OverLord.
If someone translated the name with a little more care, it would probably become something grand and imposing, like Doomguard. It was the kind of name that would not feel out of place on a powerful boss.
And now, an OverLord monster was twisting in the white snow haze not far ahead of Sinon, its low, ugly roar drowning out the wind.
The blurred black shape swung one massive arm down.
Snow and earth exploded under the blow. The impact reached Sinon through the ground, and the curtain of snow blocking her vision scattered for an instant.
Now she could see it.
A huge body, pitch black from head to toe, stood in brutal contrast against the white world around it. Its swollen muscles shone almost like metal, but they were clearly flesh. Between the bulging layers of muscle sat clusters of unpleasant tumors, as if the thing secreted slime every time it moved.
In this freezing temperature, the slime froze into crystals the moment it emerged. That left the OverLord coated in a thin layer of frost, and thanks to that white film, its appearance was a little less horrifying.
Only a little.
It was still the kind of monster that made the skin crawl.
It seemed to have started as some kind of bear, then mutated after viral infection, its body swollen to nearly half again its original size.
Of all the monsters Sinon had seen so far, this was probably the most savage. The enemies before this had included bio-soldiers, mechanical soldiers, and modified beasts like jackals, wolves, tigers, and leopards. A wild monster like the OverLord, something that looked as if it had walked straight out of a fantasy world, was rare in GGO.
Its mouth split open almost to the cheekbones, and a deafening roar burst out.
The OverLord thrashed its huge arms in a mindless frenzy. Getting close to it should have been impossible.
And yet Samuro did exactly that.
His thin body slipped into range with frightening agility, dodging through the chaotic attacks by margins that made Sinon tense just watching him.
Bursts of light and pulsing energy followed each of his movements.
The lightweight MP23 optical gun in his hand was a short-range blast-type weapon. Its range was almost useless. Five or six burning beams sprayed outward from the muzzle, which meant aiming at anything more than five meters away was basically hopeless.
On the other hand, if someone took a shot from point-blank range and all those beams landed at once, the damage would be high enough to give them a taste of an instant kill.
"That's incredible..."
Sinon watched the hunt unfold.
The OverLord's attacks had to be absurdly heavy. With Samuro's pure AGI build, even one hit would probably leave him recovering for half the fight. The monster's sheer violence made close combat look like the worst possible option. Normally, high-AGI players fought by circling the battlefield and controlling distance.
Only a tiny number of players were skilled and reckless enough to think, "I'll just get right in its face. It can't hit me faster than I can dodge."
And even that did not cover all of it.
Dodging a bullet that missed by only a few centimeters and dodging a heavy attack several meters wide were not the same kind of movement. The reaction, the timing, the amount of motion required; everything was different.
The OverLord's two arms together covered nearly five or six meters of attack range. Dodging them was hard enough on its own. Worse, because the monster was not using a firearm, there was no ballistic prediction line. Samuro had to read the downward swing of its arms directly.
In a world ruled by bullets, players rarely needed to watch an enemy's body that closely.
But he looked used to it.
Under that wild barrage, he stayed almost relaxed. Every time he moved in, he aimed for the OverLord's chest and made sure the MP23's full damage landed. After five shots, he loaded another round and fired again, calmly shaving away the OverLord's health.
Less than two minutes later, the virus-infected giant let out a final howl and collapsed into a storm of fragments.
Samuro closed the EXP panel, adjusted his MP23, and walked back toward Sinon.
As a party member, Sinon naturally received the kill reward too, even though all she had done was watch.
"For that kind of reward, this is the sort of prey a five-person team is supposed to take down safely."
She gave Samuro a strange look.
"This area only came out recently. How are you already that familiar with it?"
"I ran into quite a few while mapping the place earlier," Samuro said calmly, putting away the beam shotgun. "They're strong monsters, but once you figure out their movement pattern, that's all there is to it."
"I know that's how it works, but something still feels off..." Sinon muttered.
The way he handled enemies several times his size, and attacks that came with that much force, looked far too practiced.
"All right, next... Let me see. We can go a little deeper." Samuro opened his detailed map, estimated the route, and used his search skill as usual.
"Hm...?"
He looked to the right, toward an empty stretch of snow.
"That's rare. I picked up another player."
"Huh?"
"The Isaro region is pretty big, and it is still a new map, so not many people come here. On top of that, it is all snow, which makes fighting a pain. There are not many battles here." Samuro smiled. "But we agreed earlier. If we run into someone on the way, I will satisfy your request. Even if they are not interested, we will be unreasonable and fight our way through."
It was unreasonable.
But that was exactly why she had come.
"This place really is awful for snipers, though," Sinon complained. At this rate, how was she supposed to get any real practice?
