Chapter 36 – "Four Years of War"
Thursday.
Alex blinked into existence inside the forge. The hum of Sparksteel turbines greeted him like an old friend. He checked the internal timer.
Two months had passed.
He closed his eyes, calculating.
If the ratio held true — 1 to 1,000 — then no more than ninety minutes should have passed in the real world.
And yet, when he paused… when he traced every memory, every battle, every sleepless night…
It hit him.
He had lived four years inside this world.
Four years of blood, ash, and creation.
Not even counting the times he'd logged out.
Just pure time spent living here — forging, fighting, building.
He wasn't just visiting this world anymore.
He had grown up here.
Then Ciel's voice arrived, soft but knowing.
"Time here… was once the same as your world. But I changed that. Every moment you entered, I used what little will I had left to accelerate time. So that you could grow while your body still rested."
"When you leave… time slows again. Until it matches Earth once more."
Alex stood there in silence, eyes drifting across his compound.
He thought it was a trick.
A quirk of the system.
But no.
This was real.
Time itself was bending for him.
The world was reshaping itself around one truth:
He was no longer just a player.
He was the axis of a planet's last hope.
The forge blazed with rhythm and fire as night fell across the valley. Machinery hissed like breathing beasts. Gears turned. Magic circuits emb
Alex stood at the center of it all — the calm in a storm he had engineered over the last two months.
Above him, a translucent projection hovered in the air: a schematic of a massive humanoid form, distorted with bone growth and liquified sinew, twenty times the size of any creature
The Co
Not just another target.
A keystone of the infection. A sovereign of ruin.
The final link in the chain that held th
He turned to the v
The triple-sealed door hissed open, its locks disengaging with a deep magnetic hum. Inside, weaponry and equipment lined the interior like a temple to war — cold, meticulous, and absolute.
He had bui
Kill it.
Railgun Mk. II: Ten meters of Sparksteel rails layered with Skyrite stabilizers, fed by twin Magic Crystals, and reinforced with Adamantite plating. The capacitor tower behind it had been redesigned to vent in-line with mana flow, allowing for a full discharge every ten seconds. It wasn't just a cannon. It was an extinction device.
Magitech Cloak System: Woven from Mithril threads and powered by illusion-based magic circuits, the cloak bent light and sound on a reactive delay curve — mapping terrain feedback and movement to camouflage its wearer in near-perfect silence. Not invisibility. Something smarter.
Kinetic Disruption Blades: Dual Adamantite daggers embedded with directional force circuits. With each strike, Alex could channel inertia into a point-impact field — converting a precise stab into the equivalent of a hydraulic ram. The blades didn't just cut. They collapsed things.
He stepped back, eyes sweeping over the array.
Each tool had been designed, tested, iterated, and refined during the last two months of tireless preparation. Each one represented hours of mana calculations, circuit carving, structural simulation, and theoretical optimization.
No guesswork.
No unknowns.
Just weapons of absolute certainty.
He climbed the stairwell leading to his highest platform.
The wind met him there — crisp and dry, brushing his coat like a whisper. Below, his fortress spread like a living circuit diagram, glowing gently with mana-fed veins. Every turret stood ready. Every barrier hummed with stability. The world was still, holding its breath.
Then came her voice — quiet, reverent, like silk over steel.
"You've done everything you can."
Alex didn't answer immediately.
He stared at the stars above. They looked closer than usual tonight.
"Tomorrow is Friday," he said quietly. "When I log in again… I hunt."
"This one is not like the others," Ciel replied. "It remembers the fall of kingdoms. It bears the mana of a thousand failed empires. It was once a king."
"Now it's just another corpse waiting for the right weapon."
"And if it kills you?"
Alex narrowed his eyes.
"Then I'll come back."
"And if it kills you again?"
He didn't flinch.
"Then I'll build something that doesn't miss."
The wind rose, brushing past them both in silence.
Alex turned away from the edge of the platform and descended into the forge once more.
Below, the glow of magic circuits pulsed around him — not with mystery, but with certainty. This was no longer a place of trial and error.
It was a crucible.
And tomorrow, it would forge the death of a king.
He walked to the Railgun Mk. II one last time, placing his hand on its control plate.
A low thrum answered him — mana syncing, crystals responding.
Ready.
He stared at the weapon for a long, still moment.
Then whispered, more to himself than to anyone else—
"Tomorrow, you die."
Chapter 37 – The Day Before the Hunt
LOGOUT COMPLETE.
The glow faded from the visor.
Alex opened his eyes.
The dark ceiling of his room greeted him, still and silent. His breathing slowed as the pressure of the other world slipped from his shoulders like a heavy coat. He sat up — motion fluid, precise — and exhaled.
Four months.
That's how long he had just spent in World Frontier.
Thursday in the real world.
But over there?
It had been four months of preparation.
Refining weapons.
Testing systems.
Perfecting circuits.
And tomorrow… he would go hunting.
But not now.
Now, he needed rest.
He stood, crossed the room in silence, and lay on his bed — still clothed, eyes already closing. His body in this world wasn't tired, but his soul had walked miles of fire.
Sleep claimed him like gravity.
And the world went still.
Friday Morning.
The soft chime of his phone alarm broke the silence.
Alex opened his eyes.
No grogginess. No disorientation.
Just clarity.
He moved with instinct — out of bed, into the bathroom. The shower hissed to life. Hot water ran across his skin. Steam filled the small space, blurring the mirror, softening the silence.
Then: dry towel. Clean clothes. Brushed hair. Crisp collar.
The motions of someone who already knew the rhythm of the world.
In the kitchen, he moved with quiet precision.
Rice in the cooker.
Eggs in the pan.
Green onions sliced, miso stirred into broth.
The scent of breakfast filled the air — grounding, simple, clean.
He sat. Ate.
Every motion measured.
Every bite balanced.
His body rested.
His mind sharpened.
Because tonight — when school ended and the sun dipped — he would return.
And when he did?
Nothing would survive.
By the time he stepped out into the cool morning light, his breath was calm, his coat was zipped, and the path ahead was already familiar.
The students walked in scattered groups. Laughing. Scrolling. Complaining about homework.
Alex passed through them like a phantom.
Unseen.
Unbothered.
Unshaken.
To them, today was just Friday.
But to him?
It was the final quiet breath before the world screamed again.
The final school bell rang.
Chairs scraped.
Bags slung.
Students filtered into the golden haze of Friday afternoon with relief in their voices and weekend plans on their tongues.
Alex walked in silence.
No one noticed when he left.
No one called his name.
And that was fine.
He didn't belong in this world — not anymore.
Not with what waited on the other side.
The door to his house clicked shut behind him.
Shoes off.
Shirt hung.
Water running.
Steam hissed as he stepped into the shower, letting the heat bleed away the last remnants of the ordinary world. He didn't linger. He didn't daydream.
Every second was preparation.
Every movement—deliberate.
When the water stopped, he dressed simply. Ate a precise meal. Washed the dishes without a word.
Then walked into his room.
The VR helmet sat exactly where he had left it.
Waiting.
Silent.
He picked it up with steady hands.
Then lowered it onto his head.
The soft hiss of the VR helmet sealed around his temples.
Then—
Light.
Mana.
Steel.
The world unfolded in a low thrum of energy and memory. Stone walls glowed with veins of Sparksteel. The air buzzed with quiet circuit pulses. Alex stood once more in the core of his fortress — high above the valley he had claimed, beneath the ever-turning turbines of a world reborn through his will.
He opened his eyes fully.
And walked.
The floor beneath him vibrated gently with power — a steady hum carried through magic-lined conduits that fed every corner of his stronghold. The rail systems whispered. The barrier pylons shimmered. The forge tower hissed with latent heat.
Tonight, the fortress didn't feel like a shelter.
It felt like an unsheathed blade.
In the past four months, Alex had not merely prepared.
He had reshaped the battlefield itself.
The Railgun Mk. II stood mounted atop the western platform, its ten-meter frame braced with adamantite anchors and cooling channels that hissed with mana-vented heat. Sparksteel rails glowed along its spine, charged and synced to the twin Magic Crystals embedded in the receiver core. He'd redesigned the capacitor tower three times, perfecting its discharge frequency.
Now, it could fire every ten seconds.
Every shot, a thunderbolt.
Every impact, an extinction event.
It wasn't a weapon.
It was a death sentence waiting for a name.
