Crystals

When the countdown reached zero, Venn took a deep breath and started augmenting his body, expecting nothing to happen.

To his surprise, a faint -almost indiscernible glow enveloped his body, and he felt a surge of strength. His body felt different as if a dormant power had been awakened.

'?!

'What?! How?!

'Anyway, this is not the time to think about it!'

It was a pleasant surprise for him.

He instantly calmed his mind and quickly swung his left hand upwards at an angle.

Since the bull's mouth was quite literally right in front of his face, the swung knife stabbed precisely at its right eye.

*Roar!

The bull let out a deafening roar of pain, thrashing wildly in agony, bringing Venn along with it.

"Hell yeah!" Venn shouted triumphantly, his eyes filled with determination.

He took advantage of the bull's momentary confusion and tightened his hold on the dagger, twisting it further into the beast's eye.

He was happy that he was able to hurt the bull, but he had to deal as much damage as possible in every hit.

After all, his body was still injured and not in perfect condition.

Even though Venn had already used the health potion, his body was far from healthy.

In fact, the health potion only managed to fix his broken bones and heal a bit of his other wounds.

'Making my body usable is good enough, though.'

The bull continued its frenzied bucking, causing Venn to sway left and right like a flag.

Despite its pain, the bull was still a massive and powerful creature. With a last-ditch effort, it lunged forward and crashed into the nearest building, hoping to crush Venn against the wall.

But Venn's reflexes were quicker. He pulled out his dagger and moved away right before the crash.

The bull, now even more enraged, turned its attention back to Venn, snorting fire from its nostrils.

Venn adjusted his grip on the dagger, his body still pulsing with energy from the latest augmentation.

He used his newfound strength and agility to dodge the bull's attacks and strike back with relentless force.

'Is it just me, or does the augmentation give me a stronger boost?

And I don't feel any pain from my conduit!'

His movements became fluid, almost as if he were dancing with the beast. He weaved in and out, exploiting every opening and landing precise strikes.

Venn's confidence grew with every successful hit. He had never felt this alive, this in control of his body and mind.

Each strike he landed took its toll on the bull, and with every hit, it seemed to weaken. Venn's movements became more confident, and he saw an opening.

With a swift, well-aimed thrust, he plunged the dagger deep into the bull's chest.

The beast let out a final, guttural cry before collapsing to the ground, lifeless.

Venn stood there, panting heavily, covered in sweat and dirt.

He couldn't believe what had just happened.

He had just killed a being at least three times bigger than himself. Not only that, he even did it in a not-so-optimal health condition.

Granted, it was a surprise attack but hey, a win is a win.

"Hmm, this gift sure does come in handy," he mused as he looked at the dagger's information window.

[Normal Steel Dagger.]

[A dagger to commemorate the first opening of one of the universal dungeons. Especially crafted by the dungeon management to be an absolutely fair weapon to each challenger]

"What a stupid introduction. The dagger was not bad, almost at the same level as my beloved relic."

Then there's this mysterious system, he thought.

"The system itself was not the problem though, the problem is..." Venn shrugged as he looked at his class column.

[ Class: Special Category

Pool Saturation: 0% (Evolution Unavailable)

Rank: 10 (Awakened)

Energy Point: 0]

He paused for a moment when he looked at the glorious zero at his energy point.

Although he was frustrated and confused by the sudden change, he could still let it be. He was still able to use body augmentation after all.

Not only that, but his augmentation process was much smoother and so much more stronger than before.

Venn started to ponder about the possibility of using body augmentation with no energy.

The conclusion was 'Impossible.'

Without an energy source, no engine could work. This same principle was also applied to every kind of supernatural ability.

He tried to make sense of whatever was happening for a while. After some time, he just gave it up.

Failing to comprehend what brought about his change, he shifted his attention back to the bull-like creature he had just defeated, its lifeless body serving as a testament to his undeniable triumph.

"You know, system, I have never killed any living thing before this. But today, for the first time, I killed something." Venn murmured, his words directed to no one in particular.

Walking over to the fallen bull, Venn continued speaking aloud, almost as if he was trying to make sense of his emotions.

"Oddly enough, taking a life feels simultaneously easy and not. The sensation of cutting through flesh... It's hard to put into words. If you can categorize creatures from the gate as 'alive' in the first place though."

"Anyway, that feeling was quite unique," he said as he pulled out his dagger from the bull's chest.

*Spurt

Stepping away from the gushing blood that erupted from the bull's chest wound, Venn's gaze shifted to the ever-present floating system window in the corner of his vision.

A red exclamation mark caught his attention, positioned above one of the menu symbols beside his name.

The symbol morphed and shifted before finally settling on the letter 'L' with stars adorning it.

Intrigued, he tapped the symbol, causing a stream of announcement logs to materialize.

[System Announcement activated]

[System Update initiated]

[System Update complete]

…

[Consumed health recovery potion x1]

...

[Inferno Demonic Bull (Rank 9) killed]

[Obtained the Remnant Crystal of the creature. Please retrieve it in 5 minutes!]

[Energy Crystal of the Creature is available]

As Venn perused the log of announcements, his eyes widened in astonishment.

There was an indicator for when someone obtained a Remnant Crystal!

