"Hmm..."
Kim Min-Jun flexed his hands, staring at the translucent blue panels floating in the quiet, isolated space of the instant dungeon. Despite manually allocating his newly acquired stat points, he didn't feel a sudden, explosive surge of power coursing through his veins. Probably because his baseline power as an S-Rank Hunter was already so absurdly high, minor incremental additions felt like a drop of water in an ocean. But, as he had established before, he funneled all of his focus directly into Agility and Sense. Speed and precision were the ultimate weapons.
"There is a ridiculous amount of equipment in here."
After thoroughly testing the limits of the dungeon features—which allowed him to seamlessly drop into a pocket dimension and hunt down monsters at any given time—he shifted his attention to the System's storage. He navigated through the glowing interface, his eyes scanning rows of high-tier weapons, defensive equipment, potions, and various magical artifacts.
"This bow is much better than the custom one given to me by the Guild Master."
He reached into the glowing inventory slot and pulled out a magnificent, aura-infused bow. He held the weapon, feeling its perfect weight and balance, a little speechless at how effortlessly he could access this armory. After all, in the original timeline, Sung Jin-Woo had to bleed, suffer, and complete near-impossible quests just to unlock access to these powerful items.
Yet, Min-Jun?
Without completing a single quest, he could pull from the vault at will. In reality, all of these items, levels, and systems were already meticulously prepared by the Architect and the Shadow Monarch long before Jin-Woo ever set foot into the Double Dungeon.
Or, was this armory solely prepared by the Architect alone?
When Min-Jun thought about the grand, cosmic scale of the lore, a wave of understanding washed over him. The Architect had spent eons preparing this System, calculating endless variables to create a vessel capable of fighting face-to-face against the Monarchs and the Rulers. To have all of that painstaking work casually hijacked and taken away by the Shadow Monarch... it made perfect sense as to why the Architect harbored such intense, venomous hatred towards Jin-Woo later in the story.
If Min-Jun were in the Architect's place—if he had spent millennia building a masterpiece only for an arrogant god to steal it and hand it to a weak, oblivious human—how could he possibly remain calm?
Not that he was trying to defend the Architect. In the original story, the Architect was undeniably a sadistic villain. But the Shadow Monarch, Ashborn, wasn't exactly a saint either. The god of death didn't originally harbour any good intentions to strengthen Sung Jin-Woo out of the kindness of his heart.
If Min-Jun had to draw a comparison, the Shadow Monarch giving Jin-Woo the System was exactly like a farmer meticulously feeding a pig right before it was meant to be slaughtered.
The Shadow Monarch only wanted Jin-Woo's body. The System was designed to rebuild the human's flesh and mana channels into a perfect, durable vessel so the god could descend and take over. But somehow, through the sheer weight of the protagonist's aura, sheer grit, and plot convenience, Ashborn changed his mind. He observed Jin-Woo's struggles and decided to genuinely entrust his entire legacy to the human whose wish to protect his family was so incredibly pure.
Even Min-Jun had to admit that, compared to Jin-Woo's shining morality, his own heart was as black as a city gutter.
Where Jin-Woo's heart was singularly devoted to his duty, Min-Jun was undeniably greedy. Instead of choosing a single, righteous path and reassuring one woman of his love, he selfishly wanted more. He wanted two. And honestly, knowing himself, this greedy heart of his might even be swayed further down the line, especially when he thought of how devastatingly beautiful the heroines of this world truly were.
It would have been better if they had never even met me to begin with, Min-Jun sighed, a brief, heavy wave of self-loathing washing over him.
Yet, they had met. The thought of stepping aside and leaving them to someone else—even if that someone else might theoretically give them a simpler, safer life—was absolutely out of the question. They were special to him. He wanted them by his side, entirely and exclusively.
His mind logically understood the arrogance of his desires, and he possessed the raw physical power to force his will upon the world, yet the complex problems of human emotion were vastly different from the violent problems of the battlefield.
Solving the core conflict of Solo Leveling was brutally simple despite its extreme difficulty: he just needed to get stronger. He needed to evolve into an existence that matched the cosmic might of the Rulers and the Monarchs so he could finally have the right to stand at the adult table and dictate the fate of the planet.
But what was the solution to the tangled knot between Jin-Ah and Hae-In?