Inside the forge's inner sanctum, hanging on a reinforced rack, rested his Magitech Cloak System — woven from threads of Mithril so fine they shimmered like fog in moonlight. The illusion-based magic circuits etched into the inner weave responded to terrain, temperature, and directional sound. It didn't make him invisible.
It made him vanish into probability.
Even drones had trouble tracking him when it activated.
Next to it, sheathed in carbon-crystal brackets, lay his Kinetic Disruption Blades.
Twin daggers of polished Adamantite, each engraved with force-channeling circuits along the flat of the blade. He had tested them on steel blocks, boulders, even turrets.
They didn't slice.
They collapsed.
One strike could shatter reinforced bone. Two could bring down a gate. They were quiet. Close-range. Precise.
And utterly lethal.
But all of it—every tool, every weapon—was made to support one thing:
The armored vehicle.
He stepped through the sliding blast doors into the eastern hangar.
And there it stood.
Twelve meters long. Four meters high. Its matte-black body gleamed beneath arc lights like the armor of a buried god.
Wheels reinforced with Skyrite dampeners.
Adamantite panels interlocked across the hull like mobile fortress plating.
Sparksteel coils lined the undercarriage, feeding mana directly to its barrier stabilizers and internal defense nodes. A rotating auto-turret perched on the roof, synced to Alex's command signature and armed with tri-barreled rail-pulse cannons.
Inside?
Storage for weapons. Tools. Spare Magic Crystals. Food. Armor.
Even a magitech diagnostic table and fold-out forge tray.
This wasn't a vehicle.
It was a moving war engine.
A mobile command center wrapped in death and calculation.
It was the blade and the shield—a predator with wheels.
Alex stood before it in silence.
Four months of time.
Thousands of hours.
He had built it alone.
Not with magic.
Not with blessings.
But with knowledge.
Steel.
And rage.
Ciel's voice stirred gently into his mind.
"So this is the shell you will ride to war?"
His eyes narrowed.
"No."
He stepped forward and placed one hand against the vehicle's surface.
The metal thrummed beneath his palm.
"This is the coffin I'm bringing to the thing that ruined your world."
The turret above ticked softly — locking its systems into standby.
Alex turned and walked away, coat trailing behind him as the lights dimmed across the hangar.
Tomorrow, the war would begin.
But tonight, the fortress slept.
And so did its weapons.
Waiting.
Breathing.
Ready.
Here's the opening of the next chapter that reflects all the latest developments:
Chapter 38 – The Engine of Judgment
Dawn never touched the valley.
Not here.
Not in this world.
Instead, light came from within — from the humming mana circuits embedded in stone, from the pylons that buzzed with warding glyphs, from the forge-fires that hadn't gone cold in months.
And now, from something else.
Something heavier.
Taller.
Stronger.
Alex stood on the forward deck of his fortress, arms folded as the stormlight flickered above the hangar bay.
The armored vehicle sat in the center, now fully armed — no longer just a carrier, but a mobile fortress of its own.
The Railgun Mk. II had been mounted atop the chassis using reinforced bracers that channeled mana flow directly from the vehicle's core to the weapon's capacitors. Its long barrel reached over the front edge like a cannon from some forgotten age of war. Silent. Coiled. Waiting to speak destruction.
Flanking it, four automated turrets locked into place — two on the rear corners, two mounted mid-chassis. Each turret had a 360° arc of rotation and smart-tracking lenses powered by high-INT calibration. They moved in micro-adjustments, always watching, always predicting.
And built into the rear compartment—sealed behind reinforced mithril-shielded armor—was the drone bay.
Ten units.
Each one compact.
Each one deadly.
Each armed with kinetic mini-rounds and light barrier shrouds. Recon was their primary function—but Alex had engineered them for combat. In flight, they moved like wasps. In groups, like a storm.
He hadn't built a vehicle.
He had built retribution.
The final touches clicked into place.
He pulled up his status screen, the numbers appearing with a familiar tone of sharp silence:
Name: Alex Elwood
Level: 282
HP: 1400
MP: 2130
STR: 230
AGI: 335
END: 240
INT: 426
WILL: 102
Unused Stat Points: 75
He studied it for a long moment.
Seventy-five.
A gift of victory.
But he wouldn't spend them yet.
Not until it mattered.
Not until the moment demanded it.
He closed the window with a flick of thought.
The fortress was silent behind him.
The vehicle—charged, sealed, fed by mana veins and the will of a dying planet—hummed with anticipation.
Alex stepped toward the loading ramp.
Tomorrow, the war would end.
Or begin again.
But this time, he wouldn't walk.
This time…
He would arrive.
The interior of the armored vehicle was dimly lit — only the pulse of mana conduits and crystal indicators shone along the edges. Alex sat in the command seat, his hands resting calmly on the control interface. The Railgun Mk. II above him adjusted automatically with every shift in atmospheric pressure, and the four turrets ran silent diagnostics in preparation.
The fortress behind him faded into stillness.
The only sound was the hum of potential.
He exhaled slowly.
Then asked, "Ciel. Where is it?"
A pause.
Then her voice, soft but grim, echoed in his mind.
"Two hundred kilometers east… beyond the obsidian ridge. Past the dead rivers. There is a canyon carved by decay. A black wound in the land that still bleeds."
"It waits there."
"It doesn't sleep."
Alex's eyes narrowed. "How long has it been there?"
"Since the beginning. It was once a general of the old world. It devoured its own army before the collapse. I've tried to seal it in with rockfalls and shifting terrain… but it always finds its way out."
He didn't respond right away.
Instead, he engaged the engine.
The vehicle's core surged to life — Sparksteel lines flaring faintly along the floor, the drone bay sealing with a mechanical hiss. Mana distribution shifted into motion. Wheels groaned against the reinforced platform, and the hangar gate split open like a steel maw.
Wind swept in.
Alex looked forward, voice calm, low, and resolute.
"Then I'll erase it."
The armored vehicle lurched forward.
Its treads crushed the stone beneath it as it rolled into the open wilds.
The shield gates of the fortress disengaged behind him with a crack of mana and metal.
Out in the distance — somewhere beyond the ash plains and broken mountains — something old and hateful stirred.
And Alex was coming for it.
Alone.
Unshaken.
Unstoppable.
Chapter 39 – Collision Course
The sky was choked with ash.
Wind howled over the ravaged earth, brushing across jagged stone ridges and dried riverbeds. In the distance, lightning flickered through clouds that never rained. The land bore scars that never healed.
And from the crest of a shattered hill, Alex saw it.
The monster.
The final anchor of decay.
The Corruption Boss Master towered in the distance — a grotesque colossus lumbering through the deadlands. Its body was a grotesque amalgamation of corpses — limbs fused to torsos, ribcages exposed and twitching, skulls locked together in perverse symmetry. Twenty-five stories tall. Each step it took shook the valley floor. Its flesh writhed with parasitic movement — smaller creatures fused to its body like tumors, shrieking in silence.
Its head was a cage of bone.
Its breath was rot.
And it was moving fast.
Alex narrowed his eyes behind the armored windshield of his vehicle.
The mana targeting display pulsed in clean, pale-blue lines.
He gripped the firing control and whispered:
"Lock."
The Railgun Mk. II hummed above him.
Ten meters of coiled destruction fed by twin Magic Crystals. The Sparksteel rails surged with condensed power, each capacitor glowing like the heart of a thunderstorm.
BOOOOOOM—
The first shot left the barrel with a sonic crack that tore through the clouds. It struck the monster dead-center in the chest. Black fluid sprayed from the impact, launching fused limbs into the air. The beast stumbled but did not fall.
It roared — a hollow, gurgling sound like metal scraping inside lungs that no longer lived.
And then it charged.
Fast.
Too fast for something that size.
But Alex was already moving.
The armored vehicle lurched forward as he slammed into high-gear. The tires, reinforced with Adamantite plating and Skyrite suspension, tore across the broken hilltop like a beast unchained.
The monster gave chase.
But it wasn't a chase.
It was a firing lane.
Alex aimed the Railgun again.
The turret swiveled atop the vehicle, tracking automatically with his input.
FIRE.
Another blast ripped through the air and hammered the monster's left shoulder. Flesh exploded. Bone shattered. One of its arms — made from a mesh of at least twenty smaller corpses — went spiraling into the dirt.
But it kept coming.
Claws the size of tower cranes slammed into the hills behind him.
The monster shrieked and swung its entire upper body — but Alex swerved, tires skidding against stone, sparks flying as his vehicle danced just outside the arc of impact.
His hands didn't shake.
His breath didn't break.
He was driving and firing at the same time.
Again—
BOOM.
