The arena was far from the grave pit Bob knew. No towering constructions of bone and marrowroot, no endless tide of clawing skeletons dragging him into despair. No swirling doom clogging the sky above. It was set up as a smaller, tighter experience. Manageable at first sight, definitely not T5. The unholy colosseum was walled in by cracked, stained stone, the ground beneath his feet dry and packed. Scattered around the arena lay a dozen or so defeated skeletons. One of them was a robed figure, probably this tiers sole ritualist, fingers still lingering with embers of violet dark energy. And at the center of it all, stood the grave pit overlord.

  It had already risen. But unlike the throne-born skeletal behemoth Bob had barely survived last time, this variant was.. man-sized. Compact. It had the same grotesquely deformed skull, a violet-lit ribcage and sported a makeshift bone-club. Except it wasn’t a massive weapon designed to erase existence, just an oversized, spiked femur. It seemed significantly weaker, slower even.

  Then there was.. Derrin.. if he had read the name in the mail right. He was already fighting the boss. A young man, no older than twenty, locked in frantic struggle. His armor was a scavenged mess. Patched leather straps, padding barely holding together, a crude helmet that looked like it had been kicked around a blacksmith’s floor for eons. And his weapon of choice? A two handed.. rock. Yeah, no joke. A dinner-plate-sized chunk of rock, which he swung like it was a legendary great-hammer.

  Derrin barely slipped past a massive, downward swing of the overlord’s bone-club, the wind shear alone enough to tug at his ragged shirt. His boot scraped against loose gravel as he rolled, coming up just in time to slam his rock straight into the back of his enemy. The impact sent a ripple through the overlords frame, giving way to unbalance. Before it could recover, Derrin lunged forward, driving his shoulder into its sternum with everything he had. Something broke and the boss collapsed. Derrin didn’t hesitate. He was already moving, raising the rock high above his head, arms trembling from exhaustion and raw fury. Then, down it came. ‘Crack. Splinter.’

  The overlord’s bulging ribcage split apart like an overripe melon, the eerie light dimming down. Silence followed. For one long, ragged breath, Derrin just stood there staring, limbs vibrating with emotion too vast to name. Then his head tilted back as he screamed.

  "LET’S FUCKING GO!" His voice tore through the death-soaked air, half a warcry, half the unhinged shriek of a man who had finally snapped a leash strung on for far too long. He threw his arms up in triumph.

  After a brief moment Derrin started stomping and kicking at the overlord like he was crushing grapes for a vineyard in hell. “So. Many. Times.” Each word came with force. “You fucking killed me! Over and over. Now you’re freaking.. Uhm.. re-dead!”

  Bob finally took a measured step forward, raising a hand as if beleiving he could talk down a feral animal. “Yo, uh.. Derrin, I presume. You good, man?”

  The moment the words left his mouth, reality shifted. A pulse, heavy and suffocating, slammed into the arena like a silent earthquake. The air grew thick, almost viscous. Every inch of Bob’s skin prickled with warning.

  [System] PvP Initiated.

  A deep, guttural grind rumbled through the pit. The overlord’s remains twitched. Bone dust trembled in the air. Bob’s grip on his crowbar tightened as Derrin, still reeling, shot him a panicked glance. “Wh.. what the.. Who are you?!”

  Bob didn’t answer. His focus locked onto the overlord’s remains as its bones cracked and snapped back into place with sickening efficiency. Violet light flared in its skull-sockets, then everything about it expanded. This wasn’t just a respawn. This was a rebirth. Its spine elongated in grotesque increments. Shattered ribs mended then split, jutting outward like grafted battle trophies. Four flesh-covered arms grew from its chest-cavity. Bob rolled his shoulders. Right. That was too easy anyways. But what was that about PvP? Bob was definitely not here to fight the young warrior.

  Derrin scrambled backward, eyes darting between Bob and the overlord’s now towering form. “What did you DO?!” he shouted, voice cracking. “I KILLED IT! IT WAS DEAD!”

  Bob didn’t bother looking away from the threat. Instead, he offered a simple, almost casual shrug. “Apparently, not dead enough.”

