Chapter 260: The Waters of West Lake Are My Tears
RawrSoFierce: Since this quest has no participant cap, there's no need to roll dice for slots — anyone can join. But as I said before, if your strength isn't there, please exercise some caution.
RawrSoFierce: The weakest Void Creatures are calibrated to Doflamingo's level. Some members may not have a clear sense of what that means in practice — roughly speaking, he was slightly below where Kaguya Shinomiya is right now.
RawrSoFierce: When Kaguya went to the Star Hero world, she was already close to Doflamingo's level, and she's outpaced him since. So the benchmark is: if you think you could give Kaguya a real fight, you're in range.
Edward Newgate: Gurararara! I had no idea Kaguya had grown this strong. Not even a year — truly something to see.
Edward Newgate: Old Whitebeard is absolutely not sitting this one out. Void Creatures, you say? Gurararara — count me in!
Admiral Kizaru: So anything above Doflamingo's level qualifies… ahem. @Senbei Is So Tasty — Sengoku-san, could I request some leave?
Senbei Is So Tasty: …No need to request separately. We'll both file for leave together — from Crane, the Commander-in-Chief. A month should be sufficient.
Admiral Kizaru: A whole month… that's perfect.
Crazy Diamond: I pulled a 6A-panel Stand at the Mid-Autumn event, but I've never been on a single group quest — there's no way I'm a match for Kaguya. Guess I'll have to sit this one out.
WolfKingOfQingQingGrasslands: This King's raw physical strength doesn't even match Josuke's, but my immortal body makes death a non-issue — just painful. And the research between me and Tony Stark finished yesterday, tested and confirmed. This King wants in for the survival bonus!
"…"
Josuke was one of the Chat Group's longer-standing members — sixth to join. Unfortunately, his luck with quest slots had been consistently terrible. Every group quest had gone ahead without him, and the gap in real-world mission experience had let Kaguya lap him thoroughly.
The one saving grace was the Mid-Autumn festival event, where he'd pulled a catastrophically powerful six-panel Stand. Without that, he'd be even further behind.
"Weaker" here was Chat Group relative, though. Within the world of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure Part 4, Josuke at his current level could go toe-to-toe with Star Platinum bare-handed, no Stand required. That was simply the ceiling he'd reached through physical training alone.
Wolffy's situation was different. His raw physical strength fell well short of Josuke's — but his mind was a genuine treasure vault. He and Tony Stark had been conducting quiet research together for some time, and the confidence in his message was unmistakable. The results were serious.
WolfKingOfQingQingGrasslands: The Hui/Tony-001 Full-Spectrum Tri-Combat Mech that this King and Mr. Stark produced — the performance specs are frankly absurd. Just to name one point: a mere Doflamingo wouldn't stand a chance against it.
WolfKingOfQingQingGrasslands: We also have an entire automated armor battalion. Individually weak, but JARVIS can operate them independently without any human pilot.
WolfKingOfQingQingGrasslands: Those weaker units can run civilian rescue operations. Task 1 requires us to keep casualties as low as possible — that's exactly what they're built for.
I'm Rolling In It: That's what you get when you team up with Uncle Tony — the only scientific genius in the room who comes within a hair of my own level. This collaboration is simply unbeatable.
Roar of the Evil Dragon: Mm… I had a Versus Mode match against Little Kaguya in the Arena before. I think I can participate in this quest.
I Am Thor, God of Thunder!: Add me in, woof! My Meow-Meow Hammer has been itching for a workout. I can push 100% output right now, and burst up to 120% — one swing, one Void Creature.
Eternally Seventeen: Ara ara… a quest this interesting — how could Permissions Hound Number Two possibly miss it?
Kaguya-sama: I want to participate too. Leave the weaker Void Creatures to me.
Terrible Tornado: I'm not sitting this out either.
Wandering Little Planet: …I really want to go. But after reading Task 1, I silently teared up. With my figure, Task 1 would be completely impossible. Poor me.
Street-Corner Illustrator: @RawrSoFierce — Admin-sama, I was thinking — weaker members can still participate in this quest. They don't need to fight the Void Creatures. What they can do is maintain order among the civilian population to prevent secondary casualties from panic. What do you think?
"…"
Eriri's suggestion gave Ryū pause. He turned it over for a moment.
She had a point, actually.
This quest had no restrictions whatsoever — any member could join or leave at any time, even mid-mission. A weaker member who encountered a Void Creature could simply exit the Saekano world on the spot. They'd lose their participation access at that point, but at least they'd be alive.
And as Eriri had observed, everyone had a role to play. "Weak" was relative to the Chat Group's own scale. Measured against the Saekano world's baseline — human beings with conventional weapons — every single Chat Group member was monstrous.
More to the point, the biggest civilian death toll in a scenario like this frequently didn't come from the monsters. It came from the humans. Stampede, internal conflict, breakdown of order — that kind of secondary casualty multiplier could dwarf anything the Void Creatures caused directly. Having members dedicated to stabilizing the civilian situation was not a small contribution.
Ryū thought it through for a minute or two, then decided to adopt the suggestion.
RawrSoFierce: You all heard Eriri's proposal. Adjusting the plan: weaker members can participate after all, with the civilian stability role. But the minimum bar is being able to tank sustained heavy machine gun fire. Below that threshold — please don't come. You'll fail at the stabilization job and possibly get yourself killed in the process.
Crazy Diamond: Eh? If that's the cutoff, then even a scrub like me qualifies! Tanking machine gun fire is trivial — Armament Haki plus Iron Body, done. Easy. Clean.
Crazy Diamond: On top of that I have two Stands. And if anyone gets hurt — Admin-sama, everyone — come find me for heals! External wounds, internal wounds, one second and you're good as new!
My True Form Is Cola: Minimizing civilian casualties through crowd control… alright, I'll join then.
Maidang: Heavy machine gun fire? I survived an explosion that leveled an entire city block. I think I barely qualify.
Ying Zheng The Sovereign: It seems We must arrange suitable governance of Great Qin before departing. This sovereign will attend this quest — a contribution to the Points economy cannot be passed up.
Wandering Little Planet: Wait — wait. Does this mean I'm the only pathetic bottom-tier member left alone in an empty group chat? Wahhh, why did it turn out like this?
Wandering Little Planet: I do have Armament Haki, I have Observation Haki — but this inexplicable body of mine… so tragic!
RawrSoFierce: @Wandering Little Planet — when we eventually need a star blown up, we'll call you immediately. Hang in there, gambatte!!
Wandering Little Planet: The waters of West Lake… are all my tears… waaaah…
"…"
Wandering Earth's impractically enormous body was genuinely its biggest developmental obstacle. Even with Points invested into self-improvement, the scale remained the core problem. If it crossed over to the Saekano world, the issue wouldn't be whether the humans could survive — the only things surviving would be the microorganisms capable of living in open space.
Two planetary bodies approaching within a certain distance would begin gravitationally interacting. The result: Wandering Earth itself would probably be fine, it was quite "hard" by now and had Armament Haki coating a planetary surface, but the Saekano world's Earth — pfft, it would be reduced to a debris field in short order.
Ryū began opening crossing permissions one by one. Eighteen members in the group total — minus Wandering Earth, who couldn't participate for structural reasons — seventeen permissions to enable manually.
Was there really no batch-enable function for this? Opening them individually was genuinely irritating. When the Chat Group eventually broke past a hundred members, was he going to spend fifteen minutes on this step alone?
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