The God-Level Scavenger

The Chained Monster

"Do not look into his eyes," Amina said, her voice turning sharp and guarded as she pulled me back two steps.

The chained man laughed, the heavy iron links around his arms clanking against the wet cage floor. In the world of high-tier guilds, prisoners kept in underground water vaults were not normal criminals. They were rogue SS-rank fighters whose powers were too dangerous to execute in public without destroying entire city sectors. The Elder Council kept them submerged in black suppressing liquid to keep their magic cores frozen.

"Amina," I said, keeping my dragon scale sword raised. "Who is he?"

"Lord Malakor," she said, her bright eyes narrowing as she scanned the lock mechanisms on his iron cage. "The former head of the Black Sun Guild. Tariq's father led the raid that put him down six years ago. Everyone in the inner city believes he was executed."

"Executed?" Malakor said, his glowing red eyes tracking her torn white dress. "The council does not kill weapons, little girl. They store them. And now that you have knocked out their enforcer, the auto-release system thinks my guard shift has ended."

A loud metallic hiss echoed through the vault. The green liquid draining from his cage accelerated, and the heavy black locks on his wrists clicked open one by one.

"Kofi, we have to go right now," Amina said, grabbing my uninjured right arm. "If his suppression chains drop completely, he will collapse this entire underground level just to kill the council guards outside."

"The door is locked from the outside," I told her, pointing to the thick steel blast hatch behind the fallen silver-armored guard. "We cannot break it before he steps out."

Amina did not waste time wishing for better odds. She looked down at the fallen council enforcer, then at the silver rank badge pinned to his shoulder armor. She dropped to her knees, using her light magic like a small torch to heat the metal pin until it snapped off his suit.

"The blast hatch uses council blood and rank identification," she said, her fingers working fast as she pressed the bloody badge into the center scanner on the heavy door frame. "I can trick the scanner for ten seconds by boosting the badge's signal with my light core."

"What about the man in the cage?" I asked, turning my head as another heavy iron lock hit the stone floor with a loud clang.

Malakor stepped out of the open cage door, his tall frame towering over the walkway. Even with his energy drained from years in the dark liquid, the raw force coming off his body made the air feel thin and hard to breathe. He looked at the fallen enforcer, then at the dragon scale blade in my right hand.

"An extraction power," Malakor said, taking a slow step forward. His bare feet left black footprints on the wet grating. "The original bloodline that built the sector walls. The council spent fifty years trying to wipe your family out, boy. How are you still breathing?"

"I survive because I sort trash," I said, my teeth tight as I stood between him and Amina.

"You are trash until you learn how to use it," Malakor said. He raised his hand, pointing a single gray finger toward my chest. "Give me that dragon blade, and I will let you both crawl out of this hole. Refuse, and I will tear your core out to refill my own."

He did not wait for my answer. He moved with terrifying speed, his hand thrusting toward my neck like a iron claw.

I activated my newly stolen skill instantly.

Shadow Step.

My vision blurred, and my body dissolved into a dark streak, sliding five feet to the right just as his hand smashed through the iron railing where I had been standing a second ago. Heavy metal bars snapped like dry twigs under his fingers, falling into the dark river below.

I reappeared behind him, my dragon scale blade swinging horizontal with all seventy-six points of my updated strength.

The blade hit his bare back. But instead of slicing through his flesh, a loud metallic ring exploded through the room. My sword bounced off his dark skin as if I had hit a solid mountain of iron. The shock of the hit traveled up my arms, re-opening the wound on my left shoulder.

Malakor turned his head slowly, a cold grin spreading across his face. "Rank-D Iron Skin? Boy, my natural skin density is S-rank. You cannot cut me with low-level junk."

He backhanded me across the chest.

The impact felt like getting hit by a runaway supply truck. I flew backward, crashing hard into the blast hatch right next to Amina. My dragon blade dropped from my fingers, clattering across the iron floor. My vision went dark for a second, and a hot spray of blood burst from my mouth.

"Kofi!" Amina shouted.

The scanner on the door beeped green as her light magic override finally finished processing. The heavy blast hatch began to slide upward by six inches, revealing a long concrete tunnel on the other side.

"Get in!" she ordered, grabbing my belt and dragging my heavy body toward the small gap under the door.

Malakor walked toward us slowly, stepping on my dragon scale blade and snapping the metal hilt in half under his heel. "Nobody leaves this vault until I am full."

Amina looked at the broken sword, then at the gray-haired monster three feet away. Her face did not show fear; it showed a sudden, dangerous calculation. She reached into her torn dress pocket and pulled out a small black glass vial filled with glowing yellow liquid—a core destabilizer she had stolen from Tariq's private lab before escaping.

"You want energy?" Amina said, her voice completely steady as she held the glass vial over his bare foot. "Drink this."

She slammed the glass vial down onto the metal floor between his legs, shattering it into a hundred pieces.