On this battlefield, Rita once again unleashed That Was Close, Almost a Wipe. When the sprites began to rise, cheers swept across the front. She nodded at Avery. "I need to check the B-zone battlefield." Her hand touched the platinum helm-wheel that floated eagerly to her side. Only then did she glance at Sanchez, who had been staring at her with those bright, unblinking eyes. The moment Rita arrived, B8017913 had poured out everything it thought was worth telling—including everything Sanchez had done during these four months. Which meant that in B8017913’s eyes, Sanchez’s actions mattered. Worth recording. The enemies she had slain, the hatred she stirred, the way her presence had both fired up and steadied others... all of it. She had been revived multiple times. The scars of missing flesh clung to her. Yet she did not care. In her own defiance, they became her pride. See? Even , you still cannot defeat me. Then what does that make you but trash? Her gear was soaked in blood—her own, and her enemies’. Yet her gaze was alive, brimming with exhilaration and pride. For a moment, Rita saw not the old Sanchez of another life, eyes drowned in violence and bitterness, but someone new. As if those hatreds truly belonged to a past long gone. Rita did not have a limb-restoring skill. But her bag still carried countless potions. She pulled out one that could regrow limbs and tossed it into Sanchez’s arms. At the other woman’s wide-eyed confusion, Rita said, "Then next time, hold out longer." The curse bound into their contract dissolved the instant Rita willed Sanchez to recover. Rita did not watch the moment her limbs returned. She turned instead and prepared to leave for the final battlefield. And as she vanished, she heard Sanchez shout after her, "Am I really that charming? Did I just conquer her?" Rita: ...She regretted it. Maybe she should just teleport back right now and snatch the potion back. When she landed on the B-zone front, White-Bone Black Jade let out a resonant dragon’s cry—yet it hadn’t come from Rita’s command. For several seconds, she studied the undead dragon. Something had changed. Not for the worse. It felt... livelier. She still had control, but it wasn’t the same. But now wasn’t the time to ponder it. The trouble with Sin of Arrogance had returned. Against Shanrane, it had let her fight evenly. Now it dragged her down to parity even with common alien fodder. She still had buffs and ancient relics enough to widen the gap, but not the overwhelming slaughter she’d just dealt out. She considered burning Phoenix Seat again to massacre them. But when the alien ranks saw her arrive, they halted on their own. The whole line withdrew. All three warzones had entered a ceasefire. Only fifty minutes remained before the next leader arrived. She turned to Shadow.Q. "I need a clone skill—one that keeps as much of my real stats as possible—to hold all three fronts." "Understood. Give me half an hour." "And I’ll need armor. Leather type. Forget jewelry." She rarely carried gear into the Divine Game. Whenever she had the quota, she spent it on weapons. Now she needed to squeeze her stats as high as possible. Every request of hers now took priority. Half an hour wasn’t to find the gear—it was to pick only the very best. While Shadow.Q worked, Rita continued roaming the three warzones, reviving spirits with That Was Close, Almost a Wipe. Nivalis had already shed her dagger form and returned to her true body. She refused to heal the scars carved into her dragon scales by using Specialist Channel. They were her medals. She used only the simplest of heals to restore her HP, then carried Rita aloft above each front. Wherever they passed, silence fell. Blue Star players lifted their faces, waiting reverently for the spirits to return. And when each sprite was reborn, joy burst forth. Players raised their tiny friends high into the air, shouting, laughing, even chanting the Lion King’s circle-of-life melody. "Aaah–ka-spanda–chihuahua–" The tune was strangely familiar. Nivalis looked up at Rita standing between her horns. "You used to sing songs like that to me too. You’d hold me up high." Rita’s expression turned solemn. "No. Absolutely not. I would never do something like that." It was literally part of your stupid rookie phase. And now you deny it?! But no matter how Nivalis pressed her, Rita kept her gaze fixed elsewhere, wearing the face of someone far too busy. Nivalis wailed, "Cold shoulder! You’ve been back five minutes and it’s already cold shoulder!" By the time Shadow.Q returned with the gear, Rita had revived spirits across all three fronts. The sprites stood at the same level they had before death. Already, Eclipse Vanguard and the guilds had uncovered the hidden cost: if a spirit died again, its next revival would strip away a divine talent skill or its most-used ability. The price was steep. But it was enough. A mass resurrection. And once revived, they could not truly die. What more could they ask for? When Shadow.Q emerged from the portal, Rita was hovering above, gazing down at the swarms of sprites fluttering across the battlefield. Their numbers were nearly three times that of the surviving players. They were still human—but now with a suffix. Spirits. The blue sprites flew like coursing water over the battlefield, like veins across a body. Blue Star had never looked so blue. For more chapters visit novｅlfire.net Players clutched each other, crying and laughing, retelling their deaths, reliving the moment BS-Rita had descended at the brink. The words she heard most often were, "She came back!" Shadow.Q did not stand between Nivalis’s horns. Instead she hovered neatly by the dragon’s head, making sure to hold her position just behind and to the side of Rita. That earned her a short, quiet laugh. "You never fail to reinforce my stereotypes about politicians," Rita said.