Fine, I'll do it myself
The entrance ceremony had all the makings of exactly what anyone would expect: completely boring.
Gareth walked in with his hands in his pockets. Around him, dark suits, family crests. The hall was enormous — clearly designed to make whoever looked up at it feel small.
It worked.
Not on him, but it worked.
'Two hundred people. Formal ceremony. Probably speeches.'
'How dreadful.'
The whispers started before he reached the middle of the hall.
"That's him."
"The Thornfield heir."
"Rank F. In the first synchronization."
"Did you see Lord Victor's face afterward?"
Gareth didn't turn his head. He kept walking.
He found the group before they found him. Four students by one of the side columns. The same ones from the exam. He recognized them by posture before he recognized them by face.
One of them smiled — the kind of smile that has nothing to do with happiness.
"Look who showed up." He crossed his arms. "I figured you'd be hiding after yesterday. Honestly, I would've understood."
Gareth stopped. Looked at them. Said nothing.
"Do you know how long it's been since someone got rank F in the first synchronization? Four generations. I actually went and looked it up this morning because I couldn't believe it." A calculated pause. "Four generations, and it had to be the Thornfield heir to break the record."
Another one laughed. "At least he's good at something."
"Technically it is a record," a third added. "You have to give him credit for that."
'Insecurity dressed up as superiority. They need a fixed target to know where they stand. Completely irrelevant.'
"Hey."
Gareth turned his head.
A girl had positioned herself two meters from the group, arms crossed. Light brown hair, uniform fitted neatly, eyes locked on them with the calm of someone who had already made up her mind.
"That's enough," she said. No raised voice.
"Excuse me?" said the first one.
"I said that's enough. You have your own results to worry about. Focus on those."
Silence. The group exchanged glances. Then, without another word, they scattered.
The girl watched them go. Then she turned to Gareth.
"Are you okay?"
"Hm."
"Is that a yes?"
"They weren't getting to me."
"They were insulting you to your face."
"Yeah."
"And?"
"Nothing."
Lyra studied him for a moment.
"Why didn't you say something? They're insulting your honor. Your family. Everything."
"Ah."
"That's all you have to say?"
Gareth considered the question.
"This place is boring," he said finally. "That's all I'll say."
And he turned around.
"Wait — where are you going? It's the ceremony!"
He kept walking.
"You can't just leave!"
But he was already moving through the crowd with that specific kind of direction that belongs to someone who isn't running away — just someone who has stopped considering what they're leaving behind as relevant.
Lyra stayed where she was.
"What's wrong with him?" she murmured. "He's been acting completely different since yesterday. He barely seems like the same person."
"Who cares?"
One of the group had come back, wearing the same smile.
"If he keeps this up, we'll have plenty more material."
Lyra looked at him.
Said nothing.
But the way she looked at him was enough.
***
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The hallway was empty.
Gareth walked without a destination, running through the mental map of the building he'd built over the past two days. Old stone. Corridors with no clear logic. And at the far end of the east wing, a staircase going up.
He stopped in front of it.
'How far does it go?'
He started climbing.
One floor. Two. Three. The torchlight faded gradually until all that was left was an old wooden door with a rusted iron bar across it.
He opened it.
The sun hit him all at once.
The academy rooftop stretched out before him. Flat stone, no railings, an open view in every direction. Below, the world kept moving without knowing he existed.
And above.
Gareth looked up.
The Endless Tower floated in the sky. Fifty floors of stone and light suspended above the world like a question no one had ever finished answering. No screen between them. No monitor resolution. Real. Completely, absolutely real.
He reached out slowly.
As if he could touch it.
'I can't believe it.'
Something in his chest that hadn't moved in a long time moved.
"It's beautiful," he murmured. "So much more than through a screen."
The wind passed between his fingers.
"I don't know how I got here. I don't know why." A pause. "But I couldn't be more grateful."
He lowered his hand.
His eyes didn't leave the tower.
"It's like being in paradise."
Then the sky changed.
All at once.
Green lightning tore across the atmosphere from one end to the other. The light covered everything — rooftops, streets, faces.
And then the message appeared.
Massive. Suspended over the entire city of Eldralid.
[SYSTEM ALERT]
[Due to humanity's prolonged inactivity in confronting the Tower, a Sudden Death Protocol will now be initiated.]
[If humanity fails to locate the First Floor Gate and eliminate the corresponding Boss before time expires...]
[Their end is guaranteed.]
[04:59:59]
[The countdown has begun.]
Gareth read it once.
He frowned.
"What the hell," he muttered. "Seriously? They couldn't even handle the first boss?"
He pressed a hand against his face.
"I don't know why I'm surprised. What else could you expect from a bunch of NPCs."
Below, Eldralid erupted.
Sirens. Screaming. Crashes — one after another, as if half the city had forgotten it was still moving. Shapeless chaos.
Gareth watched from the rooftop with his hands in his pockets.
"I'd love to see that smug look on Victor's face right now," he said. "The strongest man in the world. And he won't be able to stop any of it."
A pause.
"Then again."
He turned toward the door.
"I'm part of this world now." A smile appeared on its own. "And dying isn't exactly something I'm interested in."
