Hololive: Reflection

Part Twenty-Four: Impurification

Nozomi began running down the corridors of the stronghold, grasping his pearl sword and grimacing. The others followed, all keeping up with the boy's pace. Finding a small group of four guards, Nozomi threw his sword in a similar fashion one would throw a javelin, piercing one of their heads. As the other three gasped and began to ready their guns, Nozomi kicked one of them, knocking him to the ground. He grabbed his sword, ripping it out of the dead soldier's head, and pierced the now knocked down guard's chest while a pool of blood began to muddy the area. Shin then quickly ran into the fray, swinging his scythe and swiftly dealing with the other two. Grinning at each other, Shin and Nozomi looked back to the group. Shin gave a thumbs-up as a signal, which led to everyone's moving forwards. Soon enough, the group reached a cross in the road, prompting everyone to separate into their groups. Nodding at each other, everyone ran into different hallways, awaiting the challenges that would face them.

Nozomi led his troupe of J-chad, Roboco, Risu, Mio, Rikka, Izuru, Ran, Knightley, Spade Echo, Melody, and Kaoru through the many hallways in the stronghold using the map of his souped-up radar. After much rushing through corridors, the group finally reached the room they were looking for. As soon as they entered, however, the doors to the room closed and the lights went pitch black.

"What's going on?!" J-chad yelled, unable to see a thing. Suddenly, the lights flicked back on, revealing a boy similar in appearance to Nozomi wearing a lab coat.

"Oh, Thanatos, wonderful to see you alive and well," he greeted, bowing in a very theatrical manner, "I am Nozomi, or codename 004, if you must be specific. I will be murdering the now merged 000 and 001 and drawing Thanatos out of his mortal coil with you today. Why don't you sit back and enjoy the scenery, you ten?"

"There's no way we'd let you do that!" Risu yelled.

"Not after everything you've done to us," Ran grumbled with a cold expression, pointing her trident in the boy's direction.

"Haha, I assumed it wouldn't be so easy, so I prepared this," the boy in the lab coat smiled and snapped his fingers. Nothing seemed to have happened.

"Was that a bluff?" Izuru asked, dumbfounded.

"Oh, definitely not, considering this is possible now," 004 clapped his hands together, and the positions of the people quickly changed.

"Wh-what the hell was that?!" Melody looked around her. She pointed her blaster arm at 004, releasing a large blast of energy, and... the blast was deflected by some sort of forcefield.

"W-wait! Is that...?" Roboco gazed at the walls worriedly.

"Mmm, indeed," 004 nodded in agreement, as transparent blue barriers began to show various people separated into small groups, those being Nozomi with Roboco, Izuru with Ran and Rikka, Kaoru with Spade Echo and Melody, Risu with Mio and Knightley, and J-chad with 004, "Barrier magic. To stop you, I think it'd be wise to separate you."

"You're a coward!" J-chad shouted, readying her fists at 004 and charging at him. He scoffed, shaking his head in disbelief as he walked to the side.

"Ugh, you didn't even let me explain what's going on here," he groaned, putting his hand on the side of his head, "You have no clue on how I plan to defeat you all."

"What plan would that be?" J-chad asked, still throwing flurries of punches, all of which were dodged by 004.

"The original plan was actually to have you all dealt with Iofifteen duplicates, and, while that is still the plan with some of you, I actually lucked out quite a bit," 004 informed, "I'm sure the organizer of this raid didn't see this coming, but you do realize a fourth of your team is digital, correct?"