24: Public enemy of the entire zone! His lava beam vaporizes the Holy Dragon in five seconds!

The entire channel instantly erupted, with everyone eagerly anticipating the top-ranked expert to eliminate evil for the people, staging a textbook example of righteous execution.

"Go, expert! Let that pervert know the true value of an SSS-level talent!"

"Waiting for the victory report! I've already prepared to take screenshots!"

Everyone's eyes were fixed on the leaderboard.

They saw a small indicator next to the golden ID of [Dragon Aotian], showing that a [Life-and-Death Duel] was in progress.

He made his move!

Time, at this moment, became incredibly long.

One minute.

Two minutes.

The channel was silent, everyone holding their breath, waiting for the system announcement of victory.

However, three minutes later, the anticipated victory announcement from the system did not appear.

The PVP indicator next to [Dragon Aotian]'s ID silently vanished.

What happened?

Just as an ominous premonition arose in everyone's hearts,

[Dragon Aotian] dropped a battle replay video in the channel.

Following that, his voice, still arrogant but now tinged with a hint of solemnity, came through.

"I lost. His defense tower is strange; my dragon actually couldn't defeat it. You can refer to it yourselves."

Boom!

This sentence was even more shocking than the previous five death announcements combined!

Dragon Aotian... lost?

The man who single-handedly withstood five elite Flame Dragonss, lost?

The hearts of all survivors in the entire war zone seemed to be gripped by a cold hand at this moment, almost stopping their beat.

With a fear akin to the collapse of a pilgrimage, they tremblingly clicked on the video.

The video's perspective opened from Dragon Aotian's viewpoint.

A gigantic dragon, large enough to almost obscure the entire screen, covered in dark golden, sacred scales, soared from his fortress. Its roar, even through the screen, carried an supreme majesty that shook the soul.

This was Dragon Aotian's trump card, the [Sacred Dragon]!

The dragon flapped its radiant wings, charging with the might to purify all, towards the tiny fortress shrouded in thick fog on the other side of the map.

The camera zoomed in.

Everyone clearly saw the Little Devil's defenses.

It was a pathetically small platform, densely packed with various low-level anti-air arrow towers, like a hedgehog. And in the center of all the arrow towers, stood a grotesque black high tower, completely out of place with all the surrounding structures.

The tower was entirely made of a obsidian-like material, with strange structures resembling demon ribs coiling around its body. At the top of the tower, a dark red crystal, as if condensed from magma, emitted an ominous glow.

The Sacred Dragon quickly broke through the firepower network of the outer low-level arrow towers, ignoring the negligible damage, and opened its massive maw. A golden dragon flame, powerful enough to melt steel, shot towards the headquarters which had only 1 HP!

Victory seemed to be within reach!

However, at this very moment,

The black high tower, which had been silent, awakened.

The magma crystal at the top of the tower suddenly lit up, and a dark red beam, only as thick as an arm, instantly struck the Sacred Dragon.

-100!

A shocking damage number appeared.

But for the thick-skinned Sacred Dragon, this amount of damage was negligible.

Yet, something strange happened.

The dark red beam did not disappear; instead, like a maggot in the bone, it locked onto the dragon, continuously burning its body!

-100! -100! -100!

The damage numbers flashed frantically at a rate of once per second!

Even more terrifying, everyone in the video clearly saw that the beam was slowly thickening at a visible rate!

Three seconds later, the beam had expanded to the thickness of a bucket!

-500!

Four seconds later, the beam transformed into a terrifying torrent of lava!

-1000!

Five seconds later!

Boom—!

The diameter of the lava beam had become larger than the Sacred Dragon's head!

-2000!

A suffocating, world-destroying damage number exploded from above the Sacred Dragon's head!

The majestic dragon, like a creation of a god, couldn't even let out a whimper before being instantly melted and evaporated by that terrifying lava beam, not even a single scale remaining!

The video ended there.

The entire regional channel fell into a deathly silence.

If before it was just fear,

now, a despair more terrifying, deeper, and more powerless than the Blood Moon, slowly submerged everyone's mouths and noses like cold seawater, engulfing the heart of every survivor.

Faith had collapsed.

Even Dragon Aotian, with his SSS-level talent, had been defeated, and so completely and utterly. What could ordinary people, for whom even SS-level was a luxury, use to contend with that monster holding the demon's script?

Amidst this suffocating silence, the culprit appeared once again.

The ID [Little Devil], with its SS-level badge, like dancing on everyone's graves, cheerfully broke the silence with an innocent yet cruel tone.

"Hehe."

"Oh my, is this the legendary SSS-level talent? Why is your little dragon so fragile? I wasn't even done playing, and it turned to ash, hehe."

These words were like a poisoned dagger, stabbing fiercely into everyone's hearts, especially Dragon Aotian's.

Following that, [Little Devil] seemed to have thought of something amusing, and his tone became even more playful.

"But, I still have to thank System Daddy's protection mechanism. If it weren't for the rule that defenders get a 200% attribute bonus, I'd be taking my Queen with me to tear down your home right now! Your Sacred Dragon hasn't revived yet, what would you use to stop me?"

His words revealed the truth of why Dragon Aotian hadn't been directly annihilated, but they also landed like a resounding slap across the face of this former king.

This was not an equal battle at all.

It was the demon unilaterally toying with his prey.

"But, it'll be soon."

[Little Devil]'s voice, like a demon's whisper, echoed in everyone's ears.

"Once I use these fools' resources to upgrade my headquarters to level nine, unlocking more troop types and population limits... then, what will a mere 200% bonus matter?"

"Dragon Aotian, I'll let you live two more days for now. Enjoy your last moments of gameplay, my... next toy."

Having said that, he silently vanished, leaving behind a regional channel utterly boiling with extreme anger and powerlessness.

"This is too much! This bastard!!"

"He's too arrogant! He's declaring war on the entire war zone!"

"Two days... he only left all of us two days..."

"What's the point of uniting?! Dragon Aotian lost! How are we supposed to fight? Just wait to die, all of us, just wait to die!"

Those who had previously clamored to unite and crusade against the Demon King were now completely ridiculed. The entire channel was filled with desperate curses, impotent rage, and pessimistic predictions of the apocalypse.

The golden SSS-level badge, [Dragon Aotian], never made another sound from beginning to end.