"So. Time to get to work."
***
The streets were a different world.
People running with no direction. Others pressed against walls staring at the countdown with their mouths open. An overturned carriage in the middle of the main avenue, the horse frozen in place.
Gareth moved through all of it without slowing down.
'The first boss.'
Malgrath, the Ruined King. A monarch who had once climbed higher and been reduced to the opening act of something greater. Corroded armor, crown fused to his skull, and a horde of lackeys that made the fight far more annoying than the boss himself deserved.
'The horde was always the real problem.'
And what controlled the horde were the Claws of Marveth. Built with pure emerald as the base material.
'If this world is exactly like the game, the emerald is in the Ashvorn Mines, just outside the city.'
He calculated the distance.
'If I want to get there in under an hour, I need to run. Now.'
He ran.
Forty-five minutes later, Gareth arrived at the Ashvorn Mines with his lungs in open protest.
He bent forward. Breathed.
He looked up at the sky.
[03:14:22]
"Perfect." A smile between gasps. "Made it."
Complete silence at the entrance. No miners. No guards.
'They're probably all spending their last moments with their families or something.'
He picked up a pickaxe from the ground and grabbed a lantern from the outer wall.
He went in.
Main tunnel. Rock. More rock. Worthless quartz veins.
Gareth moved forward, scanning the walls.
Ten minutes. Nothing.
Fifteen. Nothing.
"Why isn't there any?" The frustration was starting to bleed through. "I can't believe these idiots cleared it all out. They don't even know what it's actually for."
He kept going.
And then the lantern caught something different.
Green. Faint. Almost invisible against the grey rock.
An emerald vein, hidden behind a rock formation that blocked the main path. No one who didn't know exactly what they were looking for would have found it.
Gareth found it.
He started swinging.
The first strike bounced off. The second too. The emerald was harder than he remembered — or Dorian's body had less strength than he needed.
'Probably both.'
He kept going.
Twenty minutes later he had enough. The fragments were rough and his palms ached, but it was enough.
He gathered everything and ran for the exit.
The light outside hit him all at once.
[02:28:37]
'Still enough time.'
"Now I need to get to Crazy Dale's forge."
He picked a direction without stopping.
"It's not far from here."
Fifteen minutes later, Gareth pushed open the door to Crazy Dale's forge with whatever air he had left.
A broad-armed man looked up from behind the counter.
"Wait — aren't you Victor Thornfield's son? What are you doing here?"
"It doesn't matter who I am or what I'm doing here." Gareth leaned against the counter. "What matters is one thing. I need you to forge me a pair of Claws of Marveth. Right now. There's no time to waste."
Dale looked at him like he'd said something in a foreign language.
"Absolutely not." He crossed his arms. "Don't you realize what's happening? It's the end of the world. Go spend time with your family. You shouldn't be here."
"And that's exactly why you need to forge those blades right now."
"For what? Are you going to join the search for the first gate?" A scoff. "They've been looking for years and never found it. They're not going to find it now. It's pointless. And what exactly would you do anyway?" A pause. "I heard you got rank F. You couldn't do anything."
Gareth slammed his hand on the counter.
"I didn't ask for a lecture. I asked for a pair of blades."
Dale watched him for a moment.
"Fine. But do you even have what's nece—"
The emerald fragments landed on the counter.
"Close your mouth and make them."
Dale examined the fragments. Looked up.
"What about payment? I don't work for free."
"You know who my father is. You'll get paid."
A silence. Dale sighed. He gathered the fragments.
And got to work.
Gareth waited standing up, watching the countdown through the window.
When Dale finished, he set the blades on the counter.
Gareth picked them up.
The Claws of Marveth. The edge caught the light and threw a faint green reflection.
'Exactly what I needed.'
"Thanks," said Gareth, eyes still on the blades.
Dale waved a hand.
"Whatever. And don't worry about the money." A pause. "The world's going to end anyway."
Gareth let out a short laugh. Genuine.
And left.
***
[01:22:47]
'The First Floor Gate.'
He knew exactly where it was. In the game, it was buried beneath the ruins of the Old District — a part of Eldralid that had been abandoned decades ago, with no reason for anyone to go looking. No one except someone who had read every available line of lore.
He arrived in twenty minutes.
He stopped in front of the portal.
It was exactly as he remembered. A crack in the air, perfectly still, its edges pulsing with a dark green that had nothing to do with the emerald in his blades. Older. Heavier.
Gareth raised the Claws of Marveth.
He held them for a moment.
'In the game, these blades gave me forty percent base damage. Ten percent critical hit. Fifteen percent attack speed.'
'But I couldn't use skills. If I did, every attribute dropped by twenty-five percent. A brutal penalty that most players considered unacceptable.'
'I considered it a condition.'
He closed his eyes.
'These blades defined the name Mourgare. They defined the Buff Master. And even though I no longer have my system — no interface, no active buffs, nothing — I'm going to trust them completely.'
'Just like the first time.'
He looked up at the countdown.
[01:19:33]
"It's time."
He gripped the blades and stepped toward the portal.
"Let the show begin."
And he walked in.