The dust of the spatial shift hadn't even settled before the world's digital heart began to seize. On every screen from Neo-Seoul to New York, the coordinates for the Royal Palace had been updated to a "Dead Zone"—my Sovereign District.
I stood on the balcony of my newly "relocated" palace, the black-and-obsidian crown weighing heavy on my brow. My level had hit 82, and the mana density in the air was so thick it felt like walking through invisible honey.
"Chairman... or, Your Majesty?" my Chief of Security, Marcus, stammered as he stepped onto the balcony. He was wearing a new uniform—one I had "failed" to design, resulting in a 100x Refund that turned the fabric into Tier-A Shadow-Weave armor. "The Alliance has officially declared a 'Global Threat Level: Red.' They aren't just sending soldiers anymore. They've mobilized the Six Pillars."
"The Six Pillars," I repeated, the name tasting like copper and old memories.
In my past life, they were my peers. The six other "Heroes" chosen by the Holy System to protect the continents. We had shared bread, fought dragons, and—ultimately—they had stood by and watched as Princess Elara drove a dagger into my heart.
"They're coming to take back the Palace," Marcus continued, his eyes darting to the horizon. "The sensors are picking up six distinct SSS-Rank signatures approaching from the stratosphere."
"Let them come," I said, looking at the cracked marble floor of the balcony. "The palace is a mess. I should probably fail at fixing it."
I called over a group of construction droids I'd "failed" to buy from a defunct tech firm. They were rusted, clunky, and barely functional.
"Fix the walls," I commanded. "Try to make it look... welcoming."
I picked up a hammer and struck a protruding piece of rebar with a "clumsy," half-hearted swing.
[Ding! Villainous Act: Incompetent Reconstruction of a Cultural Heritage Site.] [Result: ABSURD FAILURE. (The hammer broke, and you missed the rebar entirely.)] [Calculating Refund...] [Refund Issued: 100x 'Architectural Evolution'!]
The rebar didn't just bend; it groaned. The entire palace—acres of stone and gold—began to twist. The white marble turned into "Void-Iron," a material that absorbed light and magic. The towers didn't just rise; they sharpened into jagged spires that pulsed with defensive lightning. The "welcoming" garden I had intended turned into a moat of liquid mana that would dissolve anything without my mark.
[Building Transmuted: 'The Bastion of the Usurper King' (Rank: EX).] [Passive Effect: 'Mana Choke' — All enemies within 1 mile have their Mana regeneration reduced by 90%.]
"Welcoming," Marcus whispered, staring at the terrifying fortress of doom that had replaced the beautiful palace. "Truly... inviting."
Act 1: Act of War
While I was busy "renovating," the sky above the Sovereign District began to burn. Six streaks of light, each a different color, tore through the clouds. They didn't land; they hovered in a hexagonal formation directly above my Bastion.
A voice boomed from the heavens, resonant and full of divine authority.
"Drake Vance! I am Kaelen of the Iron Fist, First Pillar of the Alliance!"
I looked up. A man built like a mountain, clad in armor made from the scales of a Great Earth Dragon, hovered in the center. Beside him was a woman wreathed in emerald flames—Sia, the Queen of Spirits. Then there was the Archer, the Mage, the Priest, and... my heart skipped a beat... Leo, the Shadow Blade.
Leo had been my best friend. The man who had promised to watch my back.
"Drake!" Kaelen shouted. "You have committed crimes against the Heavens! You have enslaved the Hero Han-Seol and stolen the Royal Bloodline! Surrender now, and we will grant you the mercy of a quick execution!"
I walked to the edge of my jagged spire, looking up at the six "Gods" in the sky.
"I'm willing to negotiate," I called back, my voice carrying effortlessly through the 'Mana Choke' field. "I'll fail at an apology right now."
I cleared my throat and looked up at them with a look of mock contrition. "I'm really, really sorry... that you guys traveled all this way just to die."
[Ding! Villainous Act: Insulting the Sovereignty of the Six Pillars.] [Result: FAILURE. (They are not amused. They are casting their Combined Ultimate.)] [Calculating Refund...]
