The monster across from him hadn’t moved.
It was still observing him for some unknown reason.
Perhaps it was because of his crazed behaviour or a divine miracle.
“Great timing,” he muttered, pushing himself up another inch, every word costing him.
“Really. Immaculate. Somebody give this god a writing award.”
The answer came in the form of a sound that split the dungeon apart.
SKRRAAAAAAAAHHHHH!!
The creature’s shriek thundered through the pit, shaking loose dust and shards of rock from the ceiling.
The stone beneath Dylan’s feet trembled violently, cracks spiderwebbing across the floor as the monster finally abandoned its eerie stillness.
Its body blurred.
“Oh, shi—”
Instinct moved before thought.
He threw himself sideways.
A deafening BOOM erupted where he’d been leaning an instant earlier as the monster’s grotesque arm slammed into the stone wall.
Rock exploded outward, fragments cutting across his cheek and shoulders.
Dylan hit the ground hard.
Pain detonated through his already broken body.
“Ghk—!”
Blood burst from his mouth as his chest seized.
His vision flashed white for a heartbeat before settling into a blur of red and grey.
Every breath scraped against shattered ribs like broken glass.
He forced air into his lungs anyway.
“…Still…” he coughed, another mouthful of blood staining the stone.
“…still alive.”
His eyes locked onto the creature as it slowly turned toward him again.
Then memory clicked.
“…A Wretchling.”
The name surfaced from the countless chapters he’d once written.
An E-Rank monster.
The weakest class of dungeon creatures.
Ordinarily, rookie hunters could handle one with enough teamwork and preparation.
Ordinarily.
Not while bleeding to death.
Not with one arm barely responding.
Not after someone had driven a blade into your back and left you to die.
The Wretchling stood taller than it had any right to, hunched wrong, like something built by a god who’d only heard secondhand descriptions of what a body was supposed to look like.
Grey-black flesh stretched too tight over a frame of joints that bent in directions that made his stomach turn just watching.
No eyes—not really.
Just a scatter of pale, weeping sockets across where a face should be, opening and closing at random like it was still deciding how many it needed.
Its mouth took up nearly a third of its head, packed edge to edge with teeth of wildly mismatched size, some needle-thin, some broken and blunt, like it had been stealing them from things it had already eaten.
When it breathed, the sound was wet and rattling, air dragging through something that hadn’t quite finished becoming lungs.
Its arms ended not in hands but in clusters of thin, twitching fingers—too many, too long, curling and uncurling with a mind of their own, tapping against the stone floor in a rhythm that was almost…
Horribly…
Patient.
“…Right.”
Dylan swallowed the coppery taste filling his mouth.
“I made you.”
The realization did nothing to comfort him.
Because he’d also written exactly how dangerous a Wretchling became once it decided to stop observing and start hunting.
His heartbeat thundered inside his ears.
The creature lowered itself.
Preparing to pounce.
“…Wait.”
Something flickered in the corner of his vision.
The translucent blue window.
The status screen.
Still hovering exactly where he’d left it.
His gaze finally shifted toward it.
The translucent screen shimmered before him, its pale blue glow cutting through the darkness.
His eyes swept across it.
Name: Dylan Harrow
Age: 17
Race: Human
Hunter Rank: F-Rank
Potential: C-Rank
Path: None
Mastery Realm: Unawakened
Titles:
None
Parameters
Strength: F-
Agility: E+
Stamina: E
Intelligence: E-
Spirit: F
Mana Capacity: G
Mana Circulation: F
Mana Meridians: E-
Luck: G-
Charisma: D
Innate Ability
[Refraction]
Description:
Refracts incoming attacks.
Remaining Charges: 3 / 3
Cooldown:
Charges replenish every 24 hours.
Unique Skill
[Plagiarize Lv.1]
Skill Slots: 0 / 3
Copied Skills:
None
Description:
Steal what isn’t yours.
Pay the price for what you stole.
Rules
• Copying a Skill requires physical contact with the target while engaged in combat.
• Only Unique Skills can be copied.
• At Level 1, a maximum of 3 Skill Slots are available.
• Copying Skills beyond the user’s limits may permanently damage the Mana Core.
Inflated Cost: Copied Skills consume approximately 3–8× more Mana than when used by the original owner.
• Slot Vacancy: Copied Skills may be discarded to free a Skill Slot.
Once discarded, the Skill is permanently lost and must be copied again from a valid target.
Aura
Status: Locked
Requirement: First Path Awakening
Bloodline: None
Magic Affinity: None
Armament: None Equipped
Combat Scriptures: None Learned
Combat Mastery: Unawakened
His eyes devoured the entire window in less than a second.
A strange side effect of becoming a Hunter.
Status windows weren’t read line by line.
They were…
absorbed.
The information settled into his mind almost instantly, as naturally as remembering his own name.
“…Not bad,” Dylan muttered, wiping blood from the corner of his mouth.
His heartbeat remained frantic, but for the first time since waking inside this dying body…
Hope.
A tiny spark of it.
“…Thanks.”
The words escaped before he realized he’d said them.
“At least that damned God gave me something useful.”
Then his gaze drifted lower.
To the first rule.
«Physical contact with the target is required to copy a skill.»
Silence.
His expression slowly froze.
The Wretchling let out another guttural growl somewhere in front of him.
Dylan didn’t even look at it.
He continued staring at the glowing line.
“…”
“…”
He blinked once.
Then looked back at the monster.
Then back at the rule.
His eye twitched.
“What…”
A beat of silence.
“What the fuck do you mean I have to fucking touch to copy Abilities?!”
His voice echoed through the dungeon.
The Wretchling answered with another furious screech.
World Notes:
Potential:
Potential represents a Hunter’s natural growth limit—essentially their maximum attainable rank.
While training, experience, and resources can help a Hunter reach that ceiling faster, they cannot naturally surpass their Potential.
Innate Abilities:
Every Hunter is born with a single Innate Ability.
These abilities can be offensive, defensive, supportive, passive, or utility-based depending on the individual.
Innate Abilities do not level up.
Their effectiveness may improve as the user becomes stronger, but the ability itself remains fundamentally unchanged.
Unique Skills:
Unique Skills are exceptionally rare abilities granted directly by the System rather than by birth.
Each Unique Skill is exclusive to a single owner, making no two identical.
Most Hunters never obtain one during their lifetime.
Unlike Innate Abilities, Unique Skills can level up, unlocking stronger effects and new functions over time.
Grades:
Hunters, Monsters, Dungeons, Skills, and Potential are all classified using the same ranking system:
G → F → E → D → C → B → A → S → SS → SSS
The greater the grade, the greater the danger, rarity, and power.