Unlimited mana was a hell of a drug.
Ash Valor had never tasted the luxury of being treated like a true high-tier powerhouse until now. An army tens of thousands strong existed for the sole purpose of keeping his resource bar topped off.
They had organized themselves into tight, two-hundred-man batteries. Each unit featured dedicated tanks and healers, but their primary directive was simple: feed Ash every scrap of Mana and buff they could muster. The brass had promised a hundred of these mobile supply stations, but the actual count far exceeded that. These weren't random recruits either; each station was manned by high-level elite teams.
With a luxury setup like this, failing to put up absurd damage numbers would be downright embarrassing.
Orion and Roland Blackwood had thrown their full institutional weight behind him. Even the Ruinblade Guild, a powerhouse Ash had never interacted with before, alongside the independent classes of Southhaven, placed absolute, unquestioning faith in his bow.
"I won't let your efforts go to waste," Ash said, adjusting his grip on his bow. His voice carried across the command channel, firm and devoid of false modesty.
As one of the top ten powerhouses in Azure Prime, false humility was a liability. The only way to repay their trust was to turn the battlefield into a graveyard.
Ash downed a cocktail of buff potions, activated his personal defensive wards, and carefully stationed his dozen-odd skeletal summons in secure, out-of-the-way positions. How long this frantic grinding session would last was anyone's guess, but these next few days would decide the fate of Azure Prime.
"Push forward!" Ash shouted over the comms, his voice ringing with absolute certainty. "I've got your backs!"
He drew back his string. Meteor Volley—one hundred consecutive casts!
His massive Mana pool vanished in a fraction of a second, replaced instantly by a cascading flood of kill notifications and a steady, ticking stream of experience.
Blink.
He flashed across space, appearing at the next designated supply station. Instantly, the support mages pumped him full of Mana, his blue bar snapping back to full.
Another hundred-cast Meteor Volley ripped through the sky.
A relentless torrent of arrows from his Stormquiver rained down in a devastating deluge, blanketing the zone. A single wave of the bombardment pulverized thirty percent of the encroaching horde instantly, leaving the survivors clinging to slivers of health.
Before the dust from his arrows could even settle, the surrounding players lunged forward. Like a pack of hungry wolves, the Southhaven vanguard surged into the gap, throwing out a barrage of their own skills to finish off the stragglers.
"Holy sht! I just secured a Level 390 kill!" one vanguard player screamed in disbelief.
"An AoE skill just bagged me two Level 300+ mobs, and I'm barely Level 200!" another roared, laughing hysterically.
"Frontliners, focus on defense! Let the ranged units clean up the scraps!"
This was the ideal ecosystem of war—everyone got a piece of the pie, and everyone grew together. With Ash’s oppressive fire support, Southhaven’s casualty rate plummeted to near zero while their loot and experience gains soared.
Ash’s grinding speed was nothing short of monstrous. In a single day, his personal kill count hovered somewhere around thirty to forty thousand.
While many Awakened classes possessed zero-cooldown AoE skills, those abilities usually suffered from pathetic base damage, barely scratching the armor of high-level mobs. Ash was different. His jaw-dropping base stats, coupled with a legendary weapon, elevated Meteor Volley to a weapon of mass destruction.
With an effective attack power of over ten million—ranking him among the absolute peak of Azure Prime—each individual arrow in his volley struck for over a million damage. When those dense, overlapping projectiles slammed into the massive hitboxes of the monster horde, the result was sheer, unadulterated carnage.
Ash moved like a specter, cycling through all one hundred-plus supply stations in a matter of minutes while maintaining a ceaseless, devastating output of archery.
Orion might have had a big mouth, but his execution was flawless. The logistics between each supply node were seamless. He had even assigned several high-tier Assassins to shadow Ash, immediately shadow-stepping him back to safety the moment a volley concluded.
With infinite Mana, Ash was an existential threat. He was a localized natural disaster, redefining the flow of the entire battlefield. To call him a one-man army was an understatement.
Southhaven’s army of hundreds of thousands wasn't comprised of elite shock troops, yet they were currently advancing at an astonishing clip. For these lower-level players, this was a golden era of power-leveling. They gained several hundred meters of ground daily, their advance steady, predictable, and virtually bloodless.
At this rate, purging the horde from Wolfcrag completely was no longer a pipedream—it was an inevitability.
"Too bad those cowards are staying back," Ash muttered, staring toward the horizon. The Voidlords remained safely tucked behind the front lines, denying him any high-value kills.
