One hour later...

Most members in the chat group seem to do well fighting on their own, including Kaito himself who had no problem at all thanks to his intermediate swordsmanship skill. Compared to the daily against Miya he did in the base world, a fight against boar who can only run straight at him wasn't even a challenge.

"Hoop"

To avoid the frenzy boar straight rush attack, Kaito jumped to the side at the last second. After than, he quickly executed basic sword skills on the boar side, Defeating it with one clean hit.

*Slash*

...!!

*DING*

"Level up, huh? This world wasn't that bad at all." Kaito muttered as he look at the notification of level-up again.  His current goal right now was to get strong as soon as possible, so the notification of level-up does make him feel happy.

As he wanted to search for more monsters though, Kaito notice Sakuya walking toward him and then asked, "Master, are you okay?"

"Ah, Sakuya. I am fine, Miya training is much harder than this. Thanks for asking." Kaito answered as he sheathed the sword to his back. He knows Sakuya is not a person who is coming just to ask about his situation, so she must be here for something else.

"Why you are here, Sakuya-san?"

"I want to inform you that the time now is 4:40, master. From the memories, 5:30 is the time when Kayaba Akihiko announces the death game. Don't you have something to say to all members before that happens, master?" Sakuya explained.

"Ah yes, of course. We don't even talk about optional tasks yet." Kaito nodded and then bowed his head down. "Thanks for the reminder, Sakuya-san." 

Sakuya smiled and answered, "Raise your head, master. This is my job as your maid after all." 

After that, Kaito quickly called all of them again to tell them important information and his decision. It doesn't take long before everyone comes to him with curiosity, wondering what he wants to talk about.

"What's wrong Kaito?" Mikoto asked.

"Is it time to check about the optional task?" Crocodile guessed the purpose immediately.

"Yes." Kaito nodded at Crocodile's answer and then asked, "Have you seen it by yourself? After all, anyone can see the task detail themselves"

"Err... I forget I can do that." (Mikoto)

"Me too..." (Erina)

"I am still not used to the chat group feature" (Uta)

"I am sorry, master" (Akitsu)

...

Most of the members shook their heads at Kaito's question, which mean they didn't see it yet. 

Kaito sighed, realizing how lazy most of the chat group members were to learn the feature by themself, though he know they probably just forget about it.

As always, with the system's help and his role as the owner, Kaito quickly projected the optional group task detail in front of everyone as he wanted to talk about this.

*DING*

----

Special Optional Task (Can be Ignored):

1. Become the ally of the Protagonist.

2. Create a guild with the most chat group members inside it, and become one of the best in this game.

3. Complete the game without exposing the mastermind by any chat group member.

Optional Task Completion Reward:  Extra 50% points on the main task reward to all the participants depending on the percentage of task completion.

----

Looking at the optional task, the reaction coming from the members were varied. Some members were got surprised, some are excited but there were also members who get confused.

"What do you all think?"

"That last optional task forced us not to expose the mastermind... the system wanted us to finish this game by completing all 100 floors?!" Mikoto reacted with a slight anger tone.

Aika who immediately understands the idea behind the optional task quickly calms her down, "No, Misaka-san. I think the system wanted the game to be completed in the way the memories do. The task itself specifically tells us not to expose the mastermind in order to complete the game... But it didn't say non-members can't do that." 

Hearing her answer, Most members agree with Aika's explanation since it does make sense, including Kaito who is also aware of this. It feels nice to have someone really smart in the chat group for once, though... he also knows Aika probably the most black-bellied person in here.

"So, we can only hope the protagonist exposes the guy on his own like in the memories?" Mikoto assumed, understanding what Aika just said to her.

"That's probably the case." Aika nodded then turn around toward Kaito and asked, "Isn't that right, Kaito-san?"

"As expected of Aika-san, I am glad you are here to help me" Kaito praised and then explained to everyone, "Basically, if we follow the event from memories, it would take more than a year before the protagonist was able to expose the mastermind by himself." 

"But we also need to consider another factor, I believe our existence definitely makes a difference from the memories" Robin added.

"Correct. On top of the fact we can't expose the mastermind, we also didn't know whether the protagonist itself would be able to guess the identity of the mastermind in this world. That last optional task was full of uncertainty... Even beating the game in a normal way would have much certainty" 

Now Kaito already explains the situation, everyone realizes how troublesome this optional task would become. The system basically forced them to solve the game based on what happened in the memories, but with their existence here, there is a chance everything that happened in the memories changed.

...

"Master, do you have a plan?" Sakuya asked seriously.