A third shot blasted into the beast's thigh. Its step faltered, dropping it to one knee, but only for a second.
It roared louder.
Still trying to crush him beneath its weight.
But the vehicle didn't stop.
The four turrets mounted on the chassis rotated in sync, opening fire with synchronized mana-guided rounds. Black ichor sprayed as the beast's outer layers were peeled away.
Alex routed additional mana into the railgun and lined up the next shot — even as the vehicle vaulted over a ruined ridge.
Fourth shot.
To the head.
It struck with a thunderclap that cracked the sky.
The bone cage around its skull partially collapsed, revealing something beneath — a pulsing core of corrupted light, writhing with fused nerves and skeletal fragments.
Alex's eyes narrowed.
Target acquired.
The monster lunged again — claws out, jaw unhinged, a scream rising that shattered nearby stones.
But it didn't matter.
He was faster.
Smaller.
Smarter.
And he had wheels.
He spun the vehicle sideways, triggering a hard pivot across the ridge line, dodging another crushing blow.
The turret realigned—
Fifth shot charging.
Mana surged into the rail.
Steam hissed from the overheated capacitors.
Target lock: central core.
Alex gritted his teeth.
"Let's see if this is enough."
FIRE.
Sixth shot.
The beam cracked through the monster's midsection, vaporizing a column of bone and severing the spinal core. It screamed, staggering.
Seventh shot.
To the neck. The fused vertebrae fractured. A cluster of heads detached from the body and tumbled down the slope.
Eighth.
A direct hit to the lower jaw obliterated the screaming mass, ripping the fused tongues and broken teeth into a rain of black gore.
Ninth.
The monster was limping now, trailing corrupted tissue in great arcs of decay. Its remaining limbs clawed at the earth, dragging it forward in stubborn madness.
Tenth.
Alex lined up the final shot with calm precision. The Railgun Mk. II glowed white-hot, rails sparking as mana surged one last time.
The beam struck its exposed chest — piercing through armor, bone, and the last flicker of monstrous resistance.
The Corruption Boss Monster convulsed, gave one last ragged exhale, and fell.
The ground trembled with the impact.
Dust rose.
Silence followed.
Alex brought the vehicle to a steady halt, wheels grinding softly against stone.
The massive corpse lay stretched across the ruined canyon, steaming and twitching in places, black ichor pouring from a dozen craters torn into its flesh.
But something was wrong.
From the center of the corpse — deep inside the chest cavity — a shape pulsed.
Not red.
Not organic.
Just black.
Perfect.
Still.
Alex activated the turret's cameras and zoomed in.
It was a sphere.
Roughly human-sized.
Suspended in the hollow ruin of the monster's body — untouched by flame, force, or rot. A black ball, matte and unreflective, humming with a slow, steady pulse that wasn't sound… but pressure.
He narrowed his eyes.
Without hesitation, he fired again.
The Railgun struck it dead center.
No effect.
He fired again — with the turret guns. Mana rounds. Kinetic bursts. Disruption coils.
Nothing.
Not a scratch.
The air around it didn't even ripple.
Alex's fingers hovered over the trigger for a moment longer.
Then he leaned back slowly.
Quiet.
Calculating.
"...Fine."
He turned off the vehicle's engines and opened the side hatch.
Steam hissed into the cold, dead air.
He stepped out, boots crunching softly on corrupted ash.
The wind was quiet now.
No birds. No insects. No monsters.
Just a man walking through the corpse of a fallen titan.
Toward the one thing that refused to die.
He climbed through the broken ribcage, each bone blackened by rot and burned clean by impact. Mana sparked against his boots. The heat of the final Railgun shots still lingered in the air.
And then—
He stood before it.
The sphere was massive, nearly as tall as him.
Perfectly smooth.
Perfectly black.
It hovered slightly above the cracked flesh beneath it.
Alex stared.
Expression blank.
Thoughts moving fast.
And then, softly, without looking away:
"...Ciel. What is this?"
Chapter 40 – The One That Waited
The silence was absolute.
The black sphere hovered—motionless, perfect, pulsing.
Alex stood still, just a meter away, the scorched bones of the Corruption Boss Monster crackling softly behind him. His finger hovered near the trigger of his rifle, but he didn't move.
"Ciel," he said again, voice low. "What is this thing?"
There was no answer.
Only a hum — deeper now.
And then—
A hairline crack.
It split across the surface of the orb like lightning etched in reverse — not light, but void. As if reality was peeling open from the inside.
Alex's eyes narrowed.
"...That's not good."
The crack widened.
The black sphere didn't fall or shatter.
It peeled — like a shell made of darkness flaking away in slow, silent strips.
Then something moved inside.
A figure stepped forward.
Not stumbled.
Not crawled.
Stepped.
Tall. Covered in skin like liquid ink. No face. No eyes. Its body was humanoid in shape, but wrong in every detail — too smooth, too still, and too sharp.
Its arms ended not in hands…
But in blades.
Not held.
Not worn.
But grown from the wrists — long, obsidian blades that shimmered with mana-dense edges so thin they whispered against the air.
The creature raised its head.
It had no mouth.
But Alex felt it smile.
He stepped back. Instinct.
And fired.
His rifle barked with explosive speed — 180 rounds launched in a single second, accelerated by magitech chamber coils and rail-fed ammunition cycling.
A full spread.
Point-blank.
Surgical.
But—
SHHHHK—
The monster's arms moved once.
Just once.
A blur.
And in that single motion, it cleaved through every bullet mid-air.
Not deflected.
Cut.
The rounds shredded into dust, halved perfectly, falling around the monster like dead snow.
Alex froze.
Not in fear.
In calculation.
The monster lowered its arms again.
It hadn't even taken a step forward yet.
And it had just erased 180 high-velocity shots without moving its legs.
He took one slow breath.
Then whispered—
"...New plan."
The wind was dead.
Ash drifted in the air, silent as falling bone.
The black monster stood unmoving where the sphere had been, its twin blade-arms held low, droplets of mana-condensed moisture sliding from their edges like condensed fear. The last fragments of Alex's shattered bullets scattered across the blood-soaked ground.
Inside his mind, Ciel's voice finally returned.
But it wasn't calm.
It was shaken.
"No…"
"That wasn't supposed to happen."
Alex's eyes didn't leave the creature. "Ciel."
"Alex… that isn't just another monster."
"It's not separate from the boss you killed."
"It's what came after."
His grip tightened on the rifle.
"What do you mean?"
"When you destroyed the Corruption Boss Monster's body… the curse at its core didn't die."
"It changed."
"It evolved."
Alex slowly circled the creature, boots crunching over dried flesh and shattered bone, the muzzle of his rifle steady.
"The corruption that built that monster was never alive in the way you or I understand it. It was a formula. A contagion. A code of rot."
"And you pushed it past its threshold."
"Now it's something else."
"Now it's pure."
The creature twitched once.
Its head tilted in the wrong direction — sharp, quick, mechanical.
Alex immediately dashed backward, loading a fresh clip.
"So what is it now?" he asked coldly.
"It is… the final form of the corruption's will."
"No more bones. No more mass. No more decay."
"Just a weapon."
"A thought given shape."
"It is the pure manifestation of execution."
"And it remembers you."
The creature took a single step forward.
Its foot didn't touch the ground — it glided just above the surface, blades humming with invisible force.
Alex raised his rifle again, but this time his fingers didn't squeeze the trigger.
He had already seen what it could do.
He needed a new approach.
And fast.
He took one step back, eyes never blinking.
"...Alright then."
He whispered.
"Let's see what perfection bleeds like."
Name: Alex Elwood
Level: 282
HP: 1400
MP: 2130
STR: 230
AGI: 335
END: 240
INT: 426
WILL: 102
Unused Stat Points: 75
His status hovered silently in his mind.
But there was no time to ponder it.
Because the monster moved.
Faster than thought.
Faster than roar.
It rushed toward him in a blur of black and silver — both blade-arms trailing behind like wings folded for a kill.
Alex reacted instantly, drawing his Kinetic Disruption Blades mid-motion.
The paired daggers locked into his palms with a satisfying click, mana circuits flaring as the inertia-altering runes activated. He ducked low, body twisting to meet the charge.
CLASH—!
Blades collided.
One black. One forged from his will.
The shockwave blew dust into a cyclone around them.
Sparks exploded as the monster's right blade met Alex's left. His off-hand redirected the other strike with a downward parry — the force so immense it cracked the stone beneath their feet.
Alex gritted his teeth.
