Essence of the Void: Part 6

Kazami's eyes darted from one spindly leg to another as each punctured the ground, his mind racing to calculate the attack pattern of the legs.

He moved with impeccable timing, barely evading each strike as the Arachne's eight legs lunged at him with almost deadly precision, barely giving him a moment to breathe. Kazami's movements were getting slower, and his reactions were delayed by his growing exhaustion.

As if sensing his weakness, the Dread Stalker leapt forward at incredible speed, and one of its many legs crashed into Kazami's virtual body.

"UGHAAA!" Kazami grunted while trying his best to keep moving, knowing full well that once his legs stopped working, he would surely become mincemeat.

It was surprising to him that he was still able to run around.

"Hey! Over here, ugly!" Waving his dull blade around, he provoked the beast even further.

Suddenly, the pain began searing through his torso and legs as his health bar plummeted, causing it to lose a substantial chunk of his remaining hit points. Kazami gritted his teeth as he struggled to stay on his feet; he could feel his strength waning.

Just as despair threatened to consume him, Tang-Ji behind him began to grip her jade shears tightly with both hands. The space around her crackled with energy as four tiny black holes materialised besides her, swirling with dark energy.

A surge of confidence rippled through her as she swung her weapon forward, unleashing a devastating strike towards the Arachne, the edges of her mouth subconsciously forming a thin smile of anticipation.

The jade shears cleaved through the air, its sharp edge colliding with the Arachne's frontal legs. Two of the creature's legs were severed, and not long after, it was sent staggering back in pain.

The boss let out a guttural screech, momentarily stunned by the unexpected attack.

Gearing into action, Tang-Ji charged towards the boss, her jade shears radiating an immense purple aura as its tip dragged across the ground as a result of its sheer weight.

It would have been practically impossible for her to run with the weapon in both arms, so instead she leveraged her dashing skill to gain speed before soaring into the air just above Kazami.

She nodded to him midair, and Kazami took off, running in the direction of the boss as if they were communicating telepathically.

Kazami took a breath before activating his Leere, recreating his damaged sword. He positioned himself in preparation for his next attack, twisting his left hip and leaning forward until he was almost to the point of falling over.

From his position so close to the floor, he could feel his virtual flesh scraping against the cold stone underneath him. In an instant, he propelled himself forward using his right leg's full might, his body now wrapped in a pale blue light.

He instantly closed the ten-metre gap between himself and the Dread Stalker, moving so quickly that he almost appeared as if he teleported.

His palm shone intensely, producing a blue rapier that was infused with the frigid essence of winter within its steel. Gripping it tightly, he charged forward with unwavering resolve, his feet now leaving a trail of frosted footsteps in his wake.

The giant Arachne boss loomed above him, still paralysed from Tang-Ji's previous attack.

With a swift motion, Kazami activated one of the rapier's most potent skills, "level 3 deployment, Rush Technique: Snow Tomb!!" pointing the weapon's tip towards the boss. On command, a wall of thick ice rose from the stones around the creature, encircling it.

As the ice wall reached its peak, a huge lid of snow formed over the Arachne, casting an enormous shadow above the icy prison. The lid plummeted down with a thunderous crash as it engulfed the boss in its wintry embrace.

The labyrinth trembled as the collision sent ripples across the atmosphere, flinging chunks of ice and snow around the room.

A moment of silence followed, broken only by the sound of cracking ice. When the dust finally settled, Kazami's eyes were filled with hope for a brief moment.

The boss's health bar was now visible, revealing a massive portion of its hit points lost as a result of Kazami's Snow Tomb skill. The Arachne struggled futilely within the icy container, immobilised and vulnerable.

Their assault on the boss did not end there. Tang-Ji, having leapt into the air earlier, hovered over the Arachne with grace. Her jade shears glinted with a newfound radiance as she channelled her energy in between the curved edges.

She let out a resolute cry: "Level 2 deployment, Rush Technique: Imperial Comet!"

A surge of power erupted from Tang-Ji's being, manifesting as a swirling vortex of black energy coalescing before her at the tip of her shears.

With unyielding focus, she pointed her pair of jade shears towards the trapped boss, locking on with unwavering precision. The vortex grew in size and intensity with each passing moment, pulsating with a dangerous aura.

In a single, resolute motion, Tang-Ji loosed the orb of energy from her weapon. It tore through the air like a scream too long held in, racing toward the ensnared beast and trailing a ribbon of shadowed magic that shimmered like spilled ink beneath starlight.

She didn't blink as it struck. The sphere hit Arachne with merciless precision, erupting into a thunderous bloom of arcane fury.

The sheer magnitude of the attack caused the very pillars that were well-rooted into the earth of the domain to tremble as if nature itself had quivered in awe.

