The Extra is a Hero?-Chapter 226: THE VAULT OF STARS

Chapter 222: The Vault of Stars

The sewers of Sky Island were not like the sewers of the surface world.

They were engineered with the same obsessive perfection as the rest of the city.

Instead of sludge and filth, the channels carried runoff water that sparkled with excess mana, glowing a soft, eerie blue in the darkness. The walls were smooth, white stone, etched with self-cleaning runes that hummed with a low, rhythmic vibration.

It was beautiful. It was efficient.

And right now, it was shaking like a leaf in a hurricane.

BOOOOM.

A shockwave from the surface battle rattled the ceiling, sending a fine dust of white powder raining down onto my shoulders.

The water in the channel sloshed violently, turning turbulent.

"Steady," I whispered, bracing my hand against the wall.

I checked my minimap. The GPS function of the smartwatch was offline due to the jamming, but my [Quantum Analysis Mind] had memorized the blueprints I stole from the library.

We were directly beneath the Central Plaza.

Above us, City Lord Cessias was waging a war against the Void Walker.

...Hungry... Master... Close...

Nox poked his head out of my pocket. His violet eyes were dilated, burning with a feverish intensity I hadn’t seen before.

He wasn’t looking at me. He was looking deeper into the tunnel.

"I know, buddy," I muttered, patting his scaly head. "We’re almost there."

The prompt regarding Nox’s growth had been sitting in my quest log for weeks, a silent itch I hadn’t been able to scratch.

[Quest: The Wyrmling’s Ascension]

[Condition: Consume ’Essence of the Fallen Star’ and ’Void-Iron Ore’.]

[Location Hint: Sky Island – The Lord’s Private Collection.]

In the game, this quest was usually skipped by speed-runners because accessing the Lord’s Vault required a reputation score of 50,000 with the Sky Council.

But I didn’t have reputation.

I had a stolen key and a city-wide apocalypse to serve as my distraction.

"Just a little further," I said, breaking into a jog.

The tunnel ended at a massive, circular door made of a metal that looked like solidified starlight.

It had no keyhole. No handle.

Only a single, flat indentation in the center.

I pulled the [Key to the Sky Vault]—the heavy ring I’d looted from the dead High Priest—out of my inventory.

My hand trembled slightly. Not from fear, but from the sheer weight of the mana pressure leaking from the door.

"Here goes nothing."

I pressed the ring into the indentation.

CLICK.

WHIRRRRR.

The sound of heavy, magical tumblers shifting echoed through the stone. The runes on the door flared from blue to green, and the massive slab of star-metal split down the middle, retracting into the walls with a hiss of pressurized air.

The air that rushed out wasn’t stale.

It smelled of ozone, old parchment, and raw power.

I stepped inside.

The City Lord’s Vault was less of a bank and more of a museum dedicated to the vanity of the High Elves.

The room was vast, shaped like a dome. The floor was polished obsidian, reflecting the thousands of artifacts floating in stasis bubbles along the walls.

There were swords that burned with eternal flames.

Shields made from the scales of extinct leviathans.

Books bound in gold that floated on their own, turning pages as if read by invisible ghosts.

"Jackpot," I whispered, the word swallowed by the sheer scale of the wealth.

But I wasn’t here for the gold. I wasn’t even here for the weapons.

I scanned the room, ignoring the A-Rank swords and the B-Rank staffs.

My eyes locked onto a display case in the far back, separated from the rest by a curtain of velvet ropes.

Inside the case, resting on a pillow of silk, was a jagged, uneven rock.

To anyone else, it looked like slag. A piece of burnt coal.

But to my [Quantum Analysis Mind], it was screaming.

[Item: Fragment of a Fallen Star]

[Grade: S-Rank Material]

[Description: A piece of a star that fell into the Abyss and returned. Contains highly condensed Void and Astral energy.]

And next to it, a bar of metal that seemed to absorb the light around it.

[Item: Void-Iron Ingot]

[Grade: A-Rank Material]

...MINE!

Nox didn’t wait for permission.

He shot out of my pocket like a black bullet, his wings buzzing.

He smashed into the stasis bubble.

BZZT!

The defensive ward shocked him, sending a spark of blue lightning through his small body.

Nox yelped, tumbling back onto the obsidian floor. He shook his head, hissed at the bubble, and looked at me with betrayal in his eyes.

...Master... mean bubble... break it...

I couldn’t help but chuckle, despite the situation.

"Alright, alright. Give me a second."

I walked over to the display.

The stasis bubble was a high-tier ward. Brute force would trigger an alarm—though with the city screaming above us, I doubted anyone would hear it.

