By the time the sixth day rolled around, the mood in Arc City bore no resemblance at all to what it had been on day one of the beta.
That first batch of five thousand players had started out like a scattered mob dropped into an unfamiliar world.
Some rolled around on the pavement outside malls swinging at thin air, some chased invisible Zombies through the park until they gave themselves a stitch, and others livestreamed the whole ordeal while wailing, "Is this thing secretly a murder simulator disguised as a fitness app?"
But by day six, everyone had gotten smart.
Solo wolves had become an endangered species; guilds that banded together sprang up along every street like mushrooms after rain.
The moment the "Armada System" — a nod to the old Honkai Impact 3rd tradition — went live, players started forming parties and grinding around the clock.
Shared experience, split assignments, pooled materials, rotating Stigmata schedules.
Someone had even color-coded an Excel spreadsheet listing exactly who was free to farm trash mobs during the day and who could hit elite spawn points at night.
Every refresh of the beta forum's front page turned up more posts just like it.
[OP: South District 3 needs a melee frontliner! Reaction A, Stamina B, night-owl schedule welcome. Guild covers midnight snacks, I'll grind three straight days!]
[Reply #1: OP look at me, Stamina C but I can spam '666' in chat, I bring morale value.]
[OP: Anyone here datamined the old scoundrel's drop tables? I've grinded my head off for three days and haven't seen a single fragment. He's absolutely got the drop rate locked server-side!]
[Reply #1: Quit whining, Old Su's just running us as free lab rats for that fifty-million bounty — unpaid AI training slaves, the lot of us.]
[Reply #2: Yep, we're cyber-slaves alright. Complaints aside — anyone want to run a pickup group at the Line 2 subway station tonight, 8pm? I'll tank aggro, katana build, just want a shot at farming the Sakura Blossom!]
That last post got a dozen pages of replies.
Because by day six, the five-star katana [Sakura Blossom] — the blade that had once made the entire server green with envy — was no longer absurdly rare.
Once the drop rate stabilized, the grinders and the lucky ones alike had ground it down from "server-wide legend" to "the graduation checkpoint for serious katana players."
Still valuable, still strong — but no longer something only one person on the whole server deserved to hold.
Except a new problem had cropped up.
Same blade. Not the same person wielding it.
Plenty of katana players had eagerly equipped the Sakura Blossom on stream, struck a pose close to Rin's, and tried to recreate that legendary one-hit kill on a tank-class monster.
"Watch closely, everyone — today I'm recreating the iconic moment, one slash to clear the screen."
Five minutes later, screams were coming out of the stream.
Some swung their first strike at empty air and got slapped dead on the spot by a Level 15 heavy-armored Zombie.
Some barely finished charging their iaido pose before a monster's heavy swing sent them straight to a gray screen.
One hardcore streamer with a "Ten Years of Hardcore Action Gaming" title card wiped seven times in a row, neck straining with the effort.
He finally slumped onto a bench in the virtual plaza, gasping like a fish just hauled onto dry land.
He yanked off his AR glasses, jabbed a finger at the screen, and unloaded.
"What the hell is wrong with this game?! Same blade, I even copied the exact wind-up on the light attack! Why does that Tofu Puff one-shot for tens of thousands of damage while I'm out here scratching two-digit chip damage?!"
The danmaku exploded with pure schadenfreude, mockery filling the whole screen.
[This streamer's play is straight-up giving me a brain hemorrhage.]
[Stop making excuses, being bad is the real sin here.]
[Do you even understand the value of a high schooler's hidden passive? You need a sailor uniform.]
[Recommend the streamer go back to school and brush up on high school physics — collision dynamics specifically.]
The streamer was so mad he nearly smashed his glasses.
The person who actually cracked the mystery wide open turned out to be a small-time content creator who specialized in breaking down action-game mechanics.
That night, he posted a twenty-minute frame-by-frame breakdown on his channel, with a title dripping in melodrama.
"Guys, case cracked! [Ordinal Scale] is hiding a broken high-tier judgment system — Perfect Deflect plus Break Exploit!"
He took apart Rin's clip from that night frame by frame, compared it against his own footage from over three hundred practice attempts, and arrived at a conclusion that made everyone's scalp crawl.
"Guys, put your pitchforks down, I'm losing my mind here."
A red targeting reticle hovered over the paused frame in his breakdown.
"To land a one-hit execution like Tofu Puff's, the key isn't the Sakura Blossom itself — it's landing a frame-perfect parry in the exact instant the monster's attack connects."
"One frame early and you eat the hit. One frame late and you're dead. The System isn't calculating a normal block here — it's calculating a perfect force-cancel."
"And then, the instant the enemy's stance breaks and its weak point opens up, you have to dump your full iaido damage into it in one uninterrupted burst."
"In other words —"
In the video, he paused for two seconds, sucking in a sharp breath himself before continuing.
"Tofu Puff isn't some rookie coasting on god-tier gear — that Reaction Speed could slice sparks off a piece of fruit! This is a straight-up reflex monster!"