He knew better than to overextend. Dozens of high-tier entities were undoubtedly lurking in the shadows, waiting for him to make a mistake. If it weren't for his death-substitution skill, he wouldn't dare spam his abilities so recklessly.
Once the siege pressure on Wolfcrag eases, Ash thought, I'll take Wolfpack-36 out for a proper hunt.
When it came to bagging Overlord-tier monsters, surgical strikes and stealth were always superior to brute-force frontlines. In a massive battle like this, his job was simple: sit back and rain hellfire.
Right now, his focus was maximizing his attribute point gains, and Wolfcrag desperately needed his DPS. Ash estimated that his presence alone had boosted their odds of surviving the siege by at least ten percent.
Hundreds of thousands of people working in perfect synergy toward a single goal—with Ash as the primary engine and benefactor. He relished the rhythm of it. Wherever he blinked, reliable tanks were already in position to absorb any stray aggro, and mana floods filled his reserves without him needing to utter a word.
It was an intoxicating way to fight.
With each passing day, his skills grew sharper, hitting harder. By the tenth day, the coalition had pushed the front line right to the shattered edge of the outer ramparts. Just a few hundred more meters, and they could reconstruct Wolfcrag’s defensive walls, sealing a massive phase victory for the siege.
Over those ten days, Ash accumulated an astronomical 400,000 War Merits and nearly 400,000 kills.
"Eighty thousand attribute points from raw kills alone in just ten days..."
That meant he was averaging forty thousand kills a day.
He immediately exchanged his 400,000 War Merits for four hundred Attribute Fruits, boosting his total stats by another 80,000. At this rate, his total attributes would easily clear five million in less than a month.
It was a staggering figure, made possible only because the entire coalition had funneled their collective resources into a single man. But Ash made sure they got their money's worth—his output eclipsed that of an entire elite division.
"The horde isn't backing down," Brett muttered, squinting at the horizon. "They're pouring in reinforcements."
It was an ominous sign. The enemy's depth was terrifying; they weren't just sustaining losses—they were scaling up. The level of the incoming monsters was steadily climbing, though for Ash, the escalating difficulty was offset by his own growth.
His Meteor Volley now covered a significantly wider area, its destructive yields scaling alongside his ballooning stats. Yet, even his godlike clearing speed felt like throwing pebbles into a rising tide. The sheer volume of the abyssal forces was infinite.
As they approached the ruins of the ramparts, the resistance stiffened dramatically. Every single inch of ground was bought with blood. Casualty rates among the Azure Prime defenders began to climb again, pushing the coalition to its absolute physical limits.
"We've come this far," a defender groaned, coughing up dust and blood. "Are we really going to stall out right at the finish line?"
At the critical juncture, Evan Valor returned to the battlefield.
Taking up a position on a shattered corner of the defensive line, he raised his hand. Two simultaneous casts of Frostfall Dominion erupted across the landscape.
The howling blizzard tore through the dense monster ranks, carving two perfectly straight, desolate channels through the living sea of black. These twin pathways traced the exact blueprint of Wolfcrag's original ramparts.
"He’s gotten even stronger," Ash observed, a sharp glint in his eye.
In the past, a single Frostfall Dominion would have left the tougher elite monsters standing. Now, the absolute-zero blast reduced everything in its path to glittering dust.
The construction crews of Azure Prime had been poised for this exact moment. The second the pathways cleared, construction materials were slammed into place. Two massive, towering ramparts materialized out of thin air, cutting the monster army in half.
[Wolfcrag Rampart Reconstruction Complete.]
[Rampart Level increased to Level 1.]
[Rampart Level increased to Level 2.]
Within moments, the system alerts flashed repeatedly until the fortification settled at Level 7.
With the physical walls restored, the broken spirit of the defenders was instantly mended.
Ash, Galehorn, Sera Ashford, and a host of other top-tier powerhouses vaulted onto the newly erected battlements.
Below them, the Lupine defenders let out a collective, deafening howl that echoed across the plains. They had actually done it. They had held the line.
Millions of Lupine warriors pooled their accumulated War Merits, instantly converting them into critical defensive resources. Heavy defensive towers materialized along the ramparts in rapid succession.
With their footing secure, the high-level combatants unleashed hell upon the forces outside the walls.
"Meteor Convergence!"
"Meteor Volley—120-cast burst!"
"Stormblade Torrent!"
"Wolf-God Domain!"
A dozens-strong barrage of ultimate-tier skills blanketed the area, vaporizing half the siege force surrounding the walls in seconds.
