The violet light of the Soul-Reaper initiation was the last thing I saw before my consciousness fractured. I had used the very essence of my soul to force that final teleportation, and the strain had been a price my body wasn't ready to pay. I collapsed into the white dust of the Necromancer's remains, a broken vessel at the feet of a dead god.
For five days, I was a ghost in my own body.
While I was unconscious, the Assistant Grimoire took command. It recognized the critical failure of my biological systems and automatically prioritized Slow Healing. As my mana trickled back into my reserve, the healing magic became a physical force. It didn't just mend the wound in my stomach; it physically pushed the rusted silver scythe out of my body. The blade clattered onto the stone floor with a hollow ring, leaving me whole but hollow.
When my eyes finally flickered open, the Tenth Floor was silent. The blue torches had dimmed. I looked at the stump of my right shoulder—the slime-web puppet was gone, leaving only the scarred gap.
"Assistant... Inventory. Get me my arm."
With a trembling left hand, I pulled my severed physical arm from the storage void. I lined it up against the shoulder, the cold flesh meeting the warm, and whispered: "Slow Heal."
The sensation was agonizing—like thousands of hot needles sewing my nerves back together. While the magic worked, I used the Creation Grimoire to manifest a feast. I ate until the strength returned to my bones, watching the black veins of the Necromancer's poison recede from my skin.
The Evolution of the Bookworm
As my arm fused back into place, I called up my status. The victory had been absolute.
[LEVEL UP! 37 → 40]
[NEW GRIMOIRE UNLOCKED: THE SOUL-REAPER]
But it was the reward for reaching Level 40 that changed the game. A new book manifested in my halo, its cover shifting through the colors of every element.
The Stacking Grimoire (Level 1): I can now merge up to five separate Grimoires into a single, unified book. No more flipping pages in the heat of battle. One book, one interface, infinite destruction.
The Soul-Reaper skills were terrifying:
Summon Skeleton: Manifest undead warriors from mana.
Bone Teleportation: I can swap places with any summoned skeleton instantly.
Scythe Mastery: The muscle memory of a thousand years of reaping.
Instant Death: If an enemy admits defeat or is incapacitated, an invisible scythe ends them immediately.
Merge: The power to officially combine skills (like Steam + Explosion) for massive damage without the mental strain of Split Mind.
The Road to Revenge
I spent two days in the silence of the Tenth Floor, testing my new limbs. I practiced swinging the invisible scythe and merging my elemental magics until the air in the arena turned to plasma.
My heart had hardened during those five days of darkness. I remembered the faces of the friends who had betrayed me, the laughter of the kingdom that had thrown me into this pit to die. They thought they had discarded a bookworm. They didn't realize they were breeding a Reaper.
"Whatever it takes," I growled, my voice sounding deeper, layered with the echoes of the souls I had consumed. "I will leave this place, and I will leave their kingdom in ruins."
I stood up, my right arm fully restored and pulsing with dark mana, and began the walk down the stairs to the Eleventh Floor.
The Eleventh Floor: The Garden of Blades
As I stepped onto the new level, my boots sank into soft, damp earth. The Eleventh Floor wasn't a dungeon of stone—it was a nightmare of biology. Giant, predatory flowers with jagged, metallic petals swayed in a synthetic breeze. These were the Bladed Flora, and their seeds were like armor-piercing bullets.
I saw a pack of them shifting toward me, their petals sharpening like razors.
For a second, the old fear—the memory of the scythe cutting through my bone—made my hand shake. But then I looked at my new Grimoires. I looked at the power of the Reaper.
"What am I even afraid of?" I laughed, a dark, sharp sound. "After the Tenth Floor... everything else is just something to be harvested."
I opened the Stacking Grimoire and merged Fire Magic with Summon Skeleton. From the earth, five skeletons emerged, their bones wreathed in roaring flames.
"Go," I commanded. "Clear the path."