Leo stayed crouched, breathing like every inhale was made of broken glass.
The Minotaur's corpse steamed beneath the rubble, its once-bright eyes now dull stone.
The system window floated before him, pulsing like it was alive.
──────────────
[Defeated The Keeper]
[Special Reward Unlocked]
──────────────
"Yeah, great," he rasped. "Does the reward come with a new set of ribs?"
The shadow stepped forward.
It wasn't a body so much as a moving absence. Its shape seemed to flicker between outlines — too tall, too lean, too wrong for his brain to settle on. But those silver eyes stayed fixed on him.
"Player," it said, voice like it was being poured into his head rather than spoken.
"You have passed. Few ever do."
Leo dragged himself upright against a shattered pillar. "Yeah? Well, if you'd told me the test involved that guy—" he jerked a thumb at the Minotaur's corpse "—I might've skipped."
"You would not have," the shadow said simply.
"Because you need what I offer."
Leo squinted. "…And what's that, exactly?"
The silver eyes didn't blink.
"The key to surviving what comes. The counterweight to the Monarch of Shadows. The inheritance of the one he feared."
The words hit harder than he expected. "So you're saying… there's someone — or something — out there that could make him sweat?"
"Yes. There was."
A faint curl of amusement entered the shadow's tone.
"And now… There will be again."
The system chimed.
──────────────
[Special Reward: Inheritance of the Pale Sovereign]
[Would you like to accept?]
──────────────
Leo frowned at the name. "Pale Sovereign? Sounds like a bad metal band."
The shadow took one step closer — the temperature in the room seemed to drop.
"Accept."
Leo stared at the [Yes] and [No] prompts. His instincts screamed This is important. The same gut feeling he got in games when clicking "No" meant you just locked yourself out of the good ending.
He exhaled. "…Fine. Yes."
The system pulsed.
──────────────
[Inheritance Accepted]
Initiating…
──────────────
The chamber went black.
Not dark — black. A suffocating, perfect absence of light. Even the faint system glow vanished. It felt like the void was pressing against his skin.
Then the pain hit.
Like every vein in his body was being flooded with liquid ice and fire at once. His knees buckled.
"Ghh—! What the hell—"
The shadow's voice slid into his mind like a knife.
"You are not just accepting power. You are becoming its vessel."
Leo gasped, muscles seizing. Images flashed behind his eyes — towering figures wreathed in pale light, locked in battle with an endless tide of shadow creatures. A throne of bleached bone. A crown that seemed to reject the darkness around it.
The voice deepened.
"You will stand against the dark tide. Where the Shadow Monarch commands death, you will command its opposite."
Leo could barely hear over the pounding in his skull. "And… what's that…?"
"Life."
The word reverberated through him. Not warm, gentle life — but raw, violent vitality. The kind that refused to die even when everything said it should.
The ice-fire storm in his body condensed, pulling inward toward his core. A pulse thundered out from his chest — once, twice — and the blackness peeled away.
Leo collapsed to one knee.
The shadow was gone.
In its place, a single new system prompt hovered before him.
──────────────
[New Class Unlocked: Pale Sovereign]
[Title Gained: Opposite of the Shadow]
──────────────
Leo swallowed hard. His hands were trembling — but not from weakness.
His HP bar ticked upward. Slowly at first… then faster. The ache in his ribs dulled.
"…Okay," he whispered. "That's… new."
Somewhere deeper in the dungeon, a howl echoed — not goblin. Bigger.
The system's golden glow lingered for a heartbeat longer… then faded, replaced by the familiar cold blue.
Time left on the Trial:
[17:42:16]
Leo stared at it.
"Oh… right. Still stuck here."
He pushed himself to his feet, flexing his fingers.
The warmth in his chest hadn't faded. It thrummed under his skin.
"Alright then," he muttered. "Let's see what this Pale Sovereign thing can do."