The Anchor That Sustains the World

I'd just scored an Ancient-grade item that might become Mythic.

That alone was enough to kill the infinite hunt on the spot, fall back to a save point — no, a safe zone the cows wouldn't reach — and call an emergency summit with every Humanity Clone rattling around inside my head.

"So what now? Do we keep reloading, or what?"

Even if I couldn't eat it, I had to go for it!

Main body, listen up! The Ancient item we got last time was just a crafting material, right? This one's actual gear!

And look at that half-assed item name. Doesn't it ring a bell, Main Body?

A bound item with an exclusive mission, and the hidden dungeon's name is stamped right on it!

"No way… is this a set item…!"

A Mythic-grade set of armor.

Just thinking the words was enough to make every Humanity Clone inside me swallow hard in perfect unison. It looked that delicious.

If the clones' hunch was right and this really was a set piece, then this was a genuine jackpot.

Without a hidden dungeon this packed with boss-tier monsters, I couldn't even begin to guess how much grinding it would take to get something like this.

So… stop reloading and just hunt for real now? Infinite reloading had basically mapped every last pattern the cows had, and that was where the confidence came from.

At the very least, I figured I could take down as many as three of those freakish muscle-cows in a single go.

"Use!"

The bone helmet with a cow's skull in my hands came alive. Blue flames bloomed from the empty black sockets of its eyes like pupils, and it fixed me with a stare.

"…???"

What the hell.

Line after line of dazzling, absurdly broken options that could make anyone's eyes spin — but I managed to tear my gaze off the item window and open my mouth.

"Mission window!"

So what the hell was that exclusive mission, then?

Curiosity and questions piled high, I opened the newly appeared mission sitting at the very top of the completed list.

"Hmm. Still no idea what any of that means!"

I equipped the bone helmet the second it bound to me.

Even still at Ancient grade, pre-evolution, Mythic was Mythic — the moment it slotted into my equipment window, it started bleeding influence into reality. When I poured spiritual energy into it, a blue ghost-fire rose above my head in the shape of cow horns.

It was that classic Mythic-item effect: ignored base costumes, ignored mods, and the hide function in the equipment window didn't work on it either.

And as I've said before, this piece-of-shit game lags — or straight-up crashes — when effects stack, which is why running two Mythic pieces at once was basically impossible.

Unless you matched the effects perfectly, or got a Mythic set with identical effects from the start.

Swapping one piece of gear might not sound like a big deal, but for someone running a pure glass-cannon build, even a shared Hit Immunity and Damage Immunity — a one-hit nullify ticket — was a pretty massive change.

It meant the "tank one shot, then kill them" strategy was finally on the table!

The option was limited to once per combat, and Hit and Damage shared the same charge, so even a weak poke or a chip hit from a feint would burn it. But that didn't matter.

My attack power, with just the Spoon active and a Rare weapon as sacrifice, was already enough to one-shot a muscle-cow on the reduced damage left after a parry.

The problem until now was that doing so would aggro another cow into transforming into a muscle-cow and attacking — and me, left wide open after the parry, would take double damage, teeter on the edge of death, and have no choice but to reload.

"But I bounced it!"

Watching a surprise fire-laser snuff out against the blue ghost-fire, I snatched up a purple-glowing weapon from the drops, Spooned it, and hurled it straight through a muscle-cow.

Drops rained down. Slaughter energy and EXP flooded in. Two more muscle-cows came charging, pounding the floor to rubble or melting it underfoot — and I scooped up another Rare weapon, Spooned it, and charged right back at them.

"Become EXP for my Mythic gear!!!"

An axe swung in vengeance for a comrade whose skull had just been caved in by a hammer — and the blue ghost-fire stopped it cold. Yu Hee recovered her stance, caught the axe on her gauntlet, yanked the muscle-cow forward off its feet, and ripped its head clean off.

"And while you're at it, I'd really appreciate the rest of the set!!!"

Even as she spat greed-soaked words, Yu Hee's face stayed blank. She picked up a dropped Unique weapon and dove straight back into the fight against the next wave of muscle-cows.

In any game, the easiest ways for a player to get stronger are leveling up, gear, and skills.

So of course the difficulty would plummet the second I got a single Ancient-grade helmet — from careful, cautious hunting to full-on rampage mode.

It wasn't just a plain Defense boost, either. The "increases all Defense" option was huge. My Defense had already dropped two full tiers — one from slaughter energy, one from a Dharma Treasure — and that single option canceled out about a tier and a half of it.

"I can swap out every piece of gear on my quick slots now!"

Epic items were pouring in so hard ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠I had to dump the Rares and Uniques sitting in my inventory and grind the low-level Epics into dumpling ingredients on the millstone.

"Even with Inventory Expansion Mod running, I can't keep ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠up!"

Of course I was stuck at the level cap, so no more level-ups — but the EXP was getting vacuumed up by my Golden Core along with spiritual energy, and it was growing fat and healthy. The expanding Mental World had Humanity Clones clinging to the walls, already starting expansion work.

Inside the Mental World, one clone was hard at work absorbing spirit stones from the inventory into spiritual energy, while another refined that energy through the Tower and injected it into the Golden Core — both of them grinding nonstop just to empty the inventory.

And of course, no matter how long the hunt went on, the cows kept respawning without rest. At some point I even started filtering Epics by option and grinding those down too.

Purple and gold gear stacking in the inventory. Consumables and materials of every kind.

And most important of all — EXP for the Mythic evolution was stacking on the bone helmet.

One muscle-cow was worth roughly 10 to 13 EXP. The evolution target was a full hundred million. At max efficiency, that was only about ten million kills.

In a hidden dungeon overflowing with items, EXP, spiritual energy, and slaughter energy, Yu Hee hunted like she meant to live there — relentlessly, endlessly, over and over.

And naturally, all of it was under Double Speed Mod.

"Ancient! Gear! Gear! Please, not materials — gear! Aaaagh!!!"

A consumable this time!!!

Black-gold light burst out. I scooped it up with a desperate cry — and it was a consumable.

I'd been slaughtering muscle-cows with boss-tier drop rates this generous, and Ancient-grade drops so far totaled exactly four.

And of those, not counting the first helmet, two were materials and this latest one was a consumable.

That's how hard Ancient items were to get.

And now Mythic?!

We hadn't even hit the mid-game crisis yet. Overall item rarity hadn't spiked. And at this stage of the game — a Mythic item?!

That was why, even staring down a hundred million EXP, Yu Hee and the Humanity Clones still had motivation burning white-hot.

"It's out again!"

The second I saw the system message, my left hand hit the consumable already loaded in a quick slot, pulled it out, and threw it.

A Legendary consumable that guaranteed a full thirty-second disengage from any combat situation — and the second I used it, I ran.

Because a hidden dungeon clears and vanishes the moment you kill the boss!

I still ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠can't kill you. Not when there's a Mythic item on the line!

"Don't die! Stay healthy! Live well!"

Please!

"Again! Again! Running like a damn rat! Mmooooooo!!!!"

I completely ignored the enraged boss's roar, cut the hunt without a second of hesitation, and fled for my life.