The grand hall of the largest player-claimed estate in Outpost 404 was supposed to be a place of celebration.

Silas stood at the head of a massive and heavily polished oak table.

He was dressed in a pristine set of Silver-grade armor that was customized to look like a regal knight.

The [Aegis Blueprint] sat on a velvet cushion directly in front of him. It glowed with a soft and authoritative golden light.

Around the table sat the remaining core officers of Vanguard’s Legacy. They held expensive digital goblets of wine.

Just five minutes ago, Silas had spent fifty thousand Veridian credits to purchase a server-wide announcement token.

He had broadcasted the First Kill of his guild of a Silver-tier dungeon boss, a massive spider matriarch, across the entire game.

It was a calculated marketing move. It was meant to tell the millions of terrified players in Overture that Vanguard’s Legacy was the undisputed powerhouse of the new cycle.

Then the trumpets sounded.

The golden text of the death of the Phantom Chimera Emperor had violently overwritten the announcement of Silas in the sky.

The name ’Dan’ was currently burned into the vision of every single player on the server.

Silas stared out the massive bay window of the guildhall and looked up at the fading golden letters. His eye twitched.

"A Titan," one of the officers muttered. He stared at his system interface in disbelief.

"That is... that is not possible. The highest level player in our entire alliance is fourteen. How do you kill a Titan at Level 14?"

Silas didn’t say a word.

He slowly raised his fist and slammed it down onto the heavy oak table.

The impact didn’t just rattle the wine goblets. It cracked the solid wood straight down the middle.

"Sir," another officer said nervously. He scrolled frantically through the global forums projected from his wrist.

"The regional chats are going completely insane. The Veridian Alliance forums are crashing from the traffic. Rival nations are already mobilizing their intelligence networks."

"The Black Dragon Syndicate of the Sakura Nation is putting bounties on information regarding this ’Dan’. The Oakhaven Apex Coalition is demanding to know if he belongs to us."

"He does not belong to us," Silas said. His voice was deadly quiet.

"It gets worse," a third officer chimed in and swallowed hard.

"I just got a ping from the respawn plaza. Thorne and Vargas did not log out because of a network error. They force-quit their capsules.

Someone placed a public bounty on their heads for a Silver-grade weapon. Their own squads turned on them."

Silas slowly turned around to face the table. "Who placed the bounty?"

The officer hesitated. "The players in the plaza are saying it was a solo guy. Name of Dan."

The face of Silas went completely blank. He reached down and grabbed his heavy iron wine goblet. He hurled it across the room.

It shattered against the stone fireplace.

"Find him," Silas snarled. His carefully crafted PR persona completely dissolved into raw and ugly rage.

"I do not care how many men it takes. I do not care how much gold it costs. You take every available squad in the beginner forest, and you grid-search every inch of the map until you find him."

"He killed my lieutenants. He stole my announcement. I want him camped until his capsule fries his brain. Do you understand me?!"

The officers scrambled to their feet. They practically fell over themselves to get to the door.

"Yes, Guild Master!" they chorused and bolted out of the hall.

Silas stood alone in the room. His chest was heaving. He looked down at the Aegis Blueprint.

It was supposed to be his ticket to absolute godhood. He was supposed to be the main character.

"Dan," Silas hissed the name like a curse. "You are going to regret logging in."

***

Deep underground, Dante was completely oblivious to the geopolitical meltdown occurring above him. He was staring at a mountain of glowing loot.

The Phantom Chimera Emperor had dissolved into a massive pile of items, raw crafting materials, and system-generated gold coins.

The sheer volume of the loot was staggering.

Dante walked up to the pile. His boots crunched on the loose coins.

He ignored the standard materials and reached straight for the two items radiating a blinding and unique light.

The first was a ring. It was forged from a dark metallic alloy that seemed to actively absorb the light around it.

A single pitch-black gemstone rested in the center. It swirled with what looked like miniature galaxies.

Dante picked it up.

[Item Appraised: Band of the Void-Walker]

[Tier: Titan]

[Type: Spatial Accessory]

[Stats: +50 All Core Attributes.]

[Hidden Stats Unlocked: +100 Luck, +100 Intuition, +100 Charisma.]