As the pockets of monsters trapped inside the city were systematically hunted down and executed, more and more defenders climbed onto the ramparts to join the defensive line. Looking out at the sea of cheering warriors, Ash felt a rare sense of surrealism.
From peak powerhouses like Evan down to the humblest crafting classes who had worked themselves to the bone to supply the front lines, every single soul had contributed to this victory. This was a miracle forged by the collective will of Azure Prime.
The siege of Wolfcrag had passed its most critical trial. For the Lupine race and the coalition at large, the strategic value of this victory was immeasurable. There had been no tricks, no clever schemes—just a brutal, attritional slog won through sheer grit, sacrifice, and the blood of millions.
The battlements vibrated with the deafening cries of victory, a mixture of pure triumph and solemn grief for the fallen.
"Phase one is done," Ash murmured, his eyes sweeping across the monstrous tide that still pooled beyond the horizon. "But the real nightmare is just beginning."
The toll of the defense had been horrific. Against an inexhaustible foe, how many more waves could they possibly withstand?
Still, he shook off the creeping dread. We have the walls. As long as we have the walls, we can fight.
If his rate of growth outpaced the enemy's scaling, he had nothing to fear. And right now, save for Evan, there wasn't a single person in Azure Prime who could match his rate of progression.
"Just hold on a little longer," Ash thought, looking back at the city. He didn't lack power; he lacked time.
While Wolfcrag remained a tinderbox, securing the ramparts was a monumental achievement. In a war of attrition, hope was the most valuable resource of all.
To capitalize on the momentum, the Stellar Pact issued a realm-wide broadcast:
[Azure Prime secures consecutive victories against the extraplanar invasion!]
[The reclamation of Grimwind Fortress and the destruction of the Spatial Conduit marked the opening salvo of our counteroffensive.]
[Today, the defenders of Wolfcrag have slain countless adversaries, fully reclaiming the city in a resounding triumph!]
[Let all races of Azure Prime stand firm. Every mob slain, every dungeon cleared, every potion brewed is a vital contribution to our collective survival.]
[To optimize our forces, Azure Prime will initiate strategic realignments across several territories. Vital personnel and combat assets will be concentrated in key strongholds to ensure an ironclad defense.]
"A 'strategic realignment,'" Ash muttered, a dry smirk touching his lips. "Nice way of saying we're abandoning undefendable cities."
To sell the narrative, Ash was dragged away from the front lines for a propaganda shoot.
Amidst the simulated thunder of spellfire and roaring artillery on the ramparts, Evan, Galehorn, and Ash stood shoulder to shoulder for a capture. In the final image, the realm's top powerhouses appeared to be sharing a casual laugh in the face of the endless darkness, looking for all the world like gods who could wipe out millions with a flick of their wrists.
In reality, the moment the shutter clicked, they plunged back into the meat grinder. Evan immediately returned to Peerless City via portal, where the fighting was rumored to be even more desperate than in Wolfcrag.
Even during the brief photoshoot, Ash had spent his downtime lobbing Meteor Volleys into the encroaching ranks.
With the walls secured, a steady stream of reinforcements poured into Wolfcrag. As the overall level of the defenders climbed, the pressure on the garrison began to ease.
Ash practically lived on the ramparts, pushing through exhaustion to anchor the defense.
After ten more days of relentless grinding, his total attributes hit a staggering five million. The coverage of a single Meteor Volley had expanded to nearly twenty thousand square meters.
As he cleared yet another sector of the siege, a crisp system prompt chimed in his mind:
[Ding! You have slain 1,000,000 Worldborn. One in a Million has leveled up.]
[One in a Million: Each Worldborn slain grants +3 to a random attribute.]
[Evolution Requirement for next rank: Slays 10,000,000 Worldborn.]
The talent upgrade was a massive game-changer. The years of slow, painful accumulation were finally yielding an explosive dividend.
With his newly amplified power, Ash became an immovable wall. Standing solo atop the ramparts, he could suppress entire legions. For the common soldiers, the sight of his solitary figure etched against the sky was better than any morale buff. As long as Ash Valor stood, the darkness would never breach the gates.
Every sunset brought a massive harvest of power.
By the end of the first month of the siege, Ash's clearing capacity had reached terrifying proportions. When his Meteor Volley struck, less than ten percent of the target field remained standing. His destructive potential was rapidly closing the gap with Evan's legendary Frostfall Dominion.
[Ding! Your level has reached Level 330. All Stats +100, Attack Range +20 meters, Attack +33,000, Attack Speed +0.2.]
