Taboo Online

Lauren received her own notification.

[Unclaimed clear rewards detected.]

[Dungeon of Truth rewards are now available.]

[You have received the following reward: Unveiled Weakness (Skill)]

[Unveiled Weakness: Your sight pierces false appearances and reveals flaws hidden beneath the surface. By focusing on a target, you may perceive concealed injuries, residual or unstable mana, weakened defenses, curses, disguises, illusions, or structural weaknesses that would normally remain undetectable.]

The timing was almost amusing. Powerforge had waited until they entered a dungeon where the rain drowned out every other sound before finally revealing rewards that might help them survive.

Lauren drew in a quiet breath.

Luke’s skill helped him understand movement. Hers could expose the things an enemy tried to hide completely.

The possibilities quickly filled her mind.

She could watch a future where Luke’s spear failed to pierce an enemy, then search for the place where its defense weakened. A hidden injury might reveal a better target. Unstable mana could warn her that a spell was about to collapse or explode.

Disguises and illusions would become much harder to use against her.

The skill might even help outside combat. Traps, damaged weapons, weakened walls, and magical structures could all contain flaws no one else noticed.

Lauren focused on the patch of soil where the bird had disappeared.

At first, nothing changed.

Then thin traces of dark mana appeared beneath the surface. They spread through the soil in faint, crooked lines before slowly fading away.

The bird was gone, but the energy that had formed its body lingered.

She wouldn’t have noticed it before.

Lauren’s smile grew as she considered how the skill could work with Oracle’s Glimpse. She could find an enemy’s weakness, search the futures around it, and show Luke when to strike.

They wouldn’t have to waste attacks testing every defense.

Lauren could find the opening, and Luke could tear through it.

They had barely begun exploring what their new skills could do when another set of windows appeared.

These were larger than the reward notifications, and their dark borders immediately drew his attention.

[You have been branded as new-generation heroes.]

Luke stared at the message.

The word branded bothered him.

Powerforge hadn’t asked whether they wanted the role. It had simply stamped the title onto them.

Another notification appeared.

[You will receive penalties for killing innocent people.]

[You will receive rewards for killing villains and saving innocent people.]

Lauren’s fingers tightened around Luke’s hand.

A final window opened beneath the others.

[Warden’s Forges have been revealed on your minimap.]

[Warden’s Forges are facilities scattered throughout the dungeon where you may forge new skills and weapons or access portals that allow you to bring anything from Powerforge Online into the real world.]

[All forging requires Hero or Villain Tokens.]

Neither of them moved.

Luke read the messages again, but no hidden warning or restriction appeared.

Powerforge had finally said it outright.

Skills and weapons could be forged. Portals could bring things from the game into reality.

All they needed were tokens.

Luke didn’t need an explanation to understand where those came from.

Heroes earned theirs by acting like heroes. Villains earned theirs by becoming worse.

His excitement over Truth Behind Motion faded.

Saving someone wasn’t only the right thing to do anymore. Powerforge had turned it into progress.

Killing a villain could buy another skill.

For someone like Luke, that incentive was dangerous enough. He wanted to grow stronger more than anything, especially when strength meant being able to protect Lauren.

But villains would receive the same offer.

Someone who already wanted to hurt others could now gain power from doing it. Every person they killed or ruined might bring them closer to another weapon, skill, or portal.

Lauren reread the notifications, and the warmth left her expression.

They aren’t even pretending this is only a game anymore.

Until now, the connection between Powerforge and the real world had remained a secret shared by a small number of players and government officials.

Now Powerforge had stopped hiding that connection from them.

The system had openly revealed portals that could move things into reality. It had also called Luke and Lauren new-generation heroes, almost the same way Red Hound and the Bureau spoke about the first heroes shaped by Powerforge.

They had entered the supervised facility so the government could study their changing bodies and abilities. The Bureau wanted to know whether they could become real heroes.

Now Powerforge had given them the role itself.

Had the system reached the same conclusion on its own?

Or did it know what was happening around their real bodies?

Luke disliked both answers.

This is even more dangerous than Red Hound thought.

Red Hound already believed Powerforge could change the balance of the world. He had warned them about awakened criminals, unstable abilities, and whoever or whatever stood behind the game.

Even he might not have expected this.

Powerforge was giving players a reason to hunt one another.

Heroes gained strength from saving people and killing villains. Villains gained strength by following whatever twisted desires had earned them that title.

Sooner or later, both sides would go looking for each other.

Luke tightened his hold on Lauren’s hand. He wasn’t reassuring her this time. Feeling her fingers inside his helped steady him.

He had entered Powerforge because he wanted strength. He needed enough power to protect Lauren and survive against enemies who could crush ordinary people without effort.

Powerforge offered exactly that.

The price was following the path it had chosen for him.

It decided which actions earned rewards and which deaths counted as progress.

Somewhere else in the world, other players were probably reading the opposite message and learning what they could gain by hurting innocent people.

Lauren turned toward Luke. She couldn’t see his expression with her ordinary eyes, but she knew he had reached the same conclusion.

Villains had a reason to become worse.

Heroes had a reason to hunt them down.

Outside Powerforge, criminals could still be arrested, tried, and sent to prison. Even Red Hound, brutal as he was, had brought an awakened criminal into the Bureau alive and restrained.

Powerforge hadn’t mentioned arrests.

It rewarded heroes for killing villains instead.

If heroes followed those rules, fewer villains would ever reach a prison cell.

Powerforge was teaching them to kill on sight.