Ren let out a sigh.
A swift battle, almost nothing surprising about it.
He had known it from the moment he drew his sword. With the gear he carried, nearly the best available on the entire First Floor, and with a level far beyond what was recommended for facing a mini boss like that, the outcome could never have been any different.
A quick victory.
And somewhat… hollow.
Ren silently stared at the spot where the Kobold had just fallen, where the system's light had faded. The sword in his hand was still warm from the final strike.
It wasn't that he was too strong. It was just… he was in the safest place in this entire world.
And his offensive skills had improved significantly.
The skill system in Sword Art Online possessed near-infinite depth.
And Ren, though still at the beginning, had already touched the first branching paths.
As for auxiliary skills, he had tried a few: stealth, search, fire-starting, cooking… Things that seemed unimportant at first, but were actually the foundation for survival in a world where every mistake could cost one's life.
Weapon skills, however, were a different story.
They were the core of the combat system. The heart of everything in this game.
There were no visible levels displayed as a number bar. Instead, everything was based on feeling.
When Ren wielded a sword, his main weapon, every slash, every clash, every fallen monster… all accumulated into something called Weapon Mastery.
Each time a certain threshold was reached, the system would quietly unlock a new Sword Arc, a sword skill, a move shaped in the image of its user.
And the damage, or delay, in each Sword Arc could be improved… players could feel it.
There were no skill levels shown like in other games of the same genre. Players had to sense the changes through actual combat.
Sword Arcs and other skills would level up gradually depending on the number of times they were used, the number of monsters defeated, and the strength of each one taken down.
When equipping a weapon for the first time, players would learn one basic skill tied to their weapon, at its most fundamental level.
It would be named according to the weapon type:
Axe Arc, Spear Arc, Dagger Arc... Every weapon had its own skill tree.
And all of it revolved around the game's central system... Weapon Mastery.
Besides those two types of skills, there were countless other branches...
Ren had once believed that by grinding hard and slaying monsters, he would just grow stronger. But he also came to realize...
From Weapon Mastery Level 2 onward, the path was no longer simple.
It wasn't just that the experience required multiplied by ten. It was also… the challenge that came from within himself.
"Too bad it didn't drop any loot," Ren muttered, eyes landing where the virtual corpse had vanished, leaving behind only a few Cor and a small bit of experience.
Nothing more.
The tenth time? Fifteenth? He no longer kept count.
Even so, every time he looked down, every time the loot window appeared empty, that same old feeling crept back in, like the world was whispering in his ear: "Not this time."
Ren exhaled—half amused, half resigned. Other players could just walk outside town, kill a few scattered mobs and already pick up a bronze sword, or iron one, a piece of leather armor, or even a rare ring.
But him?
He could count on one hand, and still have fingers left..how many times he had gotten loot after a month of nonstop battles.
Yes, he did get some equipment. But… who didn't want more? Even unusable gear could be sold for money.
Ren looked down at his dusty black-silver leather boots. His armor, crafted from high-quality wolfhide, now looked frail, worn.
He brushed off a few glowing fragments that remained from the fight. 'Could it be... someone's targeting me?'
A thought flashed by, half-joke, half-truth. But then Ren quietly swallowed it.
He knew the system wasn't alive. It had no will. No hatred.
But... sometimes, he wasn't so sure anymore.
Because if everything in this world was coded, followed rules… then why did it feel like he alone was a speck of dust the system had deliberately forgotten?
'Or maybe I'm just unlucky?' Ren wondered, not aloud, just a small breath like dungeon dust stirred by a passing breeze.
He didn't believe in luck. But... if everything had logic, then why did the invisible sense of rejection cling to him like a shadow?
He lifted his head, ready to move on, but his eyes unconsciously stopped at Copper's back, walking ahead of him.
The man was doing something... strange.
Not obvious. But enough for Ren to notice.
Copper's brows, usually relaxed in that ever-confident expression, were slightly furrowed now, forming a faint crease on his forehead.
His right hand, at times, brushed the sword hilt...then withdrew again, as if weighing something he couldn't put into words.
Ren narrowed his eyes.
Was he on guard? Against what?
No monsters. No strange sounds. Nothing but the prolonged silence of a dungeon already stripped bare of its resources.
And yet Copper occasionally glanced around, his gaze piercing into the cracks of the stone walls as if searching for some invisible trace.
Ren suddenly felt a chill run down his spine.
Could it be… Copper knew something he didn't?
Or... was he hiding something?