The video went up in the dead of night; by morning it had already climbed straight to the top of the trending list.
The entire gaming community erupted.
[I'm sorry — one single frame? That's not human reflexes, that's inhuman.]
[Where'd all the trolls go who said she had someone playing on her account? Playing dead now, huh?]
[Pure bystander here, just finished the video, my knees are welded to the keyboard.]
[Sorry, Tofu Puff, I was a little too loud earlier. Didn't mean to interrupt you murdering monsters.]
[Where are the people who imagined some shady deal behind this? She's living off pure skill, and your keyboard math doesn't even measure up to her shoelaces.]
Overnight, public opinion did a complete about-face.
The same trolls who'd been sniping snide comments days earlier got chased down and mocked by a fresh wave of fans and gawkers.
The comment section filled up with nothing but variations of the same sentiment.
[Still saying she doesn't deserve the blade? Turns out the blade doesn't deserve Tofu Puff!]
[Miss Tofu Puff, please accept my knees!]
[Is that even human? That's not a person, that's a cyber-titan!]
Meanwhile, in real life, Rin's schedule had suddenly gotten hectic.
The instant the dismissal bell rang, the back rows of the classroom at Arc City Experimental Middle School practically exploded into chaos.
Before Rin could even finish stuffing her textbooks into her bag, her classmates had already crowded around, and even girls from the class next door showed up clutching milk tea to squeeze in by the doorway.
"Rin, baby! You went absolutely feral last night!"
"Sugar mama, come here! My roommate watched your iaido slash and started writhing on the bed like a worm!"
"Boss, does your parry have a wind-up? Don't rush off after you go offline, carry us a bit — I've been stuck at level twelve all day!"
"Rin, Rin, can I get some of that luck rubbing off on me? I've pulled ten white cards in a row!"
The voices piled up over each other in a chaotic mess.
Someone shoved a phone in her face — the screen showing a fan-edited clip from her viral recording last night, views already climbing toward the million mark.
Rin stood in the middle of the crowd hugging her textbooks, her ears burning red from all the noise.
She wasn't used to this kind of scene, and could only keep answering in a soft, quiet voice.
"That was... just the System's judgment."
"The monster really was huge."
"I'll probably stream again tonight..."
"About autographs, I'm actually not very good at that..."
Every word she said set off another burst of noise around her.
It was only when their homeroom teacher poked her head in from the hallway, textbooks in her arms, and snapped, "Blocking the doorway for a chitchat, are we? Whoever's on cleaning duty today, get moving!" that the crowd finally loosened up.
Rin fought her way out with her backpack, and the moment she reached the stairwell, her phone buzzed.
It was Carole.
She opened the message and couldn't hold back a laugh.
The fleet-squad that used to have a perfectly normal name — "Team Schicksal" — had been unilaterally renamed by Carole.
[Tofu Puff Fan Support Club]
A screenshot was attached below.
On the fleet-squad's announcement board, Carole had personally posted a message.
[Everyone listen up — log on before 8pm tonight to cheer Rin on against the world boss. Anyone who flakes gets fed straight to the Zombies as rations, or spends a week scrubbing fleet-squad toilets!]
Standing at the stairwell corner, Rin's shoulders trembled slightly as she typed a reply.
"Why do you keep changing the name without asking..."
Carole's reply came back instantly.
"This is called 'bowing to popular demand'! You're the face of our fleet-squad now! Besides, doesn't it have a nice ring to it? People take one look and know we're the real deal!"
A little emoji of someone laughing with hands on hips followed after.
Rin shook her head helplessly, powered off her phone, and headed out the school gates with her backpack.
The past few days, more than a few so-called esports guilds, streaming agencies, and gaming teams had reached out to her.
Some offered signing bonuses right off the bat, some promised full career packaging, and others hinted she should just drop out and stream full-time, saying things like, "Kid, being a student is just a piece of paper. Once the traffic wave passes it's gone for good — cashing in is the real name of the game, you get how this works, right?"
But Rin never seriously considered any of it.
She knew exactly how much effort her sister had poured into letting her go to school, do her homework, and live like an ordinary girl.
And she knew that the man who'd once tossed a wooden sword at her feet in an abandoned building and told her to get up on her own would never want to see her drop out of school and turn into some screen-addicted teenager who did nothing but chase leaderboards all day.
So she went to class as usual, did her homework as usual, and borrowed her classmates' mistake notebooks during breaks as usual.
It was only in the evenings that she started walking a little faster than before.
Because tonight, South District Arc City was launching a major event.
The moment she got home, before she even fully straightened out her school uniform, she left a note for Sakura first.
"Sis, I'm logging on. Just leave me a little dinner, that's fine."
She stuck the note to the fridge door.
She changed into her light workout clothes, pulled her hair up into a high ponytail, put on the [Skyward Eye], gripped the cylindrical interaction controller, and spoke in a low voice.
"Initiate link."
Her vision flashed.
[Honkai: Ordinal Scale]
The moment she connected to the server, a red coordinate-sharing request popped up in the top right corner of her vision.
Location: South District Arc City Plaza.
