"System, talk to me. Now."
Staring at the pulverized remains of the "Undying Cockroach" staining his floorboards, Kaelen called out to the System in his mind.
He needed a logical explanation for this sheer absurdity.
The System seemed genuinely stunned. It remained dead silent for a long moment before its mechanical voice finally echoed, trembling with absolute reverence.
[Host... you are an absolute legend!]
[As expected of the Chosen One selected by this System! You obliterated a King-Tier Rift Beast with a single, devastating physical strike!]
[Ding! It has been detected that the Host has slain a Beast King exponentially above your current power level. Rewarding a tenfold amplification: You have acquired the Divine Talent 'Absolute Immortal Body' and Sixty Years of raw Astral Flux reserves!]
The System's tone was filled with pure awe, treating Kaelen as if he had just performed a world-shattering miracle.
"?"
A massive, invisible question mark hovered over Kaelen's head.
"Are you for real right now?"
He wanted a reasonable explanation. Not this crazy, hallucinated nonsense from a broken AI.
But before he could complain any further, a vast, terrifying surge of energy violently poured into his body out of thin air.
Kaelen's expression twisted instantly, his face contorting in agony.
"Wait... System bro, you're serious?!"
Remembering the 'Sixty Years of raw Astral Flux reserves' the System had just announced, realization slammed into him. His eyes went wide.
As the chaotic cosmic energy surged through his veins, tearing and rebuilding his muscles, Kaelen gritted his teeth through the searing pain. Deep down, a wild sense of anticipation began to bloom.
Absolute Immortal Body?
Sixty years of raw cultivation?!
Just how strong is this going to make me?
A few agonizing minutes later, the violent energy storm inside Kaelen finally stabilized.
The pain vanished, replaced by a profound, thrumming warmth. Kaelen let out a long, ragged exhale of relief. He slowly clenched his fists, and instantly, he felt an explosive surge of power coursing through his limbs.
"This is... Aetherial Energy?"
An ecstatic expression lit up Kaelen's face.
Ordinary humans absorbed the Astral Flux from the rifts and condensed it within their bodies to form Aetherial Energy. Only then could they call themselves true Aether Adepts.
Now that he felt the dense Aether flowing within him, didn't that mean he had finally broken his curse? He was an Adept!
The thought made his heart pound with exhilaration.
This was a ruthless, high-fantasy reality where only the strong dictated the rules. Becoming an Aether Adept was the only way to seize control of your own destiny. And he had just achieved it by... stepping on a bug.
How could he not be thrilled?
"Wait, what exactly is my cultivation tier right now?"
The moment the thought formed, a sleek holographic screen materialized in his consciousness.
========================
NAME: Kaelen Thorne
AGE: 19
APTITUDE: Lowest-Grade (Trash)
CULTIVATION TIER: Half-Step Awakened
DIVINE TALENT: Absolute Immortal Body
ARTS/SKILLS: None
Kaelen's gaze locked onto the words "Half-Step Awakened," his heart skipping a beat in sheer shock.
Half-Step Awakened?!
System, are you sure you're not pulling my leg?
The fundamental path of an Aether Adept began at the Mortal Tier, painstakingly climbing from Level 1 up to Level 9. And "Half-Step Awakened" meant exactly what it sounded like: he was standing right on the precipice of the legendary Awakened Tier!
"I... I can't believe I'm already this strong..."
Clenching his fists, Kaelen glanced back down at the insect puree on the floor, finding it incredibly hard to process reality.
I reached the peak of the Mortal Tier just by squishing a cockroach?
Ridiculous!
This is completely and utterly ridiculous!
However... I love it!
Five minutes ago, Kaelen felt nothing but disdain for this paranoid, unreliable System. But now? He was a devout believer.
System bro, you are god-tier!
"Oh right, there was also a Divine Talent reward..."
Kaelen suddenly remembered the 'Absolute Immortal Body' the System had bestowed upon him.
"This must be that giant roach's innate ability, right?" Connecting it to the Beast's moniker, Kaelen fell deep into thought.
"System, what exactly are the limits of this Absolute Immortal Body?"
Recalling how easily the 'Undying' cockroach popped under his sneaker, Kaelen admittedly didn't have high hopes. What's so 'immortal' about it? One stomp and it was game over.
As if sensing its host's skepticism, the System quickly chimed in.
