Chapter 281 – Lava Bridge
“Wow, that’s amazing.”
Someone’s murmured words spread among the 60,000 spectators in the main arena.
What exactly was it that caused such awe? Was it the trap Dice had set up in advance on the buggy, the white toxic smoke filling the high ground, or the sight of the person who emerged through that smoke? One thing was certain – this match and Dice’s play would not be forgotten for years to come.
Unlike Yoo Jin, who calculated everything and incorporated all variables into her plans to create advantageous situations, Dice sometimes drew inspiration from unexpected situations and had the ability and initiative to bring those ideas to life.
The white acidic cloud overflowing from the high ground was a result of that very ability.
But that wasn’t the end.
───Buzz!
A drone flying at low altitude suddenly crashed into the acidic smoke, while a four-wheeler crossed the road and entered an unpaved path. Dice, driving the vehicle with remarkable skill to the village on the high ground, donned protective gear just before reaching the village and maneuvered through the white cloud.
She spotted a buggy parked awkwardly against a building and quickly pulled out a fishing line and two grenades from her multipurpose pouch. Without wasting time, she connected the fishing line to the safety pins of both grenades and attached them to the wheel hub, pulling the pins out.
As soon as the wheels moved, the safety pins would detach, setting off the grenades.
The wait wasn’t long. Within five minutes of the white smoke pouring out, the acidic gas had penetrated up to the fourth floor of the abandoned villa where the enemy was hiding. He rushed down wearing a gas mask and boarded the buggy. As soon as the engine roared to life and the wheels turned, a noise like the breath of death followed.
What happened next hardly needed explanation.
A loud explosion and flash erupted simultaneously.
“Argh!”
Boom!
The buggy bounced up and turned into a ball of fire. The player was thrown out of the burning vehicle before it even gained speed, rolling across the ground, while Dice slowly walked over to confirm the kill as the explosion echoed.
What the player didn’t hear was this:
“See you next year.”
Dice pulled the trigger.
Although the player would have suffocated in the final championship if left alone, Dice had faced Logan several times and knew that the best confirmation of a kill was seeing the body disappear and only the items left behind.
A dull thud echoed as the bullet pierced the enemy’s forehead. A new kill was added to the UI, showing the number of deaths and survivors. The remaining players decreased from 60 to 50.
The oxygen supply was running low, and the sea and lava continued to encroach, spewing toxic smoke. As evidence, smoke poured out relentlessly from what used to be the entrance to the underground control room, like squeezing out a tube of toothpaste.
There was no more reason to stay here.
Dice turned around and skillfully descended the steep slope on her pre-parked four-wheeler, heading towards the center of Atakaya Volcanic Island, which was gradually being submerged, with the small village she had just left as the backdrop.
“Whew.”
Leaving the steering to the ICARUS Gear, she took off her protective gear and gas mask and breathed in the fresh air.
Of course, the sky visible beyond the low hill connected to the high ground was dark and red, with the erupting volcano, Hoku Mau Roa, spewing black clouds as if signaling the end of the world. But there was no time to delay.
As Dice entered a scene that could grace an album cover or a movie poster, everyone marveled.
“Living and dying for romance, huh, lololololol.”
“Romance (she’s thoroughly practical).”
“What’s YAS? This is YAS, lol.”
“Why do they play a different game than me? I also play AP, but they’re having so much fun. I want to join a romantic tournament instead of a rank full of camping spams!”
“If you’re jealous, become a pro~.”
Of course, each player had at least four to five cameras on them, which meant there were about 50, totaling over 200 screens.
Among them, the most popular was the Korean national team’s play screen, and the chat below was beyond bustling, to the point of overpopulation. Even after splitting it into twenty sections and applying slow mode, it was still unreadable, needing no further explanation.
Regardless, Dice and the Korean national team were each creating their own legends by defeating opponents in their own unique ways. The number of players dwindled from 50 to 40, then to 30.
The end was near.
After overcoming numerous adversities, Dice entered the burning city, freshly rescued from hell, while Harmony cautiously stood up in preparation for the Partner Streamer Showdown ending on the same day as the Final Championship.
It was a pity she couldn’t personally congratulate Yoo Jin on her victory, but that would have to wait until they returned to the hotel. Harmony sighed softly and composed a text message for Yoo Jin.
-[Harmony: Congratulations on your first place, Yoo Jin!]
A preemptive celebration that wasn’t quite preemptive.
