Apophis’s party spent the next several hours clearing the tower floor by floor.

Eventually, they stopped to take a rest, and Apophis looked at his available Skill Points.

Apophis was still lvl 8, so he had 10 Skill Points available.

Rather than invest these points in the talent tree, he decided to evolve his skill ~Chaos Flame~ to a new, even more powerful form.

He clicked “upgrade,” then inspected the new skill.

[Skill] [Esper] [Rare] [Tier: 1]

Name: ~Demon God Flame~

Skill Summary: “An ember of the flames wielded by the Demon God. Very beautiful, but extremely dangerous.” Your flames are much harder to extinguish. 300% more fire damage.

*This skill can be upgraded for 50 talent points.*

***

Meanwhile, outside the dungeon, the video of the fight between Apophis and Ceasar was making the rounds of social networks. Seeing their incredible power boosted the motivation of many people who had not reached lvl5, making them eager to reach this level of power for themselves.

As it happened, the fastest way to gain experience with firearms was to kill NPCs.

However, there were no longer many easily accessible areas where players could freely hunt NPCs any more. Most big cities were in the hands of player guilds, which protected NPCs in exchange for taxes. The only location which hadn’t been overrun by players, one way or another, was “Tyo,” the planetary capital of the republic.

With this in mind, several hundred thousand players organized themselves into a raid and prepared to attack the capital!

On the forums, conversation quickly shifted from the Duel of the Titans to this new raid. Soon, everyone was talking about it.

Because of the huge scale, there was no actual leadership in the raid. It was more of a mob than anything.

In the media, many commentators were discussing this event with fascination. It would surely result in the end of the Tyo Republic. The question on everyone’s mind was, “Will this impact the game in a positive or negative way?”

***

Apophis’s party finally ended their break and realized that it was time for them to face the dungeon boss.

They prepared themselves to the best of their abilities, then entered the boss room…

Suddenly, a golden, humanoid spirit manifested before them!

Everyone stood there in awe, gawking at her incredible aura of divinity.

Apophis inspected the figure. To his unease, he was not familiar with this being. It was new to this second life.

[???] [lvl: 250] [Tier: S] [Hostility: ???]

That tier, and the mysterious way its information was hidden… This was surely one of the most powerful entities in the galaxy!

After a few moments, the entity spoke. “Hello my children. I am the Goddess Varda Elentári, one of the protective deities of the universe. The monster you are about to face is an abomination created by a malevolent God.

“I cannot, unfortunately, intervene directly without creating an open conflict with this God. I thus charge ‘you’ to eliminate this creature. Yet, be most careful! This creature bears one aspect of its creator’s power, the capacity to corrupt living souls.”

Quest Notification: Purification of Infamy [Secret Quest] [Grade: 5~10] [Difficulty: X-]

[0)ᴠᴇʟ Summary: Goddess Varda Elentári asked you to eliminate the creation of a malevolent God, a monster with the power to corrupt your living soul.

Objective: Eliminate the dungeon boss on your first attempt and without any party member dying. Reward: Gain 100,000 CG, 50 Skill Points, and your choice of unique Passive Skill.

Failure Penalty: Lose the ability to gain EXP for 30 days, and lose the ability to befriend NPCs of Good alignment.

Everyone stared at the goddess in shock.

A quest of difficulty X?! The potential gains were insane, but compared to the penalty for failure…

In the end, everyone wanted to give up, except Apophis.