The streets of Silverport were teeming with people; even though it was only a Level 2 city, to Brynn, every step she took in that human body felt like an insult to her former grandeur.
Dressed in her dark, sophisticated attire, with blue and purple accents that highlighted her pale, aristocratic silhouette, she walked with elegance, but inside, fury still simmered as she thought of the Players who had killed her.
As she passed through the city gate, her muscles burned in a reminder of the disastrous hunt she had just faced in the forest.
As the Glass-Shelled Queen, she possessed a massive body over a meter tall, protected by an iridescent shell that turned Level 10 monster attacks into nothing more than minor scratches.
Back then, she saw her beetle form as something akin to a curse, a "stinky, ugly body" that Elysium’s AI had forced her to use.
Today, she realized just how bitter that mistake had been.
She tried to hunt a simple pack of gray wolves to regain the experience lost after her death. In the past, Brynn wouldn’t even have to move... she would send a wave of scouts coordinated by her absolute will, treating the prey as "snacks" for her children—which, though not involving a direct attack from her, still yielded experience from a distance.
But now, without her army, reality was cruel.
She felt the weight of gravity, the fragility of human skin, and how quickly her stamina was draining. What she had once been able to accomplish with a simple mental command now demanded great physical effort, precise dodges, and the constant risk of a real wound that hurt just as much as in the real world!
Her [Matriarch] class, though still classified as Epic, at this point felt like empty armor.
Without the biological control she had over the beetles—even before she could inject his Mana into the monsters she encountered—these creatures attacked her desperately, refusing to stay still for her to inject the Mana and constantly trying to strike her.
Unable to concentrate on injecting the Mana, Brynn couldn’t control the creatures and had to kill them all so far.
She felt the abilities pulsing in her Magic Core, ready to inject life essence into other creatures and coordinate complex attacks, but there was no one to receive her orders.
She was a Matriarch without a hive, merely a shadow of the power she once possessed...
’I’ve lost everything...’ she thought, clenching her fists as she watched the Silverport adventurers flaunting their weapons and mounts. ’That damned Slime...’.
The memory of Halon and the white fox tearing into her unprotected abdomen still made her shudder with hatred.
She realized that, although she had regained her human appearance and retained her class, she had lost the qualitative advantage of being the center of an ecosystem.
Brynn knew that with an Epic Class, she could apply to a guild and get the subordinates she so desperately needed, but in doing so, she would lose the initiative and become nothing more than a useful pawn for someone else.
’I can’t join a guild directly... or else I’ll just end up working for some big corporation like my father.’ She thought, looking at a group of people who clearly weren’t from around here, walking through the town square. ’But even if I don’t join a guild, I believe my Epic Class has enough value to warrant an equal partnership with others, right?’
With an idea in mind, Brynn smiled and walked confidently toward that group.
She smoothed her black hair with purple undertones and adjusted her dark, sophisticated outfit, walking with an aristocratic and confident posture, making no secret of her pride in her Upper Zone origins.
The Upper Zone wasn’t exclusive to the planet of Lohan, but a distinction that people in the Human Federation had adopted to refer to different classes of people.
Even if those Players were from other planets in the Human Federation, the way she carried herself alone would dispel any doubts about which Zone she belonged to.
As she approached the center of Silverport Square, the sound of agitated voices, heavy with frustration, became clear to her; she listened eagerly for any information she could glean from those people.
In the center of a group of fighters who clearly acted like trained soldiers stood a man who appeared to be between 30 and 40 years old, with light blond, almost white hair, a lean, slightly athletic build, whose weary features and large bags of fatigue under his eyes were contorted into a grimace of fury.
[Visual Representation Here and on Discord.gg/NunuXD]
"We spent millions of credits, bribed half of the Novice Villages, and for what?!" Ernesto roared, gesturing toward a holographic screen that still displayed the global announcement from Halon and Astralis Requiem. "We formed MY guild just a few days later, but the system barely gave us a mediocre reputation bonus! Where are the unique items? Where is the qualitative advantage Oracle promised for the vanguard?!"
Beside him, a woman of sensual beauty dressed as a mage kept her head down, trying in vain to calm her boss.
The other members of his guild, all already at Level 12, looked equally disheartened, worried that Ernesto’s anger might be enough to get them fired.
The salary they received for being part of the Hogue Guild was too good to give up, paying at least ten times more than their real-world wages.
Brynn stopped a few meters away, a cold smile playing on her purple lips, and then recognized the Hogue Group symbol emblazoned on the shoulder of their clothes.
Her father worked for large corporations; she knew exactly how to deal with men like that man... they were desperate for power that money couldn’t buy directly.
"You’re looking in the wrong place," Brynn said, her voice clear and laced with disdain—a tone that, though offensive coming from others, sounded merely refined when it left her mouth, cutting short Ernesto’s outburst of rage.
The Hogue leader spun around abruptly, his bloodshot eyes fixed on the woman before him. Siena and the soldiers tensed their muscles, but Ernesto raised his hand, intrigued by the aura of authority Brynn exuded and by the beautiful appearance of the woman in front of him.
"And who are you to interrupt the Hogue GUILD?" Ernesto asked, his voice cold and dangerous.
"Someone who understands the reason for your failure," Brynn retorted, stepping forward. "You have a numerical advantage and obviously very capable Players, but I believe that among you there is no one with an Epic Class capable of coordinating this brute force. You are an army of generals without a central mind."
Ernesto narrowed his eyes. The mention of an Epic Class was something few Players would dare to use as a bluff.
"I am Brynnear, bearer of the Epic Class Matriarch..." she continued, letting the name of her class hang in the air with the weight it deserved. "My abilities allow for the injection of vital essence and absolute coordination of subordinates in real time. I can transform your soldiers into machines that ignore pain and overcome their own biological limits, surpassing the limits that mere low-rarity Bases could never reach."
She paused, watching the shock wash over Siena’s face and the gleam of greed in Ernesto’s eyes.
Then she continued, with a move she was certain would be fatal after what she’d overheard from their conversation. "But perhaps you know me from somewhere else."
This made Ernesto raise an eyebrow in curiosity, following Brynn’s delicate finger pointing at the glowing screen still floating in front of him.
The man’s eyes narrowed, and a daring idea came to his mind. "Are you the Player killed by Halon?!"
Hearing his guess, Brynn widened her smile even more and nodded with a murderous expression that mirrored the hatred Ernesto had just shown.