By Zephyria 
(CH03) 0momo0: Anyway, see you later!! Miu, you get some rest.
(CH03) 0momo0 I’ll go check it out quickly!!
(CH03) Miu: Wait a second.
(CH03) Miu: Momo-nim.
(CH03) Miu: Nim??
Despite Miu’s attempt to stop him, Mo Yeon-hu was determined to return to the Alliance Territory, if only for the sake of survival. He swiped Miu’s chat window to the side. To be precise, it was more like fleeing.
‘I’m scared. Just how angry are they?’
As a baby rabbit expert—a Mimi Bird—Mo Yeon-hu judged that Miu’s current attitude was subtly strange.
Normally, they would have let out a lion’s roar and torn him to shreds with words, but seeing as they kept saying it was fine and denying everything… it was clear they were planning to absolutely dismantle him once he returned.
‘I have to bring back at least some small achievement.’
It would be best if he could find traces of a core, or at the very least, some leftover items from the looting.
Using a stealth item, Mo Yeon-hu walked into the Animal Lovers Alliance Territory. Since every wall that could be broken had already been smashed, entering was easy.
‘Wow, it’s a total disaster.’
Mo Yeon-hu looked around, surveying the ruined interior.
“Anyone here?”
Just then, he spotted three users standing some distance away. Mo Yeon-hu blinked, and when it seemed one of them was looking in his direction, he instinctively ducked behind a structure.
‘Are they repairing the Alliance Territory?’
Or were they searching through the debris for anything salvageable to take to a new location?
‘Oh—looks like they’re trying to fix the core. The core is right in front of them.’
Something was sparkling before them. It was far enough that he had to use binoculars to see, so he couldn’t tell the item’s information, but a round glass bead was glowing with a blue light; anyone could tell it was a core. After all, 47’s core sparkled just like that.
‘Whoa, the shape is completely different from ours. But since the core is intact, it looks like they weren’t attacked by the spy group. They must be Animal Lovers Alliance Members after all.’
However.
‘What? Why isn’t the information popping up?’
He couldn’t see any information for the people standing in front of the core. It was strange. Their nicknames and Alliance names should be floating above their heads.
Then, the figure in the center reached out.
—Voom, vooom, voom.
It was a sound that seemed to shake the earth. Mo Yeon-hu’s eyes widened at the thunderous noise. Then, the Animal Lovers’ core, which looked like a glass bead, trembled violently before splitting in half with a sharp crack.
‘What is that?’
They… broke the core?
Mo Yeon-hu narrowed his eyes. Something was sucked into the hand of the user standing there. It was a blue fragment, but the shape looked like…
‘A monument? But why would something like that come out of a core? Is it just a core shard?’
Do items like that normally come out of cores?
‘How fascinating.’
The glass bead, which had been slowly losing its light, eventually began to scatter like dust. The sight of the crumbling blue core was quite beautiful, and as Mo Yeon-hu watched, mesmerized, a thought suddenly occurred to him.
‘Wait a minute. If those people are Animal Lovers Alliance Members…’
Mo Yeon-hu froze.
‘There’s no way they’d break their own core.’
The three people in front of him were all wearing hoods. And still, none of their nicknames were visible.
If they weren’t Animal Lovers Alliance Members, could they be the ones who attacked this place?
—Gruuuu.
Suddenly, Mo Yeon-hu flinched at a chilling sound in his ear. Terrified, he whipped his screen to the side and gaped in absurdity.
Why of all things!
“Why is there a zombie here!”
—Gruuu, gruuu!
‘I used a stealth item, how did it see me?’
Confused, Mo Yeon-hu hovered his cursor over the zombie and frowned.
Zombie: Herionne de Cassian, returned after being tempered three times in hellfire.
‘Heri… what?’
A long name usually meant there was a high probability that this zombie was necessary for progressing through the main story. And such zombies occasionally had immunity to certain items!
—Gack, gack.
Fortunately, the zombie was caught on a structure and was only flailing its arms, but that mouth was the problem. The arms reaching out with all their might, the wide-open maw, and the teeth clattering inside.
‘Stop making noise. Please!’
If he moved even a little, the zombie blocked by the structure would follow and attack him, revealing his presence. Shooting his gun here would also give him away.
‘If I use the Skeleton…’
Looking down, he saw his Skeleton.
—Ttu-ttu-tta-tta?
