense heat. She kicked the WindBox into the air and jumped, the extra air produced by the fan propelling her higher as it exploded, it's usage expired.

Still running, MegaMan kept an eye on his now aerial opponent. He had to admit, that was a pretty risky and clever trick with Windbox, but what was her game? 'I can sense Buster Energy in one hand and an Aqua Element Chip in the other…..ooooh..' So that was your plan huh? MegaMan headed towards the nearest patch of grass, Piruluk firing at his position as he made landfall. The first shot from her bow barely missed, he rolled out the way of the second shot, and nearly managed to kick himself off the ground and out of the way of the last one. 'TrainArrow2?' He didn't need his precognition to recognize the color of the arrows sticking out of the ground. 'Three shots..three left.' And another was coming his way! He kicked off the ground, landing above the electrified water as the first arrow hit, he spun out of the way of the second, and just as Piruluk was coming down, she didn't shoot the third.

"GAAGH!" That's because she shot her Buster at him, freezing his legs solid.

MEGAMAN.EXE
HP: 1200
-70HP
LEGS FROZEN!

MegaMan quickly punched the ice off of his legs, grabbing a few of the shards in his hand before they could fly off and running towards Piruluk. 'Windbox, and now TrainArrow.' She had 28 chips left, and he had 27. A rush of excitement coursed through his code as he awaited what she had planned next.

|I told you that wouldn't work.| Ms.Mari said as Piruluk activated Air Shoes before she fell in the water, falling on her but just a few inches above the electrified marsh. |He can just shake off physical status ailments just like that.|

"I see." He was coming straight for her again. "It took him a couple seconds to get out of my ice. Close range is what I need." But first, she needed to get rid of whatever was in his hands. "AquaTower." With a swipe of her hand, pillars of electrified water a story tall shot out and headed towards her opponent.

|Incoming MegaMan!|

"I see them!" And with the electrical element from what he did to the water, he won't be moving for a while if it hit! "Lan, send the three Chips on the right! The Asterisk, A and B ones!"

|Ok!|

"Thanks!" MegaMan stopped in place and ran to the left, the electrified AquaTowers following him. 'So she has that level of control over them?!' Then this plan was going to take a bit of setting up. Shattering through that ice would be super easy, but she could easily make more or reinforce it, and these towers were making getting a good shot really really hard. He ran straight for a few seconds before curving back straight towards Piruluk, who immediately shot her Buster into the water before he could do anything, raising a sheet of ice in front of her as a shield. "MiniBomb." Three small bombs, orb shaped with a blue stripe in the middle, appeared in his left hand as the AquaTower path split, two of the blocking his way towards their controller. 'Hmmm…'let me try something.' MegaMan threw the bombs into the air towards Piruluk, and just as they arced atop of the Aqua Towers, the pillars extended up into their path, the electricity causing the orbs to detonate prematurely. 'Just like I thought.' The remaining AquaTowers began to encircle MegaMan, altering their heights at different speeds, most of them going low enough that he could simply walk over them. So she has a sense of humor huh? 'Good thing I'm in position!' He thought with a grin. "Lan, send the other two Chips!" He moved to the left, and then to the right, the AquaTowers either staying in position or following him slightly. 'Interesting.'

|MegaMan, what are you doing?!|

"I'm testing out something, seeing if-" An opening! "GUARD2!"

Piruluk felt the AquaTowers she sent after Lan's Navi dissipating. |Get ready to counterattack!|

"There's no need." With the Chip Limits in place here, nothing Lan or his Navi had could seriously hurt her. "Their tactics are decent but their Chip Selection so far leaves a lot to be desired." Program Advance this Program Advance that, that was the crux of all their best strategies. "I believe I'm safe."

"Uh-huh. You might want to look on your map screen then.|

"What are you talking?-" Piruluks eyes widened as she looked on her HUD, seeing MegaMan's icon quickly barreling towards her. "Impossible!" She turned and ran-

SMASH!

-Too little too late as MegaMan's butt smashed through her ice shield and right into her face, sending the two of them skidding above the waters as the momentum made his butt grind her face into the water for the duration of the crash.

PIRULUK.EXE
HP: 700
-100 FROM CONTINUOUS ENVIRONMENTAL DAMAGE!

Piruluk quickly threw him off of her, seeing a yellow shield on her enemy's arm dissipate. "Urghh…" It hurt to move. The environmental damage was weak, 10HP every second you're in contact with the hazard, but the status effects... "Y-you us-s-ed G-_Guard to P-propel yourself Didn-DIDN't YOu?"

"Yep!" MegaMan said, smiling as he rubbed his sore, now tingly butt. "I redirected the force of the attack back at myself before the Chip designated you as a target, sending me flying straight through your shield!"

MEGAMAN.EXE
HP: 1130
-70HP

"I-IS-SEE!" And then he just stood there. For two whole minutes. "A-aren't you GOING to a-aTTACK?"

"Why?" He replied with a confused look. "That's against the rules. I have to wait until you recover. If you can't get up in five minutes, then you can't fight anymore, and it's an automatic forfeit."

"I-iSEE." The teacher was bleating in her ear about her carelessness. 'That's twice you've hurt me.' Feeling was returning to her body. "I-I Can M-move-MOVE Now."

MegaMan jumped a foot away from her and got into a fighting stance with a smile. "Your move."

A Heal Chip sent by Ms.Mari cured the rest of her ailments. "Thank you." She aimed her Buster at Lan's Navi, the thing doing the exact same. Neither of them moved, both of them charging the energy in their arm cannons. 'I need to immobilize him.' Using the BattleChips FreezeMan used in his fight with Lan's Navi wasn't going to cut it. Luckily for her, the hands that be gave her a good Chip Selection this time. "AreaSteal."

MegaMan's eyes widened after hearing that, firing his Buster at her only to hit nothing. "Oh crud!" Of course she'd have AreaSteal, Ms. Mari bought out all the stops when NetBattling him and Lan! "Where are you…?"

"Above you." MegaMan quickly looked up, eyes widening as a blue Spreadgun's barrel was just inches away from his face. "Bubble Spread." She unloaded every shot onto him, emptying the chambers on her weapon. Each and every shot made a loud and painful sounding thud, the impacts so powerful that they slammed into the ground below. Again and again she hit him, never stopping even as she landed above the water, exhausting all 16 shots of the Chip, her arm reverting back to normal in the process. "Hm, that ought to do it."

|Piruluk, you might want to look at his HP!|

MEGAMAN.EXE
NO DAMAGE TAKEN!

"Of course…" Piruluk groaned.

|LOOK OUT!|

"GAH!" She heeded the warning too late as her opponent, now transparent, ran up to her and kneed her in the stomach- 'R-right in the w-wound!' -And then roundhouse kicked her into the air! 'H-he must have used Invis!' The kick sent her a good 4 feet away, her enemy taking potshots at her with his Buster, six shots in total as she fell, quickly landing on her feet and shooting back at the bastard, who easily dodged her shots as she took quick pauses to slowly raise another ice shield, a translucent one so as to keep an eye on him. 'Keep dodging, keep dodging…' And more importantly, his other hand. The kick took off a good 50 shots and those hits from his Buster took off a good 60 in total. 'I'm almost down to half my health.'

