The next morning, as the first rays of dawn broke.
Edith had already risen. She carefully brushed her ink-black hair until it was smooth, changing into a sharp, functional set of leather tactical gear.
The air was still cool as she stepped into the hallway—until the sight outside made her freeze—Lawson, Dodge, and Katie were waiting there like stone statues.
"Good Morning, Edith!" Lawson's energetic greeting exploded without warning, sounding particularly loud in the quiet corridor.
"Mm—!" Edith jumped, her body jolting in surprise. She instinctively stepped back, eyes wide with shock. She clearly hadn't expected this three-person "ambush" at her doorstep.
Before she could ask anything, Lawson's expression turned serious. He made a shushing gesture and leaned in, dropping his voice to a whisper meant only for them:
"We're going to the Command Center to discuss the strategy for the Shadow General. Keep it down. Don't wake the rookies—a deathmatch of this level is too heavy for them right now."
The doors of the Command Center were locked tight by Ester. An alloy round table and several chairs had appeared in the center.
Lawson gestured for everyone to sit, his expression more solemn than ever.
Lawson stared into Edith's eyes. "Alright, Edith. Tell me the true face of 'that guy.' As a veteran player, you must know his name!"
At the mention of that name, the last trace of color drained from Edith's already pale face. A parasitic fear seemed to crawl up her spine, making her tremble as she squeezed the name through her teeth:
"...The General of Tempered Steel: Mon Dirobos."
Lawson blinked.
"It's HIM?!"
A moment of realization hit him, and he slapped his thigh hard.
"No wonder that guy hates the veterans with a passion! Back in the gaming community, he had a legendary nickname—'The Global ATM'. Because he was a walking mechanic BUG!"
Dodge slammed the table, standing up in excitement, his voice booming like a drum. "That's the one! As long as you met specific conditions, the system wouldn't trigger the 'Clear' prompt after you killed him. "
"Players could just 'corpse-camp' and beat him indefinitely. Rare materials would drop like a non-stop gift bag! He was basically a free ATM!"
Katie had a nostalgic look on her face.
"I gathered the materials for my {Moon Swift} armor from him back then... I remember that even if you force-quit the game after farming enough, the materials stayed in your inventory. Sigh... being whipped by every player in the world in turns, he was actually quite pitiful."
Lawson coughed, adding, "In order to complete those SS-Rank sets, before the devs fixed the bug... I estimate,
conservatively... I probably farmed him about nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety-nine times."
The Command Center fell into a tomb-like silence. A chill crept up the spines of the four listeners, cold sweat beading on their foreheads.
They had finally found the root cause of Mon Dirobos's rampage. In perfect unison, they turned and pointed at Lawson.
"LAWSON! YOU'RE THE TRUE FINAL BOSS HERE, AREN'T YOU?!"
Ester pulled out her bundle of tissues from somewhere, sobbing as she wiped her eyes. "As an NPC, I can feel his pain! Big brother, you're a demon! A devil! A scumbag veteran player!"
Facing the collective condemnation, Lawson merely looked away guiltily, muttering under his breath, "You can't blame the players. Blame the dev team for leaving such a massive bug in the game..."
"Since it's your fault, go solo him yourself! We're on strike!"
The group turned their backs on him with synchronized precision.
This sudden labor strike left Lawson staring blankly, his jaw nearly dropping.
"Enough. This is no time for jokes."
Only Edith maintained her "sober reality." She took a deep breath, her tone becoming heavy and suffocating.
"Even if he was once a victim, in this real world, he has become a total butcher. Who knows how much blood is on his hands while we sit here discussing a plan?"
She suddenly clenched her fists and slammed them onto the alloy table, her knuckles turning white from the force.
"In the game, we played with him. But here, he crushed my defenseless comrades into mincemeat like they were ants! Before the next tragedy occurs, I will purge him personally!"
At Edith's accusation, Lawson's playful "player" mask vanished. He silently shoved his hands into his pockets, a confident, sharp smirk spreading across his face.
"If that's how it is, then I'll tell you exactly how to clear this raid."
Lawson strode over to the Command Center's large holographic projector. His fingers blurred as he swiped through the database, pulling up the monster profile for the Shadow General.
"You're right. He's a butcher, and I'm the 'demon' who farmed him nearly ten thousand times. Because of that, nobody understands his construction, his stress points, or the fatal flaws he exposes when he's pushed to the brink of fury better than I do."
Lawson's voice suddenly dropped to sub-zero temperatures.
All emotion was stripped away, replaced by the mechanical, absolute calm possessed only by top-tier veteran players facing a nightmare-level dungeon.
