The spatial transfer hit Moon hard and made him feel dizzy.
When the sensation finally stopped, he found himself standing exactly where he had been before the teleportation. He was in the center of his grimy windowless apartment in District 4.
He braced himself and expected the landlord's heavy fists to resume pounding on the flimsy wooden door.
"Cross! I know you're in there!"
Silence.
Moon blinked. He walked over to the door and pressed his ear against the thin wood. There was nothing. Not a footstep and not a breath.
He glanced at the digital clock glowing on his cracked stove. It read 14:32:04. He stared at it for a full thirty seconds, but the final digit didn't change.
"Time freezes," Moon muttered as realization dawned on him. "Real-world time completely freezes while I'm in a trial."
He let out a massive sigh of relief and slid his back down the door until he hit the floor.
The adrenaline was finally beginning to ebb away, leaving behind the stark reality of his situation.
He was covered in foul-smelling zombie blood, his clothes were ruined, and he still owed rent.
But he wasn't the same person who had left.
"System," Moon commanded aloud. "Open Profile."
┌──────[ Profile ]──────┐
│ [Name]: Moon Cross
│ [Title]: N/A
│ [Talent]: Limitless Plunder (SSS)
│ [Mana Nodes]: 0/9 Opened
│ [Origin Points (OP)]: 500
│
│ [Attributes]
│ Overall Bodily Power: 1.5 (Baseline Human: 1.0)
│ Strength: 1.8
│ Agility: 1.3
│ Vitality: 1.3
│ Mana: 1.2
│
│ [Skills]: Necrotic Bile (F-Rank)
│ [Inventory]: Rot-Walker Claw x1
└───────────────────────┘
Moon stared at his attributes. His overall bodily power had surged from a pitiful baseline to 1.5 in just three minutes of combat.
The raw strength he had plundered from the Rot-Walkers was sitting heavily in his muscles.
But his eyes snagged on a specific line.
"Mana Nodes 0 out of 9 Opened. What the hell is a Mana Node?"
As soon as he asked the question, the System responded and pulled up a tutorial prompt.
[Ding!]
[Mana Nodes are the internal limiters of a mortal body. To properly harness ambient Mana and advance past the F-Rank limitations, a candidate must manually channel their physical power to shatter these nodes. Opening a Node permanently increases baseline capacity and grants a minor regeneration effect.]
[Hint: Host's current Strength (1.8) exceeds the minimum requirement (1.5) to forcefully open the first minor Node.]
Moon didn't need to be told twice. He pushed himself off the floor and sat cross-legged on his ragged cot.
"Alright. Let's break the baseline."
Following the system's intuitive guidance, Moon closed his eyes and turned his focus inward.
He could feel the plundered stats. He felt the dense heavy strength residing in his arms and chest, and the flighty agility in his legs.
He visualized that raw untamed Strength. With a grunt of effort, he mentally grabbed that energy and forced it to circulate through his body.
He pushed it down toward his lower abdomen where the system indicated the first Mana Node was located.
It was not a gentle process.
"Argh!" Moon hissed through clenched teeth.
His veins bulged against his skin and turned a dark purple. The red energy battered against an invisible barrier inside his core.
The pain was searing and blinding. Sweat poured down his face and washed away the dried zombie blood.
He didn't stop. He pushed harder and relied on his newfound Vitality to keep his body from tearing itself apart.
Push.
His muscles trembled violently.
Push!
CRACK!
A loud popping sound echoed from inside his own body. It was like a pane of glass shattering under immense pressure.
Instantly, the pain vanished and was replaced by a rush of absolute euphoria.
A cool refreshing current flowed out from the newly opened node, circulating through his veins and washing away his fatigue.
He opened his eyes and took a deep shuddering breath. His vision seemed sharper. The heavy sluggish feeling of a baseline mortal body was entirely gone.
[Ding! First Minor Mana Node successfully opened.]
[Bodily limitations expanded. Host is officially recognized on the path of Ascension.]
