The Sapphire Shallows.
To the high-ranking "Luminaries" of the Upper Heavens, this place was a paradise of sparkling ether and boundless resources. But for a "Static" like Vane Varkas, it was a humid, crushing hell. In this galaxy, your "Saturation" was everything. If you were born with high-frequency colors, you were a noble. If you were born dull, you were just a tool.
Vane was worse than a tool. He was a "Static"—a human mistake with a color density so low he was practically invisible to the laws of physics.
"Move faster, you useless dog!"
A heavy boot, glowing with the emerald resonance of a Rank 5 Knight, slammed into Vane's ribs. Crack. The sound of ribs breaking echoed through the underwater cavern, muffled only by the thick, pressurized ether.
Vane tumbled across the jagged coral, his outdated mechanical diving suit wheezing as it leaked precious oxygen. He coughed, and a spray of greyish blood coated the inside of his helmet.
"Lord Caelum... I've... I've secured the Blue-Note Crystal..." Vane gasped, his voice trembling through the comms. He held up a pulsing, sapphire-colored gem. It was beautiful. It was the "Source" of a new law of physics—a treasure that could buy a whole planet.
Lord Caelum, the golden-haired prodigy of the Silver-Tier Guild, stepped forward. His armor was a masterpiece of "Solar Gold" art-physics, radiating a warmth that pushed back the freezing abyss. He looked at the crystal, and then he looked at Vane as if he were looking at a piece of discarded trash.
"Well done, Vane," Caelum said, his voice smooth and cold. "With this crystal, my Saturation will finally break through to the Seventh Rank. I will become a Lord of the Second Ocean."
Vane tried to smile through the pain. "Then... the reward? My sister's medicine..."
Caelum paused. Then, he began to laugh. It was a soft, elegant sound that made Vane's skin crawl.
"Medicine? For the sister of a Static?" Caelum shook his head. "Vane, you really don't understand how this world works. Masterpieces don't have 'Static' footprints on them. If the Guild knows a lowly trash like you helped me, it taints my record."
Caelum's eyes suddenly flashed with a murderous, golden light.
"The mission report will say that the party was ambushed by a Deep-Sea Terror. Everyone died... except for me, the hero who managed to retrieve the artifact."
"Wait—Lord Caelum! No—!"
"[Art-Physics: The Executioner's Stroke]."
Caelum didn't even use a weapon. He simply pointed a finger. A beam of pure, white "Bleach"—the terrifying force that deletes the "Definition" of matter—shot out.
BOOM!
The beam hit Vane's chest dead center. Vane didn't even have time to scream. He felt his armor, his skin, and his very soul being stripped of their "Color." He was being unmade. The force of the blast sent him flying backward, straight over the edge of the Abyssal Shelf.
Below him lay the Zero Depth. The forbidden zone. The place where the "Canvas" of the universe ended.
As Vane fell into the absolute darkness, his last sight was Lord Caelum, standing at the edge of the cliff, looking down with a bored expression as he wiped a speck of dust off his golden sleeve.
I... I am dying, Vane thought. His consciousness was flickering like a dying candle. I worked for them for ten years. I ate their scraps. I took their beatings. And in the end... I am just a smudge to be erased?
A hot, jagged rage ignited in his fading heart.
If I could... if I could just have one more chance... I would paint this whole heaven in their blood!
[Ding!]
A sharp, mechanical sound rang out in his mind, cutting through the silence of the void.
[SYSTEM AWAKENING: CRITICAL ERROR DETECTED] [Scanning Host: Vane Varkas...] [Status: Deceased (Physiological Definition: 0%)] [Alert: The 'Bleach' has failed to delete the Target.] [Reason: You cannot erase the 'Void'.]
Vane's eyes, which had turned white in death, suddenly sparked with a dark, violet light.
[Conditions for the 'Forbidden Masterpiece' have been met.] [Acquiring the 'Zero-Depth' Palette...] [Reconstructing the 'Abyssal Sovereign'...]
Suddenly, the absolute darkness of the Zero Depth began to move. It wasn't water. It wasn't ether. It was Ink.
Millions of gallons of pitch-black, primordial ink rushed into Vane's corpse. His shattered bones were knit back together with "Dark Matter" filaments. His lungs, which had collapsed, were filled with the "Breath of the Abyss."
His heart gave a sudden, violent thud. It sounded like a war drum echoing in the deep.
[Host has successfully Levelled Up!] [Level: 1] [Class: The Obsidian Sovereign] [Trait: Absolute Saturation (Locked)] [Skill Unlocked: Pigment Drain (Rank F)] [Skill Unlocked: Render (Rank F)]
Vane opened his eyes. He wasn't breathing, yet he felt more alive than he ever had in twenty-four years. He looked at his hands. They were no longer the pale, sickly grey of a Static. They were a matte black so deep that they seemed to suck the light out of the water.
