On the other side.
At the entrance to the Gate of Glory.
The residents leaving the city, along with the players mingling among them, had all fled.
Even Ito Sho, who had sworn he would stay, quietly slipped away by boat when he saw things taking a turn for the worse.
But just as he left the Holy Capital's boundaries, he seemed to suddenly see something terrifying. An utterly horrified expression crossed his face, and then he dissolved into a puddle of data and vanished on the spot.
After spending so long in the Holy Capital, he had almost forgotten he was a player. The moment he left the Holy Capital and lost the protection of its radiance, the system erased him, leaving not the slightest scrap behind. Even his equipment and supplies dropped nothing.
Inside the gate.
A heavily armored knight, nearly twelve meters tall, wrapped in all kinds of iron chains and laden with equipment, was pulling the gate shut, panting as hideously as an exhausted ox.
"Huff... huff, this really isn't a job for a human. Fuck..."
Mosen, the Rose Knight, complained. He had long since removed his helmet, revealing yet more equipment crammed inside his armor, along with a thin, scar-covered torso like air-dried cured meat.
More equipment seemed to increase his strength, but even with so much added, the gate was still somewhat difficult to close. It still had some way to go before it shut.
Just then, a new disturbance came from underground.
The upheaval at the center of the Holy Capital reached this place as well, making the earth tremble and even the Gate of Glory shake, far more violently than the first time.
"Shit, there's no time!"
Mosen sensed the change.
If anyone could have looked directly into his eyes without being