'Keep your eyes on her, keep your eyes on her…' And more importantly, her other hand. Jeez, he hoped he didn't hit her wound! This wasn't a fight for his life like with LuckyRucky! Suddenly her hand morphed, and he managed to load his BattleChip just a second later. His Chip was a more rounded version of his Buster with a bladed rifling inside the barrel, while Piruluk's hand didn't change, and instead she was holding a boomerang. "Bad draw huh?!" He yelled, rushing towards her shield while still dodging her shots, the ice shield letting them pass through.

"You'd be correct." Piruluk jumped back, keeping an eye on his Buster and his face. 'He's looking at my feet. Is that where he's going to aim?' Continuing her retreat, she held her boomerang closer to the water to block as many of his shots as possible….the shots that she soon realized weren't coming. "What are you waiting for? You know full well standard Buster fire won't pierce the metal of a Boomer Chip."

"Yeah, I know! AIR SHOT!"

'Oh crap,' A powerful gust of air shot from her enemy's arm cannon at her face, the damage blocked just in time by the boomerang, but that wasn't what she was worried about, for Air Shot was one of the more powerful Chips on dangerous terrain, as shown when,despite blocking the 20HP worth of damage, she was sent skidding into the water and electrified again. "GAGAGGAGAGAGAAA!"

"AIR SHOT!"

And he did it again!

PIRULUK.EXE

HP: 600
-20 FROM AIR SHOT
-200 FROM CONTINUOUS ENVIRONMENTAL DAMAGE!

|Hold on Piruluk! Panel Return!|

PANEL RETURN
STANDARD CHIP
ELIMINATES ALL TERRAIN ALTERATIONS WITHIN NETBATTLE ARENA
UNABLE TO FUNCTION OUTSIDE OF OFFICIALLY SANCTIONED NETBATTLE LOCATIONS

Mega Man watched with irritation as the electrical charge of the water disappeared. "And it was such a good plan too.." Lan rarely used ideas like this!

{Yes it was MegaMan, and I commend you and Lan for thinking of it!}

"Darn it…" Piruluk was feeling very Akira right now….

{But now I think it's time we end this, shall we?}

{Huh?} Lan looked at the two Navi's health bars. {But MegaMan's still in the lead Ms.Mari!}

The teacher let out a chuckle...a very familiar chuckle that told Lan she knew something that he should've. {Yes, that's correct. But do remember it was my sister who taught me to NetBattle...and you do remember who my sister was, right? I guess you can say I have a bit of Jealousy, don't you think?}

{Yeah Ms.Yuri-} Lan's eyes widened as he began typing. |MegaMan, get away from Piruluk, now!|

MegaMan jumped up into the air, raising his arms into an X-position to guard his face. "GUARD1!" All he had to do was redirect the shield before he attacked and he'd be out of attack-

"Catcher." Before MegaMan could even register what had happened, the data for his Chip had left his systems and installed themselves into Piruluk's. A tractor beam had kept him suspended in the air, courtesy of a yellow and red UFO with a face and appearance that wouldn't look out of place as a company mascot.

CATCHER
STANDARD CHIP
UNINSTALLS 1 BATTLECHIP FROM ENEMY OPPONENT.
ONLY 1 OF THIS CHIP IS LEGALLY ALLOWED IN CIVILIAN PETS

"So that's your plan I see." Irritating.With a near snarl, Piruluk charged her Buster and activated the Guard1 Chip, summoning the shield and quickly got in front of it, firing her Buster just as Lan's Navi reached the halfway point of his fall. "Guard1." She fired her Buster at the shield, which ricocheted off of it and into the new shield on her arm, sending her flying straight at the blue nuisance. She slammed right into him, giving him a taste of his own medicine and kicking off of him before unloading five uncharged shots into his chest, and then began charging her Buster again per Ms. Mari's orders. With the fall, the impact, and the speed at which it all happened, MegaMan's Air Shoes didn't have enough time to trigger, sending the blue Navi into the water. One Piruluk was on 'the ground', she fired her Charge Shot at him, freezing him in place. "There."

{Thank you Piruluk!} Ms. Mari said. {And as for you Lan, I never said that there was a Chip Limit for you right?}

{....Oh no…..}

{And that tells me all I need to know! Piruluk?}

The blue-haired Navi nodded. "Understood." She was going to enjoy this. And the resulting pain was the perfect distraction to give him a little present. "Jealousy."

JEALOUSY
MEGA CHIP
DAMAGE (VARIABLE) HP LOST DEPENDING ON CHIP TYPE/CLASS/ETC

There was no grandiose animation, no screams of agony, not even a single attack. The Chip did it's job, taking 80 HP away for every Chip Lan loaded into him. "3...4...6...9…"

MEGAMAN.EXE
DAMAGE LIMIT REACHED!
WINNER: PIRULUK.EXE!

Yep, Piruluk was feeling very Akira right now.

ACDC Academy, 11:00
Room 6B

There were a lot of empty rooms on the 2nd floor of ACDC Academy, but there were many more rooms occupied with students and faculty. These empty rooms were for extracurricular purposes, mostly being a safe place to use chemicals in, but when they weren't in use, they often served as gathering spots for the various cliques to eat come lunchtime. Room 6B was where the former gardening club used to be, and until the school decided what to do with the room, two troublemakers and their much more academically inclined friends used it as a club room to chat, eat and NetBattle. Contrary to popular belief, Ms.Mari wasn't a complete stick up her butt disciplinarian, she liked to let her students have fun, especially during her 'off days.'

" I can't believe you lost to the newbie!"

"Shut up Dex…" Lan grumbled as he and Dex ate their lunches peacefully. "How was I supposed to know that she'd pull out Jealousy?!" He took a bite out of his mushy peanut butter and jelly sandwich and swallowed. "That wasn't in the rules!"

"HAH!" The taller, more rotund boy replied as he too ate his peanut butter and jelly sandwich. "She didn't say that we couldn't use Mega Chips! It's not her fault you didn't read!"

"Rub it in why don't you…" Lan looked at his bitten-into sandwich and sighed. "When did Ms. Mari say we can eat good food again?"

"When we become model students…" Dex answered, just shoving the entire sandwich into his mouth and gulping it down in one go. "Straight A's, perfect attendance, and all that goody-two-shoes junk."

