The Author's POV

"hmm...am I perhaps interrupting?"

As light yellow particles flew in the air, I stared at Arnold and Amanda in the distance. Soon my eyes interlocked with Amanda's.

Noticing her situation, my brows slightly furrowed. The situation was a lot worse than I had imagined...According to my prediction, considering her skills, she should've been evenly matched against her opponents...yet why was she on the ground on the verge of losing?

Waking up from his stupor, staring at me, John flusteredly said as his mind raced.

"Y-ou, who are you?"

What's going on?

...how did he make it all the way here from the center of the map?

According to his calculations, it would've taken ten minutes to make it from there to here from the center of the map with a decent movement art...yet, not even five minutes after they ambushed Arnold's group, and reinforcements had already come?

What was going on?

Ignoring John who was currently flustered, Amanda's eyes interlocked with mine. Thereafter, without me needing to say anything, Amanda capitalized on the moment when John was distracted due to my appearance and quickly moved her head away from the tip of his spear and quickly dashed towards where her bow was located.

"You, where do you think you're going!"

Noticing Amanda's action, recollecting himself and glaring at her, John quickly raised his spear and prepared to thrust it at her exposed back.

-Kacha!

Hearing the sound of the air being split due to the spear thrust, Amanda didn't stop moving. She knew that Ren had her back...and she wasn't wrong.

-Swooosh!

Just as the spear was about to stab her right in the back, pointing in her direction from the opposite building, a translucent yellow ring quickly headed in her direction and directly stopped right before the tip of the spear.

-Clank!

A shockwave swept the surroundings as the ring came in contact with the tip of the spear. Debris and dust flew everywhere as a consequence of the impact.

Not long after, as the ring and the spear were locked in a stalemate, the ring slowly lost its luster and the spear soon broke through it...however, it was already too late.

Picking up her bow, Amanda quickly turned around. With an arrow materializing in her hand, without hesitation, she quickly pulled the string of her bow until it touched her lips before releasing it.

-Swooooosh!

Like a shooting star, the arrow coursed through the air as it hurtled in John's direction at an unimaginable speed. It was so fast that a blue line could be seen tracing the path of where the arrow traveled.

"Shit!"

Opening his eyes wide, John tried his best to evade the arrow, however, it was already too late.

Brushing past the body of the spear, the arrow quickly pierced through John's right chest area.

Thereafter, John found himself helplessly thrown all the way to the other side of the building as his body crashed against one of the walls.

Baaam—!

"Khhhhaaaa..."

As his back crashed against the wall, John couldn't help but groan out loud as spit escaped from his mouth.

blanked for a couple of

"khhh..."

collided against the wall, as his mind regained some clarity, he heard the sound of soft footsteps headed towards his

-Step! -Step!

coldly looked at him, Amanda's brows were tightly knit.

that she had still lost moments before.

her bitter...no, what made her bitter was the fact that everything went according to

been warned beforehand of such a situation

be attacked first and that at least two people were going to attack her...she knew,

for time...yet she did the opposite. She thought that she could win, but

at John who was right

had a

"I-mpossible!"

thoughts, was John's angry yet

weakly looked up towards Amanda. Thereafter, shifting his head to the right, John found a tangible

bitterness, John found his body slowly turn

"Cough..."

body turn into particles, coughing a couple of times, John couldn't

could I have lost?...Everything went according to my plan,

plan should've

and from there winning the whole game. He was going to be hailed as a hero right after this...he could've already imagined his whole

out of nowhere and foiling everything was

with the help of his strange rings that

knew

one last struggle, staring at the youth who had jet black hair and blue eyes, John raised his voice as

me, how did you make it

He had to know.

know how

very last

back towards him, I looked at him

you ever heard of

of the reason as to why I managed to aid

to why

just when we spawned in this map, I had already told Amanda and the others the

them on this enormous map as I already had

direction of where the sound of them fighting was

say, our opponents weren't half bad. Although they

I was genuinely impressed.

"You-"

about to speak up, his body

[You have died]

what replaced it was a white card that emanated

-Swooosh!

bending over and picking up the card, after a brief glance, Amanda flicked her wrist and threw the

"Thanks"

card. Shortly after, turning on my watch, I

Zack, are you

short

front of the

"Yup, it's 2041689"

[2041689?]

"Yup"