It was just as fast as him.
AGI 335 — and it could match him blow for blow.
He countered.
Struck low, dagger forward, slicing toward the monster's abdomen. The Kinetic circuit surged with amplified force — a microburst of compressed inertia aimed to collapse its core.
CLANG—
The blade struck.
And stopped.
Its skin — or whatever passed for skin — didn't tear. Didn't dent.
It reverberated like striking a slab of solid diamond wrapped in steel.
Alex's eyes narrowed.
"…So you're built like a fortress."
The monster twisted.
One blade slashed horizontally — Alex ducked, backstepped, and rolled across broken stone, both daggers raised in reverse grip.
"It's not just fast," Ciel warned. "It's hard-coded to resist physical breakdown. It's built for close-quarters annihilation."
"I noticed."
Alex exhaled and switched tactics.
His eyes flashed with raw intent.
INT: 426.
He didn't need incantations.
He didn't need a staff.
He simulated the spell in his mind — visualized the circuit, the shape, the force.
Three rings. Two accelerators. One compressed channel.
Lightning Formula: Voltaic Lance.
He extended his left palm.
CRACK—
A spear of electricity erupted — 30,000 volts, forged from mental calculation and pure mana, arcing through the air like a thunder god's finger.
It struck the creature directly in the chest.
The impact flared like a mini-sun.
And then—
Nothing.
The monster stood inside the blast.
Unshaken.
Unaffected.
Not even smoking.
Alex's heart didn't skip.
But his mind accelerated.
"…It resists magic, too."
"Not just resists," Ciel said, her voice taut.
"It negates spells. Your lightning wasn't absorbed. It was rejected."
Alex raised both daggers again.
The creature tilted its head once.
Then raised both arms in perfect silence.
The next round would begin.
And now, he knew:
Neither steel nor spell would bring it down easily.
But he hadn't run in over four years.
And he wasn't starting now.
The twin blades carved through empty air where Alex had just been.
But he was already gone.
A pulse of light shimmered across his body as the Magitech Cloak activated mid-motion — Mithril threads flaring faintly as the illusion circuit bent light, sound, and mana signature around him.
He ducked behind the fractured corpse of the original boss and vanished into stillness.
The monster stopped.
It turned its head once. Slowly.
But it did not move forward.
It couldn't see him.
It didn't know where to strike.
Alex knelt, heartbeat steady, breath controlled.
INT: 426 engaged like a command processor.
His thoughts branched into structured matrices.
Analyze. Reconstruct. Solve.
Observation Log – Corruption Entity: Post-Evolution Form
✔ Speed = Equal to AGI 335
✔ Reaction time = Frame-accurate blade deflection
✔ Close-range efficiency = Maximum
✔ Bullet defense = Perfect
✔ Lightning (30,000 volts) = Ineffective
✔ Body = Hyper-dense, damage-resistant skin
Alex glanced at the spot where his Kinetic Disruption Blades had struck earlier.
There—barely visible beneath its right rib.
A small wound. No deeper than a knuckle.
But it was something.
He catalogued it immediately.
Vulnerability Assessment
✔ Physical attacks: Minimal damage; possible with extreme force
✖ Magic attacks: Nullified or rejected on contact
✖ Bullets: Cut
✔ Internal integrity: Unknown
✔ Minor wound identified: Requires sustained or amplified force
Alex's eyes narrowed.
He had one resource left that he hadn't used.
Unused Stat Points: 75
He didn't hesitate.
[Allocate All: +75 STR]
A rush of raw density surged through his body.
Muscle fibers thickened.
Weight increased.
Grip strength doubled, then tripled.
Veins of mana-woven tension surged across his arms and spine.
Updated Stats:
Name: Alex Elwood
Level: 282
HP: 1400
MP: 2130
STR: 305
AGI: 335
END: 240
INT: 426
WILL: 102
Unused Stat Points: 0
He closed the interface.
His blades pulsed faintly with new pressure — the weight of every strike now amplified beyond anything he'd ever delivered.
Still hidden by the cloak, Alex took one slow step around the ribcage.
The monster remained still — sensing nothing, waiting for him to slip.
He gripped both daggers tight.
No words.
No roars.
Just a single thought:
"Let's test what breaks first — your shell... or my resolve."
The air shimmered as Alex disengaged the Magitech Cloak.
The moment his presence returned, the monster reacted instantly—blades rising, body lunging with surgical speed.
But Alex didn't retreat.
He surged forward.
STR: 305. AGI: 335. INT: 426.
A machine of flesh and judgment.
His Kinetic Disruption Blades flared with mana-pressurized force as he spun low and slashed—
CLANG—!
A parry. He redirected the monster's left blade with the flat of his dagger, twisting his body past the right, which carved a trench in the stone where his throat had been a second before.
His target: the neck.
Not just any point.
The wound.
A tiny gash just below the collar—the only mark his earlier strikes had left.
He slashed.
First strike — direct hit.
The wound widened by a millimeter.
The monster twisted and retaliated—arms scissoring like guillotines.
Alex pivoted beneath the left blade, slid up the creature's side in a wall-run fueled by AGI, and—
Second strike — same spot.
A crack.
Not deep, but felt.
The monster hissed—no mouth, no voice, but the vibration of pain throbbed in the air.
Alex dropped low as both arms tried to slice him apart from either side. He ducked under one, then used his offhand blade to parry the other in a micro deflection — sparks exploding down the edge.
Third strike.
The neck again.
Each attack landed like a precision drill. Same angle. Same depth. Same spot.
He couldn't afford to slash wildly.
Not now.
This wasn't a brawl.
This was surgery under pressure.
The monster slashed horizontally — Alex backflipped into a spin, touching ground only long enough to slide behind the beast's right shoulder.
It turned.
He saw the opening.
Fourth strike.
Deeper.
Black ichor sputtered out now — not spraying, but leaking. Slow. Controlled.
He was getting closer.
But he had to stay flawless.
One mistake.
One misstep—
And he'd be cleaved in two.
The monster struck again. A feint. Then a real blow behind it. Alex barely caught it in time, parrying with both blades in an X-guard that rattled his bones.
Then—
He twisted inside the strike zone and launched upward.
Fifth strike.
The wound split.
The armor cracked like splitting ironwood.
Alex didn't smile.
He didn't speak.
His eyes were narrowed.
Focused.
Obsessed.
The next blow would matter.
He circled.
Parried.
Dodged.
The twin blades danced around him like scythes of death, but he moved with supernatural rhythm — guided by instinct, calculation, and cold intent.
He waited.
Watched.
And then the opening came.
The monster twisted its torso to compensate for a wide swing.
Its neck leaned just slightly forward.
Exactly how it had the first time he landed the wound.
Alex leapt—
Final strike.
His daggers pierced deep.
A surge of kinetic force exploded into the same wound.
The crack widened.
The flesh tore open.
Something inside pulsed—
Exposed.
Chapter 41 – The Silence After
The monster screamed without a mouth.
Black liquid sprayed as Alex's blades tore across the same wound — again and again, each strike driven with surgical exactness and overwhelming strength.
One. Two. Three. Four—
He didn't stop.
Didn't breathe.
Didn't blink.
The blade-arms swung wildly now — not with precision, but desperation. The creature's balance faltered. Its movements slowed. But Alex never lost his rhythm.
Five. Six. Seven—
More of the thick, ink-like blood poured from the neck wound.
Every strike opened the fissure wider.
Every motion exposed the unnatural, pulsating bundle of nerves within — black and twitching, wrapped in flesh that refused to die.
He slid behind it, reversed his grip—
Final strike.
Both daggers plunged into the wound.
He pulled outward.
SHHHK—
And the head fell.
It hit the ground with a wet, shuddering thud — its form spasming once, twice…
Then going still.
The body stood for a heartbeat longer.
Then it collapsed.
Dust rose.
And the world… finally stopped moving.
[You have defeated: Evolution-Class Corruption Entity]
[EXP GAINED: +30 LEVELS]
[UNUSED STAT POINTS GAINED: +150]
Alex stood in the silence, breath steady, hands dripping with the creature's thick blood. The corpse was twitching—briefly—but not resisting.
Then, like a whisper caught on wind, Ciel's voice reached him.
"You did it."
"I can purge it now."
A radiant pulse spread from the ground.
The moment the last twitch faded from the corpse, Ciel's power surged outward — not in fire, but in cleansing light.
The monster's body began to dissolve — from the feet up, collapsing into black ash and flickers of unbound mana. It didn't rot. It didn't explode. It simply ceased to exist.
