There was a gathering down below. Well, calling it a gathering probably wasn't exactly accurate, because it was nothing really of the sort. Instead, it felt like Zarek was suffering a bout of déjà vu.
There was a Hub down there. Even from this far away, Zarek could tell that it was a Gambling Hub that already had a couple of its six slices greyed out. There were only two items left to grab, while the other two were death zones.
'Is it a coincidence?'
Zarek had taken over a month and a half to get here, a bit faster than his original estimate, not thanks to Urouge and Eliz. But that already put him at over the two-month mark here, leaving him with just four more months to fulfill his promise to Priya.
Now there was this inconvenience here.
Should he wait it out and hope that someone cleared the other two sections? But who knew how long that would take.
That was a B Class Gambling Hub down there. The speed it was moving at wasn't a joke at all. And with a single slip-up, the threats that would be coming out wouldn't be a joke either.
The biggest problem was that of the two slices that were greyed, one was actually a death zone. Meaning, the Hub had already been triggered to explode once already. That meant that its threat level had ticked up a tier.
'What are these people? Amateurs?'
Clearly, not all of them were like Urouge. For the most part, the participants in this trial were guileless children without the slightest hint of intelligence during their waking hours.
Zarek was actually being a bit harsh. A skill-based Gambling Hub like this one of such a high Class wasn't easy to use. One of the reasons he hadn't already decided to just rush up was because he wasn't 100% confident in slapping down on the wheel at the right time this time either.
The situation back in the desert had been very different. That had only been an E Class Hub, and he had a C Class Scouting Skill to refine his senses at the time.
Right now, though, his C Class Scouting Skill was outdated, and that was a B Class Gambling Hub that was already quite angry.
But unfortunately, everyone else skulking around here knew that too. And none of this changed the fact that a Hub was a Hub was a Hub. Meaning… it would attract Turned as well.
The participants in the surroundings seemed to have killed the ones that had been here off, but from what Zarek could tell, the explosion hadn't been too long ago.
That was to say that the Godsfall coming from this Hub had only recently gotten a huge tick upward, which meant its range was wider and the Turned that would be interested in lurking around here would be much stronger.
'My luck really is something else…'
Zarek sighed, shaking his head.
He decided to refocus for a moment. If the map sent him here, what he was looking for had to be around here somewhere. Maybe there was a possibility of sneaking in?
He really didn't want a situation where he'd have to compete with others for whatever this was. However, as Zarek began to scan the region more and more, his heart dropped.
There was nothing obvious.
No hidden cave passageways, no rivers of water it might be tucked away in, just a Hub and a shit ton of snow. There were some dunes, hills of white that sloped up and down, but there was no telling if that was what he was hoping for either.
All the map was doing was pointing toward the Hub.
'You can't be serious.'
There were two possibilities. Help us out by reading on M|V|LEM5PYR.
Either the map was trying to tell him that there was something in the Hub that he would need at another location he'd have to trek to. Or, the Hub was actually somehow the exact thing he was looking for here.
Zarek didn't like either of those possibilities.
In the first case, not only would he have to put himself in danger taking a chance on a B Class Gambling Hub of all things, he would then likely have to go on yet another long journey. Worst yet, the next place he ended up at might not even be the final checkpoint.
How much time would he waste? Would he still be able to keep his promise?
In the second case, it was even more variable. There were three possibilities that Zarek could think of.
Maybe one of the rewards was a direct teleportation to where he needed to go. Then there was the possibility that the Hub's destruction might open up some sort of gap or passageway he needed to enter. And the wildest of them… well…
When monsters manifested from Gambling Hubs, they seemed to come out of a portal of sorts. What if he was meant to take the brief gap to enter one?
This second case was probably one that others wouldn't even think of, as the first case seemed to be the most obvious answer. But Zarek was too used to thinking outside of the box.
'This is really something else.'