"How you two haven't qualified for expulsion yet is a mystery to me!" The two boys winced, not at who was telling them that, but the oh so delicious smell emanating from them. There was only one person who could advertise how rich they were just by smell alone: Yai Ayanokoji. Her massive forehead bouncing the light from the windows off it's surface, the usually pigtailed blonde had decided to forgo her usual hairstyle, her foot length blonde hair done in a gigantic oversized bun. She wore a secretary uniform, with matching skirt, and slim-framed glasses. In her right hand was her bright gold PET, and in her left was a large briefcase, also bright gold, with her face on it. That was where the smell was coming from. "You two dunderheads are the biggest paradoxes in this entire school! Well..second biggest."

"Good morning Yai!" Lan said with fake cheer, noting a duller tone in her voice. "We're doing good, how about you!" And she was in her 'Brown-nosing clothes'...oh how he would pity his poor dad when she inevitably found him.

The little 8 year old scoffed and took a seat next to the two. "I'll give you respect when you earn it Hikari."

"I saved you from suffocating to death a few months ago!"

"You can't go five weeks without stopping some massive catastrophe, try doing something to actually impress me please?" The two boys growled, ignoring their whining stomachs as the delicious peanut butter and jelly sandwich was taken out of her briefcase. "Ahh, there's nothing like the classics, right boys? Freshly made honey infused into the peanut butter with cranberry jam. It's the simple things, you know?"

Ignoring Dex trying to butter up Yai, Lan's anger at being baited like this was instead focused on the blonde's lack of enthusiasm. "What's wrong Yai?"

Dex stared at Lan confused and then turned to the tiny terror. "Yeah he's right! You're usually lording over us with your food way more than this! And you haven't even given us our share yet!

"...That's because you're not getting anymore shares…" Yai told them, her mood dropping fast. Because of that new student, Ms.Mari bought out the security scanners and found out about the stuff I hid in my briefcase." The two boys turned white as a sheet. "She found out I was sneaking food to you guys, and had Glyde call my dad." She saw the looks on her friend's faces, the utter terror. "You guys aren't in trouble, don't worry…." Tears began to form in her eyes. "Daddy didn't even say anything! A few hours later all the money in my food budget was gone, and now...and now…!

"WHO WANTS LOBSTER?!" Ms. Mari yelled excitedly, the teachers for the grade cheering as they ate their feast. "I got the tartar sauce!"

"I got the stuffed ham!"

"I got the to-go trays!"

"Mariko, what about the students?" One of the teachers asked.

"They're feasting just as hard as us! Be sure to thank my star student Yai for this!"

Tears were running down the three's faces as Yai continued. "Five months worth of lunches and dinners are gonna go to those stupid teachers because I was nice to you losers!" She held up her peanut butter sandwich. "This is the last bit of good food I'm gonna have, and then I'm gonna have to eat the stupid slop you have!" She slammed her face into the ground and began to sob profusely.

"Lan, dude?"

"Yeah?"

"We are in so much trouble once the field trip's over! Please tell me you got some cool NetSaver stuff!" Ms.Mari was a lot less painful with her punishments whenever Lan did the hero junk!

Lan looked away nervously. "Yeah, I'm not sure about that." Yai ceased her sobbing and looked up worryingly. "I can't tell you here, but once we get to SciLab, I'll tell you and my dad everything."

The two looked to each other and nodded before Dex spoke up. "That bad huh?" Lan shrugged. "Well why can't you just share some of the files?"

"And have Chaud breathing down his and subsequently our necks?" Yai answered. "Do you really want skunk-hair finding out that Lan's been sharing information with us again?"

"He didn't find out last time!"

"Last time was Kotobuki, nimrod. It's kinda hard to enforce that when you're worried about suffocating to death under irradiated computer servers."

"So Yai, anything on that new student?" Dex and Yai turned to Lan, who was eager to get the conversation far away from that debacle. "How badly did she screw up to get sent back so many grades?"

"Oh man!" Dex said with a laugh. "I completely forgot about that! She's like a reverse you, Yai!"

"That's the understatement of the year." The giant foreheaded girl said as she brought up her PET and opened up the desktop. "Glyde managed to get some information on her before he and the others went to the school's Square. I didn't believe what I was reading at first, but the information is legitimate." Dex and Lan's PETs beeped, the two boys taking them out of their pockets and opening up the PDF file sent to them. Dex blanched. Lan could barely contain his laughter.

"....It reads like my report card." Dex said in horror. "But like, a thousand times worse."

"I know right?!" Lan said, laughing as he read. "This is so tryhard and fake! Whoever made this must've really hated her!"

Underneath the CyberTree in the school's Square, Piruluk felt a shiver. 'What was that?' Probably nothing important. 'Now which of those folders did Wily put that thing in?'

"Scratch that, the fact that someone even left this here! As her public record!" He and Dex made way better forgeries when they were trying to avoid parent teacher meetings! "There's like 344 typos in the first sixteen paragraphs!"

"346." Yai corrected. "It's pretty obvious that either 'Mara Kumegiya' is an alias, one that I don't blame her for using if she's stuck in a class full of kids, or that she really is that stupid, and deserves her spot here."

"See Dex?" Lan activated the Find function and pointed him to the errors. "The dates are all wrong, for starters. I can pretty much tell you that the city there doesn't have a school at all, and there's no way that she lives on that street and still look that good!"

"Who looks good?" Oh crap. The three kids closed the file and turned to see the older girl in question staring at them in confusion. "You three reading a fashion magazine or something?"

"Nope!"

"I have no idea what you're talking about."

"I'm not into that girly crud!"

"Oh, ok!" Netsaver kid, Fat Fuck, and Ugly Forehead Girl. god, it felt like she stepped into a sitcom! Netsaver kid was the troublemaker, Fat Fuck the comic relief, and Forehead the kissup rich kid! They were just missing the generic smart good girl and the ensemble would be complete! "Sooooo, I heard Piruluk beat you!"

"Yeah!" Fat Fuck said mockingly, interrupting Netsaver kid before he could see. "Ms.Mari totally whipped his butt with a super rare Mega Chip!"

"Dex…"

"And she only used her Custom Screen Twice! She could've ended Lan right then and there, but totally played him!"

"...Just like how Yai and Mayl do you whenever it's time to turn in our homework?"

Fat Fuck sputtered and began talking, and Akira could barely hold back her groan of annoyance. "So Lanny Lan!"

"First name basis, huh bud-" The glare from the cute older girl froze him in place. "S-sorry…"

Damn right you were. "So Lanny Lan! You mind if just you and me talk for a bit? That cun- I mean the teacher said I had to apologize for whatever it was I did to you." It was either for something she did or something she said. She really didn't remember.

"Huh?"

"She means her outburst back in class." Ugly Forehead Girl interjected. "There's only one Navi that could be called a 'blueberry f-wad.'

"Oh." Netsaver Kid turned back to her. "I don't know what Ms.Mari's talking about, but I never met you in my life. So you don't have anything to apologize for."

"That's what I told the bitch!" Oh fuck! "F-forget you heard that!"

