The capital of Earl Steim's territory, Frontier, was a city that never truly slept. It was a sprawling, vertical metropolis of soot-stained stone and hissing steam, a place where the jagged ambition of ten thousand merchants clashed daily with the polished steel of the kingdom's finest knights.
In the heart of this urban labyrinth, where the air smelled of ozone and roasted meat, Euphemina felt like a ghost haunting a treasure vault that had been stripped bare.
For a full week, the "Duplicator" had practically lived within the cacophony of the markets. She had scoured every rickety stall in the back alleys, interrogated every tight-lipped NPC librarian in the Great Archives, and refreshed the Auction House interface until her eyes burned with the physical fatigue of a thousand glowing menus.
Her gold—6,500 pieces, a sum that could buy a small lordship in the outskirts—sat heavy and useless in her inventory.
She was looking for an Orb Production Method.
In the world of Satisfy, orbs were the undisputed pinnacle of magical catalysts. Unlike staves, which focused power, or grimoires, which expanded utility, an orb acted as a secondary heart for a caster, amplifying mana density and allowing for the theoretical "threading" of simultaneous spells.
But the blueprints for such items—especially high-level or Unique-grade ones—seemed to have vanished from the server entirely. The difficulty of obtaining a production method for a specialized class item was like trying to pluck a specific star from a galaxy of distractions.
"Ohh… in the end, all my efforts are in vain," Euphemina whispered, her shoulders slumping as she leaned against the cold, damp stone wall of the Auction House. "Is crafting really that rare? Or is the system just mocking me?"
She thought of her dealings in Winston, of the enigmatic and prickly blacksmith she had encountered, and the massive profit she had turned through Rabbit's schemes.
To any other player, she was the pinnacle of success. To herself, she was a stalled engine. Without a high-tier orb, her growth would hit a ceiling she wasn't prepared to acknowledge.
But as she pushed off the wall to head toward an inn, her expression suddenly stiffened. The weary slumped posture vanished, replaced by a predatory stillness.
Over the last forty-eight hours, a sensation had been crawling up her spine—a microscopic prickle of awareness that her unusually high Insight stat refused to ignore. It wasn't the clumsy gaze of a fan or the lingering stare of a thief. This was systematic. Professional. It was the feeling of a predator measuring the distance to its prey's jugular.
'Who is it?' Euphemina wondered, her mind racing through a list of enemies.
She was a secret ranker, a shadow in a world of spotlights. She had meticulously hidden her name from the Fame, operating under a dozen different aliases to avoid the very situation she now found herself in. To the world, she was "Erina" the blacksmith, or "Mia" the merchant, or "Lina" the traveler.
"It is unpleasant…" she muttered, her voice dropping an octave.
She turned a corner, intentionally steering away from the main thoroughfare and into a secluded, narrow alleyway where the light of the magic lamps didn't quite reach.
Here, the sounds of the bustling market were muffled by thick, damp brick and the drip of condensation from overhead pipes. She stopped dead in the center of the gloom, staring into seemingly empty air.
"Come out," Euphemina said. Her voice wasn't a plea; it was a command, cold and resonant. "I know you're there. You've been breathing down my neck since the North Gate. My patience is not a renewable resource."
Inside the shimmering veil of the [Stealth] skill, Faker's heart skipped a single, rhythmic beat.
He was the number one ranked assassin in Satisfy, a prodigy who had ascended the rankings with terrifying speed, dethroning the legendary "Old Sword Demon" in less than a year.
His movements were not merely quiet; they were silent. His presence was not merely hidden; it was non-existent. At Level 7, his Mastery of Stealth was considered a masterwork of digital concealment.
'Surely, she didn't see through me?' Faker thought, his muscles tensing like coiled springs. 'A blacksmith—even a high-leveled one—shouldn't have the perception required to detect a Master-tier Assassin.'
Keeping his eyes locked on the girl's back, he flicked open the Tzedakah Guild's private party chat with a mental flick.
> (Faker): Does it make sense that she is referring to me? It must be one of you guys being sloppy.
> (Ribon): Don't make me laugh, Faker! We're three roofs away and downwind. We're at a safe distance!
> (Zeldark): ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ The Great Faker, the "God of Shadows," discovered by a mere blacksmith? Your pride is showing, man. Maybe you tripped over a bucket?
> (Horyu): Wait. Look at her head, Faker. She's staring exactly in your direction. Angle of incidence is 180 degrees. Did you get too close?
