The Shadow Demon stood twelve feet tall and roared so loud that the very ground seemed to shake. The air was thick clogged with the stench of sulfur and rot and the monster’s fist, a swirling mass of pure shadow, crashed down toward me. A few minutes ago, that would’ve meant game over. Back then, I’d have cowered, squeezed my eyes shut, just hoping for a quick end.But not this time.As the fist came down, it felt like time warped around me. Everything slowed. I saw the path of the strike as clear as a line drawn in the air, every detail stretched out for me to read. At 62 agility, even a lightning-fast attack like that felt like it was moving through syrup.I reached for the skill humming in my mind: Shadow Step.BEEP! ACTIVATING SKILL: SHADOW STEP (RANK 1). MANA COST: 10.My body melted into cold, dark mist the second the demon’s fist obliterated the ground where I’d stood.BOOM!Stone shards exploded everywhere, but I wasn’t there to get splattered. In less than a heartbeat, I refo

Leaving the trash-lined chaos of Sector 7 for the neon-soaked luxury of the Mid-District felt like changing worlds in the blink of an eye. Down below, freelancers scraped and clawed for pocket change; up here, people wore silk robes over enchanted armor and dropped a scavenger’s annual haul on a single bottle of mana wine. I kept my hood up and my iron mask tight over my face, slipping through crowds as just another merc or if anyone got nervous maybe an assassin out for a snack. Nobody met my eyes. It helped that my stats these days, especially my nearly maxed-out strength and the upgraded shadow bloodline, gave off a deadly kind of vibe that kept the riff-raff at bay.Instead of marching through the main, muggy corporate streets, I zigzagged through back alleys, all clean stone and soft light, until I got to The Obsidian Vault a place that pretended to be a fancy antique store but actually held the city’s biggest, nastiest Black Market Auction. In this place, you could buy almost an

Eighty-five million credits feels a lot different when it's just a single sliver of premium plastic resting in your palm. Back in the Obsidian Vault’s shadowy VIP tunnel, Grand Master Vance handed me the encrypted Platinum Black Card himself. His fingers shook, age crumpling him nearly in half, nose almost brushing his shoes.“The funds have cleared, my lord,” he whispered, oozing the kind of reverence only money buys. “Standard five percent fee, of course. The rest eighty point seven five million anonymous, untraceable, ready for you. Is there anything else we can do to keep your… continued favor?”“Settle a private invoice,” I answered, my voice heavy and distorted behind the matte-black iron mask.I tapped the Abyss Ring, bending space right at my side. A flicker of digitized parchment slipped into my hand: my shopping list of rare magical ingredients raw materials regular shops would never carry, the kind you need to brew a Sovereign Dragon Elixir. I needed those special catalysts

The last sparks of fire mana faded away, sinking into the skin of my right palm. Oliver Vance hit the crypt floor hard like a puppet cut from its strings. He didn’t budge. Didn’t even groan. His breath turned shallow, his face sunken, wiped clean of the power that used to radiate from him like a furnace. Tier-5 mana, gone just an empty shell now.$$BEEP! FORCED CLASS EXTRACTION COMPLETE.$$$$SUCCESSFULLY EXTRACTED FROM 'OLIVER VANCE':$$$$+120 MANA$$$$+80 AGILITY$$$$BLOODLINE SECURED: 'VANCE CONGLOMERATE PYROMANCY BLOODLINE' (RARE).$$$$SKILL ACQUIRED: 'BURNING REIGN' (RARE - RANK 1).$$$$NOTE: TARGET HAS BEEN STRIPPED OF ALL COMBAT CAPABILITIES AND REVERTED TO A PERMANENT TIER-0 ORDINARY HUMAN STATUS.$$Heat surged through my chest unfamiliar, wild, now perfectly woven together with my Sovereign Shadow Core Bloodline. I could feel my mana capacity stretching, fire magic slipping easily beneath my control.I looked at Oliver’s limp body, then over at Chloe. She was kneeling in the f