"No. As long as it is a fight, you gain experience. There is no such thing as moving backward."
The two of them headed in the direction Samuro had detected.
...
After moving through the snow even more slowly and carefully than before, they began to hear monster roars and the lonely sounds of combat drifting through the wind.
Was someone else clearing this area?
The two approached the fight slowly, then lay down together behind a thick bank of snow. Sinon nudged her head forward and lifted it slightly, only for a hand to press down on the top of her head.
It was not forceful, but it stopped the extra movement.
"Your goggles are brown. In this place, that contrast stands out. Better take them off." Samuro removed his own goggles as he spoke and narrowed his eyes toward the distance.
He really missed nothing.
That was Sinon's assessment.
She took off her goggles too. Visibility was still poor in the shifting snowstorm, but just as when Samuro had been fighting earlier, the excess shockwaves scattered the lighter snow. With a sniper's enhanced eyesight, making out the scene was not hard.
The monster was in the same weight class as the OverLord, but it was a different species.
It did not look as ferocious as the OverLord, but it felt more vicious. It was a snake-like creature, though at that size, python was probably the better word. Its black-purple body had no scales. Instead, its surface was covered in uneven ridges and sunken marks of flesh.
"N23 Icebane Python. That's the name," Samuro said beside her, reciting the monster information. "The prefix is the virus infection code. High attack, high speed. Its raw stats are not that impressive, but it is extremely annoying."
Sinon frowned.
"Only... one person?"
In front of the python, which kept dragging tracks through the snow, there was only one struggling figure.
What stood out most was her long, glowing green hair.
"A solo player? And a rare female player, too?" Samuro murmured, watching the fight ahead with interest.
From where they were, the female player seemed to be having a terrible time with the python. She was trying her best to fight back, but the monster slipped away from each attack at high speed. In return, its rapid assault kept catching her, and she could not evade properly.
Maybe the harsh environment was limiting her movements.
Sinon could see it clearly.
She let out a quiet sigh.
"This makes it impossible to ambush her properly."
"You want to help her?" Samuro asked.
"There is no pride in beating someone like that. Besides, female players are rare in this game. Honestly, this place is too harsh on them. Any woman who made it this far has real determination. Let's help her out."
"Ambushes are part of tactics," Sinon added, "but I would feel bad ambushing someone who is already in trouble."
"All right."
Samuro had no objection. He simply nodded, drew a gun from his waist, and rushed out before Sinon could react.
With his AGI value, he reached a spot not far behind the lone female player in only a few seconds. He made no attempt to hide his movement, so she noticed him immediately.
Seeing her startled expression, Samuro gave her a friendly smile.
"Hey there, lady. You looked like you were in trouble, so I came to lend a hand."
"Oh... oh."
The girl with glowing green hair froze for a second or two. Once she came back to herself, gratitude appeared on her face.
"Thank you. I'm not doing too well right now. Could you go up front and keep that snake busy first? Once I recover, I'll support you."
"The Icebane Python is fast, and its mechanics prioritize anyone taking recovery actions. Fight with me, lady. Don't worry. I'll hold aggro."
"No, I should not. I will only get in the way." The girl shook her head awkwardly.
Samuro fired first, knocking back the monster as it tried to rush in. A thoughtful look crossed his face.
"I see. All right, I understand."
At that answer, the girl seemed to relax a little.
"Then why don't I make things safer for you directly?"
"Huh...?"
The female player stared at him in confusion.
Samuro gave her a bright, sunny smile and raised the gun in his hand toward her forehead.
Boom.
Unlike the sharp crack of the Peacekeeper, the shot from this revolver was violently loud.
Blue Rose. A deep-blue, six-shot, large-caliber revolver. Its custom barrel even allowed it to fire two bullets at the same time. As an oddball among revolvers, it did not have the usual precision or stability. It threw those advantages away in exchange for close-range violence.
It was basically a shotgun in handgun form.
Two beautiful ice-blue sparks flashed.
The green-haired girl's head was punched through by brutal force, and her entire body snapped backward. The expression on her face was still one of pure shock.
"-?!"
Watching from the snow behind them, Sinon nearly choked.
"What are you doing?!"
She could not stop herself from shouting.
"Wouldn't she be safer if she died and went straight back to the respawn point?" Samuro shrugged from up ahead, swung open Blue Rose's cylinder, loaded two large-caliber rounds, topped off the weapon, and walked toward the writhing ice python.
"What kind of thought process is that?!"
"Stay down there and play prone camper for now. If nothing unexpected happens, we are about to get a PvP encounter."
Samuro used the Peacekeeper in his right hand for mid-to-long range, while his left hand unleashed Blue Rose's close-range burst fire with brutal efficiency, steadily forcing the Icebane Python into a dead end.