[UNORTHODOX FANG: 99% → 100%]
[MASTERY ACHIEVED]
[NEW ABILITY UNLOCKED: Lightning Fang]
Sothing clicked in my mind.
Not gradually. All at once.
Images flooded my consciousness, movents I’d never practiced but suddenly knew.
Knowledge seeped through like water finding cracks, filling gaps I hadn’t known existed.
The sword in my hand felt different. Not heavier or lighter.
Just... right.
Like it had always belonged there and I was only now realizing it.
I moved without conscious thought, my body responding to instincts that were newly ford.
The remaining wolves lunged as one.
I t them.
Oathstorm flowed through forms that were Unorthodox Fang but evolved, sharper, cleaner, each strike leading perfectly into the next like a river finding its course.
Lightning arced not just along the blade but from it, extending my reach, turning single strikes into chains of electrical devastation that jumped between targets.
The last wolf tried to retreat.
But i closed the distance in a single step and ended it with a strike so clean the body was in pieces before it hit the ground.
Silence fell in the cave.
I stood there, breathing steady despite the exertion, Oathstorm crackling with residual energy in my hand.
It’s so much different than before.
I can move smoothly.
I looked at my hands, at the sword, trying to process what had just happened.
\Scarlet was staring at with wide eyes, her knives lowered, expression caught sowhere between shock and awe.
"What the hell was that?" Her voice was barely above a whisper.
Before I could answer, Tessa scread.
I spun.
A wolf—one we’d thought dead, just twitching corpse—had sohow dragged itself across the floor toward Tessa while we’d been distracted.
Its body was ruined, half its internal organs spilling out, but corrupted determination drove it forward.
Tessa had her small utility knife raised, stabbing down at it with desperate force.
"Die you filthy creature! Die! Die! DIE!"
She was cursing words I hadn’t heard her use before.
The wolf’s jaws snapped at her, missing by inches.
Then it lunged with its remaining working claw, aiming for her throat—
I moved.
Crossed the distance, grabbed Tessa with one hand and yanked her backward, intercepted the wolf’s claw and head in a single motion that ended with both separated from its body.
The corpse finally went still.
I turned imdiately to Tessa, gripping her shoulders, my eyes scanning for wounds.
"Are you alright? It didn’t scratch you? Didn’t touch you at all?"
My voice ca out more intense than I’d intended, adrenaline and genuine fear making it sharp.
She looked up at .
Then smiled mischievously.
"Aww~"
She clasped her hands over her mouth in exaggerated delight.
"You’re worried about ? That’s so sweet!"
My jaw clenched.
I pulled back, releasing her shoulders, turning away before she could see my expression.
I imdiately and completely regret that decision.
And walked around the cavern, checking the corpses thodically, making absolutely sure nothing else was playing dead.
Tessa trailed behind , her earlier fear completely evaporated now that the danger had passed.
"I would have killed that thing myself, you know. I had my knife. I was stabbing it. It was working."
I didn’t reply.
"I’m tougher than I look! I can handle myself in a fight!"
Still didn’t reply. And just kept checking around.
"Are you ignoring ? Jin? Jin, I’m talking to you—"
"They’re all dead," I said, cutting off her rambling. "Nothing left alive down here except us."
Before I could say anything else, a sound echoed through the cavern.
Stone grinding against stone.
Scarlet yelped and jumped backward as part of the nearby wall collapsed inward, revealing a hidden alcove we hadn’t noticed before.
I moved to check, and inside were...
Various items scattered and piled haphazardly. Mineral chunks that glinted in the light. Dried herbs bundled together. What looked like beast parts, claws, fangs, so kind of crystallized organ.
The wolves’ collection? They’d been gathering things?
I crouched near the pile, examining the contents with my debug vision.
[ITEM_SCAN]
iron_ore_chunks: LOW_GRADE
mana_crystals: SMALL
misc_trinkets: SEVEN
...
Not worthless, but not a fortune either.
"We can’t take all this," I said, ntally calculating weight and space. "We don’t have room in our packs."
Tessa tilted her head, looking at with genuine confusion.
"What are you talking about? You’re a noble, right? Don’t you have a storage ring?"
My eyes widened.
"Ugh!" I scratched my head.
"Well, about that..."
Is there really sothing like that? How did I not know storage rings were a thing?
Scarlet started laughing.
"You didn’t know? What kind of incompetent noble doesn’t know?!"
Tessa giggled too, joining in the mockery, but then she moved closer and flicked my forehead lightly.
"The ring, dummy. That also works as storage. Most high-grade enchanted rings do."
I blinked at her. "What?"
She held out her hand patiently, like explaining sothing to a child.
"Pour so blood and mana into it. That’ll activate the storage function and bind it to you specifically."
I looked down at the Ring of the Warden on my finger.
You have got to be kidding .
I pulled out my utility knife, pricked my finger, and let a drop of blood fall onto the ring’s surface while channeling mana into it simultaneously.
binding: CONFIRD
storage_capacity: 10_cubic_ters
current_contents: EMPTY
access_thod: NTAL_COMMAND
The ring pulsed once with warmth, and suddenly I could feel it, an empty space, dinsionally folded, accessible through intent alone.
It’s been there the whole ti.
This entire ti I could have been storing things and I never knew.
I turned inward, focusing on my debug vision interface.
Why didn’t you tell about this?
[Host requested basic information, thus system provided as requested!]
The hell! Storage capacity definitely falls under ’information about the item’!
[Negative! It was hidden ability.]
"BULLSHIT!" I said it out loud without aning to.
Tessa’s eyes narrowed. "What did you just say?"
I stood quickly, brushing off my pants. "Nothing. Talking to myself."
"You said ’bullshit’ pretty clearly—"
"Let’s just get this stuff loaded and get going back to—"
Thud!
The sound cut through my words like a knife.
I turned.
And froze
Scarlet had collapsed.
She was on her knees, one hand braced against the ground, the other pressed to her side.
And spreading across her exposed skin... were dark veins.
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