"Hell yes," Moon laughed and clenched his fists. The power was intoxicating.
But power didn't pay the rent.
He shifted his focus back to the UI and explored the other tabs. Beside his Profile, there were three distinct options. Forums, Public Chat, and Universal Market.
He opened the Forums first. It was a chaotic mess of text scrolling by rapidly.
User 8472: "I LOST MY FUCKING ARM! How do I get an arm back?! Please, it was a goblin, I swear to god!"
User Vanguard: "PSA for new Awakened: DO NOT try to bring your Earth guns into the Dungeons. Non-system items are strictly banned by the Convergence. They will turn to dust. Bring a baseball bat or buy a system weapon!"
User 9912: "Will suck dick for a healing potion. Serious inquiries only."
Moon raised an eyebrow.
"Good to know the human spirit remains unchanged across the multiverse."
He noted the vital rule that non-system items couldn't enter the trials. That explained why he couldn't have brought a kitchen knife anyway.
He closed the Forums and opened the Universal Market.
This was what he was looking for. Thousands of items were listed like F-Rank swords, minor healing potions, skill scrolls, and strange crafting materials. The currency used was Albion Credits which was the actual real-world money of his current planet.
"System, can I list my inventory?"
[Affirmative.]
Moon pulled the Rot-Walker Claw from his inventory. It materialized in his hand, heavy and lethally sharp.
It was a system drop, meaning it had inherent value to crafters or other Awakened who needed an edge.
He checked the market for similar items. Low-grade monster parts from F-Rank trials were currently in insane demand. F-Rank Bone Daggers were selling for 80,000 Credits.
Moon created a listing.
[Item: Rot-Walker Claw (F-Rank Material/Makeshift Weapon)]
[Price: 50,000 Credits]
[Duration: 1 Hour]
He undercut the market slightly to guarantee a fast sale. He needed cash immediately.
He hit List.
Ten seconds passed.
[Ding!]
[Item Sold! 50,000 Credits have been deposited directly into your linked biometric bank account.]
Moon froze. He quickly pulled up his cracked low-tech civilian comm-pad from his pocket. He booted it up and waited for the slow interface to load his bank app.
Current Balance: 50,003.42 Credits.
"Holy shit," Moon breathed as his hands shook slightly.
Fifty thousand credits. To put it in perspective, his rent was 800 credits a month. A premium synthetic-steak dinner in the upper districts was 100 credits.
In exactly three minutes of real-world time, he had gone from a starving evicted orphan to a man holding more cash than his predecessor had seen in his entire miserable life.
The heavy oppressive weight of poverty that had crushed this body for eighteen years evaporated into thin air.
Moon stood up and stretched his newly empowered limbs. He walked back to the door with a confident grin spreading across his face. He unlocked the deadbolt and yanked the door open.
Time resumed.
"CROSS! I SAID OPEN THIS FUCKING door!"
The overweight balding landlord stood in the hallway with his fist raised to pound on the door again. He stopped, startled by Moon's sudden appearance.
The landlord took a step back and his eyes widened as he took in the sight before him.
Moon was covered in black gore and his shirt was torn to shreds. His muscles were visibly thicker, and his eyes burned with a dangerous calm that hadn't been there a second ago.
"You... what the hell happened to you?" the landlord stammered as his bullying tone instantly evaporated.
Moon pulled out his comm-pad, tapped a few buttons, and held it up.
Beep.
The landlord's comms chimed in his pocket. He pulled it out and his jaw dropped.
"That's 5,000 Credits," Moon said. His voice was smooth and deadly quiet.
"That covers my back rent, the next three months in advance, and a very generous tip for you to shut the fuck up and never bang on my door again."
The landlord swallowed hard and nodded rapidly.
"Y-Yes, Mr. Cross. Of course. Thank you."
Moon slammed the door in his face.
He leaned against the wood and let out a low laugh.
Limitless Plunder wasn't just a talent. It was the key to conquering this entire godforsaken universe. And he was just getting started.