All around, the land shimmered.
The corrupted stone cracked and crumbled into fertile earth.
The blackened trees sprouted green buds again.
The skies lightened.
The rot that had infested this place for centuries… was gone.
"The moment its core died," Ciel whispered, "the curse tethered to it collapsed. I can reclaim the area. All of it."
"You just ended a thousand-year wound."
Alex said nothing.
He simply sheathed his daggers and turned toward the horizon — where the first clean wind began to blow.
The wind had changed.
For the first time in this region, it smelled clean.
Alex stood at the edge of the now-cleansed canyon, boots sinking slightly into reborn soil. The black corruption was gone. The monster's body had dissolved. Silence stretched across the valley like a breath long held — and finally exhaled.
But Alex wasn't done.
He opened his status screen without hesitation:
Name: Alex Elwood
Level: 312
HP: 1400
MP: 2130
STR: 305 → 355(+50)
AGI: 335
END: 240 → 340(+100)
INT: 426
WILL: 102
Unused Stat Points:150 → 0
He felt the change ripple through him instantly.
Muscles tightened.
His pulse steadied.
Every fiber of his body coiled with enhanced force and unshakable stamina. Even the grip of his blade felt different — like the world itself was lighter.
But he didn't linger in it.
He looked toward the horizon.
Then spoke aloud, voice calm and low:
"Ciel."
A soft pulse answered in his mind.
"Yes, Alex?"
"That was one."
He turned his eyes toward the mountains in the far east — where the clouds hung too low, and the light still refused to shine.
"Give me another."
Ciel was quiet for a moment.
Then her voice returned — not surprised, not afraid.
Only ready.
"Then I'll find it."
Chapter 42 – The Long Hunt
Four months.
That's how long he hunted without rest.
Across dead valleys, blackened forests, sunken ruins, and ash-choked plains — Alex Elwood tracked, engaged, and destroyed seven Corruption Boss Monsters. Each one monstrous in scale. Each one different. Each one dead within minutes of confrontation.
Some crawled on bone towers. Others flew on wings of warped sinew.
One even burrowed beneath the ground like a living earthquake.
But none of them evolved.
He waited for it.
He looked for it.
Every time he saw a boss, he watched its death carefully — checked the corpse, scanned for anomalies, waited for the black sphere to appear again.
It never did.
No burst of corrupted pressure.
No reformation.
No second phase.
"It must be rare," he muttered one night, leaning against the hull of his armored vehicle. "Extremely rare."
"More than rare," Ciel answered quietly. "What you fought… wasn't just an evolved boss. It was an anomaly. A mutation beyond control. A result of cumulative corruption that adapted beyond the system's limits."
"And yet," she added, "it may not be the only one."
Alex closed his eyes.
If they were that rare… they were likely hiding.
Waiting.
And they wouldn't appear under open sky.
He would have to descend deeper — into places where the world forgot how to scream.
Still, the hunt brought strength.
From level 312 to 362.
Each boss fell faster than the last — his weapons sharper, his reflexes tighter, his strategy more relentless.
But it wasn't just raw muscle he sought.
During the third month, one of the bosses tried something new.
A curse.
It didn't scream.
It whispered.
A psychic rot seeped into the air. A soul-wound. It dulled his senses, warped his perception, and slowed time around his thoughts.
He nearly faltered.
But only once.
After that, he knew what he needed.
Stat Allocation:
+50 Strength+50 Endurance+50 Agility+100 Willpower
Current Status
Name: Alex Elwood
Level: 362
HP: 1400
MP: 2130
STR: 405
AGI: 385
END: 390
INT: 426
WILL: 202
Unused Stat Points: 0
The curse didn't touch him now.
Willpower burned like a shield inside his mind — every thought precise, every doubt drowned.
He stood atop a cliff overlooking a cracked basin, where black wind once churned and monsters had nested for generations.
Now it was silent.
The ground below him was littered with the skeletal remains of seven corrupted titans — burned, shattered, erased.
Alex watched the horizon, cloak fluttering in the cold wind.
The Evolved One hadn't shown itself again.
Not once.
Which meant it was either extinct… or hiding.
He clenched his fists, gauntlets humming with mana-fed weight.
"Ciel," he said quietly.
"Yes?"
"We're done with surface hunting."
"Understood."
"Then it's time to go deeper."
Alex nodded once.
Eyes locked on the mountains ahead — jagged, dead, and whispering.
Something was still down there.
Something smarter.
Stronger.
Rarer.
And he was ready.
Chapter 43 – Before the Descent
The clouds above the ruined mountains churned like the surface of a black sea. Lightning flickered at the edges, illuminating fractured peaks and valleys carved by centuries of rot. Below, the world waited in silence — as if holding its breath.
Alex stood at the edge of a wind-blasted cliff, one boot resting on a shattered ribcage left behind from his last hunt. His cloak snapped behind him like a banner of war.
"Where's the next one?" he asked, eyes fixed on the horizon.
Ciel responded instantly — her voice no longer gentle, but focused.
"There's a faultline beneath the Redstone Wastes. Hidden below a collapsed civilization — one built before the corruption ever rose."
"I've found concentrated mana disturbance... and lingering traces of decay."
"It's deep. Sealed. Forgotten by the world."
"But it's not dead."
Alex said nothing for a moment.
His fingers tightened at his sides.
A sealed ruin. A buried origin. Maybe even a nest.
This wasn't a surface sweep.
This was a descent into the true heart of corruption.
He exhaled once.
"Then I'm going back first."
"To the fortress?"
He nodded.
"Before we go into the dark, I need supplies."
Hours Later — The Fortress
The massive hangar doors hissed open, revealing the glowing veins of Sparksteel running along the walls. Lights flickered to life as the armored vehicle rolled into its cradle, steam trailing from its undercarriage.
Alex stepped down, boots clinking against the polished steel of the loading deck.
His domain awaited him.
The hum of machinery.
The scent of oil, magic, and ash.
The silence of a place that bent to his will.
He moved like a ghost through the corridors.
Straight to the supply bay.
There, he began restocking:
Mana-charged crystal coresRefined Adamantite platesHigh-caliber rifle ammunitionMithril strips for field-repair of circuitsEmergency ration capsulesCloak-thread reels for stealth recalibrationDrone auto-repair kitsMagic crystal fusesOne backup mana battery the size of a human torso
Everything was categorized.
Everything was exact.
No noise.
No panic.
Just readiness.
He opened a side compartment and checked the embedded railgun capacitor — drained, but stable.
He'd fire again soon.
And this time, it wouldn't be in open terrain.
He returned to the command chamber and stood before the wide tactical display that showed the map of World Frontier — now mostly cleansed in the north and west.
But in the east?
Still black.
Still pulsing.
Still waiting.
Ciel's voice stirred again.
"Once you enter this place… you may not be able to come back easily."
"Its walls twist. Its air devours sound. No one has returned from there."
Alex's expression didn't change.
"I won't need to come back."
He turned from the display.
And walked toward the waiting vehicle.
This time, he would go into the pit.
Not just to fight.
But to find the origin of this rot — and kill it at the root.
Before leaving the fortress, Alex took one final detour.
Not to rest.
Not to delay.
But to build.
He descended to the deepest floor — past the main forge, below the magitech storage wing, into the restricted vault where only one door existed… and only one purpose had ever been written into the walls.
The air was dense with containment spells and electromagnetic shielding.
The circuits here were not etched for automation or industry.
They were designed for obliteration.
Alex stood before a reinforced cradle the size of a small aircraft.
And in it, he began to assemble something that even Ciel dared not speak of aloud.
It had no name.
No title.
No restraint.
It was a missile, forged with all the knowledge his intelligence could simulate and all the materials his fortress had stockpiled over the past year.
Adamantite fins.
Sparksteel pulse tubes.
A triple-chamber mana ignition core.
But at its heart — something else.
Ion Force.
Condensed electromagnetic annihilation, bound within a gravitational matrix carved by layered mithril-etched magic circuits.
There was no fire.
No radiation.
No fallout.
Only pure, localized erasure.
When fired, it would not scorch the land.
It would erase mass at the molecular level — breaking bonds, shattering atomic cohesion, and nullifying everything within the pulse radius.
No echoes.
No debris.
Just absence.
He spent three days crafting it.
During that time, more than 70% of the fortress's resources were consumed — drained from mana batteries, metal stores, fusion capacitors, and magical crystal reserves.
And when it was done…
It sat in silence.
Perfect.
Terrifying.