Sender: Carole.
Attached message: [Rin! Hurry up and get on your bike! The plaza's already packed, we're fighting for front-row space!]
Rin grabbed her keys from the entryway and ran out the door and down the stairs.
Not long after.
The sky had gone nearly pitch black, but the entire South District plaza blazed with a startling brightness.
Countless players stood along the streets, on rooftops, at abandoned bus stops, and around the plaza's edges, their IDs glowing densely overhead like a floating, man-made sea of stars.
The AR equipment had transformed the whole district into a half-real, half-battlefield space, red data streams surging between the high-rises, while a massive shadow blanketed the sky in the distance — as though something impossibly heavy were coiled behind the clouds.
The next instant, a server-wide announcement rang out.
[Highest-tier quest released]
[World Raid: Judgment-class Honkai Beast — Demon Dragon Benares]
In the crowd, Carole, wearing her signature leather jacket, hopped up onto a stray concrete block and waved toward Rin.
"Over here!"
Rin parked her bike and pushed through the crowd toward her. Carole jumped down and grabbed her wrist.
"Look at the announcement board in the sky!" Carole pointed up at the night sky.
[Flag-Capture Raid Rules:]
[Quest Duration: 72 hours.]
[Arc City is divided into three defense zones, each spawning a projection of a Dragon's Heart.]
[Player weapons cannot damage the dragon's true body. The Dragon's Heart summons guardian beast swarms with their own drop tables.]
[Killing the guardian beasts drains the Heart's energy bar.]
[When the 72-hour countdown ends, the final boss showdown is forcibly triggered.]
Rin looked up at the sky.
Behind that thick black cloud cover, Benares's massive silhouette flickered in and out of visibility.
It hadn't fully manifested yet, but even the mere shadow of those spread wings was enough to squeeze the breath out of anyone watching.
Carole licked her dry lips and pointed at a line of red text at the bottom of the announcement.
"Forget the rules, look at the bounty."
[World Boss Raid Bounty:]
[1. Base Clear Reward: A ten-million-yuan cash pool, split evenly among all participating players.]
[2. First-Kill Team Exclusive Drop: The server's only SSR-grade divine artifact — the [Skyward Authority]!]
[Bonus Attribute 1: Redeemable for five million yuan in cash.]
[Bonus Attribute 2: Highest Sequence authority — beta data inheritance.]
[Entry Description: Any player holding this item may carry it over into the official launch version once the game goes into full open beta and all server data is wiped.]
The crowd fell dead silent.
A few seconds later, players who'd been quietly munching on bread jumped to their feet, tossing their snack bags aside. Behind their glasses, the crowd erupted into a roar loud enough to blow the roof off a cement factory.
"Holy crap!! Five million??!"
"Wait, forget the rest — what the hell is this 'inheritance privilege'?!"
"You're telling me this gear carries over even after the open-beta wipe?!"
"So whoever holds it starts open beta day one already fully geared out, wrecking the entire server?!"
"That old scoundrel's lost his mind! Su Yu's actually lost it this time!!"
"Push, push, push!! Nobody's sleeping for the next three days!!"
Nearly every player's eyes turned bloodshot at the exact same moment.
Standing beside Rin, Carole was already burning with excitement, practically steaming.
She turned and clapped Rin hard on the shoulder, nearly sending her stumbling forward.
"I've already got the plan worked out — we're doing shifts!" Carole clenched her fists. "Daytime, you're in class. I'll take the support club and clear the regular summons around the perimeter, farming points."
"In the evening, once you're out of school and on your bike, you take the lead — we go clear out the elite mob strongholds guarding the Hearts!"
Carole reached out and clapped Rin on the shoulder again.
"The dragon's true body unlocks right on Saturday evening! You're off that day — that's when our fleet-squad grabs that non-wipe artifact!"
The [Tofu Puff Fan Support Club] members around them joined in the cheering.
"Yeah, yeah! Rin handles the big stuff, we'll take care of the small fry!"
"No sleeping tonight, why would you sleep — wake up and someone else already took the artifact!"
"If we pull it off, I'm renaming the fleet-squad to [Tofu Puff's Royal Guard] on the spot!"
Carole grew more and more worked up as she talked, her hair practically standing on end.
In the distance, in the real night sky —
the clouds tore open under the wind. A massive holographic silhouette of a winged demon dragon flickered in and out of the churning dark.
Rin rested her hand at her waist.
The holographic hilt of the Sakura Blossom pressed against her palm.
Her thumb pushed the tsuba loose, and a thin line of cold light glinted along the edge of the blade.
Rin nodded slowly.
"Alright."
She tightened her grip on the interaction controller, and the Sakura Blossom's virtual blade unfolded inch by inch in the darkness, pink light flowing along its spine.
The System's countdown began ticking, and under the watching eyes of every player, it finally hit zero.
With a dragon's roar that echoed across the entire district, the three-day world boss raid officially began.
The next instant, wave after wave of players surged forward like a broken dam, weapons in hand, charging toward the monster silhouettes spawning at the end of the street.
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