The Book of Greed shimmered in front of Yggy, lines of golden script etching themselves into place:
[ Loot Registered ]
STR: 212 → 214
DEX: 325 → 328
VIT: 137 → 138
INT: 69 → 70
LUCK: 8 (Level Up → 8)
Book of Greed Capacity: 128 / 160 pages
Yggy stayed low in the shadows, back to the wall. The darkness inside the house was his ally now.
KRA-KOOM!
The warped door didn't just open; it exploded inward, splinters flying as the frame shattered. The first goblins stormed in, eyes wide and blinded by the sudden, pitch-black gloom.
They didn't find a defender. They found a floor slick with gore.
SPLAT! THUD.
The front-runners tripped over the corpses Yggy had already piled by the entrance, their charge collapsing into a clumsy, wet stumble. A shriek of confusion—"GARR?!"—was cut short.
SSSHHIIING!
A cleaver whirled through the darkness, an invisible, telekinetic predator. It bit deep into a goblin's neck. The sound was a wet, sickening SCHLURK!
Before that body even hit the floorboards, a spear followed, punching clean through another's ribs with a heavy THWACK-KRRK! as it cracked the spine.
CRASH!
Glass and wood shattered as others, desperate, tried to force their way through the windows. They were met mid-leap. One was skewered by a floating spear, pinned to the frame with a solid THUNK! Another was hacked apart by the cleaver in Yggy's own hand, his form a shadow moving within the shadows.
HACK! CHOP!
No two deaths were alike. A high-pitched gurgle as a throat was slit. A wet pop as a spearhead took an eye. A dull, heavy CRUNCH as Yggy's cleaver shattered a skull.
But there was one constant: anyone who entered did not leave alive.
The only thing going out… were the heads.
THUMP.
Yggy flung them one by one through the broken window, letting them bounce across the snow. Each head was an insult, a challenge. The goblins outside howled, their already dim wits fogging over with blind rage.
With every kill, with every whispered Loot, Yggy felt it—strength surging in his limbs, speed burning in his muscles.
The goblin leader watched from the center of camp as the slaughter continued, screams and snarls rising into the frozen air. His jaw clenched.
Frustration…
He sent a hundred more.
And Yggy grew a hundred times deadlier.
Four waves came and fell, the snow outside painted black-red. The house became a grinder, the windows and door nothing but mouths that swallowed lives whole. Until at last… only the leader remained, with fewer than eighty goblin guards around him.
Yggy stepped into the open air. Snow crunched beneath his boots, clothes soaked in goblin blood then he muttered
"Loot."
The house, the corpses, the splattered blood, even the severed heads he'd tossed into the snow—vanished. The battlefield was scrubbed clean, as if nothing had ever happened.
A system panel flared bright before him:
[ Congratulations! ]
Level Up: 9 → 10
Luck: 10
the Book of Greed's cold tally as he show the page:
[ Personal Stats — Yggy Medas ]
Aether Rank: (F)
Aether Proficiency: Level 10
Class: Criteria not met
STR: 214 → 852
DEX: 328 → 1356
VIT: 138 → 565
INT: 70 → 280
LUCK: 10
Book of Greed Capacity: 134 / 180 pages
Floor Quest:
Defeat Enemies — (520 / 1000) Defeat the Boss — (0 / 1)
Special Buff:
Warm Felt Inside a House — Immune to the coldness of snow and wind as long as a structure of +5 is stored in the Book of Greed.
The panels faded. All that remained was the sound of the wind, the crunch of snow, and the leader still standing in the distance—watching him.
Yggy could feel it—the strength, the lightness in his limbs, the way his Looter Domain expanded like an invisible tide. His vitality surged, wounds knitting faster than before. And the lost warmth returned, wrapping around him as the special buff took hold again.
But there was something else.
Something about the Book of Greed.
He raised his left hand, fingers spread.
"Dead goblin—manifest."
The world warped.
A mountain of corpses—five hundred and twenty goblins in every state imaginable—piled high to his left, steaming in the cold air.
Book of Greed: 10 / 180 pages
The moment they appeared, the surge of power in his body dropped away.
"Looter Domain. Loot."
In a flash, the mountain vanished. The world was clean again.
Book of Greed: 11 / 180 pages
Yggy's grin widened—not from victory, but from the rush that followed. Power—thick and intoxicating—pulsed through every muscle, whispering of how much more he could grow.
More loot meant more strength.
More strength meant more danger.
He held it in check, not letting the thrill stretch too far. His heart was still a warning.
From the center of the field, the goblin leader roared in fury. The nameplate above him shifted—no longer shrouded in question marks.
Barork (Lv. 15)
Full crimson hue. Fully visible. Fully marked for death.
Yggy dashed forward. The goblin guards surged to meet him—eighty in total, a wall of green flesh and steel. Behind them, Barork—eight feet tall, big-bellied but built like a wall of muscle—charged, each step shaking the frozen ground.
"Cleaver."
A hundred cleavers manifested in the air before him.
"Telekinesis—shoot."
