The summons came without ceremony.
No dramatic announcement echoed through Hall Nine. No heroic music played, no banners unfurled. Instead, every system belonging to Hall Nine—every sword bearer, every hybrid combatant, every survivor who had endured the hall's brutality—received the same silent directive at precisely the same moment.
> Emergency Deployment Authorized.
Destination: Unregistered Ruined World.
Threat Classification: Extreme.
Primary Hostiles: Autonomous Combat Drones.
Estimated Quantity: Thousands.
Threat Level: Lethal to Rank Five and Below.
Mission Objective: Suppression and Survival.
The training hall froze.
Conversations cut off mid-sentence. Blades paused inches from impact. Even the air itself seemed to tighten, as though Neon Eden had drawn a collective breath.
Aira felt the directive settle into her system like a cold stone.
Thousands.
And lethal to Rank Five.
Hall Nine was strong—but it was not invincible.
She stood among them, silver moon hair flowing freely down her back, her rank indicator still glowing softly at Rank One. If anyone doubted the logic of sending her now, they did not voice it. Hall Nine had learned that numbers on a display were not always the full story.
The instructor appeared on the central platform moments later.
His expression was carved from stone.
"This is not training," he said. "This is not a test. This is a containment failure that Neon Eden can no longer ignore."
He swept his gaze across the hall.
"The world you are being sent to has no name," he continued. "Its designation was erased after first contact failed. Its sky is broken. Its land is dead. And its machines have been killing anything that evolves past Rank Five."
A ripple of unease moved through the hall.
Drones were common enemies.
But this—
This was different.
"These drones are not standard," the instructor said. "They learn. They adapt. They rewrite their targeting logic after every engagement. They are the reason this world fell."
Aira's system pulsed.
> Data correlation detected.
Drone behavioral patterns: Similar to rogue construct event.
Threat escalation potential: High.
Her fingers curled slightly.
So this was where anomalies went when they were not destroyed quickly enough.
"The gate opens in five minutes," the instructor finished. "If you retreat without authorization, you will not be retrieved. If you fall, your systems will not be recovered."
He paused.
"Welcome to Hall Nine's real purpose."
The floor beneath them split open.
A gate unfolded.
Not a clean portal like those used for controlled world-hopping. This one looked… wounded. Its edges shimmered unevenly, light bending wrong around its frame. Through it, Aira glimpsed a sky the color of ash and land scarred by endless conflict.
The ruined world waited.
One by one, Hall Nine stepped forward.
Veterans first. Then newer recruits. No one hesitated.
Aira followed.
The moment she crossed the threshold, the air changed.
Gravity pressed unevenly against her body, as if the world itself had forgotten how to hold weight properly. The sky above was fractured—vast plates of gray cloud drifting independently, light leaking through cracks like wounds that refused to close.
The ground was metal.
Not plated.
Not constructed.
It was metal grown into the shape of terrain, warped and twisted, as if the planet's bones had been replaced with machinery long ago.
Aira inhaled slowly.
The air tasted stale. Processed. Recycled too many times.
Her system updated immediately.
> World synchronization complete.
Environmental hostility: Severe.
System interference detected.
Combat parameters adjusted.
Around her, Hall Nine spread out instinctively, forming overlapping defensive formations. Rank indicators glowed brighter here, struggling to maintain stability under foreign system laws.
Then—
Movement.
The horizon shifted.
At first, it looked like heat distortion.
Then the ground began to move.
Thousands of shapes rose from beneath the metallic terrain, unfolding with mechanical precision. Sleek, angular forms. Multi-limbed. Armed with weapons that hummed with unfamiliar frequencies.
Drones.
So many that counting them felt meaningless.
Their optics ignited in unison—cold, blue-white light sweeping across Hall Nine.
Aira's system reacted sharply.
> Hostile entities detected.
Individual threat assessment: Rank Five equivalent.
Quantity multiplier engaged.
Overall lethality: Extreme.
Rank Five.
