Dante was magnetically anchored to the stone plateau.

Fifty feet above his head, the three Stormwing Chimeras were finalizing their ultimate attack.

The massive orb of purple lightning crackled with enough voltage to instantly zero out his 9,100 health pool.

He couldn’t dodge. He couldn’t teleport.

He didn’t panic. He just opened his inventory.

"You want a target?" Dante asked and stared up at the glowing orb. "I will give you a few."

He equipped the [Mantle of the Void-Dragon].

The pitch-black and starry cloak materialized instantly out of his void ring. It settled heavily over the gold plating of his [Sun-Forged Cuirass].

The heavy fabric rippled and defied the erratic static wind blowing across the plateau.

He didn’t use the Limitless Flight passive.

Flying up into the center of a concentrated lightning trap while anchored to the floor was physically impossible.

And even if it wasn’t, fighting three aerial targets in their own element was inefficient.

He needed to break their targeting mechanic.

He activated the secondary passive of the cloak.

[Skill Executed: Echoes of the Void]

The space directly behind Dante rippled like water.

Two exact and tangible duplicates of Dante stepped right out of his own shadow.

They weren’t the fragile optical illusions generated by his [Fractured Reality] skill.

They were physical constructs. They looked entirely real.

They wore identical sets of glowing Gold-tier armor, held identical [Crimson Edges], and radiated the exact same massive base stats as the original.

Dante mentally commanded the clones.

The two Shadow Clones immediately sprinted forward.

They were completely unaffected by the Thunder-Prison targeting mechanic that was firmly locked onto the original coordinates of Dante.

The clones ran to the absolute opposite edges of the stone plateau. They waved their red broadswords in the air, yelled, and generated massive amounts of artificial system aggro.

The Gold-tier system of the Chimeras glitched.

The Thunder-Prison targeting mechanic was designed to lock onto a single stationary player.

The system engine suddenly found itself trying to differentiate between the real player anchored in the center and the two tangible high-stat clones actively generating threat on the perimeter.

The massive lightning orb destabilized.

The purple energy violently flickered and shrank. It completely collapsed in a burst of harmless static and entirely lost its target lock.

The magnetic anchor holding the iron boots of Dante to the stone floor vanished instantly.

"Idiots," Dante smirked and rolled his neck.

The three Chimeras shrieked in absolute frustration. Their ultimate mechanic had been completely canceled by a simple aggro-split.

They decided to abandon the magical artillery and resort to physical violence.

The three flying beasts folded their crackling electric wings tightly against their panther bodies.

They put themselves into a massive, high-speed, and synchronized dive.

They ignored Dante completely and aimed directly for the two Shadow Clones currently running along the edges of the arena.

They were dropping fast with their razor-sharp talons extended. They were ready to tear the clones to pieces.

"Got you," Dante said quietly.

He didn’t draw his sword. He didn’t use the clones to attack or defend. He just let them run to act as the perfect bait.

He raised his empty left hand and pointed his open palm toward the dead center of the arena. He perfectly predicted the trajectory of their converging flight paths.

The moment the three Chimeras swooped down to within twenty feet of the stone floor and entered the exact center of his effective range, Dante triggered the skill.

[Skill Executed: Cyclone of Ruin]

The localized F5 hurricane exploded into existence.

The deafening roar of the Zenith-tier wind completely drowned out the thunderstorm raging above the Spire.

The massive and dark purple vortex instantly filled the entire center of the plateau and reached fifty feet into the air.

The three Stormwing Chimeras hit the edge of the vacuum at full diving speed.

They didn’t stand a chance.

Their electric wings designed for high-speed gliding and aerial agility were completely useless against the sheer overwhelming rotational force of the hurricane.

They shrieked in panic as they were violently ripped out of their dive trajectories.

The Zenith-tier wind grabbed them, completely overrode their physical momentum, and sucked them directly into the center of the cyclone.

They were grounded.

The massive beasts tumbled helplessly in the air and crashed heavily into each other. They took massive physical tick damage from the sheer velocity of the wind.

[-1,200]

[-1,200]

[-1,200]

The numbers popped up rapidly as the wind sheared across their digital bodies.

Dante didn’t wait for the ten-second duration of the cyclone to end.

He knew that the second the wind died, the Chimeras would recover their balance and immediately launch themselves back into the safety of the sky.

He couldn’t let them fly again.

He drew the [Crimson Edge] and targeted the trapped Chimeras spinning wildly inside his own hurricane.