Faker didn't reply. The Tzedakah Guild had been hunting the player known as "Erina" for a week. Based on portraits drawn from witness statements in Winston—blonde hair to the waist, roughly 160cm, strikingly beautiful—Faker had finally cornered the target in Frontier. Jishuka's orders had been absolute: "Watch her until I arrive. Do not engage. We need her skills."
But the target wasn't acting like a blacksmith. She wasn't looking at the masonry or the metalwork of the alley. She was looking at him.
"Don't peek at me like a pervert," Euphemina said, her voice snapping like a whip. "If you don't come out, I'll make you come out. And I promise, you won't like the method."
Faker held his breath, forcing his heart rate down to nearly zero, entering a state of biological stasis. 'She's bluffing. It's a common tactic for high-level players who feel a presence—they shout into the dark hoping for a flinch.'
Peeeong!
The air didn't just vibrate; it shattered. A massive explosion of compressed mana erupted in a three-meter radius around Euphemina. It wasn't a fire spell or a frost nova—it was pure, raw kinetic energy. The shockwave slammed into the alley walls, cracking the brick and sending heavy debris flying.
"Kuk!" Faker hissed.
The physical displacement of the air was too much for the Stealth skill to compensate for. The distortion became a silhouette, and the silhouette became a man. Faker tumbled backward, his concealment shattered by the sheer, blunt force of the magic. He landed in a crouch, daggers already in hand, but his eyes were wide with shock.
Euphemina wasn't finished. She turned, her eyes glowing with a predatory, lilac light that seemed to swallow the shadows of the alley. She didn't reach for a hammer. She raised her hand like a conductor.
"Angel's Scream."
BIIIIIIIIIIK!
A high-frequency ultrasound wave tore through the narrow corridor. It wasn't a sound one heard with ears; it was a vibration that resonated in the marrow of the bones. Faker's equilibrium vanished instantly. The world tilted forty-five degrees to the left. His eardrums vibrated with agonizing pressure, and a thin, crimson trickle of blood began to leak from his ears.
Euphemina stared at him, her gaze blank and terrifying. "Who are you? Why are you watching me? Are you with the Mero Company, or just another bottom-feeder looking for a payday?"
Faker gritted his teeth, the world spinning in nauseating loops. 'How? How can a blacksmith use top-level magic with no chant? No staff? No circle?'
In that moment, Faker realized the Tzedakah Guild's intelligence was not just flawed; it was a catastrophe. The portrait matched the girl perfectly, but the class was a hallucination.
He moved. He didn't have a choice.
[Shadow Step]
Faker blurred into dozens of dark afterimages, circling Euphemina at a speed the human eye was never meant to track. The damp air hissed as he cut through it. As he passed her flank, he reached out with lightning reflexes—not to kill, but to identify. He snatched the hooded hat from her head.
The long blonde hair spilled down her shoulders, shimmering even in the gloom. Her face matched the portrait perfectly, but as the "Erina" disguise faltered under the combat state, the system-generated ID floating above her head finally updated.
It wasn't "Erina."
It was Euphemina.
'We fell into a trap,' Faker concluded instantly. 'Someone fed us false information to lead the guild away from the real blacksmith. This woman… she's a monster in her own right.'
"Give it back," Euphemina said, her voice trembling—not with fear, but with a cold, simmering rage. She snatched her hat back from Faker's hand with a speed that shouldn't have been possible for a caster.
"Why are you stealing my things? All the men I meet lately are psychos. First that grumpy, arrogant blacksmith in Winston, and now a voyeuristic thief."
Faker's eyes narrowed, his daggers held in a reverse grip. "What guild do you belong to? No solo player carries that kind of mana density."
"I don't understand what you're talking about," Euphemina replied, her lilac eyes flashing. "You followed me for two days. You threatened my space. Now, I'm going to fix that nasty head of yours. Lightning!"
KWAANG!
A bolt of pure, blinding white electricity fell from a cloudless sky, funneled down by the narrow alley walls. Faker flickered away, his afterimages being vaporized by the strike. The smell of ozone filled the air. He appeared directly behind her, his dagger aimed at the base of her neck—the flat of the blade, intended to stun.
"Unfortunately for you," Euphemina said, her voice calm as she stood perfectly still, "I won't fall for the same technique twice. I've already memorized your rhythm." She didn't turn. She simply slammed her palm backward into his abdomen.
PEENG!
A burst of concentrated flame erupted from her palm, engulfing Faker's torso. But Euphemina's eyes widened slightly. There was no resistance. No weight of a body.
"The same technique can be applied differently," a voice whispered in her ear.
