After a hearty meal and a decent nap, Hope grabbed his new spear and got back to the grind.

  And the moment he started pulling on the space around him, he felt it—the difference hit fast. Not just in the numbers, but in how Spacetime tugged at his head. The strain wasn’t just lighter—it was way lighter. Way more than he’d expected.

  ??Spacetime Handling (Level 9 + 6)

  You saw the frame beneath reality. What bends for others bends to you.

  ? 75% reduction in mental strain when manipulating Spacetime Magika.

  ? +15% to Magia while in the presence of Spacetime Magika (only the highest applicable Magika Handling effect applies at once)

  That 75% strain cut? He felt all of it.

  But more than that—it made him notice something important. Every new level, even if the bonus looked the same, actually mattered more than before.

  If just one more level pushed it to 80% reduction, that’d leave only 20% of the original strain.

  A fifth of the cost—while others had to settle for a fourth at best.

  Sweet.

  Maybe the System wasn’t as bad as he thought.

  He chuckled as he made his way back to the grind—

  And froze on the spot.

  “Fuckers,” he muttered under his breath, eyes narrowing at the creatures ahead.

  They looked mostly the same, maybe a bit bulkier, but the prompt had changed.

  Scorchback

  Level 80

  Twenty-five fuckin’ levels higher than before.

  Why? Because it had been too easy? Because they wanted to crank up the pressure? No breaks for him, huh? Just keep tightening the screws. Let’s see how far the Crawler can go before he snaps. That’s what you sick, twisted bastards want—just...

  Sigh.

  What could he do? It was their stage. Their rules. They did whatever the hell they wanted, and he knew it.

  No matter how many points he earned, how good the gear, how much progress he made... in the end, he was still just that—entertainment.

  Hope drew a deep breath, leaned back, and raised his middle finger to the sky.

  Wiggled it a bit, just for good measure. Then dropped his arm.

  Level 80. Would it change much?

  Doubt it.

  He didn’t wait. Spear in hand, he blitzed forward through terrain he knew better than his own face by now.

  The creature reacted faster this time, sensing him several meters earlier. So what?

  Hope did what he always did.

  Wind wrapped around him as he pushed off the ground. Air Gear kicked in. His coat flared behind him as he shot forward, straight for the throat.

  The creature tried to twist away. Even swung down the slab of metal really fast—but—

  Its weight betrayed it.

  Just as it moved, Hope tweaked the anchor—made it lighter, not heavier.

  Without that natural feedback from the ground, the thing lost balance, stumbled right where Hope predicted it would.

  He used wind pressure to adjust, stay straight, carve a path forward—and then, the spear struck true.

  Straight through the throat.

  The thick skin resisted more than before. But the new spear also cut deeper.

  He pulled back, stepped on its shoulder, flipped mid-air, and landed several meters behind, as casually as he’d come.

  The Scorchback collapsed behind him in a spray of its own blood, and Hope looked up at the sky.

  “Happy now? Fun? Maybe bump it up another twenty next time, what do you say?”

  He let out a mocking laugh.

  Not a single level gained.

  What a joke.

  Lately it felt like he had to kill dozens of elites just to nudge the bar forward. What the hell?

  Level 100 felt... far.

  He didn’t give it much thought as the coin merged with the one in his bag and ticked the number up by 10.

  Seemed like they gave twice as much as before.

  Well, good for him.

  And just like that, he kept going, killing one after another. A dozen or so kills later, he finally gained another level.

  Level 53 ? 54

  Now that the strain on Spacetime was lighter, he started relying on it more—experimenting with what he could do beyond just shifting weight.

  And slowly, he found some ways.

  As he shafted through the dark tunnels, feeling the wind brush against his hair, Hope focused on the Scorchback’s weapon being aimed at him.

  The arc of the swing was wide, but he kept his trajectory just slightly off course. And as the weapon came down, about to connect with his shoulder, he expanded the space between them—just a little.

  Enough to make the strike veer off and miss.

  He slipped through the opening and finished it off with a quick thrust, putting extra weight behind it.

  Hope exhaled sharply as he landed.

  The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

  Expanding and compressing space—both were more taxing than shifting weight, and not by a small margin.

  But it gave him a card to play. A way to shift the balance in the fight... literally.

  He also felt like he understood space a bit better now.

  Not in a fancy way. He couldn’t write a book about it or explain the rules. But after enough fights, enough strain, his body started picking things up. Space wasn’t just empty air—it had lines, direction, tension, like it followed some pattern. It wasn’t random.

  Sometimes, when he focused hard enough, he could feel those lines stretch. Like space between two points wasn’t fixed. Like the distance could shift, depending on how he pressed his will into it. He didn’t move things the way someone moved a rock—he changed how far apart they felt, at least for a moment.

  It wasn’t teleporting or blinking. More like stretching out the floor between two steps so he didn’t land where they expected. Or tightening it, so something reached faster than it should’ve.

  And each time he found something, he pressed on it. Practiced it. Changed the angle, the timing, the way it was applied—and paid attention to the effect. What did what. What felt right. What gave better results with less strain.

  Ideas came fast. He tested them as they came, one after another.

  And just like that, the tunnel came to an end.

  Waiting there, bathed in a dull glow, stood his old friend—just a little more armor on it and a bit higher leveled.

  Scorchbrute [Elite]

  Level 90

  Yeah. Like just 28 more levels. Not much.

  For the first time, Hope actually hesitated. A level 90 Elite… was no joke.

  But something told him his strategy should still work. Even if it was stronger, faster, heavier—weight and space were still the same. And if he played it right, a shift at the right time would throw the thing off-balance.

  Create an opening wide enough to end it in one clean strike… maybe.

  Hope locked eyes with it. The brute didn’t charge—just stood there, watching, as if unsure whether Hope was even an opponent.