He activated his ultimate execution skill.

[Skill Executed: Phantom Waltz]

The world slowed to a complete crawl.

The pulsating and purple invulnerability frames enveloped his gold armor. They turned him completely untargetable by the combat engine of the game.

He vanished from the edge of the plateau.

Five deafening cracks resounded over the roar of the hurricane.

They sounded like a string of heavy artillery shells firing right next to his ear.

Crack.

Dante materialized directly inside the cyclone.

Because he was the caster, he was completely immune to his own environmental wind damage.

He slashed the red broadsword horizontally and delivered 1,000% physical damage cleanly across the exposed chest of the first Chimera.

Crack.

He teleported instantly to the second Chimera.

He appeared directly above its back and drove the red blade straight down through its eagle skull.

The massive damage multiplier shattered the digital bone instantly.

Crack. Crack.

He appeared below the third Chimera and delivered two brutal vertical upward strikes in rapid succession.

The Zenith-tier kinetic force completely severed its crackling electric wings and permanently removed its ability to fly.

Crack.

He materialized one last time and drove the blade directly into the exposed core of the first Chimera. This finished the five-strike sequence with an execution blow.

The animation ended.

Dante materialized back on the solid stone of the plateau, perfectly balanced, and his boots planted firmly on the cracked rock.

He slowly sheathed his sword, and the red blade clicked satisfyingly into the scabbard.

Behind him, the duration of the hurricane expired.

The massive vortex collapsed in on itself. It left the air completely still for the first time since he entered the floor.

The three Stormwing Chimeras hit the ground.

They landed in several different pieces. They didn’t even twitch.

The system engine processed the massive and overlapping damage inputs from the [Phantom Waltz] sequence.

A second later, all three Gold-tier bosses simultaneously exploded into massive clouds of golden loot polygons.

[Target Eliminated: Stormwing Chimera x3]

The icon for [Phantom Waltz] on the interface of Dante instantly flashed from gray back to bright and usable red.

Dante turned around. He dismissed the two Shadow Clones running along the edges of the plateau.

They stopped moving, turned into thick black mist, and melted seamlessly back into the dark fabric of his [Mantle of the Void-Dragon].

He walked over to the center of the arena where the massive pile of glowing loot was currently resting on the scorched stone.

Because of the enhanced drop rates of the Abyss difficulty, the three Gold-tier flying bosses had dropped an absurd amount of wealth. 𝙛𝒓𝓮𝙚𝔀𝒆𝒃𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝓵.𝙘𝒐𝒎

He activated his [Band of the Void-Walker].

He vacuumed the thousands of gold coins, massive chunks of electrified crafting materials, and a single glowing Gold-tier helmet into his infinite inventory to appraise later.

Sitting at the very bottom of the pile was the fourth stat crystal of his run.

[Item Appraised: Stormwing Core]

[Tier: Consumable]

[Effect: Permanently grants +5 to all base stats.]

Dante picked up the crackling purple crystal and crushed it in his palm.

The warm and static energy flowed into his arm and instantly integrated with his digital physiology. It added another flat boost to his already massive baseline.

He pulled up his system interface to confirm the floor clear.

[Floor 4 Cleared.]

[Time: 2 Minutes, 10 Seconds.]

"Not bad for an aerial fight," Dante said and dismissed the blue window.

The massive thunderstorm raging directly overhead completely cleared.

The black and swirling clouds parted rapidly. They dissolved into mist and revealed the standard and vibrant violet sky of the Overture server.

At the far edge of the circular stone platform, the final heavy iron staircase materialized out of the rock.

The stairs were wide and led up to a massive dark archway at the absolute top of the Spire of Ascension.

Dante rolled his shoulders and felt the pleasant and permanent weight of the new stats settling into his avatar.

He had completely steamrolled the first four floors of the Abyss difficulty.

The toxic jungle, the magma forges, the frozen wasteland, and the thunder peaks had all failed to slow him down.

He hadn’t even burned through a significant portion of his stamina or health, largely thanks to the infinite support of Aura and his own Zenith-tier multipliers.

"Four down," Dante said and looked up at the final archway. "One to go."

He didn’t hesitate. He jogged up the final set of iron stairs.

He was ready to face whatever apex predator the Spire was keeping locked in the final room.

He was ready to clear the trial, secure his open-world banking privileges, and leave Outpost 404 behind permanently.

He stepped through the dark archway and entered the fifth floor.