  The overlord locked onto them momentarily before tearing through the air in Bob’s direction: a massive, abrupt lunge. Bob shifted left, barely dodging the first strike as a fleshy bone-forged claw plowed through dirt where he had just stood. As the overlord passed him, he swung at its leg. The strike sent it crashing ahead in an uncontrolled mass of cracks and rattle. Derrin yelped as he scrambled away. He was still adjusting.

  Something in Bob's periphery vision popped. A shadow not cast by the overlord. His gaze flicked toward the edge of the arena. There, perched with an unsettling amount of patience, stood a forth figure. He donned a reinforced leather armor, rune-inscribed with faint glowing sigils. A black hood concealing all but a confident smirk above a pale chin. A gemencrusted gloved hand held onto a staff embedded with a sickly green stone. The figure was watching. Waiting. Studying. Bob’s gut knew. He’s definitely the one who’s doing the PvP’ing.

  [Echuu] Oh ho. Well, technically you are still fighting a monster. So.. PvE, Bob.

  Bob grimaced: Echuu?!

  [Echuu] Yeah, I forgot to mention one key thing about Bib and the rest of the slime-fam. If one is stealing bag-space, you and I get to talk. Wobble-talkie style for the win!

  Sure enough, his interface showed Bib had snuck into his inventory.

  Derrin snarled before Bob could add another thought. "That freaking guy! He's been camping me for a while!"

  Bob’s jaw set. He knew this pattern. He’d seen it before. Some near-maxed-out piece of shit getting his kicks from wrecking new blood, turning a grind spot into a personal red-room of humiliation and torture. Bob rolled his shoulders. That’s multiplayer, for ya. He could go after the necromancer. Break his concentration. But.. There was one problem: He didn’t do PvP anymore. Not because he couldn’t, but because it was unpredictable, messy, an entire can of worms in it's own right. He’d seen enough games force-on ‘rivalry mechanics’ or karma-tracking, locking players into endless vendettas. That wasn’t the fight he was here for. The real enemy.. The thing blocking progression.. was the skeleton, even if it had just been resurrected by a douche. He adjusted his grip on the crowbar. Its weight hummed through his fingers, the sheer, unapologetic power of a simple tool now re-made into a one-handed wrecking-machine. He rushed forward, feet kicking up dust and bone shards as he sprinted toward his target then jumped.

  The six-armed monstrosity stood waiting, now balancing on one leg. It swung at him. 'Dodge-roll', 'Jump'. Coiling his muscles, he swung mid-air. 'Smash.' One clean hit to the skull.

  [System] Weak Point Struck! Damage x2. Boss Staggered! Overkill Bonus Applied! Material Drops: Void Eye x6.

  The impact echoed through the arena like a gunshot as the skull pulverised. Violet light flickered violently, then died out entirely. The overlord collapsed, hitting the ground with a hollow thud.

  [System] Re-animated Boss Defeated. PvP on-going.

  "Alright. That’s taken care of." He turned back toward Derrin, who had taken a few steps back after witnessing the sheer force of Bob’s attack.

  The young fighter stumbled to his feet, gawking at the corpse. “.. you can one-shot it?”

  Bob shrugged, resting the crowbar on his shoulder. “Well. Technically it was a two-shot. But, yeah. If I had led with the head-blow.. Guess so.”

  Derrin shook his head. “Dude, what the hell are you packing?”

  Bob smirked. “Crowbar.”

  The young man’s eyes flickered between disbelieve, awe and barely contained fury. Then fury took the lead: "You!" Derrin turned so sharply that the dust curled around his boots like a microtransaction effect attached to its equipment-slot. The necromancer at the arena’s edge didn’t flinch. Bob dragged a hand down his face. Damn, here we go.

  Stomping forward, Derrin scooped up the bone-club mid-stride. “You think you’re real funny, huh?” His voice was low, but every syllable vibrated with a rage born from months of suffering at the hands of the same enemy. “You were farming me.. Weren’t you?”

  The necromancer didn’t move. His eyes darted, flicking between Derrin, Bob, and, well, piles of boss-bone. Bob stayed where he was, arms crossed. He’d seen this before. This wasn’t about a single death. It wasn’t even about the loot loss. This was about dignity, despair and suffering. About every cheap ambush, every unfair encounter, every second wasted clawing back from defeat that shouldn’t have happened.