The six heroes didn't wait. They raised their weapons in unison. A massive circle of light, miles wide, formed in the clouds. This was the 'Judgment of the Hexagram'—an attack designed to erase entire cities from the map.
"Die, traitor!" Kaelen roared.
[Refund Issued: 100x 'Reflective Insolence'!] [The 'Judgment of the Hexagram' has been redirected and multiplied.]
The pillar of divine light shot down from the sky, but ten feet above my Bastion, it hit an invisible mirror. It didn't just bounce back; it split into a thousand jagged needles of holy fire that screamed back toward the Six Pillars with a hundred times the speed.
"Scatter!" Sia screamed, her emerald flames flickering in terror.
The sky erupted. The Six Pillars, the "invincible" protectors of humanity, were scattered like leaves in a hurricane. Kaelen was sent plummeting toward the ground, his dragon-scale armor smoking and cracked.
I didn't wait for them to recover. I looked at the unconscious Han-Seol, who was being guarded by my shadow-soldiers.
"Associate," I said, waking him with a splash of mana. "The Pillars are here. Go out there and 'fail' at defending me. I want to see how much your new sword can eat."
Act 2: The Fall of the First Pillar
Kaelen of the Iron Fist slammed into the liquid mana moat surrounding my Bastion. He rose, coughing up gold-tinted blood, his eyes glowing with an insane fury.
"You think a few tricks can stop me?" Kaelen roared, his muscles bulging until his armor began to snap. "I am the Earth! I am the Mountain!"
He charged toward the bridge. I sent Han-Seol out to meet him.
Han-Seol, still trembling and holding the dull, gray Excalibur, looked like a lamb being sent to a slaughterhouse. He looked back at me, his eyes pleading. "He'll kill me, Drake! I'm only Level 30 now because of your taxes!"
"Then fail at dying," I said.
Kaelen's fist, glowing with the weight of an entire tectonic plate, slammed into Han-Seol's chest.
[Ding! Villainous Act: Sending a Weakened Ally to their Death.] [Result: FAILURE. (Han-Seol survived... barely.)] [Refund Issued: 100x 'Vampiric Durability'!]
Han-Seol didn't fly backward. Instead, as Kaelen's fist hit him, a surge of life-force was ripped directly out of the Earth Pillar and shoved into Han-Seol.
Kaelen's arm withered instantly, turning into a dry husk of skin and bone. Han-Seol, meanwhile, stood up straight, his wounds healing instantly, his Level jumping from 30 to 55 in a single heartbeat.
"What... what did you do to me?" Han-Seol gasped, looking at his glowing hands.
"I just 'failed' to protect you," I said, leaning over the balcony. "Now, Associate... finish him. I need his mana stone for my new fountain."
Act 3: The Shadow of the Past
Kaelen, the Mountain of the Alliance, lay shriveled and gasping in the dirt, his SSS-Rank dignity stripped away by a "tax" he never saw coming. The remaining five Pillars descended slowly, their auras no longer triumphant, but cautious. They landed on the blackened bridge of my Bastion, their weapons drawn and glowing with a desperate intensity.
Among them, Leo, the Shadow Blade, stepped forward. His face was obscured by a mask of shifting smoke, but I knew the eyes beneath. They were the eyes of a man who had once sworn a blood-oath to me in the trenches of the Great Rift.
"Drake," Leo's voice was a jagged whisper. "The System didn't just change your body. It corrupted your soul. You're playing with powers that the Holy System marked as 'Forbidden' for a reason. You're becoming the very thing we fought against."
"Forbidden?" I laughed, the sound echoing off the Void-Iron walls. "Leo, the only thing 'Forbidden' in this world is losing. I learned that when your 'Holy' Princess put a hole in my chest while you stood there holding her cape."
"We did what was necessary for the balance!" Sia, the Spirit Queen, shrieked, her emerald flames turning a violent shade of indigo. "One Hero was too powerful. You were becoming a God among men. The world didn't need a God; it needed a symbol!"