If Yoo Jin’s acquaintance won instead, it would be incredibly embarrassing. Harmony chuckled at the thought and left the arena.
This happened just 15 minutes before the Final Championship ended.
“Conditions of the entryway are really bad…”
Seeing a scene that looked like a part of hell superimposed onto reality like a slice of cake, I murmured without realizing it.
If this were reality, the air alone would be enough to cause burns throughout the city. The approaching lava was burning and pushing away everything in its path.
Of course, I had a different reason for saying this.
“The path is really a mess.”
Despite being in a safe zone, lava flowed prominently ahead.
In this map, like other kill zones, lava surrounded the map in a circular form. If the lava overflowed from the underground earlier than the kill zone approached, it created another lava river cutting through the circular safe zone. People arriving from afar, like me, wouldn’t know about this unless they were nearby.
The final safe zone was in an under-construction area, with concrete dust flying everywhere. Normally, the construction noise and equipment would be absent, replaced by the sound of beans roasting all around.
But that wasn’t the problem.
A lava river, dozens of meters wide, blocked the middle of the anticipated route.
‘…Can I step on it?’
Unlike in movies, lava is incredibly dense. It was heavy and solid enough to step on quickly without sinking too deeply. But in this flowing state, it would stick to the feet after a few steps, likely causing a fall into the fire pit.
The other side was also a construction site. Metal pillars and scaffolding embedded in the ground were bent like chopsticks or swept away by the lava. The cloths and windbreaks covering the construction site seemed to have already burned away.
I had no choice but to abandon this path.
I needed to turn back.
“I should have brought the car up here.”
Thinking of such a crazy idea must mean my brain was fried from the heat.
Still, if I could utilize the nearby materials to make a jump, I might cross. First, I needed to check if the four-wheeler parked outside was still there. Since the current path was unusable, I had to go back anyway.
I climbed back up the stairs I had descended and looked around. This place was a large shopping mall under construction, only about three floors built, making it relatively complex compared to other construction sites.
Like elsewhere, the balcony areas meant to be protected by metal scaffolding, windbreaks, and cloth had long been swept away by lava. This meant I could check outside from here.
When I looked outside, I saw that the four-wheeler I had ridden was now a pile of ashes or a burning heap of scrap metal.
“I figured it would be like that.”
Of course, there was no use in lamenting over past events.
I needed to find something similar to a rope and a weight. If necessary, I could throw it somewhere to catch on, then jump from the building to land on the construction site across the way. There were plenty of odds and ends around; the line was the most crucial factor.
Using the fishing line in my pocket was out of the question. With the radiant heat, the moment it snapped from the rebound, I would likely free-fall into the lava. If only I had a drone, I could have activated it at maximum output and grabbed it mid-fall to partially mitigate the damage.
But it was too late for that.
While scanning my surroundings intensely to find something useful,
───tututututututu!
“I knew it!”
At this point, the things I could see more of than useful items were enemies.
Three of the six bullets hit my armor, legs, and thighs. Fortunately, they all bounced off the shield. The damage was still manageable, but now I had to confirm the enemy’s position. As I hurriedly descended the stairs, I activated a decoy and switched to shooting mode.
From the circular dish-like hologram projector, a long rod extended, and a stand that could hold something popped out. As soon as I placed the pistol from my holster onto it, a support extended from the back, and a hologram identical to me appeared, aiming the pistol at the stairwell.
After hiding the hologram projector behind some materials and securing the support to the wall to control the recoil, I climbed the stairs again. The moment I caught sight of the second floor, I
saw the enemy hiding behind cover. I immediately fired nanites to dissolve it and began shooting.
The battle started.
“Argh!”
With an ominous noise, a seeker mine rolled towards me at terrifying speed. Reflexively, I switched to full-auto and pulled the trigger, one lucky shot destroying the mine. Flash and shrapnel erupted, leaving my ears ringing.
Meanwhile, the enemy seemed to have counted the exact number of rounds I had fired. As soon as I exhausted one magazine, a pulse-like energy wave radiated towards me. I was thrown into confusion by the shockwave, but fortunately, I rolled down the stairs and avoided getting shot.
As the confusion slowly cleared, I heard the enemy quickly approaching. I hurriedly hid beside the stairwell, pulled out a MOLLE grenade, cooked it for two seconds, and threw it up the stairs. That should deter the enemy from coming down easily.
A tense silence followed.
But it didn’t last long.
“Again…!”
Tsuzuzuzuzuzuk!
The cooldown for the seeker mine was over.
