Editing Rapid Fire King:Volume1 Chapter 3 (section)

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Takamura was worried about something in the shoot ‘em up game.

…''I can’t seem to dodge the bullets for some reason.

He could not dodge the enemy bullets.

That had been bothering him for a while now.

It had started two nights ago when he had pulled out that game console and played the shoot ‘em up game he had for it.

He had stayed up late playing it that night and the night after, but…

…''I keep trying, but I just can’t do it right.

His ship was hit by the enemy bullets so often it felt like every single one was doing it.

They would hit him, his ship would be destroyed, and he would game over.

…''Why is that happening?

He worried about it, he thought about it, and he pondered it. He pictured the situation from last night in the hopes of finding some kind of solution.

…''First, there was the screen.

He was using an old 15-inch home TV.

His small ship was in the center of the screen. He had a top-down view of the white fighter.

The troublesome enemy bullets were about 1/6 the size of his ship.

If his ship was a gold general or king on the shogi board, then the enemy shots were a lot like marking pins placed next to it.

The problem was that his king could not dodge those marking pins.

The enemy fired those bullets.

He knew that.

The enemy would fire after appearing from outside the screen.

He knew that too.

The screen was scrolling vertically, so the enemies were either on the ground or in the sky. The former were tanks or gun emplacements and the latter were airplanes or helicopters.

The enemies would suddenly appear from the top or sides of the upwards-scrolling screen.

They would fire bullets, but only a beat after appearing on the screen. None of them started firing the instant they appeared.

The incoming bullets would accurately target his ship. They would hit it right smack in the middle.

Thus, he had to keep his ship on the move so it would not be hit.

Logically speaking, he would never die if his ship was always on the move.

Yet he was hit and he did die.

And it always happened suddenly.

He would grab a power up item, think “hell yeah”, and then get hit and die.

Because he would suddenly find a bullet had arrived right in front of his ship. As in, less than a centimeter away. Once it was that close, there was no way to move his ship out of the way.

He would notice it and know what was coming.

And the bullet would hit his ship.

Nothing he did was fast enough.

More and more would fly toward him.

Boom.

Dead.

His mind would go blank.

He would simply stare for a moment, but then uncontrollable rage would fill him.

To calm himself down, he would place his joystick on the floor while deciding never to play that game again.

He would sigh, collapse backwards, stretch his arms upwards, and sigh again.

Then he would just lie there for a while.

Until he grew frustrated.

Then he would sit back up and play some more.

He would return to the beginning.

It was always like that.

If he could do so-so at the game, it would not have bothered him so much. He would have just chalked it up to being that kind of game.

But when he was defeated so utterly, he felt more confusion than anything: ''Why does this keep happening?

If he did not figure that out, his only memories of the game would be of being shot down over and over. He had started this half for fun, so he wanted something more than defeat out of it. Which meant…

…''I need to think about this until I can figure out why I can’t dodge it.

“Hm.”

As he thought about it, he narrowed his question down to one thing.

…''Why don’t I notice the bullets until right before they hit me?

The enemy bullets would suddenly be there right in front of him.

He did not know why.

But he felt like it could not be mere coincidence.

He concluded there was some reason why the bullets arrived so close without him noticing.

They would keep hitting him until he figured out what that reason was.

As things were, he was not even really playing the shoot ‘em up game.

…''Right now, it’s a game of being shot down over and over.

True to the name, the point of a shoot ‘em game was to shoot ''them''.

But to do that, it was crucial he did not let the enemy attacks hit him.

He had to dodge the enemy bullets.

He realized something at that point.

…''If I just hit the buttons without thinking, I’m not really playing the shoot ‘em up game.

He had to dodge and survive while shooting his way through the enemies.

He could not just shoot his way through the enemies. He also had to defend himself by dodging and surviving.

He understood how to shoot. You only had to press the button for that.

But how was he supposed to dodge and survive?

He had to answer his earlier question to figure that out.

…''Why do the enemy bullets appear in front of me all of a sudden?

He did not have an answer.

He felt like he had hit a dead end already.

“Yeah.”

He thought back over his nights of playing the game, but he doubted this would tell him the answer.

He understood what was happening, but he did not understand why. And unless he knew why, he could never think up a solution.

''What do I do?'' he wondered.

“Taka.”

He was dragged back to reality when someone called his name.