  The necromancer finally reacted, rolling his shoulders with a deliberate ease. “Relax, man.” he said, voice calm. Amused, even. “It’s just part of the deal here.”

  Bob saw it before it happened. The way Derrin’s grip twitched. The way his shoulders bunched. Wrong choice of words. Derrin exploded forward. No finesse, no technique, just raw momentum fueled by absolute, unfiltered spite. The bone-club came down soon after in a two-handed swing, aimed to crush, to shatter, to break whatever smug confidence was holding the necromancer’s jaw in place.

  The necromancer sidestepped and backpaddled with an unnerving ease, sending the club slamming into hard ground.

  The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  Yet, Derrin wasn’t done. “Part of the deal? What fucking deal is that!” He advanced, steps slow and deliberate. “Camping me for an eternity, spending your time making sure I never got past this arena. That is just normal to you?”

  The necromancer calmly raised his hand. “Dude. Chill.”

  “Shut up.” Derrin’s voice was dangerously steady. “You must know what kind of hellish pain this system puts people through.. The dying.. And you still did it.”

  The club started to rise again, poising for another strike. This time, Bob coughed intentionally, and scraped his boot against the dust and gravel. Minor sounds in the tense silence, but it was enough to remind the others that he was still there. Derrin hesitated as he looked to Bob.

  The necromancer, being the absolute genius that he was, took that as his cue to double down. “Oh, what now?” He smirked. “Lost your nerve. You gonna pivot into a live-webinar on honor for your cult-following huh? This place.. it doesn’t give a damn about fair fights.”

  Bob tilted his head. The necromancer wasn’t fighting back. He was just taunting. Edging everything on. Derrin was in over his head here. An ant on a stick in the hands of a hungry silverback. Alright. Time to de-escalate.

  “You’re not wrong.” Bob said, voice light. “But see, there’s a difference between using the system and.. whatever this is.”

  The necromancer frowned and shifted his gaze in Bob’s direction. “Excuse me?”

  Bob pointed lazily at him with his crowbar. “Look. I don’t blame you. You’re playing it your way.” He paused for a second, then proceeded. “Kid's finally got his kill though. The boss is dead. Let’s call it. You clearly out-punched this pi?ata one too many times.”

  Derrin turned to Bob, eyes flashing. "You’re seriously gonna let this rat-bastard walk away?"

  Bob shrugged, keeping his tone even. “Buddy. I don’t do PvP. This is not my fight.”

  "What bullshit is that? He griefed me. This is exactly your fight. You chose to assist." Derrin’s lips curled.

  Bob tilted his head. “If it was truly my fight, I would be the only one left standing. Right now, there are still three of us.”

  Silence. Derrin’s hands twitched, his rage fighting against logic. Bob held his ground. Then, finally, the kid gave in, halting his anger while nostrils still flared. He turned to face the necromancer, eyes burning with pure venom. "If we ever see each other again, I’ll gut you." The necromancer didn’t respond.

  Bob sighed. "Yeah. Great talk, everyone. Glad we all bonded over serial-homicide." Bob could hear Echuu holding back a chuckle-prompt from back in the antechamber.

  The faintest flicker of movement, a hand gesture, a subtle tap on some interface Bob couldn’t see. Before anyone could react, the necromancer disappeared. Not a logout animation, not a visual effect. It was cleaner, sharper, like the system itself had erased him. Bob’s gut twisted. That guy knew what he was doing.

  [System] Tier 1 Vault Accessible. Claim your rewards, and may you bear them well.

  With a deep grinding of stone, a stairway in the ground appeared. It led to a crude iron door, already sliding open. Behind it a small chamber waited. There wasn’t much inside. Just a single pedestal, a lone path orb resting on a velvet cushion. Bob turned towards Derrin, who had gone eerily quiet. For the first time, Bob got a real look at him. The guy was thin. Hollow eyes, dark circles, and a haunted look that didn’t quite belong to someone his age. His gear was patched together, barely holding up after what must have been dozens of brutal deaths. Right now it was nothing but shitty cosmetics.

  He finally gave Bob a tired smile. "Guess I should introduce myself, huh? You got the name right before. I’m Derrin Coles of the fighter class path."

