The blue light of the exit portal washed over Igris, depositing him safely back

at the Greenshade boundary.

He adjusted his jacket, breathing a bit heavily, and looked up at the massive

holographic leaderboard hovering over the T-Rex jaw entrance.

[ GREEN LIZARD DUNGEON - FIRST-YEAR LEADERBOARD ]

1. [Player Hidden] (Solo) - 07

Minutes, 42 Seconds.

2. Starlight Team - 28 Minutes, 14 Seconds.

Igris stared at the number one spot and grunted in profound dissatisfaction.

"Seven minutes? I wasted way too much time testing out my movement speed."

Without a second thought, he turned right back around and walked directly into

the abyssal mouth of the dungeon.

For the next two hours, Igris became a localized natural disaster.

He speed-ran the dungeon three more times.

With every single run, he optimized

his route, fully utilizing the terrifying physical capabilities of his Heavenly

Asura Bloodline and his 10x Multiplier. He didn’t even bother sneaking anymore.

He simply blitzed through the prehistoric forest like a crimson meteor.

Every Green Lizard Sentry took exactly one hit. The Mutated Commanders took one

hit.

And by the final run, even the towering Level 15 Green Lizard King was

eradicated in just three fluid swings of his Epic-grade katana.

When Igris finally stepped out of the exit portal for the fourth time, the

golden bell of the leaderboard tolled deafeningly across the plaza.

DONG! DONG! DONG!

The board violently glitched, updating his best time.

[ GREEN LIZARD DUNGEON - FIRST-YEAR LEADERBOARD ]

1. [Player Hidden] (Solo) - 03

Minutes, 12 Seconds.

Looking at the glowing numbers, Igris finally smirked. "Much better. I can live

with that."

Satisfied that he had established an absolutely insurmountable record, Igris

casually pulled up his status screen, eager to see how much stronger he had

grown.

He had slaughtered hundreds of monsters during those three speed-runs.

He

should have easily gathered enough kills to fully unlock the 100x Multiplier

tier and max out his Asura stats.

But as his eyes scanned the blue holographic interface, his smirk froze.

[ Kill Points: 84 / 100 ]

Igris blinked. He rubbed his eyes and looked again. The numbers hadn’t moved.

Neither his System’s Kill Points nor his Bloodline’s Soul Devourer had

registered a single kill from his three reruns!

"What the hell?" Igris laughed bitterly, scratching his head.

"System, why aren’t my kills counting? I just slaughtered that entire camp three times over!"

A cold, mechanical prompt materialized in his vision.

[ System Notice: Dungeon instances are artificial constructs of DUST energy.

When a dungeon resets, it merely recreates the physical vessels of the monsters based on the dungeon’s core soul template. ]

[ Warning: During the Host’s first

run, the ’Heavenly Asura Bloodline’ permanently devoured the foundational Soul Essence of this dungeon’s inhabitants. ]

[ The monsters in the reruns possessed

no souls, therefore granting no Kill Points. Furthermore, because the core soul template has been devoured, the Green Lizard Dungeon is now destabilizing and will permanently collapse in a few months. ]

Igris stared at the prompt, his jaw slightly slacked.

He hadn’t just cleared the dungeon. His Divine Bloodline had literally eaten the

dungeon’s foundational code.

"So... if I want to upgrade my Multiplier to 100x, I can’t just farm the same

easy instance forever," Igris muttered, rubbing his chin. "I need to find a

completely new dungeon. A new species to devour."

"THREE MINUTES?!"

At that moment, a shrill, hysterical scream shattered Igris’s thoughts.

He looked up and realized the entire plaza had descended into absolute madness.

Thousands of students from both Marlin Academy and Penta-Star Fortress were staring at the leaderboard as if they had just seen a ghost.

"Is the System broken?! That’s literally impossible!" a Penta-Star elite yelled,

his previous arrogance entirely erased. "They didn’t even have a team! It says

solo player!" "Who the hell is Player Hidden?! Did an Instructor sneak in to mess with us?!"

Near the front of the crowd, Arian Nickel’s face was beet red. The aristocratic Godscions was stunned.

His

perfect, flawless 28-minute record had just been utterly humiliated by someone

who cleared the dungeon almost ten times faster than him.

Even Dawson, the arrogant Vampire from Penta-Star, had dropped his haughty smirk, his crimson eyes wide with genuine shock.

Igris casually pulled the collar of his camouflage jacket up, preparing to quietly slip away into the crowd when—

’Bzzzt.’