But I preferred finesse.

I placed my hand on the pedestal control rune. I channeled my mana, aiming not to break the lock, but to rot it.

Using the Abyssal mana signature I had mimicked from Draken, I infected the rune.

The bright blue light of the ward turned a sickly purple, then flickered and died.

POP.

The bubble vanished.

"Dinner time," I said.

Nox didn’t hesitate. He leaped onto the pedestal.

He unhinged his jaw—wider than should have been physically possible—and swallowed the [Fragment of a Fallen Star] whole.

Then, he greedily crunched down on the [Void-Iron Ingot], chewing the metal as if it were a biscuit.

CRUNCH. CRUNCH. GULP.

Immediately, the Wyrmling froze.

His body went rigid.

A pulse of darkness exploded from him, knocking me back a step.

[System Alert: Companion ’Nox’ is undergoing Evolution.]

[Evolution State: Cocooning.]

Shadows swirled around the small dragon, thickening into a solid, spherical shell of pure darkness. The shell floated in the air, pulsing with a deep, resonant beat.

Thump-thump. Thump-thump.

"Sleep well," I whispered, grabbing the floating cocoon and gently placing it into my inventory. "When you wake up, we’re going to have some fun."

Objective one complete.

Now for the real reason I was here.

I turned my attention to the center of the room.

There, on a raised dais, stood a pedestal.

But it was empty.

There was a plaque.

Here lies the scabbard of the Sword of Light. The Seal of the King.

"The scabbard," I muttered, my eyes narrowing.

In the game lore, the Hero’s Holy Sword—the weapon used to seal the Demon King—wasn’t kept in the Vault.

It was kept in the Spire, guarded by the City Lord himself.

But the Scabbard... the Scabbard was the key.

The Sword was the lock on the Demon King’s prison.

The Scabbard was the only thing that could safely transport the Sword without breaking the seal.

If the Demon Cult wanted to steal the sword, they couldn’t just grab it. The Holy energy would vaporize a demon on contact.

They needed the Scabbard to contain it.

And the Scabbard was gone.

I touched the empty pedestal. It was cold.

Dust had settled on the rectangle where the object should have been.

"It wasn’t taken today," I realized, a chill running down my spine.

"It’s been gone for days."

The Cult hadn’t just infiltrated the city tonight.

They had been here.

They had already stolen the container.

"The attack on the grid... the barrier... the SS-Rank demons..."

I pieced it together, speaking to the empty room.

"It’s all a distraction."

They didn’t want to destroy Sky Island.

They wanted to keep Cessias busy.

They wanted the City Lord to leave the Spire to fight the Void Walker.

And while Cessias was distracted saving his city... the real thieves would be entering the Spire to take the Sword.

"Cessias is fighting the Void Walker at the Plaza," I muttered, my mind racing.

"That means the Spire is undefended."

I checked the map in my head.

The Vault had a maintenance elevator. A private lift that connected directly to the Spire’s upper levels.

It was how the Lord moved his treasures.

I ran to the back of the room.

There, hidden behind a tapestry of the First King, was a steel door.

I pressed the stolen key-ring against the panel.

ACCESS DENIED.

LOCKDOWN IN EFFECT.

"Damn it," I hissed.

The system was locked down because of the invasion.

I drew Draken.

The Divine Sword hummed, sensing my urgency. The dragon soul inside woke up, groggy but eager.

...Break... wall...?

"Break door," I corrected. 𝚏𝐫𝚎𝗲𝕨𝐞𝐛𝕟𝚘𝐯𝚎𝗹.𝕔𝐨𝗺

I gripped the hilt with both hands.

I didn’t use a skill. I just poured raw mana into the blade, feeding it my anxiety, my haste.

The black steel glowed with a violet light.

"Open sesame."

I thrust the sword into the seam of the steel door.

It sank in like a hot knife through butter.

I ripped the blade sideways, tearing the locking mechanism apart with a screech of tortured metal.

I kicked the door open.

The elevator shaft was dark. The car was on the upper floor.

I didn’t wait for it to come down.

I looked up the shaft. Cables stretched up into the darkness, disappearing towards the top of the Spire.

"Climbing it is," I grumbled.

I sheathed Draken and jumped, grabbing the oily cable with my gloved hands.

I began to climb.

The climb was grueling.

My arms burned. The air in the shaft grew thinner as I ascended, the mana density rising until it felt like I was breathing soup.

Floor 50.

Floor 100.

Floor 150.

The sounds of the battle outside muffled through the thick walls of the Spire.