The "Faker" she had hit dissolved into gray smoke. The real Faker was already behind her, his body twisted into a low, powerful arc, his leg mid-swing.
PAKAK!
"Ugh!"
Euphemina groaned as the kick caught her squarely in the ribs. The force sent her tumbling across the wet cobblestones, her expensive robes staining with mud and soot. She skidded ten meters before slamming into a stack of empty crates.
Faker stood his ground, his expression a mask of professional indifference. "It's impressive that you can use magic without chanting, and your reaction speed is top-tier. But you aren't my opponent. You're a magician. Once an assassin closes the gap, the math is simple. It's over."
Euphemina sat up slowly, wiping a smear of blood from her lower lip. A strange, haunting smile began to spread across her face. She felt a thrill she hadn't felt since her last Class Quest. This man was a monster. A true high-ranker. He was exactly the kind of "source material" she needed.
"It is only a moment of elation," she said, her voice dropping to a low, melodic whisper. "You think you've seen my class? You've only seen my morning routine."
"Ancient Queen's Knight."
A pillar of absolute black light erupted between them, freezing the moisture in the air. Faker recoiled as a knight in obsidian plate armor, wreathed in undulating dark smoke, materialized in mid-air. It had no face, only a void where a visor should be.
"A familiar?!" Faker gasped, his Shadow Step cooling down. "You're a summoner?"
The Knight let out a guttural roar that vibrated the very stones of Frontier. It reached into the darkness swirling around its waist, pulling the shadows into the physical shape of a massive, jagged greatsword. It swung with the terrifying momentum of a falling mountain.
KWAANG!
The brick wall behind Faker shattered into fine red dust. He danced backward, his heart hammering. In mid-air, he flicked his wrists, launching three poisoned daggers toward Euphemina.
'She's a caster. She can't dodge while maintaining a summon.'
But Euphemina didn't cast a shield. She didn't even flinch. Instead, her body blurred. She shifted her weight with the fluid, unnatural grace of an assassin, her afterimages mimicking Faker's own [Shadow Step] with haunting accuracy.
The daggers whistled past her, hitting the ground and exploding in a burst of anti-magic energy that she simply stepped around.
Faker's blood ran cold. 'Summoning? High-tier Magic? And now my own Assassin techniques? What the hell is this woman?'
"We're going to help!"
The silence of the alley was shattered as three figures dropped from the slate rooftops like heavy stones.
Ribon, Zeldark and Horyu. They landed in a perfect triangle around Euphemina, their weapons drawn and glowing with active skills.
"Are you still insisting on a one-on-one, Faker?" Ribon shouted, slamming his heavy shield into the ground, creating a [Fortress Zone].
"She isn't an opponent you can win against alone! Look at that summon—it's at least Level 250 stats!"
"Don't ignore us just because you want the glory!" Zeldark added, his two-handed sword humming with a blood-red aura.
Euphemina looked at the four of them. These weren't just players; they were the Tzedakah Guild—the elite of the elite, the hunters of the rankers. Any other player in Satisfy would have surrendered or looked for an escape route.
But Euphemina had spent the last month traveling the continent, duplicating the ultimate skills of every high-ranker she encountered. Her "Skill Slots" were full of the most broken, over-powered abilities in the game. She was currently in her Strongest Mode.
"You brought friends," Euphemina said, her blonde hair whipping in a magical wind that began to swirl around her. Her lilac eyes were now glowing with the stolen power of a hundred different legends. "Good. I was worried I'd have to hold back. Dragon Claws!"
The earth beneath the Tzedakah Guild's feet didn't just shake; it erupted. Sharp, massive stone pillars shot upward in a jagged, rhythmic sequence, forcing the elite guild members to scatter like leaves in a storm.
"Meteor Shower!"
Euphemina didn't stop. She pointed a single finger at the narrow strip of sky visible between the buildings. The clouds over Frontier turned a bruised, blood-red color. Tiny, white-hot fragments of fire began to rain down with the density of a monsoon.
"She's using Great Spells in succession?!" Horyu yelled, raising his shield to intercept a falling meteor. The impact nearly drove his knees into the cobblestones. "There's no cooldown! There's no mana depletion!"
"No way…" Zeldark muttered, dodging a stone pillar only to be met by the whistling arc of the Ancient Queen's Knight's blade.
Euphemina stood at the epicenter of the destruction, her expression one of calm, focused divinity. She wasn't just a player; she was a mirror, reflecting the collective power of the world back at those who dared to corner her.
The Tzedakah Guild had come looking for a blacksmith, but they had found a disaster.