4If there was anything that the citizens of Gamindustri were good at, it was playing games. If there were two things they were good at, it was playing games and dealing with the general weirdness of their world.
Take Lowee, for example. Ruled with the iron hammer of the Console Patron Unit known as White Heart, which some said had been taken from a certain pair of plumber brothers, evil was largely smashed to pieces when she could be bothered to do any work. Instead of, you know, wasting her time writing terrible stories and eating tangerines while being a kotatsu potato. Which was a lot like being a couch potato, except that a heater was involved.
On the other hand, the people of Lowee tended to be the sort who were interested in things besides appearance… or at least they preferred a different type of appearance. There had to be some reason the land was full of lolis for its leadership. On the other hand, it was also Gamindustri's undisputed leader when it came to magic, which meant that entire villages disappeared all the freaking time as the result of some sort of curse or magical experiment or what have you. So, ten percent of the people having their minds trapped inside of a video game server was pretty much just another Tuesday. Gamindustri was filled with Heroes who made their living by adventuring, after all; no sooner had the system gone up than a few hundred started looking for control towers, magical crystals, or whatever else could be shut down in order to stop it. A few dozen even started trying from inside.
Things were a little less relaxed in the other nations, especially the Basilicoms. The biggest reason, well…
"Neptune, it would seem that the people trapped inside of the server are unable to give faith to anyone."
Neptune dropped the plate she was holding. This being Planeptune's Basilicom, and Neptune being Neptune, the highly durable plastic just bounced a bit before rolling away to rest near the wall.
"Th-th-that's really bad, isn't it!?"
Histoire nodded.
"If we don't have enough faith, we won't be able to transform! If we can't transform, we can't fight Boss monsters! If we can't fight Boss monsters, Gamindustri's going to be destroyed!"
Histoire nodded. Neptune slumped over.
"Please tell me you have a plan, Histy."
Histoire nodded.
"There is nobody better at figuring out a way to turn evil machines off than Heroes are."
The fairy sat down in front of Neptune and patted the CPU's head.
"We can leave that part to them. What's important is that we find out who the leaders of WINNERS are and bring them to justice before you lose the power to fight them. More people could be sucked into their server at any time, so it's imperative that we move quickly."
Neptune visibly perked up. Beating up bad guys was something she could totally get behind. Nice and simple, just the way she liked it!
"However, because the Heroes are busy trying to turn it off, they don't have the time to raid dungeons. I'm afraid you'll have to fight the Boss Monsters here in Planeptune; I've already asked the others to handle the other lands."
"Then let's do this thing!"
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Meanwhile, thousands of miles away… or, you know, however far it was to the middle of Leanbox…
"Easy mode."
Lowee was the land of magic, but Leanbox was the undisputed master of lasers and beamspam. This was due in large part to the presence of Cave, a security maid (or something like that; most people weren't entirely sure) who had absolutely no fear whatsoever of little things like hundreds of attacks all coming at her at once.
Yeah, monsters probably weren't going to be a problem. Especially after the CPU Green Heart had challenged Cave to a speed-run of all the dungeons in the land.
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Meanwhile, thousands of miles away… this time to Lastation's Basilicom…
"Are you going to get that phone, Nepgear?"
"I'm sure it's not important, Uni. Now come on; I want to put on the whipped cream."
They're probably just making a cake or something. Yeah. That's it. Cake.
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Histoire sighed as she put the phone up and fluttered out to look through the window. The forces had been set in motion; now, all she could do was wait and see if it would be enough to protect Gamindustri.
Not too far from everyone's favorite fairy, Planeptune's Power Trio were looking at the list of dungeons they still needed to run through.
"I've got lunch in case you guys get hungry!"
"I've got a cell phone to call for help when Neptune gets buried alive or something."
"You two don't trust me at all, do you?"
Neptune slumped over dejectedly and poked at the ground a few times. It was hard for her to be depressed for long, though, and she perked up again as she heard some chatter nearby.
"Heya, peeps! What's going on?"
The girl behind the counter smiled and gestured to a freshly-updated screen.
"Ah, Lady Purple Heart. The recent commotion has caused a change in the leadership board since some of the usual contenders are distracted."
Neptune looked at the list. As usual, [Team Neptune] rested comfortably in fourth place.
The averaged rankings of any individual or team depended mainly on two factors: the number of dungeons run and the difficulty of each quest. A single difficult quest was worth multiple easy ones, naturally enough, and Neptune's habit of using her freakish strength to take down some of the toughest monsters had gotten her, Compa, and IF enough points to remain comfortably high on the board. She was a little too lazy to go all the way to the top, though.
However, the bottom three ranks were all newer members. They really must have been working hard to get to a point like this.
"Lemme take a looksies…"
Neptune whistled slightly as she tapped the screen and brought up some more information.
"Sir Hero and Friends? That's the most ridiculous name I've ever heard. And who does this 'AAAA' think he is?"
There was really no reply anyone could give to that.
"And… a solo hero?"
Neptune blinked as she looked up at the counter again. Tradition had it that solo heroes were vastly more competent than their party-using counterparts; that she was even on the list meant she was probably going to keep rising very soon.
That happened a lot, actually. Heroes blasted up through the ranks and hit their goal, then dropped it and were ultimately overtaken by others again just in time for the next bright start to start rising.
"Well, whatever. C'mon, tell me which dungeons are the biggest problem right now!"
"Of course, ma'am. As you can see on the screen over here, we've had a sudden infestation of Dogoo in the-"
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All across the land, swords were swung and spells sizzled against the sickly skins of shortly-to-be-slain monsters. That, too, was normal for Gamindustri. However, there did seem to be more monsters than usual wherever you looked, a fact that made absolutely no sense whatsoever. Monster breeding didn't work like that, even if you counted specialists training their Animal Husbandry skills in order to get inbred but powerful companions and releasing the rest into the wild to fend for themselves and most likely die early deaths or start a secret monster colony.
There was, of course, a simple and reasonable explanation for the increased number of monsters. It was just that nobody was looking in the right direction to find it; people never noticed the crisis behind them when they were already fixated on one right in front.