[Passive 1 (Infinite Void): Upgrades the inventory capacity of the user from 50 slots to Infinite. Weight restrictions are permanently removed.]

[Passive 2 (Void Step): Movement speed increased by 30%. User leaves no physical footprints or ambient tracking data.]

Dante let out a low whistle.

In the Zenith Protocol, inventory management was a nightmare. A standard player only had fifty slots.

A stack of health potions took up one slot. A heavy broadsword took up three. Players were forced to leave valuable loot behind simply because they couldn’t carry it.

Infinite inventory space broke the economy of the game entirely. He could strip-mine an entire dungeon and carry it all back to town in his pocket.

He slid the band onto his left index finger. The ring instantly resized itself and clamped securely onto his digit.

A rush of cold energy shot up his arm.

He immediately felt the hidden stats taking effect.

Intuition wasn’t just a number. It was a physical sensation.

He felt hyper-aware of the cavern around him. He could hear the faint dripping of water echoing from tunnels hundreds of yards away. He could sense the slight variations in air pressure.

The Luck stat was invisible, but in a game entirely dependent on drop rates and critical hit chances, an extra hundred points was absurd.

Dante opened his inventory interface. The standard 5x10 grid vanished. It was replaced by an endless scrolling black void.

"Alright then," Dante said. He casually waved his hand over the massive pile of Chimera loot.

Every single coin, every chunk of Titan-grade scales, and every rare bone fragment was instantly sucked into the void ring. The floor of the arena was swept completely clean in two seconds.

He knelt back down and picked up the second glowing item.

It was a heavy breastplate. It wasn’t made of traditional metal. It looked like it had been carved from a single piece of pure and condensed sunlight.

The surface gleamed with a brilliant and polished gold. It was etched with intricate and ancient runes that pulsed with a warm energy.

[Item Appraised: Sun-Forged Cuirass]

[Tier: Gold]

[Type: Heavy Armor (Chest)]

[Stats: +2,500 Physical Defense, +1,500 Magical Defense.]

[Passive 1 (Solar Core): Grants immunity to all common tier debuffs (Poison, Bleed, Slow).]

[Passive 2 (Unyielding): If a single attack deals more than 50% of the Max HP of the user, the damage is instantly halved.]

Dante immediately unequipped his cheap beginner linen shirt. He tapped the breastplate.

It digitized into a stream of golden light and seamlessly wrapped around his torso. It solidified into perfect-fitting armor.

It was surprisingly light. It didn’t restrict his mobility in the slightest despite the massive defense stats.

He pulled up his character sheet to review the damage.

[Name: Dan]

[Level: 19]

[Class: Warrior]

[HP: 6,100 / 6,100]

[Physical Defense: 2,800]

[Magical Defense: 1,550]

He was a walking fortress.

Between the [High-Grade Vitality Elixir] he had squeezed out of the merchant and the new Gold-grade armor, his survivability was practically guaranteed against anything in the beginner zones.

And with [Abyssal Cleave] and [Wrath of the Firebird], he hit harder than a localized natural disaster.

Dante stretched his arms to get a feel for the new armor.

"Not bad for day one," he said to the empty cavern.

He looked around the ruined arena. The Phantom Chimera Emperor was gone. The void chains were shattered.

There was nothing left to kill.

He needed to head back to the surface. He had an infinite inventory now, and the cronies of Silas were out there farming early-game resources.

It was time to start intercepting Vanguard’s Legacy raiding parties and permanently relieving them of their hard-earned loot.

Dante turned toward the entrance of the cavern. He was ready to make the long trek back up the Whispering Chasm.

As he took his first step, he noticed something glowing in the dust where the Chimera had died.

He hadn’t seen it when he vacuumed up the loot pile. The system hadn’t registered it as a standard item drop.

He walked over and brushed the dirt away with his new gauntlets.

It was a small and circular crest made of a strange dark glass.

It was roughly the size of his palm. It glowed with an ominous and eclipse-like ring of silver light.

It didn’t have an item box. There was no system prompt telling him what it was or what it did.

Dante frowned. His newly boosted Intuition stat was screaming at him.

The air around the crest felt wrong. It felt heavy like the atmosphere right before a massive thunderstrike.

He reached down and wrapped his fingers around the glass crest.

The moment he touched it, the entire cavern violently shuddered.