Maintaining a blistering pace of nearly one level per day, the milestone notifications came like clockwork. On his most explosive day, his personal kill count surpassed a hundred thousand.
[Ding! Your level has reached Level 360. All Stats +100, Attack Range +20 meters, Attack +36,000, Attack Speed +0.2.]
Upon hitting Level 360, Ash dropped 500,000 War Merits to purchase five high-tier Attribute Gemstones.
A Level 1 Attribute Gemstone cost a hefty 100,000 Merits, but the ten percent boost to its corresponding stat was well worth the investment. Level 2 Gemstones offered a twenty percent boost but cost ten times as much, making the base tier incredibly cost-effective.
Once he slotted the gemstones and dumped his remaining Merits into raw attributes, his stat sheet looked absurd. He finalized his upgrade by pulling a set of high-tier Level 360 gear from the guild vault.
"An entire month of uninterrupted growth," Ash murmured, testing the draw of his bow. He knew exactly how precious this window of safety had been.
Throughout this month, Azure Prime at large had continued its steady retreat, with grim news arriving daily from other fronts. The atmosphere across the realm was suffocatingly bleak, but Ash’s personal outlook had never been more optimistic.
"From this point on, I can finally start carrying my own weight."
Having exhausted his pooled gold, merits, and consumables, Ash had pushed his combat capability to its absolute threshold.
[Ash Valor]
Level: LV360 (460,000,000 XP)
Total Attributes: 10,710,000
Attack Power: 18,690,000
Health: 21,000,000
Mana: 4,200,000
Defense: 1,213,000
Attack Range: 1,980 meters
Attack Speed: 28.2
Critical Hit Chance: 74%
Innate Talent: One in a Million (LV7) — Each Worldborn slain grants 3 random attribute points.
Phase Step: 40%
Damage Reflection: 35%
Skill 1: Tenfold Shot
Skill 2: Armorpiercer Level 2 (+20% Damage)
Skill 3: Crushing Blow (LV2) — 20% chance to deal double damage.
Skill 4: Meteor Volley — Each arrow deals 10% of Attack Power. AoE scales with Spirit.
Skill 5: Radiant Aegis — Lifesteal effect: 10%
Skill 6: Skybreaker Arrow — Combines all arrows into a single, devastating shot.
Universal Skills: Phantom Summon, Blink, Eye of Clarity, Ward's Bulwark, Damage Reflection, Granite Bulwark, Enthrall, Life Ward
[Ding! Your comprehensive combat power has reached Rank 2 in Azure Prime. You have unlocked the Achievement: Peerless Duo.]
[Reward: Attack Range +100, Attack Speed +1.]
His attack range now sat at an eye-watering 2,080 meters!
If he could have his way, Ash would gladly spend the next decade farming attribute points behind the safety of the walls. But the real world was far too cruel for that.
News from Peerless City was grim. The conflict had escalated to a terrifying pitch, already claiming the lives of two top-ten rankers. The capital of human resistance had teetered on the brink of total collapse multiple times.
Even Evan had been driven to the absolute edge, rescued only when Dusk Whitmore burned his ultimate Holy Ward to pull him back from the jaws of death.
"I'm Rank 2 now," Ash murmured. "Can't let Evan carry the entire world on his back forever."
But running off to Peerless City was a rookie mistake. It would only bottleneck their forces. Instead, Ash intended to turn Wolfcrag into a second meat grinder, forcing the abyssal command to split their focus. By drawing their gaze here, he would bleed off the pressure suffocating the capital.
He opened his communications. "Orion. I’m ready. Let’s start the next phase."
For the past month, Orion had pestered him daily for updates on his combat power, to the point where Ash had started ignoring his pings.
"Send me your stat sheet," Orion’s message flashed. "Now."
Orion knew the kid was growing, but he didn't realize the sheer scale of it. When the details populated his screen, a primal, unfiltered roar echoed from the guild leader’s command post on the ramparts.
"Holy sht! With stats like these, why the hell are we still hiding behind a wall?!" Orion screamed into the channel. "From this day on, the Skystrider Guild's target is the top two of Azure Prime! Even the Wolfking is going to have to show me some damn respect!"
The guild leader was practically vibrating with excitement. His guild had just birthed an absolute god.
"Ash, you magnificent, patient bastard! If I had half your power, I would've charged out there weeks ago!"
Ash offered a quiet smile. It wasn't about patience; his explosive growth was a recent development, fueled by the late-game scaling of high-tier gemstones and optimized gear. He had simply beaten everyone to the punch.
