God of creation system : The apocalypse

Chapter 10 : The encounter

XXV and Zhui's Story

( From Nathaniel's manga)

Zhui's POV

Deep within a vast, dark forest inhabited by various monsters, a Crimson Game was currently underway—the Dark Forest.

This place was frequently chosen as a game arena because, spanning the size of a hundred towns, its sheer scale made it the ultimate battlefield.

I was currently here for a Crimson Game. The match had barely started, but I was already bored out of my mind.

I opened my status bar and read the game information to find out what I needed to secure a victory. "There are still a hundred days left before the game ends. How boring," I muttered to myself.

If I hadn't been forced to flee from my enemies, I would never bother enduring this place.

The Hube possessed an exceptionally sharp sense of smell, and they had managed to plant a tracking spell on me. I had no other choice but to hide in areas they hadn't explored yet.

A moment later, growing tired of sitting at the edge of the cliff, I stood up and prepared to hunt some monsters.

From my vantage point fifty feet high atop the cliff, I didn't hesitate to throw myself over the edge.

It was the fastest way to get down to the lower levels of the dark forest.

I could feel the pure malice radiating from the black energy of the monsters that called this place home.

I balanced my body weight in midair to ensure a successful landing. As I drove my sword straight into the grassy earth, a powerful gust of wind burst outward, instantly drawing the attention of the surrounding monsters.

Barely a second after I landed, aggressive monsters swarmed toward my location to attack.

Without wasting any time, I struck first before they could even launch an assault. I moved with the lethal grace of a striking serpent, slithering fluidly through every path.

"Serpent Slash!"

With the razor-sharp edge of my blade combined with blinding speed, I easily sliced off their heads and slaughtered them.

Defeating the monsters in this area was effortless for me, largely due to my extensive combat experience against much stronger species.

Red flames suddenly erupted along the blade and anything it sliced, burning fiercely until the targets were reduced to ash.

"Everything here is just weak trash," I remarked, sliding my sword back into its sheath.

Frustration crept in. For the past day, I had only encountered low-tier monsters, and unlike other games, these creatures didn't drop any items. It felt like a total waste of the entry f*e I had paid.

Another problem that had been bugging me since yesterday was my daily meals. The red flames of my Sanitoshi blade incinerated anything its edge touched into absolute nothingness.

I quickly checked the rewards I obtained from slaying the monsters, and as expected, I only earned one point per kill.

At this rate, I'd have to slaughter a thousand of these creatures just to win back the thousand points I spent to enter.

With a bit of luck, maybe I'd manage to drop a decent item from my kills, but the lucky box rate in this game was a dismal one percent.

A short while later, as I walked deeper into the heart of the forest, a sudden noise caught my attention.

It was the sound of a man screaming and wailing, crying out desperately for help.

"What kind of noise is that?"

As I kept a sharp eye on the surroundings, I spotted a human man with white hair and tattered clothes.

He was running and crying, begging for his life as two monsters chased right behind him.

"Please, help me!"

"Anybody, I'm begging you!"

"I don't want to die yet!"

He was completely out of breath from exhaustion, forcing himself to run despite having nowhere near enough strength to survive this ordeal.

Predictably, the man tripped and tumbled across the ground, giving the monsters the perfect opening to lunge forward and devour him.

It wasn't my habit to meddle—especially when there was nothing in it for me—but for some reason, my hand moved on its own, gripping the hilt of my sword and drawing it free.

Habitual alertness took over, allowing me to strike the monster closest to my position.

"Crimson Burst!"

My sword unleashed a wave of red flames that slammed directly into the two monsters, engulfing them instantly.

The sheer power of my attack blasted their bodies into countless charred fragments, scattering the remains across the area.

I honestly had no interest in saving this guy, but what could I do? Things had already played out this way.

The man’s reaction made it obvious he was utterly stunned by what I had done, leaving him sitting frozen on the ground without a word.

Red flames suddenly flared around me, a deliberate display of my presence meant to intimidate any potential enemies and keep me ready for surprise attacks.

I whipped my sword through the air to extinguish the flames clinging to its edge, then took a step forward toward the miserable creature sitting before me.

"I never thought I'd see a weakling wandering around a Class-B game."

Without missing a beat, I told him straight up that weaklings like him had no place in a dangerous zone like this, especially since he lacked the strength to fight back. "You came to the wrong place. Nothing awaits you here except death," I stated.

I looked the man over from head to toe, finding absolutely nothing special about him that would justify him participating in a game at the top of the tower.

"From the looks of you, you aren't a warrior. Tell me, how on earth did you even get into this game?"

Instead of answering my question, the man was gripped by sheer terror and simply dropped to his knees.

He immediately began groaning and weeping, acting like a terrified child begging for mercy.

Puzzled as I was, I didn't dwell on it too long since digging into his background wouldn't give me any tangible reward.

The man continued crying and pleading for his life, explaining through sobs that he couldn't remember anything about what had happened to him or why he was even here.

His frantic reaction didn't seem like an act, especially since he looked moments away from death, doing nothing but crying as he ran.

I couldn't fathom what had happened to him, but a strange sense of pity washed over me. Despair was etched all over his face, yet he clung desperately to the will to live in the middle of such a hopeless situation.

Did he seriously think he could survive a place like this by running and hiding? He was practically walking meat dropped straight into a cave full of starving, savage beasts.

Moved by a flicker of sympathy for this miserable wretch, I drew my sword once more to put him out of his misery.

My blade was more than capable of ending a human like him in a single instant, granting him a painless exit before he had to endure any further torment in this dark world.

Seeing me draw my sword, the man panicked further, frantically trying to crawl backward away from me.

I coldly informed him that thousands of bloodthirsty monsters roamed this region, and at any second, he was bound to run into another one of them.

"Have mercy on me, please let me live!" he sobbed.

His desperate desire to survive was written all over his face, but this world showed no mercy to the weak.

"You really don't understand. Even if I let you live, nothing awaits you in this place except death."

A death filled with unimaginable anguish and agony. Even if he tried to hide, he would only prolong his own suffering, slowly devoured by fear, anxiety, and deep resentment toward the world. He would die here—if not torn apart by monsters, then starved to death with nothing to eat.

"Crimson Flame!"

Red flames erupted from my blade, unleashing a surging ball of fire that swallowed the man whole.

It was pathetic, but death was the only true escape from his miserable existence in this world.

I felt him thrash wildly within the blazing inferno, his screams echoing through the air. To my complete shock, his body hadn't turned to ash yet.

A moment later, he thrust his hands out of the fireball and miraculously broke free from the flames.

"Have mercy..."

"I don't want to die yet!"

I was utterly stunned. For the very first time in my life, I was witnessing a human manage to escape the Crimson Flame.

"Impossible... what kind of nonsense is this?"

I couldn't fathom how he survived my attack.

I sensed zero defensive energy shielding his body, yet he remained entirely unfazed by the destructive red fire discharged by my sword.

The man remained on his knees, pressing his head flat against the dirt to resume his desperate begging, while the red flames stubbornly clung to his skin, still flickering and burning.

The twin Sanitoshi swords—Rabaikasyu—were the sacred weapons of the royal Soul Eater clan.

They possessed divine flames capable of burning away the spiritual energy of living beings and reducing everything to absolute ash.

"So why is this happening? Why can't it kill a low-tier creature like him?"

The man continued whining and begging. He was pitifully weak, yet he was defying the ultimate weapon of the Khan clan.

I couldn't let this slide. It was a massive humiliation for my bloodline, and I needed to fix this immediately.