Ryuji's gaze couldn't help but drift toward Tsunade's walking posture — and that was when he noticed something that he had completely overlooked before.
Her walking speed… hadn't changed at all.
Her posture was perfectly normal. There wasn't the slightest hint of stiffness or awkwardness in her movements — as if the intense battle from last night had never even happened!
In other words…
She didn't feel any pain.
Right, right, ninjas were famously good at enduring pain. And Tsunade, as a battle-hardened veteran and an elite medical ninja, would obviously have an even higher pain tolerance than most.
That must be it!
"Yeah… that's probably it…" Ryuji muttered to himself, trying to convince his uneasy heart.
Then he suddenly remembered something about Tsunade from Naruto — her monstrous physical abilities.
Sure, she wasn't quite on the level of Hashirama Senju, whose cells could stay active even decades after his death, but Tsunade's physical stats were still completely absurd — practically on par with the Raikage, a man who specialized in pure taijutsu.
The Raikage, after all, came from a long line of muscle-bound freaks. Tsunade, on the other hand, was a woman — so technically, she should've been at a disadvantage when it came to physical strength.
But reality clearly didn't care about technicalities.
Tsunade's body was in a whole different league.
If anything, she was stronger than the Raikage. And while her healing ability couldn't compare to the ridiculous regen powers of Hashirama, it was still way beyond anything a normal human could even dream of.
Hashirama's recovery speed was so broken that you could literally stab him one second and watch him heal the next. The only reason he ever died was because he got depressed after killing his best friend — not because his body gave out.
As for that whole "body gave out" theory...
Yeah, try saying that again after looking at those ridiculous Hashirama cells.
"So what I felt that night… wasn't just Tsunade's natural tightness — it was her subconscious strength and her passive regeneration at work too..."
Realizing this, Ryuji's face turned pale with shock.
He had never even considered that possibility.
But then a terrifying thought hit him like a truck.
"No... wait... If we're talking about her hemophobia kicking in... Tsunade wasn't even using her full strength at all!"
Come to think of it... every time they did it, it always depended entirely on Tsunade's own limits — like when her body couldn't take it anymore, that's when he could finally finish.
But now... he realized that wasn't even her real limit.
...Could it fall off? His dragon?
Or worse… could it get ripped apart?
Cold sweat dripped down his forehead.
He was genuinely terrified by the thought.
"The difference between worlds really is horrifying…"
Gulping nervously, Ryuji stepped into the merchant's hut.
The merchant girl, who usually could stir a bit of his primal instincts, didn't have quite the same charm today.
After all, no matter how pretty she was... Tsunade's looks, body, and overall vibe completely blew her out of the water.
Sure, the merchant's stillness had its own mysterious charm, but when there was a gorgeous girl who could actually move?
Yeah, mobility wins every time.
"Let's see what missions are available today."
Opening the merchant girl's mission list, Ryuji immediately noticed something off.
Normally, there were always four missions refreshed every day.
But today?
There were only three.
That's right — one was missing.
"So the number of missions is actually fixed?"
Ryuji frowned slightly but didn't think too much of it. He still had plenty of unallocated stat points sitting there unused. His plan was to wait until he met up with Tsunade before investing them — just in case dumping points blindly might mess up his ability to complete certain missions.
Better safe than sorry.
But just as he was about to close the interface, something interesting caught his eye.
At the bottom of the mission list... there was a little arrow icon.
Huh? There's a next page?
Curious, Ryuji tapped it.
Sure enough, the screen flipped — and what appeared before him made his eyebrows shoot up.
Every mission on this second page had a strange little vertical line marking them at the front.
Not only that, the distance markers for these new missions were noticeably farther away.
The earlier missions had always been within a hundred meters of his current location — two hundred meters at most.
But these new missions?
Two hundred meters was the starting distance.
Some were even as far as three or four hundred meters away.
"…So all the previous missions were basically Level-1 missions, huh? And now… either because I've done too many of them, or maybe because of this Blood Moon event, I've unlocked access to Level-2 missions?"
Ryuji didn't really believe that Kiri hadn't noticed this kind of thing before.
But the fact that none of these Level-2 missions showed up on her map?
That was all the confirmation he needed.
These missions — they were exclusive to him.
Only he could see them.
That alone made them feel like hidden content, tailor-made for his personal growth.
But as for the types of missions themselves? There didn't seem to be any change.
They were still the same boring collect-this, kill-that, rescue-someone types of tasks.
Even so, Ryuji didn't need to think twice to know...
The difficulty of the tasks will definitely be higher than before.
However, he still bravely chose to accept the mission — and not just any mission, but another zombie clearing quest.
