Maria and her clones chased down all of the running PKers and they killed them one by one. The ones attacked by her [Shadow Clone]s took a while to kill since they only retained 80 percent of her stats and couldn’t use all of her skills, only a select few. Even then, they were still strong enough to kill the PKers. The [Shadow Clone]s battle AIs were very similar to the AIs of her [Shadow Puppet]s so this was quite a nice addition to her already powerful arsenal of summoned beings.
Since she was already in her [Nightmare] form, Maria didn’t forget to summon her [Shadow Puppet]s so that they too could also give chase to the ‘EXP bags’ that were running away from her.
“Come back here! Stop running like cowards!” Maria yelled.
She was able to easily catch the PKers that she was targeting herself thanks to her [Blink] spell but it was a hassle since their escape method was quite smart. They didn’t group up together but ran in different directions. It was smart but with a pursuer behind them, they were only making Maria’s hunt a bit more tedious than it should be.
In the end, Maria successfully hunted all of the PKers and took away all of the items they dropped and acquired a lot of EXP. She had just leveled up but killing the escaping PKers had boosted her EXP bar to 23.6 percent already. The amount of EXP she gained this time was way more than the amount she obtained from the war back on Vanhal. A large part of it was due to the fact that she was taking an active part in the battles unlike on Vanhal where she was just sitting at the back and letting her armies do the heavy-lifting for her.
“Hmm, that was fruitful~ I wonder if Gaia has any more targets for me?”
The Celestial Order players that were left behind quickly moved to complete the contribution quest they were doing before the captain of the squad personally reported what happened to them earlier to their guild master. The team that was attacked was from a guild that wasn’t too high up in the contribution rankings so it was a bit hard for their guild master to seek an audience with the top guilds of the faction but since it had something to do with the re-emergence and identity of the ‘Black Shadow’ that had been previously terrorizing the factions, an audience was quickly granted.
“What? So you’re telling me that the ‘Black Shadow’ was actually a player all along?”
“Hoh, now this is something.”
“Do you have any evidence to back your claims?”
“R-Rather than me telling you, I should just show you!”
When asked for proof from everybody, the small guild’s guild master didn’t hesitate and immediately took out a small orb that projected the footage that was taken directly from the battlefield where it all happened.
“This was taken directly on the spot by one of my guild’s team captains.”
It first showed the intense battle that the small guild’s guild members were having with the PKers. The team captain immediately started recording so that he could take this footage as evidence as to why they couldn’t complete the quest so they wouldn’t receive any blame for failing the quest later on but instead, they captured something even more interesting.
“What’s this? I don’t see the ‘Black Shadow’ anywhere!”
“Please be patient, sir. She’ll appear soon!”
When the Summons was used and the gods started appearing on the battlefield, the guild members on the video were slowly losing ground to the PKers, and just when everything looked hopeless for them, someone suddenly appeared and blocked one of the gods’ attacks with only their weapon.
[This one’s pretty weak…]
The person that appeared on the video and said such a thing was none other than Gerald’s little sister, Maria. The other Guildmasters immediately turned to him and eyed him suspiciously but Gerald acted like it wasn’t any of his business. He was as cool as a cucumber. What happened next shocked many in the room as Maria used her famed sword, the Zantetsu-R, and used a single attack to blow away the summoned god before finishing it off right after.
After that, she rushed towards the summoner and split his skull in only a few hits before she started attacking all of the other PKers around here. Finally, the shine of a level-up hit her and she started laughing. The PKers saw that things were looking bad for them so the leader ordered a retreat and it was then that the ‘Black Shadow’ appeared.
This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.
"[Nightmare]."
After Maria said that, her shadow began wriggling before it moved and wrapped around her body very eerily. Her form changed into the one that everyone was familiar with, the infamous ‘Black Shadow’. The puppets that were a signature of the Black Shadow appeared from the shadows on the ground and another eerie thing happened. Multiple Black Shadows began appearing in the next moment before they all dispersed to chase down the PKers that were running.
“T-That’s the end of the video…” The small guild’s guild master said.
“So, your sister was actually the Black Shadow all along,” Eos said as he turned towards Gerald who only replied with a shrug.
“This is a surprise to me as well. I didn’t think she was that frighteningly powerful. Must be nice~”
“Don’t play dumb, Gerald. Your sister has been terrorizing our guilds for a long time now and has been hindering our quest progression!”
“And what’s that got to do with me? She may be my sister but it’s not like I can control what she does. Her activities are her own doing and I have nothing to say about them.”
“Bullshit!”
“Yeah, during those times, only your guild and the Fallen Angels were the least impacted by all of the Black Shadow’s attacks!”
Gerald started laughing as he replied, “So what, it’s not my fault she targeted you guys. If you’ve got a complaint, say it to her! Don’t take it out on me.”
