kscans

Chapter 2 - 2

The abolition of Manipulators for Multi-Sword Users.

It meant I would no longer be able to use the four-sword style in FWO. At the same time, without my four-sword style, I was only an average player. If I couldn’t use Manipulators, I could no longer be a top ranker in FWO.

FWO, Farum World Online, is a game where you clear dungeons that exist all over the VR world. The world rankings are updated based on the dungeon completion rate. I was currently ranked 132nd in the world. In terms of solo completion rate, I was the 14th ranked player in the world.

I had been able to work this hard because of an obsession with the four-sword style since I was a child. And because FWO was the only full-dive VR game that allowed for a four-sword style.

I loved the feeling of speed, defeating enemies with a flurry of attacks from four swords. The sense of omnipotence, being able to attack and defend simultaneously. And the overwhelming number of attacks was the best part.

I loved the four-sword style.

And now, the FWO management intended to take that away from me.

"How can I accept this!"

The announcement from the management stated, "With the addition of new jobs, we will be streamlining several jobs with few users." It seemed the Multi-Sword User was chosen as one of those to be streamlined.

Incidentally, dual-wielding is a popular combat style, and there would be no changes to it.

I just couldn’t accept it, so I decided to contact Tanaka-san from the FWO management, the one who had brought me this corporate sponsorship deal.

Usually, we communicated by email, but this time I called him. I also needed to confirm why he had offered me the sponsorship at this particular time.

"Yes. This is Tanaka from the marketing department of GG Corporation."

"Tanaka-san!! I saw the announcement!? What is going on!?"

"Ah. It’s you, Hayate-kun..."

I could sense his awkwardness even over the phone.

"I was watching your stream. I never thought you’d defeat Gadil solo."

"More importantly, please tell me why the Manipulators are being abolished."

"It was in the announcement, wasn’t it? It’s because there are few users. Even if the number of users is small, as a game, we have to add new weapons with every major update. Even for unpopular weapons, we have to create new designs and 3D motions, which requires an outrageous amount of development costs."

"W-Well, that’s true, but... Then you should keep working to improve the controls or increase the number of users. You know how much I’ve tried to popularize the four-sword style, don’t you, Tanaka-san?"

Previously, it seemed the management also had the intention of increasing the number of four-sword style users, and we had even teamed up for official collaborations to stream beginner-friendly demo videos a few times.

"Yes. I know you’ve been a great help to us, Hayate-kun. But it can’t be helped. The difficulty for a human with only two arms to move a non-existent third and fourth arm was something we couldn’t solve, no matter how much we tried to assist on the software side."

I felt a strong sense of dissonance at first, too. I couldn’t operate the Manipulators as I wanted and felt frustrated. I also know that until about a year ago, the management had tried to eliminate that dissonance. They collected data with the cooperation of the few hundred four-sword style users who had mastered it and worked on improvements. I cooperated with that data collection as well.

The idea was that if a single person could freely move four arms, it could be applied to various fields in the real world, such as medicine and construction, so research was being advanced not only in the game but in the real world as well.

But it was no good.

It seems even the researchers couldn’t analyze why we were able to master the four-sword style. I once read a paper presented at an international conference using an AI translator, and the conclusion stated, "It has been confirmed that among bipedal humans, there exist individuals who can operate four arms without any sense of incongruity. However, the investigation into the principle behind this has not reached a conclusion."

It seems that GG Corporation, the management of FWO, had given up on improving the feel of Manipulator controls, and since then, no correction patches had been applied.

Even though there were no updates, I had believed that development was proceeding behind the scenes...

"We had planned for you to fail in defeating Gadil, Hayate-kun. And then, while you were feeling down, we were going to offer you a new sponsorship."

"...What?"

"A campaign to promote changing from the abolished combat jobs to different ones. We wanted you to announce it. In the scenario we, the FWO management, had envisioned, you would change to a new job with a job-change bonus, challenge Gadil again, and win."

"Th-That’s...!"

Aren’t they just using me for their own convenience!

If I could show through my stream that I could become strong even after giving up the four-sword style by gaining power through a job change, it would prevent other four-sword style users and players of other jobs scheduled for abolition from leaving the game. That must be it.

"I know. I feel truly sorry for doing this to you, who has cooperated with us for so long. That’s why I’m telling you everything like this."

"...Is the abolition of Manipulators already decided?"

"Yes. It’s a policy decided at a company management meeting, so there’s nothing we can do."

FWO is a super popular game with over 100 million players. In that context, a style with only 800 users being eliminated is unavoidable. If it doesn’t generate profit, the operating funds for the game will run out.

I had to do things like file tax returns and looked up things online that an ordinary high school student wouldn’t know much about. So I can understand those circumstances.

I can understand, but I couldn’t just accept it.

"Anyway, I’ll send you the details about the job change campaign by email. If you decide to accept the sponsorship, please reply. Well then, see you."

With that, Tanaka-san hung up the phone.

A little while later, an email arrived. Written there was the information that the abolition of Manipulators would be implemented in the next update.

The time I had left to use my four-sword style was just one month.