"Why would we?" Ugly Forehead Girl asked. "All three of our Navis our Undernet level strength at their weakest, and we go down there for fun sometimes. None of the kissups and brown-nosers come here anyway, so go ahead and curse. It's not gonna be any worse than what we hear on UnderSquare's /H/ board."

Netsaver Kid and Fat Fuck nodded in agreement. 'How the fuck do these brats know about that board?!' And they went there for fun?! "No thanks…I don't want that teacher finding out."

"That's good Ms. Kumegiya!" All four students screamed at the sudden appearance of Ms.Mari right in the middle of the room, who had in her hand four forms. "Just remember that you're not as powerful as you think you are, and we'll get along just fine!"

Dex ironically was the first to catch his breath. "H-how long were you here?"

"Around the time Ms. Kumegiya walked in." The teacher explained as she went around the room and put the forms in her student's hands. "She's my new problem child, so I have to make sure she stays out of trouble."

"I-I see." Lan said nervously. 'Whew! Less heat on me!'

"I want these four forms signed and printed on both ends by the time the trip's over. We're leaving for SciLab in 20 minutes, don't be late!"

"Yes Ms. Mari…."

"Good!" And then she was gone.

"WHAT JUST HAPPENED?!" Akira yelled, looking around frantically. "She just popped out of thin air!"

"I wouldn't question it." Yai answered. "Ms. Mari has a sister that trained her to do that." Being a former WWW infiltrator gave Yuriko Ozono a lot of impressive skills to pass down to her sister. "She just does it to mess with us. Specifically us."

"WHY?!"

"Because no one in our grade gets more detention and in school suspensions than us." Yai shuddered. "Sometimes she lets her sister teach, just to mess with us. She's just as smart as Ms. Mari, maybe even smarter, so we can't even tell the difference!" She really hated Ms. Mari's 'off days' and cursed Lan for ever telling her about them.

"O-oh is that so?!" What kind of messed up school had that freak under their employ?!

verifiaman · Feb 11, 2021

???? World

"Miyu Katsuragi two losses, Momo Matsumomo 2 losses, Miyubi Matsutame…" A total of 44 future LRIGS were in her que, each with their own wishes and desires, all in stasis, three different kinds in fact. Memory stasis that overloaded their currently tiny processors, preventing them from booting up, A code that put them in Sleep Mode automatically, and the pain from being transferred from neurons and lobes to 1s and 0s. Mayu grinned, situating herself in her skull-shaped throne. As she went over her list. Which unlucky girl's life would she get to see shatter first?

It didn't take long for her to choose. "Hello new victim!" She calmed herself and held out her hand. From her white, skull shaped throne, Mayu grinned at the teenaged girl she put in ridiculous clothing. Congratulations, Miyubi Matsutame." She said 'cheerfully' to the confused 14 year old girl. "You are now an Eternal Girl."

The green-haired girl in question blinked as she looked around. "...Where am I?"

Ah the beauty of being a digital being; she didn't have to remember her lines. She pulled up a holo-screen, one only she could see and interact with, and began to read from it "My apologies young child, but I-"

INCOMING MESSAGE!

"I'm afraid that your desire for your friend to reciprocate your feelings will never come true...in a sense."

"W-what do you mean?!" Miyubi nearly screamed, remembering the last battle. "I had to go to the freakin Undernet for this fight, on the principal's computer! This is all I have left!"

And that's why this was so funny! "Yes, your break-in and assault was indeed praiseworthy, and showed your dedication to fulfilling your wish. However-"

INCOMING MESSAGE!
INCOMING MESSAGE!
INCOMING MESSAGE!

"......" Her calm facade nearly broke. 'Stupid message thingie!' "But rejoice! Your wish has been granted! Allow me to-"

"I thought you said my wish hadn't been granted!"

"...I said in a sense. Now young child-"

"Oh god!" Oh, just keep interrupting her! "What did I agree to?! I spent five months with Chiro for this! What's gonna happen to me?! What's going to-" Miyubi blinked. "I-is that a skull throne?!"

Oh why did she let daddy have a say in the interior decoration?!"Yes. But it is not-"

"Oh my god, Anne was right! this game was pure evil!"

"Now I don't-

INCOMING MESSAGE!
INCOMING MESSAGE!
INCOMING MESSAGE!

"This place is like one of those evil villain lairs in those dumb JRPGs! Oh god oh god oh god oh god!"

INCOMING MESSAGE!
INCOMING MESSAGE!
INCOMING MESSAGE!

INCOMING MESSAGE!
INCOMING MESSAGE!
INCOMING MESSAGE!

"...............I SEE." Mayu gave the girl, Miyuko-whatsit, a flat look. "System Restore to five minutes ago." The second she finished her sentence, Whatsherface's body froze in place mid panic. "Excuse me for a second." Was the girl conscious? Probably. She rarely used that ability to shut them up. She then teleported out of the throne room and into one of the many gardens. "What now?!"

WIXOSS TROUBLESHOOTING REPORT
SENDER: URITH.EXE
THREAT LEVEL: ALPHA
VIOLATION 44-A
LRIG&SELECTOR IN VIOLATION: PIRULUK.EXE&AKIRA AOI
VICTIM: MEGAMAN.EXE

"Uh-huh…." She teleported back to Miyuwhosits, opened up a portal, and shoved the former human in to live out the rest of her miserable existence in the Cyberworld. "Oh nonononono…" She should've gotten this the instant the code was violated! Violation44-A dealt with a Selector and LRIG pair misusing their powers in such a way that it could blow the lid on WIXOSS without triggering the curse! And of all people, Piruluk was the one?! 'This sucks!' She opened up a comm screen. 'Daddy's going to have to know about this…'

BOWEL CLEANING
BE BACK TONIGHT.

And that was the message she received. "...." Guess she'll have to wait until tonight. Daddy was gonna be double angry tonight!

But first, she had to clear as much as this que as possible. Age equaled experience when it came to her powers, and she lacked both by a considerable margin. It sucked being so young.

SciLab Tokyo, 14:44
SciLab Wait Room #5

"Uhh Maryo?"

Akira rolled her eyes at the kid as she opened her 'Super Duper Science Gal' bag the guide gave her and opened up the can of tea inside. She was in the back of the waiting room, far away from the rest of the brats, sitting on a pretty comfy sofa with her legs crossed. "It's Mara; what do you want?"

"Why are you in our class?"

"That's none of your business." Because Piruluk was a bitch. "Anything else?"

The kid looked away for a second before holding out her PET. "Can I have your contact info? You're really smart, and-"

*VRRR! VRRR!* Akira groaned as she bought out her own PET. "Hold on, I gotta take this." She bought it out of sleep mode. "What?"

|Do it.| Piruluk typed. |It will help your standing if you get some good press in time before the N1|

"Hmm.." She looked at the kid, then back at Piruluk. 'That's not a bad idea.' "Alright." She put her PET back into sleep mode and turned to the kid. "I'll help you, but once we get back to school. Got it."