Each one.
Aira's throat tightened.
Even one of those drones would be a deadly opponent for most of Hall Nine.
And there were thousands.
The drones did not charge.
They observed.
Analyzed.
Then, with chilling synchronization, they moved.
The first wave hit like a storm of steel.
Energy beams tore through the air, cutting deep gouges into the metallic ground. Hall Nine responded instantly—barriers flaring, swords flashing, magic detonating in controlled bursts.
Aira drew her sword.
The moment it manifested, the world seemed to recognize it.
The blade hummed, dark runes flaring faintly as magic aligned itself perfectly along its edge. Her system overlaid targeting data, but she ignored most of it.
There was no time.
A drone lunged at her, blades spinning with lethal speed.
She stepped into its range instead of retreating.
Steel met machine.
The impact jarred her arm to the shoulder, force far greater than anything she had faced before. The drone adapted instantly, adjusting its angle mid-strike, learning her response in real time.
Aira twisted, magic reinforcing her grip, and severed one of its limbs. Sparks exploded outward, showering the ground with molten fragments.
The drone did not fall.
It reoriented, weapons recalibrating.
Her system chimed.
> Combat efficiency: 63%.
Level gain potential: Low per unit.
Cumulative engagement required.
So killing one wasn't enough.
She had known that.
Around her, Hall Nine fought desperately. Rank Four and Five combatants fell back under pressure, formations tightening. Even veterans struggled as drones adapted to their fighting styles after only a few exchanges.
This wasn't a battlefield.
It was a learning ground.
For the enemy.
Aira gritted her teeth.
She could not brute-force this.
She changed rhythm.
Instead of striking to kill immediately, she altered her attacks—feints, incomplete patterns, deliberately inefficient movements. Magic flickered unpredictably along her blade, feeding false data into the drones' adaptive cores.
The drone she faced hesitated.
Just for a fraction of a second.
She took its head clean off.
Her system updated.
> Enemy neutralized.
Combat data absorbed.
Level increase probability: Minimal.
Minimal.
But progress was progress.
The battlefield grew louder.
Explosions tore chunks from the metal terrain. Drones fell—only to be replaced by more crawling up from below, as if the world itself was spawning them.
Aira leapt onto a higher ridge, surveying the chaos.
Hall Nine was being overwhelmed.
Slowly.
Relentlessly.
Her system pulsed again.
> Warning.
Sustained combat at current rate will result in attrition failure.
Recommendation: Tactical shift.
Aira exhaled.
Fine.
She would give the system something it couldn't predict.
She raised her sword—not to attack, but to signal.
"Pull back!" she shouted, her voice cutting through the din. "Don't fight them alone!"
Some turned in surprise.
Some hesitated.
Then they saw it.
She drove her blade into the ground.
Magic surged—not outward, but downward, threading into the metallic terrain itself. The world shuddered as her hybrid magic interacted violently with the machine-planet beneath them.
The ground screamed.
Drones faltered as the terrain beneath them warped, their footing destabilized, targeting disrupted by conflicting environmental data.
Aira yanked her sword free.
"Form clusters!" she shouted. "Overlapping patterns! Don't let them isolate you!"
Hall Nine reacted.
Not because she outranked them.
But because in that moment, she was right.
Clusters formed. Blades and magic overlapped. Drones that adapted to one combatant were struck by another before they could recalibrate.
The tide did not turn.
But it slowed.
Aira fought at the center of it all, silver moon hair whipping violently behind her, glittering even under the broken sky. Her body burned with exhaustion, muscles screaming, system warnings stacking silently at the edge of her awareness.
She did not look at her level.
She did not ask for growth.
She only fought.
Because this world did not care about potential.
It only cared about survival.
And as thousands of drones closed in under the dead sky, Aira understood something with chilling clarity:
This ruined world was not meant to be reclaimed.
It was meant to grind warriors down until only the truly adaptable remained.
And Hall Nine—
Had just been thrown into its teeth.