Chapter 37 – The Mirror of Reversal
Yggdrasil still burned in crimson light when I returned to Aeternum Sanctum—the echoes of my battle with Lust still fresh in the system logs, like scars across my combat interface. The sanctum had never felt so quiet. No alerts. No messages. No voices but my own. Only the faint hum of data coursing through the crystal walls, soft as a heartbeat.
Defeating a World Enemy wasn't something most players could even imagine attempting alone. It had taken every ounce of my strength, every skill I'd ever mastered. World Break had nearly shattered my avatar from the strain. The last thing I remembered before the screen dimmed was HIME's voice, low and clear:
"Victory confirmed, Ren-sama."
Now, the victory felt hollow. I had the Sin Core of Desire—a glowing red crystal that pulsed faintly in my inventory, radiating power and potential. I didn't know why, but it almost felt alive. Every few seconds, it pulsed in rhythm with my heartbeat, like it could sense my curiosity.
"Ren-sama," HIME's voice came softly, breaking through my thoughts. "Recovery is complete. System checks show no lasting damage. Shall I proceed with tactical analysis of the battle log?"
I shook my head. "No need. I've already memorized everything that mattered."
"Then, what is your next objective?"
I leaned back in my chair—the one I'd modeled after the crimson throne from Muspelheim's magma fields. "I'm going to find it."
"Define 'it.'"
"The Mirror," I said, my voice almost a whisper.
For a second, HIME said nothing. Then:
"Clarify: are you referring to the rumored World-Class Item 'Mirror of Reversal'?"
I nodded slowly. "Exactly that."
The idea had formed during my fight with Lust, somewhere between the first illusion and the last explosion of data. I had wondered—if I could defeat a World Enemy and obtain its Sin Core, then could I become one? Not through corruption or loss of control, but through intention. If I could take what they were and invert it, maybe I could see the system from the other side.
To do that, I needed a mirror.
The Mirror of Reversal wasn't just a myth. It was one of those WCI entries the developers had teased early in the game's life cycle—a "god-tier artifact capable of reflecting reality itself." No one had ever confirmed its existence, but there were enough fragments, whispers, and error logs floating around to make the story believable.
The supposed function was simple: anything that touched it could be inverted—fire to frost, light to darkness, even buffs into debuffs. With the right template data, it could rewrite one's status in the system.
If the stories were true, it was the only artifact capable of flipping the World Champion status into that of a World Enemy.
Of course, it was also said to be the most dangerous WCI ever made, because once it reversed something, it couldn't reverse it back.
"HIME," I said as I opened the inventory. "How far do the archives trace the Mirror's last known coordinates?"
"Data fragments suggest Helheim," she replied instantly. "No confirmed sightings, but overlapping anomalies in the region near the Obsidian Crypt. Last recorded event occurred during the 'Envy Incident.'"
That made sense. Envy had been the first player to ever become a World Enemy, and when his avatar disintegrated, half the world's data flux had collapsed into Helheim. It would make perfect sense for the Mirror—if it existed—to end up buried somewhere near there.
I turned my head toward the floating hologram of the world map. "Time to check the ground myself."
"Searching Helheim manually would take months, Ren-sama."
"Not manually," I said with a grin. "We'll use a bigger lens."
The golden light of the Grand Atlas flared around me.
Out of all the World-Class Items the guild had collected, this one remained my favorite—not for its power, but for its precision. Unlike other WCIs that commanded destruction, The Grand Atlas was pure observation, a perfect map of everything within a hundred square kilometers. It marked every ally, every hostile, every neutral, even monsters beneath the surface—tiny data points pulsing on its surface like stars.
But the reason I needed it wasn't for what it showed—it was for what it didn't.
WCI signatures canceled one another out. Their effects clashed and repelled like magnets.
If there was another World-Class Item hidden somewhere inside its scan radius, it would appear as a blank void—a silence in the data sea.
"HIME," I said, raising my hand as golden light spread out in waves across the simulated world. "Initiate the Atlas sweep. Center on Helheim's southern hemisphere. I want everything between coordinates 57°S and 80°E."
"Understood. Deploying Grand Atlas field projection."
Light rippled across the dark sky. The map unfolded—layers of terrain, crypts, caverns, and ruins flickering in shifting gold. Data poured into my view like rivers, scrolling faster than I could read.
For twenty minutes, we scanned.
Dozens of minor relics appeared, some familiar, some lost to time. But no mirror.
I narrowed my focus. "Narrow the scan radius. Look for anomaly clusters—regions of complete null data."
The world map contracted sharply, down to a single region.