"Mon Dirobos is called the 'General of Tempered Steel' because he utilizes a triple-layer dynamic armor system. Normal attacks are nothing more than tickles to him. However—the logic behind that 'Global ATM' bug lies in his power core. During the 0.7-second window when he switches defense modes, an unfixable logic loop occurs, causing an instruction conflict."
"Wait a sec, bro!" Dodge raised a hand, looking skeptical. "Are you sure a dusty old glitch like that still works now?"
THUD!
Lawson slammed his palm onto the holographic table. He stared intensely at the flickering data values. "That bug was hard-coded into the same library as the ' Mob Farming ' exploit. As long as the glitch hasn't been patched, this flaw must still exist! Right, Katie?"
"Ah, actually, yeah," Katie smiled nostalgically.
"Back during the Stronghold Capture Mission, I relied on that bug to farm LP for everyone."
Hearing this, Ester's delicate face twitched. She puffed out her cheeks like a startled pufferfish.
"This is too much! No wonder the capture progress felt like they'd never end! I honestly thought progress was slow because everyone was still in the newbie phase... but it turns out you were all cheating without a hint of guilt?!"
Edith didn't have time for Ester's complaints. She pressed Lawson for the strategy. With a flick of his finger, Lawson drew several glowing red circles on the hologram, locking onto the target's vitals.
"The tactic is simple: The 'Corpse-Camp' Execution. No detours. No attrition. We are going for an absolute execution."
Lawson turned around, his eyes burning with a light that commanded the room. "Dodge, the task of drawing him out falls to you. I want you to unleash the full power of {Tiger Soul}. The moment he activates [Steel Frame], bite down on his defense trigger. Lock his skill logic for three seconds—do not overextend. As long as you pin his defense level to Phase One, you win!"
"Katie, the mobility of {Moon Swift} is the key to this hunt. The second Dodge draws his focus, go into Overload Mode. Cut into his blind spot at a 35-degree angle above his back left shoulder. Use your Crescent Frost Blades to sever his cooling circulation pipes!"
Finally, his gaze landed on Edith. His voice was laced with a chilling, undeniable authority.
"Edith, I know the hatred in your heart. Therefore, the Finishing Move is yours to execute. When his core is forced into a hard reboot due to overheating, he becomes the same 'training dummy' that can be humiliated indefinitely. I want you to burn through all your combat arts and pierce his core through and through!"
The corner of Lawson's mouth curved into a cruel, arrogant arc—the smile of a man who had reigned supreme in the gaming world for ten years.
"Since he dared to cross the boundary between fiction and reality to seek revenge on me, the 'Demon King'... then I'll help him remember the fear of being dominated those 9,999 times. This time, I won't even give him the chance to crawl back to the Recycle Bin!"
Just as Lawson reached the peak of his speech, standing there as if he had his own epic background music, Katie ruthlessly threw a bucket of cold water on him, poking a hole in the perfect plan.
Katie raised her hand weakly.
"Um... Senior? Your strategy is brilliant, but the problem is... where do we find him? Where exactly is he hanging out right now?"
Lawson's movements instantly froze.
His grand posture, poised to command the world, remained suspended in mid-air, making him look like a stone statue cursed by Medusa herself.
The atmosphere in the Command Center plummeted to absolute zero in a heartbeat. The hot-blooded, inspiring tactical briefing he had just delivered now sounded more like a delusional stand-up comedy routine.
This sudden logical blind spot left Lawson utterly speechless.
His lips twitched a few times, but in the end, he could only sink into a deathly, suffocating silence.
Dodge let out a long, heavy sigh, spreading his hands in a gesture of resignation.
"Sigh... if only reality had a 'Flashback Battle' feature like the game. We could just pull up the strategy data, drag a boss we've already beaten into a 'Memory Arena,' and practice on him as much as we wanted. But alas... reality doesn't offer such luxuries, does it?"
These words were the final nail in the coffin. Everyone exchanged glances, the air filled with microscopic particles of pure embarrassment.
The fighting spirit that had just been ignited was now nothing more than a pile of cold ash scattered by a cruel wind.
Lawson's face, which had been glowing with the fire of command moments ago, completely collapsed under the weight of the awkwardness.
He looked like he wanted to dig a hole and crawl inside it right then and there.
He lowered his head, his voice shrinking to a faint, mosquito-like mumble:
"Uh... well... today's combat mission... is... temporarily, uh, suspended. Let's leave it at that. We'll... reconsider everything from a long-term perspective later."