His greatest and most desperate weapon.
Ciel finally spoke.
"You could've built an army."
Alex didn't look at her.
He simply said—
"I only need one shot."
He sealed it within a specialized launch pod on the armored vehicle's rear undercarriage, safeguarded by triple-lock enchantments and insulated casing.
It would not detonate by accident.
But when it did…
Nothing would remain.
The Ion Missile sat sealed beneath the armored vehicle — silent, pulsing faintly inside its containment cradle. No heat. No radiation. No visible threat.
But Alex knew what it carried.
He had crafted it with one purpose.
And now, Ciel had shown him where it would land.
"Beneath the Redstone Wastes," she had told him.
"There's a faultline… a fracture carved open during the early wars. What lies beneath isn't just old."
"It's where it started."
Alex now stood before a topographic projection of the region — a jagged canyonland of sunken spires, blackened mesas, and wind-scoured bones.
At the center: an ancient ruin, sealed beneath layers of stone, debris, and time.
And deeper still?
A collapsed human civilization — the one that first discovered the corruptive force. The one that had used it without understanding its consequences.
"They were powerful," Ciel whispered. "The most advanced of all empires. They unlocked secrets no one else dared to pursue."
"They destroyed every rival civilization on the planet."
"But the cost came later."
"Their bodies decayed. Their sanity collapsed. Their identities shattered. They turned on each other… then on themselves."
"They became the first monsters. And the corruption learned how to spread."
Alex stared at the ruin's glowing marker.
"Greed," he said quietly. "Power. Arrogance."
He lowered his gaze.
"And now they sleep beneath the earth like a bomb waiting to breathe again."
He turned from the display and looked toward the Ion Missile, sealed inside its pod like a bullet aimed at history itself.
"That's why I built it."
Not just as a weapon.
But as a correction.
A judgment.
He didn't want to purify the origin.
He wanted to erase it.
The forge dimmed behind him as the armored vehicle powered down.
Outside, the wind howled across the cliffs of a dead world.
Alex stepped into the driver's seat.
He input coordinates.
And began the descent toward the Redstone Wastes.
Chapter 44 – The Depth That Waits
The Redstone Wastes stretched endlessly ahead — a dead sea of crimson dust, shattered rock, and wind-carved mesas. Even the sky above seemed thinner here, as if the sun itself refused to burn too brightly over what lay beneath.
Alex drove in silence.
The armored vehicle hummed with purpose, powered by mana-fed coils and reinforced treads that crushed everything beneath them without effort.
Distance to target: 3000 kilometers.
But he wasn't waiting until arrival to make his move.
He activated the drone bay.
With a hiss of hydraulics and a soft pulse of mana ignition, a recon drone launched from the vehicle's rear module — slicing through the sky like a silent bird of prey.
Alex's eyes narrowed as the onboard display synced to his vision.
The drone soared across the wasteland, tracing a straight line toward the carved fracture in the earth — the one Ciel had described. The source of it all.
And then… it saw.
The canyon.
The wound.
A black gash in the world, miles wide and seemingly endless in depth — as if the planet itself had been torn open to bleed.
What emerged from it was worse.
Corruption Boss Monsters.
Not dozens.
Not hundreds.
Over one hundred thousand.
Each one towered at 20 floors minimum, moving like gods of rot — crawling, stomping, slithering across the landscape in writhing masses. Their bodies twisted with broken architecture, spires of bone, wriggling limbs, and pulsing cores.
It was a city of titans, all malformed and maddened, orbiting around a single location — the fracture's center.
But that wasn't the worst of it.
Amid the corrupted horde, new shapes emerged.
Sharper.
Cleaner.
More lethal.
Evolved Corruption Boss Monsters.
The drone tagged and counted rapidly.
Over 10,000.
Each one a perfected killing machine — some humanoid, some serpentine, others insectile — all faster, denser, and more intelligent than their lesser kin.
They moved in formations.
Watched the skies.
Patrolled the core like knights of extinction.
And then the drone reached the center.
Alex's jaw tightened.
Even he didn't speak.
There, resting in the middle of the fracture like a god buried in its own gravity—
Was the Heart of the Corruption.
A monster the size of a mountain.
No… bigger.
The drone's scanner struggled to define it.
At least two kilometers in height, maybe more.
Its body was half-merged with the ground, as if it had grown from the soil itself — a blackened mass of twitching veins, skeletal pillars, and glowing cores that pulsed in rhythm with the land.
It did not move.
It breathed.
Each inhale sucked wind across the entire canyon.
Each exhale spilled clouds of thick corruption that cloaked the sky like a second atmosphere.
Alex said nothing.
He simply watched.
And understood.
The monsters above weren't guards.
They were cells of a larger organism.
A body with a mind.
A mind that had waited for him.
"This is it," Ciel said softly, almost reverently.
"This is where the corruption was born."
"And where it waits to be killed."
Alex closed the display.
No fear. No hesitation.
Just focus.
"…Then I'm bringing the missile."
The drone returned.
Its wings were scorched from residual corruption in the upper atmosphere, and its outer shell bore the dull stain of decay-tainted air. But it had done its job.
And Alex had seen enough.
The armored vehicle slowed to a halt atop a dune of black glass and scorched sediment, 3,000 kilometers from the fracture.
The land trembled faintly — not from movement, but from breathing.
The thing in the center wasn't asleep.
It was waiting.
Alex moved to the rear of the vehicle and activated the lockdown sequence.
The launch pod split open with a deep, rumbling hiss.
Steam rolled out from the containment vault, and from it emerged the Ion Missile — twelve meters long, plated with Adamantite, trimmed with Sparksteel, and glowing faintly with internal charge.
He didn't speak.
He didn't blink.
For the next thirty minutes, Alex worked in absolute silence.
Wrench. Seal. Conduit link. Targeting calibration.
Every step exact.
Every motion rehearsed.
It wasn't just installation.
It was a ritual.
By the time he finished, the Ion Missile was mounted onto the vehicle's dorsal launch system — anchored in shock-absorbing bracers and stabilized by a six-point targeting cradle.
Ciel's voice stirred gently as he locked the final ignition ring.
"Once it launches… there's no taking it back."
Alex stepped away from the missile and looked toward the storm-choked sky above the Redstone Wastes.
"…Good."
His eyes narrowed.
"Because neither is what's down there."
Chapter 45 – The Final Signal
The targeting array pulsed with pale-blue runes, flickering softly across the reinforced control panel. Alex stood before it in silence, his armored fingers hovering above the interface.
The coordinates were locked.
The fracture — the center of the Redstone Wastes — pulsed like a black wound across the map. At its core was a 2-kilometer-tall monster, wrapped in fused bone and decay. Around it crawled over 100,000 Corruption Bosses, encircled by more than 10,000 Evolved Entities.
A heartbeat of the apocalypse.
Alex's finger pressed the trigger.
FIRE.
The armored vehicle rumbled with deep, metallic resonance as the dorsal launch cradle split open, revealing the Ion Missile.
Twelve meters of black Adamantite plating. Sparksteel linings. A shimmering aura of compressed mana distortion and ionized force.
There was no sound.
Only a sharp, piercing crack — like glass shattering across the fabric of reality — as the missile vanished into the sky.
It didn't burn.
It didn't leave fire.
It left nothing.
The missile accelerated beyond sound, beyond thought.
Mach 7… Mach 12… Mach 20.
Wind ruptured in its wake, carving pressure lines across the Redstone Wastes.
At the heart of the fracture, the Heart of the Corruption began to stir.
But it was too late.
Ciel's Voice — Not Divine, But Dreadful
"Alex… what is this?"
"This isn't a weapon."
"This is unmaking."
She paused — stunned, nearly whispering:
"The mana web in that region is collapsing. I can't track time. I can't even sense ley-lines. The missile is deleting space."
"You didn't build a bomb."
"You built oblivion."
0.2 Seconds After Contact
There was no explosion.
No dome of fire.
No pillar of smoke.
No thunder.
Only collapse.
Space buckled inward on itself.
The very air shivered and vanished. The earth folded. Mana fractured. Sound failed.
Everything within 100 kilometers — every monster, structure, spire, and whisper of corruption — was pulled into a collapsing point and ceased to exist.
Not incinerated.
Not scattered.
Erased.
The Heart of the Corruption did not scream.
It simply ended.
Its breath, its rot, its presence—gone.
Silence After Erasure
When the pulse faded, the sky was… clear.
No ash.
No wind.
Just silence.
The Redstone Wastes, once the most corrupted place in the world, was now empty.