"Thanks!" The girl smiled and ran back with a giggle.

Akira chugged her tiny can of tea. God this was gonna be a shit first night. First with this kid, and figuring out how to threaten her shithead LRIG into explaining herself.

Ms.Mari looked at her PET's clock, grumbling to herself. "Where is he?" She sent that Mr.Prog that message five minutes ago! It wasn't that much of a trip to his dad's lab!

*DING!*

The elevator doors opened, Lan coming out with a nervous look on his face. "Sorry about that guys, I had some bad food last night." Some of his classmates glared, irritated that they had to wait for him, while the others ignored him, having become immune to the Hikari Lateness Syndrome. Ignoring the glares with a nervous grin, he sat down next to Dex and Yai, and when no one was looking he simply whispered 'NetSaver Business.' The two nodded in understanding as Ms.Mari uploaded their homework to their PETs. It was time to go.

And as the class departed the building, a man in a red cowboy hat watched them from the upper floors, grinning as he held his cactus patterned PET. "DesertMan, get ready for a casting call." Tonight was going to be a showstopper.

ACDC Academy, 16:00
Class 2-A

The class had emptied for the day, with the last student having finished cleaning up before going home. That left Ms.Mari at her desk to go over the lesson plans for the next few days one more time just to be sure it was perfect, and the ball of sunshine that started here today.

'Where is it, where is it?' Akira thought, tapping on her desk impatiently as she looked at her PET's clock. 'I want to get out of here!' No way was she going home, but damn it she hated helping people! That little twerp left to watch some show, so now all she had to do was wait for her ride to pick her up! But it.wasn't.here yet! "Piruluk, call them!"

|I did. They said that there would be a delay due to them transporting another client.|

"Oh of fu-" The teacher's eyes darted up towards her. "-dging course it is! Gee willikers that's annoying!"

"Yes, I bet it is." Ms.Mari said as she went back over her work. 'Port replacement and repair? That's going to take a lot out of my budget, but it is important. "Also if you're wondering where your ride is, you're not getting one."

Akira's grip tightened so much that it cracked her PET's handle. "What?"

"You live in this school now." 'The new PET model is going to have wireless Jack-In technology. I know that modern devices have it, but how am I going to approach this..?' "As part of the deal to let you stay here, you live in the dorms rent free, like anyone grade 12 or above." She didn't need to look up to see Akira's shock; she could probably hear her pupils shrink in shock if she could. "It's five floors above here, six doors to the right of the eleva-" With a flurry of rapid footsteps, she was gone. "Did she seriously not know that?" Her PET's hardware had enough power to support her Navi, surely it could receive a private Email. 'Eh, she probably deleted it.' It wasn't like her Navi purposefully hid the information or anything!

The elevator door closed behind Akira as she put in the floor number and held her PET up close to her face. YOU LITTLE SHIT!" Another ding in the jar.

|Your nostrils are very clean.|

"......" The elevator began to slow down. "You know what?" She said as the door opened, taking a deep breath as she walked out into the hall. "Not worth it; you're not worth it." Now was it left or right from the elevator. "I finally moved out of my worthless house with my worthless mom, and now that I have a room to myself-" She missed Piruluk's snort. "-You're not going to ruin it for me!" She turned right, trying to remember the room number when the light of the sun caught her eye. "Dam-darn it…" Once her eyes adjusted, her attention was brought to the scenery outside.

Wordlessly, she pressed her hand against the window, staring at the city below. A clean city, an average city. |Akira?|

"I've almost forgotten what this looks like."

|Akira?|

Ignoring her LRIG, the incognito ginger focused her attention on finding her room. Where in the world was it? "Uhmm, excuse me? Are you new here?" Akira's and Piruluk's eyes widened; they recognized that voice! "You!"

"A-Akira?!" The girl in question quickly turned and much to her displeasure, it was her. "Is that you?!" Long brown chocolate hair, smooth skin, brown eyes, all part of the generic everyday girl look belonging to one of the most Akira's most hated people next to Iona. "You look..different."

ACDC Town, 16:00

Public Walkway 1

The best time to use the walkway when you wanted to get home without overcrowding was around this time. There weren't that many people going to and from their jobs around this time, and this part of town didn't have much of, if any, of a nightlife. This meant that three kids, Dex, Lan, and Yai could travel alone at sundown with only the surveillance cameras as their only guardian.

Currently the three were sitting at a bench in front of a long row of potted plants running alongside the wall, protected by a glass dome.In Yai's hands was Lan's SubPET, taken apart and connected to her own via ribbon cables. Why something so extreme? Because SubPETs suck. The two boys hovered over her, anticipation written all over their faces as she looked at the "Yeah I don't think I can do this." She said to Lan in a matter of fact tone. "The code MegaMan's running now is way out of date. It's so old that neither Glyde nor my PET's systems can understand it." One of her friends being forced to use a SubPET, the poorer man's hand me downs, was absolutely revolting to her. Once Lan and MegaMan could tell them what the heck was going on, that LuckyRucky girl was going to pay for messing with her people! 'Is this C++?!' That was the equivalent of giving an olympian an iron lung to breathe! How was MegaMan so powerful?!

"Just wait till I get my hands on that Luckywhatsername!" Dex growled. "GutsMan and I are gonna pound her into dust!" His Navi let out a very enthusiastic "GUTS GUTS!" in agreement.

"You're gonna have to get in line. "Lan muttered as Yai began to put his PET back together. "MegaMan forced an automatic logoff for an entire region. Right now Chaud's probably going over the footage."

"Yeah that's right!" Dex exclaimed. "ProtoMan's gonna pound that hooded weirdo in the dust!"

Lan looked at his PET as Yai finished reassembling it, unsure of that after what he'd seen. "Alright Lan, I'm done. " She handed it back to him. "I'm going to bring Glyde out of sleep mode and have him analyze anything I might have missed. Hopefully I'll be able to give you some good news by tomorrow afternoon."

"Thanks Yai." Lan would kiss her if he didn't fear she'd bite him!

"No problem." The heiress said back as she got off the bench. "What are friends for? Now let's go home; Mayl's gonna flip when she sees what happened!"

"Yeah you lucky stud you!" Dex congratulated with a heavy pat on the back as the two went on their way, leaving Lan alone as MegaMan booted up.

"Mayl huh?"

"...."

"...Ru-Ru…"

"Akira."

"...Ru-Ru…"

"It's Ruko."

|AND MY NAME'S TAMA!|

"What the heck are you doing here?"! Akira nearly shouted.

"I could ask you the same thing!" The brunette countered.

"I go to school here!" Akira shouted back, looking at Ruko's clothes. "You sure as hel-heck don't!" That is the fanciest freaking black suit she'd ever seen! Business tie, low cut collar, white cuffed sleeves and- "Those shoes had to have set you back a good ¥65,000!

Ruko blinked. "...These are the clothes for valedictorians and student government leaders. I got this stuff for free!"

