At that time, the once unstoppable tide of players, the classic Swarm Tactic that had carried so many victories before, completely and utterly failed. The attacks of the Imperial Blood Demon King were all area-of-effect devastation, and every single skill painted the ground red, wiping out entire swathes of fighters at once. The more it killed, the thicker the miasma of Blood Fury coiled around its body, seething like a living storm.

Finally, it reached into the void of its own power and wrenched out a sky-defying crimson blade. With a single cleave, the earth split open, and the entire face of the ground erupted. Pillars of molten rock burst into the sky like geysers, and countless players were annihilated in an instant. Then, without a word or even the slightest hint of concern, the demon king leapt into the searing lava and vanished.

Slowly, the ground cooled and hardened again, leaving behind only a scarred, smoldering landscape. If not for the carnage scattered across the ruins, it might have felt like a nightmare that dissolved on waking. It was a monumental loss of resources, lives, and effort, and in the end, the enemy had simply dropped its ultimate and walked away. The Survivor Faction was left bitter and deeply frustrated, while on the Carnage Faction's side, the mocking laughter was probably already starting.

So when Markham pulled a familiar, terrifying blood-red blade from behind his back, a cold jolt of recognition shot down Ethan's spine. It was the same motion, the same aura, as when the Imperial Blood Demon King had summoned its weapon. Worse, as Markham brought his blade down, it stretched in mid-air, the killing edge extending like a long, whipping ribbon of blood. It was already close to a hundred feet long.

If that thing hit the ground, the physics engine of Ethereal was about to get a very serious stress test.

The name Markham shouted for the skill only confirmed Ethan's fear. It was the same one that had caused that final, apocalyptic eruption of magma. The realization hit him like a punch to the chest.

"Fall back! Into the corridor, now!" he roared, already shoving Lyla toward the narrow passage. His eyes flicked upward, calculating distances and levels. They were on the seventh floor of the catacombs. If Markham really was copying that skill, he wasn't just going to kill the enemies in this chamber, he was going to punch a hole straight through the entire underworld, blasting a crater all the way to the surface.

Sure, the Uncharted Catacombs would eventually respawn and reset, the terrain restored as if nothing had happened. But the impact, the spectacle, the sheer spectacle of it would be recorded by a hundred player UIs. Markham was about to become internet famous. Ryan's earlier display of power had been terrifying, but it was clean, all focused force, no structural destruction, less visual shock.

Markham's move, by contrast, was pure spectacle, and he was going to be insufferable for weeks.

BOOM.

Just as Ethan's team scrambled into the relative safety of the corridor, Markham's colossal Blood Fury blade struck the stone floor. The entire subterranean world jolted, a massive tremor that rippled outward like a submerged explosion. The shockwave traveled for miles.

Far to the north in Blackridge, players felt the ground shudder beneath their feet. Up on the frost-bitten mountain peaks where countless low-level adventurers were grinding mobs, the sudden vibration sparked instant panic.

"Avalanche! Run!"

The cry echoed across the slopes as players turned and sprinted downhill, but no one outruns a collapsing mountain. A vast section of the peak broke loose, an ocean of snow and ice thundering into the valley below, swallowing everything in its path. Player corpses and dropped gear disappeared beneath a hundred feet of white, treasure reduced to nothing as it waited to fade on the next system refresh.

Back in Blackridge itself, the tremor rattled rooftops, knocking sheets of snow free. The long, picturesque icicles hanging from every eave became deadly rain, shattering on the cobblestones. A few unlucky souls standing in the wrong place met an embarrassing end in the safety of their own city, skewered by falling ice.

Deep underground, the situation was far more immediate.

"Boss, the whole place is coming down!" Victor yelled over the grinding roar of stone.

"Goddamn Markham," Ethan swore, shielding Lyla from a shower of debris. "I'm going to have words with him outside of Ethereal. A lot of words."

"How is his skill even allowed to do environmental damage like this?" Evelyn shouted, awe slipping into her voice despite the danger.

The entire team was furious. They had fought tooth and nail through the dungeon, their names stained crimson with Player-Kill counts, even the three healers weren't clean. And now, after surviving the enemy, they were about to be buried alive by their own side's overzealous artillery.

