The world returned to me in a nauseating swirl of sensations. The cold, damp cobblestones of the alley pressed against my cheek. The acrid taste of bile coated my throat. A deep, resonant ache pulsed behind my eyes, a brutal reminder of the mana backlash. I was a vessel that had been filled with an ocean and then violently emptied, leaving only cracked, brittle clay behind.
[User Condition: Critical Mana Depletion.]
[All Skill Progression Halted for 00:58:12...]
The red, glaring system prompt was a constant, painful presence in my vision. I pushed myself up, my arms trembling with the effort. I was weaker than I had ever been, even before my Awakening. This was the price of playing god. No, not god. A lord. And a wise lord understood the cost of his power.
I needed to get home. The thought was a dim beacon in the fog of my exhaustion. Using the wall for support, I staggered to my feet. The sirens still wailed, but the initial panic in the streets had subsided, replaced by a tense, fearful stillness. The breach hadn't been sealed—the purple tear still marred the horizon—but the initial wave had apparently been contained. The news projections on the buildings now showed replays of the battle, highlighting heroic stands and the mysterious, timely intervention that had saved the Vance heiress.
"…the origin of the spatial slash remains unknown," a commentator's voice echoed. "Guild leaders confirm no Spatial Mage of that caliber was deployed in that sector. It's a mystery that saved a life today."
A mystery. I was a mystery. The phantom of the battlefield. The knowledge should have been exhilarating, but all I felt was a profound, bone-deep weariness.
Somehow, I made it back to my apartment building. Slipping inside was easy; everyone was still huddled in their fortified homes. When I entered our apartment, Aunt Maria rushed to me, her face pale with worry.
"Leon! Stars above, you're safe!" She pulled me into a tight hug, then held me at arm's length, her eyes narrowing. "You look terrible. What happened? Was it the panic in the streets?"
"I… I got jostled by the crowd. Fell. It's nothing," I mumbled, the lie coming easier now, layered over the greater deception. I needed to sleep. I needed the progression halt timer to run out.
I retreated to my room, collapsing onto my bed without even taking off my shoes. The moment my head hit the pillow, I was plunged not into sleep, but into a strange, lucid dreamscape.
It was a world of data. Golden streams of code flowed around me like rivers. The hundreds of dormant skills I possessed appeared as locked, shimmering cubes of light, orbiting a central, brilliant core—the [Eye of the Mimic]. I could see the faint, almost stagnant progress bars on each one, frozen at their various percentages. But my attention was drawn to the core itself. A hairline crack, faint but visible, ran through it. The forced manifestation had damaged the very foundation of my power.
A new prompt, calm and analytical, appeared before me.
[System Diagnostics Initiated.]
[Root Cause: Mana Conduit Incompatibility. F-Rank Mana Channels are insufficient for A-Rank Skill Manifestation.]
[Proposed Solution: Forge a Mana Core Circuit.]
[Objective: Create an internal network to bypass natural channels, allowing for controlled skill manifestation without physical backlash.]
[Process: Autonomous. Requires significant mana and time.]
This wasn't just a skill; it was evolving. It was learning from its mistakes, creating solutions. The road to lordhood wasn't a straight path; it was a series of upgrades, and my first major one had just been triggered.
When I woke, hours later, sunlight was streaming through my window. The sirens were silent. The breach, according to the soft news chime from the main room, had been stabilized by the concerted effort of the city's S-Rank Hunters. The cost had been high, but a catastrophe had been averted.
The debilitating weakness was gone, replaced by a familiar, if still low, level of strength. The red warning was gone. And the progression halt timer had expired.
DING!
[Mana Core Circuit Foundation: 0.1%]
[All Skill Progression Resumed.]
A new, long-term objective had been set. But more immediately, my skills were growing again. I checked the list. [Fist of the Boulder] was at 19%. [Spatial Slash], the skill that had nearly broken me, was already at 3%, its progression seemingly accelerated by its forced usage.
A knock on my bedroom door made me jump. "Leon? You have a visitor," Aunt Maria said, her voice tinged with a strange mix of awe and confusion.
A visitor? No one ever visited me.
I opened the door and my heart stopped.
Standing in our small, humble living room was Elara Vance.
She was out of her combat gear, dressed in a simple, elegant blue dress, but she still carried an aura of unshakable grace and power. Her silver hair was like a fall of moonlight in our dim apartment. She looked… real. And she was here.
"Leon," she said, her voice soft. "I heard you were caught in the chaos yesterday. I wanted to make sure you were alright."
My aunt was practically vibrating, offering Elara tea with a reverence usually reserved for saints. I just stood there, dumbstruck. This was the inciting incident for a different kind of conflict—the romantic one.
"I'm fine," I managed to say, my voice rough. "Just… fell."
Her summer-sky eyes studied me, and for a terrifying moment, I thought she could see right through me, to the cracking core and the hundreds of stolen skills. "It was terrifying out there," she said, accepting the tea from my flustered aunt. "I was on the front lines. Something… strange happened."
My blood ran cold. "Oh?"
"A Dreadweaver had me cornered. I was sure it was over." She looked down at her hands, her composure faltering for just a second. "And then… it was just cut in half. By nothing. No spell, no Hunter. Just a line in the air."
"The commentators called it a mystery," I said, forcing a neutral tone.
"They did," she agreed, her gaze lifting to meet mine again. It was sharp, probing. "But it didn't feel random, Leon. It felt precise. Targeted. Like someone was watching. Someone who didn't want to be seen."
The suspense was a physical knot in my stomach. She was suspicious. Not of me, specifically, but of the event. And I was the only one who knew the truth. The memory of her determined face on the battlefield, the sheer will I had poured into saving her, flashed before my eyes. The romantic conflict was no longer abstract; it was here, in my living room, drinking my aunt's cheap tea.
"I'm just glad you're safe," I said, the most honest thing I'd said all day.
A small, genuine smile touched her lips. "Me too." She finished her tea and stood. "The Guilds are initiating a city-wide talent re-evaluation. They think the crisis might have… triggered latent potential in some. You should consider signing up, Leon."
A re-evaluation. The perfect cover. If my "latent potential" were to ever "trigger," that would be the way to explain it. The system was giving me a path, not just to power, but to legitimacy.
"I'll think about it," I promised.
She left soon after, leaving a silent awe in her wake. I stood by the window, watching her silver-haired figure disappear down the street.
The phantom had received his first visitor. The lord had been given a potential path into the light. And the fool now had a choice to make: remain in the comforting shadows, or step onto a stage where Elara Vance, and the entire world, could finally see him for what he was becoming.
The game was getting more complicated, and the stakes had never been higher.