Ethan did not leave his grandfather’s house immediately.For nearly an hour, he remained at the dusty table with the Legacy archive print placed in front of him and the old notebook open beside it. Afternoon sunlight slipped through the curtains in thin yellow lines, catching dust in the air and making the room feel less abandoned than preserved, as though his grandfather had expected somebody to return and finish reading.The archive image disturbed Ethan more than the notebook.Eight figures stood before the stone structure marked with the broken-ring symbol. One was unmistakably Ethan. Seven were blurred by cross-timeline distortion rather than ordinary damage.The acquisition timestamp remained:JUNE 17, 1998But the System had already clarified the important point.It was not an event photograph.It was a cross-timeline archive record that had somehow been acquired in 1998.Information before event.Memory before life.Ethan turned it over again.Nothing.He checked the notebook’s

The first creature stepped into the dim blue light.Ethan did not attack.He watched.Its body was low and elongated, supported by four narrow limbs that bent at angles resembling neither a wolf nor any creature he remembered from Eternal Ascension of Tower. Pale skin stretched tightly across its frame, while a mask of yellowed bone covered the entire head. There were no visible eyes. Only two narrow openings where eyes should have been.A second creature emerged behind it.Then another.Seven.Nine.Twelve.More shapes shifted beyond the light.Ethan tightened his grip around the cheap sword he had purchased several days earlier.Outside the dungeon, he had been Level Twenty.Inside, his statistics had not changed.His knowledge had.The System floated beside him.[LEGACY TRIAL ACTIVE.][STANDARD DUNGEON RULES SUSPENDED.][TARGET IDENTIFICATION...][FAILED.]Ethan frowned.Ethan: Again.He tried focusing on the nearest creature exactly as he had done thousands of times in the game.No

By eight in the morning, the streets surrounding the Hunter Association were already crowded.Temporary barriers divided the avenue into registration lanes while large digital boards displayed instructions above the entrance. Military personnel and Association staff struggled to keep spectators from blocking the paths reserved for awakened applicants.A week earlier, most people had been learning how to survive.Now they wanted to know where they stood.HUNTER RANKING ASSESSMENTOFFICIAL CLASSIFICATION: F ? SThe letters were simple.Their consequences were not.Rank already determined which government contracts a Hunter could accept, which dungeons they were legally permitted to enter, how much insurance companies demanded before covering a party, and how aggressively newly formed guilds attempted to recruit them.High rank meant better equipment. Better access. More money. More influence.And, increasingly, more respect.Humanity had required remarkably little time to build a social

The darkness inside Old Tower Gate lasted only nine seconds.It felt longer.When the emergency lights returned, Ethan's first instinct was to count people.Mina stood to his right. Leonard had moved closer to the stone table. Mara and Daniel were already checking the room's edges. Kieran had one hand on his weapon and the other on the equipment pack he still refused to put down. Noah remained near the far wall, but the System continued treating him differently from everyone else.[ASCENDANT FORMATION: 6/7.][WATCHER CHANNEL: NOAH — EXTERNAL.][ORIGINAL LAST DAWN: 8/8.]The three lines were still present when Ethan reopened the party interface.He read them carefully.For weeks, every mystery had become dangerous the moment somebody assumed two similar things were identical. Leonard was Riven, but Leonard Cross was still a life that had happened. Ethan Vale was the name attached to the game record, while Ethan Elyrion existed somewhere beneath it. Mina had one name across both historie

Ethan found the place where Leonard disappeared by following blood that was not Leonard's.Black droplets stained the stone in a thin line through the broken trial chamber. Each one dissolved when Ethan got too close, leaving behind a faint fragment of the broken-ring symbol.Mina: That is definitely not normal blood.Kieran: I am beginning to miss normal monster blood.Daniel crouched beside one of the marks.Daniel: It is not blood.Mara: Then what?Daniel: Record residue.Ethan looked at him.Daniel: I don't know how I know that.Ethan: Adrian?Daniel's jaw tightened.Daniel: Maybe.They followed the trail to a stone wall burned with a larger symbol.A circle surrounded by eight lines.Ethan stopped.Eight.Not six.Not seven.The same number EAT kept insisting on whenever the original Last Dawn was shown accurately.Ethan crouched beside the mark without touching it.The eight lines were not identical. Six extended directly into the circle. One sat slightly apart, connected by a th