Chapter 14 — first skill
Sam had barely fallen unconscious for a moment when A tremor ran through his body and his eyes snapped open.
For a split second, there was nothing—no sound, no breath, no thought—only the silent echo of agony flooding his nerves. Then came the pain.
It hit like lightning. His body convulsed violently on the cold cavern floor, veins bulging beneath his skin. His left leg jerked in the wrong direction with a wet crack that tore through the silence. Bone pierced through flesh—then, just as suddenly, slid back into place, knitting together as if time itself had reversed.
But the pain didn't stop there.
His spine arched, bones snapping one after another in a horrifying rhythm before straightening again. Then his arm. His ribs. His jaw. Each break and repair sent another shock of white-hot torment through his body until the cavern walls themselves seemed to tremble with his muffled screams.
He lost consciousness more than once. But the pain—merciless, overwhelming—kept dragging him back, forcing him to endure.
Minutes, maybe hours passed. He didn't know how long but When it finally ended, Sam lay still—his chest heaving, his face pale and drenched in sweat. For a long while, he didn't move, afraid that any twitch might start it all over again.
Then, slowly, he opened his eyes. His body trembled—not from pain, that had faded— but from the memory of it.
But when he looked down, every wound was gone. The blood coating his skin was still fresh, but the cuts beneath were all healed. The tired ache in his limbs had vanished. What replaced it was… something else.
A weightless strength. A pulse deep in his core.
He sat up sharply. "What… happened to me?"
Looking around, he froze. The caven hall that was the battlefield hadn't changed—the bloodstains on the cave walls were proof enough of the massacre—but something else had. A faint blue shimmer glowed beneath him, forming a dome that pulsed like a living heartbeat. Outside it, a shadow moved.
The Goblin Leader.
The hulking creature, having entered the cave sometime while he was in pain, snarled and swung its cleaver again and again, each hit splashing sparks of azure light across the barrier. But it couldn't break through. it didn't care and just swung the cleaver without rest. The madness in his red eyes having increased even more.
Sam's eyes narrowed. Oddly, he didn't feel the dread he had before. That crushing, suffocating pressure from earlier—gone. Now, the leader only looked like a stronger goblin nothing more. A dangerous one, sure—but no longer as terrifying.
Ignoring the creature for a moment, he focused inward. Something felt different about his body, even his thoughts felt lighter, faster, smoother. To confirm, he summoned his panel.
⸻
STATUS
Name: Sam Walker
Age: 19
Rank: F (Evolve)
Talent: Devour (SSS / Unique)
Attributes:
• Strength — 137
• Agility — 142
• Endurance — 135
• Mana — 139
Skills:
• Empowering Howl (E)
Empowering Howl: Let out a resounding howl that boosts strength by 10%.
Duration: three minutes.
⸻
"Huh? Is that a skill?" Sam let his gaze linger for a moment on what was his first skill. Wondering with a frown why it had taken so long in the first place.
On second thought, he just devoured 200 corpses and he only got one skill? Are skills that scarce or was there some hidden condition he was not aware of.
Shaking the thought aside for now, he checked his attributes. His eyes widened slightly—each one had soared past a hundred, agility being the highest of all. He finally remembered the notifications that had flashed across his eyes before he blacked out.
Navigating to the log, he read:
⸻
SYSTEM NOTIFICATIONS
• YOU HAVE REACHED YOUR STAT LIMIT.
• YOU HAVE EXCEEDED YOUR STAT LIMITS!
• EARTH HAS DEPLOYED A PROTECTION BARRIER FOR THE DURATION OF YOUR EVOLUTION.
• YOU HAVE REACHED THE PEAK OF YOUR RANK — (F).
• YOU MAY NOW EVOLVE TO THE NEXT RANK — (E).
⸻
"I see… so this barrier—this dome—it's Earth's doing?" he murmured, staring at the fading blue light. "Hold on… Since when was the planet conscious…?"
None of it made sense, hell… none of what has happened in the past hour has made sense, but now wasn't the time to dwell on it. The dome flickered, light thinning like mist in the wind. The Goblin Leader noticed too—roaring triumphantly, probably thinking his efforts were paying off.
Sam exhaled and grabbed the broken bone pike from the floor. "Guess I'll have to evolve later."
As the last of the barrier disappeared, he rolled aside—just in time.
The goblin's cleaver came crashing down, carving a deep gouge in the rocky floor where he'd been a heartbeat ago. Dust and stone fragments exploded into the air.
Sam's heart pounded, but not from fear. His body moved smoother than ever before, instincts sharper. He sidestepped the next swing effortlessly, feeling the rush of air as the blade passed him by.
"Strong," he muttered—Sam was surprised and happy that he had not decided to block that hit and dodged instead. it properly wouldn't have ended well even with his current stats.
Quickly recovering and not wasting the opportunity, he struck with his broken pike towards the goblin's head, having gained a habit for targeting lethal spots during his earlier fight with the mob.
The broken pike plunged toward the goblin's head—but instead of piercing, it chipped uselessly against its thick, stone-like skin. The impact rang like metal on rock.
The leader grinned, tusks glistening with drool, and swung its cleaver again while letting out groggles and grunts.
Sam ducked back, mind racing. The goblin was not only strong, it was tough too..
He still hasn't realized then what he was dealing with.
Normally, an E-ranked dungeon required multiple E-ranked monsters to maintain its classification.
But there were exceptions—rare cases where a lesser number of monsters or even only one's existence was enough to define an entire dungeon's rank.
Those cases were called anomalies.
Sam's gaze hardened as the goblin's roar filled the cavern.
He'd killed dozens of goblins before.
But this one—this was something else entirely.
After all standing before him now…
was one such anomaly.