He wasn’t one to talk, but the Skeleton looked exceptionally stupid today. While he was panicking, Mo Yeon-hu suddenly froze, feeling a gaze pierce his back.
‘It must be my imagination.’
How could that be possible? How is it theoretically possible to sense someone looking at you in a game through intuition…
“I’m screwed…”
…it is?
The three figures standing in the distance were all looking this way simultaneously. Mo Yeon-hu’s face turned pale. Moreover, that wasn’t all. The three paused for a moment and then began striding toward him.
Apparently, it seemed strange that the zombie was drawing aggro all by itself.
‘Why are they walking like final bosses?’
The three people, their dark robes fluttering, had ‘???’ marks floating above their heads.
‘What do I do?’
He had a very bad feeling. He didn’t know what they were doing here, but one thing was certain: if his presence was discovered now, something troublesome would happen.
‘Still, I can’t just stand here like an idiot shouting “What do I do?”‘
After a brief tremor, Mo Yeon-hu prepared himself to shoot.
‘If they get closer, I’m firing.’
With his target locked, Mo Yeon-hu’s profile now looked like someone who had properly adapted to the game.
In the past, he would have just trembled, but perhaps thanks to the experience he’d gained, he looked quite confident and resolute on the outside, which was cool, but…
‘Please don’t come any closer! I bite. I really do.’
His mind was a mess. He couldn’t help his cowardice; his liver was the size of a grain of rice, let alone a pea. Mo Yeon-hu stared intently at the screen, his heart pounding.
‘I guess they haven’t noticed yet.’
Seeing them approach while looking around, it seemed his stealth was still effective against users.
Therefore, he had only one chance. The moment they got close, his bullet would bury itself in the head of the character in the middle. If he took one down first and fought 2:1, his chances of winning…
‘Would be zero.’
Mo Yeon-hu quickly recognized his own skill level. Meanwhile, the three continued to close the distance.
‘I’m really going to shoot.’
—Step, step, step.
‘I said I’m really shooting…!’
Five steps, three steps, and one step…
—Whirrr, tudududu…
But at that moment, the sound that had been faintly audible suddenly became clear. No, it wasn’t just clearer.
—…Tudada!
It had come close overhead.
Mo Yeon-hu snapped his head up, his eyes widening.
—Tudadada!!
Along with the sharp sound of rotors violently cutting through the air, a massive roar shook the ground. The source of that roar was…
—Slide, clunk.
Soon, a figure set the helicopter to auto-pilot, opened the door, and lowered the ladder. He saw a leg step down onto the fluttering ladder.
And at the same time, the three in front of Mo Yeon-hu stared at the newcomer.
(General) Miu: What’s this?
Clink. The user who appeared with a bazooka slung over one shoulder was…
(General) Miu: Are you guys Voldemort or something?
Naturally, it was Miu.
‘Noona!!’
As if in a scene from a movie, Miu looked down while hanging from the helicopter ladder, and Mo Yeon-hu almost forgot his own situation in his joy.
(General) Miu: They’re using items that hide nicknames…
Miu jumped from the ladder and stood tall before the three. Throughout this, the three people remained silent, just standing there.
(General) Miu: I guess you can’t chat.
(General) Miu: You can’t kill me either.
(General) Miu: Because the log will reveal who you are.
It seemed that the item guaranteeing anonymity worked on a similar principle to the stealth item.
‘Even if the nickname on the head is hidden, it seems they can’t stop the nickname from appearing in the log. First, I have to tell Miu I’m here.’
Mo Yeon-hu hurried to chat with Miu. This was because when using a stealth item, users cannot determine each other’s positions unless they are party members. Just then.
—Pop, shhhhh!
‘A smoke grenade?!’
With the sound of something spraying, white smoke rose, obscuring the vision. Two of the three suddenly detonated smoke grenades and began to flee. As the three vanished in an instant, Miu fired the bazooka as if they had been waiting for this.
—…Phew-boom!!
It looked as if a small rocket were attached to Miu’s shoulder. After firing one shot, Miu immediately threw the bazooka to the ground.
A sniper rifle immediately appeared.
—Bang, bang, bang!
The targets probably weren’t even visible due to the aftermath of the smoke grenade, but Miu fired three shots carefully and quickly, staring at something.
‘Oh! There!’
He saw one person run out of the range of the smoke grenade. They had failed to escape. And then, the text appeared.