Anime Crossover: Post-Apocalyptic Survival, My Stand is the World

Kato Megumi nodded calmly.

"Well, okay, I see."

Her tone was as flat as a teacher assigning homework: "Please go back and preview the next chapter."

Under the expectant and curious gazes of everyone, she stood up gracefully.

First, she straightened her blue school uniform skirt, which was slightly wrinkled by the wind. Then, she walked with an extremely ordinary gait, devoid of any skill.

Step by step, they walked toward the defensive circle composed of hundreds of monsters.

"..."

At that moment, the flow of time seemed to change differently in everyone's senses.

Yukino held her breath, her icy blue eyes filled with tension.

Shi Yu clenched her fists, her wine-red eyes unblinking, afraid of missing any crucial detail that could be included in her next "epic masterpiece".

Yui, even more nervous, clasped her hands together, closed her eyes tightly, placed them against her chest, and chanted a prayer at an extremely fast pace, as if reciting a mantra: "I can't see her, I can't see her, I can't see her, I can't see her..."

A strange scene happened.

Those guards, who exuded a powerful sense of oppression, actually turned a blind eye to the intruder who swaggered right under their noses!

A gigantic, rhinoceros-like monster patrolled along a predetermined route, its iron hooves, powerful enough to crush concrete, less than five centimeters from Kato Megumi's toes.

The dust that rose up in that instant even gently brushed against the hem of the girl's skirt.

But it did not react at all.

Another monster, floating in mid-air like a ghost, scanned around. Its crimson gaze, like a searchlight, swept over Kato Megumi, even slightly adjusting the scanning angle up and down to accommodate the girl's height.

But it also did not issue any alarms.

They continue to meticulously execute their flawless patrol procedures, just like the most dedicated (bjdc) NPCs in the world.

Kato Megumi walked in as casually as a passing breeze.

'This is…' Yukino looked at this scene and even she felt that her worldview had been shocked like never before.

Shiyu and Yui were also stunned. They didn't expect Kato Megumi to walk in so easily. She was unbelievable.

“Awesome…”

On the top floor of the SEGA building, watching this scene through drone footage, Sora held his breath for a long time before finally managing to squeeze out the two words that best expressed his feelings.

……

ten minutes later.

Just as everyone was still in awe of that miraculous scene, Kato Megumi returned.

She remained completely unaffected, as if she had simply gone downstairs for a walk and picked up a package. She was utterly unharmed.

She also had a brand-new smartphone in her hand, which she had picked up from the corpse of some unfortunate man.

On her phone were a dozen or so photos she had just taken inside the UDX building, taken from a ridiculously low angle that could be described as "straight man's" worst perspective.

The photo is even a bit out of focus, and it also has the shadow of her own fingers.

“Three underground floors.” She gestured across the photo, reporting the situation to everyone in her usual calm tone.

"There is a very large computer room."

"There was a heavy-looking iron gate at the entrance that couldn't be pushed or pulled open. There was also a very complicated combination lock on the gate."

In the photo, the physical security door made of some unknown superalloy and the electronic combination lock on the door, which is flashing with an icy blue light, are clearly visible.

"Well done, Kato!" Su Chen praised her generously and gave her a thumbs up.

MVP! Best player of the game!

Then, he picked up the walkie-talkie again.

"Hey, Kong."

"I had Shiyu send you the photos via an encrypted channel. Did you receive them?"

"Received!" came the excited reply from the other end of the walkie-talkie. He was full of energy and eagerness to try.

"No big deal! Don't worry, boss! This level of electronic lock is just an Olympiad math problem for my little idiot during summer vacation! It's just an appetizer!"

"Leave it to us!"

"five minutes!"

"No! Three minutes! I can decipher its entire lineage for eighteen generations! Make it kneel down and sing 'Conquer'!"

……

Top floor of the SEGA building.

A war without gunfire has begun.

Kong and Bai, the brother and sister, sat side by side in their seats. Their ten fingers were like elves dancing on the piano keys, turning into countless phantoms and dancing rapidly on the keyboard!

"Firewall, type: dynamic maze. Thirteen nested layers... Building reverse algorithm, brute force attack."

"First level, 3 seconds, breakthrough."

"Second level, 5 seconds, breakthrough."

"Very good, Bai. Keep this pace; the opponent is already stunned by our attack. Take them down in one fell swoop! Let them see what 'Blank' really means!"

A look of excitement and fervor spread across Kong's face, like that of a general about to conquer an enemy city.

