Frederick stepped aside, releasing the Divine Ward. The protective space dissolved, and silence fell like a curtain. Both of them stood ready, tense, waiting for the Dark Knight's next move.

  It came. Exactly as expected.

  With a howl of power, the Dark Knight descended upon them, sword raised in a diagonal arc. Bck Fire wrapped the bde like a death omen, sizzling through the air. Oren reacted on instinct. He unched a Horizontal Ssh, intercepting the blow. Sparks erupted. The csh rattled his arms. He barely blocked it—and still lost HP from the sheer force.

  Now it was speed versus power. Reaction versus prediction.

  Steel rang against steel as they cshed again and again. Left. Right. Left. Right. Parrying, blocking. Deflecting not just the strikes, but the fire ced into them. The battle was a rhythm of violence.Then the minions came.

  They surged from the mist. Lesser shadows, but persistent. Unlike their master, they couldn't vanish at will. But they didn't need to. Their numbers made up for it. Distractions. Disruptions. Each one a thorn in the side during an already impossible fight.

  A knight.

  A boss.

  And a swarm.

  Killing them did little. The minions were tethered to the Dark Knight. They died, yes—but they came back. Always came back.

  "I'm losing health fast!" Frederick's voice crackled through the mic, edged with panic. "My armor's falling apart! I should've brought the good set. This one's garbage!"

  His current gear was built around the Divine Ward, boosting magical defenses. But it had no real defense against direct sshes. Every hit bled him. He couldn't tank like Oren. Not for long.

  And time was slipping. Oren could feel it—thirty seconds lost, maybe more, since the Ward dropped.

  They needed a pn.

  But none came.

  And the battle raged on.

  Before long, after countless blocks, breathless dodges, and barely any chance to strike back—it finally happened.

  The one thing Oren feared most.

  Frederick died.

  "Fuck! Bro, sorry. I'm finished, go..." His voice crackled out, and a moment ter, his virtual body hit the ground with a dull, tragic thud. Oren didn't need to look to know—Frederick's user tag blinked once… then vanished. Gone.

  All that remained was Oren.

  Him.

  The Dark Knight.

  And the minions.

  He stole a quick gnce at the boss's HP bar.

  Barely a fourth gone.

  His heart sank.

  And he cursed.

  He didn't want to give up. Not now. Not when they were finally close to the end. This was the culmination of months of effort, hours of coordination with friends and randoms who had stuck it out through every failed attempt, every patch, every wipe.

  He couldn't just let it go.

  So he kept going. Tried to think. Searched for something that might shift the odds. But no pn came. Only pressure. More and more. The attacks didn't let up. The minions, once split between him and Frederick, now focused solely on him. The swarm multiplied. It pressed in, a wall of pain and noise and code.

  He blocked. Dashed. Parried. Countered.

  Again.

  Again.

  Again.

  His HP bled steadily downward, even when he got everything right. He was faster than them, better than them. But not enough. They just didn't stop.

  The only was that the Dark Knight himself didn't move.

  He stood just at the edge of the mist.

  Silent.

  Watching.

  It made no sense. A boss of rank 10 like this should've usually been aggressive, opportunistic. Any vulnerability and they'd pounce. But this one didn't. It just waited. Oren caught glimpses of it now and then—a flicker of eyes glowing red in the fog, a glint of bck steel catching phantom light.

  It was almost like the Knight was amused. Like it wanted him to suffer.

  And it worked.

  Oren clenched his jaw. He knew it wasn't a real person, but still—he felt toyed with. Mocked. And he was pissed.

  And then, in that exact moment, an idea clicked into pce.

  There was one way. One ridiculous, borderline-suicidal way.

  He had always dismissed it, but now, it was the only thing left.

  So he dropped his sword.

  Not just any sword. It was the Scarabeus. Legendary. Porcein bde, azure etchings, heavy and magnificent. A weapon designed to deal massive damage.

  Useless now.

