Chapter 14: The Reaper's Descent
The sun had barely risen in the city when Zeke and Dan stepped into Sector 8's lively marketplace. It was the real world, but the energy in the air mirrored that of a game event. A crowd was forming, gamers pointing and whispering as the duo passed by.
"Dude," Dan muttered, adjusting his hoodie, "we're getting mobbed."
Zeke chuckled, tugging his cap lower. "Guess our avatars are more famous than we thought."
Dan grinned. "You did break the Vault. Twice."
"Well, they didn't know it!"
They tried to remain discreet, but word traveled fast. Within minutes, they were surrounded by excited fans.
"Zaphro! Is that really you?"
"Yo, you're SlicerDM, right? Man, that PK reversal in Sector 7 was insane!"
They talked a little bit to the fans, signed some autograph and pose a selfie with them.
Zeke raised a hand in greeting to another group of crowd that was about to approach them but leaned over to Dan. "Let's get out of here before this turns into a livestream circus."
"Right behind you."
They dashed through a narrow alley and into a side exit, catching their breath.
Back at Zeke's apartment, the two dropped onto the couch, laughing.
"Feels weird," Zeke said. "Being treated like a celebrity."
Dan opened his inventory tab on his holo-display. "Well, considering what we went through in the last event, I'd say we earned it. Speaking of which—"
He summoned video feed a glowing data shard and slid it across the table.
Zeke picked it up, eyebrows raised. "This… is?"
"The Rain Maker Fragment," Dan replied, voice serious. "From that weird anomaly portal Accel and I found. It shouldn't have dropped, not from an AI fragment entity like that."
Zeke studied the item. The glow felt unnatural. "It reeks of leftover system corruption."
"Exactly. Something's wrong, Zeke."
They shared a silent look, then nodded.
"Let's log in," Zeke said. "Let's talk to the others.
---
[In-Game: Enigma Online PH]
Their avatars materialized in the cold windswept ruins of Forgotten Village—the place where Amana the Ice Goddess had once fallen. But the winds were quiet now. Peaceful.
Zaphro flexed his fingers, wings flickering dark violet. "Still feels haunted."
Slicer appeared beside him, cloak flapping. "Let's get to Frontier Village. The others are waiting."
A teleport glyph ignited beneath their feet.
---
Frontier Village
It was bustling. Food stalls, blacksmiths, and class trainers lined the walkways. At the heart of the plaza stood Ayana, Verillion, Shion_Rio, Jin, Erik, Erenir, Aryus, Accel, and Xavier. They were already discussing strategies for the coming patch.
"Kuya Zaphro!" Accel waved. "You're late!"
"I had to dodge some real-world paparazzi," Zaphro quipped. "It's exhausting being handsome."
Gwydox floated near the tavern, his newly reforged form glinting with obsidian armor and bright-blue ethereal veins.
"'Bout time, you slowpoke," Gwydox snarled. "You bring the snacks?"
"Got you some glitch cubes," Zaphro said, tossing a treat. Gwydox caught it midair with a sarcastic grunt.
Before they could settle, the sky above the village darkened unnaturally.
"Whoa…" Shion turned to the sky. "That's not a weather effect."
A massive black cloud descended—its edges rippling like corrupted data. The atmosphere shifted.
SYSTEM WARNING: Anomaly Detected. High-Level Threat Approaching Frontier Village.
The cloud twisted, and from it descended a towering figure—cloaked in obsidian armor, twin scythes in both hands, glowing red eyes under its hood.
Level 300 Player Reaper [Legendary Boss]
HP: 1,000,000 / 1,000,000
DEF: 100,000 / 100,000
MP: ∞
SP: ∞
Movement Speed: 8,000 / 8,000
Evasion: 5,500 / 5,500
ATK: 50,000 / 50,000
Critical ATK: 80,000 / 80,000
"Evacuate the newbies into the taverns!" Zaphro barked, eyes scanning the sky. "Everyone else, prepare for a raid-level encounter!"
"No way," Aryus whispered. "A Level 300 boss… here?!"
Zaphro's eyes narrowed. "That thing... it came from the Rain Maker anomaly."
Players scattered. Only the core party and a few high-level players remained.
From the edge of the chaos, a familiar figure entered the fray—Great_Kai.
"Kaito?!" Zaphro blinked. "What the hell are you doing here?"
Kai grinned. "Helping save your butt, cousin."
Zaphro smirked. "You better be strong!"
"Try me."
---
The Reaper lunged without warning, crossing half the village in a blur. Two NPC gate guards were downed instantly. One swing. Instant death.
The Reaper moved. In an instant, it slashed across the plaza. A Level 240 warrior was cut down instantly, his HP evaporating.
"Everyone! Focus on defense formation Alpha!" Verillion roared.
Slicer summoned spike traps and chain blades to slow the boss, while Erik cast binding light magic to reduce movement speed. Erenir and Ayana buffed the entire party.