"And now you have a landlord," I replied. "I'm going to fail at a simple counter-attack now. Watch closely."
I raised a single finger toward the five of them. I didn't chant a high-level spell. I didn't summon the Void. I tried to cast a basic, Level 1 'Fire Spark'—the kind of spell a child uses to light a birthday candle.
[Ding! Villainous Act: Overwhelming Arrogance in Combat.] [Action: Casting 'Fire Spark' against SSS-Rank Heroes.] [Result: PATHETIC FAILURE. (The spark fizzled out before it even left your fingertip.)] [Calculating Refund...]
The Five Pillars braced themselves for a meteor or a firestorm. When nothing happened but a tiny puff of smoke from my index finger, Sia let out a mocking laugh. "Is that it? Your 'Glitch' has finally run out of—"
[Refund Issued: 100x 'Fundamental Combustion'!] [System Glitch: The 'Concept of Heat' has been Refunded to the Environment.]
The air didn't get hot. It ceased to be air.
A wave of absolute, conceptual incineration erupted from my finger. It wasn't fire; it was the idea of fire. The bridge beneath the Pillars didn't melt—it simply evaporated into subatomic particles. Sia's emerald flames were "eaten" by the refund, her spirit magic being stripped away to fuel a blast that turned the sky over the Sovereign District into a blinding white sheet of pure energy.
[Experience Gained: 2,000,000] [Level Up! Level 82 -> Level 89!]
When the light faded, Sia was on her knees, her emerald hair turned to white ash. The Archer and the Mage were unconscious, their legendary gear melted onto their skin. Only Leo remained standing, his 'Shadow Step' having allowed him to phase into a different dimension for a fraction of a second to survive.
He looked at the devastation. He looked at his fallen comrades. Then, he looked at me.
"You aren't Drake," Leo whispered, his mask cracking. "Drake was a Hero. You're just a Ghost with a grudge."
"I'm the Ghost you made," I said, stepping off the balcony and floating down toward him. "And it's time to settle the bill for my funeral."
Act 4: The Final Tax of the Pillars
Leo moved. He was the fastest man in the world, a blur of darkness that bypassed the laws of physics. His daggers, 'The Twin Fangs of Night', were aimed for the gaps in my 'Usurper's Presence'.
I didn't draw my sword. I didn't use the 'Royal Decree'. I decided to "fail" at a basic block.
[Ding! Villainous Act: Combat Negligence.] [Result: FAILURE. (Leo's daggers have pierced your 'Void-Iron' suit.)] [Calculating Refund...]
The daggers sank into my chest. Leo's eyes widened. He expected me to die. He expected the 'Shadow Poison' to rot my heart.
[Refund Issued: 100x 'Pain Transference'!]
I didn't feel the blades. Instead, Leo let out a scream that cracked the sky. Every ounce of damage he intended to deal to me was multiplied by a hundred and redirected into his own nervous system. He collapsed, his body twitching with the phantom agony of a thousand stabbings.
I reached down and grabbed the 'Shadow Blade' by his throat, lifting him into the air.
"You always were too fast for your own good, Leo," I said.
I looked up at the drones still filming from the distance. The world was watching. The Six Pillars had fallen in less than an hour. The Alliance was broken. The "Heroes" were now just more "Associates" waiting to be processed.
"Listen up, World!" I shouted, my voice carrying across every digital stream on the planet. "The era of 'Heroes' is over. From now on, if you want protection, if you want to survive the Gates, you don't pray to the Heavens. You pay your rent to me."
[Ding! Global Quest: 'The End of the Age of Light'—COMPLETED.] [Reward: 10,000,000 Credits, 'The Key to the First Heaven', and 'God-Slayer' Title.] [Refund Issued: 100x 'Divine Authority'!] [You have reached Level 100.] [The 'Holy System' is now attempting to initiate a Factory Reset...]
I felt the world glitch. The sky flickered between blue and a deep, binary red. The "Gods" were panicking. They were trying to delete the save file.
"I don't think so," I whispered, gripping my Ring. "I'm willing to fail at being deleted."