"Good for you." Akira replied with a snort; lucky bitch.

"Now what are you doing here?" Ruko countered. "You're up here, not even in your uniform, it's like you-" She narrowed her eyes and held out her PET, her LRIG waving cheerfully at Akira. "I see how it is."

"Uh-uh,no-no freaking no!" Akira quickly pocketed hers and held her hands out. "I'm not doing that right now; I'm just here to find my room, and nothing else." 'Ru-Ru' continued her glare. "I'm serious! I'm on the up and up now!"

|Oh wow she's right Ruko!| The LRIG, Tama, proclaimed. |Tama just got an Email from Piruluk, and she has the creden..creeden..crudent-|

Akira groaned. "Credentials." Fucking moron. 4 years and that idiot didn't still had the mental capacity of a toddler. "I am a proud student of this Academy-"

|-And she's hanging out with a bunch of kids!| Tama cheerfully explained without a hint of spite.| A lot of the older guys wish they could relive their youth like you're doing! You must be sooo lucky!|

"....Yes, a proud student of this academy. How did it feel stepping on me to get to the top, 'Ru-ru?"

"I don't know. Why don't you ask Iona and find out?" Akira seethed. "Look, I'm not going to go down to your level. Unless you want to fight, and I do mean for real-" She rolled up her sleeve, letting Akira see a long healed scar that she may or may not have had a hand in creating, going up from the back of her hand to her elbow. And it also let her see the muscle. Good god the muscle. "-I suggest we pretend that we never saw each other and use our LRIGs to settle things between us. Deal?"

"D-deal." Ruko Kaminoto then pulled her sleeve back down, smiled and went on her way.

"Oh and your room number is 6A!"

"Y-yeah." She stood out there for a full minute, still processing the threat. And then she began to move, muttering to herself as she held out her PET to the door, causing it to open. She didn't take note of the fresh laundry smell, the nice computer, flat screen TV built into the wall, or the bed that didn't have the metal springs stabbing her ass and making it a bitch to sleep on. She just closed the door, gently locked it, threw her PET onto the bed before getting on it herself, put the pillow over her face, and screamed. 'GODDAMNSTUPIDGOODYTWOSHOESBITCH!' Why?! WHY?! Why her?! WHY IS IT ALWAYS FUCKING HER?! She screamed into her pillow, again and again, thrashing violently and throwing her blanket and sheet off the bed. 'Oh please just let this day end, things can't get any worse!

"Miss Mayro, I'm here to get help with my homework!" DAMN IT!

ACDC Town, 16:22
Sakurai Residence

To: LantarLord@HikariACDC1.
From: PianoQueen@SakuraiACDC1
Sent: Monday, 13:12
Subject: WIXOSS

I'm guessing MegaMan told you everything by now huh?
I don't know if I'm able to tell you myself what's going on, just that if I had the power to help against the LifeVirus and Gospel, I would have done so in a heartbeat.
This thing, this game, I'm barely a part of it, and yet I'm still in it. I'm
(This message has been saved as a Draft. Time: 13:20)

To: LantarLord@HikariACDC1.
From: PianoQueen@SakuraiACDC1
Sent: Monday, 14:45
Subject: WIXOSS

Did you send Chaud over? Why?! He was talking about something called a 'Code 3!' What the heck's a Code 3?! Is that why an entire section of the Net went offline?!
Lan, you're not on the rankings, and you're not listed as a Selector, there's still time! Get out of this game!
(This message has been saved as a Draft. Time: 13:20)

Roll wiped the sweat from her brow as she finished looking over the mails. The PET was still recharging, currently at 88%, while Mayl was staring listlessly at the windows, having seen the school bus drive down the street a few hours earlier, and the school bell a half an hour back. |These two-| out of forty and over 33,000 words. It sucked being an LRIG sometimes. |-Are the only safe ones I think won't trigger the Kill Flag.|

But then again, the thing doesn't always kill you in the same way. It never did. "They're gonna be coming soon."

|And we'll be ready Mayl, trust me. Now go on and get dressed. Lan's mom sent you a dinner invite while I was in sleep mode, so it'd be a good way to air everything out. To the best of our abilities of course|

Mayl nodded and soon she was fully dressed and out the door with Roll in her pocket. The second she finished locking the front gate and activated the security system was when Mr.Hikari's car just came rushing into the driveway. Curious, she came closer, standing near the side of the house doghouse as Mr.Hikari and some older girl came out-

"But that's all I can tell you since we're in public and being in public means that-" -Who was talking almost a mile a minute. "So that's all you need to know about Selectors!" Before Mayl could proclaim her shock to herself, the older girl turned to her and pointed her finger straight at her. "Like her! She's one!"

Mayl just blinked. 'H-hi Mr.Hikari?" That girl was wearing a SciLab employee uniform, how could she be that stupid?! Scratch that, how was she alive?! "Fancy meeting you here!" Any words that would have escaped her lips died out by the blank stare the doctor was giving her. He pointed to his house and she quickly went inside, sitting down at the Hikari family table and not uttering a peep as the chatterbox made herself comfortable next to her.

Yuichiro sat down at the opposite end of the table, fiddling with his PET until a loud beep could be heard throughout the house. "My wife's out shopping and my son should be home soon. Neither of you are leaving until all of us talk this out."

"Understood Mr.Hikari…"

"Right!" The chatterbox said with a tone of one that didn't understand the situation she was in. "I'm just sooooo glad I can talk Selector junk with other people without that whole choking on your own blood thing!" She missed the wince the redhead made or the quick look of anger Mr.Hikari was giving her. "So Mr.Hikari, how did you...learn...about...WIX..OSS…" Her brain decided now it was time to turn on. "Oh yeah; I'm in trouble aren't I?"

"You're not the only one." Yuichiro said, he and Mayl glaring at Chiyori who was sighing in relief. "Earlier today I received a strange Email from my son about something called 'WIXOSS.' Chiyori talked about WIXOSS, and going by her Navi's anger, it's a very big secret. And now my future daughter in law is involved in this." Both girls looked away, the elder Hikari able to almost smell the fear and panic radiating off of them. Their bodies were shaking slightly, Mayl looking very ashamed, and the older Chiyori looking as though she was about to bawl her eyes out, her eyes begging him not to make her tell anymore. "As I said I won't do anything until Lan gets here. We're going to have a very long talk about this. Now if you'll excuse me.." He got up and headed to the stairs. "I'm going to get some papers so we can be all on the same page."

Once Mr. Hikari left, Roll decided to speak. |WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOUR SELECTOR?!|

|HELL IF I KNOW, CHIDORI CAN'T KEEP HER DAMN MOUTH SHUT!|

"I said I was sorry…" The brunette mumbled, clutching her heart as if it could save her. "I really messed up this time, didn't I?"