Occasionally, the whole shaft would shudder as a particularly heavy blow landed somewhere on the island.

Finally, I reached the service hatch for the top level.

The Sanctum of the Sword.

I pried the grate open and pulled myself up, rolling onto the carpeted floor of a hallway.

I was panting, sweat dripping from my nose.

But I was quiet.

I activated [Shadow Stalker’s Cloak]. My outline blurred, merging with the dim light of the hallway.

I crept forward.

The hallway led to a massive set of double doors.

They were slightly ajar.

And from inside, I heard voices.

"...the barrier is holding. Cessias is occupied."

The voice was smooth, cultured. It sounded like a scholar.

"Excellent. Proceed with the extraction."

I peered through the crack in the doors.

The room beyond was the Sanctum. It was a circular room with windows that offered a 360-degree view of the clouds.

In the center, floating in a beam of pure, holy light, was a sword.

It was beautiful.

The blade was white gold, etched with runes of light that hurt the eyes to look at. The hilt was winged, set with a diamond the size of a fist.

The Hero’s Holy Sword.

[Item: Excalibur (Sealed)]

[Grade: Divine]

And standing before it were three figures.

Two were clad in the robes of the Demon Cult High Priests.

But the third...

The third was wearing the uniform of a Sky Island Council Guard.

A traitor.

The guard was holding a long, rectangular object wrapped in dark cloth.

He unwrapped it.

It was the Scabbard I had noticed missing from the vault.

"Be careful," one of the Priests hissed. "Do not touch the blade directly. The light will burn you to ash."

"I know my duty," the guard replied.

He raised the Scabbard.

It was made of black dragon leather, bound in silver. It seemed to suck in the light from the Holy Sword.

He moved to slide the Sword into the Scabbard.

If he succeeded, the Sword’s holy aura would be masked. They could walk right out of the city with the ultimate weapon against demonkind in their pocket.

I couldn’t let that happen.

But there were three of them. And based on the mana radiating from the Priests, they were at least B-Rank.

I was one E-Rank student with a tired body and a sword that hated holy things.

"Think, Michael," I urged myself. "Think."

If I attacked, the Priests would intercept me. They would buy the guard enough time to sheath the sword.

I needed to disrupt the process.

I looked at the room.

The floor was engraved with a massive containment circle, designed to keep the Holy Sword stable.

The guard was standing on the edge of the circle.

If I could break the circle... the Holy energy would become unstable.

It would flare.

And anyone trying to touch it—even with the Scabbard—would be blasted back.

But breaking the circle required a massive amount of force.

Force I didn’t have right now.

Unless....

I reached into my inventory.

I pulled out a small, heavy object.

A Mana Battery. The A-Rank one I had stolen from the fallen Knight earlier.

It was unstable. It was leaking power.

It was basically a grenade.

I looked at the battery, then at the group.

"Fire in the hole," I whispered.

I didn’t throw it at them.

I threw it at the floating Holy Sword.

The battery sailed through the air, a clumsy, heavy projectile.

The guard saw it.

"What—?"

He didn’t have time to react.

The battery hit the field of holy light surrounding the sword.

CRACK.

The unstable mana in the battery reacted violently with the pure Holy energy..

It didn’t explode in fire.

It exploded in rejection.

A shockwave of pure, white force detonated from the center of the room.

VOOOOOOOM!

The guard was thrown backward, the Scabbard flying from his hands and skittering across the floor.

The two Priests were blasted off their feet, slamming into the walls.

The windows of the Sanctum shattered outwards, raining glass into the sky.

I shielded my eyes, bracing myself against the doorframe as the wind howled through the broken room.

"Now!"

I sprinted into the room.

I didn’t go for the Priests.

I dove for the Scabbard.

I slid across the floor, grabbing the black leather sheath just as the guard scrambled to his feet.

"YOU!" the guard roared, drawing a sword. "GIVE THAT BACK!"

I stood up, clutching the Scabbard to my chest.

I looked at the floating Holy Sword, now vibrating violently, its light chaotic and angry.

Then I looked at the traitor.

I grinned, breathless and crazy.

"Sorry," I panted. "Finders keepers."

The two Priests picked themselves up, their hoods falling back to reveal faces tattooed with abyssal runes.

Their eyes glowed purple.

"Kill him," one hissed. "Kill the boy. Take the sheath."

They raised their hands, dark magic gathering.

The guard charged.

I was surrounded. Trapped in a tower with three killers and an unstable holy nuke.

"Well," I muttered, gripping Draken in my other hand. "This is going to be a fun five minutes."

(To be continued)