  Bob nodded. "I’m Bob."

  Derrin snorted. "Just Bob?"

  Bob shrugged. "That’s me alright."

  Derrin let out a thin, brittle chuckle, rubbing the back of his neck with frail grit of a man who had long since spent his last reserves of hope. His gaze flicked toward the vault. Something in his eyes dulled, the weight of too many failures pressing in at once.

  “This is kinda ironic.” he muttered, voice tight with something Bob couldn’t quite place. “I unlocked the Summoner stall first. Thought I’d get to play with pocket monsters or some shit. Conjure some companions, fight alongside them, you know?”

  Bob had enjoyed similar games too in his youth. And minions was definitely a build-strat that exploded even in modern games. “.. So what happened?”

  Derrin’s voice went dark and empty, the kind that didn’t invite company. “It was nothing like that at all.” His jaw clenched, eyes shadowed with exhaustion rather than anger or disappointment. “You don’t summon monst.. creatures. You send out callings. Requesting help, hoping for allies. Yeah. No-one really bothers to show up if you can't make it worth their while.” His lips curled. “You don’t get to be a beastmaster. Instead, you’re just bait without a hook.”

  Bob frowned. That was worse than he expected. “With my luck, I bet the reward system for co-op sucks balls?”

  Derrin snorted, shaking his head. “Understatement of the fucking century.” He crossed his arms, the movement making his tattered leather bracers creak. “You can post a reward when you send a calling. Gold, gear, orbs, whatever you’ve got. But nothings baseline.”

  Bob looked at him like he knew. “You had nothing to post..”

  Derrin nodded grimly, his hand tightening into a fist before he forced himself to relax. “Not a damn thing. I've been stuck in this fight for a while.” He sighed, looking away. “First time I fought the boss, I thought, okay, tough, but doable. Second time? Started noticing patterns. Third time? Got stomped back to zero. Fourth? Tenth? Fifteenth? It stopped being a fight.” His voice was quiet now, almost a whisper. “It became a wall.”

  Bob didn’t respond right away. He’d seen it before. In games, in forums, in himself. That moment when a challenge became a graveyard of persistence. A mausoleum for every ounce of effort spent with nothing to show for it. He studied Derrin, noting the way his shoulders curled inward, the way his fingers twitched randomly, like his nerves were taking turns remembering the stings of each and every loss.

  “Someone must’ve answered eventually.” Bob said, testing the waters.

  Derrin barked out a laugh, bitter and frayed at the edges. “Yeah. You.” His jaw worked, his mouth twisting before he muttered. “You’re a different sort than the rest of us, Bob.” His fingers drummed against the buckled strap of his belt, restless. “Most would see a fight they couldn’t profit from and bounce. A guy with no rewards to give, someone not worth the effort. But you.. ” His eyes flicked up, sharp despite the exhaustion. “You didn’t even check the payout, did you?”

  Bob shrugged, gripping the crowbar a little tighter. “To be honest I didn’t really care if you had anything on ya. Just figured the boss might drop something for me too.”

  A few seconds of silence was followed by Derrin's huffed breath. “Yeah. That’s what I prayed for, you know.” He ran a hand through his tangled hair. “That someone would answer. Someone who wasn’t just looking for an easy win.”

  He didn’t know what to say to that, so Bob went with nothing.

  "After my starter-gear broke, I took out a loan. Then more." Derrin admitted, hands clenched at his sides. "It kept me in the fight. But.. I still couldn’t win." His knuckles turned white. "The curses started stacking. Now.. I'm like a broken mess of countless cracks and flaws."

  Bob’s stomach twisted. He thought back to his own lost fight. The pain. The sheer horror. He felt it once. But this guy? Exhaustion had crept into his bones replacing his very marrow. Every loss had left a distinct mark, like old scars carved into the code of his existence. He was drowning in it and Bob didn’t have a lifeboat for shit like this.

  His boots scuffed against the floor, as Derrin stepped forward. He approached the pedestal, the orb’s glow reflecting in his eyes. His fingers hovered near the singular reward, just close enough to claim it, yet he never reached further. He just looked at a prize that had long since lost its meaning. Then, without hesitation, Derrin turned away. "Take it." he said, his voice flat.