Eldora reigned in her anger. |...I wanna say no since you're actually learning, but yeah, you F'd up royally. I'm just wondering why the three of you aren't dying.|

|It's weird.| Roll muttered. |The heart crushing isn't the only method of death for breaking the rules.| She used her PET's infrared to initiate a short range communication with her fellow LRIG's device, opening up a small chat window. |Are you sure that nothing tried to kill you and Mr.Hikari on the way here?|

Eldora shook her head, taking stock of her fellow LRIG's Level 0 form. 'Simple, lean, not bad, not bad!' "Nope. the guy was pretty pissed though.|

|Alright.| Roll turned to Mayl. |That beep was probably the security system by the way.| Mayl nodded in agreement. |But we've been involved in dangerous stuff all the time, why do this now?|

|...Probably because someone let slip that we're in a situation where we can be killed in a way that doesn't involve-| Hearing Chiyori's whimper caused Eldora to calm herself down. |I'm sorry. Let's just wait for this Lan guy, ok Chiyori?|

"Ok…"

|And as for you guys!| Eldora smiled, causing Mayl and Roll to become defensive. |Why don't we have a little fight? Not between Selector, but between NetOps? A good NetBattle will be a good way to pass the time, dontcha' think?|

Mayl looked to Roll and nodded. "Let's do it." It'd be a good way to psyche herself up for when Lan got home. She just hoped the curse would let her talk to him about this.

This wasn't too bad, Akira thought. The only real annoying bit was hooking the kid's PET up to her room's computer and having Piruluk crack whatever coked up password the brat's parents had on the thing, but otherwise, she didn't have any problems with this. She didn't like it, didn't hate it, it was just a thing that was happening.

"So if you just download this Addon from the SciLab App store, you can reactivate that function without risking your Navi freezing. Piruluk?"

|Understood. CTRL F| She then spoke the line of code she was looking for, which then immediately appeared on the young girl's PET screen, and on Akira's computer. |There was your problem. The integer you used caused your Dummy Navi to malfunction. This code pertains to it's walking animation synching up with its body, and you didn't type it out properly.|

Akira pointed to the fifth line of code on the screen. "That one right there. Code that syncs a Navi's animations to their Models don't use punctuation marks. That's why your Navi frame skips when it walks. You should've gotten an error message when the runtime program for the animation cycle started up though."

"Woooow…" Akira resisted the urge to smile at the wide-eyed look the kid was giving her. "I didn't even think of that; thanks!"

"Yeah, ok." Akira scrolled down the list of coding. "Problem 2 right there. That integer's completely wrong. "

"Really?" The girl looked confused. "But I did it like the instructions said!"

"Sure you did. Piruluk?"

|Understood.| Piruluk accessed the other PET once again. It was disgusting how in sync she and Akira were at times. |Just like you assumed.| The troublesome data appeared on the computer screen. |Line 44. You entered the commands as instructed, but there are a total of twelve spaces between the text. It's what's preventing the BattleChip render from loading properly, and subsequently with your Navi's improperly inputted animation sequence, prevents your Navi from working properly.|

"You just put it in wrong." In reality, the kid didn't probably didn't pay attentionThis type of shit was common back in elementary school, the homework itself more finding what was wrong with the instructions rather than getting the Dummy Navi to actually work. "Piruluk,fix the code and do a test run." The computer screen showed a status bar that quickly filled up, followed by a 352X240 screen with a bipedal Navi in the center. It's only discernible features being the crash test dummy texturing over its body. "See? Works fine."

"Oh thank you miss!"The girl hugged Akira's arm, quickly disconnected her PET from the computer, and then pocketed it. "I'm gonna show up Yai for sure with this!"

"Ok, sure. Now get out of here, it's almost freaking nighttime!"

The girl froze. "OH SHOOT!" And a second later she was gone.

"Finally."Akira locked her door before going back to her computer where, to Piruluk's confusion, she turned off it's internet access. "Now that the brat's gone, I can finally get down to business." She held her PET straight to her face, so Piruluk would have no choice but to look into her eyes and the beast like snarl on her face."Like what the fuck were you thinKING WITH THAT STUNT ON THE BUS?!"

|....|Oh. She completely forgot about that.

"Why don't you be a pal and remind me: How much did that cloak cost me?"

|...|

"Oh, I can look it up no problem, I just want you to tell me how much that super special cloak you begged me to buy cost me!"

|You know the answer.|

"And you're going to have a meeting with Mr. Fridge Magnet if you don't answer the goddamn question!" Akira slammed her fist into the desk, her teeth bare. "And what's worse was that you used WIXOSS cards in public!"

|That area's IP Recognition Software was outdated and-|

"I.don't.care! If that kid's Navi didn't force you offline, your Battle Data would have been recorded and we would've been SOL'd!" A light chuckle, filled with nothing but pure anger, came from her lips. "If I go down, I'm taking your ass with me. Remember when I told you that?"

|Yes..| This wasn't good, this wasn't good at all. Wily must know about her stunt by now. |And I agreed wholeheartedly.|

"Really? You didn't forget?"

|No.|

"Oh, uh-huh, so you're saying that-"

*KNOCK KNOCK* "Akira?"

"OH GOODIE!" Another person she wanted to stab right now! "What do you want Ru-Ru?! I'm busy!"

"Yeah, and that's the problem! You're lucky my roommate's got garbage duty right now, otherwise you would've been-" She made a slicing sound. "I'm coming in." Akira didn't ask how Ruko got into her room. Her and Piruluk were too busy contemplating the fact that they could've died at any point in the conversation. Ruko closed the door behind her and sat down on Akira's bed, crossing her legs. "So what was that all about, because it sounds like you had Piruluk use an NAT cloak to do something that caused an area wide logoff, like what happened today." Ruko's eyes tracked Akira's noting the girl was looking at the sharp pencil on the side of her desk. "Really? You're gonna try that with me?"

|Stupid Stupid!| Tama yelled. Or cheered. No one could really tell with her.

"I don't know, maybe I'm gonna stab myself, you didn't fucking think of that?!" Oh god that stupid swear jar, she forgot all about it! "Fine, I won't try anything. What do you want?" And that's when things got worse for the duo.

Ruko held out her PET, the screen showing something very familiar. "You're going to help me with something tonight, and I won't tell anyone about what you did on the way to SciLab."

"O-oh…" Ru-Ru was a Netsaver, just like that kid with the bootleg LRIG… "So that's the real reason why we haven't been arrested."

Ruko nodded. "We're going to work together tonight. I have intel that someone's going to break into the school to steal something very important, and you're going to help me stop them."

|We can go aaaaaaaaaallll out!| Tama's voice shouted from the PET. |We can use our LRIG form to kick the bad guy's butt!|

|I see.| Akira could swear she heard Piruluk's voice waver for a second. |So this thief is a Selector, I take it?| How? How could the plan have been leaked?!