His phone vibrated in his pocket. Frowning, he pulled it out. A notification banner sprawled across the screen, and almost at the same time, a chorus of pings erupted from the nearby students still loitering around the Greenshade boundary.

[Lecture: Ruins & Magic Inscriptions.]

[Location: Main Auditorium.’

[Requirement: Inscription Pen, Starvein herb, banetin herb, Inscription Paper, Dragon Blood or Blood of beast closer to dragons)]

Igris swipe-dismissed the message. "Too much hassle," he muttered, stepping toward heading home. But his foot hovered mid-air.

He froze.

’Runes and inscriptions.’

His mind flashed back to the [Battle Skill: Arcane Wind Slash] sitting in his inventory. He had been stuck on how to inscribe it on his body without failing. To use an arcane skill, he needed to draw the corresponding rune on his own body. He couldn’t just eat the book. He needed this lecture.

Around him, the other students had come to the same reluctant conclusion, groaning but changing direction. None of them could afford to miss this if they wanted a future as Rune-smiths.

Igris sighed and merged into the stream of students heading toward the market district. The chatter was unavoidable.

"Did you see how fast that person cleared the dungeon?"

"Yeah, insane. Must be a high level Godscion from a legacy family.."

Igris kept his head down, ignoring the gossip. He approached the market and saw a stall The equipment stall was tucked in the noisier section of the market, wedged between a potion vendor selling virgin blood and a woman selling shoes.

When Igris saw the old man behind the counter, his face twitched slightly.

The man looked like a goblin and a dwarf at the same time.

His nose was swollen, with beady eyes that tracked Igris like a hawk tracking a mouse.

Igris kept his expression neutral as his dual-colored eyes scanned the messy display across the counter. There was half-expired potions, withered herbs and other stuffs.

His gaze landed on a thin, bone-white pen tucked inside a cracked glass case. Next to the case, hanging from a rusty nail, were two bundles of dried herbs—one a deep violet with silver veins running through its leaves, the other a sickly greenish-black with bulbous, tumorous roots.

An Inscription Pen. Starvein Herb. Banetin Herb. Inscription Paper. Golden Snake Blood.

Igris’s heart skipped a beat, but his face remained utterly bored.

He picked up a chipped dagger from the pile, pretending to inspect it. "Grandpa, your junk is more rusted than a vampire’s conscience. How much for this butter knife?"

The old man’s eyes twitched. Who’s starts a conversation like that? "Butter knife?! You blind, boy! That is the Fang of the Dire-Wolf! It cost at least 200 Gold Crowns!"

Igris burst out laughing. "200 Gold Crowns? For a toothpick that couldn’t cut warm butter? I wouldn’t pay 200 ’copper’ coins to melt it down for scrap."

He tossed the dagger back onto the pile with a loud ’clatter’. Then, with the air of a man who couldn’t care less, he gestured lazily at the items he actually wanted.

"I’ll take that bone toothpick in the case, those two ugly weeds hanging from your nail, the fancy paper buried under your garbage, and whatever that snake piss is in that vial."

The old man’s beady eyes narrowed. For a split second, something flickered.

"Snake piss?!" The old man clutched his chest as if mortally wounded. "That is authentic Golden Snake Blood! Harvested from the Golden Serpent of the Abyssal Chasm! One drop can fuel an inscription for a century! And that pen—" he jabbed a gnarled finger at the glass case, "—that is a Moonbone Inscription Pen! Forged from the rib of a Lunar Titan! And the Starvein and Banetin herbs are high grade alchemical herb, you uncultured swine!"

"High-Grade?" Igris raised an eyebrow, leaning forward to pluck a strand of the Starvein herb.

"This thing is drier than a mummy’s asshole. And the Banetin has mold on its roots. The paper is yellowed, the pen’s tip has a micro-fracture, and your ’authentic’ Golden Snake Blood has separated—see how the oil is floating on top? It’s been sitting in sunlight. Probably lost half its potency."

The old man’s face contorted. But he didn’t deny it. He couldn’t. The boy wasn’t bluffing.

"Even so," the old man recovered quickly, slamming both hands on the counter, his voice booming like a auctioneer on crack, "even with minor degradation, these are rare goods! The pen alone is worth 500 Crowns! The blood, 400! The herbs, 300 together! The paper, 200! You’re looking at 1,400 Gold Crowns minimum!"

"1,400?" Igris stared at him. Then he laughed again, but this time the laugh was cold. He stepped closer, his dual-colored eyes locking onto the old man’s beady ones with an intensity that made the merchant’s smile falter.