The combination attack proved devastating as the creature writhed and struggled within its icy prison, unable to break free from the weight of the snow and the power of the dark energy.

The boss's health bar had reached 50%, but rather than advancing forward to unleash another round of attacks, Kazami paused. Remembering his time during the game's beta testing, he vividly recalled nearly dying during his first boss raid.

Despite the armour clinging to his frame like polished steel, one blow had dragged Kazami's health bar straight into the red.

'Wait—'

The thought sparked too late.

He remembered now—an AOE strike.

The spider boss had a desperation move, a last breath meant to take everyone down with it. But the words hadn't left his mouth yet.

The ground trembled. The boss cracked through its icy binds, limbs twitching with violent promise. Its hulking mass coiled, shadow stretching beneath it.

Kazami's pulse thrashed in his throat.

Tang-Ji still hung in the air, blade raised, unaware.

"It's going to—!" he shouted, but the warning tangled in his breath.

Then, motion—

A blur at the edge of his vision, fast, sharp—

Someone moved.

Ukiyo leapt into action as if she had already anticipated the boss' next attack.

Sliding gracefully under Kazami's icy trail that was created earlier, her movements were fluid and precise.

Within seconds, she had positioned herself directly beneath the boss.

She threw herself against one of the boss's colossal legs, using the full weight of her body, causing it to lose balance.

The arachnid wobbled as its eight legs were momentarily thrown into disarray.

The jumping attack was interrupted, preventing it from spreading its poisonous webs around the entirety of the room, giving the team a vital moment of respite.

The labyrinth echoed with the resounding thud of the boss's unsteady steps, its movements erratic as it struggled to regain its balance. It was a temporary advantage, but it provided the trio with a precious opportunity.

Kazami lunged forward at the Arachne with speed comparable to his earlier technique, using his momentum to drive the tip of his ice rapier deep into the boss's right flank.

The enemy's hit point gauge dropped closer to the red zone, with only a marginal amount remaining in the orange zone.

Sparks burst from the wound, followed by a shrill metallic sound.

The boss monster shook Kazami off from its side, flinging him more than two metres across the arena. At the same time, Tang-Ji landed firmly on the ground, her heavy weapon following suit, creating a small nick in the already worn-out concrete.

Tang-Ji steadied the shears across her shoulders, breath shallow, weight shifting with each step. She readied herself for another strike—

—but the boss moved first.

Its grotesque frame arched back, limbs rooted, abdomen tilting skyward. The gesture was unnatural, almost theatrical.

Kazami's eyes locked onto the motion. He'd seen this before.

His voice ripped through the tension.

"Poison—move, now!"

Too late for doubt. Only instinct remained.

The Arachne's mouth gaped wide open, and from within its depths, a sickly red venom gathered. In an instant, the monster forcefully expelled the poisonous substance in a concentrated stream, which hurtled towards Kazami, sizzling in the air.

His pupils dilated as he swerved to the side, barely escaping the venomous stream.

Yet, the attack was too swift for him to evade entirely. 

A streak caught his arm.

The burn came instantly—sharp, all-consuming. His gear hissed as it warped, metal bubbling, cloth peeling like scorched paper.

He hit the ground hard, knees cracking stone.

"Ah—fuck!" he growled, clutching the limb, breath ragged.

Steam rose from the ruined plating. His fingers trembled against the exposed skin beneath.

Through clenched teeth, he managed, "Tang-Ji... don't let it touch you."

He curled closer to the wall, the venom was still eating into the last scraps of armour.

Tang-Ji's heart pounded in terror as the Dread Stalker let out another thundering shriek, signalling that it was ready to spit another deadly onslaught of venom. Its many eyes began to spaz out vilely before making its hideous gaze present to Tang-Ji.

Her hands trembled, knuckles white around the shears.

Doubt coiled through her chest like smoke, thick and cloying. Every breath felt shallow, the chaos around her stretching into a blur—rotten wood groaning, acid hissing against stone, the boss's shadow looming larger.

Then—

A voice cut through.

Sharp. Clear. Familiar.

"Don't be scared!"

Tang-Ji's head jerked towards the broken staircase below.

Dust still drifted through the air where debris had collapsed, but from beneath the wreckage, that voice rose with startling clarity.

"You already have the strength to overcome this!"

A current stirred the blood-soaked fragments of shattered stone at her feet. Tang-Ji's breath caught. The poison bubbling in the distance hissed, creeping closer like a living curse.

Ukiyo's voice surged again, louder now. "Your Leere is defensive! When I borrowed it—I knew. You weren't meant to fight head-on."

The words struck her harder than the boss's roar. A quiet truth, long buried, surfacing.

"Let it move with you," Ukiyo cried. "Like it's part of your body. Like it's your soul."

