Mass Teleport

Even now, I occasionally dream of those days.

A time when just thinking about it made my breath catch and my chest tighten.

It was a memory that brought a heavy sigh, even as I dragged my feet along.

Pro gaming is a career famous for its short lifespan.

Or rather, it used to be famous for that.

Back in the era of PC gaming, pro gamers retired early.

They would start preparing around middle school and begin contemplating the end by their early to mid-twenties.

Aside from a few exceptional cases, a slight drop in instantaneous reaction speed directly translated to a decline in overall physical performance.

But with Infinity Realm, the story was different.

It wasn't about controlling a character from a top-down perspective; it was combat based on actual movement.

While reaction speed remained crucial, experience and technique became abilities that could never be ignored.

In short, the importance of training and learning had risen alongside raw talent.

As former pro athletes from other sports and veterans from military special forces began delivering excellent results, the talk of a pro gamer's short lifespan truly became a thing of the past.

Because of this, today's pro gamers boasted quite a diverse range of backgrounds.

I never thought I'd end up doing this kind of work again.

For instance, the experience of working on construction sites just to earn living expenses!

Eunha Gaming's Earth Mage, Quake, was someone who had picked up the game as a hobby, only to discover a hidden talent.

He didn't know how far this talent would take him, but for now, he was incredibly satisfied with the fact that he no longer had to haul cement.

He still couldn't forget the memory of that hellish first day.

Or the memories of sleeping on flattened cardboard boxes in a corner and chatting over cheap coffee.

Memories that now felt almost nostalgic... No, he needed to stop thinking about that.

At any rate, he was recalling his construction days for the first time in a long while.

Mostly because what he was doing right now was exactly the same.

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Currently, Quake had slipped away from the main battlefield and was secretly mining dirt and stone.

Operation Rice Ball.

Aside from its rather deflating name, this strategy was highly rated within the team.

Strong long-range firepower. High team comp stability. Combat sustain... not bad.

Unlike a typical joker card, it retained significant power even if the game dragged into the late stage.

A strategy with good stability and superior performance is what we call a new meta.

Even so, Eunha Gaming strictly treated the Rice Ball strategy as a joker card.

This was because testing had revealed a fatal flaw.

A severe shortage of earth!

Throwing rice balls at the enemy team wasn't a skill officially supported by the system.

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This was also why they had to protect the ghouls when compressing the boulders with the trebuchet.

Since it was a combined technique utilizing the game's physics engine, there were many details to manage.

The biggest issue was the moment the stones for the catapult were compressed.

If they only packed in stones without adding earth, their precious ghouls would be crushed to death.

The ghouls had to stay alive at least until Corpse Explosion could be cast.

Using a stronger shield would solve the problem, but... Eunha Gaming only had one supporter.

They couldn't just spam their precious supporter's skills at will.

In the end, resolving it with a wide-area buff like Song of Protection was the most rational approach.

The earth around the main battlefield had already been completely depleted.

When resources ran low, it was only natural to mine them nearby.

While the other mages drew attention, the Earth Mage had to mine earth like this.

"For now... this should be enough. If I stay away too long, they'll notice."

Once they showed their hand, the enemy would definitely counter them at this exact timing.

There was a reason why this couldn't be used as a standard strategy.

Quake sighed and began casting.

To conserve mana, he couldn't afford to rush the cast time either.

Just as a swan paddles furiously beneath the water's surface.

Behind the seemingly broken catapult attack lay this kind of tedious labor and effort.

Well, it should still be fine for now.

After all, strategies like this only required the victims to be clueless the first time.

A spot far away, chosen specifically to avoid detection.

If only there wasn't a Berserker watching him with an innocent face.

Yes, it certainly would have been fine.

— ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠"SnowWitch is fighting an incredibly difficult battle here."

— "First of all, the burden on Endure is immense."

— "He's a player who excels at micro-managing his guard gauge, but with the catapult exploding twice, it's just not easy."

— "But would it get any better if Nabi joined them? Not necessarily."

— "In a situation like this, it's actually more helpful for that Berserker to stay completely out of sight."

The guard gauge in Infinity Realm operated on a simple principle.

When a player entered a guarding state,

taking an attack consumed the gauge to mitigate damage.

The consumed gauge only recovered when the guard was lowered.

No tank could block every single attack.

No matter how sturdy they were, getting hit repeatedly would eventually deplete the gauge.

Keeping the guard up mindlessly risked failing to block a crucial attack.

In other words, a tank's skill ultimately lay in their ability to manage their guard gauge.

In a way, it was a class where knowing when to lower the guard was more important than knowing when to raise it.

For instance, against explosive attacks, the standard method was to guard only the core explosion damage.

The subsequent shockwave and shrapnel were meant to be absorbed using the shield and raw defense.

Top-tier tanks would often lower their guard right in the middle of an explosion.

However, against that dreadful catapult strategy, such plays were tricky.

There was a brief delay when toggling the guard state on and off.

Yet, the opponent's rice balls exploded with a very slight delay after the initial impact.

Because that delay wasn't uniform, a single mistake could force them to take the explosion with their bare body.

As a result, Endure's guard gauge was draining much faster than usual.

The situation was already burdensome enough with three mages on the opposing side.

Even with full support from their own supporter, it was difficult to hold out.

The only reason they had survived this long was that their ranged damage dealers weren't just sitting idle.

Humans are creatures of adaptation; after facing the terrifyingly fast projectiles repeatedly, the trajectories began to register in their eyes.

By successfully shooting down the projectiles in mid-air a few times, they were somehow barely managing to hold the front line.

— "We say this very often, but in the end, there is only one way to stop this."

— "SnowWitch is, after all, a team that relies on their sword."

— "Of course, depending on the situation, that sword could be a ranged dealer, or sometimes even a tank..."

— "But one thing is certain: once you draw the sword, you have to cut something down."

— "They need to show us something. And Player Nabi has always been the team's blade."

Ultimately, Yu Nabi had to create a variable.

It was a bitter truth, but such was the fate of a non-standard team composition.

Yu Nabi's position was not that of an ordinary bruiser.

She possessed overwhelming power in close combat.

Yet, in a standoff centered around ranged damage dealers, she was no different from a short teenage girl.

She offered no help in holding the line.

Therefore, she had to secure an advantage from a different angle.

Consequently, Yu Nabi's Berserker was forced to prove her reason for existing in every single game, much like an assassin.

If she didn't like that, she should have built defense and stood on the front line.

Since she had dumped all defensive duties onto Endure, she had to properly fulfill her role as an attacker.

As the game grew more suffocating, the question of what Yu Nabi was doing and where she was grew larger.

And the moment the screen switched to Yu Nabi's perspective...

The question didn't just grow; it threatened to explode.

— "Uh, um. Is this a technical issue?"

— "We apologize for the temporary broadcast instability—"

— "Correction. The production crew states that there is no error in the feed."

— "The screen you are seeing right now is indeed Player Nabi's actual field of vision."

— "It's pitch black. Where on earth is she? Was there a terrain like this in the Weeping Plains?"

A sight that was simply, endlessly black.

Amidst the absolute darkness, a system message popped up.