Ordinarily, someone would have to go through the arduous task of dissecting a gate creature's head to determine whether there was a Remnant Crystal or not.

The Remnant Crystal was a crystal found on the heads of creatures emerging from the gate.

By using the remnant crystal, a person could obtain something, be it a remnant ability, a remnant weapon, remnant tools, remnant armor, or even a remnant-summoned creature.

Turning back to the bull's lifeless form, Venn suppressed his disgust and mustered the courage to dissect the creature's head.

He used his power from his earlier augmentation to easily cut the head into two.

The moment the gigantic head split, Venn saw a resplendent red crystal the size of a normal medicinal pill or capsule in the middle of the creature's dead brain.

Reaching out, he grabbed the crystal with his left hand leaving him with the feeling of disgust.

He wiped it a few times on his tattered school uniform, and before he had the chance to hesitate, he ate the remnant crystal.

Considering the fact that it was literally from a creature's head, Venn scrunched up his face in disgust as he tried his best to swallow the small crystal.

That's right, the way to use a remnant crystal was simple. One just has to eat it, to use the remnant crystal.

When the crystal reached his throat, it started to dissolve and he could feel warmth started to spread all around his body.

It was a weird feeling. It was as if the knowledge of how to materialize something appeared in his head.

Holding back his urge to just materialize the remnant, Venn looked at the system interface.

He wanted to experiment; if this system interface was like in the games that he usually plays, then-

[Remnant obtained. Remnant type: Armor.]

[Remnant armor: Dark Inferno Bathrobe

Remnant description: This fashionable bathrobe was created with the intent to make the wearer feel relaxed even after getting out of the bath

Remnant abilities:

-Heat control: Automatically adjust the wearer's body temperature

-Heat resistant: Provides protection against heat up to a certain threshold

-Dark Vision: Moderately allows the wearer to see in the dark]

As he expected, the system allows one to look for more detailed information about a remnant.

He once heard from his teacher that when one used a remnant crystal, they would automatically have a certain level of understanding of the remnant they obtained.

And just like before, he, too, had some understanding of the remnant's functionality, but it was not clear enough. All he knew was this bathrobe had something to do with heat.

'With this feature, I don't have to try this and that to understand this robe.'

As he thought of that, he summoned his new remnant armor.

A dim flash of light appeared, and the remnant armor materialized. When someone used a remnant armor, they would be automatically worn by the user.

It was such a convenience that one didn't have to manually wear the armor by themselves.

"Alright, now that I have pretty decent clothes, it's time to move on," he exclaimed.

He then walked to the side of the creature once more, crouched down, and stabbed his dagger into the creature's chest.

After widening the hole from his killing move, he rolled up his bathrobe's sleeve and put his hand inside the bull's chest.

It was disgusting, yes, but after opening up the creature's head for the first time, he already made peace with the fact that this is just how life is.

Groping around, he managed to find what he was looking for.

He could feel another crystal-like substance, and when he pulled it out, what appeared was a light cream-colored crystal the size of his pinky.

It was the energy crystal of this dark inferno bull. This energy crystal was the main resource that was mined or hunted, to be exact, from the gate creatures.

Other than remnant crystal, this energy crystal, too, was the main reason why most gates were usually controlled by the government or large corporations.

Although this thing was much more common than the remnant crystal, it was pretty expensive nonetheless.

After all, this energy crystal was the energy resource for most rune-based devices or tools. One can imagine how much money would roll in when they comes into possession of a gate.

Other than remnant crystal and energy crystal, the creature's meat itself was usually a delicacy.

He couldn't bring this one with him though. He didn't have the time to clean the meat or let out the blood.

The energy crystal alone is enough for now.

Looking at the prospect of earning quite a bit of money when he got out of this situation, Venn's expression started to brighten.

'But still, this development really does feel novel-like, though.'

Although Venn showed a carefree expression, deep inside, he was contemplating his situation.

'Especially the fact that my energy was reset to zero, and I am still able to use body augmentation. My class suddenly changed too.'

If this wasn't a novel-like development, then what is?

"Anyway, let's go to the shelter~ I believe there will be all kinds of things there. I would most probably have a great time watching a good show." Venn's tone was light as if he didn't just fight a life-or-death battle.

Having obtained such an interesting thing which was the system, he couldn't help but forget his initial fear of the gate and the creatures it would spawn.

With the dark red sky looming above him, Venn walked, his mind abuzz with various thoughts.

Though he couldn't reach a definite conclusion, he was 99% sure that this gate was different from the others.

Not only does the creature that spawned completely out of his expectation- that is to say, meeting a rank 9 creature would be utterly impossible if it were spawned by a category 5 gate.

A category 4 gate and above would spawn a rank 7 creature as the weakest after all.

It shows that a category 6 gate or above would lead to the creation of a dungeon. Or maybe this one gate was unique, a one-of-a-kind type of gate.

And just like the name itself, maybe creatures spawned by the dungeon were much more diverse in rank than a gate's.

Venn glanced at the floating interface at the corner of his eyes, intrigued by the unexpected turn of events.

"Well," he chuckled, a hint of exhilaration coloring his voice, "I guess this will be fun~"