Tang-Ji's heartbeat pounded in her ears. Not with fear—

—but with clarity.

She didn't want to keep hiding. Not anymore. Not from pain, from confrontation, from the fragile truth of herself. Her fear of being cast aside, of being misunderstood—it all fell away like the last leaf of autumn surrendering to wind.

She breathed in. Deep.

Held the shears tight.

Shifted her stance.

The blade quivered with energy—cool, protective, alive.

Another shriek from the boss. A spatter of venom surged towards her, luminous and lethal.

Tang-Ji stood firm. She wasn't running.

With her voice steady and full, she screamed into the chaos,

"Level 1 deployment—counter technique: Abyssal Haze!"

A barrier erupted before her. Black, pulsing, jagged at the edges—like obsidian forged in a storm.

The venom hit.

But it didn't break through.

It sank in.

Swallowed whole.

The barrier shimmered, hunger glowing in its cracks, feeding off the poison as if it had been waiting for it all along.

Energy crackled within the Abyssal Haze, swirling and building in intensity. As a cloud of black mist began enveloping Tang-Ji's entire body, the barrier unleashed the absorbed venom back at the boss, hurling the toxic mass back in retaliation.

The boss recoiled, its monstrous form writhing in agony as the venom coated and burned its body. The sudden release of energy sent shockwaves rippling through the domain and sprayed droplets of poisonous chemicals across the walls.

The boss's health bar above its head receded significantly down into the red zone.

Kazami howled, ignoring the poor state of his health bar, and sprinted forward along the wall. Positioning his ice rapier at a low angle next to his knee, his left foot kicked off the floor at full force. 

"Now! Everyone—attack!" Kazami roared, his voice cleaving through the air like a blade drawn from fire.

Ukiyo and Kazami surged forward, silhouettes slicing past Tang-Ji as she caught her breath, the aftershocks of her barrier still humming in her bones.

The ground cracked beneath them. Steel met carapace. Every swing sang—sharp, deliberate, echoing through the chamber like the beating of a war drum.

The spider boss reeled, its once-menacing form now flinching, buckling beneath the unrelenting rhythm of their onslaught.

Tang-Ji moved before she realised. Her feet left the ground. Her blade arced with the others, slipping into their rhythm as though she'd always known it.

Three figures. Three pulses. One momentum.

Each strike felt less like violence and more like breath, like belonging. A strange warmth unfurled in her chest, foreign but not unwelcome—as if she'd almost cracked open a door long bolted shut.

She glanced at them—Kazami's fierce precision, Ukiyo's feral grace—and wondered if this was what it felt like to fight with someone, not just beside them.

As the boss's health dwindled, its movements grew sluggish and desperate.

It prepared one final attack in an act of desperation; however, Kazami, who had been skilfully evading its assaults, intercepted it with his rapier, freezing its remaining limbs.

He then delivered a devastating attack, striking the monster with unparalleled precision and power.

The boss's life gauge was left with just a sliver of health.

"Finish it, Tang-Ji!" Kazami screamed as Tang-Ji began charging up another massive burst of energy.

Her Leere pulsated with energy, the crackling energy yearning to be released. With her whole body and soul, Tang-Ji used all the remaining stamina to fire her ultimate skill.

She called upon the power of the "Level 8 deployment, Ultimate Technique: Eden's Pulsar!!" Unleashing the full force of her Leere with unwavering conviction.

The air crackled with dark, purplish energy as a vortex of shadow formed around Tang-Ji's body. Gripping her shears firmly with both hands, her eyes glowed with an otherworldly radiance as she raised her weapon, pointing its tip directly at the boss's core.

Gradually, black matter began to develop at the very tip of the jade shears as a shadowy mass began creeping down the edges of the blades before slowly condensing into a minuscule sphere at the very edge of the weapon.

Suddenly, a massive beam of concentrated gravity erupted from the Leere, tearing through space with an unstoppable force. The beam pulsed with an aura of darkness, its sheer magnitude eclipsing everything around it.

The Dread Stalker, caught off guard by the onslaught, could only watch in confusion as the all-encompassing darkness consumed it.

The immense power of an Eden Star incinerated and crushed the boss into nothingness, reducing its grotesque form to mere particles.

After obliterating its target, the beam proceeded forward, crashing against the wall of the chamber before creating a wide hole in the sphere of the domain.

Silence settled in as the dust cleared, revealing the absence of the monsters. The weight of its defeat hung heavy in the air before the door to the dungeon behind it swung open.

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As the blizzard storm began to subside and sunlight began seeping through the gaping hole that Tang-Ji had opened up, the three players knelt down, exhausted from what felt like an endless abyss of fighting.

"Hey, Kazami." She asked with a tired voice, "Is it really over?"

