Artillery in the rear fired without pause, hurling shell after shell into positions already flooded with Slime Mold.

Though the trenches were drowning, no matter how Thea urged its spawn forward, it could not overrun the line.

The gunfire never ceased. Even after losing half their numbers, the players refused to retreat, instead pushing forward, again and again.

Inspired by the shelter residents fighting at the front, even the NPC soldiers unleashed astonishing courage, charging to reinforce the lines.

The battle reached a stalemate.

Every street had become a meat grinder, both sides throwing in everything they had to seize every last meter before the final defense line.

When everyone was still fighting intensely, something unbelievable happened. The Tide just upped and left in the midst of fighting!

The Mutant Slime Mold suddenly turned back. Cunchers, Creepers, even Rotten Knights... All of them retreated like a receding sea.

Panting heavily at the middle sector of the 4th position of his Defense Sector, Kakarot reloaded his rifle and glanced out the shattered window toward the street below.

When he saw the Crunchers suddenly turning tail and retreating, Kakarot’s face filled with surprise. “What the hell?”

The Tide was retreating?!

Last year, when the Tide arrived, it had taken them days of brutal fighting, pushing forward step by step, all the way to the Mother Body that wouldn’t stop spawning creatures, killing it before the Tide finally ended.

He was just getting into the groove. So why were the enemies running away now?

Beside him, Broken Leg Kevin looked just as dumbfounded, his expression as if the sun had risen from the west. “Did Thea chicken out?”

Watching the creatures pour out of the buildings and pull back, Kakarot shook his head with a complicated look.

Just then, the voice of Spring Water Commander came through the communication channel. “... Mosquito reports Slime Mold retreating toward the north of the second ring. I think the Burning Corps really did it... Damn... They actually succeeded!”

There was a hint of awe in his voice.

To be honest, though he had supported Ample Time’s Operation Bodyguard, he had always been doubtful about that man’s idea of storming the city center.

Maybe he just didn’t understand the game deeply enough.

In his view, for a game still in closed beta, there was no way those developers would let players kill the city’s final boss.

Wouldn’t a simple immune mechanic make more sense to protect the main boss?

Yet, against all logic, the developers had been that generous. Just like the “anything is possible” line in Ample Time’s original pitch, as it turned out, he wasn’t kidding.

If they could finish off Thea, then from that day on, the Tide might become nothing more than history, at least for Clearspring City.

“What’s our move?” Kakarot tapped his helmet and asked.

After a moment’s thought, Spring Water Commander answered without hesitation.

“Chase.”

Broken Leg Kevin blinked. “Chase them? Now?”

“That’s right!” Spring Water Commander said firmly. “This is the best chance we’ll get. The Death Corps have reached the edge of the second ring and the Skeleton Corps is moving up as well. If we can keep these little bastards from retreating, we’ll wipe them all out, young and old alike!”

“Heh, now that’s my kind of plan!” Kakarot grinned, chambered a round, switched to team-wide comms, and shouted at the top of his lungs, “Brothers! The Tide is retreating, time for the counterattack!”

“Change the BGM!”

As if on cue, the static-filled radio suddenly switched to a familiar tune.

It was the whistle that accompanied every start of war in the past when the administrator was still personally leading the charge.

As it echoed across the smoke-choked battlefield, players who were moments away from collapsing found themselves suddenly reawakened, their blood surging with raw adrenaline.

Their earth-shaking roars scattered the dust hanging in the streets.

Every player charged forward like they’d been injected with pure rage, chasing the retreating fungus down the avenues.

“Kill them all!”

“RAAAAAAAGH”

The soldiers of the First Corps standing on the line stared, dumbstruck, at the sight of the red-eyed, battle-crazed shelter dwellers charging after the retreating Tide.

Li Shudong swallowed hard, his eyes wide with shock and awe that soon turned into pure reverence.

Those were true warriors. They didn’t fear death, and they were untouched by fatigue.

Their courage was infectious. His blood boiled with it, and before he knew it, he was shouting a phrase he didn’t even understand the meaning of.

“Kill them all!”

...

As the Storm Corps and First Corps began their pursuit, the second ring of Clearspring City erupted into a full-scale counteroffensive.

While Thea struggled desperately to redirect its children and hold against the simultaneous pressure from two fronts, Falling Feather and Little Feather’s devouring of the Main Mother Body was drawing to an end.

That fading consciousness no longer pleaded for mercy, only screamed curses before sinking into endless darkness.

Falling Feather felt his awareness melting into Its body, flowing through Its veins and spreading throughout Its vast form.

Gradually, he began to feel not just the body... but what lay beyond it.

The billions of spores drifting through the air were like his sensory tendrils. Through those floating neurons, he could sense every Mutant Slime Mold, every one of its children.

That included Thea, and the Slime Mold crawling over the walls.

He saw clearly how that same Thea, the Main Mother Body’s most beloved child, was now staring up at him with eyes full of terror.

It was as though he was the monster.

And at that moment, a word he had only ever seen in novels flashed through his mind.

“Is this... possession?”

It felt like the most fitting description.

Realizing that, a thrill of ecstasy coursed through him.

Ignoring Thea’s fear, he focused his will, merging deeper into that vast sea of consciousness.

Then, suddenly, a streak of blinding white light pierced his awareness.

With a deafening boom, his body felt as if it were yanked violently into an endless void.

Losing all sense of his body, Falling Feather panicked for a moment, certain he had overdone it and was suffering the backlash of his actions.

But then, a gentle murmur brushed his ears, calming the storm in his chest.

“Yiwuu!” (Don’t be afraid. I’m here too!)

Taking a deep breath, Falling Feather looked toward the glowing white light floating beside his spirit form.

“Little Feather?”

“Yiwu?” (Yes?)

“Where... am I?”

“Yiwuuuu.” (This is its memory.)

“Its memory...”

Repeating the words, Falling Feather realized what they had devoured wasn’t just its body, but Its memories as well.

Curiosity stirred in him. What kind of memories did a being like that hold?

Then, tiny points of light began appearing in the surrounding darkness. In mere moments, the black void blossomed into a vast, endless starfield.

Floating amid the shimmering nebulae, Falling Feather’s eyes widened. Or rather, his consciousness did, since he no longer had eyes.

A bright star emerged from the starlit expanse. Beside it, a beautiful planet hung in space.

It was like a master-crafted sculpture.

Its land glowed a dusky red, its seas a vibrant green. Boundless rainforests covered its surface, teeming with flourishing life. Yet it wasn’t the usual kind of forest. The trees were colossal mushrooms, towering like living spires. The animals that roamed the world bore no resemblance to Earth’s creatures.

They were born from the soil, returned to dust upon death, and began the cycle anew.

All life fed upon Its filaments. There was no hunger, no killing, only perpetual play.

There was no food chain there, only a perfect circle.

In a sense, everything that walked, flew, or sprouted from the ground was the same. All were the children of the world.

And across the passage of ages, they had achieved eternal harmony. All things were nurtured by it, and in turn, all things nourished it.

Gazing at that beautiful planet, Falling Feather was transfixed, mostly because he had never seen anything like it.

“So this is... the Nucleus?”

It didn’t seem nearly as terrifying as he had imagined.

“What is this?” he asked softly.

A distant voice answered from deep within his mind.

“It has no name.”

“When your kind arrived... you called it Gaia.”