Whatever the answer, the air inside the dungeon suddenly felt heavier, as if every step from here on wouldn't just take them deeper…
But closer to a truth Ren wasn't sure he was ready to face.
Copper turned back to look at Ren, wearing a faint smile, one that no one could quite tell was sympathy or mockery.
"I'm sorry," he said, voice steady, as if simply reciting an inevitable truth, "but there's no other choice."
Ren froze. His brows furrowed. That sentence… something about it was very wrong. Very familiar. As if… he'd heard it before, from someone else, in another place, at a pivotal moment when everything first began to fall apart.
Copper silently flicked through his system interface, then pulled something out from his inventory.
A long, slender cylindrical object, old, its grip worn smooth from time.
Ren's eyes widened.
"Wait… what are you doing with that?" he asked, voice low, almost a warning.
In Copper's hand… was a sword hilt.
Not a complete sword, but a fragment, the hilt still connected to a jagged piece of blade, snapped clean as if broken by something harder than steel.
Ren felt his whole body tense.
It looked just like the two items he had stored deep in his inventory long ago, so long that he'd forgotten why he even kept them.
Two broken swords. Two fragments, like unsolved riddles.
Without a word, Copper stepped toward a moss-covered stone wall, the farthest corner of the dungeon path they were standing on.
There... embedded in the wall, was a small recess, just the right size to fit the hilt of the broken sword.
Without hesitation, Copper drove the hilt into the socket, gently, as if inserting a key.
"Stop!" Ren shouted...but it was too late.
A dry, metallic sound echoed as metal locked into stone.
Immediately, a sequence of system notifications appeared, each line flashing past like the world was taking a long breath before something began to move.
[The Four Broken Swords… The key has been gathered.]
[Condition met...]
[Condition met...]
[Condition met...]
[Condition met...]
[Forced retrieval of items.]
[Items collected... condition complete...]
Suddenly, Ren's inventory opened on its own, and two items vanished right before his eyes.
Ren swallowed hard.
He waited for something.. anything, to happen. A door to open. A tremor. A flood of monsters. Something. Anything.
But nothing came.
No light. No sound.
Only silence. Crushing, suffocating silence, stretching on long enough to flatten every sensation.
Ren took a deep breath. His eyes stayed locked on the place where that strange event had just unfolded.
"…Copper." He spoke. This time, there was no anger, no scorn, only absolute vigilance.
"What the hell did you just awaken?"
Copper said nothing. But this time, his smile was gone.
Only his eyes remained, eyes tinged with weariness and cold, as if he had crossed too many lines no human should bear. They no longer reflected confidence...but something closer to resignation.
The light from the floating system window cast a pale gray glow on his face, like ash, a light that warmed nothing.
And then, he answered, with a sentence that made the cold in Ren's chest feel terrifyingly real:
"You won't like the answer… but sooner or later, you'll have to know."
His tone wasn't high or low, sad or sarcastic. It was like some distant being reciting a law of nature...something inevitable.
Before Ren could react, Copper continued:
"I only meant to try it… I didn't expect you to be holding the other two fragments."
Ren's heartbeat seemed to slow. A strange numbness crawled down the back of his neck.
"I've been watching you… since the day you encountered that monster outside the Starting Town… and received Broken Oath."
Ren stood still.
He… he knew.
"…You've been watching me since then?" Ren asked, voice hoarse, laced with both suspicion and tension. His hand gripped his sword hilt reflexively, uncertain whether for defense, or to keep himself from trembling.
Copper nodded, then shook his head, as if the matter was trivial.
"I'm not the only one. You didn't think you were… ordinary, did you?"
"The thing you hold in your hand doesn't fall under any known category...not a regular item, not a quest item, not equipment, or even a weapon. Broken Oath, Shattered Faith... they're parts of something this world was never meant to show."
Ren's breath quickened.
The dungeon air felt like it was thickening. The stone walls seemed to close in.
Not because the space was tight, but because Copper's words had opened an invisible void: a chasm beneath truths Ren had never dared to face.
Copper stepped closer to the wall, placing a hand on the spot where the broken hilt had just been inserted.
"The system isn't responding. Maybe because it's still incomplete. Or… because it's awakening something that was never meant to exist again."
He turned back...and this time, his eyes were no longer cold, but serious.
"Ren. We're not just ordinary players. We're… something deeper."
"I found suspicious information from the beta test. This world… is hiding something. The ones who made this place… are hiding something..."