“Let go of him—”

Whoever resisted was promptly smacked aside and rendered comatose. It didn’t matter to Dasha either way as long as they were breathing. In Plait’s case, he was breathing and talking. A step up, indeed. He studied him rigorously and took his time experimenting.

Blood was spilled. Screams echoed through the bridge.

“The bravest knight in the land…a title well deserved.”

Five agonizing minutes had passed, each moment stretching into eternity for Plait. Dasha had torn him apart with a relentless precision that bordered on sadistic artistry. Limb from limb, he had dissected Plait's physical and mental fortitude, leaving him hanging on by the thinnest thread of existence. He tested several concoctions, including Dream Meth.

The edges of his eyes were pink, overloaded from the amount of substance forced into his system. His cheeks were stained with pink-coloured tears. The effects were glorious to behold, if not for the incessant choking and wanton gasps.

“Thank you very much for your services, Plait.” Dasha dully released him. Arms and legs torn, Plait's body fell to the ground without meaning. Blood painted a morbid tableau beneath him, an abstract masterpiece of suffering and despair. Every breath he took seemed to scrape against the jagged edges of his fractured being.

Dasha stood over the broken figure, regarding his handiwork with a detached curiosity. The scientist within him reveled in the data gathered from the systematic dismantling of a once-proud warrior. The five minutes had been truly informative.

Meanwhile, Plait's consciousness teetered on the brink of oblivion. His breaths came in shallow gasps, a haunting rhythm of survival in the face of torment. His eyes, once ablaze with defiance, now held a glimmer of resignation.

“Ah, wait, I almost forgot.” Dasha crouched down and—crunch! He struck his hand inside his chest and pulled out his beating heart. “Here it is. Open inventory.”

Plait's heart was beating with the last vestiges of its strength. Theoretically, the inventory would store it as it was. In the past, whenever items went in the inventory space, it was like time had stopped at the moment of transfer. It was more than a refrigerator, it was like a permanent treasury. He politely put the heart inside, filling a corner box.

Plait's eyes, clouded with agony, let out a wheezing sound. His HP hovered in the dangerously low range until finally—

Zip!

It went flat, disappeared, and lifted the lingering sign of life.

Plait, the bravest knight of all, was dead. The allies of Plait that attempted to save him had been blasted away by a swipe of Dasha's hand and rendered unconscious. He would experiment with them later.

“You did not have to do that, Otherworlder.” Plait’s sworn enemy, Domnall, stood behind him. He did not mind his death. It was what he wanted, yet victory seemed to be bitter.

“Is that right?” Dasha picked himself up, shifting towards Domnall who was on-guard. “How would you prefer he have died? With glory?”

“Yes. By my hands,” Domnall emphasized.

“Glory in death. Such an ancient way of thinking yet…I don’t entirely disagree with it.” He recalled his glorious life and the greatness within, and then his forgettably dull death. It simply didn't make sense. “I will consider your words, Domnall. Perhaps some of these men do deserve better deaths.”

Domnall’s frown didn’t cease. “I am not a fool. I can hear it in your voice. You do not care. Whether it is me, the king, or your enemies, you see us as absolutely nothing, don’t you?”

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For a footnote in Irish history, he sure was observant. “Careful. I’m on your side…remember?”

The bravery of the warrior knew no bounds. “Will you steal the hearts of everyone here?”

“I will,” Dasha admitted. “Will you stop me?”

Domnall wished he could. “…my king summoned you and there are still battles to be fought.”

“I noticed.” A kilometre behind the bridge were several pockets of players and soldiers ducking it out. It was but a blip in his vision and since his Qi Sensing did not go very far he was unable to gauge the total number of players. “An explosion, perhaps?”

“Indeed. They say the ground split apart and darkness ravaged the lands and sent everyone hurling.”

‘From the ground? What manner of skill would hurl away thousands of people?’ In the direction of Dublin City, he saw a suspicious number of bodies and thick red fog. He had noticed the fog alongside the strange clash of darkness and light. For the second time, he contemplated going.