"Right." Ruko clarified, and Piruluk realized the girl was still a terrible liar after all these years. "I won't tell you everything, but when Tama was looking for people to fight, she came across a bunch of weirdos called the Bubble Brigade." Oh. BubbleMan. Of course. "Tama asked for directions to some ice cream shop she wanted me to take her to-"

|They had a cool Ice cream flavor, mint chocolate!|

"-And for some reason they thought she was threatening them. The next thing I knew, I woke up at 4 in the morning to find Tama with three HeelNavis on my computer talking about a Tet-" Ruko's eyes darted to the right. "-So long story short, what's in here requires the power of a Selector to take."

|I see.| Piruluk said, clenching her fist angrily. |And did they provide any other details?|

"Only that the LRIG's level 0 form was an ice themed Aqua Type Navi, a real washboard in the chest, and 'looked like the biggest loser you'll ever see', in their own words of course."

|She must be a real androdyna!|

|You mean androdgynous, Tama.| Piruluk corrected. 'That fish lipped IDIOT!'

|Thank you!|

"So you want us to team up right?" Akira chimed in. Ruko nodded. "And I won't get arrested right?" Ruko nodded. "Sure, I'm game."

|I am too.|

Ruko sighed in relief as Tama cheered. "That's good. I thought I was going to have to threaten you or something, maybe a bit of blackmail, but that was easier than I thought.!" If Akira wasn't being Akira, and actually kept her mouth shut, then tonight would've been a lot harder!

"Yeah, I'm shocked too!" Akira shouted, moreso over the fact that freakin' Ru-Ru just said all that with a straight face! "So what time?"

"22:55 is when the thief will make their move." Ruko continued. "At 20:44, I'll call you down to the administrative building in the west wing of the school, and we'll send our Navis into the network to guard it. All additional plans will be downloaded to your PET and told to you when ready."

'Which means FlashMan will summon me and the others around 19:00 or so to adjust our plans.' Piruluk thought.

"If everything goes as planned, You'll be excused from participating in class for a month, and you'll be given a wireless version of the current PET model, with Undernet Cloaking technology built into it."

Akira's eyes lit up. "You have a dea,l Ru-Ru!"

Five minutes later Ruko left Akira's room, leaving the two alone. "Well this day's just gotten a whole lot better! I'm gonna get me a new PET and possibly participate in legally allowed violence!"

|Are you sure about this? This could be a trap.|

Akira just stared at Piruluk. "Really? Her and Short Bus?"

|..Fair point.| Akira was acting logical, had a tangible goal, and had the chance to severely hurt someone legally and get away with it. Getting her to back down from this was going to be impossible. 'Wait, she couldn't back out even if she wanted to.' Damn it! 'How am I going to alert him in time for him to alter the plan?!'

"Now if only I can find some loser Selector to beat up…" Akira said with a happy sigh. "Then this day'll be perfect!" Piruluk's eyes widened; that was it!

Ruko looked out her window, her PET on it's charger built into her desk. |Ruko, the soundproofing is active.| Tama alerted as she closed the room's environmental control systems. Being a NetSaver had a lot of perks. |Are you ok?|

"No…" Was the reply, not even looking back at the LRIG. "Nothing about that meeting was right."

|Huh?| Tama tilted her head. |You said everyone matured from back then, so why not Akira?|

Ruko sighed in annoyance. "I said everyone but Akira. I'm just shocked that she's so calm after the stuff I've heard she'd been up to! Now all of a sudden she's in school again, trying to be on her best behavior for the most part, and agreeing with whatever I'm saying? The last time we met, she kidnapped Hitoe and stabbed me!"

|Hmmm…..| Tama put a hand to her chin. |Maybe someone's bribing her, like when you want me to be quiet on those boring NetSaver meetings?|

Ruko shook her head. "Can't be; I've seen Akira's home life, I've seen her blog posts when that crazy stalker broke into her house and leaked them on the net. She can't be satisfied with just this. There has to be something else at play,but what?"

Tama pondered those words. |Maybe you can get Iona to make her records public again?|

Ruko shook her head. "I barely got her to agree to it in the first place." Not to mention there was an obvious ulterior motive to it all, Iona coming to her to protect Akira out of 'the kindness of her heart' using her NetSaver authority. A video showing Akira's home and family life later, and she agreed to Iona's terms. "I just don't know what to do. And then there's Piruluk…"

|She was really angry!|

"I know." She could sense it pretty well. The Navi that she attacked must have angered her if she went against Akira's orders like that. "Well we'll find out tonight, and then Akira won't be able to shut-"

*BEEP *BEEP!* |You got a challenge Ruko!| The room lit up with a dim white glow, coating everything inside it's glow as though through a filter. |It's Akira! She's challenging you to a fight!|

"...."And just like that, all of Ruko's worries went away. "Let's go."

|YAAAY!| Tama was so glad to see that smile on Ruko's face. They hadn't had a fight in a long time! Granted, even she could see that this sort of behavior was what prevented Ruko from being promoted so she could do these cool missions legally, but who cares?! BATTLE!

ACDC Town, 17:00
Hikari Residence

"Man I'm beat.." Lan grumbled finally reached his house as the street lights turned on. Dad's car was in the driveway, so if he was in a good mood -AKA his bosses didn't make him hit the sauce and, as he and his friends heard the neighbors put it, remind mom on why he was the best husband ever- He could fix MegaMan up nice and good!

|The alarm's on.| MegaMan warned as Lan put his hand on the doorknob. |There are three people inside right now, PET ID's register as dad, Mayl's, and an unknown SciLab employee.| With a beep from the SubPET, the house's security was disabled. |Ok, you can go in.|

"Thanks." Lan mumbled as he closed the door behind him, a taxi cab passing by. "I'm home!" He said tiredly as he closed the door. He put his shoes away and entered the living room where Mayl and some other girl were too busy with their PETs to notice him. 'Finally!' Now to get some answers! "Hey, Mayl!"

'You're lucky, Lan Hikari.' Saiko thought as he bought out his PET, his cab bringing him ever closer to his residence for the night. 'You're not my target today.' He began typing. |FlashMan, is DesertMan ready on his end?|

|Yes. His Sand Eyes have sent the data to the main server and verified Lord Wily's data. The TetraCode is in the exact same place as he said it would be.|

|Good. And Piruluk?|

|She is offline at the moment, but her connection to the WIXOSS Network remains stable. The meeting begins in two hours in ACDC Area 2.|

|Understood.|

|In the meantime, We should work on DrillMan's Status Immunity. The Elemental Conversion BIOS and COM files have finished booting up, so I'm ready to begin when you are.|

|Understood.| Saiko grinned as he looked to the night sky. With the success of this operation, WWW would have two of the mighty TetraCodes in their possession. Cybergeddon was on its way to completion, one step at a time. |Start the countdown.

5 HOURS REMAINING
55 MINUTES REMAINING.

Deletion Survivor WIXOSS (MegaMan Battle Network/ WIXOSS)

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