Yet, the future held even greater promise. With One in a Million yielding three attribute points per kill, he was essentially running a legal cheat code.
Upon crossing the Level 360 threshold, Ash prepared to step beyond the safety of the ramparts.
When he moved, the army of millions behind him would move too. The Lupine forces wouldn't hesitate to follow him into the fire.
Ash wasn't the only one who had grown. The surviving members of the Galeforce Squad had collectively breached Level 330, and the entire coalition army had experienced a massive surge in power.
A hundred miles of desolate, monster-infested wilderness separated Wolfcrag from Grimwind Fortress. To establish a secure buffer zone—a true Outskirts for Azure Prime—they had to purge this entire corridor. They couldn't afford to wait. If higher-level abyssal threats crossed over, they would lose their window entirely.
A massive, joint announcement flashed across the region:
[The Ruinblade Guild, Eternal Guild, and Skystrider Guild will establish a secondary network of Guild Grounds between Wolfcrag and Grimwind Fortress!]
[This region will be reclaimed as a multi-racial Outskirts. As territory levels scale, this corridor will evolve into a massive urban cluster! If one city falls, a dozen more will stand in its place!]
This was a true war of reclamation, tied directly to the survival of the entire realm.
[Defensive towers will secure every sector. We will build an impenetrable sanctuary where no beast may tread!]
The coordinates of the new territories were made public. Each major guild had committed to constructing a fortress city of their own along the trade artery.
Peering down at the black ocean of monsters from the edge of the ramparts, Ash felt a brief tremor of hesitation. Stepping into that abyss was madness.
But he was the only one with the strength to lead the charge. There was no turning back.
Ash wasn't a man for grand speeches. He simply raised his glowing bow high into the air, his voice amplified by the battlements' acoustic runes.
"We fight our way to Grimwind Fortress!" he roared. "But before we march, let's collect a little bounty!"
With his vastly expanded range and upgraded stats, things that were once impossible were now well within his grasp.
He turned to the master of shadows. "Declan. Care to assist?"
The enemy Voidlords had been keeping their distance, staying just outside his old maximum range. Ash suspected they were intentionally hovering on the periphery, teasing him to overextend.
"At your service," Declan Ward replied with a curt nod. The legendary assassin, who had once dwarfed Caden Marlowe in sheer prestige, now spoke with the easy deference of a subordinate.
"Good," Ash said. "Sera, Kyrin, prep your heavy artillery and watch for the openings. Galehorn, Orion—get ready to order the charge."
A powerful hand gripped Ash's shoulder, and the world blurred.
Flash! He was instantly transported several hundred meters beyond the wall.
On the first step, Ash loosed a devastating command.
"Skybreaker Volley!"
[Player Ash Valor has slain the Darkwater Swarm Voidlord. All Players in Azure Prime receive All Stats +20. All Players in Wolfcrag receive All Stats +100.]
With his current raw attack power, ten shots from his Skybreaker Arrow were more than enough to obliterate a Voidlord. And with his current Mana capacity, he could fire a hundred of them back-to-back.
Flash!
He bypassed the frontline entirely, landing nearly a mile deep into enemy territory.
[Player Ash Valor has slain the Golden Locust Voidlord. All Players in Azure Prime receive All Stats +20. All Players in Wolfcrag receive All Stats +100.]
[Player Ash Valor has slain the Abyssal Rift Voidlord. All Players in Azure Prime receive All Stats +20. All Players in Wolfcrag receive All Stats +100.]
[Player Ash Valor has slain the Crimson Gaze Voidlord. All Players in Azure Prime receive All Stats +20. All Players in Wolfcrag receive All Stats +100.]
Flash!
On the third step, he picked up five more kills in rapid succession.
Within a heartbeat, Ash had secured a flawless deca-kill.
"Enjoy the stats!" Ash laughed as the global buffs cascaded over the entire army. That quick sequence had just netted every defender in the sector an instant 5,000 attribute points.
After a few more rapid blinks, he was pulled back onto the ramparts. His Mana reserves began to refill rapidly under the healers' care.
But as he glanced toward his designated safety corner, he winced. Of his eleven Undying Skeletons, only six remained standing.
His Life Ward had been triggered five times in those few seconds. The death-substitution skill was worth its weight in gold.
Even now, Ash had no idea what kind of hidden traps or silent curses had targeted him out there. But he didn't care. The threat was neutralized.
He drew his bow and pointed it toward the distant horizon.
"To all defenders of Wolfcrag and Grimwind!" Ash's voice boomed across the entire front. "Break the gates! We unite the lines by sundown!"