A large blank circle—an absence roughly ten kilometers wide—appeared on the upper left quadrant of the scan, deep below Helheim's ice caverns.
There it was.
"Ren-sama," HIME said. "Coordinates locked: Subterranean Region X-91, depth 6.2 kilometers. The anomaly's signature perfectly matches a World-Class Item suppression field."
"Then we've found it."
"Probability: 97.4 percent."
"Close enough."
The teleportation sequence activated, and I stepped into the light. The sanctum's warm glow faded into the cold blue of Helheim's endless underworld.
The temperature meter on my HUD plummeted instantly. Even with resistance buffs, frost crawled across my armor like living ice.
The silence was suffocating.
Helheim had always been beautiful in its own tragic way—a kingdom of glass bones and frozen sorrow. Every step I took echoed across a cavern filled with crystal stalactites and long-dead code fragments frozen midair.
"Ren-sama," HIME whispered through the link, "environmental hazard minimal. Energy signature from the anomaly is… unusual. I detect reflective frequencies similar to illusion magic, but much higher."
"Good," I muttered. "That means it's reacting to us."
We moved deeper through the tunnels, following faint pulses of light flickering through the ice.
The path twisted, spiraling down like a glacier-built labyrinth.
And then, at the very bottom, we found it.
A single mirror stood embedded in a wall of frozen stone.
It wasn't large—maybe the height of an ordinary player avatar—but its surface wasn't solid. It rippled faintly, like liquid glass breathing. Around it, the ground shimmered with concentric rings of silver light, runes flickering in ancient Yggdrasil code.
Every few seconds, the mirror's surface shifted—showing not my reflection, but different versions of me.
A copy with demonic wings. Another cloaked in fire. Another wearing the armor of a god.
It was reflecting possibilities.
"Ren-sama…" HIME's tone carried the faintest tremor, though it was only her programming. "Confirmed: World-Class Item detected. Classification—'Mirror of Reversal.' Stability index—volatile. Approach with caution."
"I'll keep my distance," I said, taking a slow step forward.
As I got closer, the air grew thick, heavy. The mirror seemed to sense me, rippling in recognition.
Data lines along its frame pulsed, shifting from silver to crimson, then back again.
And then, without warning, my reflection moved—on its own.
It tilted its head and smiled.
"Ren-sama, caution!" HIME warned, barriers flickering into existence around us.
But the reflection didn't attack. It simply raised its hand—the same as mine—and pressed its palm against the inside of the mirror.
When I mirrored the gesture, a ripple of energy passed between us—sharp but not hostile.
Like a heartbeat syncing between two entities.
For a moment, the world went still.
And then the system spoke:
[World-Class Item Detected: Mirror of Reversal]
[Input Required: Template for Inversion]
I froze.
So it was real. And it worked exactly as the legends described. It could reverse anything. All it needed was a reference—something to invert.
"Ren-sama," HIME said softly. "Do you wish to proceed with initialization?"
"Not yet." I closed my hand, letting the light dim. "We found it. But we're not ready."
"You intend to use the Sin Core of Desire as the inversion template," she said flatly, already predicting my thoughts.
I nodded. "That's right. If this mirror can rewrite status flags, then I can use it to flip my World Champion designation into World Enemy using the Sin Core as the seed. But not here. Not without preparation."
"Risk assessment: catastrophic," HIME replied. "Even if successful, your player data would be fundamentally altered. You may lose control of your avatar or access rights to the account."
"Maybe," I admitted. "But we've always been about testing limits, haven't we?"
For a long moment, the two of us stood in silence before the mirror.
Its surface flickered gently, showing me—not as I was, but as I could be.
A form wrapped in silver flame, eyes burning with crimson light.
Not human. Not monster. Something between.
I stepped back and opened a portal.
"Let's go, HIME. We'll come back when we're ready."
"Acknowledged. Returning to Aeternum Sanctum."
As the teleportation light consumed us, I took one last glance at the mirror.
The reflection waved at me before vanishing into ripples of light.
Back in the sanctum, I stood in the data vault where the Sin Core glowed faintly within its crystalline container.
It pulsed like a heart, radiating quiet temptation.
I reached out but didn't touch it. Not yet.
Somewhere deep down, I knew this next step wasn't about power anymore.
It was about understanding—what it meant to exist inside a world like this, to push every system and find what lay beyond its boundaries.
The mirror waited in Helheim, the Sin Core burned in my hand, and for the first time in years, I felt something new.
Not excitement. Not ambition.
Curiosity.
Pure, undiluted curiosity.
And I smiled to myself, whispering under my breath:
"Let's see what happens when we turn the world upside down."
End of Chapter 37 – The Mirror of Reversal