Editing A Simple Survey:Volume2 Reaper05 (section)

===Part 4===

“…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………You’re kidding.”

The bunny girl muttered those words in shock.

She showed a look of amazement that had not been seen on her face before.

“But…you shouldn’t be able to solve those. You shouldn’t be able to solve them!! Those are the worst possible questions for the answerer because they used the answerer’s own thought processes to seal up his personal loopholes!!”

“''The worst possible?''” Higashikawa Mamoru frowned doubtfully after he finished typing. “''You think that’s the worst possible? This was nothing more than a simple monitoring.''”

“Oh, I see. It was ''because'' they were absolutely impossible to answer. That’s why! That has to be it!! That brought the absurd into play, didn’t it!? The power to make the impossible possible allowed you to answer those unanswerable questions!!”

“…”

Higashikawa Mamoru slowly shook his head.

He did not need any strange powers to solve something of this level.

It was just a matter of preconceptions.

The fixed idea that he could never solve it would restrict his thoughts. By resetting everything and rethinking from square one, he could find a way through.

This was just a game of creating a question and solving it oneself.

It had nothing but himself in it.

But Higashikawa knew of something else.

He knew of his nine comrades who had taken on the burden of others’ lives and futures and shown him the way to the best answer.

When he thought of them…

When their lives hung in the balance…

He could no longer think of this as his own choice. It exceeded the boundaries of playing a game with himself and new pathways of thought opened up.

When someone falls in love, gets married, has a child, or takes on responsibility for anything important, their thought processes transform into something new. This was the same as that.

“I win.”

“…”

“I win. It doesn’t matter if you accept it or not. I won the final attraction. The master key I need to rescue those nine is mine. And more importantly, we no longer need to be bound by those ridiculous powers. Isn’t that right?”

“Ha…ha ha,” laughed the bunny girl.

It was not that she had stopped thinking out of fear or that she was laughing out of desperation.

Some decisive core remained. She had not broken yet.

“Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!! Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!!”

“…What do you find so funny about this? Are you laughing at your own fate?”

“I can’t help but laugh. This is so absurd. This is truly absurd!! This is not what we organizers had hoped for, but it is actually of even higher purity! After that conclusion, there can be no doubting it. Objective Alice will be led here!! Our great desire shall be fulfilled!!”

The bunny girl snapped her fingers.

All of the laptops gave off a dazzling light. They were not simply displaying something. The devices themselves had obviously exceeded some sort of limit. The excessive amount of electricity caused them to give off light on the level of a camera flash, but the great burden then caused the laptops to burst to pieces and send sparks flying everywhere.

“!?”

Higashikawa covered his face with his hands and the bunny girl was gone by the time he could see again. One door to the bar was suspiciously sitting open, but he did not know if she had actually escaped through it.

However, he held the key to the entire facility in his hand.

And he still had that unnatural power to call in success that apparently came from the absurd. If what the bunny girl had said was accurate, this power was on the level of the goddess of victory who caused conflicts among the gods because simply having her on your side would give you victory in a war.

If he tried to find her, he could find her right away.

If he tried to kill her, he could kill her right away.

“But more importantly…”

The nine dangling in the great pit below the floor came first.

Higashikawa thought all of the laptops had been destroyed, but when he looked around the area, he found one laptop that was conveniently unscathed.

He did not know if it had simply survived or if his power had overturned continuity once more.