Free Web NovelChapter 71: [71] : The Abyssal Tide, Server Red Alert
The warning chime was not just loud. It physically hurt.
Declan grabbed the side of his head as the high pitched digital alarm screamed through his neural link. It sounded like an emergency broadcast siren dialed up to maximum volume and played directly inside his brain stem.
The red system text floated in the air, glowing so brightly it cast a crimson hue over the entire courtyard of the Earth Sanctum.
[Server Event]
The Abyssal Tide has initiated.
[Objective]
↳ Defend your Safe Zones or face deletion.
"What is that?" Sloane asked. She dropped the rusted iron dagger she was holding and stared at the empty air. She could not see Declan’s personal interface, but she could clearly see the red light reflecting in his dark eyes.
"Another server event," Declan muttered, blinking rapidly to clear the spots from his vision. "The Grid is throwing a tantrum."
"Wait, another one?" Kendra walked up quickly, gripping her sniper bow. "We just survived the Purge Wave! The Flesh Stalkers are still roaming around outside Sector 7. How can the game drop another event already?"
"Because the developers are losing control," Declan said. He opened his system menu and navigated straight to the Global Server Chat.
He needed to know the scale of this thing.
The chat window popped up. It was moving so incredibly fast that the text was just a massive blur of white and blue light. Declan had to use his Abyssal Sovereign stats just to slow his perception down enough to read the messages.
[Global Server Chat]
↳ User Ironclad: Bro, what is happening in Sector 2?! The ground just ripped open!
↳ Mage Girl 99: Chasms! Massive black holes are opening up everywhere! They are swallowing the spawn zones!
↳ GuildLeader Rex: All members fall back to the capital! The walls are being breached! What the hell are these things?!
↳ Rogue Shadow: They are not normal mobs! They look like shadows! My dagger just phased right through one!
↳ User Ironclad: The Abyssal Tide! It is a server wipe! The whole game is crashing!
Declan closed the chat window. His jaw tightened.
This was not a localized event. This was not just a few high level monsters spawning in the woods to punish low level players. The Grid was tearing itself apart.
"Chasms are opening across all the sectors in the game," Declan explained to Sloane and Kendra. "Millions of monsters. But they are not Flesh Stalkers. They are Void beasts. The same kind of Abyssal energy I saw the cultists using."
Sloane looked terrified. She glanced up at the glowing purple dome of the Earth Sanctum. "Are they going to spawn here? In the real world?"
"Not yet," Declan said, looking at his hands. "The real world convergence is still in Phase Two. Right now, only low level trash like Flesh Stalkers and Sludge Brutes can physically manifest on Earth. The heavy stuff, the Abyssal monsters, are still trapped inside the digital servers."
"So we are safe," Kendra let out a huge breath of relief. "As long as we stay inside the dome here in Sector 7, the big monsters cannot touch us."
"We are safe here," Declan agreed. He looked at the massive black iron walls he had built.
Then, reality hit him like a bucket of ice water.
He had brought the Sanctum Core into the real world. He had used it to build the Earth Sanctum. That was why they were safe.
But back in the game, back in Sector 4 of the Grid, the Iron Bastion was completely exposed.
When Declan unbinded the main core to drag it into reality, he had left Bram, the Level 30 Master Artificer, in charge of a localized sub core. That battery powered dome was the only thing protecting the thousands of players who had paid Declan for safety.
"The Iron Bastion," Declan swore loudly.
"What about it?" Sloane asked in confusion.
"I left the sub core running it," Declan ran a hand through his hair. "Bram built it using raw mana crystals. It generates a temporary red barrier. It keeps out regular monsters like Flesh Stalkers. But it is not a permanent Sovereign tier shield like this one."
"If millions of Abyssal Void beasts are swarming the game right now," Declan continued, his voice dropping an octave, "that sub core is going to get drained in minutes. They will crack the barrier."
"And everyone inside will get deleted," Sloane finished the thought. Her face went pale.
"Exactly." Declan said.
He did not care about being a hero. He did not care about saving random gamers. But something is him wasn’t feeling right.
The players inside were his completely obedient workforce.
And Bram was there. The old NPC mechanic was the only guy who knew how to turn raw game code into automated defense turrets. Declan absolutely could not afford to lose his blacksmith.
"I have to go back," Declan stated firmly.
He turned around and started walking fast toward the central keep of his warehouse.
"Go back in?!" Kendra yelled, jogging to keep up with him. "Declan, the server is literally melting down! If you log in now, you are going to drop right into the middle of a world ending event!"
"I am the world ending event," Declan replied without looking back.
He pushed open the heavy steel doors leading into the main warehouse floor. Sitting directly in the middle of the dark room was the massive coffin like corporate dive pod. It was still hooked up to the industrial power main, humming quietly.
