--Chapter 80--

"Drive the bastard back to the orphanage. I don’t need him anymore."

A woman’s voice echoed through a gray fog. Dispelling as quickly as it rose.

"With what gas?" another voice asked coldly. "it can’t be mine. Let him find his way back himself. I won’t waste expensive gas on this scum."

The voices overlapped one another, repeating and bouncing off each other like ping pong.

Inside a dark street soaked by rainwater and dirt. A small boy stood silently, his tiny frame barely illuminated by a flickering street lamp.

This boy was ten year old Dean Faust.

His clothes were torn all over. With his lips split open and blood trickling down from his forehead through the side of his face into the puddle he was standing in.

But his eyes...the mirrors of bleakness that reflected the world were filled with hatred far too intense for a child.

There was a resolution in his posture and in his voice. "I don’t need any of you," the boy muttered shakily.

His fists trembled. His shoulders slummed in repressed anguish.

"You can all die..." he yelled into the shifting fog.

The adults, a man, woman with faces covered by the fog, turned away from him like he was trash left on the roadside.

The child’s breathing became heavier. His chest quivering as tears streamed down from his face.

Pure white pain mixing with red rage. His tears and blood became one and the same.

"Die then," he hissed loudly, "I don’t need you bastards to survive."

Standing a few steps away from the boy was another figure.

Not alot older, but definitely taller, well fed unlike the scrawny child.

Eighteen year old Dean Gray looked down at the child silently. The younger version of himself looked so tiny.

So angry... So tired... and yet hungry!!

His body was bruised, battered and bloodied while dirty rainwater gathered all the way to his knees and climbed.

For some reason, seeing that child again hurt more than the beatings ever did.

Even after crossing worlds...Even after becoming someone else...

That boy still existed somewhere inside him. Staring at the world like it owed him a debt that needed to be paid in blood.

Dean slowly stretched his hand toward the child.

And then...

His eyes snapped open.

"Hah!"

Dean sat upright immediately, breathing hard while cold sweat clung to his skin.

For a few seconds, he simply stared ahead blankly while his chest rose and fell.

The same nightmare again.

No... Not a nightmare...

A memory.

One that’d refused to stay buried. Even after so many years. Dean rubbed his face slowly before looking around the room.

His fingers pressed against the smoothest piece of fabric he had ever touched.

"...Where the hell am I?" he turned his head from side to side.

This definitely was not the infirmary, neither was it his dormitory.

’Did I die and come back as a king?’

The possibility wasn’t that slim after all, the room he could see was ridiculously expensive.

The bed he sat on was massive. With enough room for maybe five people. That’s if they slept like kings.

The furniture was dark wood. And it wasn’t mahogany. Whatever it was.. a considerably weighty bag must’ve been spared for the purchase.

The chandelier hanging from the ceiling probably cost more than his old apartment back on Earth.

Then his eyes landed on the crest hanging on the wall. This was when he finally felt a form of relief.

It was a crimson dragon wrapped around a sword.

Dean sighed, happy he wasn’t dead. He recognized the crest from the one Leona gave to him.

"The saint family crest."

His expression changed. His nose suddenly became more aware of the soothing rosy fragrance of the room.

"Is this Leona’s room?"

Wait...I’m in Leona’s room?

Dean pushed the blanket aside slowly and sat at the edge of the bed.

His body still ached slightly but the deep exhaustion from before was totally gone. Whatever amount of time he spent unconscious, his body clearly needed it.

Looking down, he noticed the bandages around his arm and shoulder.

The wound from the Void Serpent had already been treated properly. The burned flesh had been cleaned and wrapped carefully.

Then Dean paused.

"...Wait."

He looked down at himself again. He was wearing a different set of clothes. More loose and definitely fresh.

Dean stared for a second before slowly leaning back against the bed.

"Ohhh... you bad girl, Leona."

A grin appeared on his face briefly before a familiar sound dispelled his escalating thoughts.

Ding!

System notifications flooded his vision all at once.

[Total EXP Prior: 25,600]

[You have completed several self-imposed objectives.]

[You have survived your first ever blue gate.]

[Reward: 10,000 EXP]

[You have defeated a Diamond Colossus (High-Ascended)]

[Reward: 10,000 EXP]

[You have successfully closed a Blue Gate]

[Reward: 12,000 EXP]

[Accumulated EXP: 32,000EXP]

[Total EXP: 57600EXP]

At this point, the system rewards for his actions shouldn’t surprise Dean but he couldn’t help himself.

His mouth opened slightly, out of pleasant surprise.

"...What?"

Before he could think of what to do, another set of notifications appeared.

[Rend Enhancement Complete]

[A High-Ascended Cores Absorbed]

[A Blue Core Crystal Absorbed]

[The Tool of Severance has Advanced]

[New Rank: Peak- Ascended Class (Highly-unstable)]

Dean read through and was generally astonished by how much he was growing right now.

For once, even he did not know what to say.

From the sheer amount of experience points available, he could jump through several ranks in one go.

And this was only one gate. Something he’d stubbornly entered. And now—

Rend had evolved into a Sovereign-tier weapon. That alone was insane. Unstable or not.

The blade had him playing catch-up and now he had a new problem at hand again.

Dean leaned back slowly while processing everything. Surviving that Blue Gate might change everything.

It wasn’t just about his strength but his very standing in general. He was the heir to a dying family and he’d contracted the help of an Herald to close a Blue gate.

He gestured in the air like he was reading from a newspaper.

"The story would go. A first year student entered a Blue Zone and survived."

Whether he was breastfed all through by Leona wouldn’t matter. Just surviving was already absurd enough.

And if Leona wanted to be a good sport. It would read.

"And he closed it."

That was the type of achievement that would spread through the academy like wildfire.

Dean exhaled slowly, all this was cool but he needed to do something else before all the glory.

He focused on the accumulated experience points.

"Right..."

If his math was any good then Elite tier 5 to tier 6 required fourteen thousand EXP.

And as such tier 6 to tier 7 needed another fifteen thousand.

A small grin slowly curled at the edges of his lips.

"I can actually do it."

Without hesitating further, Dean selected the option with a thought.

’Rank up.’

Ding!

[14,000 EXP Used]

[You have ranked up from Elite tier 5→Elite tier 6]

A warm and fuzzy feeling spread through his body instantly.

It started from his chest before flowing through every muscle, bone and vein like freezing water.

Dean clenched his fists slightly as the feeling intensified. His body first felt stiff then became even looser than before.

His senses sharpened. The fatigue in his muscles faded further while he felt Verge flow smoother through his circuits.

Like his body was finally catching up to the power he kept throwing at it recklessly. Through this system upgrades.

Dean laughed quietly under his breath. He made sure to remain observant after all, he was still in someone else’s house.

As much as he tried to comport himself, he couldn’t help the reality that he still had enough EXP left.

More than enough....

The smile on his face widened further. As he looked at the screen in front of him.

"One more."

–End of Chapter–