Chapter 87: Collecting beauties
Miles glanced at Grimm before slipping on the jacket. Although the boy didn’t show it, he was certain he’d used his [Eagle Eye] skill while throwing it. The arc had been far too neat.
The fabric fit him loosely; its sleeves covered a quarter of his wrists, once again reminding him of his diminutive stature. Still, it was warm, and much better than being shirtless, so he resigned himself to it for now.
"Thanks."
Grimm gave him a once-over, then nodded before turning his attention back to his phone, which he’d pulled out at some point.
’How does it have any battery?’
His own phone still remained in his bag, shut down to preserve what little remained of his battery life. Driven by a mix of boredom and curiosity, he leaned slightly to see what was on Grimm’s screen.
It wasn’t particularly difficult to do so. In the glow of the dimming flashlights, it might as well have been a beacon.
On the bright surface was a digital image of three people. Two, a man and a woman, stood a short distance from the third person, a kneeling man.
The woman clung close to the man beside her as he looked down on the other man disdainfully. A few speech bubbles floated around them.
"How could you betray me, Angie? After everything I did for you."
That one came from the kneeling man.
"Don’t call me Angie, you rat. Babe, I don’t know who this man is."
"It’s alright, I believe you. Do you want me to break his legs?"
Those hung around the standing woman and her partner, respectively.
A bit confused at what exactly he was looking at, he glanced at the top of the screen and found a line of text written there.
[Blizzard Apocalypse: After being betrayed by my ex, I awakened an SSS rank infinite space and collected all the beauties.]
’What? I-is that a comic?’
The title seemed a little lowbrow to be any proper comic.
’A ma-manhwa... yes.’
That had to be it; he’d seen things of the sort during his brief webnovel days. They were Korean comics, if he was remembering correctly.
’It’s probably a good thing I never read them.’
Finally noticing his gaze, the boy angled his phone away from view, shooting him a suspicious glance before turning back to his screen, scrolling again.
Miles looked away, figuring it was probably best not to press the matter. His eyes drifted to the metal block sitting silently at the back of the room. A thought flashed through his mind at the sight.
He turned back to Grimm.
"How many points do you have?"
The boy paused his scrolling, looked back at him with silent consideration, before replying.
"About a hundred."
Miles only took a second to think about it before deciding it wasn’t an unreasonable number. Grimm alone probably had the highest number of kills among them, both before and after losing his gun.
The combination of skills he had just served to multiply his lethality.
He tilted his head.
"Are you planning to upgrade your EGO, then?"
The boy’s eyes widened a bit in realization, only for a moment though; he nodded his head with his usual poker face right after.
"Yeah, yeah. I was just waiting for you to do it first."
Miles narrowed his eyes a bit. There were so many logical holes in that statement, it almost hurt to hear it. Saying it with a straight face didn’t do much to help either.
But once again, he chose not to push. The boy’s usually silent presence wasn’t unwelcome. Unusual habits or some shamelessness here or there didn’t change much.
"Right... I’ll be going first then. Please alert the others if anything happens to me."
He only watched the boy long enough to see him nod before heading for the pylon. Placing a hand on the surface, he felt a familiar alien chill flow through him with little fanfare.
The terminal appeared once more.
[Pylon #10755 is currently being accessed by User #6745]
[User #6745]
[Username: Miles]
[EGO: Little prince by the sea Lv1]
[Skills: Delusion Lv1, Cold Resistance Lv1]
[Points: 105]
[Pylon #10755]
[Pylon Rank: Level 1 (600/6000)]
[Current capabilities: Reality stabilization field (Level 1), Information, Upgrades.]
There was nothing new besides the points, so he quickly navigated his way to the upgrade menu.
[Upgrades]
[EGO: Little prince by the sea Lv1(0/100)]
[Skills: Delusion(Unique) Lv1(0/100), Cold Resistance(Common) Lv1(0/100)]
’Hmm... how exactly does this work?’
He stared intently at the EGO level counter for a few moments before promptly giving up when the interface showed no change.
’Maybe I’m approaching this the wrong way.’
The pylon seemed responsive to his thoughts, given how he’d answered the Y/N questions before. So he went that route.
He thought about allocating his points to EGO, and almost immediately, something changed.
[Do you wish to upgrade your EGO for 100 points?]
[Y/N]
’Y.’
There was no hesitation.
The menu vanished as quickly as it popped up. Miles closed his eyes, and for a second, he was certain he’d be sent back into that strange, network-like place he’d gone to during his first upgrade.
Nothing of the sort occurred.
A chill yet comforting breeze swept across his face. It carried the faint, salty scent of the sea. His hair felt slightly heavier and damper on his head. He could almost feel the softness of sand brushing against his toes.
’Am I...’
He looked around, only to find himself still in the room.
’... dreaming?’
He turned back to find Grimm still huddled in his spot against the wall, occasionally letting out a small, breathless chuckle at something on his screen.
"Grimm?"
The boy raised a brow.
"What?"
"I..."
Miles trailed off, staring blankly at his face. Discreetly, he pinched himself, feeling the sharp pain even through the layers of numbness he was already used to.
"It’s nothing."
Grimm shrugged before turning back to his phone.
’It’s real.’
The light breeze still lingered, and he could still smell salt in the air. He let out a shallow breath, taking in the comforting breeze before turning back to the pylon.
A new notification was displayed there.
[Congratulations, you have upgraded your EGO: Little prince by the sea, from Level 1 to Level 2.]
[And so begins the path to your doom, and so begins the path to your salvation.]