Zarek shook his head and then eventually chuckled. Nothing was going to come easily, it seemed. In that case, there was only going to be one way out of this.
A wide grin spread across Zarek's face.
A pair of Lurker's Godsfall threads appeared in the palms of his hands, attaching to the cliff ledge he lay on. Then he stood to his feet, leaning back as far as he could.
A second pair of threads formed, then a third, then a fourth, then a fifth.
They layered on top of one another as Zarek continuously took one step back after another.
The moment his arms started trembling, Zarek kicked his heel back and up, slapping against the butt of the lance and sending it soaring over his head.
'Time to let my nuts hang.'
**BANG!**
Zarek suddenly shot out like a cannon, grabbing the lance out of the air. He slipped one foot behind the thickest coned section of the lance while balancing the other on the front portion, tilting it upward.
He soared through the skies as though he was riding on the wind, covering so much distance so fast that most of those in the surroundings didn't even register that he was there until he was already bearing down on the Hub.
Many were lurking in the surroundings, but there were some that were much closer by, separated from it by a distance of maybe a hundred or two hundred meters.
Some were alone, some sat in their own groups as though they were all waiting for someone to break the stalemate.
Zarek happily obliged.
The eyes of all of them finally focused.
"Is he trying to kill himself?" a dark-faced young man with an odd, leathery texture to the underside of his jaw and neck looked up with a frown.
—
**Name: \\[Indyana Vertex]**
**Role: \\[N/A]**
**Core Stats:**
> \\[Strength: B-]
> \\[Dexterity: B]
> \\[Intelligence: C+]
> \\[Endurance: B-]
> \\[Charisma: B-]
—
Zarek was flying through the air much too quickly, and he had come from such a large distance. It was obvious at a glance that he wasn't using his own power to soar like that, and even more obvious that it wasn't very well controlled.
The lance wobbled beneath his feet and wasn't designed to be ridden like that, while the man himself didn't seem to have wind affinity.
He had never seen anything so ridiculous before.
Another hurriedly stood, not putting as much thought into it as Indyana.
—
**Name: \\[Jakob Setler]**
**Role: \\[N/A]**
**Core Stats:**
> \\[Strength: B-]
> \\[Dexterity: B]
> \\[Intelligence: B-]
> \\[Endurance: B-]
> \\[Charisma: B-]
—
He wore a heavy red armor, the sort that should have made him fall right through the snowy plains he stood on. And yet, he glided over them as though he was as light as a feather.
Seemingly having seen through something the others hadn't, he was dashing forward with all of his might.
His hair looked like thin tendrils of fur-covered flesh as though it was formed from countless dog tails rather than hair. His pupils were pill-shaped and slashed horizontally around his amber irises, and the staff he wielded felt as heavy as a planet as it swung through the world.
High in the air, Zarek couldn't help but click his tongue when he saw Jakob's quick actions.
'Annoying.'
But it was something he was well-equipped to deal with nonetheless.
Jakob unleashed a roar, stomping down a foot while his staff suddenly extended. It shot across hundreds of meters, appearing before Zarek in a flash.
Luckily, the timing was about just right.
'\\[Angel Wing Flash].'
**Chi.**
**Chi.**
**Chi.**
Zarek cast three in a row in quick succession. Every time he did so, he used the momentum-stopping features of the Skill until he lightly touched the ground as though he had been there the entire time.
Kill himself with his own methods? How could he be such an amateur?
The Skill was designed to accelerate you beyond mach speeds and stop you on a dime. What Zarek did best was utilize the secondary and tertiary abilities of Skills and Talents at just the right time to take advantage of his enemies.
Without even looking back, Zarek slammed out a palm and the Gambling Hub began to spin.
His eyes had already gotten a closer look at the Gambling Hub. Seeing what the two items were, he had a few guesses, but none of them certain.
He could only gamble.
'In that case, I'll move forward like that's the answer.'
Zarek's palm shot forward again, swift and decisive.