He had even begun to imagine the look of admiration and shock that Su Chen and those women would give him after he successfully cracked the code!

That must feel amazing!

Just as he was about to lead his invincible data army to break through the last obstructive firewall and obtain the highest management authority over that electronic lock.

A change has occurred!

hum!

On the huge main screen in front of them, all the rapidly scrolling code disappeared instantly.

Instead, a text composed of the simplest "0" and "1", filled with a cold warning, slowly emerged.

[WARNING: Unauthorized intrusion detected. Anti-tracking measures activated.]

The external power line has been physically disconnected.

[Final warning: Everyone outside, leave immediately.]

Below that text was an incredibly annoying emoticon made up of emoticons.

You are not welcome here.

"!"

Kong's movements suddenly froze, and his hands, which were still flying across the keyboard, instantly stopped in mid-air.

"We've been...discovered?!"

He stared at the scene before him in disbelief, his mind blank.

"Impossible! My intrusion path was an absolutely 'silent' mode, involving hundreds of disguises and redirects! How did they discover us in such a short time?"

"Brother." Bai, who had been silent and focused on calculations, suddenly spoke up.

"Their computing power is very strong..."

"While we were cracking her firewall, she also reverse-tracked and located our physical location, exposing our position!"

"Nani!"

Kong was completely shocked.

Someone can actually keep up with Bai's calculation speed? What a joke!

Although we are not professional hackers, we shouldn't be so helpless!

"interesting!"

After a fraction of a second of shock, Kong's eyes showed no sign of retreat; instead, they ignited a fierce battle blaze more intensely than ever before!

"Since you don't welcome us."

"Then we'll beat you until you 'welcome' it!"

He slammed his hands back onto the keyboard!

"Bai, switch modes, full power! Blow through this guy's firewall!"

Just as the battle reached its most intense stage.

There was a "ding" sound.

Suddenly, an image file sent by the other party popped up on the empty screen.

He paused for a moment, then subconsciously clicked on it.

Then he saw a classic "Tom and Jerry" meme.

On the screen, Talking Tom is pointing at Jerry (himself) off-screen with a look of disdain and contempt, accompanied by a line of bold, blood-red text full of sarcasm.

"That's it?"

"..."

"puff!"

A clearly visible cross-shaped vein suddenly popped out on Kong's forehead!

“Damn it!”

He was so angry that he slammed his fist hard on the handrail.

"This guy actually has the leisure to 'combat memes' with me while I'm going all out on an attack?"

"That's outrageous! Absolutely outrageous!"

Chapter Sixty-Five: Kobayashi's Dragon Maid

The UDX building has three underground floors.

This is the heart of the entire skyscraper and the largest network data exchange center in the Akihabara area.

Inside the server room, which resembled a steel forest, the only sound was the ceaseless hum of thousands of server cooling fans.

On top of this constant white noise, occasionally bursts of dense, crisp, and incredibly rhythmic mechanical keyboard clicks, like a storm, would be added.

"Da da da!"

A young woman wearing a classic programmer's plaid shirt that was faded from long-term wear, a pair of ordinary black-rimmed glasses, and short, messy brown hair that looked a bit unkempt from being too lazy to style.

She was curled up in her expensive ergonomic chair in an extremely inhuman, boneless sitting posture.

Three huge 4K displays lay across her face, their screens displaying a waterfall of green code that reflected on her pale, sickly face, a result of prolonged lack of sunlight.

She is Kobayashi.

An ordinary, unremarkable office worker who, before the apocalypse, toiled every day for a living, for rent, and for damned KPIs, whose biggest dream was "Let the world end, so I won't have to go to work."

And now, the world has indeed been destroyed, but not in this way.

"Done." She pressed the last Enter key, and a perfect closed-loop code on the screen announced the completion of the firewall's routine maintenance.

Looking at her impregnable defense, she breathed a long sigh of relief.

She doesn't actually like this kind of high-intensity work, but now, this high wall built of code is the only support for her and her family.

She wearily rubbed her aching temples, pulled out a pack of compressed biscuits from a nearly empty emergency food box next to her, tore it open expressionlessly, and began to chew them dry.

It tastes like eating sawdust mixed with sand, but at least it provides the necessary calories.

A worried voice came from behind her.

"Kobayashi...you haven't slept for three days straight."

Xiaolin paused in her chewing motion, but didn't turn around.

Because she knew who was behind her. And only they could move freely within this fortress she had completely sealed off.