  He swapped it out. Dug deep into his inventory and pulled another one—an old rapier.

  Uncommon-tier. A trash item picked up from some long-forgotten NPC. It still had most of its durability, only because he'd never bothered to use it.

  Light. Fast. Sharp.

  Exactly the thing he needed. The one single game mechanic that could make this work.

  Perfect parries. That was the key.

  If he could time them exactly right—frame-perfect reactions—he'd trigger a small moment of invulnerability, a brief window to survive a hit that otherwise might have killed him. A crack in the attack.

  It was all he had.

  And the rapier was the only weapon he had that was fast enough to make that happen. The Scarabeus, magnificent as it was, couldn't respond quick enough. It was designed for slow, overwhelming swings, leaving Oren exposed. The rapier, on the other hand, was nimble. Swift.

  It was basically all about precision.

  Every parry with it would give him a moment of breathing room. A split second where the system gave him a blessing: a chance to recover, reposition, or—if he was lucky—strike back.

  He wasn't sure how long that time frame would st, but it was all he had.

  He took a deep breath. Focused.

  Then he began.

  First minion. A swift ssh. He parried. Clean. The shadow staggered, recoiled.

  He lunged at another.

  One hit. Kill.

  But no time.

  Another blow came instantly after. He turned too te. Missed the parry. Barely blocked. His HP dropped a little—but he didn't flinch.

  No time for frustration. No time for doubt.

  Another came from behind. He spun. Parried. That familiar ripple of sound and light came with the impact of their bdes.

  Another parry.

  He turned around. Searching for his next opponent.

  And through the mist, he saw it.

  The Dark Knight.

  Watching. Waiting.

  Oren didn't wait.

  He lunged.

  The rapier fshed forward like lightning through fog, the bde a sliver of red light—and struck the Knight between the eyes. It was fast enough that it couldn't react.

  Impact.

  A shudder ran through the boss—damage, stagger. Not huge. But important. And also more than he'd ever managed since the beginning of the fight.

  His buff made it count.

  He danced back.

  Breathed.

  Another minion charged.

  He stared at the Dark Knight. It stared back with those vile, crimson eyes.

  But Oren didn't flinch.

  He moved.

  And the battle became a dance.

  It was brutal. But still, there was something almost soothing about it. Step, csh, dodge, spin, parry. The rapier fshed like a streak of starlight through the fog, biting into his enemies with terrifying speed. Oren's feet found instinctual pcement, his strikes nding with increasingly refined timing.

  It felt choreographed.

  Too perfect.

  And Oren was starting to sweat bricks—his eyes wide and staring.

  Each motion carved away uncertainty. Each parry immersed him even further. There were moments when the whole world narrowed into the millisecond between bde and guard, between death and survival.

  And the Dark Knight—he seemed to notice.

  The boss began to shift. No longer content to merely observe from behind the mist, he began to engage. The skirmish deepened. What was once a shadowy presence in the periphery became a relentless force in the foreground. The Knight blocked Oren's lunges now.

  He parried back. He attacked with cold, deliberate swings that carried weight and fury. His patterns grew smarter, faster—more aggressive.

  But the weapon didn't matter.

  Not his strength.

  Not his style.

  Because Oren would parry. Every time.

  Steel met steel. Sparks lit the fog like fireflies in a storm. The two danced in a tightening spiral of blood, their duel shadowing over the lesser foes swarming the battlefield. And still, the minions struck—sometimes from behind, sometimes from the sides. But now Oren welcomed them. Their attacks were windows, opportunities.

  He used them.

  Each perfect parry against one of them granted him those precious seconds of invincibility. Seconds where he could reposition. Heal. Re-engage the Knight with new tactics. The minions, once a threat, had become part of his strategy. Their intrusion was no longer disruption—it was fuel.

  At some point, he realized the lesser shadows had begun to falter. Not vanish, not entirely—but retreat. Their attacks slowed. Fewer came. Perhaps the Dark Knight had pulled their leash tighter, recognizing that they no longer served their purpose. Or perhaps—just maybe—the system had acknowledged that this was no longer a swarm fight.

