Sparks of electricity blasted through Van's body. He took a stance that defined one prepared to take a race. The moment he took off, only a stroke of blue light visibly moved through the army of beasts and their numbers started dropping to the ground. Even the sword he wielded was bound in electricity.
Haruka on her part, lifted her hands into the air and thick long chains burst out from the ground underneath the beasts within her view. The chains mercilessly strangled and cut through their slimy skins. Her hands swayed in different directions and so did her terrifying chains pop out from every corner.
Ashton's eyes suddenly switched to the clear blue color of the sky. He inhaled deeply and his voice came calmly.
"Weather Manipulation, Rain of death."
An enormous dark cloud hovered over the beasts that were headed in his direction. A heavy downpour came on them and their bodies melted away on contact with the raindrops.
Flynn's shirt shredded into pieces as the tattoos on his body lit up in a bright golden color.
"Release," He simply said.
Monsters of different builds seeped out from his body till it was rid of tattoos. Each monster which represented each tattoo on his body charged at the incoming beasts, launching the best of their attacks.
[ Name: Viral Beasts ]
[ Rank: ??? ]
[ Virus endlessly produced as a result of the glitch in the world of the Harbingers Of Death ]
Max was literally in tears having equipped the Beast Slayer.
"I have finally made it to the realm of endless beasts!"
Already enveloped in flames, he dived into the sea of beasts causing a large number of them to perish in the scorching heat of his ability.
"This is so beautiful!" Max screamed in pleasure at the continuous spill of colourless liquid on his body from the beasts he slaughtered.
[ Squad 15 has gained +4 points ]
[ Squad 15 has gained +14 points ]
[ Squad 15 has gained +28 points ]
[ Squad 72 has gained +10 points ]
[ Squad 11 has gained +16 points ]
Notifications were constantly displayed in the sky, with Squad 15 taking up the lead faster than expected.
The team tirelessly fought against the beasts but that was just the tip of the iceberg and more viral beasts came flowing in.
"Why do they keep on increasing in number?!" Avery shouted to the hearing of the others, rapidly increasing the number of arrows she shot out so they would multiply into even larger numbers.
"There's just too much of them," Flynn watched as his monsters fought against the beasts.
Just then, about four of the huge rocks which the group thought to be asteroids fell from the sky and travelled towards the ground. Max was quick to notice this and hurriedly jumped backward to safety. The huge rocks landed on lots of the beasts sending them to their death in an instant.
" What are those rocks?" Van thought as he struggled to fight off the beasts that had already surrounded him. They didn't have any abilities except the fact that their already long arms could elongate. It seemed all they wanted was to eat him.
They didn't have faces and that was the most confusing part to as how they would eat him when they had no opening. But then expandable holes suddenly opened up in their stomachs. They were all willing to share him.
Max glared at the rocks annoyed they had stolen his supposed kills. His mood was quick to change when cracks began to appear on the rock closest to him.
Not giving it a second thought, he rushed at the rock and struck it with his sword and it reacted in a manner he had least expected. A blast of energy blew him away and the rock opened up to reveal tons of small eggs stored in it. These eggs immediately began to fall out, taking on the form of viral beasts that grew from infants into fully matured ones within seconds. The other rocks also broke open and gave birth to more viral beasts in the same fashion.
Max hurriedly got out of the hole his fall had created as a result of the attack against him. For the first time, his health points dropped to a point lower than it had ever done.
[ Your HP had reduced ]
[ HP 10/25 ]
[ HP will be restored in 5 minutes ]
"To hell with those rocks!" He bit his lips in anger.
"Fury of a thousand blades!"
The exact number of six portals opened up above the newborn beasts. Blades dropped from the holes, piercing through their targets.
Luckily, this attack was enough to do a great deal of damage to the endless presence of the creatures.
"Lava synthesis!"
Max drove his sword into the ground. Countless cracks opened in the ground in front of him leading to the beasts. Hot bubbling lava swallowed as much of them as it could.