Eos grunted in dissatisfaction, but there were truth in his words. Maria was only his sister and it wasn't like he could dictate his sister's actions. To quell the rising dissatisfaction among those present towards Gerald, he quickly spoke up, “What Gerald said is right. Just because they’re related, it doesn’t mean that he can control her. Anyway, it doesn’t matter now that we know the Black Shadow’s true identity since her sabotage was in the past. If you want to get revenge on her, do it yourself but from what you’ve seen, I’m sure that’s not a smart idea.”
“...She made short work of those PKers that even our elite teams are helpless against. Could it be, maybe she’s targeting the PKers to help us?”
Gerald chuckled and refuted that notion, “Impossible. My sister wouldn’t help out our faction or the Pantheon. Have you forgotten? She’s part of the Goddess’s faction. If anything, this is likely a mission she received from the Goddess. What was the Goddess faction’s mission again?”
“...It was to prevent the war from happening…in other words, they’re trying to stop the progression of the Main Quest…”
Gerald nodded and continued, “Hmm, exactly. Didn’t you see how she only targeted the PKers? She wouldn’t do that only because they were Red Named players, she did it because they used their Summons.”
Eos narrowed his eyes and said, “The hidden requirement to trigger the next Main Quest is to have 50 or more players’ Summons clash–”
“So to stop that from happening, she’s going to target all of the players that use their Summons in a battle…” Another Guildmaster said as he finished Eos’s words.
“Precisely…we’re in the clear for that since we’re all in agreement to wait for more players to exit the Void Sea. As long as we don’t use our Summons in a battle against the Pantheon players, my sister shouldn’t target us,” Gerald said.
“Hmm, the Goddess’s faction sure is troublesome. We might have to do something about them before we trigger the Main Quest.”
Another guild master spoke up and said, “If what we’ve deduced is correct, then isn’t this good for us at the moment? The PK guilds are the only ones using their Summons in battle, for now, so wouldn’t she be dealing with them for the time being as long as we don’t use our Summons?”
“That’s true.”
“I guess, for now, the PK guilds won’t be a problem.”
“Well, isn’t this a blessing in disguise?” Gerald chuckled and said. “If that’s all, I’ll be leaving. I have some contribution quests to complete.”
At the moment, Maria had returned to Gaia’s Temple but it wasn’t long before she had to move again since Gaia gave her a new location where a battle was taking place. The combatants were using Summons so this made them Maria’s targets. This time around, the PKers were from the Celestial Order and they were attacking players from the Pantheon. Maria was already in her [Nightmare] form when she attacked so she made quick work of the PKers and didn’t have to give chase like before.
Her reappearance was made known to the Pantheon this time but unlike with the Celestial Order, no one found out about her true identity. The guild masters of the Celestial Order decided to keep their mouths shut regarding her true identity so they wouldn’t leak the fact that the Black Shadow was part of the Goddess’s faction. The reappearance of the Black Shadow was bad news to the Pantheon who didn’t know that the Black Shadow was actually Maria. They began taking the necessary precautions to prevent the Black Shadow from interfering with the contribution quests.
The two opposing sides in the Pantheon had to declare a truce as they didn’t want the Black Shadow to interfere with their precious contribution quests. The two sides’ leaders, Caedes and Arthur, who both recently had finished their Awakening Quests and became Awakened Players, came out to the front just in case. The Black Shadow was bad news but the guild masters of the Celestial Order who knew that it was Maria, were laughing when they saw the Pantheon players’ movements.
The days ahead were tense as the Black Shadow went around hunting any players that used their Summons in a battle but as the days passed, more and more players began returning from the Void Sea Realm. With there being more Summoners around, the conflicts grew more frequent and while it was bad news for the two factions since the PK guilds became more and more rampant, it was good news for Maria who was constantly moving around and filling up her EXP bar and gaining levels.
In the past few days since she started hunting, Maria had gained 5 levels and the rate her EXP was increasing wasn’t lessening at all.
After an IRL week went by, enough players had returned from the Void Sea Realm and the time was right for the next stage to begin. Gaia had already noticed what was going on and knew that she couldn’t completely stop the war as it was inevitable. There were too many players on the Celestial Order and Pantheon side for her faction to prevent the war from happening even if they did have quite a lot of skilled and powerful players on their side. Gaia took notice of a few individuals that were very powerful other than Maria. Sky, Lizzy, a unique Mechanic-class player named Hans, and a Shaman named Aether.
Maria was always out hunting the players that used their Summons in battle but this didn’t mean she was the only player that was given this mission. Everyone else in the faction had received the same quest after Gaia noticed that there were too many players using their Summons and Maria couldn’t handle them alone. This quest was categorized as an Alternate Main Story Quest and the rewards were left unknown.