Mash-up Anime World: Creating the SCP Foundation to Contain Anomalies

Afterward, Haruto and Argo continued grinding monsters around the prairie town.

The Martial Arts skill, being the first hidden skill obtainable in SAO, was exceptionally powerful.

It wasn't an active skill but a passive support ability.

It could activate after any attack, adding one additional martial arts strike and indirectly boosting the damage of that attack.

With this skill in hand, Haruto's monster-killing efficiency reached a whole new level.

Thanks to his self-created sword skills and the passive martial arts ability, insect-type monsters around the prairie town were essentially being steamrolled.

However, Argo's actions had become noticeably more hesitant compared to before.

Back on the road, even though Argo was only Level 1, she had coordinated with Haruto effortlessly despite fighting monsters way above her level.

But now that the monsters were equal in level to her, her movements seemed sluggish and restricted.

Her previous efficiency was completely gone.

Haruto wasn't surprised by this.

Previously, when unaware of SAO's abnormality, people acted freely without fear.

But after learning this was a death game, fear of dying naturally made people more cautious.

It was human nature.

And one of the reasons Haruto didn't stop the chaos of SAO was precisely because of this.

In this "real" world of SAO, it was actually a way to filter out people with talent and strong mental fortitude.

He could then recruit these individuals into the Foundation, significantly expanding its combat personnel.

Those who could continue fighting in a death game without harming other players were guaranteed both in skill and temperament.

Besides that, there were other reasons as well.

First, Haruto was a morally upright person. He wouldn't recklessly use anomalous powers to forcibly take from ordinary people.

That was part of his personality—and also the Foundation's code of conduct.

Otherwise, the Foundation would truly be a supernatural dictatorship, not a shield for humanity in the dark.

Second, Haruto was quite concerned about a particular girl: Yuuki Asuna.

She also needed the experience from the SAO incident in order to become the resilient swordswoman known as Asuna.

Though the current Asuna was cute in her own right…

It was the more mature and hardened Asuna who truly won the hearts of many.

Watching Argo act so timidly out of fear, Haruto sighed helplessly.

After slashing down the last bee-type monster, he stopped moving forward. Because he halted so suddenly, Argo bumped right into his back.

"W-What? What happened?" the girl asked in a fluster.

Haruto turned around and looked at Argo.

"Miss Informant, you should have intel on the first floor's labyrinth map, right?"

Argo blinked in surprise, then nodded.

The internal and public beta maps differed, and the location of the boss room had to be rediscovered.

But the general location of the first-floor labyrinth hadn't changed.

And as the most well-known informant during the beta, Argo definitely had that info.

"I do, but... what do you want the labyrinth map for?"

Haruto poked Argo on the cheek.

"The guide work ends here. To free this world as soon as possible, I'm going to try and clear the labyrinth."

Argo immediately shook her head.

"Are you crazy?! This game is for real now! If you die in here, you die in real life too! No matter how strong you are, heading into the labyrinth without a safe level is way too dangerous!"

The so-called "safe level" meant being at least 2-3 levels higher than the labyrinth's core monsters.

Considering this was a real death game, even higher wouldn't be too much.

But Haruto's current level wasn't even equal to those monsters.

Facing Argo's anxious persuasion, Haruto simply looked at her quietly.

Argo eventually lost the courage to meet his gaze.

"Aren't you afraid? That dying in this game means real death…" she asked in a trembling voice.

Haruto gently ruffled Argo's short, golden-brown hair.

"Anyone would fear death—it's normal. But some things just have to be done, right?"

Clearing the tower was like containing anomalies.

Someone had to do it.

Players couldn't stay trapped in this fantasy world forever.

Just like humans couldn't live in darkness forever.

Someone had to walk out of the cave, light a torch, and take the first step into the unknown.

Argo's eyes widened.

The boy before her was absurdly strong. If he just kept farming using intel, he could surely survive to the end—to the day they all went home.

Yet he chose to give up the safe path and walk into danger.

"I... I still don't know your name," Argo finally said.

Haruto smiled and replied:

"You're right. A blank nickname is annoying to call. My name is Takamine Haruto. That's my real name. Just call me Haru."

Argo pointed at herself.

"I'm Hosaka Carina Tomo. That's also my real name. Haru... don't die."

Haruto nodded.

"Carina—what a lovely name. Just to see you again, I promise I won't die."

In the end, even Argo didn't quite understand why she handed over the intel to Haruto. Nor did she know what she was feeling as she watched his back walk away.

The one thing she was grateful for was that Haruto hadn't disbanded the party when he left.

Though she wouldn't gain EXP from monsters if they were too far apart, at least she could still see his status on the party list.

Argo returned to the prairie town and checked into a random inn.

Curled up under the blanket, her mind was still replaying that boy's figure and his words.

Was she being too cowardly, letting fear dominate her?

She couldn't help thinking that.

On the road, she'd already noticed her actions had become clumsy.

Teaming up with Haruto, she felt more like a burden, unable to even support him properly.

In the haze of self-doubt, her consciousness faded and she finally fell asleep.

That day had been exhausting, with her nerves constantly on edge—it had drained her completely.

In her dreams, she softly called out: "Haru…"

Meanwhile, after receiving the intel, Haruto stormed toward the depths of the first floor, killing everything in his path.

The tower was a perfect equilateral triangle, so the map of the first floor was also the largest.

That alone was a headache.

He traveled through a vast swamp, crossed a tall mountain range, and finally arrived at the labyrinth.

The monsters gradually increased in level along the way, but none posed any threat to him.

Once inside the labyrinth, he kept slicing through enemies like chopping vegetables.

Before he knew it, time had flown by.

Haruto frowned slightly.

Finding the boss room was purely a matter of luck—either that or fully exploring the entire labyrinth.

But the first floor's labyrinth was way too big.

"Tsk. I should've brought Kanako (SCP-181, the lucky one) into the game. That was a miscalculation!"

Rubbing his forehead, Haruto casually opened the game menu and clicked the logout button at the bottom.

The next moment, his body turned into a beam of white light and vanished from the labyrinth.

In the very next second, an eye appeared in the sky above the labyrinth.

Kayaba Akihiko, watching the area, was dumbfounded.

Did… did a player just log out?

He quickly checked the data—and sure enough, someone had logged out in the labyrinth zone.

Panicking, Kayaba opened the GM panel and tried to trace the source of the loophole.

After thoroughly checking, he discovered it was a hardware vulnerability.

Kayaba was so shocked he felt like cursing.

Actually, Kayaba had long noticed Haruto's presence.

As a representative of one of the two major financial conglomerates, and someone with inhuman abilities, Haruto had excited Kayaba immensely.

Watching such a high-and-mighty figure become a chess piece in his hands was very satisfying.

Until now.

Kayaba, frozen in disbelief, suddenly remembered the time Haruto and Shiro had toured the root servers.

He clearly recalled Shiro's godlike operations.

Kayaba instantly realized—that was when they planted the backdoor in the system.

Furious, Kayaba attempted to ban Haruto's account.

The result… proved that no amount of software control could beat a hardware override. Haruto's account was basically a ghost entry—completely outside his control.

Kayaba's previously triumphant mood shattered. His very psyche was on the verge of collapse.

"At least… it's just that one anomalous account…"

Kayaba tried to comfort himself.

And then, not long after he said that—two more accounts logged out.

Kayaba Akihiko: !!

If this weren't a virtual world, Kayaba would've vomited blood all over the control panel.