"Lucia! Are you even human?!"
Silas's eyes snapped open.
The veins on his forehead bulged, his gaze a turbulent storm of shock, fury, and a hollow, soul-crushing disappointment. The agony was physical, but it paled in comparison to the realization that the sister he had raised from the cradle, the girl he had bled for, could do this.
"I thought you were just chasing idols. I thought it was just a rebellious phase. But this..."
A cold shiver raced down his spine as the memory of the betrayal flickered across his mind like a jagged blade.
No one knew his secret: Silas was a traveler from another world. Orphaned upon arrival, he had been taken in by a kind couple who, five years later, gave birth to their biological daughter, Lucia. His adoptive parents had been saints, treating him with the same warmth they gave their own flesh and blood. When they were killed in a tragic car accident during his eighteenth year, Silas didn't hesitate. He took the weight of the world onto his shoulders to ensure Lucia never wanted for anything.
Everything changed the year she entered university.
The God-Abandoned Game descended upon reality.
It wasn't just a game; it was a new world order. By slaying monsters within its reaches, humans could harvest "Lifespan", a currency that could be spent to manifest digital powers into the physical realm. The strong could tear through fighter jets with their bare hands; surviving a nuclear blast was no longer a dream but a tier of power. The world spiraled into chaos, disaster following disaster.
While others struggled to find their next meal, Silas had carved a bloody path through the darkness, dragging his sister along with him. He had ascended to the pinnacle, becoming one of the top hundred elites globally. His crowning achievement was the discovery of a mysterious Piece of Eden, the Eye of an Ancient God.
He had finally reached the threshold of true godhood... and that was when his own sister struck.
Silas never stood a chance because he never raised his guard. She had laced his drink with "Soul-Wandering Water," a neurotoxin that left him a prisoner in his own skin, unable to twitch a finger.
He remembered Lucia standing over him, her expression eerily vacant.
"From the time I was a child until now, all you've ever done is manage me. Control me," she had whispered. "You forbid this, you ban that. Every day felt like I was suffocating. I've never known a second of true freedom."
She had looked down at him with a mix of pity and resentment. "I know you hate Fabian. You never let me go to his fan meets or his concerts... Do you have any idea how much I missed because of you?"
"But did you know? Fabian contacted me himself today. He's always known I existed. But because of you, he knew we could never be together. Until now. I finally have my chance."
Her eyes had gleamed with a fanatical light. "As long as Fabian gets your Ancient God's Eye, he'll surpass you. Then you won't be able to stop us anymore!"
Silas's soul, adrift in the haze of the toxin, watched in silent horror as his sister, the girl in the innocent white dress, reached down and personally gouged out his eyes.
"Don't worry," she'd said, her face flushed with a manic joy. "Fabian said he'd help you find new ones. Just as long as you don't stand in our way..."
She had skipped out of the room, clutching his legacy. She never knew that Fabian had laced her "reward" with a lethal poison. Within minutes of her departure, Silas had died a wretched, lonely death.
Now, Silas sat up in bed, his breath hitching.
The room was clean, simple, and flooded with the golden warmth of a morning sun peeking through the curtains. The breeze gently toyed with the fabric.
"I'm back... nine years?"
He looked at his hands, unscarred, steady. His expression slowly hardened into a mask of ice.
"Fabiani..."
The man was a celebrity in the Great Federation. Lucia had been obsessed with him since his trainee days, a fanatic who mistook a star's PR for genuine affection.
Silas had tried to save her from that vacuous world. No staying out all night. No clubs. No smoking.
"Did that truly feel like suffocating?" he mused bitterly.
When the game began, he hadn't allowed her to party with strangers. He had carried her, leveled her, and protected her until she reached the apex of power. He had shielded her from every hardship the apocalypse had to offer.
"And you thought that was a prison?"
He remembered this day. It was the day the game descended. Lucia had been screaming at him because Fabian was holding a concert in the neighboring city. She wanted to skip her calculus final to attend. Silas, ever the responsible brother, had refused.
In her spite, she had snuck out anyway. In his past life, he had spent the first hours of the global collapse frantically searching for her, seeking a reconciliation he thought was necessary for their survival. Under his wing, she never suffered a single setback.
"Fabian...?" Silas let out a low, jagged laugh. "Lucia, you were always a fool. If you had used that Eye yourself, you might have stood a chance. But to give it away?"
Fabian was a second-rate hack who couldn't have lasted a second against Silas in a fair fight. He had ignored them for nine years, only appearing the moment the Ancient God's Eye was unearthed. The intent was transparent to everyone but the girl blinded by "love."
"In my last life, I missed so many opportunities because of you. I avoided the most dangerous zones because I didn't want to risk your life. I could have gone so much further than the Top 100."
He stood up, the weight of a decade of guardianship sliding off his shoulders.
"If my protection was your 'restraint,' then consider yourself liberated. In this life... I have no sister."
The moment he made the decision to cut the cord, a profound sense of clarity washed over him. He felt light. For the first time in years, the suffocating burden of responsibility was gone.
Suddenly, a mechanical, frigid voice resonated within his mind, and a string of ethereal, glowing text manifested before his eyes.
[Eye of Judgment: Initializing...][Authority of "The Arbiter" Acquired!]
Silas froze.
The Eye of Judgment was an Isu-tier artifact. When he had found it in his previous life, it had bonded to his biological signature.
"Even when they tore it from my skull, they couldn't take the soul-bond," he whispered, a predatory grin spreading across his face. "It came back with me."
In his past life, he had never been able to trigger the artifact's true power. But now, in the silence of his old bedroom, the Eye of the Ancient God had finally opened.