Kazami was only a few steps away from the broken stairway leading up to the once-enclosed arena. He heard Tang-Ji's query but did not respond for a few seconds.

Then he slowly got to his feet and muttered, "Yeah, it's all over now, and we won." His voice was barely audible from exhaustion.

Tang-Ji slowly rose to her feet, and she paced over to Kazami. She was aware that she needed to apologise for the grief that she had given him, since it was her own narrow-mindedness that had hurt him.

Yet before she could utter a word of regret, Kazami turned around and limped towards her, pulling her into his arms and embracing her warmly. Tang-Ji was taken aback by this show of appreciation, her cheeks turning a pale shade of red before reluctantly returning the hug.

"I'm sorry for saying those things earlier." He murmured gently.

In that tender moment, just as the two were coming to terms with their emotions, Kazami's demeanour changed abruptly.

Over Tang-Ji's shoulder, his gaze landed on Ukiyo.

She stood a short distance away, kneeling on the ground, her hands resting delicately on her lap. But something was… off.

Unlike the exhaustion written across their faces, Ukiyo looked untouched by the fight. Her expression was unreadable—too composed, too distant. Her eyes weren't filled with relief or even joy.

She was staring at them.

Not with admiration. Not with concern.

Just… watching.

A cold shiver ran down Kazami's spine. Something about the way she held herself—still, poised, as if she had already known how this would end—felt wrong. Artificial, even.

His arms loosened around Tang-Ji as unease settled into his bones.

Then, he turned to face Ukiyo directly.

"Tell us who you are," He demanded, his voice steady despite the knot tightening in his chest. "I know for a fact that you're not just an NPC."

"You just called her Tang-Ji earlier during the battle. An NPC is programmed to call a player by their gamer tag, the name displayed just above our heads."

He continued, glaring intently at Ukiyo as he moved in closer.

Tang-Ji stepped forward instinctively, placing herself between Kazami and Ukiyo.

"Kazami, stop," she said firmly, her arms slightly outstretched.

"She saved our lives. Why are you interrogating her like this?"

Kazami's gaze didn't waver. "Because something isn't right."

"I've been paying careful attention to you during the whole trip, and I've noticed that something about your actions and the way you talk is unusual compared to the other NPCs I've encountered." Kazami said, choosing his words carefully, certain that he was onto something.

Tang-Ji was confused, her loyalties torn between her friends. She wanted to stop Kazami from pushing Ukiyo any further, but nagging curiosity tugged at her.

Ukiyo had indeed never acted like a typical NPC. Her way of speaking and her emotions had been far too lifelike to be mere computer programmes.

'It was thanks to Ukiyo that I'm alive and that I was able to protect Kazami and finally let go of my fears,' Tang-Ji thought to herself.

She could never see her as an enemy.

However, her hands trembled slightly as doubt began to creep in, unwelcome and cold.

'But her words, her expressions, the way she spoke about grief as if she had felt it herself… It had all seemed too real.'

Tang-Ji swallowed hard.

Whatever resolve she had wavered.

She turned her head slightly, glancing back at Ukiyo, searching for answers in the girl's eerily composed face. "…Ukiyo?" she murmured, but this time, it wasn't a defence. It was a question.

"Are you going to tell us or not? Who are you, and how are you able to get a blue cursor?" Kazami asked, now losing his patience.

Pulling her right sleeve down, Ukiyo rose slowly from her place on the floor. Her eyes flickered with a hint of vulnerability before shifting back into a stern expression.

Before Kazami could continue, she finally answered, "You're right. I am not a computer-generated programme." She admitted it; her voice was steady but tinged with sadness. "I didn't mean to deceive you, but I had my reasons to not speak up about my identity."

His anger gave way to confusion as he demanded, "Who are you? Tell me!" 

Ukiyo took a slow breath, her fingers tightening around the fabric of her sleeve before she let it fall. Her gaze flickered between Kazami and Tang-Ji, uncertainty shadowing her expression.

"In the real world…" she started, her voice quieter now, as if the words themselves were a weight she had carried for too long. "People know me as Mai."

Kazami narrowed his eyes.

"Mai?" he echoed, the name unfamiliar to him.

Ukiyo hesitated, then met his gaze with quiet resolve. "I didn't come here as a player—I was sent here."

The words hung heavy in the air, cutting through the tense silence. Tang-Ji felt her stomach twist.

'Sent here? Not a player?'

Kazami's exhaustion seemed to dull for a moment, his mind racing to piece it together.

"Then… who sent you?"

Ukiyo exhaled, her hands curling into fists.

"I wasn't supposed to reveal my identity, but I can't keep deceiving you two anymore." Her voice wavered slightly before she steadied herself. "I am a Japanese idol. A Cubetuber."