A blip of energy suddenly entered his Qi Sense. He snapped back and held a hand out. His gauntlets cracked and he anticipated a clean block. White flames struck his gauntlets and he was nearly pushed off the bridge.

‘What—!?’ He put out a second hand and blasted Inferno Palm. The white flames died out and Dasha stood there, slightly disturbed by the smoke rising from his hands.

He was hurt. He was actually hurt. ‘How in the world…?’ He stared at the palm of his hand and the ensuing smoke. Then, he looked up at his opponent.

Silver earrings of various types and a red tunic with undone buttons—Hugo Sánchez. “That was a full blast of Holy Flames. How are you…?” Arm outstretched, Hugo seemed just as confused as he was, except for the opposite reason—he took too little damage.

‘He was just outside the range of my Qi Sense so I didn’t detect the attack until it was too late. Impressive range and speed.’

“I guess I can work with this.” Hugo put a hand behind his neck. “I wonder how many points I’ll rack up with five more kills…”

“Domnall,” Dasha said. “Leave.”

Domnall gulped and nodded. He gestured to the few soldiers with him and they all ran away, jumping over the bridge and into the river. Hugo glanced between them.

“Player versus player. That’s fine too.” Hugo lifted an arm high in the air. “Holy Flames: A Thousand Candles.”

‘What’s this?’

The air became saturated and his throat went dry. The atmosphere shimmered as if acknowledging the imminent gathering of magical energy. Suddenly, a thousand flickers of white flames materialized, dancing in a mesmerizing display around Hugo. Each flame radiated with an ethereal snow-white glow.

There were so many little pockets of fire that they surrounded not just Hugo but the bridge and everything around Dasha too. The air itself continued to heat up till it was as humid as the desert.

His finger twitched.

Instantly, several candles of light snapped at him. His speed was supreme but the space was deeply confined and so were his movements. Dasha, in spite of being class five, was struck in the shoulder.

Once again, it hurt.

‘How is he doing damage? I don’t understand. No player should be able to hurt me with my defence.’

He dodged and weaved. A searing pain erupted in Dasha's shoulder as one of the candles found its mark for the second time. This time, he narrowed his Qi Sense to his immediate surroundings. Each movement, each dodge, was a calculated understanding. A prediction with a three-dimensional map of the thousand flames coming at him.

Dasha Pang made the impossible possible and dodged all of them, and soon enough, he found the rhythm at which the flames moved.

‘It’s not very complicated. There’s a thousand of them but…’ Back-step, side-step, limbo. ‘They don’t synchronize. Hugo isn’t controlling them. It’s simply aiming for my body—’

Bam! Two flames rammed into each other, exploding into glorious white fireworks. Hugo still didn’t move. At this point, the automated spell was useless. Dasha was dodging and predicting the wisps of white like they were second nature. His rate of adapting was ludicrous, to the point that he began walking through the miniature army of a thousand, weaving left and right.

“Show me something else,” Dasha ordered. “Or else I’ll kill you now.”

“You…” Hugo jumped back several times, brows drawn together. He seemed to understand that one attack from Dasha would mean death. “Holy Flames: Holy Arrow!”

The sheer focus of mana in his hand fell short of Dasha's. Calmly, he threw out a hand and blocked the flash of light. He didn't bother tracking it with his eyes, assuming correctly that it had a predictable trajectory and reacting accordingly. His gauntlet blocked the attack and prompted the candles to dart at him again. He casually dodged them, having not lost focus in the slightest. His mind did think though; Hugo Sánchez hurt him. Smoke was seeping from his hands.

‘This is interesting.’

Still dodging without issue, still unfazed, and healing all the damage in a minute, Dasha proclaimed, “I was right about you.”

“I have no idea who you are,” Hugo replied. He stepped back, creating greater distance. He inhaled sharply and manifested a white magic circle as he aimed an arm at him. “Holy Flames…”

His gauntlet crackled. “I’ll play around with you thoroughly, Hugo Sánchez—”