Even Resurrection Has a Price

The slaughter energy I'd raised by killing the bugs had topped off more spiritual energy than Auto-Battle had burned through, so I took what comfort I could from that and started healing myself with spiritual energy, forcing my exhausted body back into motion.

Then I set about carving up the bug corpses one by one with spiritual energy, breaking them into pieces.

Along with the message window, a smooth carapace burst out of a bug's corpse, gleaming with a blue light.

Rare, sure — but it was a crafting material. What a piece of shit.

Random drops from smashing objects in a dungeon got level-scaled, so I'd been hoping for even one piece of gear in my level range. I'd smashed every last "corpse" object and all I got was a single bug shell. Luck of the damned, honestly.

This was still only the dungeon entrance, so I followed the slope the bugs had crawled up and slowly stepped into the dark hole.

The bugs that came pouring out of the dungeon were all kinds of shapes and sizes, but for the most part Auto-Battle could clean them up without trouble. That was only possible because Auto-Battle mode got a correction based on total stats. If I'd charged in barehanded with nothing but raw spiritual energy and no techniques, I'd have been pill bug snacks ages ago.

And then, true to dungeon form, two whole pieces of gear dropped...!

I tossed the Normal-grade bug antenna with its trash durability aside. The cockroach-like foreleg, though — that was a Magic item with the prefix Powerful slapped on it. A top-tier prefix that unconditionally boosted raw weapon damage by thirty percent, on a two-handed weapon. Once I had that, I could carve through bugs even without Auto-Battle!

"One single item not dropping is why I've been suffering like this the whole time."

Just having gear meant I could shred same-level monsters like this, and the fact that I hadn't gotten a single equipment drop until now was so unfair it made my blood boil. This game was genuinely garbage.

Aside from "drop items," "crafted items" made from materials, and "shop items" bought from NPCs, nothing registered as an "item" at all — which was why I'd been forced to leave the village basically naked every time. Random drops only came from dungeon or village objects. If I'd known from the start, back when I was living in the village, that this world was a reality-patched dumpster-fire of a game, I would've gone full earnest pot-smashing training for the random drops. By the time I figured it out, I'd already killed every last villager and converted them into my spiritual core, so the "village" designation was long gone.

A single scythe-like swing of the Powerful Foreleg, wreathed in crimson spiritual energy, was enough to cleave a bug clean in half. Watching the red energy surge and thrash like fire answering my emotions, I tightened my grip on the weapon and pushed toward the red dots marked on the minimap.

My spiritual energy came from a spiritual core built on slaughter energy. Compared to an ordinary spiritual core — the kind people were born with, that naturally drew in the primordial energy of heaven and earth — mine wouldn't even recover unless I killed something. But in exchange, through the power called "experience" gained via slaughter, my spiritual core could grow at a terrifying rate.

The growth I'd scraped together just by killing and killing bugs made the days of scraping by without leveling feel like a lie. I'd been level fourteen before entering the dungeon — more than double that now. If my weapon hadn't kept breaking from low durability midway through, I would've leveled even faster.

Armed with a bug's fang, I reached the dungeon's largest zone — the center. I'd cleared as many trash mobs as possible for levels before the boss fight, so this should be enough!

Of course the ominous event message had to pop at the exact same moment. Waiting for me in the boss room wasn't a regular dungeon boss — it was a named dungeon boss.

Named dungeon bosses gave more experience than regular ones and could drop gear with unique prefixes, so maybe it was lucky. I might even have ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠called it lucky myself — if the reality patch hadn't just put a house-sized earthworm baring its teeth at me!

"Even eok-kka has its limits?!"

The moment the earth dragon — which looked like nothing so much as a colossal earthworm — coiled its body, I instinctively raised spiritual energy and used my weapon as a shield. It didn't matter. In the blink of an eye the earth dragon charged, its massive bulk slamming down on me like a truck, and I went flying through the air with a whoom before smashing into the wall. Only then could I spit out a shrill scream mixed with curses.

"Argh! Auto-Battle!!!!!"

Are you kidding me? Auto-Battle mode never had a restriction like that—

Before I could finish the complaint in my head, the earth dragon's jaws yawned open and it came barreling at me where I was stuck in the wall. The nightmare of it filled the space beyond the blue message window, and I yanked spiritual energy up in a panic.

First: my spiritual energy was powered by experience raised through slaughter.

Second: by nature, my spiritual energy's attribute was slaughter — a kind of death attribute.

Third: because of that, it had outstanding offensive power... and defense so low it was a joke!

I couldn't even put up a moment's resistance. The spiritual energy I'd raised to defend tore like paper under the earth dragon's charge. Rather than attacking it, the energy was ripped away completely — and with it went my left arm, diving straight into the earth dragon's belly. I forgot even that pain as I realized there was no time to think about what came next, and I dragged out every last scrap of spiritual energy I had left.

"Gyaaaaaaaaah!!!!!!!!!"

The scream tore out of me as I yanked spiritual energy up all at once, capillaries bursting across my whole body until I was soaked in blood. Even so, I clenched my right fist and set my stance — the same one I'd used smashing scarecrows — poured every remaining drop of spiritual energy into my fist, and threw a single punch at the earth dragon charging with its mouth wide open.

The crimson spiritual energy ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠coiled around the strike swelled savagely, ballooning in size, and the instant it collided with the earth dragon a pure white flash erupted. At that all-too-familiar effect, a hollow laugh burst out of me even then.

"A dodge proc? Here?"

I felt my entire body being ground to paste in vivid detail — bare, spiritual energy completely spent, exposed to the earth dragon's charge — and then.

"I'm going insane. For real."

When I came to, I was standing blankly on the ground overlooking the hole that was the dungeon's entrance. I checked my body. The only thing off was—

"My... spiritual core."

A portion of the spiritual core I'd raised through slaughter had been permanently torn away — roughly ten percent. Which meant the spiritual core itself had shrunk smaller than when I'd first entered the dungeon. Thanks to the Training Ground bug, I'd grown the core so much that killing bug swarms had only expanded it by maybe five percent. And then a worm had eaten ten percent of it.

"Looking at the dungeon respawn..."

Even in Ironman Mode — a challenge mode that blocked save-loading — dungeon respawn still worked, so I could guess that a few of the modes I'd deliberately installed to raise the difficulty weren't functioning. That would probably change once my realm rose and the modes unlocked, but for now I comforted myself with the fact that I'd at least come back at all.

"No, seriously — does this even make sense, Status Window."

I clawed at my head in irritation at the event, then opened the Status Window.

My level hadn't dropped. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠The spiritual core that was my energy source had partially vanished, so of course it wouldn't show on the Status Window — but the two-point stat loss from the event just now was enough to make me scowl.

"I really do need skills, though."

Skills: techniques that used the spiritual energy drawn up from the core inside the body. Until now I'd only been wrapping it around weapons or my body and slamming it in like an idiot, but now that I'd at least set a toe on the lowest rung of cultivators, I had to learn or acquire techniques that used spiritual energy properly.

I sat down in front of the dungeon entrance and fretted for a long time, but nothing clever came to mind. In the end, I reached a single conclusion.

"Whatever!"