Every girl close to him knows how adaptable Kaito was to any situation, and thinks he should have an idea of how to approach the optional task. In fact, they are right... Kaito did have a plan even before asking the opinion of chat group members. The reason he wasn't telling it yet was that he wanted to listen to all the member's suggestions first, but it seems most of them just got confused. He doesn't even mind if someone doesn't want to do the optional task and probably agrees with their decision. After all the last optional task is impossible to do if any member wants to just expose Kayaba Akihiko to finish the game.

Kaito nodded and explained, "Think about this. While the task said we can't expose the mastermind ourselves, it didn't say that we can't give a hint to the protagonist to make him discover it on his own, possibly making the game finished quickly"

...!!

"Then, what we need to do is befriend the protagonist of this world and then give a hint of what is happening in this world!" Mikoto exclaimed.

"Incidentally, the first optional task does tell us to become allies with the protagonist of this world" Erina added.

"How and who is going to do it, though? It's easier said than it needs to be done" Aika said seriously, which quickly dimmed the excitement.

...

"I don't think I could get along with the protagonist of this world" (Erina)

"I can do that, but I am not sure if he wanted to befriend me." (Saitama)

"I am not good at talking." (Itachi)

"My appearance probably just scared him." (Crocodile)

"I think I can do it!" (Nanoha)

"But Nanoha-chan, you are too young to befriend him." (Erina)

"He probably just sees you as a little sister, or just avoids you entirely because he is anti-social at the start of memories" (Aika)

"Yep. His early attitude is hard to approach" (Erina)

"Ughh..." (Nanoha)

...

Listening to all members' hesitance, Kaito decide to take this matter by himself as he suggested, "Well... Let me try to befriend the protagonist later as we are close in age, and both of us are male. I think I have a better chance to befriend the protagonist myself than any of you here" 

None of the members dispute his suggestion as Kaito said does make sense. Most members also believe in Kaito's capability, since it has been proved from the previous group task.

"Then, since you take the work yourself owner... what we should do?" Aika asked as she raised her hand.

"Honestly, you all can do whatever you want." Kaito shrugged.

"Wait, are you serious?" Mikoto commented in disbelief.

"Yes. I know everyone probably wanted to do something on their own and I understand that. We will do another meeting when we were able to create a guild." Kaito explained.

...

"I like this idea." (Crocodile)

"I want to investigate this world more" (Itachi)

"I want to learn how cooking in this world work." (Erina)

"I wonder if there is a singing skill available."  (Uta)

...

"Before that, I suggest you all make a group so you could move together, after all this world is still dangerous" Kaito announced.

After that, all the members quickly created groups on their own including Kaito himself based on their own interests.

The first group is Crocodile, Nico Robin, Itachi, and Kazehana, who seems to want to build a sort of information agency in this world. Hearing their ideas, Kaito only agrees with this after making them promise to not make a criminal group in this world, and all of them agree with his condition.

The second group is all members that don't really want to fight like Erina, Arato, Uta, and Yuu. They wanted to focus on a non-combatant aspect of this world since all of them just don't have the talent for combat. Kaito agrees with this idea, as the group owner, he doesn't want the members to get hurt after all.

The third group is the biggest group, members who seem to want to fight a lot and have fun with it, like Saitama, Mikoto, Nanoha, Fate, and Aika. It seems their goal is to fight in the frontier and save a lot of people as much as they could, which Kaito obviously also agrees easily.

The last group obviously are Kaito group, consisting of Kaito himself, followed by Sakuya, Miya, and Akitsu. Kaito's goal himself was to befriend the protagonist aside of getting stronger in this world. Although, Kaito also has a hidden intention, which recruits some people in this world to maximize his profit for the task reward... But he won't say that to anyone yet.

"Remember to stay alive, everyone. Also, if you need help, just mention everyone inside the chat group." Kaito reminded everyone for the last time as they were about parting away.

"I understand" (Crocodile)

"I will make sure to report our progress as much as we could" (Erina)

"Got it" (Mikoto)

...

After that, they all split up into their respective small groups. Kaito also decided to get his small group back to town quickly, because he wanted to try to get the best gear and essential items like potions before chaos ensued.

All the girls agreed with Kaito's decision and rushed towards the town together. Luckily, they all still had time and got everything they needed quickly before they were all teleported to the middle of the town of the beginning, where Kayaba Akihiko declared his real purpose for making this game world.

...

Renaxan

Sorry for the late update, I got very sick for a few days, resulting in no mood to write at all.

Anyway, the members splitting up was intended from the beginning, since writing a chapter where 17 people talk at each other at the same time is just... pain lol, especially if I want to progress the story a bit faster. Not to mention it is hard to give enough attention to each group member... as you can see what happened in this chapter.

Lastly, no I don't forget about Est if anyone is curious.