Chapter 78 | A Damsel, a Disaster, and a Bad Decision

I collapsed onto the rooftop ledge, my chest heaving like I’d just run a marathon. Twenty-one points. Twenty-one fucking points with five minutes left on the clock.

My muscles screamed at me despite Boundless Stamina keeping me upright. The trait prevented exhaustion but did nothing for the actual damage I was accumulating. Every assist had required precise Spectral Reach deployment. Every sprint between engagements had burned through reserves. My arms felt like someone had replaced the bones with lead pipes.

Worth it though. Absolutely worth it.

I watched applicants scatter across the plaza below, some hunting the last few robots, others helping injured teammates toward the medical tents at the field’s edge. The green-haired kid I’d helped earlier was systematically destroying one-pointers with his vine Aspect, moving with confidence he hadn’t shown before.

That’s what tactical support looks like, assholes.

Five minutes remained. I needed to decide how to close this out. Twenty-one points put me above minimum but nowhere near the top tier. The muttering kid from earlier probably had forty by now. Sloane was definitely crushing whatever field they’d stuck her in.

I could hunt more robots but my stamina was getting sketchy. Spectral Reach felt heavier with each deployment. Blitz had maybe two more uses before I’d be running on fumes.

Playing it safe meant coasting to the finish with what I had. Risky meant pushing for top five percent and potentially collapsing before the timer hit zero.

My stats were good but they weren’t miracle-worker good. Fifty Strength. Fifty Agility. The sixty-three Intelligence helped me think faster but didn’t make my body move better.

I needed better abilities. Stronger pulls. Something that would let me compete with the Legendary-tier monsters this place attracted.

The ground shook.

Not a tremor. A full earthquake that made the building beneath me sway like it was drunk. Dust cascaded from nearby structures. An alarm started wailing across the entire simulation field, loud enough to make my ears ring.

What the absolute hell?

I scrambled to my feet and looked toward the source of the disturbance.

The eastern wall of the arena had opened. Actually opened, like massive bay doors retracting to reveal something beyond.

Something big.

Something metal.

Something that made every robot I’d fought so far look like a child’s toy.

"HOLY SHIT IT’S A KAIJU!"

The words tore out of my throat before my brain caught up. The thing emerging from the bay doors stood at least fifty feet tall, constructed entirely from articulated metal plating that gleamed in the afternoon sun. Four massive legs supported a body shaped vaguely like a beetle, with a head that was all angles and glowing red sensors.

Each step it took shook the ground hard enough that I had to grab the rooftop edge to stay upright.

The zero-pointer.

Isabelle’s warning echoed in my head. Natural disaster analogue. Do not engage. Anyone who defeats it receives a personal letter of recommendation.

Fifteen years and nobody had managed it.

I stared at the thing as it moved into the field proper, its legs crushing abandoned vehicles like aluminum cans. Those red sensors swept across the plaza methodically, targeting systems locking onto anything that moved.

How the hell was someone supposed to beat that?

My Spectral Reach could lift maybe a hundred pounds if I pushed it. That thing weighed thousands. Blitz would get me close but what was I supposed to do, kick its ankle? My abilities were support tools, not tank-killers.

Wide berth. That was the play. Give that monster all the space it wanted and hunt points elsewhere.

I turned toward the ladder leading down from the rooftop. The plaza was already clearing out, applicants sprinting away from the zero-pointer with survival instincts intact. Smart move. No shame in recognizing an unwinnable fight.

My foot hit the first rung when the notification appeared.

EMERGENCY QUEST: THE DAMSEL AND THE DISASTER

OBJECTIVE:

Rescue Felicity Hardy from zero-pointer engagement zone within 3 minutes

REWARDS:

+1000 SP, Gold Gacha Pull, +15 Reputation with Felicity Hardy

BONUS OBJECTIVE:

Defeat zero-pointer (Probability: 0.03%)

BONUS REWARDS:

Epic Ability "Titan Slayer," +5000 SP, Legendary Gacha Pull (Selection Option)

FAILURE PENALTY:

-50 Reputation with Felicity Hardy, Permanent Injury to Felicity Hardy (Moderate)

TIME REMAINING:

2:58

My heart stopped.

Felicity.

The blonde girl with the Mirage Aspect who’d sat next to me in the auditorium. Blue eyes. Ridiculous optimism. Pink shorts that had made certain thoughts extremely difficult to suppress.

She was in danger.

The zero-pointer’s targeting systems had locked onto something in the plaza’s center. I couldn’t see what from my position but the System wouldn’t lie about this. Felicity was there. Right in the thing’s path.

Three minutes.

I looked at the ladder again. Then at the zero-pointer. Then at the quest notification floating in my vision.

Conflict with Side Quest: Academic Excellence.

That meant if I went after Felicity, I’d probably miss whatever engagement I needed to secure top five percent. All the assists I’d farmed would mean nothing if I threw away the bonus objective for a girl I’d talked to for five minutes.

One thousand Scumbag Points wasn’t nothing. The Gold pull with selection option was genuinely valuable. But the Academic Excellence quest offered three hundred SP and its own Gold pull.

Math said abandon Felicity and hunt more points.

My Intelligence stat agreed. Logical play was maximizing my own position.

My fifty Strength and Agility couldn’t carry someone while fighting a fifty-foot metal monster. The zero-pointer would crush me before I got close enough to matter.

Every smart cell in my upgraded brain screamed at me to take the ladder down and forget the blonde girl existed.

I activated Blitz and launched myself toward the plaza instead.

The world blurred as I covered thirty feet in under a second, landing on a lower rooftop with enough force that my knees buckled. Pain shot up my legs but I pushed through it, already scanning for Felicity’s position.

There.

Center plaza. Exactly where the System said she’d be.

Felicity was on her knees beside an injured applicant, some guy with a broken leg judging by the angle. She’d conjured an illusion around them, a shimmering wall of translucent energy that made their position harder to see.

The zero-pointer didn’t care about visibility. Its sensors locked onto heat signatures.

And it was moving directly toward them.

Two minutes forty seconds.

I jumped to ground level, hit the pavement running, and felt every muscle in my body protest the demand. Boundless Stamina kept me moving but it didn’t make the movement pleasant.

"FELICITY!"