SSS-Class Profession: The Path to Mastery - Chapter 84: The Court of Masks

In 2173, the world’s first Full-World Virtual MMORPG game ‘Astral Online’ went on sale globally, forever changing the blue planet Asteria!

With its revolutionary Digital Capture System, astonishing graphics and ability to scan yourself into the game with up to 20% beautification, countless defenders rallied to play the game.

Fifty million players logged in on launch. There were no queues or lag on launch, leaving countless critics impressed and willing to try the game. Because the game used a 6-hour play limit a day, it allowed even working adults to keep up with young students and the unemployed.

A resounding success, as more people poured onto the game servers, families and friends alike. Astra Online became a household name overnight.

One month later, the game opened its first RMT system, which made earning a living from the game easier... Thus began the Astral rush!

Professional players formed guilds and factions to increase their profits, but nobody could know this prosperity was a mere joke.

One year later, players fused with their avatars, gaining powerful abilities in the real world, which tipped the power and caused chaos.

Two years later, demons and monsters from inside the game invaded the real world.

Three years later, over 90% of humanity perished, leaving the rest to hide like rats, unable to fight back in fear.

Four years later, this world is no longer ours. The demons march on our last bastions, one by one. They exterminated us.

Zell was an average player who liked to collect beasts in the game and evolve them into humanoids, as they were primarily females.

He spent most of his life working two jobs to make ends meet.

Thanks to the excellent healthcare of his country, there were no crippling debts. There was only emptiness.

When the end came, he was powerless and alone. His only companions were his cute pets and Rika, his cherished Flame Rabbit.

She was the only beast he evolved to a humanoid form after his late start to the game.

He died saving the life of a strange girl with white wings and his pet Rika, the sad eyes of Rika and the girl’s sorrow floating through the air as he slowly passed away.

However, instead of dying, he awoke inside an empty white room with a single computer and a strange, game-like screen that allowed him to edit his IRL avatar and persona.

Who offered him this second chance?

For what reason did they help him?

Can he meet Rika again?

Zell could never know; he only knew his second life’s goal.

Survive!

Yuan was born with an incurable illness that left him blind at a young age and crippled a few years later, rendering everything below his head useless. Deemed hopeless and irredeemable, his parents quickly gave up on him, and the world ignored him.

Teotihuacan, a sacred place of worship. In the vast world, feel the quaint and desolate ancient city, and the eagle cries and the leopard roars are chasing away.

Go back to Central America 700 years ago, when the Aztecs were very prosperous.

The priests stood at the top of the pyramid of the sun. One hundred thousand warriors covered the entire wilderness. fluttering. The high priest held his hands high, and the obsidian dagger gleamed in the sun, drawing a cruel and gorgeous arc, bringing the cycle of life back to the earth. Tens of thousands of cheers sounded, with the reverence of the ignorant era.

This was a gift dedicated to the sun god, in return for the sacrifice of the gods in creating the world.

Solemn sacrifices from sunrise to sunset, all-night revelry ignited the whole night, and so on for a hundred years, until white-skinned terrors came from the east coast, bringing blood, thunder, monsters, and disease.

Doomsday, as legend has it, or the end of the Fifth Era?

How can a traveler, in this fierce era, inherit the legacy of two thousand years of ancient Mesoamerican civilization, resist the invasion of Western colonizers with an immortal soul, and lead the ancient Aztec civilization to a new path ~~

- Description from novelbuddy

To rebuild death god’s glory, was our obligation!

At the start of the story, he and his zanpakuto had to fight for his own territory!

The Lord of Hell, Mephisto?

Playing with people’s hearts, you might need to learn more from me!

Necromancer?

Let me test the might of Ryūjin Jakka!

Iron Man, Tony Stark?

Come, come, it just happened that I am in need of technical support in the Technological Development Department!

…

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When Lod ruled the three major organizations of the Wandenreich, Las Noches, and Seireitei, and looking at the entire universe, he could not help but sigh with emotion: In fact, at the beginning, I just wanted to live!