The God-Level Scavenger

Unstable Ground

The black glass vial shattered against the iron floor, releasing a harsh yellow gas that instantly caught fire.

The chemical fire flared upward into Lord Malakor’s face. The core destabilizer was designed to force a high-tier magic user’s internal energy to clash with itself, turning their own power into a weapon against them. In our world, the noble families used these chemicals to control dangerous prisoners because standard weapons could not pierce S-rank skin. Amina had taken the vial from Tariq's laboratory weeks ago, holding onto it until she found the exact moment to cause maximum damage.

Malakor let out a low roar as the golden flame washed over his arms. The black veins along his neck bulged outward as his suppressed energy began to burn inside his own chest.

"You little rat," Malakor said, his glowing red eyes turning wild as he stumbled backward, trying to slap the burning yellow liquid off his bare skin.

"Move!" Amina said, her hand reaching down to grab my coat collar.

She did not wait to watch him suffer. She pulled me under the rising blast hatch just as the heavy steel door slid back down with a loud thud, locking Malakor inside the burning vault.

We fell onto the rough concrete floor of the emergency tunnel. My chest burned with every breath I took, and my mouth was full of blood from his backhand strike. The broken pieces of my dragon scale blade were still lying back inside the vault, destroyed under his foot. I had lost my main weapon, but my system window was glowing bright green in front of my face.

[Extraction complete.]

[New Skill Active: Shadow Step (Rank A).]

[Current Stats: Strength 76, Agility 72, Defense D-Rank (Iron Skin).]

"Are you able to stand?" Amina asked. She was leaning against the cold tunnel wall, her face pale from using so much light magic to trick the scanner.

"I can walk," I said, pushing myself up from the hard ground. "Where does this pipe go?"

"It leads to the lower drainage canals under the outer mountain," she said, pulling her torn dress tight around her shoulders. "It is the only route out of Sector 4 that avoids the city grid radar. But we are out of the safe zone now. The faction territory begins at the end of this tunnel."

I looked down at my hands. My skin was still rough and dirty from the lower sector mud, but the power inside my muscles was growing stronger with every fight. "What factions?"

"The regional guilds that refused to join the Elder Council," Amina explained, stepping quickly down the dark concrete passage. Her voice was calm and analytical, completely focused on the strategic reality of our situation. "The city council tells the public that the lands outside the wall are empty wild lands filled with monsters. It is a lie. The refugees and rogue guilds built their own trade camps out here. But they hate people from the inner city, and they kill anyone wearing council gear on sight."

She pointed to the silver badge still pinned to my torn shirt—the one I had pulled off the dead enforcer back in the vault. I quickly ripped the silver metal off and threw it onto the dirt floor.

We walked fast through the underground tunnel for ten minutes until the smell of stagnant water grew stronger. The concrete pipe opened up into a wide stone archway overlooking a hidden valley deep within the mountain pass.

Spread out below us were hundreds of small iron huts, glowing with dim yellow lanterns. Giant wooden watchtowers lined the edge of the settlement, and heavy iron chains hung between the cliff walls to keep low-level wild beasts away. This was the Outlaw Haven of Sector 4—a place where no council law existed.

"We need food and a new blade," I said, looking down at the crowded dirt streets below.

"We need to be careful," Amina corrected me, her bright eyes scanning the guards standing on the wooden watchtowers. "Tariq's family guild trades stolen metal with the leaders of this camp. If they find out we are here, they will sell us back to the inner city before midnight."

We climbed down the narrow stone path, blending into the crowd of armed scrap collectors and rogue hunters moving through the lower market. People covered their faces with dirty rags, carrying heavy packs of monster bones and raw crystals mined from the deep caves.

We stopped near a small weapons stall made of scrap iron. Dozens of rusted swords and crude iron spears hung from heavy wire hooks.

The shop owner was a stocky man with a long scar across his nose. He looked at my torn clothes, then at Amina's dirty white dress, his eyes narrowing with immediate suspicion.

"You two look like you ran through a meat grinder," the merchant said, leaning over his wooden counter. "You got coins, or are you just wasting my time?"

"We have scrap metal to trade," I said, reaching into my pocket to pull out three high-grade power core chips I had salvaged from the cave guards back in the dungeon.

The merchant's eyes lit up as he saw the blue glow of the chips. He reached out to grab them, but before his fingers could touch the metal, a heavy steel spear slammed down onto the wooden counter between us.

A group of four men in red leather coats stepped out from the crowd, surrounding the stall.

The man in front wore a silver tiger badge on his chest—the emblem of Tariq's allied trading faction. He looked at Amina's face, a cruel grin spreading across his lips as he pulled a bounty poster from his belt.

"Well, look what walked right into our camp," the leader said, holding up the poster showing Amina's face. "The Young Master put a ten-thousand coin reward on your heads. Dead or alive."