The waiting room of the Ironhold Underground Arena smelled awful. It was a bleak and dimly lit stone chamber filled with weapon racks and wooden benches.
A dozen heavily muscled and scarred combatants were already inside. They were sharpening rusted axes, adjusting dented iron breastplates, and wrapping their knuckles in stained leather.
When Sebastian walked in, every eye locked onto him.
He was wearing standard issue starter cloth. His frame was entirely unarmored, and his only visible weapon was the rusty dagger holstered at his hip. To the gladiators, he didn't look like a challenger. He looked like a lost tourist who had wandered into a meat grinder.
A collective and cruel smile spread across the room. They saw fresh meat. They saw an easy win.
Sebastian found an empty spot on a wooden bench in the corner. He sat down and pulled up his inventory, completely ignoring the murderous glares of the men he was about to surgically dismantle.
He had twelve silver coins and an Iron Broadsword looted from Viper, the headless guild leader back on the bridge.
Across the room, leaning against a rusted iron pillar, was a shady Goblin merchant picking his teeth with a bone splinter. He had a battered leather satchel slung over his shoulder. The unmistakable icon of a Black Market Skill Vendor floated faintly above his head.
Sebastian stood up and walked directly through the cluster of intimidating gladiators.
They parted slightly, confused by the sheer and unbothered momentum of his stride. He stopped in front of the Goblin.
"Show me your spellbooks," Sebastian said. His voice was flat and devoid of any conversational warmth.
The Goblin sneered and eyed Sebastian's starter clothes.
"Spells cost silver, human. You look like you deal in lint and copper."
Sebastian didn't argue. He manifested the Level 5 Iron Broadsword from his inventory and slammed it onto the stone floor. The heavy metal clattered loudly, drawing the attention of half the room.
"I don't want your good stock," Sebastian said. "I want your bottom of the barrel trash. Give me a basic Wind skill and a basic Lightning skill. That sword covers it."
The Goblin's eyes widened greedily at the pristine broadsword. He quickly snatched it up before Sebastian could change his mind and rummaged through his satchel. He tossed two thin and moldy pamphlets at Sebastian's chest.
"Basic Wind Blade and Basic Touch of Shock," the Goblin cackled. "Don't come crying to me when they barely scratch the paint off a shield."
Sebastian caught the pamphlets. Without a second thought, he crushed both of them in his fists. The paper dissolved into grey motes of light that sank into his skin. The system registered the newly acquired Tier 0 skills.
A heavy iron door at the far end of the room suddenly ground open. The Half-Orc registrar from the front desk stuck his ugly and scarred face into the room.
"Drifter!" the Half-Orc barked and grinned maliciously. "You're up. Try not to slip on the blood out there."
Sebastian walked past the Half-Orc without a word. He stepped out of the dark and claustrophobic tunnel and into the blinding glare of the arena.
The roar of the crowd hit him like a physical shockwave.
The colosseum was massive. It was a circular pit of sand and blood enclosed by towering stone walls. Thousands of degenerate NPCs and early access beta testers packed the stands. They were waving betting slips and screaming themselves hoarse.
"And entering the ring!" a magically amplified voice boomed from the announcer's podium. "We have a newcomer! No armor! No guild! Playing the universally despised Drifter class... give it up for the absolute madman, The Drifter!"
A chorus of boos, laughter, and hurled insults rained down from the stands. Half-eaten apples and empty ale mugs shattered against the invisible magical barrier separating the crowd from the arena floor.
"And his opponent!" the announcer roared. The crowd's boos instantly turned into deafening cheers. "Currently holding a three match win streak! The walking fortress... Tanker Bob!"
From the opposite gate, a massive figure stepped into the sunlight.
Tanker Bob was a Level 12 Guardian. He was clad head to toe in heavy interlocking steel plate armor that gleamed under the magical spotlights. In his right hand, he held a steel mace. In his left, he wielded a massive tower shield that was almost as tall as he was. Every step he took shook the sand.
Bob stomped toward the center of the ring and lifted his visor to reveal a smug bearded face. He looked at Sebastian and burst into genuine booming laughter.
"Are you kidding me?" Bob bellowed. His voice carried over the crowd. "Did you get lost on the way to the tutorial village, twig? Look at you! One swing of my mace and your character is getting deleted!"
Sebastian stood perfectly still with his hands resting loosely at his sides. He looked at the towering and armored behemoth with the hollow deadpan stare of a man who had already seen the end of the world.
"Are you done talking?" Sebastian asked. His voice was low but it carried a chilling edge that made Bob's laughter falter for a fraction of a second.