Alex stood still, watching from a high ridge as the final echoes died away.
He said nothing.
But the world had heard.
Inside the vehicle, Ciel finally spoke, her voice hollow with awe.
"I can't detect any corruption at the fracture site."
"There's nothing left. No mana scars. No residue. No curse signatures. No fallback echoes in the system's structure."
"The center is gone."
She paused, then added with more clarity:
"There are still some corrupted monsters scattered across the world — remnants. Those created long ago and abandoned. But they're not like the ones from the fracture."
"They're unstable. Dying."
"None of them are strong enough to replace what you just destroyed."
Alex exhaled slowly.
"Then they're just cleanup."
"Yes," Ciel whispered.
"Because you just erased the origin."
System Message
[You have destroyed the Heart of the Corruption]
[Mass Annihilation Confirmed]
[103,457 Corruption Boss-Class Entities Eliminated]
[10,493 Evolved-Class Entities Eliminated]
[Origin Core: Atomized]
[LEVEL UP: +10947 LEVELS]
Updated Stats
Name: Alex Elwood
Level:11,309
HP: 1400
MP: 2130
STR: 405
AGI: 385
END: 390
INT: 426
WILL: 202
Unused Stat Points: 54,735
Ciel's voice softened, her tone no longer cautious but reverent.
"It's over, Alex."
"This world… can breathe again."
Alex stepped outside, onto the steel ramp of his vehicle. The wind touched his face — real wind, not poisoned by rot or curse.
He looked at the horizon, where the fracture once stood.
Now flat.
Lifeless.
Still.
"…No gods," he murmured. "No monsters."
Just air.
And silence.
Chapter 46 – The Weight That Follows
The silence remained.
It had been an hour since the Ion Missile struck.
Yet the world hadn't moved.
No birds returned. No corrupted fog slithered back. No system alerts rang out. Just a stillness so profound it felt heavier than war.
Alex stood atop the steel ramp of his armored vehicle, arms folded, the wind brushing against him with unfamiliar purity. The land ahead was flat — unnaturally flat. A smoothed plane of absence where once there had been a gaping fracture.
There was no crater.
No scar.
Just absence.
"It's still gone," Ciel said gently.
"I've run diagnostics on the leyline structure. There's nothing anchoring corruption anymore."
She hesitated.
Then said with a whisper:
"I think you unmade a concept."
Alex didn't respond immediately.
His eyes were locked on the horizon, where reality itself had once bent beneath a monster's breath. Now, even the air had no memory of it.
But the system remembered.
And it had changed him forever.
System Update
[Mass Ascension Confirmed]
[You have leveled up: +10,947 levels]
[Unused Stat Points: 54,735 → Distributed Evenly]
Final Status
Name: Alex Elwood
Level: 11,309
HP: 113,370
MP: 56,865
STR: 11,352
AGI: 11,332
END: 11,337
INT: 11,373
WILL: 11,149
Unused Stat Points: 0
Alex Elwood is no longer human.
He is the result of surviving when no one else could. Of growing where others fell. Of refining his body, mind, and soul through war, death, invention, and resolve.
Now, his stats aren't just numbers.
They are laws rewritten.
STRENGTH – 11,352
[Human peak: 30–40 STR]
Alex is 283× stronger than the world's strongest humans.
Can shatter mountains with a punchCrumples tanks and titanic monsters with a flick of his wristRips through Adamantite and Sparksteel — metals that could resist dragonsHis full-force blow could match or exceed a meteor impact
ENDURANCE – 11,337
[Bulletproof at 50 END]
Alex is 226× tougher than someone completely immune to bullets.
Immune to blades, bullets, beams, radiation, fire, acid, magical destruction, soul erosionCould survive standing inside a black hole, a supernova, or a collapsing dimensionRegenerates faster than most things can damage him
AGILITY – 11,332
[Olympic peak: 30–40 AGI]
Alex is 283× faster than Earth's fastest humans.
Moves at ~12,748 km/h (Mach 10+)Reacts in microseconds, perceives battle in slowed-down timeCan strike thousands of times per secondAppears as a blur — or invisible — to anything under AGI 1000
INTELLIGENCE – 11,373
[Genius IQ: 10–20 INT]
Alex is 569× smarter than a genius.
Calculates magical formulae faster than thoughtUnderstands interdimensional physics, quantum mechanics, and metaphysics by instinctDesigns weapons, machines, and spells Predicts outcomes before choices are made
WILLPOWER – 11,149
[Unshaken at 30–40 WILL]
Alex is 278× more mentally unbreakable than even the most battle-hardened soldier.
Immune to fear, madness, curses, mind control, illusions, divine pressureCannot be corrupted, seduced, deceived, or disorientedKeeps perfect clarity even in the presence of eldritch horrors or gods
Ciel's voice returned, softer this time. Not cautious. Not reverent.
But concerned.
"You've gone too far ahead."
"There is nothing on this planet that can stand beside you now."
Alex's expression didn't change.
He knew she was right.
The last enemies had been deleted.
The rest were just ghosts.
He walked to the side of the ridge, his boots crunching softly against glass-like soil. The wind rustled his coat. The sky was clear for the first time in years.
"What will you do now?" Ciel asked.
Alex didn't answer at first.
Then finally—
He whispered.
"I'll finish the cleanup."
"Even if they're dying, I'll end every corrupted remnant left."
Chapter 47 – Ten Minutes of Silence
The wind whispered across the empty ridge, gentle and clean.
Alex closed his eyes.
And sensed.
Far beyond the horizon — across shattered seas, dead continents, and blackened forests — he felt them. Faint pulses like dying embers in a graveyard long abandoned.
Corruption Bosses.
Not many.
Just a few.
Scattered like dying fragments across the world.
But they were still alive.
Still rotting the edges of creation.
And that meant they had to die.
He opened his eyes.
And vanished.
He crossed oceans in seconds.
Skimmed above the waves, faster than the wind could bend.
Mountains passed beneath him like ripples.
Forests blurred. Plains collapsed into lines.
Wherever his senses felt even a whisper of corruption, he arrived — and erased.
Each Boss was massive.
Each one ancient.
Each one, once, would've taken an army to stop.
But not anymore.
The first fell to a single punch that split the air and fractured the sky.
The second evaporated beneath a railgun blast that hit before the barrel even glowed.
The third didn't even scream — it simply came apart as Alex passed through it at speed, blades drawn, motion perfect.
Ten minutes.
That's all it took.
In ten minutes, Alex had crossed an entire world.
And by the end—
There were no Corruption Bosses left.
"That's the last one," Ciel whispered.
As each one fell, she had followed — not with words, but with power.
Every time Alex killed one, Ciel purged the land.
The rotted soil healed.
The corrupted sky cleared.
The rivers began to flow again, untainted.
Cities long turned to bone began to settle into dust.
Alex stood on a quiet bluff overlooking a wasteland that, for the first time in its history, was no longer dying.
System Message
[Global Purge Complete]
[All Corruption Boss-Class Entities Eliminated]
[Remaining Tainted Zones: 0%]
[LEVEL UP: +167 LEVELS]
Updated Status
Name: Alex Elwood
Level: 11,476
HP: 113,370
MP: 56,865
STR: 11,352
AGI: 11,332
END: 11,337
INT: 11,373
WILL: 11,149
Unused Stat Points: 835
Distributed
Name: Alex Elwood
Level: 11,476
HP: 113,370
MP: 56,865
STR: 11,519
AGI: 11,499
END: 11,504
INT: 11,540
WILL: 11,316
Unused Stat Points: 0
The sky was quiet now.
For the first time in centuries, the planet breathed.
Ciel's voice returned, softer than before. There was something in it now that hadn't existed for a long time.
Peace.
"It's done, Alex."
"There are no monsters left."
Alex stood still.
Then quietly stepped forward.
Into a world that had no more enemies.
The silence lingered after his words.
Ciel didn't speak right away.
Alex remained at the bluff's edge, his eyes distant — not toward any monster, ruin, or battlefield… but toward the sky. Toward what lay beyond.
Then, finally, he said quietly, "Don't worry."
"Don't worry…?"
He nodded, just slightly.
"I'll still visit you."
A pause. Then—
"You will?"
He smiled faintly — the rare kind, the one that rarely made it past all the armor.
"You're not just code, Ciel. Not anymore. You've watched me survive every second of hell this world could throw at me. You guided me, endured with me, and never once gave up."
"You're more real than most people I've met on Earth."