He was standing on the "Floor of the Universe." And above him, miles away, he could see the faint sapphire glow of the world that had thrown him away.
"Caelum," Vane whispered. His voice caused the water to ripple in a 100-meter radius. "The 'Static' is coming back. And I've brought the Eraser with me."
The Return of the Dead
Back on the Abyssal Shelf, Caelum's knights were busy cleaning up the "evidence."
"Lord Caelum, the extraction ship is here," one knight reported, bowing low. "The 'Static's' body has likely been dissolved by the Zero Depth by now. There is no trace left."
Caelum nodded, his face full of arrogance. "Good. Let's go. I'm tired of this filthy trench. I need a wine that matches my new Saturation Level."
But as they turned to leave, a massive vibration shook the entire shelf.
RUMBLE...
"An earthquake?" a knight shouted, drawing his emerald blade. "No... the pressure... the pressure is rising! Something is coming from below!"
Suddenly, the water at the edge of the cliff turned pitch black. It wasn't a shadow—it was as if someone had spilled a bottle of ink into the ocean.
SPLASH!
A figure vaulted over the edge, landing on the coral with the weight of a falling star. The ground shattered instantly. A shockwave of "Pure Black" energy erupted, turning the nearby glowing coral into grey ash.
"Who goes there?!" the knights roared, pointing their glowing spears at the silhouette.
From the cloud of dust and ink, a man stepped forward. He was tall, his body lean and packed with dense, black muscle. He wore a "Shroud" made of living shadows that flickered like flames. His eyes were two pits of obsidian with violet rings pulsing in the center.
"V-Vane?" Caelum's eyes widened. He stumbled back, his golden armor clanking. "Impossible! I saw you get Bleached! No one survives the Zero Depth!"
Vane didn't speak. He just looked at the knight closest to him.
"[Pigment Drain]," Vane said.
A tentacle of black ink shot out from Vane's shadow, faster than the eye could follow. It struck the knight's chest.
In a split second, the knight's brilliant emerald armor began to lose its color. The green was sucked out, followed by the silver of the metal, and finally, the tan of the knight's skin. The knight didn't even have time to scream before he turned into a colorless, translucent husk.
He fell to the floor, shattering like glass.
[Experience Gained: +100 XP] [Level Up! Level 2] [Stolen Pigment: 'Emerald Green' (100% Purity)]
"Monster! He's a monster!" the other knights cried out in terror. They charged at him, their weapons glowing with high-frequency light.
Vane's expression remained dead silent. He raised a hand, and the "Emerald Green" he had just stolen began to swirl in his palm, mixing with his own black ink.
"[Render: The Emerald Slasher]."
From Vane's shadow, a beast emerged. It was four meters tall, with the body of a deep-sea predator and claws made of the very emerald metal Vane had just absorbed. It was an "Ink-Born"—a summon created from the essence of his kills.
ROAR!
The Ink-Born beast lunged forward, moving at a speed that ignored the water's resistance. It was a massacre. In less than ten seconds, the knights were torn to pieces, their "Physics" shredded by the beast's abyssal claws.
Vane walked through the carnage, his eyes fixed on Caelum.
Caelum was shaking now, his "Solar Gold" aura flickering like a dying lightbulb. "S-Stay back! I am a member of the Silver-Tier Guild! If you kill me, the Great Lords will—"
Vane reached out and grabbed Caelum by the face. The golden armor sizzled where Vane's black fingers touched it.
"You talk too much for a man who is about to become ink," Vane said.
He didn't kill Caelum instantly. That would be too merciful. Instead, Vane began to slowly drain the "Saturation" from Caelum's body. He felt the golden power flowing into him, filling his "System" with high-rank energy.
[Level Up! Level 3... Level 5... Level 10!] [New Skill Unlocked: Shadow Sovereign's Territory] [New Quest: The Five Oceans' Rebellion]
Vane tossed the grey, dying husk of Caelum aside. He looked at the Blue-Note Crystal lying on the ground. He picked it up and crushed it in his hand, absorbing the sapphire energy directly into his soul.
The system flared with a new, blood-red notification.
[Warning: You have declared war against the Heavens.] [The Five Oceans will now hunt you.]
Vane looked up, staring through the miles of water at the distant, glittering lights of the Upper Heavens. A dark, terrifying smile finally appeared on his face.
"Good," Vane whispered, his voice echoing like a curse through the abyss. "I was getting tired of the dark. I need more colors for my masterpiece."
Behind him, dozens of Ink-Born eyes opened in the darkness, glowing with a hungry, violet light.
The "Static" was gone. The Abyssal Sovereign had risen. And the Five Oceans would never be the same again.