The bridge to the Upper District was a sprawling span of carbon-fiber and light, guarded by automated turrets and scanners that could read a man's genetic sequence from a mile away.
Han Seo-Jun walked toward the gate, his footsteps heavy. Every time he leveled up, the world felt less solid. The concrete under his boots looked like low-resolution textures; the air felt like a stream of data packets.
[WARNING: SYSTEM SYNC AT 88%] [GHOST DATA DETECTED IN VISUAL CORTEX]
"Halt."
The voice didn't come from a speaker. It came from the sky.
A streak of silver light slammed into the bridge fifty meters ahead of him. The impact cracked the reinforced deck, sending shards of glass flying. As the dust settled, a woman stood there. She wore a sleek, white-and-chrome bodysuit, her hair a liquid silver that defied gravity. Floating behind her were six crystalline floating swords, humming with a holy frequency.
[IDENTIFYING TARGET...] [NAME: APOSTLE NO. 12 – 'SILVER WING' RYU-HWA] [LEVEL: 75 (ASCENDED)] [THREAT LEVEL: CALAMITY]
Ryu-Hwa looked at Seo-Jun with eyes that were nothing more than glowing blue apertures. "A glitch in the slums is one thing," she said, her voice echoing with a thousand overlapping layers. "But you dare approach the Bridge of Ascension? Your soul is a chaotic mess of stolen code. It's disgusting."
"Disgusting?" Seo-Jun stopped, a dark smirk tugging at his lips. "I call it recycling."
"Arrogance is a trait of the Low-Born," Ryu-Hwa snapped.
With a flick of her wrist, three of the crystalline swords shot forward. They moved at Mach 3, cutting through the very air molecules. In the standard Soul-System, a Level 0 like Seo-Jun should have been turned into a red mist instantly.
But Seo-Jun didn't dodge. He reached out.
[SKILL ACTIVATED: 'OVERWRITE']
As the first sword reached his chest, his hand turned into a blur of black-and-purple static. He caught the blade. The holy energy hissed against his palm, trying to purify his "corrupted" existence, but Seo-Jun's power was a black hole. It didn't resist; it consumed.
"What...?" Ryu-Hwa's mechanical eyes flickered. "You're touching a Divine Artifact with your bare—"
CRACK.
Seo-Jun squeezed. The crystalline sword shattered. But instead of shards falling to the ground, they turned into purple strings of code that flowed up Seo-Jun's arm.
[DIVINE DATA ABSORBED] [TEMPORARY BUFF: 'SWORD-GOD'S INSIGHT' ACTIVATED] [ANALYZING APOSTLE'S COMBAT LOG...]
"Thanks for the snack," Seo-Jun said.
His speed doubled. He became a streak of violet shadow, bypassing the remaining swords. Ryu-Hwa gasped, her wings unfurling to take flight, but Seo-Jun was already there, hovering in the air behind her—not through flight-code, but by simply 'deleting' the gravity affecting his body.
He grabbed her wing.
"You talk about the High-Born and the Low-Born," Seo-Jun whispered, his eyes burning with the void. "But in the end, you're all just lines of text on a screen. And I've got the eraser."
[EXECUTING PROTOCOL: 'SYSTEM CRASH']
A massive surge of dark energy erupted from Seo-Jun's hand. The bridge groaned as the sky itself seemed to pixelate and tear. Ryu-Hwa screamed as her Level 75 defenses were bypassed by a "Zero-Rank" virus. Her white suit turned black, the light in her eyes flickering like a dying bulb.
[CRITICAL HIT!] [APOSTLE RYU-HWA'S LEVEL DEGRADED: 75 -> 60 -> 45...]
"Stop... stop it!" she pleaded, her voice losing its divine echo and sounding human—frightened—for the first time.
Seo-Jun let go, kicking her away. She tumbled across the bridge, her wings shattered and dull. He didn't kill her. Not yet. He needed a messenger.
"Go back to your Architect," Seo-Jun commanded, his voice shaking the very foundations of the bridge. "Tell him that Han Seo-Jun is coming. And tell him that his 'Perfect World' has a virus it can't quarantine."
He turned away from the broken Apostle and looked at the shimmering gates of the Upper District.
[LEVEL UP!] [LEVEL UP!] [LEVEL UP!]
[HIDDEN STAT 'AUTHORITY' INCREASED: 0.01% -> 0.5%] [SYSTEM MESSAGE: THE ARCHITECT IS NOW OBSERVING YOU.]
Seo-Jun looked directly into the "camera" of the system interface and flipped it off. "Good. I want him to watch."