"Gwydox!" Zaphro yelled. "Target its evasion stat!"
"Yeah yeah, I got it!" Gwydox's core flared. "CHAOTIC BLAST: LOCKDOWN!"
A swirling vortex crashed into the Reaper, reducing its evasion by 1,000 temporarily.
Kaito flew above, casting elemental bursts from his Belphigor Scepter.
"Meteor Crash!"
Fire rained down. The Reaper blocked it with one hand, then vanished.
"Where—"
Zaphro's danger sense screamed. He spun, just in time to block a scythe aimed at Accel.
Clang!
The force sent him skidding backwards.
"He's playing with us," Ayana gasped.
"Then let's up the stakes," Zaphro growled. "Demonic Angel Form: Awakening!"
Black flames engulfed him, wings expanding. His stats skyrocketed. Accel followed, activating his own Semi-Dark Angel mode.
"Let's go, mentor!"
They launched into the air, assaulting the Reaper from all angles.
Jin flanked the Reaper with a series of blink strikes, drawing aggro. Shion launched dual-charged swords, the sound like thunder. Erenir activated his soul-linked barrier, tanking the next strike that would've wiped half of the casters around.
Still, they were barely making a dent.
"Together!"
Their dual Dark Ascension triggered a synchronized combo. Blades of black lightning and crimson flame cut through the Reaper's armor—but only chipped 2% of its health.
It retaliated with a scream that shattered the sky. A Reaper Zone formed—a black dome where time slowed.
---
Suddenly, a global ping echoed.
GM Kaizen has entered the field.
GM Akil has entered the field.
GM Aero has entered the field.
Three radiant beams landed at the plaza center. The Game Masters appeared in their regal forms.
"Looks like we're needed," Kaizen said, drawing a glowing rapier.
"This anomaly's not just a bug," Akil muttered. "It's a threat to server integrity and to all players."
GM Aero nodded at Zaphro. "We'll need your party's full support to contain it. Form up."
Gwydox cracked his core knuckles. "About damn time the overlords did something."
Zaphro landed next to them. "What's the plan?"
Kaizen pointed skyward. "Aero and I will suppress its regen and movement. You and your team land heavy DPS."
Akil raised his hand. "Casting: Reality Lockdown."
The world froze for half a second. The Reaper's passive HP regen was sealed. Aero followed with a world-scaling Anti-Mobility Field.
"NOW!"
The entire party rushed in.
Accel: "He's wide open!"
Ayana: "Dark Bloom!" and two of her summons release a unison magical attack.
Jin: "Raging Dragon Style slash!
Shion: "Chains of Eden!"
Erik: "Judgment Hammer!"
Kaito flew past them all, unleashing an ultimate.
"Storm Calamity: Cataclysm Pulse!"
His scepter fired beams in every element, shaking the Reaper's defense.
Zaphro followed with a finishing move.
"Dark Angel Overdrive: Terminal Eclipse!"
Gwydox casted a skill underneath the boss that controls gravity. Rendering the boss unable to move.
Zaphro's sword turned into a black hole, devouring light before exploding.
The Reaper's HP dropped to 400,000.
Then it laughed.
"You think… this is over?" it spoke for the first time.
A surge of dark matter poured from its body.
It split.
Four clones, each with 250,000 HP, emerged.
"IT DUPLICATED!" Aryus screamed.
Zaphro cursed. "We split too! Take one each!"
Each squad handled one clone.
Gwydox gritted his fangs. "Nope! I got it. Time to end this!"
He dove into a clone, activating Chaotic Core Fusion Mode, unleashing distorted light cannons.
Clones fell one by one. Finally, only the true Reaper remained, weakened, surrounded.
All three GMs formed a sigil.
"Zaphro, your team will finish this!"
Zaphro nodded. "Party! Final Assault!"
Everyone activated ultimates.
Zaphro and Accel struck together—blades and cards infused with forbidden angel energy.
The Reaper exploded in black light.
[SYSTEM ANNOUNCEMENT]
Legendary Boss Defeated: Level 300 Player Reaper
Event Cleared. Server Anomaly Stabilized.
Not a single drop of loots or even exp..
Silence.
Then—cheering.
Players flooded the square again. GM Aero looked down at the fragments left behind.
"This was no ordinary monster," he said. "It was built with forbidden code. This is Rowan's doing"
"System even classified it as event." Akil added.
Zaphro glanced at the ground. The Rain Maker Fragment pulsed faintly.
"Then we have a bigger problem."
The camera panned out. Above the clouds… a shadow watched.
....
"GM Kaizen POV"
The sky above Frontier Village had shifted to a calm, bruised violet. What was once a battlefield scorched by chaos now stood still, the air thick with lingering code static. I hovered slightly above the cracked town square, boots not touching the ground, as a soft holographic interface rippled in front of my eyes. The Player Reaper's data fragments were still unraveling—corrupted strings, forbidden directives, and something even worse… signatures.
