Dark World.
Barren, desolate, gray, ruined, bleak—without day or night, without color, without living things.
As far as the eye could see stretched an incomparably oppressive expanse of land, beneath an endless, heavy black sky that moved slowly, beside a silent sea as infinitely level as it had no waves.
As mentioned before, Participants had ranks.
And this was the place B-rank Participants could enter.
—Another world.
In truth, almost no Participants came here as soon as they reached B-rank. Although being in the Dark World accelerated the recovery of Magic Energy and physical energy and noticeably enhanced one's strength,
this place still belonged, after all,
to the world of those Numbered Monsters from all kinds of scenarios!
Compared to the real world, where there were all sorts of things to do, practically no one among the Participants took an interest in the Dark World,
except for a very small few.
Because
hunting Numbered Monsters in the Dark World was the only way to obtain Night Equipment aside from Night Battle scenarios.
Though it lacked the perfection of scenario rewards always being suited to the victor, and its rank depended on the quantity and quality of the prey, it was already enough to draw in those who pursued power,
sending them into another world.
Then, little by little, they worked out the rules for entering the Dark World.
Do not enter the Dark World from within a city.
Like some kind of reflection, the entry point corresponded to the location in the real world. If one chose to enter from a city with a large concentrated population,
what awaited was a desperate disaster city, like a dark apocalypse, packed full of a Numbered Monster Sea.
Amidst it were countless Numbered Monsters with all manner of abilities, numbering in the tens