SSS Rank: Infinite Enhancement, I Can Upgrade Everything to God Tier! Chapter 1: [1] : The Debt and The Dive, SSS-Rank Talent

Sector 7 debtor’s prison was exactly as awful as it sounded.

It was a deep underground prison where people who owed the gacorps too much money went to rot. The whole place slled like cheap nutrient paste and unwashed bodies.

Declan Vance sat on his tal cot, staring at the ceiling.

He had been down here for five years. His debt was so high it looked like a phone number. He was never getting out.

Not alive anyway.

Heavy boots echoed down the tal walkway outside his cell. Declan did not bother sitting up. The footsteps stopped right in front of his door.

The heavy steel door buzzed and slid open.

A corporate guard in slick black tactical gear stood there. He was holding a digital tablet.

Behind him stood two more guards carrying stun rifles.

"Declan Vance," the lead guard said. His voice was bored.

"That is the na on the jumpsuit," Declan replied, pointing at the faded orange fabric he was wearing.

He got used to the prison tough guy concept.

"You are being offered a way out," the guard said, tapping his tablet. "A clean slate. All debts forgiven."

Declan finally sat up and narrowed his eyes although he wasn’t buying it.

"Sure. What do I lose? My eyes? My spine? Or just whatever is left of my dignity?"

"You have been selected for the Grid Dive," the guard said flatly.

"The Grid Dive?"

Declan froze. Everyone in the slums and the prisons had heard the rumors about the Grid Dive. The gacorps were testing so new mysterious virtual reality network called the Primordial Grid.

It was not a ga. It was a at grinder.

They threw prisoners and desperate people into the dive pods. The rumor was that if you survived and did well, you got your freedom and rich payouts. But the catch was brutal. If you died in the Grid, the feedback loop fried your brain in the real world.

"The survival rate is basically zero, isn’t it?"

Declan asked.

"It is higher than your chances of paying off your debt by sitting on that cot," the guard countered. He held out a digital pen. "Sign the waiver. Or do not. We will just ask the guy in the next cell."

Declan looked at the pen and looked around his tiny miserable cell.

He did not want to die. But he was not really living right now either.

"Does it co with a free al before I go?" Declan asked.

"No."

"Cheap bastards," Declan muttered. He stood up, grabbed the pen, and pressed his thumb against the tablet to sign it.

"Walk," the guard ordered.

They marched him out of the cell block and into an elevator. They went up far above the prison levels into a sterile blindingly white laboratory.

The room was filled with row after row of massive tallic pods. Thick cables ran from the pods into the ceiling. Most of the pods were empty but Declan saw a few orderlies wheeling away a body bag on a gurney.

Declan stared at the body bag as it rolled past. "Is that what I think it is..."

"Get in," the guard pointed to an open pod.

Declan climbed into the cold tal box. The interior was lined with soft padding. As soon as he lay down, chanical clamps locked over his wrists, ankles, and chest.

"Hey, wait a minute," Declan started.

Before he could ask any questions.

A tal halo lowered from the top of the pod and clamped securely around his head.

Small sharp needles pricked the back of his neck.

"Initiating Dive," a robotic voice announced over the room’s speakers.

Declan did not even have ti to curse.

A massive jolt of electricity shot into his spine. His vision exploded into blinding white light. He felt like his body was being ripped apart on a molecular level. The pain was unbelievable, burning through his nerves like battery acid.

He wanted to scream but he did not have a mouth anymore.

[Connecting to the Primordial Grid...]

A blue holographic text box floated in the endless white void of his vision.

[Scanning Soul Frequency...]

[Analyzing subject data...]

Suddenly, the blue box flickered. It turned a harsh warning red. The text started glitching and characters scrambled frantically.

[ERROR. ERROR. ERROR.]

Declan’s consciousness floated in the void.

He felt a weird pressure in his head like a suppressed mory trying to claw its way out.

[Anomaly Detected.]

[Soul Frequency matches a prior unrecorded dive.]

[mory fragnts fractured. Core data corrupted.]

[System protocol breached.]

Declan had no idea what the system was talking about. Prior dive? He had never been in a pod before in his life.

The red boxes vanished. A new golden prompt appeared. It glowed with a strange warm light.

[Anomaly recognized. Bypassing standard class allocation.]

[Generating Unique Talent based on Soul Fracture...]

[Congratulations.]

[You have awakened the sole SSS-Rank Talent: Boundless Enhancent.]

Declan stared at the floating golden text.

SSS-Rank? That sounded completely overpowered. He read a lot of cheap web novels back when he had free ti. SSS was the top of the food chain.

[Initializing Player Profile...]

A new screen popped up in front of him.

┌──────[ Profile ]──────┐

│ Na: Declan Vance

│ Level: 1

│ Class: None

│ HP: 100/100

│ Stamina: 100/100

│ Mana: 50/50

├──────[ Attributes ]───┤

│ Strength: 5

│ Agility: 5

│ Vitality: 5

│ Intelligence: 5

├──────[ Talent ]──────┤

│ [Boundless Enhancent] (SSS-Rank)

└──────────────────┘

Declan focused his mind on the Talent.

Another box expanded detailing what it actually did.

[Boundless Enhancent SSS-Rank]

↳ Description: The rules of the Grid do not apply to your items or skills.

Declan kept reading. The system dumped a chunk of basic knowledge into his brain so he could understand the chanics.

In the Primordial Grid, players earned Origin Points by killing monsters or completing quests. These points were the main currency. You used them to buy things or more importantly to enhance your gear.

For a normal player, enhancing an item was a massive gamble. You could use Origin Points to upgrade a weapon up to 5. That was the hard cap. If a normal player tried to push a weapon to 6, the item would instantly shatter into useless dust.

Declan’s talent broke that rule.

[System Remark]

↳ Effect 1: The Enhancent Cap is completely removed. Your items and skills will never shatter from enhancent failure.

He understood what was going on imdiately.

Declan blinked. ’Wait. Never?’ he thought.

’So I can just keep upgrading a stick until it hits like a nuke?’

[System Remark]

↳ Effect 2: Conceptual Mutation. For every 10 enhancent milestone reached on an item or skill, it will trigger a conceptual mutation, granting it a god-tier trait that defies normal logic.

’Holy crap,’ Declan muttered in his mind.

If this was a ga, he had just been handed the developer cheat codes.

Before he could celebrate, the white void began to crack like glass.

[Integration Complete.]

[Dropping player into the Grid.]

[Welco to Hell.]