The seeker mine dropped to the first floor, heading not towards me but towards the pre-set hologram projector. This confirmed one thing: if the seeker mine’s cooldown was over, the stun pulse was probably ready too.
In other words, facing the enemy head-on was not an option. I needed to lure them into wasting their stun pulse on the hologram projector.
I took a step forward, and at that moment, the mine, patrolling autonomously, started moving towards me. It accelerated with a crackling sound, closing the distance to about three meters. I didn’t dodge but aimed my gun. I needed to ensure the enemy believed my position was the same as the hologram’s.
A loud pop echoed as the mine exploded, hit by a bullet.
Although I took the full brunt of the blast, the enemy should now have a rough idea of my position.
“…!”
Barely getting myself together, I waited by the opposite stairwell.
And then, a few seconds later,
───Bang!
───Bang! Bang! Bang!
The hologram fired its gun, and the pulse, more like a shockwave, struck the hologram projector. Naturally, the pistol and decoy were destroyed, but in return, I got 30% of my shield energy back and the enemy’s back in my sights.
I switched to full-auto. The distance between the enemy’s back and my gun was only a few meters.
I pulled the trigger, and the enemy was reduced to a wreck. The refreshing sound of the shield breaking and the heavy thud of bullets hitting echoed. My Honey Badger had a magazine capacity of 45 rounds.
After about 30 rounds, the enemy quickly hid behind the cover where the hologram decoy had been, firing suppressive shots with a panicked expression. Moving at impressive speed, he emptied his last bullet and hid on the first-floor balcony touching the lava.
But at this point, I had the upper hand. I could have easily won in a frontal confrontation, but I wanted to conserve my HP and shield. So, I considered how to deal with the enemy.
And the method I finally decided on.
-Thunk!
The moment the charged nanite launcher hit the wall, the concrete wall began to melt like ice cream left out on a summer day. The cement wall crumbled, revealing the steel framework inside, and soon, the enemy hiding behind the opposite wall was exposed.
“Uwaaaagh!”
And that was the enemy’s last cry.
With a loud pop, the enemy turned into a corpse and a pile of items within seconds.
Of course, I had no time to leisurely loot. As I tried to casually search through the items, something caught my eye – or rather, I didn’t even need to see it. The ominous sound of something collapsing reached me from across the way.
Sure enough, lava was invading the first floor, bringing down the building’s pillars. This liquid, molten rock, carried an immense amount of heat and physical force. It was natural that the building couldn’t withstand such a disaster.
And now, lava was beginning to rise where I stood!
-[Alert: Hostile environment intrusion. Building deformation limit reached, collapse imminent.]
“This is bad.”
Was this the end? Would my final championship end with the building’s collapse? As I stared at the melting wall – a crazy idea popped into my head.
Collapse?
“Could it be….”
At that moment, as if possessed, I inserted a nanite cylinder into the chemical launcher.
I aimed at the upper pillars of the building across the way and the one I stood in, separated by about ten meters – my plan was simple. By collapsing both buildings, I would create a platform over the lava river. It was a do-or-die situation; I couldn’t just sit and wait to burn to death.
Explosive engineering was a complex science, but I didn’t have time for precise calculations. I simply relied on gravity to guide the buildings towards the lava river, ten meters wide.
The cylinder flew through the air. The pillars of the building across the way and the one I stood in began to disappear. There was no one around anyway, and the nanite canisters would keep recharging until I died. If I ran out, I would just keep dissolving the pillars with newly spawned canisters.
And after about a minute,
───Kugugugung!
“Heek…!”
The building started to collapse.
The three-story concrete makeshift buildings on either side of the river leaned towards each other, pouring tons of debris and stones into the ten-meter-wide lava river.
Since I had moved aside earlier, I wasn’t harmed by the collapse. So, I started moving as soon as the dust began to settle. In no time, the debris formed a path across the lava. As I stepped cautiously onto the path, I could feel the lava trying to push the debris aside just a few meters away.
It felt like an eternity, but it was only 20 seconds.
And then-
“Hua…!”
───Crack!
As soon as I crossed safely, I could see the makeshift bridge made of building debris floating away in the lava, and I sighed in relief.
I wanted to collapse right there, but there was still a long way to go. I wished I had thought of this sooner, but life was always like that. For now, I was grateful to be alive.
Of course,
“It really feels like I’m the only one facing all these challenges.”
That was probably not a wrong statement. Once again, I had escaped a deadly situation.
The final match of the final championship was not over yet.