It was no surprise both of us were defeated in an instant. After all, [The Faculty Director] was a being, whose strength was currently beyond the realm of imagination. It was capable of unleashing thousand slashes in a split microsecond. So, the only way for us to stand a chance was to exploit the cheats given to us. I didn't know for sure what his cheat was, this information didn't have a backdoor disclosing it so easily, but based on what I had seen, he had some type of coin manipulation cheat. But technically, my cheat was similar – I was rewriting the values, this would mean, his cheat has something else to it entirely. I still had to gather this information. And for that I need to talk with him. Of course, at the moment this wasn't possible in the slightest.
I was now 1 km away from the center of the impact. Which meant [The Faculty Director] could sense beings in at least 2,5 km and attack in an area at least 1,5 km in diameter. This was tough. From what I had seen, Noah knew a lot and fused multiple classes but I didn't think he would be capable of unleashing an attack that can travel more than 2,5 km and even hit the target. Not even talking about dealing damage to the target. At the moment, this entity was at least one million times stronger than the two of us combined. We needed to find a way to shorten the gap quickly or else we were going down.
At that moment, I had to keep my distance, observe the battle and carefully choose a "Crimson Form". I didn't have to specifically tell Noah because I knew he had most likely finished with his preparations already. He probably knew I was watching from a distance and had probably even guessed my cheat. My body was emitting sparks of crimson energy. It was getting harder to control it every second. That's why generally the "Crimson State" was a one-time skill only at the end of an entity's life. The power could consume you at any moment. In fact, it was trying from the very first moment. It tried to wrap my mind in its images but it only showed me "that" family, which no longer existed. I had made sure of that the moment the tower project had started.
Even though this failed, the existence behind the "Crimson State" waited. I didn't have information but I knew it was there, waiting. The moment I began unleashing a crimson attack, [The Faculty Director] had already sent a couple of invisibly fast slashes at my direction. Even though we were getting stronger every second, the enemy was the same way. And it wasn't like us – it had let the existence consume it for higher power. This was what an entity, which lost everything, was capable of doing – destruction. It was honestly sad. But I didn't care. It had freed me from the thinking of how to contact Noah, and in turn, I had to free it from its mindless suffering – by defeating it.
But "defeat" was a generous word. Right now, what we needed wasn't just to win. We needed to rewrite what winning even meant. Against an enemy like [The Faculty Director], there was no conventional path. Each slash wasn't just an attack – it was a command to reality, an override of the game's laws. It was just like a hacker. It wasn't just using power – it was the system now. Or, at least, that's what it believed. But the cracks were there. I'd seen it before in others like it – ones who let power consume them. The stronger the shell, the louder the scream inside.
That's when I decided: I wasn't going to just fight it. I was going to exploit it.
「Status: [Crimson Resonance Sync: 12%]」
「Warning: Emotional Disruption Detected. Risk of Mental Collapse Increased.」
The system didn't like this. It wasn't designed for two "Crimson Users" to cooperate, but we had begun our plan the moment [The Faculty Director] had entered "Crimson State". We had to cooperate as fellow cheaters. This was our path. The system, the being behind the "Crimson State" expected us to collapse before we collaborated. They expected betrayal.
But me and Noah? We were rewriting the algorithm of what it meant to be players.
I activated my personalized "Crimson Lock" – a cheat protocol I had written into my own essence, a forbidden override I had embedded directly into the base memory of my identity when I first entered the Tower Project's code. I was a cheater after all, that was the least I could do. I was "bad", "strange" and "evil".
「Cheat Protocol: Backdoor Δ initialized.」
「Limited Command Line Access: GRANTED.」
Lines of red code slid down my vision, symbols spinning through unknown languages and corrupted dialects. I wasn't trying to destroy [The Faculty Director] yet. No. First, I needed to find the root – the source of the Crimson corruption – because that was what gave it the edge over us. It had merged with the Crimson. We were just borrowing it. If I could isolate the Crimson's core command thread….. I could reverse-engineer the interface. Or better – overwrite it. But it would take time. And time was a thing we didn't have.
Suddenly –
BOOM.
The ground split open between me and the center. A wave of gravity bent the forest behind me backward like paper caught in a storm.
[The Faculty Director] had noticed me. Or, to be more precise – the existence controlling it.
「[The Faculty Director] used skill: Time Lock Distortion Slash 」
「Damage Calculated: LETHAL 」
「Dodge Rate: 0% 」
「Defense Penetrated 」
「Initiating Passive Cheat Countermeasure….. 」
「Failed….. 」
I should have died. Instead, I stood in a different place. A different time. A figure stood beside me. Tall. Quiet. Radiating calm and terrifying familiarity. Noah. But not now-Noah. This was a fragment. A shadow he had left behind, encoded in the cheat system. He had already found a new way to cheat, just as I expected but even faster. His voice echoed in my ear—calm, focused.
"You figured it out. Good. I'll hold him off for 3 seconds. That's all I can give you. Open the lock."
3 seconds. In a world where a million actions could happen in one. That was forever. I dropped to one knee, activating the deepest layer of my hack—buried behind thousands of proxy firewalls, hidden even from myself until now.
「System Override Request: Crimson State Core Thread Access 」
「Authorizing Identity: Undefined (Blacklisted Entity) 」
「Override Key: 00-RED-000-DELTA 」
「Warning: You are attempting to rewrite a Primordial Entity Core. Sanity Risk: 99.97% 」
I didn't hesitate. 'Sanity' was a luxury for people who didn't know what it meant to be erased. I reached through the data. Through the fire. Through the screams of lost minds and forgotten memories. And I touched it. The root. The first Crimson Lock. It would have a serious impact on me – that was for sure but we had no choice. If [The Faculty Director] hadn't started being under full control of the Crimson existence, it would've been a lot easier. But that stupid leader turned out to be weaker than I expected. There was a price I had to pay if I overuse the Crimson Lock. I had to try to be very fast or else everything would crumble. Noah had secured me time, I had to use it to strengthen the logic of my strategy to the purest.
It looked like a heart, glitching between a thousand shapes, every beat echoing like a nuclear pulse. But it was wrong. The code... it was not created by the Tower. It was external. An infection? Or a message?
Then it hit me.
[The Faculty Director] wasn't the wielder of Crimson.
It was the first victim. The real enemy….. was still watching. Pain was all I could feel in every particle of me. As if I would disintegrate in an instant.
A laugh echoed through the data, the matter, the space – distorted, hollow, infinite. Then a name appeared. A name I had never seen. I was tricked…..
「User: [Crimson Origin – ???] has descended. 」
「1 New Unread message 」
Topic: Cheater Warning
From: The Cheater's Hall
A user from above the 25th tower island has descended. It passed through the {Night of Ice Gate} and it will take the system a considerable amount of time before the user can be stopped. The information presented in this message is to not be disclosed outside of "The Cheater's Hall".
Cheat Update: Shared Protocol Synced will be provided to both early members of "The Cheater's Hall" present on the battlefield, participating in the battle against User: [Crimson Origin] as a form of compensation.
We apologize for the situation.
[Accept?]
I pulled back instantly. My mind reeled. Blood leaked from my nose in real life, and I bit my lip to stay conscious.
But I had what I needed.
A map of the Crimson threads. A blueprint to rewrite it.
Noah's echo faded. Time snapped back. The reality was now red.
「Cheat Update: Shared Protocol Synced – Dual Rewrite Mode Enabled 」