  This was a duel.

  One-on-one.

  And it was a brutal skirmish now. No beauty left in their movements. Just close-quarter savagery. Their swords blurred in the mist, aimed at necks, hearts, spines. Oren's fingers ached from the constant tension—he could feel sweat trickling down his temple in real life, stinging his eyes—but he didn't stop.

  He couldn't.

  There were moments when the Dark Knight forced him back, blows hammering into his guard hard enough to shake the screen. Oren would stagger, barely catch a minion's bde mid-swing, then twist into a perfect deflect—buying himself the half-second needed to gulp a potion and surge forward again.

  He was bleeding. Tired. On the edge.

  But he was still here. There was movement again. At his right periphery, a fsh of bck. It was the perfect angle.

  He parried it, giving a swift pierce at his opponents direction. The light rapier following his command.

  And for the first time since Frederick fell, the Dark Knight began to step back.

  Not far. Not retreating.

  Just... hesitating.

  Oren gripped the mouse tighter, knuckles white. His whole body leaned into the moment. He knew his friends were watching—spectator mode probably lit up with frantic shouts of hyped up maniacs.

  Because Oren had fucking done it.

  The Dark Knight's HP was now hanging by a thread—just a sliver left, a whisper of red barely visible on the bar. Oren had carved it down through sheer force of will, through fwless precision and ironcd refusal to die.

  He'd once had eight healing fsks. Now, barely enough for two full refills remained.

  His fingers trembled. His vision blurred.

  But none of that mattered.

  Not the resources.

  Not the risk.

  Not even the fear.

  He was ready

  His parries were no longer reactions. They were instinct. His movement, second nature. Every dodge, every counter, every fsh of his rapier was a statement

  And now, at the edge of exhaustion, something in him clicked.

  He smiled.

  Because now, finally, it was his turn.

  Oren raised the rapier.

  He shifted into stance—low, coiled, precise. The world around him slowed. The mist faded. The minions stood back like silent ghosts, irrelevant.

  Even the Dark Knight seemed to freeze, reading the shift in posture, sensing the storm about to be unleashed.

  Then—

  Fsh.

  Oren's character exploded forward, a streak of light tearing through the gloom. He flew like a missile—sharp and unstoppable, a shit eating grin on his face. The air split behind him. The fog parted. His rapier gleamed like the edge of dawn.

  The Dark Knight moved, too—too slow, too te. He raised his bde in a desperate, clumsy block, aiming high, bracing for a direct strike—

  But Oren didn't strike high.

  Midway through the flight, with nothing but instinct and a flick of the wrist, he redirected.

  A curve, subtle but deadly. His trajectory bent like a serpent's lunge moving in an unpredictable path towards his goal.

  And then—

  Impact.

  The rapier pierced straight through the bckened armor. Right into the center of the chest. Not just through the pte—but through the shadow beneath. To the boss's core.

  The Dark Knight staggered and jumped back.

  But Oren didn't relent. Now was the time to commit. So he did.

  He instantly thrust forward, his body becoming a blur in its speed.

  His heart was racing, his grin widening.

  This was it.

  "I've got you!"

  Just as he was about to serve the finishing blow, a pop-up appeared, and his face dropped.

  [Effects of Aracus' orb have run out, removing stat buffs.]

  And just as the buff left, the Dark Knight lunged toward him without any hesitation. As if he had anticipated this very moment. As if it actually had a sense of risk. Of sacrifice.

  It was breathtaking, really.

  If it just didn't concern his loss, Oren might've even gaped in awe.

  The Knight's entire armor ignited, dark fmes engulfing both him and his sword. In a blink, he surged forward and sshed in a single, devastating motion—cleaving Oren's character clean in half before he could even think to react.

  A final red pop-up appeared on screen. Just as Oren smmed his fist straight into the monitor.

  [You died. Transporting to logout point.]