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Terra—South Industrial Zone

A hundred players from a minor guild touched down on the planet in their guild\'s two corvettes.

Rather than trying to help the players stuck on Terra, they immediately made their way to one of the many huge factories in the sector. They killed the dozen Imperial soldiers who had the misfortune to be patrolling the area at that time, then made themselves busy looting the factory\'s abandoned goods.

This kind of behavior was unfortunately common in Horus. As soon as a planet had trouble defending itself, the players swarmed like scavengers to take advantage of the situation and plunder anything of value. Some especially greedy people even took advantage of these situations to participate in trading slaves!

After the small guild\'s players had been scavenging the abandoned factory for a short time, one player entered the office of the factory\'s manager. He quickly sent a message in the guild\'s group chat. "Guild Leader! I did it! I found the chest!"

The factory was a huge complex of buildings, and the guild leader was several buildings away at that point. He immediately started sprinting back towards the main office, sending his own message into the chat as he did so. "Seriously? Awesome! I\'ll be there in a minute, don\'t touch anything!"

***

The office was packed tightly with players, all eager to see what treasure their guild had just won. The guild leader held his breath and opened the chest. There was a hiss of inert gas escaping as the seal broke, and then they all saw what was inside: a haul of gold bullion and cash valued at over 329,200 GC.

One player near the back, unable to see, asked, "What is it? Did we find anything good, Razzor?!"

Guild leader Razzor\'s eyes were bloodshot from working non-stop over the last two days to make sure his small guild could participate in the coming attack on Terra. He was emotionally drained, and now felt ready to cry at the payout in front of him. It had all been worth it.

"Jackpot!" he said at last. "Big win! We did the right thing in coming here!"

Cheering broke out throughout the crowd, which quickly gave way to silence as the players began to wonder how the money would be split up. Such a huge amount of GC could completely transform someone\'s life in the real world, after all.

Understanding the silence, Razzor added, "100,000 CG will go into the guild treasury. We\'ll distribute the rest among us!"

The celebration that filled the room was even greater than the one before, so much that a framed painting that had been on one fall trembled and fell to the floor, where it was trampled underfoot. Everyone was bursting with joy, thinking about everything they\'d buy with their share—as well as how strong this find would make their guild! Soon, everyone thought to themselves, the bigger guilds would have to take them seriously!

Razzor grinned, very satisfied at being able to give such a bonus to his loyal guild members. He quickly pulled up his guild menu to keep track of how to best divide the booty, then began the careful work of doing so.

But then a voice suddenly broke through the jubilant scene. "Um… Guild Leader, we have a problem…"

Razzor raised his head nervously. "W-what?! What\'s happening? Hostile players? Imperial soldiers? Federals? Be more precise!"

The player stammered back, "Uh... hard to describe. Just… look out the window and see for yourself."

The guild leader turned and looked out the window. Indeed, it was quite difficult to describe. He saw a huge, black blizzard or maelstrom that was surrounded by shimmering white light.

Razzor looked back down at the treasure. He frowned, staring at the shimmering air that had begun to appear on the surface of the gold bars.

The expensive wooden desk that the money sat on caught fire in an instant. "What—"

Suddenly, a shock wave blasted out from the dark blizzard and pulverized every building within a huge radius—including the one Razzor\'s guild was standing in.

Eternals had superhuman levels of resilience, of course. The temperature rising enough to ignite the wooden table had caused some damage to the regular players, but hadn\'t even broken through Razzor\'s own defenses as a Rank C- character.

The shock wave from the maelstrom was something else. It instantly killed every single player in the guild except for Razzor himself, who was still close to death after absorbing this attack.

The guild leader pulled himself free from the twisted metal and shattered concrete of the rubble, gasping in the scorching, dusty air. He realized at once that he would be the only survivor. "I\'ve got to get the treasure back to our ships," he mumbled to himself. "Everyone else will have to make their way back from the Temple of Valor, I guess… Perhaps I should meet them halfway. Or would it be best to use stealth on my own, so that the risk of being seen is lower?"

But then he stopped and stared at the figure who was also standing up from the rubble.

There\'d been another survivor.

"Hey!" he called. "I\'m here also! Come on, we need to act quickly. How\'d you survive? What sort of defensive Skill did you…" his voice trailed off as he saw the inhuman features of this other "survivor," features that made it obvious this man didn\'t belong to his guild.

Razzor\'s blood ran cold as he scanned the stranger.

╔══════════════╕

╟─╼ PLAYER

║ ╰╼[Name]: Apophis

║ ╰╼[Title]: God Slayer

║ ╰╼[Guild]: Eclipse

║ ╰╼[LvL]: ???

║ ╰╼[Tier]: ???

║ ╰╼[Class]: Esper

║ ╰╼[Biology]: Void Zetark

╚══════════════╛

Apophis had already been a legend in the game for a long time, and his recent participation in the events on Terra had only accentuated his infamy. Razzor recognized him at once.

But before Razzor could react, another player suddenly crashed down into the rubble between them, a humanoid who seemed to be using a Skill that covered him in liquid metal.

Whatever was happening, Razzor realized that it was so far out of his league that he might as well be an insect.

