UNLOCK: I CAN SEE MY STATS

chapter 39 : I'm ... you

The coastal sea, near Haven Island

A mild breeze blew across the clear sea, carrying the scent of salt and the sound of waves crashing against the rocks. In a small corner of the fishermen’s dock, the place had become a silent massacre.

Marcus, the tall young man with neatly cropped hair, stood there stiffly. His black eyes were blank, staring at the bodies of strange sea creatures strewn across the yard.

He gripped his sword’s hilt and drove it deep into the skull of a sea creature with a twisted nose, then pulled the blade out, dark blue blood coating it. He wiped the blade on the dead creature’s clothes and kicked it aside.

Thud!

"I don’t know if I’ve finished them all off..." he muttered with a frown, slowly scanning the area. "If some managed to escape and reveal where we are... I’ll find myself running again from island to island."

When he stepped into a side room of the building, his eyes caught on shelves and walls covered with maps and nautical charts.

"Hmm, interesting room..." he whispered, raising his brows in surprise at the precision of the details. "Truly the work of a professional."

He sheathed his sword and began flipping through one map after another, then let out a bitter sigh.

"If I’d known they had a navigator this skilled, I’d have kept him alive, at least long enough to learn navigation from him... but..."

A calm smile spread across his face. He placed a large book on navigation in his lap and thought

"With transformation number zero, I can learn this by myself."

Transformation number zero — stored in the bracelet’s library — granted him extraordinary intelligence and terrifying comprehension. Only four months ago did he realize how foolish he’d been to ignore it, discovering he could use it to absorb any knowledge from books at insane speed.

He sat on a cracked wooden chair and began turning the pages.

"This man was a real genius... too bad I killed him." he said with quiet, genuine regret.

Then he closed his eyes, pulled back into the memory of that day that changed everything: the day his father was assassinated, the day that mysterious bracelet latched onto his chest... the turning point after which his life was never the same.

"Seven months... seven months passed like a flash." he whispered in a voice tinged with bitterness.

"And since that day, I’ve been moving from island to island..."

Harsh images crossed his mind: chases by the Marine Army, spies of the world system, betrayals by villagers lured by the bounty on his head, which had risen to 540 million Rela. The world system even put ten million Rela on anyone who revealed his location.

A villager betrayed them, then later even the chief of a village Marcus himself had saved from pirates. They all bowed to money, to their fear of the world system.

All of this drove him here. And this time, he chose to live alone in the forest while he sent his mother and siblings to the village. But what he discovered later was that this island was actually a secret slave colony ruled by sea creatures, with quiet backing from a nearby Marine Army branch.

He growled as he remembered the information he ripped from one of them under torture.

"The world system... the Marine Army... hand in hand with these bastards."

His pupils contracted.

"Should I slaughter the soldiers at that branch and wipe everything out?"

He shook his head hard.

"No... that might draw attention, and they could discover where I am."

He kicked the table violently, scattering the maps.

"I’m sick of this... even if I have power, my family can’t keep up with the danger."

A shadow of his mother rose in his mind, death’s scythe of her fatal illness hanging over her.

"I’ll find them a safe place... then go search for a cure. Even if it means going to the deep sea or the final land, I won’t hesitate."

A strange spark lit up in his eyes.

"This... might work."

Then the voice of the bracelet on his chest spoke in its cold mechanical tone.

[Scan complete...]

[DNA successfully acquired...]

[Transformation unlocked...]

---

"Hmm? Oh... the scan finished that quickly?" Marcus murmured happily when he heard the bracelet’s voice reporting its success in copying the DNA of the sea creatures.

"That means I now have ten transformations."

He pressed the hidden etching on his chest. The bracelet let out a sharp tone, then a green curtain of light appeared before his eyes filled with small icons , each one representing a transformation from his genetic library.

Form of the sea king serpent

Form of the flea — standard transformation type

Form of the elephant — legendary transformation type

Lightning ability — the elemental power he copied from Eren

Construction ability — the special type he got from his mother

Pressure ability — special type

Aura ability — special type

Form of the gray dwarf (symbol of intelligence)

Form of the sea creatures

And now... the DNA of the amphibians

"Let’s see what this new transformation does..."

As soon as he thought of it, a slight electric current ran through his body. His muscles tensed a little, his fangs grew long and sharp.

He touched his teeth with a finger, feeling the terrifying sharpness.

"Hmm... just the teeth?" he muttered coldly as he lowered his hand.

"Not much benefit... just underwater breathing and some physical strength."

He shrugged and said "It’s fine, I wasn’t expecting much. It was just curiosity."

Then he closed his eyes and activated the construction ability. Dozens of transparent arms made of pure energy extended from him. The arms swept all the maps out of the room and stacked them up. After that he created a huge energy chest and put everything inside.

He strutted out of the building, the chest floating behind him like an obedient servant.

"If anyone asks what I spent most of the last seven months training besides my body and sword — the answer would be construction ability, and the second... pressure."

---

When he finished looting, he stood in the yard among the corpses, especially the body of the sea king that looked like a cow.

"I hate the look of this building. Better to erase it completely."

He lifted his foot and stepped into the air, a transparent platform forming under him, followed by stairs of construction energy.

Marcus smiled as he climbed into the sky.

"That’s why I love this ability."

When he was high enough, he pointed his hook toward his boat on the shore, sending the chest off to deposit its contents there. Then he looked down at the bloodstained yard.

"This is the second time I’ve done this..."

He took a breath, canceled the transformation, and the moment the transparent stairs disappeared, he was freed from gravity and began to fall.

He immediately activated the pressure ability.

Zzzzt!

He dropped at tremendous speed, the wind ripping at his ears, the air compressing around him.

"Pressure burst."

His right fist glowed with a transparent aura. The air near it cracked like glass.

Boom!

He punched into the empty space. For a moment, he seemed frozen in place. Then a clear film shot from his fist and spread through the yard and the entire building.

Everything it touched started disintegrating. Rock, steel, wood... even the light itself seemed distorted inside that deadly circle. In seconds, everything turned to dust, toyed with by the breeze.

When it was over, what was once a fortress for the sea creatures was now just a dark pit filled with seawater.

Marcus canceled his transformation, returned to human form, then shifted into the sea king serpent and dove toward the shore.

He emerged there, canceled his transformation again, and collapsed, panting.

"Tch... this technique drains an enormous amount of energy."

But he smiled coldly.

"But it’s worth it. The power to erase everything... that’s my strongest card."

Then he touched the bracelet on his chest.

"More than just a trump card."

He gave the island one last look, then pushed his boat out to sea.

"Best to leave... even if I compressed the sound, that shock must have reached their ears."

And he sailed away, his eyes fixed on the horizon... on his coming plans, the siblings he promised to protect, and the mother he vowed to save from death.