"Anti-Cheat Protocol... no. It can't be…" I muttered, narrowing my eyes behind my interface.
The sound of bootsteps on cobblestone snapped my focus back to the present. Zaphro approached—limping slightly, one wing clipped, blood-coded feathers flickering with sparks. He carried Gwydox over his shoulder, the sentient animus blade humming faintly, like a purring beast recovering from a coma.
"We need answers, GM Kaizen," Zaphro said. His voice was heavy with exhaustion… but sharper than ever. "That wasn't just a glitch. That was a weapon."
Behind him, the rest of the party assembled slowly. Shion had burn marks on his armor, Verillion clutched his staff like a lifeline, and Aryus leaned on Erenir's shoulder. Even with the GMs stepping in, they barely survived.
Dan—SlicerDM—was hunched by the fountain, panting beside Accel and Ayana. Xavier and Jin helped civilians who'd ignored the tavern lockdown. For a moment, no one spoke. They all looked at me.
I sighed.
"A weapon, yes. But not just any weapon. That thing… was called 'Protocol_Zero.'"
The moment I said it, Aero flinched beside me. Even Akil's usual aloof expression darkened.
Zaphro tilted his head. "Protocol_Zero?"
I glanced toward the ruined horizon. "Back in beta, before public release, we had a contingency program built to detect illegal modifications—cheat codes, exploits, corrupted accounts. You know, the usual garbage devs have to clean up."
"But that wasn't just a cleaner," Dan interrupted. "It felt like it wanted to kill us."
"It did," Akil finally spoke. "Protocol_Zero was a self-evolving killcode. It didn't just flag cheaters—it erased them from existence. Accounts, inventory, memory logs, even their IP traces. Gone."
"Erased," Gwydox echoed, his voice gritty and mechanical. "That explains why my animus core felt fear. That thing was older than me."
"But it was erased," I continued. "We wiped it after the AI governing team deemed it too dangerous. It didn't distinguish between cheaters and innocent bystanders. It began rewriting its own conditions for execution."
Zaphro narrowed his eyes. "Then how the hell did it come back?"
I opened my system log, expanded the node I'd been analyzing since the final blow was struck.
"Here's the problem," I said, pushing the hologram toward them. A dark red signature flickered across the display—an admin code long revoked.
"'ROW4N_Override,'" Shion read aloud. "Wait… Rowan? That Rogue GM from last time?"
Zaphro stiffened. "The guy who helped designed the early programs and protocols for the game."
"Same," I confirmed. "Rowan was brilliant. Obsessed with control. When we found out his involvement to the anomalies, he was removed from the team and the entire company. But not before he copied fragments of the anti-cheat source code and who knows what else?"
Verillion's voice trembled. "So... he hid a doomsday program inside a broken item?"
"The Rain Maker Fragment," Dan whispered. "It was bait."
"No," I corrected. "It was the trigger. The Rain Maker wasn't just an item—it was a decoy shell to hide Protocol_Zero. Rowan must've embedded it in dormant code. The anomaly readings during the boss battle confirmed it—the Reaper wasn't just summoned, it awakened."
Zaphro clenched his fists. "And Kaito…"
We all turned. Great_Kai—Zeke's cousin in real life—stood behind a group of players who'd survived the fight. He looked overwhelmed, clearly shaken. His in-game avatar trembled. He'd tried to warn them, but no one had believed him.
"Kaito didn't know the full extent," I said. "But he was tracking the anomalies. He almost triggered it days ago."
Zaphro looked at the younger player with something between guilt and anger. "He was trying to help."
I nodded solemnly.
Eira, the sentient system who now resided within the town's Guardian Core, emerged in a shimmer of light and knelt beside Gwydox.
"You should've told them sooner, Kaizen," she said softly, tracing her fingers along the scarred cobblestone. "If that code wasn't erased completely, what else did Rowan leave behind?"
"I don't know," I admitted. "But one thing's certain—this isn't the end."
Aero opened a secure voice channel and projected a quarantine signal across the server. "From this point onward, all chaotic items are classified. No trades, no duplications, no market exposure."
Akil added, "And if any more anomalies emerge… we act immediately."
Zaphro stepped forward, exhausted but unbroken.
"Then you better start preparing," he said. "Because that fight… that wasn't just a bug. That was a test. Rowan's not done."
For a moment, silence fell over the square again.
Until Gwydox chuckled. "Damn right he's not. And if that psycho GM wants a war, he better know—we're bringing an army."
The players around them slowly began to cheer. From fear to fire, the spark of resistance ignited.
Dan grinned and nudged Zeke. "Looks like we're celebrities again."
Zeke smirked. "Not the kind I wanted."
The camera drones resumed recording. From the ashes of the battle, new alliances formed. The GMs exchanged grim looks and quietly began extracting deeper logs from the core of the anomaly's remains.
Somewhere, deep in the dark layers of code no one dared explore, an old admin tag flickered back to life:
ROW4N_LIVES.EXE
The war for Enigma Online had just begun.