CHAPTER 224: THE BEACON AND THE SHADOW

Chapter 220: The Beacon and the Shadow

The sky above Sky Island was no longer a canvas of stars; it was a ceiling of bruised, bleeding crimson..

The three SS-Rank anomalies—the Abyssal Juggernaut, the Siren of the Void, and the Void Walker—hung in the air like harbingers of the apocalypse, their sheer presence warping the gravity around them.

I crouched in the shattered window frame of the Sector 4 warehouse, the stolen Horn of Behemoth pulsing with a cold, rhythmic beat in my hand.

The dust from the closed rift coated my uniform, but my mind was clear, cold, and running at maximum overclock.

[Quantum Analysis Mind: Active]

[Threat Assessment: Catastrophic.]

[Survival Probability (Direct Engagement): 0.00%]

"Three SS-Ranks," I whispered, the wind howling through the broken glass.

"In the game, the ’Skyfall Raid’ was a Level 90 event. It required a full guild alliance of A-Rank hunters and three S-Rank NPCs just to hold the line. We have students and a handful of teachers."

The logic was simple: We were dead.

Unless the board changed..

I looked at the Horn in my hand. It was a beacon. A massive, screaming signal of Abyssal energy intended to guide the demons.

Then, I looked at my map, specifically at the Luxury District where Leon Lionheart was stationed.

My eyes narrowed.

"Leon," I murmured. "The Protagonist."

In The Eclipse of Hero, the protagonist possessed a hidden trait, one never explicitly listed in the status screen but encoded into the game’s logic: [Fate’s Magnet].

It meant that in any chaotic scenario, the primary antagonist or the strongest monster would instinctively target him. It was the narrative engine that drove the plot.

Right now, the demons were hovering, assessing the city. They were looking for the strongest concentration of Light to snuff out.

City Lord Cessias was flaring his SS-Rank aura at the Central Spire, trying to draw their fire. But he was shielded by the spire’s defenses.

The demons wouldn’t go for the hard target first. They would go for the soft, bright one.

I gripped the Horn.

"If I keep this," I calculated, "they come here. I die."

"If I destroy it, the summoning signal fades, but they’re already here."

"But if I... mask it..."

I shoved the Horn into my dimensional storage. The pocket dimension cut off its signal instantly.

The sudden disappearance of the beacon caused a ripple in the mana atmosphere.

Above, the Abyssal Juggernaut—the bone-armored giant—roared, confused. It turned its massive, helm-less head, scanning the city.

Its gaze swept past Sector 4. It swept past the Central Spire.

And it locked onto the Grand Hotel.

There, standing on a balcony, radiating a desperate, brilliant gold light, was Leon Lionheart.

His Holy Flame affinity, agitated by the demonic pressure, was flaring like a lighthouse in a storm.

The Juggernaut didn’t think. It didn’t strategize. It roared, a sound that shattered windows three blocks away, and dove..

[Target Lock: Leon Lionheart.]

I let out a breath I hadn’t realized I was holding.

"Sorry, Leon," I muttered, a cold smile touching my lips. "But that’s the price of being the main character. You get the glory... and the aggro."

With the Juggernaut distracted, and the Void Walker floating toward the City Lord’s tower, the chaos had a shape. A structure..

And in chaos, there was profit.

My eyes shifted from the sky to the street below. The Mana Knights were frozen, statues of silver. The grid was corrupted.

But the corruption wasn’t just jamming the signal. It was leaking...

From the vents of the sub-stations, from the cracks in the pavement, raw, condensed Void Mana was seeping out.

It was the byproduct of the Siren’s song, crystallizing into physical form.

[Item Detected: Void Shard (Raw)]

[Grade: A-Rank Material]

[Market Value: 50 million Ren per ounce.]

It was littering the streets. The currency of the endgame, scattered like trash..

Also, the Cultists I had dispatched... they were elites. High Priests. Their robes, their daggers, their spatial rings...

"Nox," I whispered.

...Master?... Scary sky... hide?....

"No hiding," I said. "Hunting. But not monsters. We’re hunting treasure."

I dropped from the window, landing silently in the alley

.

While the heroes fought for the world, I was going to rob the battlefield blind.

[Sky Island – The Grand Hotel Terrace]

The wind whipped Leon’s hair across his face. The golden aura of his Holy Flame burned fiercely, wrapping around him like a second skin, but inside, his heart was hammering a frantic rhythm against his ribs.

"It’s coming," Leon choked out, his eyes wide.

The Abyssal Juggernaut was plummeting from the sky like a meteor made of bone and hate. The air pressure alone was cracking the marble tiles of the terrace.

Aiden Stromfang stood beside him, dual swords drawn, lightning crackling. But for once, the feral grin was gone from Aiden’s face. His hands were trembling.

"That thing is SS-Rank, Leon," Aiden hissed. "We can’t fight that. We can’t even scratch that."

"We don’t have to kill it,"

Leon said, though he didn’t believe his own words. "We just have to survive until the teachers get here."

"Move!" Aurelia Miller screamed from the doorway.

The students scrambled back just as the Juggernaut landed.

BOOOOOM!

The impact pulverized the entire front section of the hotel. The terrace disintegrated. Stone and velvet furniture were reduced to dust.

Leon was thrown backward, tumbling through the lobby, crashing into the front desk. He gasped, his vision swimming..

Dust billowed.

From the cloud, a massive hand made of grey bone emerged. It gripped the remains of a stone pillar and crushed it to powder.

The Juggernaut stepped forward. It was twenty feet tall. Its chest was a ribcage filled with green ghost-fire. It didn’t have eyes, just empty sockets that leaked black smoke.