"Don't panic, head for the eighth level," Ethan ordered. "The Inhibitor Chamber."

The eighth layer of the catacombs, the so-called Inhibitor Chamber, was technically part of the same dungeon instance, but Ethan knew better. It functioned like its own pocket dimension, sealed off from the unstable geology above them, and right now it was their only hope.

"Ladies first. I mean, I'm out of here!" Leo shouted, already grinning as he triggered Energy Burst, his body blurring forward in a streak of motion.

"Oh no you don't."

To everyone's surprise, Victor was the one who reacted. With a casual flick of his hand, a pair of glowing wings shimmered into existence on Leo's back, and a bright tether of white light shot from Victor's palm, latching onto Leo mid-dash. Leo managed a clean sixty feet before the spell yanked him backwards like a snapped bungee cord, dropping him beside Victor with a stumbling thud.

Faith's Pull, a standard Priest utility spell meant for dragging allies out of danger. Victor, the slowest member of their party, was using it for… alternative purposes.

"Hey, what the hell, man?" Leo sputtered, completely blindsided.

"All for one, mate," Victor replied with a grin that held not a shred of sympathy. "We die together, we respawn together. No skipping the line."

The rest of the team burst into laughter, the tension breaking for a moment at the sheer betrayal on Leo's face.

"You're a real piece of work, you know that?" Leo glared, then sighed and shook his head. "Fine. My turn."

He jogged a few steps, shot Victor a triumphant grin that absolutely promised revenge, and triggered his second Energy Burst. The skill had two charges, and Victor's Faith's Pull was nowhere near off cooldown. Leo clearly thought he was in the clear.

Victor's smirk vanished, replaced by a groan of irritation. He was still the slowest among them.

"Evelyn," Ethan said, his tone carrying all the suggestion needed.

A rush of air answered him.

Of course she understood. They had another Priest. Evelyn was their Discipline specialist, and Faith's Pull was one of her core spells.

Leo, mid-celebration, was once again yanked off his feet and reeled back into the group like an unruly child, landing in an undignified heap.

"You guys are the worst," he snapped, though his anger crumbled instantly under Evelyn's cool stare. He settled for glaring at Ethan instead. "So damn petty."

Ethan only laughed, the sound nearly swallowed by the increasing roar of collapsing stone above them.

They kept moving even through the teasing, and Leo, now resigned to his fate, fell back in line behind Ethan. The group sprinted through the open Golden Gate of the Inhibitor Chamber just as the ceiling of the seventh level gave way in a deafening crash. The entrance behind them vanished under tons of falling rock, sealing them off from the destruction.

Inside, silence descended so suddenly it felt unnatural. The air was still, almost heavy, and the violent shaking outside faded to nothing more than a distant, muffled rumble.

Ethan stepped forward and looked around, and a strange wave of déjà vu washed through him. In his past life, he had never set foot in the Inhibitor Chamber. In this one, he had almost skipped it too, planning to smash the device and move on. He had always assumed it was just another end-room for a dungeon objective.

But standing here now, he froze.

The walls caught his eye first, the smooth curves of the stone almost organic, as if molded instead of carved. Strange glyphs pulsed faintly across the surfaces, alive with a rhythm he could feel more than hear.

It was familiar, painfully familiar.

No wonder this place hadn't despawned when the objective was completed. There was more to it, far more than he had ever imagined.

In his previous life, he had never heard any specific descriptions of this room, not because it lacked features, but because players probably never looked closely. To anyone else, it was just set dressing for a boss fight. If he hadn't been in the Sea of Death, that other place, the one carved into his memories like a wound, he would have thought the same.

But the resemblance was unmistakable. The architecture, the faint thrum in the air, the alien energy humming through the stone, all of it felt like a small, contained reflection of that other, far more terrible location.

A cold shiver slid down his spine, unrelated to temperature or fear of collapse. This wasn't just a room to house a plot device. This place had secrets, old ones, buried so deep that no player had ever thought to search for them.

And now he was standing right in the center of them.

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