  Bob’s left eye twitched as Derrin motioned to the orb. It was a meager bounty, all things considered.

  "Bob. You take it." There was no bite to his words, no bitterness. "I’m done. No more fighting. But you.. You can actually do this."

  Derrin slumped down on the floor unable to scrub away the weight of his losses. "You ever push so hard, fight so long, that you stop remembering why you started?" His voice was low. “Despite it all, I was starting to get better. I learned the boss's tells, fought smarter. Fucking crushed that overlord with nothing but a rock and a ton of tier one curses.."

  Bob just stared and listened. This was clearly that guy's chosen time to ride a monologue-train out into the sunset.

  "Debt Keeper doesn’t care about ‘almost.’ It doesn’t matter how hard you tried. All that is tallied is success and failure." His fingers flexed at his sides, like they wanted to grip something, his weapon, his will, something solid. They found nothing. "I told myself I could dig my way out if I just worked harder. Kept fighting, pushed on. But there’s no end to it is there?" His jaw tightening. "The worst part was clawing back to hope again and again." His voice cracked slightly. "Hope’s the cruelest bitch here. It keeps you chained, when you should’ve cashed out, wondering if just one lucky break could turn things around."

  Bob understood completely. All those curses had racked up. And with one orb to show for a mountain of trouble? This whole vault was a mocking taunt, spitting in his face.

  Derrin motioned again to the orb, more forceful this time. "So take it. Take the reward. Take the win. I really don’t need it Bob. Not anymore."

  Bob studied him, the set of his shoulders, the way his whole body seemed to fold in on itself. Derrin wasn’t just tired. He was done. This was a player at the edge of his own story, waiting for the final curtain, almost fearful someone would pull him back.

  [Echuu] Oh no.. He’s heading for a one-way exit.

  Bob frowned. What do you mean?

  [Echuu] Remember what I told you, Bob? Boss Door devours those who give up.

  “No!” Bob said it firmly. Derrin blinked. His head tilted slightly, as if he felt his mind play tricks.

  Bob pulled open his inventory, flicked to his path orbs, and counted. Four left. Enough to make a difference, if you knew what you were doing. And Derrin, he had built up some experience it seemed, doing all the missteps already. Yet here he was, beyond a simple rage-quit: This wasn’t a player about to delete his save file: He was about to throw his game-system off tallest fucking bridge he could find, and jump in after.

  "Derrin. You keep what’s yours." Bob said quietly, voice steady. "That bastard already took too much. I’m sorry we let him go man. Next time we'll wipe the floor with his ass together." Then, without breaking eye contact, he tapped to drop items.

  The four orbs hit the stone floor with a soft, chiming sound, pooling at Derrin’s feet like scattered fragments of possibility. He didn’t move. Didn’t speak. He just stared, expression unreadable, stunned, disoriented, shaken. Like his brain had short-circuited trying to process what the hell just happened. Bob tilted his head slightly, watching him, gauging him. Then he smirked.

  "Why?" Derrin’s voice was barely more than a breath, raw and uncertain.

  Bob chuckled as he threw the orb from the pillar to Derrin aswell, then planted his ass on the reward-cushion. "Because fuck this system." He let the words sit there, heavy with meaning. "And also.. " He grinned, slow and sharp. "Crowbars. You are gonna love 'em!"

  Derrin exhaled sharply, a stunned, breathless noise escaping him. Half a laugh, half something else. His shoulders twitched, like the weight pressing down on them had suddenly shifted, cracked, let in the faintest sliver of light. He lifted a hand to his face, fingers digging into his temple, then let out another short, clipped laugh. It was disbelieving, rough, but real. “Fucking crowbars, yeah?”

  Bob saw it. A flicker of something. Not relief. Not gratitude. Something deeper. He was afraid to call it hope, after that monologue. It wasn’t big or loud, but it was there, a tiny ember, now refusing to be snuffed out. Maybe Derrin would claw his way back off the ledge. A long, silent moment went by, followed by a soft chime.

  [System] Friend Request Pending..

  Derrin wasn’t done after all, Bob thought.

  [Echuu] .. Unless he just needs somewhere to post his last will!