Chapter 86: [86] : Project Ragnarok, Corporate Desperation

Declan hit the manual disconnect button on his interface.

The massive stone courtyard of the Iron Bastion vanished in an instant. It was replaced completely by the darkness of the real world.

He opened his eyes. He was lying flat on his back inside the stolen corporate dive pod, hidden safely in his abandoned Sector 7 warehouse.

He pushed the heavy metal lid open and sat up as the cold conductive gel slid off his arms.

The air inside the warehouse didn’t smell like toxic rain or rusted metal anymore. It smelled like fresh roasted coffee!

Declan climbed out of the pod and his bare feet hit the cold concrete floor. He was still wearing the dark tactical jacket and the orange prison pants he had looted earlier.

He walked over to the center of the dark room.

Sloane was standing next to a makeshift table made out of a wooden shipping crate. She had a small portable camping stove set up and was pouring boiling water into two tin cups.

Kendra was sitting on a ruined car bumper near the heavy steel doors. She was casually cleaning the sights of her +10 Sniper Bow with a dirty rag.

Over by the far wall, the hospital bed was humming quietly. Mia was still asleep, but the life support machines were running perfectly. They were drawing their power directly from the Earth Sanctum’s magical grid.

"You’re back," Sloane said and handed him a steaming tin cup. "I found some instant coffee in the back of that ambulance we hijacked. It tastes exactly like dirt, but it has caffeine in it."

"Thanks," Declan took the cup. He took a sip. It did taste like dirt. He loved it!

"So," Kendra called out and did not look up from her weapon. "You went back in. Did the Iron Bastion survive the Abyssal Tide?"

"It survived," Declan said, leaning against a concrete pillar and letting the hot liquid warm his chest. "I expanded the borders. We own a ten kilometer radius now. Bram is currently building the heavy artillery."

Sloane stopped pouring her own cup and stared at him. She looked at his pitch black eyes and the dark corrupted veins pulsing on his neck.

"Declan. You look completely terrifying. You look exactly like your game avatar."

"Synchronization rate is at sixty percent," Declan stated flatly and flexed his dense fingers. "I am officially an Abyssal Sovereign in the real world now. Which means we don’t have to hide in this warehouse for much longer."

Far away from the dirty rain soaked slums of Sector 7, the situation was much less relaxed.

High up in the white glass spire of Apex Paradigm Headquarters, Director Sterling was rapidly losing his mind!

The massive server observation room was dead silent. The dozen technicians in white lab coats were typing frantically at their consoles, sweating profusely under the harsh fluorescent lights.

Sterling stood in front of the giant holographic globe projecting in the center of the room. He stared directly at Sector 7.

The power grid was completely shut down. The entire district was supposed to be a pitch black dead zone overrun by Level 20 Flesh Stalkers!

Instead, a massive pillar of purple light was shooting up from the center of the slums and completely defying their blackout order.

"Director," the lead technician spoke up, his voice shaking. "We cut the power. We cut the data lines just like you asked. But the anomaly’s safe zone is still completely active. He is generating his own magical energy grid."

"I can see that!" Sterling barked and slammed his fist against a sleek metal desk.

"He didn’t just hack the game. He brought the game’s physics engine into my city. He is sitting in a slum with the power of a digital Warlord and we are completely locked out!"

"It gets worse, sir," the tech swallowed hard and tapped a few keys to bring up a new graph. "We managed to get a brief ping off his biometric signature when he logged out a few minutes ago. His synchronization rate is climbing incredibly fast. He hit sixty percent."

Sterling froze. The color instantly drained from his perfectly manicured face.

"Sixty percent," Sterling whispered, absolute dread creeping into his cold voice. "That means he can pull high tier items right through the dimensional gap. He can pull Sovereign tier skills into reality."

"Yes, sir. Normal weapons will not work on him anymore. The Goliath Mechs were entirely useless against him at thirty percent. If he decides to march on this building right now, we do not have a conventional security force that can stop him."

Sterling straightened his tie. His eyes turned cold and entirely ruthless. He was a corporate oligarch, and he was not going to lose his monopoly to a random guy in an orange jumpsuit!

"Conventional forces are obsolete," Sterling said firmly. "Initiate Project Ragnarok."

The technicians all stopped typing. They looked at the Director in sheer horror.

"Sir," the lead tech stammered and pulled at his collar. "Project Ragnarok is highly unstable. Those subjects are not soldiers. They are death row inmates injected with Level 40 Wendigo DNA and heavy illegal cybernetics. They are completely mindless killing machines. If we drop them into a civilian sector..."

"There are no civilians in Sector 7!" Sterling roared, his professional demeanor shattering.

"There are only monsters and the anomaly! I want Player V erased from existence. I want his physical body turned into a bloody smear on the pavement. Deploy the squad immediately."

"Yes, Director."

Ten minutes later, the heavy roof doors of the Apex Paradigm tower slid open.

Three heavy stealth gunships lifted off into the toxic rain. They didn’t have pilot windows. They were entirely automated and controlled by the central server.

Inside the dark cargo bays of the gunships, massive figures sat heavily chained to the reinforced walls. They were eight feet tall!

They had pale grayish skin stretched tightly over thick cybernetic plating. Their jaws were unhinged and filled with jagged metal teeth, and their arms ended in spinning hydraulic saw blades.

They breathed heavily and drooled acidic saliva onto the metal floor. They were a horrific fusion of corporate tech and Grid monster code designed for one specific purpose.

The gunships banked sharply in the sky and headed straight for the glowing purple beacon of light in Sector 7.