When he thought of the two women together, his chest ached. It wasn't because he was confused about his feelings; he knew exactly what he truly wished for. But when he pictured their inevitable reactions, knowing they had both offered him their genuine, vulnerable hearts, his answer made him sigh helplessly.
Let's stop thinking about that right now.
This was an age-old dilemma, a cycle of human history that always repeated itself. It was just like how Sung Jin-Woo would eventually rewind time over and over to fix his mistakes. But as Min-Jun had sworn to himself before, even if his methods weren't perfect, and even if he carried the heavy regrets of his decisions, he would press forward. Every action had a price. To reach the selfish, triumphant conclusion he desired, he had to be willing to pay the price.
"But regardless of my personal life, this System is absolutely amazing."
If his lore knowledge was correct, the System's leveling mechanic was fundamentally designed to mimic the unique ability of the demon race—specifically, the power to endlessly grow stronger by consuming the souls of the fallen.
"The King of Demons."
When he thought of that specific Monarch, the one brought into the fold by the Shadow Monarch, he realized a critical flaw in his current plan. He could grow exponentially stronger by killing monsters. But the number of monsters in the gates wasn't infinite; it was a finite, exhaustible resource.
Just like how there were only eight billion humans on Earth in his previous life, the population of monsters had a hard cap. The dimension where the monsters originated wasn't a peaceful sanctuary; it was ruled by the absolute law of the jungle. The strong constantly devoured the weak. Herbivores consumed the magical flora, and carnivores slaughtered the herbivores.
Because of this finite pool of experience points, Min-Jun realized a terrifying problem. If he aggressively cleared the dungeons and killed all the high-tier monsters to power-level himself... he would effectively starve Sung Jin-Woo of the experience points needed to reach his original canon strength!
If Min-Jun hoarded all the kills, how would Jin-Woo level up and build his iconic Shadow Army? It would make the process of Jin-Woo inheriting the Shadow Monarch's power far more painful, or worse, cause the human vessel to fail entirely.
This is a massive problem, he thought, his brow furrowing.
If only there were a way to share the wealth. If possible, he wanted all the multiversal 'Suzukis'—his alternate selves scattered across different dimensions—to possess this exact same Soul Consumption ability.
Wait.
Could he ask the Manager to forcefully modify the System? Could he reprogram the core code so that it allowed all of the Suzukis to connect together, working exactly like the 'Party System' in a classic MMORPG?
In MMORPGs, players frequently form parties to hunt down high-level bosses and grind mobs together. While the total experience gained from a single monster was mathematically divided among the members, the sheer speed and quantity of their combined kills meant that everyone leveled up significantly faster.
[Affirmative. The requested modification is mathematically possible. Do you wish to initialize the Multiversal Party System Mode?]
"..."
Can you do that?
[Affirmative. As the host expands its authority and grows stronger, the Manager will systematically evolve alongside all connected hosts to become the ultimate supportive framework.]
"..."
A wild, uncontainable grin broke across Min-Jun's face. His heart practically caught on fire, pounding against his ribs with sheer, intoxicating excitement. He thought of the limitless possibilities. The Suzukis in Tensura, in the Solo Leveling universe, and beyond—all of them hunting, fighting, and sharing their monumental experience pools simultaneously across time and space!
Do it!
[Affirmative. Executing System Override.]
As the Manager violently evolved, rewriting the very fabric of the Architect's masterpiece, Min-Jun knew he had just secured a flawless way to grow to the level of a god without triggering the Shadow Monarch's immediate suspicion.
As long as I am not noticed by Ashborn.
Or, at the very least, he needed to grind enough shared multiversal experience to ensure he was practically untouchable by the time the god of death finally realized his System had been hijacked.
Yet, before he could conquer the cosmos, there was a far more immediate, grounded problem waiting for him on Earth. He knew that dragging his feet would only make the situation more painful. He had to solve this problem of the heart, here and now.
With a mental command, the blue panels shattered into pixels.
Min-Jun stepped out of the spatial distortion and materialized back in the real world. As the magical energy faded, he lifted his gaze and immediately locked eyes with Sung Jin-Ah and Cha Hae-In.
"Oppa!"
"Min-Jun."
The two of them had been waiting for him. Seeing the raw relief and affection in their eyes, he silently swore that he wouldn't make them wait in uncertainty any longer.
His methods might not be perfectly right, and society might judge him for his greed, but he knew one thing for absolutely certain: he could no longer lie to his own heart.