  Hope wasn’t sure either.

  No… he was sure.

  Sure, he could grind more levels, get better gear, come back stronger with better odds. But what would that prove? Where would that path lead if he kept dodging the hard fights, the uncertain ones?

  Would he ever break the chains like that? Would he ever change anything? Ever give others something real—hope?

  No.

  He had to push. Even if it wasn’t safe. Even if the path was steep and full of pain. Even if he wasn’t sure he’d win.

  He had to move forward.

  And so… he did.

  The Scorchbrute finally reacted, its gaze steady and locked on him. Hope felt the weight of it—the pressure, the power. This thing wasn’t just strong. It was truly strong.

  In raw strength alone, it completely outclassed him.

  He knew he’d have to use every trick he had to tilt the fight in his favour. A direct clash? He’d die in one exchange.

  His heart beat faster than usual, a low thrum behind his ribs, but he forced it to settle. The moment the creature took its first step, Hope didn’t wait—he triggered Air Gear. Wind wrapped around him as he lessened gravity’s grip, and his body blurred from where he stood.

  Yet even at that speed, less than a blink later, the giant cracked the ground beneath its feet and launched forward. The shield came first, raised high, wide enough to cut off nearly every angle. It wasn’t going for a strike—it was going for a full-shield bash. Bash and crush.

  Hope cursed under his breath. It had gone for the shield, not the mace. Wider surface, less room to dodge, and it centred the blow. Hard to slip through. Smart bastard.

  Snapping into motion, Hope twisted mid-air, dragging at the strain as he carved a curved line into the wind. He compressed the space ahead and stretched the one behind, slipping out of range by a hair.

  He didn’t stop. Rotating again mid-air, he re-entered striking range with his spear in hand, momentum built and aimed for the side. But the brute rotated even faster.

  Hope reacted—lightening the weight beneath its anchoring foot, trying to throw its balance off as he surged in. The gap was just barely there, his spear nearly at its mark.

  But the creature dipped its head low and caught the attack on its helmet.

  Another curse left Hope's lips. He couldn’t let his spear collide with that thick slab of reinforced metal—not without the recoil kicking the hell out of him. So he twisted again, veering off and stepping on the helmet to vault out.

  Except the brute raised its fuckin’ head. Fast.

  The sudden jolt of motion would’ve snapped his legs if he hadn’t lightened himself at the last moment, using Air Gear to push in the same direction to reduce the force.

  Even then, he flew hard and crashed into the rocky ceiling above.

  His shoulder took the brunt, jolting a shockwave down his spine as jagged rock tore through his coat and ripped a shallow groove along his back. Dust rained down as he kicked off, twisting in the air, trying to reorient before he hit the ground again.

  Pain flared.

  His ribs burned. Shoulder screaming. Breath short. But the Scorchbrute didn’t give him even a heartbeat.

  It was already pivoting, stomping forward, mace gripped tight. The air shook with each step. Cracks spiderwebbed through the ground from where its feet landed.

  Hope slammed Air Gear again, wind bursting under his soles as he jetted sideways across the jagged terrain. Rocks scraped his shin, another tore through the side of his boot, but he didn’t stop.

  He couldn’t.

  The mace swung sideways, tearing through the air like a falling boulder. Hope ducked low, compressing the space under his body, flattening his own form downward as he tucked into a forward roll.

  Even then, the weapon clipped his trailing leg.

  A white-hot burst of agony tore through his calf. He hit the ground, teeth clenched, rolling hard across gravel and rock. His spear almost slipped from his grip.

  He dug the point into the floor, slowing his spin, then snapped upright with blood trailing down his leg.

  "Fuck," he growled, chest heaving.

  He barely avoided getting crushed, and he was already bleeding. Not good.

  But he’d seen it.

  The Scorchbrute overcommitted on the last swing. Just for a fraction of a second. Its arms extended, weight shifted, and its stance wide. There was an opening.

  Small.

  Deadly to reach.

  But there.

  Hope’s foot slid back. The wind curled again, Air Gear primed. The pain in his leg screamed at him, but he ignored it. His mind tunneled in, sharp and clear.

  He had to close the distance. Not just fast—right.

  He altered the density of the space between him and the brute’s inner knee. It wasn’t big—barely a couple of centimeters—but if he compressed it just right, his motion would seem to snap through, like the world jolted forward.

  Then he’d land the strike.

  He moved.

  It wasn’t graceful. Wasn’t smooth.

  But it was sudden.

  A lurch, a drag, his body snapping forward with unnatural momentum. Wind howled in his ears as he burned Air Gear mid-jump, thrusting the spear down low, targeting the joint—right above the greave, where the armor met flesh.

  The Scorchbrute roared, twisting, too late.

  The spear pierced.

  Not all the way—resistance stopped him halfway in—but it was enough to stagger the thing, its leg buckling, a splash of dark red shooting out.

  Hope didn’t get to enjoy it.

  The backhand came from above—mace reversed—crashing like a wrecking ball. He twisted, raised his arm too slow, and the shockwave hit him like a car crash.

  His body lifted. Slammed sideways.

  The wall cracked.

  Hope gasped, vision swimming, as he slid down the stone with his ears ringing and his arm limp. His left arm was broken—he knew without needing to check.

  Breathing ragged, eyes narrowed, he looked back toward the brute as it limped forward, rage boiling in its eyes.

  He smiled through the pain, blood trickling from his lip.

  "Still walkin’, huh?" he muttered.

  His whole body hurt. His arm hung like dead weight. His leg throbbed, and his ribs felt cracked.

  But the thing bled.

  And now it limped.

  Hope pushed himself back up, feet shaky, spear dragging along the floor.

  He stared at the creature, spat blood onto the stone, and raised his spear higher.

  "Come on, then."