In the darkness, X felt like a god.
He stood in the plaza outside Cloud City’s largest department store, the storefronts reduced to silhouettes by the blackout. Crowds had poured into the street—some shouting, some crying, some just frozen with their phones held up uselessly, screens dead.
Perfect.
He lifted the Death-Omen Bird.
Up close, it wasn’t just a “bird.” Its body had been forged into a weapon—part feather, part bone, part cold metal that shouldn’t exist in a sane world. When X gripped it, the air around the barrel frosted.
He fired once.
A shriek like a funeral bell rang out, and the shot tore through a storefront sign. Sparks exploded. Glass rained down.
Screams erupted.
X laughed. “Run.”
He fired again, this time into the crown of a roadside tree.
The trunk snapped like wet cardboard. The whole thing toppled into the crowd.
Bodies scattered. People tripped over each other. Someone’s leg bent the wrong way. Someone else didn’t get up at all.
That satisfied him.
He didn’t need the world to end. Not yet.
World Completeness was still at sixty-two percent, and the System’s leash was tight. He could only spend two percent of “disaster” before the System would step in.
But two percent—aimed right—was plenty.
X aimed the weapon at a distant high-rise and fired.
A window on the tenth floor blew outward. Fire licked up the curtains. The building’s occupants spilled onto balconies, screaming into a city that could no longer hear them.
X turned in a slow circle, drinking it all in.
He raised his voice, shouting at the dark sky as if he knew cameras were watching.
“All gifts come with a price! You wanted the truth? Here it is!”
He laughed again, sharp and bright.
“Send your people. I’ll be right here.”
As if on cue, a line of vehicles cut through the fog at the plaza’s edge. Uniformed agents poured out, weapons raised. Among them were a few players, their movements too quick, too clean to be human.
X grinned.
Good. He’d been bored.
A man stepped forward—young, athletic, eyes steady even in the chaos.
Quinn Hayes.
X recognized him from the dossier he’d stolen. A player with a reputation for being “reliable,” which in X’s experience meant “easy to predict.”
Quinn shouted something—an order, a warning.
X didn’t bother listening.
He lifted the Death-Omen Bird and fired.
The shot struck Quinn in the chest.
For an instant, Quinn’s expression went blank with surprise.
His upper body burst apart.
Blood sprayed the pavement. Bone fragments clattered across concrete. The lower half of him toppled like a puppet with its strings cut.
The agents froze.
X inhaled, almost giddy. “Where is she?” he asked the stunned line. “Where is the mermaid?”
No one answered.
X fired again.
Two more people fell. One screamed until the sound cut off mid-syllable.
The plaza turned into a slaughterhouse.
X felt invincible.
The air changed.
The smell of blood thinned, replaced by something clean. Cool night wind. The faint scent of grass.
The screams… dulled.
X blinked.
The plaza was still dark, but it didn’t feel like a battlefield anymore.
People stood nearby, faces tilted up, pointing at the sky.
They were smiling.
They were taking pictures of the stars.
No one was dying. No one was running. No sirens. No smoke. No fire.
X’s stomach dropped.
Illusion.
He’d been fighting ghosts.
He tried to step back—
And his legs didn’t move.
Stone hands burst from the concrete beneath him, fingers as thick as his forearm, clamping around his calves, his waist, his shoulders. More hands crawled up his arms, locking his wrists in place.
Cold spread through his blood.
He felt his skin tightening.
Hardening.
His bones… turning to stone.
X snarled and tried to force his half-spark to heal the creeping petrification, but the stone didn’t “damage” him the way a wound did.
It rewrote him.
A figure stepped out of the darkness a few paces away.
Not tall. Not imposing.
Just… calm.
The man’s build was solid, slightly broad through the shoulders, clean-cut and handsome in a forgettable way—the kind of face you could lose in a crowd.
Except his eyes weren’t forgettable at all.
They were the eyes of a hunter who’d stared into the Endless Sea and come back.
X understood instantly.
This was Rhine.
The Level 2 player of World αK49.
And not only Level 2.
Because the stone hands weren’t “magic.” X could feel it—the same kind of authority living inside his own half-spark.
Divine Spark power.
So I’m not the only one, X thought, rage spiking hot.
He roared, forcing every ounce of strength into his limbs, trying to tear free.
The stone hands loosened… a fraction.
Not enough.
X was pinned. And while he fought, the petrification crept higher.
Rhine didn’t even look impressed.
He simply turned his head toward the girl standing behind X.
A pale girl in the dark, breathing controlled, both hands wrapped around a revolver.
Flint.
“Recoil’s light,” Rhine said, voice flat and practical. “Don’t flinch. Watch for ricochet.”
X’s eyes widened.
No.
He twisted, trying to wrench his head aside—
“Bang. Bang.”
Two shots.
X’s half-spark tried to stitch the damage closed, but Rhine’s authority pressed down like a boot, choking off the healing.
The second round finished it.
X’s body went slack in the stone hands, eyes glassy under the star-filled sky.
Smoke drifted from Flint’s barrel.
Xueyu’s gaze unfocused as her System lit up.
[SYSTEM]
You have stopped and killed Stowaway X.
Reward: Extractable Talent—S-Rank “Daily Login.”
Choose: PLUNDER or DECLINE.
Xueyu didn’t hesitate.
“Plunder.”
[SYSTEM]
Talent acquired: S-Rank “Daily Login.”
[SYSTEM]
Tutorial Task Complete: “Plunder a Talent.”
Reward issued: Eligibility to Awaken (Ascend as a Supernatural).
A second notification flashed—this one on Rhine’s side.
[SYSTEM]
World αK49—World Completeness Check: 62%
Xueyu let out a shaky breath. “I… I can’t believe it worked.”
Rhine didn’t look away from the corpse. “Your illusion was strong, but it wouldn’t have fooled him by itself.”
He glanced at her. “A half Divine Spark can see through too many tricks.”
Xueyu’s eyes widened.
Rhine’s voice stayed steady. “I reinforced it with my own spark. Made the nightmare feel real enough that he forgot to doubt.”
He stepped to the corpse and cast his line.
The fishing hook sank into X as if the body were water.
The System chimed in rapid succession.
[SYSTEM]
You have obtained: Half a Divine Spark.
[SYSTEM]
You have obtained: Death-Omen Bird.
[SYSTEM]
Divine Spark Fusion Progress: +100%.
Total Fusion: 100%.
You have obtained: Full Divine Spark.
[SYSTEM]
You have been upgraded to a Level 3 Player.
More prompts followed immediately, each one heavier than the last.
[SYSTEM]
New privileges unlocked:
• Skip Cycle (Cycle 12 → Cycle 15)
• World Chat Channel Access (World αK49)
• Divine Spark Fusion Permission
• Divinity Permission
Rhine tightened his grip around the rod.
Full.
Not half anymore.
A complete Divine Spark settled into him like a second heartbeat—quiet, heavy, and vast enough to make the air around him feel thinner.
Xueyu stared at him, wide-eyed. “Rhine… you just—”
“I know,” Rhine said.
Somewhere beneath Cloud City’s chaos, something deeper had shifted. Like a giant eye had opened and noticed him.
And that was the real disaster.