At the Ruins of Sunset, two lines of text appeared on the public notice stone:
[The Sea of Hopelessness instance's True End—"Theory of False Gods"—has been recorded]
[MVP player: **(This player has not set a display name)]
The players gathered nearby began discussing it among themselves.
"Is Chang Xu still alive? He wasn't the MVP. I remember his nickname was his real name..."
"He probably hadn't had a chance to set a nickname yet. Looks like this is his first recorded clear. This instance was so bizarre. All the strong players died. I wonder who got lucky and picked up the scraps."
"Could it be that they just don't want to set a nickname? A few people in the Sariel Guild use asterisks..."
"You know, you might be onto something."
"We'll see when the footage comes out. I'm curious who the MVP is."
[Sea of Hopelessness rating: S; reward: 5000 points]
[Cleared the Sea of Hopelessness True End route; reward: 5000 points]
[Worldview decipherment: 100%; reward: 5000 points]
[Completed a medium-difficulty side quest; reward: 5000 points]
In the temple in Game Space, Qi Si sat in a high-backed chair, looking at the system notification that he had completed the side quest. He wasn't surprised.
Once the instance had reached its midpoint, he'd realized there was no need to investigate the specific identities of the other players.
He only had to use the time trick to kill them all. It didn't matter which faction they belonged to. In the face of death, all were equal.
The only use of their identities was that they'd prevented Qi Si from directly going after certain people early on.
And after he'd obtained the Sea God Scepter, that was no longer an issue.
The Rules no longer restricted him. The holder of the Sea