***

After their initial exchange of attacks, Apophis inspected DungEater and saw that his metallic enemy still had 95% remaining HP. Apophis immediately created a dome of black fire around them, hoping to steadily drain DungEater\'s HP while expending as little Energy as possible.

He glanced at his Energy bar, trying to estimate how long he could keep fighting. It was a very good thing that he\'d consumed those potions before resuming their fight. Even still, he only had 70% left, which he was exclusively dedicating to ~Susanoo~ as a defensive measure. Fortunately, he could use his fire-based Skills for free. Otherwise, he\'d probably have already lost.

Apophis was in a pretty desperate situation. The difference in power level between the two of them was simply too high for him to overcome. DungEater was Rank A-, and… well, Apophis hadn\'t had any time to look over all his stat changes since his evolution into a Void Zetark. However, he\'d been Rank B before his recent evolution, and he couldn\'t imagine that he\'d have gained enough power to reach the same tier as DungEater.

Rank A was such a godly level of power that even the difference between the weakest A- and the strongest A- was a wider gap than the difference between Rank E- and Rank C+. This power scaling was incomprehensible to most players in Horus at this time… but Apophis, with all his experience from his first life, knew better.

Moreover, DungEater\'s strange biology added a chaotic factor to the fight which Apophis hadn\'t fully figured out. At the very least, his liquid metal body seemed to make him very resistant to fire. That was likely why he\'d been the one sent by the Cult of the Sun to assassinate Apophis in the first place.

But Apophis simply had no choice except to keep using fire. It was not only his primary method of attack, receiving the benefit of nearly all his passive Skills and specializations, but the ability to use fire attacks for free meant he could devote all his Energy to defending himself with ~Susanoo~. At the moment, Apophis knew he needed to protect himself at all costs…

…At least, until he discovered DungEater\'s weakness. Everybody had one. It was just a matter of patience.

But until he could discover this weakness, Apophis had to work hard to keep his "friend" busy!

Apophis clapped his hands together and slammed them into the ground, creating two huge columns of black fire that blasted over a hundred meters into the sky. They smashed themselves together with DungEater in the middle.

But just before they reached him, DungEater sprinted out of the way and towards Apophis!

Apophis left his ~Susanoo~ on the ground and used his ~Demonic Wing~ to leap high into the air away from his foe. Since his body was made of black smoke, it was nearly impossible to tell that he\'d left the skeletal armor behind. He blended in nearly perfectly with the black flames surrounding them both.

Indeed, DungEater fell for the ruse! He prepared a powerful Boxer Skill and then released it the instant he came into melee range of ~Susanoo~. Over a thousand punches smashed into the purple skeleton.

Meanwhile, Apophis watched from above. He tried to ignore the fact that his Energy bar was melting away under DungEater\'s assault. He concentrated on the two columns of fire he\'d already summoned, wrapping them around each other and compressing them into a sphere of only a few meters in diameter around both ~Susanoo~ and DungEater.

Apophis could see his Energy meter continuing to drain even though he\'d concentrated both heat and energy to an intense degree within the orb of flame… but suddenly, the rain of blows against his ~Susanoo~ stopped.

Apophis immediately deactivated ~Susanoo~, hoping to recover a bit of Energy while DungEater reacted to being enveloped by this intense flame. Inside the sphere, DungEater was floating like a fish in an aquarium. He seemed to be preparing something.

However, Apophis noticed something quite heartening! His enemy\'s body had shrunk enormously: his feet and hands were missing and he seemed malformed and warped, like a piece of chocolate dropped into hot milk.

Despite being physically and mentally exhausted, Apophis shouted with joy, "I got you, you son of a bitch!"

DungEater\'s body was dissolving faster and faster within the corrosive flame. He couldn\'t speak, since his mouth was melted closed. He simply shot Apophis a dark look…

…And then disintegrated.

Apophis immediately released all his Skills and crumpled to the ground, totally exhausted. He checked his Energy bar and saw that he still had 48% left, which was more than he\'d expected after DungEater had begun to pummel his skeletal guardian.

Far more worrying was his mental fatigue. It would be very difficult for him to make quick, important decisions until he got some rest. This was truly one of the most intense fights he\'d overcome in this second life.

Breathing heavily, Apophis glanced around him at the ruins of the building they\'d been fighting in. Most of the material had been burned or melted. To his astonishment, Apophis saw a random, badly injured player hiding in the corner. His name read "Razzor," and he opened his mouth to say something—

But something was very wrong. Apophis\'s instincts were screaming at him to pay attention.

But… to what? Not to Razzor. It was something having to do with DungEater. He was certain of it.

After a few seconds, it clicked into place: Apophis had received no notification that DungEater had died.

Then his mouth went dry as he heard a peculiar noise from the molten patch of ground where DungEater had disintegrated.

Apophis turned and saw a liquid metal pool bubbling on the ground, then rising and forming back into a humanoid.

Apophis was impressed and terrified at the same time. He\'d condensed his fire to an incredibly hot temperature, almost as though he\'d thrown DungEater into a yellow sun!

"Are you joking?!" he asked in disbelief. "How many times do I have to kill you?!"