[Absolute Immortal Body: Grants hyper-accelerated cellular regeneration. As your cultivation tier increases, the host will become capable of instantaneous limb regeneration, and eventually, total physical rebirth from a single drop of blood.]
"Limb regeneration? Rebirth from a single drop of blood?!" Kaelen gasped. "Are you serious? It's really that overpowered?"
He was genuinely stunned. He hadn't expected the ability to be so terrifyingly potent.
Eager to test it out, Kaelen grabbed a small utility knife from his desk and, bracing himself, dragged the blade across his index finger.
HISS!
Kaelen winced as a sharp line of blood welled up from the cut.
But a second later, a miracle occurred. Kaelen felt a soothing warmth radiating from his Aetherial Core directly into his finger. The deep laceration began stitching itself back together at a speed visible to the naked eye.
In less than three seconds, the skin was completely smooth. Not even a microscopic scar remained.
"Whoa... this is completely insane."
Kaelen blinked, staring at his perfectly healed finger in disbelief. With a recovery speed this broken, it truly earned the title of 'Absolute Immortal Body.'
Furthermore, according to the System, this was only the base level. Once he officially broke through to the Awakened Tier and beyond, he could regrow severed arms or resurrect from a puddle of blood. It was true immortality!
A feverish gleam of anticipation sparked in Kaelen's eyes.
Just by squashing one weirdly large cockroach, I shot straight to Half-Step Awakened and bagged an immortality cheat.
If I were to stomp on a few more pests... or go to the alley and fight a stray dog... or even hunt a real Rift Beast...
Wouldn't I become an unstoppable god by next Tuesday?!
Although the System's threat assessment was clearly broken, its reward payouts were mind-bogglingly generous! The more Kaelen thought about it, the more his inner loot-goblin awakened.
Without hesitating, he grabbed his flashlight and began tearing his apartment apart, actively hunting for any small bugs, spiders, or mice.
Having reached the Half-Step Awakened tier, Kaelen's physical senses were infinitely sharper than an ordinary human's. He could hear the heartbeat of a moth.
Within minutes, every single mosquito, silverfish, rogue ant, and unfortunate spider hiding in the dusty corners of his room was ruthlessly located and executed.
Achievement Unlocked: Household Pest Rampage!
However, looking at the tiny graveyard of squashed bugs scattered across his floor, Kaelen's face slowly fell into a frown.
"System? Come out here!"
"Don't play dead with me! Where's my loot?!"
Kaelen stood with his hands on his hips, frustrated.
What gives? The System hadn't made a single peep during his entire bug-squashing massacre.
He called out to the void for another five minutes, but the System remained stubbornly silent, entirely ghosting him once again.
Kaelen eventually gave up, sitting heavily on the edge of his bed with a thoughtful expression.
Where did the logic fail?
Clearly, his foolproof plan to farm low-level mobs for god-tier rewards had hit a wall. The dream of becoming an invincible powerhouse purely through exterminating pests was shattered.
After piecing together the events, Kaelen arrived at two possible conclusions.
First: that giant crimson cockroach was genuinely a freak anomaly. Perhaps, as the System analyzed, it really did harbor the dormant bloodline of an Ancient Abyssal Demon Swarm, which was the sole reason it triggered such a massive payout.
Second: the System was just fundamentally glitched. The reward he received earlier was a complete fluke—a result of the AI hallucinating a King-Tier threat and dispensing rewards accordingly.
"Sigh. I'll just have to test the waters later and figure out how this stupid thing actually works."
Kaelen rubbed his temples, feeling a mix of amusement and exhaustion. Stuck with a System that was equal parts generous and insane, he really didn't know whether to consider himself lucky or cursed.
"Still... even if it was just the System glitching out, I robbed the bank today."
Feeling the dense, vigorous Aetherial Energy thrumming through his veins, a confident smirk finally broke across Kaelen's face.
He was a Half-Step Awakened.
In this ruthless world where Aether Adepts ruled and Rift Beasts slaughtered cities, he finally had the fangs to bite back.
A nineteen-year-old pseudo-Awakened... even in the sprawling, elite metropolis of Neo-Veridia, a prodigy of that caliber was as rare as a phoenix feather.
Starting today, the era of Kaelen the wage slave was officially over. If he returned to the Neo-Veridia Astral Library tomorrow, he'd practically be considered a senior expert!