"— [Grace of the Armor God], FULL POWER!"
In an instant, a divine, blinding golden radiance erupted from Lawson, manifesting as a flowing barrier of laws.
He charged into the stinking gale that threatened to shred steel, turning into a golden blur as he intercepted the roaring halberd head-on.
It was the absolute defense, capable of negating all physical and magical damage in existence.
However, at the split second before the collision—just as the air pressure ruffled Lawson's hair—the berserk Chieftain suddenly wrenched the wolf to a halt upon seeing Lawson's face.
The halberd stopped mere centimeters from his throat. The resulting gust of wind sliced Lawson's skin.
Under the terrified and bewildered gazes of everyone, a haunting flicker of clarity crossed the Chieftain's crimson eyes.
Her scale-covered throat trembled violently as she spat out a raspy murmur that made Lawson feel as if he had fallen into an abyss:
"You... you're still alive? My useless son!"
The voice was hoarse and distorted, like metal grinding against sandpaper, yet it carried a bone-deep familiarity that made Lawson's entire body shudder.
The giant wolf skidded to a stop, kicking up a cloud of dust that nearly swallowed Lawson. The blade of the halberd hung just millimeters from his chest. The cold wind blew back Lawson's white coat, and with it, all his killing intent.
"...Mom?"
The word felt like it had been lodged in his throat for an eternity before being painfully forced out.
Lawson froze. The golden [Grace of the Armor God] flickered unsteadily around him, as if even this invincible defense skill was suffering a logic failure in the face of that one "call."
What should have been a touching reunion felt like a grotesque, absurd nightmare within this Shura-field of a camp.
Behind him, Victor and George were frozen in shock. The elemental magic George had been preparing sputtered out in his palm.
He stared at the oppressive Brutes Chieftain, then at Lawson's lonely, trembling back. A storm raged in his mind.
"Wait, is this a joke? Lawson's mother... is the boss of this camp?"
The Chieftain looked down at Lawson from atop her wolf. There was no maternal warmth in those crimson slits, only a mix of cold disappointment and madness.
She slowly retracted her halberd, her mouth curling into a gruesome sneer.
"Still as weak as ever..."
She looked down at the slumped Lawson, her voice sounding like a judgment from the depths of Hell.
"Still that same pathetic brat who hides in his room and buries his head in electronic trash for comfort whenever something happens. Since you survived, why didn't you crawl far away? Why... did you have to jump out and become an eyesore?"
Every word was like a rusted nail, driven with lethal precision into Lawson's most guarded wounds.
That was his deepest nightmare—the rejected, despised shut-in who could only find a sense of existence in a fictional world. A decade of peak achievements seemed to crumble into ash under that familiar scolding.
"I... I'm not... that..."
Lawson's voice was hoarse. His iron will shattered in an instant. The glorious golden barrier flickered and died as he fell to his knees with a heavy thud.
He was crying.
In the center of this brutal battlefield, the man once known as the "World's Only" Armor Smith was now like a child being humiliated by his mother at the school gates, tears hitting the scorched earth as he shook uncontrollably.
"As expected, trash remains trash, no matter how much time passes."
Extreme loathing flashed in the Chieftain's eyes. Without a moment's hesitation, she swung her halberd, the blade whistling as it aimed for Lawson's defenseless throat.
She truly intended to kill him, to erase this "stain" that brought her shame.
"—YOU IDIOT! WAKE THE HELL UP!!"
CLANG—!!!
A deafening metallic crash exploded.
The expected sensation of being pierced never came.
Lawson opened his trembling eyes to see his vision filled with a blinding white light.
It was George.
The man, usually so arrogant he seemed cold-blooded, was now gritting his teeth, using his low-defense steel body to shield Lawson. The halberd's edge sliced through his shoulder plate, biting into flesh.
Blood dripped down the white armor, splashing onto Lawson's pale face.
"Lawson... you owe me more than just a set of God-tier gear now!" George's face was contorted in agony, but he held his ground against the mountain of force.
"You... you're still alive..."
The Chieftain's neck twisted stiffly as that raspy voice rang out again.
The tone, the emphasis, even the disgusted pause was exactly the same as before.
"You... you're still alive..."
She was like a broken record, mindlessly repeating that malicious curse.
Lawson, slumped on the ground, suddenly jolted. The scalding heat of George's blood on his face finally burned through the fear in his heart.
He slowly raised his head, his tear-filled eyes rapidly regaining their clarity.
"So... that's how it is."
Lawson stared intently at those crimson pupils, where only slaughter-code flickered. This wasn't his mother. No matter how similar the shell was, it was nothing more than a hollow husk possessed by a Shadow Shifter; its will had been stolen.
Those words that stung him were merely the "loathing" scraps the system had excavated from his mother's memories.
She was looping, for she had long since lost her soul. All that remained was a string of personality patches rewritten with malice.
"If you were really her, you'd be screaming at me for not fighting back right now, instead of wasting your breath like a broken machine."
Lawson wiped the blood from his face. Bracing himself against George's steel shoulder, he dragged himself back to his feet.
With every inch he rose, the golden radiance around him grew denser, more focused—a killing intent far more refined and furious than before.
"Using a son's guilt to toy with the battlefield..."
The hem of his coat whipped violently in the wind. Golden light bloomed at his fingertips once more. His temples throbbed as his brain entered an extreme state of overclocking.
Lawson's voice was as cold as arctic ice, carrying a terrifying, explosive pressure:
"Congratulations. You've successfully pissed off the one player... who knows this game better than anyone else in the world."