[ Viral Beasts continue to appear ]
[ A new quest has been received ]
[ Destroy all eggs within the inverted realm ]
[ Reward: 500 gems ]
[ Reward: +50XP ]
*. *. *.
"What do you see, Nisha?" The young man standing beside her asked. He was dressed in pure white robes with his long green hair flowing to his waist.
Standing in the smoke-clouded boundary between the inverted realm and the other side, the guardian's pure white eyes stared blankly into the space in front of her.
"The teams are doing better than I expected. Especially him..."
Her voice trailed off as her vision remained on the boy with purple eyes more than she had, had it on other players.
"Who?" The man asked.
"I think he's the special one. It appears he has the Monthenia inside of him," Nisha calmly spoke. "What is he trying to do? Destroy the rocks in the air. Monthenia has become even more daring, I guess it's because his host has a daring personality too."
She returned to silence as she continued watching the event going on in the realm. Every player who had participated in the game happening in the inverted realm were all mortal beings who were picked at random. Just like any other game, Harbingers Of Death had an error that needed to be corrected, a glitch. The mortal beings were recommended by the authorities for the task of getting rid of the virus produced every day as a result of the glitch. Being the weakest in the world ranking, a specific number of mortal beings were sent there as a challenge given by the authorities. In the world of the Harbingers Of Death, the weak had no stand so if they were to be eliminated it wouldn't make any difference and would only give room for the strong ones to get even stronger.
Nisha sighed.
The inverted realm was a mistake, an error that was later used by the authorities as a test to judge between the weak and the strong. At the moment, a large number of the players that had gone into the realm would not return. Nisha had mentioned that a player may die in the inverted realm at his or her own risk and there was a reason behind her words.
Human players who are killed in the inverted realm would never be able to respawn in the game for a second chance neither would they even return to the human world as their souls would become trapped in the realm and as such after a while the realm converts them to energy that reincarnates into a virus, a viral beast. This also applied to bots in the mortal being ranking too as they could also be affected by the virus.
Human players or bots absorbed by viral Beasts would also not respawn as they would only be converted to strengthen the beasts' physique and who knows even stimulate an evolution in them.
Something strange soon stopped her thoughts mid-way.
"The realm is closing with a blackout! It's traveling fast from the inner part!"
"What?!"
The former calm expression on the face of the man beside her fell to worry. "This has never happened."
"This means the glitch has developed a core without my knowledge and it has sensed something that has angered it." Words hurriedly flew from Nisha's mouth.
The realization of something dawned on her.
"It's because he is destroying the eggs!" Her eyes swiftly caught hold of the boy with purple eyes once again.
*. *. *.
As the other of his teammates wasted no time in battling with the beasts on the ground, Max launched himself into the air with the aid of his flames.
Lava flowed from his palm engulfing the Beast slayer in it, though it didn't cause the sword to melt instead it happened to strengthen its attack power.
"Destroy!" Max shouted like a madman, slashing through each rock which exploded with lava afterward.
[ Squad 15 has gained +200 points ]
[ Squad 24 has gained +140 points ]
[ Squad 16 has been eliminated ]
[ Squad 2 has gained +200 points ]
[ Squad 30 has been eliminated ]
[ Squad 42 has been eliminated ]
[ Squad 10 has been eliminated ]
[ Squad 15 has gained +300 points ]
[ Squad 68 has been eliminated ]
All of a sudden the number of teams that were eliminated had taken to a drastic increase.
"What in the world is that?" Haruka went into a daze after successfully killing 20 beasts at that time as she spotted darkness quickly traveling from a far distance towards them.
Just then, a familiar voice rang in the ears of all players that were still alive.
"Everyone evacuate the realm immediately! The realm has gone into rage!" Nisha shouted despite her voice already being loud enough for everyone's hearing.
Haruka stared at the device on her wrist.
[ Game duration: 5:30:02... ]
[ Game duration has frozen]
[ Evacuate the inverted realm ]