Steel screamed through the air, cutting toward the incoming guards. Blood spattered the snow as Yggy lifted his right arm.
"Spear."
A hundred spears shimmered into existence and fired like bolts from a crossbow. The horde staggered as heads, torsos, and limbs were pierced, but Barork simply swung his massive cleaver—half as tall as Yggy himself—knocking them aside in bursts of steel and splinters.
A few guards dropped dead.
"Loot."
The corpses vanished, power flooding into his limbs again.
Barork roared, a sound like an avalanche, and charged. his massive cleaver cutting the air with a terrifying FWHOOOSH! The ground trembled as he closed the distance, his eye fixed on Yggy, promising a brutal, messy death.
He swung. The cleaver crashed down, not on flesh, but on the frozen earth where Yggy had stood a fraction of a second before. Stone chips and ice exploded outwards from the impact.
Yggy was already ten meters away, his movements liquid and unnervingly silent. He didn't meet the charge; he flowed around it, a shadow gliding over the snow.
Barork bellowed in fury at the miss and spun, his follow-up swing a horizontal arc meant to cleave a man in two.
Yggy didn't even try to block. He ducked under it, the wind of the passage ruffling his hair. As he rose, his hand gestured—not with a weapon, but with cold, calculating intent.
ZIIIP! SSHK!
Two spears, ripped telekinetically from a nearby corpse-pile, shot through the air.
The brute leader didn't flinch. He roared, swatting one spear out of the air with his gauntleted fist like it was a twig. The second spear he simply ignored, letting it glance off his thick, iron-plate armor with a dull, heavy KLANG!
"WEAK!" Barork bellowed, pounding his chest.
Yggy's eyes narrowed. Brute force wouldn't pierce that armor. Raw power wouldn't stop that charge. He wasn't a brawler. He was a looter. He didn't fight fair; he dismantled.
He darted left. Barork, clumsy and powerful, pivoted to follow. Yggy gestured. SHHH-THUNK! A spear didn't aim for the chest. It aimed low, punching deep into the goblin's unarmored left knee joint.
Barork's roar turned into a wet shriek. His charge collapsed into a dragging, furious limp. He swung his cleaver wildly, a tornado of blind rage.
Yggy danced back, a matador avoiding a dying bull. His mind was now a razor, lashing out.
FWIP! A discarded shortsword flew like an arrow, lodging in Barork's right bicep. SCHLURK! The arm spasmed, losing its strength. THWACK! A heavy handaxe spun through the air, burying itself in the brute's other thigh, pinning the leg. ZIIING! Another spear, this time aimed at the cleaver-wielding wrist, severing tendons.
CLANG!
The massive weapon fell from a suddenly nerveless hand, steaming in the snow.
Barork stood, a horrifying pin-cushion of his own army's steel. He was immobilized, tangled in a web of his own fallen weapons. He tried to lunge, but his legs were ruined. He tried to swing, but his arms were pierced. His movements were sluggish, his power utterly neutralized.
He was a fortress, and Yggy had just pulled out every foundation stone, one by one.
Barork let out one last, desperate, gurgling roar.
Yggy stopped dodging. He walked forward, his own cleaver in hand.
He didn't even wait for a final lunge. He planted his boot on the haft of the spear buried deep in the creature's thigh and ran up it, using the goblin's own impaled body as a ladder.
Barork's one eye, wide with shock and rage, followed him up.
Yggy's cleaver flashed in the pale, cold light.
One clean, fluid arc.
SSSHHH-LICK!
The head, its roar cut short, toppled from its shoulders. Blood didn't just spray; it fountained, a wide, hot arc that painted the virgin snow crimson.
THUD.
The massive body collapsed, rattling with the steel that held it together.
Silence.
A final, wet plop as the head settled.
Every goblin in the horde was dead. Only ruins, scattered weapons, and the blood-scarred battlefield remained.
"Loot."
The world blinked. The entire encampment—bodies, blood, rubble—vanished. Only the white snowfield remained, untouched, as if the battle had never happened.
A system panel appeared:
[ Congratulations! ]
Level Up: 10 → 12
Luck: 10 → 12
As sketches of Barork body stayed on one page and below it the
Gained Stats for killing Barork:
Str= (+10)
Dex= (+8)
Vit= (+15)
int= (+4)
Followed by the Book's update:
[ Personal Stats — Yggy Medas ]
Aether Rank: (F)
Aether Proficiency: Level 10
Class: Criteria not met
STR: 852 → 1070
DEX: 1356 → 1650
VIT: 565 → 740
INT: 280 → 364
LUCK: 12
Book of Greed Capacity: 130 / 180 pages
Floor Quest:
Defeat Enemies — (600 / 1000) Defeat the Boss — (0 / 1)
Special Buff:
Warm Felt Inside a House — Immune to the coldness of snow and wind as long as a structure of +5 is stored in the Book of Greed.
The panels faded. Yggy inhaled the cold air, power still coursing through his veins.
"Time to kill the boss of this floor," he murmured to the wind.