Ursus Border, Snowfields.
After that colossal explosion, the once-white landscape had been reduced to ruins. The snow was gone, the ground torn apart, and the land once stained black with the Collapsal's pollution—blood or mud, who could even tell—had been completely blown away.
In the center of a crater several kiloters wide, Steven dragged himself out from under the buried earth, looking like a man who had just crawled out of his own grave.
The surroundings were unrecognizable. The air reeked of sulfur and scorched gunpowder, and the storm clouds had already dissipated from the sky. As for the giant monster that once towered over the snowfield—there wasn't even a trace left.
Well, not entirely.
At the very center of the explosion, there was a clump of ash darker than the rest, faintly distinguishable. That was all that remained of the Collapsal.
Steven's HUD had already told the story: the boss's health bar had dropped to zero the mont of detonation. Honestly, even he hadn't expected just how destructive a charged creeper could be in this world.
It wasn't just a bomb—it was basically on par with a small-scale nuke. The only difference was the lack of radioactive fallout afterward. In terms of raw destructive force, though, it was arguably even worse.
No matter how tough that Collapsal's regeneration or defense, there was no tanking a blast like that.
Even Steven hadn't gotten away unscathed—one of his full shields had been completely obliterated, and he'd lost a good seven or eight hearts in the process.
"Yeah… note to self, don't overcharge those things. They pack a bit more punch than firecrackers."
He coughed twice, pulling a bottle of milk from his inventory. One gulp later, the lingering mutations and pollution that he got earlier lted away, restoring him to his normal self. Then he headed toward where the monster had once stood.
Charged creepers were terrifying, no doubt. Their power exceeded even his expectations. But Steven had no intention of using them again. Sure, the explosion was devastating, but it didn't discriminate between friend or foe.
Unless he was planning to beco so kind of supervillain or terrorist.
Dropping one of those things in a nomadic city would level it in seconds.
Shaking his head, Steven crouched by the ashes, sifting through what little remained.
Bosses always left loot behind, right? The only problem was—had the explosion wiped out the drops too?
If all he got after all that effort was a handful of WAP, he'd count this as a massive loss.
Luckily, though the Collapsal was gone, it had at least left sothing behind.
The Collapsal body was vaporized, sure, but in the ashes Steven uncovered sothing that definitely didn't belong in this world.
An egg.
Or at least… sothing egg-shaped.
He wasn't even sure he should call it an egg. It didn't have a hard shell; when he pressed it, it felt soft, springy, almost like flesh.
If he had to describe it, "atball" would've been more accurate.
Honestly, if it weren't palm-sized—if it were as big as a basketball—he would've sworn he was holding a Xenomorph egg straight out of Alien.
Fortunately, this thing didn't open up at his touch, and no face-hugging insect burst out to clamp onto him.
The fleshy egg rested quietly in his palm. A steady rhythm pulsed from within, like the beating of a heart—proof that it was alive, and not just so grotesque lump of stone.
When he checked its na, his expression turned… complicated.
[Primordial Collapsal Egg: A product born when a Collapsal absorbs enough nourishnt. To raise it may be considered a taboo.]
"…So basically, I just got a monster spawn egg?"
"Collapsal Egg" he could understand. But with the prefix Primordial? That instantly raised the item's prestige by several levels.
And just like the description warned, while the thing looked harmless enough now, who knew what would hatch if he really incubated it? For the people of this world, such an item was absolute heresy. If anyone got caught raising a Collapsal, their country secret service would probably kick down their door the very next day.
But of course, that only made it more interesting to him.
To a Minecraft player, an egg was ant to be hatched. If a mob could be raised, then it had to be raised. And if you couldn't breed it into a whole farm full of them, then what was even the point?
The rarer and stranger the creature, the greater the thrill of keeping it. That was the essence of it. Otherwise, why were there so many crazy mods—raising dragons, raising maids, even people who wanted to breed parasitic hive queens or rift monstrosities from Thaumcraft?
In that sense, raising a so-called "baby Collapsal" sounded very appealing to Steven.
Of course, now wasn't the ti to hatch it.
He slipped the egg into his inventory, and just as he was about to poke through the ashes for more loot—four figures erged from the snowfield, making their way toward him.
That surprised him. After seeing such a massive explosion, these Blades still dared to approach?
Brushing the dirt off his hands, Steven turned to see four Emperor's Blades crouched by the ashes, examining the remains.
"Ah, sorry about that," Steven said sheepishly, like a kid caught playing with firecrackers. "Might've gone a little overboard with the boom. Anyway, there's nothing left here. Hope you don't mind?"
He wore the expression of an honest, country bumpkin apologizing after being caught red-handed—except, of course, the crater behind him which stretched for kiloters.
The Emperor's Blades didn't dare reproach him. The only reason they'd dared step onto this battlefield was because they'd felt the aura of the Collapsal suddenly vanish. The courage to enter this place had co only after its death.
And when they pieced it together—the thunderous explosion that had echoed across Ursus, the massive crater in front of them, and this mysterious boy standing alive and unscathed in the very center—the truth beca terrifyingly clear.
This man, without a scratch, was the cause of that annihilation.
The very one who had erased that Collapsal.
Who in their right mind would dare provoke soone like that?
What's more, this mysterious boy hadn't just shown off—he'd actually helped them resolve an impossible crisis. That Collapsal wasn't sothing they could have dealt with on their own. If it were, they wouldn't have been scrambling to ask for reinforcents in the first place.
In truth, the thing he'd just obliterated was probably the strongest Collapsal they had ever seen on the Ursus snowfields. Even on the frontlines where the fiercest battles raged, nothing of that caliber had ever appeared.
And this mysterious boy had taken it down alone.
That creature had been beyond them. Even with five of them working together, they hadn't been able to scratch it. If the monster had been allowed to approach a city… no one could even imagine the catastrophe. And it had only devoured a mining outpost! If it had consud an entire city, Ursus would've been forced to unleash every single trump card it stored just to stand a chance.
And yet this so-called impossible monster was reduced to ashes by the hand of one seemingly ordinary young man.
The conclusion was obvious.
The boy before them was an even greater monster.
The only thing the Emperor's Blades could feel now was relief—relief that they had never once crossed him. As for the fact that this mysterious boy had blown the Collapsal into dust, leaving behind nothing but a crater the size of a small town? That was a trivial detail.
So long as he had solved the problem without creating an even greater disaster, Ursus could forgive much worse. If he had leveled an entire nomadic city in the process, they'd still have counted it as an acceptable trade.
"You jests…"
Once they confird the pile of ash truly was all that remained of the Collapsal, the Emperor's Blades approached Steven. Their leader bowed deeply, voice solemn, full of gratitude.
"We do not know how to properly address you. Though your heroic deed cannot be publicized, His Imperial Majesty will surely extend his deepest thanks."
The lead Emperor's Blade's respectful tone carried two ssages at once: first, a probe at his identity, and second, the reassurance that Ursus would treat him kindly.
They weren't stupid. This "human-shaped monster" wasn't soone they could command or leash. But as long as he wasn't their enemy, that was enough. Better to offer courtesy and buy peace than to risk angering him.
Steven smiled warmly, looking every bit the friendly traveler instead of the boy who had just wiped a giant Collapsal off the map.
"Just a wanderer passing through. You can call Steve."
'Man, these guys sure are easy to talk to.'
< >
Note: Character Illustration is in this Google Drive:
sdrive.google/drive/folders/1iuyfwNVFHzIi9H4rWNT_lAm7jTSiah_M
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