"Sloane, you are in charge of the real world," Declan ordered as he walked up to the machine. "Keep the entry gates closed. Only let the hunting parties back in to drop off their loot. If the corporate drones come back, ignore them. They cannot break the shield."
"What if the Flesh Stalkers group up and rush the walls?" Sloane asked nervously.
"The walls reflect physical damage," Declan said, placing his hand on the cold metal lid of the pod. "Let them hit the walls. They will just turn themselves into dust."
Declan did not wait for any more questions. He popped the heavy metal latch. The lid of the dive pod hissed and swung open, revealing the thick layer of conductive blue gel inside.
He climbed in. He did not bother taking off his boots or his black tactical jacket. The gel immediately molded around his heavy frame.
He reached up and grabbed the mechanical sensory halo resting at the top of the pod. He pulled it down over his head. The cold metal clamps locked firmly into place around his temples.
He felt the sharp, familiar pinch as the neural needles slid perfectly into the back of his neck.
"Initiate Dive," Declan commanded.
The machine roared to life. The heavy industrial power cables sparked and whined as they drew massive amounts of electricity from the Sector 7 grid.
The physical world vanished. The dark walls of the warehouse, Sloane’s worried face, and the cold gel completely faded away.
A blinding, violent white light swallowed his consciousness.
The transition back into the Primordial Grid was rough. The system was severely lagging. Declan felt like his avatar was being dragged through thick mud. Error codes flashed briefly in the corners of his vision as the game struggled to load his absurdly high stats.
[System Status]
↳ Connecting to Sector 4...
↳ Warning: Extreme Hostile Density Detected.
↳ Spawning at last known coordinates: The Iron Bastion.
Declan opened his eyes.
The sky was not purple anymore. It was not black. It was a churning, sickening vortex of deep, dark red. It looked like a massive open wound in the digital sky.
He was standing on the high iron scaffolding overlooking the central crafting zone of his city.
The noise was absolute insanity.
It was not just the screeching of monsters. It was the sound of space literally tearing apart.
Declan looked beyond the borders of the city. The entire Ashen Bog was gone. The toxic mud, the dead trees, the ruined buildings, they had all been swallowed up by massive, jagged chasms that had ripped open in the ground.
And pouring out of those chasms were the Void beasts.
They did not have a fixed shape. They looked like towering masses of shifting black static and purple lightning. They had too many limbs. They had clusters of glowing white eyes that blinked erratically. They moved like glitching shadows, completely ignoring the game’s physics engine as they flowed over the terrain.
There were not thousands of them. There were millions.
They formed a literal ocean of dark matter that completely surrounded the Iron Bastion.
Declan looked down at the edge of his city.
The red energy dome generated by Bram’s sub core was holding, but barely. The barrier was flashing wildly, covered in spiderweb cracks. Every time a Void beast slammed into the shield, the red light dimmed.
The players inside the city were in total chaos. They were running around like headless chickens, screaming and pointing at the cracked sky. They knew the barrier was failing.
"Boss!" A gruff voice yelled over the deafening roar.
Declan looked down. Bram was standing near the massive stone forges. The Level 30 Artificer had his heavy iron hammer resting on his shoulder. His black obsidian prosthetic arm gleamed in the firelight.
Bram was not panicking. He looked furious.
"The sub core is draining too fast!" Bram shouted, pointing at the glowing battery terminal in the center of the square. "These Abyssal freaks eat raw mana! The shield will not last another five minutes!"
"It does not need to," Declan said casually.
He did not use the stairs. He just stepped right off the forty foot scaffolding.
He did not even use Void Blink. He just let gravity take him. fɾeewebnoveℓ.co๓
His +10 Spiked Striders hit the stone pavement with a heavy, solid crunch. The Kinetic Dampener trait completely erased the fall damage. He did not bend his knees. He just stood up straight and dusted off his black Predator’s Coat. frёewebnoѵēl.com
Declan looked at the massive sea of monsters pushing against his walls.
"You built the turrets?" Declan asked.
"I built better than turrets," Bram grinned, a wild, crazy look in his eyes.
The old man hit a heavy red button on his workbench.
The thick iron walls of the Bastion suddenly shifted. Massive metal plates slid open with a loud mechanical grinding sound.
Sitting right on top of the main gate, fully integrated into the base defenses, was the massive blue glass barrel of the Relic tier siege weapon Declan had looted from the corporate army.
The +20 Mana Breaker Cannon.
"It is hooked directly into the main forge," Bram yelled proudly. "It has infinite ammo, boss!"
Declan smiled. His dark eyes glowed with Abyssal energy.
"Light them up."
