The wind returned. This time, it carried weight.
Kai stood in silence, still haunted by the vision the Seer had shown him. The futures. The failures. The promise of what he could become. But none of that mattered if he remained weak.
The black key in his inventory pulsed faintly—but he knew he wasn't ready to unlock what it led to. Not yet.
His thoughts turned to the weapon that had tried to awaken for him. A sword of pure cosmic intent, born from the future. It had a will—an ego—and it had rejected him.
> "Unworthy."
"Your class is not high enough. Your soul is not yet tempered. Your fate is still… incomplete."
It had vanished, sealed, awaiting a future version of him.
For now, he needed a sword he could wield.
---
Kai returned to a place only he remembered. Deep in the old storerooms of his home, buried beneath forgotten heirlooms and the dust of silence, he uncovered a case wrapped in dragon-hide cloth. He unwrapped it with reverence.
Inside was a blade scarred by time—an old sword once held by his father during the era of the war. A blade that had not sung in battle for decades.
It was not beautiful.
It did not shine.
But it remembered war.
> "You carried this for all of us, Father. Let me carry it now."
He gripped the hilt and left for the dungeon gates.
---
The Dungeon of Echoing Souls.
A place where the voices of the dead whispered endlessly. A place abandoned by large guilds. Too unpredictable. Too cursed. Too… cruel.
Kai entered alone. But fate had other plans.
In the second floor of the dungeon, amidst traps and shadows, he heard the crash of metal and the growl of monsters. Following it, he found a lone figure battling a pack of corrupted beasts—a boy barely older than him, fighting with raw desperation and uncanny instinct.
He was fast. Sharp. Untrained—but moving like he had something to prove.
Kai stepped in, cutting down two enemies before they reached the stranger. Together, they silenced the room.
The boy panted, lowering his dagger. "Thanks… I didn't think anyone else came to this dungeon."
Kai nodded. "You're reckless."
A small laugh. "Unlucky, actually. But thanks to you, I might live to be reckless tomorrow."
They introduced themselves.
The boy's name: Riven.
An orphan. No guild. No support. A rogue hunter. And yet, Kai saw it in his eyes—the glint of someone with buried power.
They teamed up. Floor after floor, they cleared the dungeon together.
Then, on the sixth floor, everything changed.
---
They found a sealed chamber. Whispering walls. A heartbeat thrummed through the stone. A cursed boss lair.
When they entered, the dungeon rejected Kai's presence—a force pushed him out temporarily into a shadowed boundary. He saw Riven inside, isolated… yet unafraid.
The monster emerged—a creature stitched from bones, carrying a scythe forged from forgotten prayers. It roared.
And Riven screamed.
But it wasn't a scream of pain.
It was a resonance.
Riven's eyes turned silver. His veins glowed faint blue. The monster paused—as if it recognized something.
The scythe shattered.
The air ruptured.
> [Unique Awakening Achieved: Soulborn Class – Reaper of the Silent Path]
[Class Trait Unlocked: Echo Drain | Deathsense | Endless Hunt]
The boy who had no future now glowed with untapped, terrifying potential.
Kai forced his way back in with sheer will.
Together, they defeated the boss—Kai wielding his father's sword with purpose, and Riven, newly born into his power, slicing souls from the air itself.
---
After the dungeon collapsed behind them, Riven stood at the exit, dazed. "I… I don't know what just happened."
Kai smiled faintly. "I think you found your path."
Riven turned to him. "And what about you?"
Kai's blade hummed with warmth. He checked his status.
> Level: 25
[Class Advancement Triggered – Trait Unlocked: Limitless Potential (Dormant)]
He looked to the sky.
"I'm getting closer."
---
Next: Chapter 13 –"The Limitless Brand & the Godslayer's Trial"