Defense-oriented, wielder of the sacred blade.

In this sudden, hellish environment, commoners fall one by one.

One after another, they collapse. After three minutes, when Maple’s avatar vanished, more than half the players had dissolved into light.

Even so, all realized at once that they could not avoid using piercing skills against the 【Brutal】-state Maple. Small damages accumulated. Maple returned to her original form.

The monstrous shape reaching toward the sky faded. Maple fell into the group of players.

Each player had prepared their skill. They would not allow her to land.

【Full Armament Deployment!】

From the floating Maple, countless gun muzzles pointed downward.

Black weapons unfolded one after another, clattering into place.

【Oozing Chaos】! 【Poison Dragon (Hydra)】!

The monster’s mouth, seen too many times pointing at the ground, unleashed a blast that obliterated the players aiming to attack Maple from below.

The following Poison Dragon sank poison into the earth, making the terrain favorable for Maple.

Players without sufficient Poison Resistance were struck down instantly.

The monstrous body enveloping Maple had indeed vanished.

Yet Maple was, in truth, no less than a creature that reshaped monsters into human form.

Perhaps even more so.

Appearance had improved vastly, yet its methods of attack had grown immeasurably more varied, harder to counter.

An even more troublesome creature—beautiful, angelic in face, yet a demon.

To opposing players, such an impression was unavoidable.

Maple, having landed, turned her weapons upon the players encircling her—firing through them, burning them down, felling each one.

Maple, at the heart of the toxic sea, could not be approached without immunity to poison. Magic projectiles, even those with piercing effect, were stopped by the great shield.

The players surrounding her thus abandoned their encirclement and withdrew from Maple’s vicinity.

Maple did not permit such departure unharmed. She began moving at high speed, engulfing the area in flames.

The members of the Gathering Holy Sword, having been halted by a fissure in the ground just after their ambush failed, managed to avoid counterattack.

At present, they were targeting the Orb of the Flame Emperor while eliminating the competitors who had gathered by chance.

Pain and Dread, capable of fighting alone with ease, moved independently. Drag and Frederica, however, remained together.

The reasons for fighting apart from the Maple Tree are two: efficiency in eliminating rival guilds, and the fundamental danger of the Maple Tree itself.

"Withdraw before the target moves... is that it?"

Pain murmurs alone, dispatching the player before him.

For Pain, as for Maple, crossing a certain threshold turns combat against lesser opponents into labor.

Pain envisions the battle with Maple in his mind, recalls the outcome.

No matter how he maneuvers, both remain at full strength—neither can overcome Maple.

"Reforge the body...?"

Pain intends to fight again when the chance to win returns.

"Perhaps seek new skills..."

Pain watches Maple's reckless movement from afar, then cuts down another player before him.

Three guilds deemed dangerous by all others have gathered together.

Their destructive power is not trivial.

And since all three consciously avoid interfering with one another, the situation is particularly dire.

After all guilds retreated, broken and spent, only four from the Flame Emperor's Nation remained, and the members of Maplewood.

Maplewood had been battered—Crom had used Cover Move and Cover indiscriminately to shield Yui, Mai, and the rear guard—but Kasumi had recovered in time, and Sally was unharmed.

Maple was, of course, fine.

“Without skills, we’d have been finished…”

Crom could not believe he had survived.

His HP had nearly vanished multiple times, yet it had recovered at an unsettlingly rapid pace.

In contrast, the Kingdom of the Flame Emperor lay shattered. Many of its hidden advantages had already been spent. Further, most of its guild members had already withdrawn.

They would not fight beneath the Maple Tree.

Mizari made the same judgment. She abandoned retrieving the orb between herself and Maple. Instead, she wrapped flames around her body.

An explosion followed.

Yes. Using every last point of MP, Mizari mimicked Maple’s self-destructive flight, evacuating herself and Shin and Markos from the area in an emergency.

Unlike Maple, she relied on Mizari for healing. The result proved successful.

This was the unanimous decision of the Flame Emperor’s guild members.

They had entrusted the survival of the upper ranks to the four strongest within the guild.

Maple and her companions succeeded once more in reclaiming an orb.