"I'm gonna crush you into a fine paste!" Bob roared. He dropped his visor and dropped into a defensive crouch behind his massive shield. He began his slow and inevitable tank like march forward.
Sebastian didn't draw his rusty dagger. He simply raised his right hand and extended his index and middle fingers together like a child pretending to hold a gun. He channeled five points of mana into his fingertips, intending to cast his newly acquired trash tier skill.
A tiny and pathetic wisp of compressed air materialized at his fingertips.
And then, the system woke up.
[System Ability]
↳ Action Registered: Cast Basic Wind Blade
↳ Nexus Glitch Activated: Proficiency x10,000
↳ Basic Wind Blade leveled up to 10 / 10! Max Level Reached!
↳ Evolution Requirement Met. Basic Wind Blade evolves to Tier 1: Gale Slash!
↳ Proficiency Overflow Detected! Gale Slash leveled up to 10 / 10!
↳ Evolution Requirement Met. Gale Slash evolves to Tier 3: Hurricane Edge!
↳ Proficiency Overflow Detected! Hurricane Edge leveled up to 10 / 10!
[System Warning]
↳ Concept Threshold Breached. Spatial Severance Law Unlocked.
↳ Hurricane Edge evolves to Conceptual Law: Dimensional Sever.
A localized singularity of pure and terrifying pressure manifested around Sebastian's hand. The ambient air in the arena was instantly violently sucked toward his extended fingers. It created a miniature vacuum that popped the eardrums of the players sitting in the front rows.
The knowledge downloaded into Sebastian's brain with a sharp and agonizing spike.
He didn't just understand wind anymore. He understood the mathematical coordinates of space. He understood how to target the invisible seams of reality and simply unzip them.
Tanker Bob was five feet away. He was raising his mace for a skull crushing blow.
Sebastian casually swiped his two fingers diagonally through the air.
There was no massive explosion. There was no flashy and blinding light. There was only a sound. It was a terrifying and absolute shriek of the physics engine tearing apart at the seams.
A thin and perfectly black line appeared in the air. It was a two dimensional crack in space that shot forward with the speed of light.
The black line passed directly through the center of Tanker Bob's massive tower shield. It continued seamlessly through his heavy steel breastplate, sliced through the chainmail beneath, and exited out the back of his armor. It dissipated into the arena wall behind him.
Sebastian lowered his hand.
For a full second, nothing happened. Bob froze mid swing and blinked behind his visor. The crowd fell into a hushed and confused silence.
"Ha! You missed, you stupid" Bob started to say.
Clang!
The massive and impenetrable tower shield suddenly slid perfectly in half. The top diagonally separated from the bottom and crashed heavily into the sand.
A millisecond later, the thick leather straps holding Bob's armor together snapped. The steel breastplate, the pauldrons, the greaves, every single piece of his Level 12 heavy gear cleanly bifurcated and fell away from his body. It rained down around his boots in a heap of useless scrap metal.
The precision of the Dimensional Sever was so absolute and so conceptually perfect that it had targeted and severed only the armor values. It completely ignored Bob's actual HP.
Bob stood completely frozen in the center of the arena. His mace slipped from his trembling hand.
He was now wearing nothing but his basic grey digital undergarments. The invincible tank had been stripped naked in a fraction of a second by a flick of a wrist.
Bob looked down at his ruined and impossibly severed gear. He looked up at Sebastian, who was already turning his back and walking toward the exit gate.
A dark and spreading stain quickly formed on the front of Bob's grey undergarments as his bladder let go. The Level 12 Guardian dropped to his knees in the sand. His eyes were wide with unadulterated terror.
"I... I yield!" Bob screamed. His voice cracked hysterically. "I yield! Don't kill me! Please!"
The announcer was entirely speechless. The magical amplification crystal at the podium hummed with dead air.
The thousands of spectators sat in a stunned and paralyzed silence. Their brains entirely failed to process how a Level 1 Drifter had just casually bypassed thousands of points of armor rating with a gesture.
[Match Concluded]
↳ Winner: The Drifter.
↳ Purse Awarded: 50 Gold Coins.
A heavy pouch of digital gold materialized in Sebastian's inventory. The familiar and comforting weight of capital settled into his interface. It wasn't enough to buy out the real world logistics companies yet, but it was a start.
"Physics engine is definitely going to need a patch," Sebastian muttered dryly. He stepped back into the shadows of the gladiator tunnel. He didn't look back at the crying Guardian in the sand. He had his money, and he had a schedule to keep.