It ignored Aiden. It ignored Aurelia. It turned its head toward Leon...

"LIIIIIGHT..." the monster groaned, its voice the sound of gravestones grinding together. "EXTINGUISH."

It raised its flail—a massive iron ball spiked with obsidian, burning with green fire.

Leon scrambled to his feet, raising his sword. The Holy Flame flared, defiant but pitifully small against the mountain of darkness.

"I am a Lionheart," Leon shouted, his voice cracking. "I will not kneel!"

He charged.

It was brave. It was heroic. It was suicidal.

He swung his sword, aiming for the creature’s knee.

The Juggernaut didn’t even block. It simply swung the flail..

The wind pressure from the swing alone knocked Aiden and the others off their feet.

Leon saw the shadow of death descending. He knew, with absolute clarity, that he couldn’t stop it.

CLAAAAAANG!

The sound was deafening. But Leon wasn’t crushed.

He opened his eyes.

Standing in front of him, holding a greatsword that was nearly as large as the demon itself, was a figure in a white coat stained with soot.

Alastor Greythorn.

The Sword Saint’s muscles bulged, his boots cracking the floor as he caught the massive flail on his blade. He was grinning. A savage, bloodthirsty grin that matched the demon’s own malice..

"Pick on someone your own size, you ugly pile of calcium," Alastor growled.

He shoved.

With a roar of effort, Alastor pushed the

Juggernaut back. The demon stumbled, surprised by the resistance.

"Students!" Alastor barked, not looking back. "Get out of here! Go to the underground shelters!

This isn’t a class anymore!"

"Teacher!" Leon gasped.

"GO!" Alastor roared, his aura exploding. A silver column of sword-intent pierced the ceiling, matching the Juggernaut’s pressure.

He leaped, his greatsword cleaving the air.

[Skill: World Severing Slash!]

The battle of the SS-Ranks began, shaking the very foundations of the hotel.

[Sky Island – Sector 4 Streets]

While the hotel collapsed under the weight of divine combat, I was three streets away, sprinting through the chaos.

The Siren of the Void was floating above the commercial district, singing.

It wasn’t a song. It was a sonic attack.

SCREEEEEEE.

Glass windows shattered. Civilians clutching their ears fell to the ground, bleeding. The song corrupted mana, turning the streetlights violet, causing the defensive wards on the shops to short-circuit.

And where the wards failed, the Void Shards formed.

I slid under a hovering car, dodging a piece of falling masonry.

There.

In the middle of the street, where a mana-conduit had burst, a cluster of black crystals was growing like a cancer.

[Void Shard (Pure)]

[Quantity: 5kg]

"Jackpot," I whispered.

I ran to the cluster. I didn’t touch it with my hands. Void mana burned flesh.

I drew Draken.

"Eat," I commanded.

The sword hummed. It touched the crystals. The black void energy was sucked into the blade, refining it. The physical crystals remained—now purified, stable, and incredibly valuable crafting materials.

I swept them into my inventory.

...More... Master... Shiny...

Nox poked his head out, eyeing a shattered jewelry store window where enchanted necklaces were spilling out.

"Focus, you greedy lizard," I hissed. "We want the raw stuff."

I moved down the street. The Siren’s song was getting louder. She was drifting this way, her tentacles smashing buildings as she went.

I needed to be careful. If she saw me, I was dead.

But then, I saw something that made me stop.

A Mana Soldier Knight had fallen nearby. It wasn’t dead—just offline. Its connection to the grid severed.

But its chest plate was open, revealing the A-Rank Mana Battery inside.

In the game, these batteries were quest items. Highly volatile, extremely dense.

And right next to the Knight, lying in a heap of rubble, was a dead Cultist. A High Priest.

He was wearing a [Ring of Spatial Storage]. A high-tier one.

I looked at the Siren above, distracted by destroying a clock tower.

I looked at the loot.

"Risk versus reward," I muttered.

I activated [Shadow Stalker’s Cloak]. I blurred into the background.

I sprinted to the Knight first. I grabbed the battery. It was hot, heavy, humming with A-Rank power. Into the inventory.

Then the Cultist. I didn’t have time to check the ring. I just grabbed his hand, pulled the ring off (it was stuck, I had to break the finger—messy, but necessary), and pocketed it.

SCREEEEE!

The Siren turned. She had sensed the movement. Her eyeless face looked down at the street.

A tentacle lashed out, smashing the pavement where I had just been.

But I was gone.

[Space Affinity] + [Swift Step].

I blinked into a sewer grate twenty meters away, landing in the dark, damp tunnel below.

Above, the street exploded as the Siren unleashed a void blast, frustrated at missing her prey.

I sat in the dark, breathing hard, clutching my loot

.

"Two A-Rank batteries," I whispered, checking my inventory. "And a High Priest’s ring."

I checked the ring’s contents.

Gold. Lots of it.

Scrolls. Forbidden ones.

And...

[Item: Key to the Sky Vault]

My eyes widened.

The Cult wasn’t just here to destroy. They were here to rob the City Lord’s Vault. The vault that held the artifacts of the Golden Era.

And this priest was the bagman.

"They failed to get in," I realized. "Because the barrier went up too fast. Or because Alastor interrupted them."

I looked at the key. It was heavy, made of star-metal.

The City Lord was fighting the Void Walker at the spire. The vault was currently unguarded, its magical defenses likely scrambled by the jammer.

And I had the key.

A slow, crazy grin spread across my face in the dark sewer.

"Forget the shards," I whispered to Nox. "We’re going to rob a castle."

(To be continued)

Support Author Here: ko-fi.com/dj_anime_india

GPAY Upi: boradivanjyoti@okhdfcbank