Standing in front of a completely new ruin, he glanced at the noticeably larger building compared to the previous ones. Nodding to himself, he started the mission without hesitation and smashed open a window with a swing of his axe.
Sure enough, Level 2 missions were indeed tougher than Level 1. The number of zombies had practically doubled. But with a machine gun in hand, it wasn't exactly a problem. He simply used twice the amount of ammo he had before and managed to clean up the horde without much trouble.
"But still just as poor, huh…"
Ryuji sighed helplessly as he rummaged around for a long time, only to come up with some duct tape and a few bottles of medicine — with questionable expiration dates at that.
Aside from a few brass fittings and some canned food, he didn't find anything else worth mentioning. It was downright tragic.
And seriously — in a game that's clearly modeled after American survival horror, how the hell is there such a shortage of guns?!
What kind of nonsense is this?
Grumbling, he started pushing along the only halfway decent thing he'd found — an old bicycle that still looked rideable. He figured that once he got back, he could try repairing it at the trader's crafting bench. At the very least, it could serve as a temporary mode of transport.
But just as he returned to the camp, he caught sight of Kiri coming back from her own mission.
And in her hands...
An AK-47.
Ryuji froze.
Before he could even say anything, Kiri came running over like a gust of wind, her voice full of excitement.
"Ryuji! Ryuji! Look what I found!"
Without waiting for a response, Kiri practically shoved the AK into his hands. Ryuji stared blankly at the assault rifle, then stared even harder as Kiri, like a magician, suddenly pulled out another gun seemingly from thin air.
For a moment, he was speechless.
But for the sake of his pride, he had to at least ask.
"…Did you get these from a mission?"
Ryuji knew that completing missions could sometimes reward weapons. But for him, it had always been things like iron arrowheads or painkillers — nothing remotely close to a proper gun. The best thing he'd ever gotten was a Molotov cocktail, which, granted, had been pretty useful.
Beaming with pride, Kiri raised her hand like she was shooting an invisible gun, then brought the AK up to her cheek and planted a loud kiss on it.
And as she lowered her hand again, yet another gun — this time an SMG — appeared out of nowhere.
"Yup! I told you I went out to do a mission, right? The moment I walked in, I found a weapon bag! And guess what — inside there was an AK, an SMG, a shotgun, and a whole bag of shotgun shells! Then when I went to turn in the mission, that lady trader even gave me another AK!"
As she finished speaking, the MP5 in her hands morphed instantly into a pump-action shotgun.
Ryuji could only stare in stunned silence.
He quietly covered his face with one hand.
He thought for a moment, then looked up at the sky.
Finally, he turned back to Kiri, his expression filled with deep confusion.
Finally, he turned to look at Kiri.
"Does this even make sense?"
He really couldn't believe it.
Kiri went out on her very first mission… and somehow came back with a whole arsenal of weapons?
Meanwhile, he had been scavenging and fighting tooth and nail this whole time — and this was all he had to show for it!?
And seriously… why did a level-one mission reward her with an AK!?
What about him? After doing so many missions, risking his life again and again — all he got was a pile of useless junk?!
Ryuji felt a wave of dizziness hit him.
Sure, he'd never been lucky enough to win any "free drink" kind of prizes in real life… but this was a survival game world!
Did they really need to slap him in the face with this kind of brutal luck gap here too?!
Weren't all those other isekai protagonists supposed to be walking luck gods!?
Why was he… so cursed?
"Maybe you just didn't search carefully enough?" Kiri shrugged nonchalantly.
"Tell you what — I'll go with you next time. Who knows how much good loot you've missed just because you're so careless. Oh, and by the way, I found a level-two mission. And there's this new 'share quest' option I wanna test out."
Ryuji nodded silently.
Truth was, he also wanted to test something.
Earlier, when he checked the quest interface, he'd noticed a new option too — Share Quest.
He wanted to see if sharing a quest meant both players could get the rewards.
So the two of them headed over to the trader to turn in their mission.
This time, the reward was painkillers and a heat-insulation modules.
As always, Ryuji picked the painkillers without hesitation.
But sadly… even with a level-two mission, the extra reward turned out to be just a single skill point.
Ryuji accepted another level-two mission. Together, they quickly headed to clear out the police station entrance.
Fast in, fast out.
Fast to finish the mission.
And… fast to stare in disappointment at the absolutely pathetic loot.
"…What the hell are you, exactly?" Kiri finally couldn't hold back anymore.
After searching the entire police station, all she managed to find were two moldy hamburgers.
Meanwhile, he… after flipping every drawer, cupboard, and locker in the building… ended up with exactly two bottles of mineral water.
"Don't ask!" Ryuji's face was as dark as the bottom of a burnt pot.
In every possible sense — black as soot.
~~~~~~~~
Next Bonus chapter target: 500 PS.