"…But you'll be back in your world. Won't you forget me, once you're surrounded by everything again?"
He shook his head.
"I could never forget you."
A beat passed.
Then her voice returned — not trembling now, but blooming with warmth.
"Then… we'll still talk?"
Alex nodded once more. "We already are."
He tapped the side of his head. "We're still linked."
Ciel went quiet, then added gently:
"So… I can still be with you."
"Even across worlds."
"Even across thoughts."
He smiled again. "Exactly."
There was a long, glowing silence between them.
Then she asked:
"Are we… friends now?"
Alex turned slightly, wind brushing past his shoulders.
And said, with a voice calm, warm, and utterly real:
"Yes. We are."
Chapter 48 – The Return
The world of World Frontier stood still.
No alarms.
No corrupted storms.
No enemies left to kill.
Only the soft hum of mana flowing through healed ley-lines, and wind passing through a sky once choked with decay.
Alex sat in the command seat of his armored vehicle, eyes calm, expression unreadable. His mission was complete. Every corrupted monster erased. Every cursed zone purified. The will of the world — Ciel — was safe.
And so was the world she called home.
He opened his interface.
No hesitation.
No doubt.
[Logout Confirmed]
Light.
Collapse.
Transition.
Reality inverted, then restructured — not with pain or disorientation, but smooth finality. The link severed, the connection dissolved.
Earth – 07:41 AM
Alex's eyes opened beneath the visor of his VR helmet.
Soft light spilled through the window of his room.
The air smelled of metal and dust and quiet.
He sat up slowly.
No stiffness.
No disorientation.
Just breath.
And stillness.
He removed the helmet and placed it on the desk beside him. His hands didn't shake. His pulse didn't rise. The world felt… normal.
Almost.
Because something had changed.
He stood.
Every muscle in his body moved like a coiled spring wrapped in velvet.
He walked toward the mirror — not to admire himself, but to confirm what he already knew.
His power was still there.
All of it.
Every digit of strength, speed, resilience, thought, and clarity.
But it didn't leak.
Didn't flare.
Didn't warp the air or crush the floor.
He was in complete control.
His footsteps were silent.
His breath, slow and measured.
A being who could shatter buildings with a touch…
Now folded his blanket.
And straightened his chair.
Without bending steel.
Without breaking the room.
"You've learned how to restrain it," Ciel said softly in his mind.
"Good."
He nodded, smiling faintly.
"I'm still human here," he said. "Even if I'm… something else now."
"You're more than that," she whispered.
"But I'm glad you're still you."
He walked to the kitchen, opened a cabinet, and began to prepare breakfast.
The heat of the stove didn't flicker under his presence. The floor didn't crack beneath his weight. The world didn't bend in fear.
Because he wasn't a danger to it.
Not unless he chose to be.
And he wouldn't.
Because now, Alex Elwood was something the world had never known before:
A god who could choose restraint.
As he stirred the eggs, a flicker of memory returned — subtle, silent.
He checked the synced VR data beside him.
[Total World Frontier Runtime: 12 Days, 3 Hours, 11 Minutes]
He froze, only for a moment.
Because in World Frontier, the clock had ticked differently.
1,000 times faster.
More than 5 years had passed for him.
Five years of war.
Of building.
Of dying and coming back.
Of becoming something no one else on Earth could possibly understand.
He exhaled slowly.
That weight didn't crush him.
But it never left either.
"Does it feel distant?" Ciel asked softly.
He shook his head. "No. It feels… closer than this world."
"But you're here now," she said gently.
"And time… here, at least… still moves forward."
He plated his food and sat in silence, looking out at the quiet morning sky.
The world outside hadn't changed.
But he had.
And only two minds knew it.
His.
And hers.
"Will you still visit me?" Ciel asked after a pause.
Alex smiled faintly.
"Of course."
"Even if we're far apart?"
He tapped his head. "We're not."
A pause. Then—
"So we can still talk?"
"We already are."
"Then… are we friends now?"
He looked out the window, voice quiet, steady.
"Yes. We are."
Chapter 49 – A Day Without War
The streets were alive with the soft rhythm of morning in Japan.
People moved through narrow sidewalks with purpose but not urgency — children laughing, the scent of fresh bread from bakeries, distant train calls echoing between buildings. It was a world that breathed quietly.
Alex walked among them in silence.
No coat. No armor. Just a dark hoodie and jeans. Hands in his pockets. Pace calm. Eyes relaxed.
He moved like a ghost in plain sight.
No one recognized him — not because he was hiding, but because they couldn't imagine who or what he was.
A man who had once fought gods.
Now standing in line behind two high schoolers buying melon bread.
"So… this is what a normal Saturday feels like," Ciel said gently in his mind.
Alex gave a slight smile, eyes drifting to a row of vending machines near a subway station. "This is peace."
"You're very calm. I expected you to feel… detached."
"I'm not detached," he said, watching a small child drag her sleepy father toward a gacha machine. "I'm grounded. I just know now how much weight I used to carry."
"And now?"
He looked up at the pale blue sky — clean, cloudless.
"Now I'm just… walking."
He visited a quiet bookstore near the station.
The scent of old paper and ink greeted him like a friend. He passed through the aisles slowly, scanning covers in silence. He could memorize every word in every book here in seconds. But he didn't.
He read slowly.
Not because he had to.
Because he chose to.
Later, he stopped at a small restaurant tucked between a laundromat and a florist. The kind with handwritten menus and a waitress who smiled like she meant it.
He ordered katsudon and iced green tea.
A quiet meal. Unremarkable.
Perfect.
"Do you ever miss the world you saved?" Ciel asked as he finished eating.
"I miss the purpose sometimes," he admitted. "But not the war."
"And me?"
He smirked. "You're still here."
"True," she said, and he could almost feel her smiling.
In the afternoon, he visited the riverside.
Old men fished under bridges. Students in uniforms laughed over snacks. Bicycles clicked along the gravel paths. A breeze passed through sakura trees still bare from winter.
He sat on a bench and closed his eyes.
Let the warmth of sunlight rest on his skin.
Let the noise of a living world fill his ears.
And through it all, Ciel remained with him.
Not as a voice of war or command…
But as a friend.
Chapter 51 – The Sister and the Sky
Sydney International Airport was bright with filtered sunlight and filled with the familiar hum of announcements, wheels on tile, and voices in a dozen languages. Alice Elwood stood near Gate 47 with her backpack slung over one shoulder, her university blazer slightly wrinkled, and her black hair tied in a low ponytail.
Around her, the rest of the field trip group — university students, two teachers, and a trio of accompanying monks — milled quietly, checking passports and boarding passes. A week in Australia had passed quickly.
It had been peaceful.
Educational.
But she was ready to go home.
Beside her sat Mayu, her closest friend in the group, and one of the younger female novices accompanying the trip. Dressed in a simple robe and sneakers, Mayu had a wide smile, soft features, and eyes that still carried traces of childhood innocence.
She stretched her arms and yawned. "The flight's going to be long…"
Alice nodded, glancing at the display board. "At least it's direct."
There was a pause between them. A comfortable one.
Then Mayu leaned her head against her shoulder and said softly:
"I miss Japan…"
"But mostly, I miss my younger brother."
Alice blinked, surprised.
"Your brother?"
Mayu smiled faintly, eyes still on the ceiling.
"He always cooked for me before I left. Not anything fancy. Just rice and eggs or curry sometimes. But it was warm. Made me feel like home."
"I didn't realize how much I'd miss it until I didn't have it."
Alice looked down for a moment, her lips curving faintly.
"…I know what you mean."
Mayu turned her head.
"You too?"
Alice gave a small nod. "My little brother's the same."
"Really?"
"Yeah. He cooks better than me. Quiet type. Doesn't talk much, but… he always makes sure I eat. Even if I'm late. He remembers what I like. Never complains."
She looked toward the window, where planes taxied slowly across the tarmac.
Her voice softened.
"…I miss him too."
Mayu smiled and closed her eyes.
"I think younger brothers don't realize how important they are sometimes."
Alice didn't answer.
Because hers had always seemed so distant.
So unknowable.
And yet, he was always there when it mattered.
"Final boarding call for flight JL772 to Tokyo—"
The overhead voice echoed.
The group began to gather their things. Teachers called for attention. Passports were checked one last time.
Alice rose, backpack over her shoulder, and followed the group down the long corridor toward their gate.
Her mind drifted as her footsteps echoed.
Not toward Australia.
Not toward school.
But toward home.
And the quiet boy who always had a warm meal ready.