CHAPTER 66: SHADOW HUNTER

The air in the underground base of the Core seemed denser that morning.

Even with the four Thrones still in meditation or analysis—each lost in their own magical data streams—there was a distortion in the environment that none of them commented on. An interruption too small to be noticed at first glance, but subtle enough to disturb the right instincts.

Eren felt it first.

Not as a common sensation, but as an internal break — a slight mismatch between his commands and the system’s responses. Something that only a player with absolute control of their own interface would be able to perceive.

On the screen projected to the left, it flashed discreetly:

[Synchronization Deviation: 98% → 93%]

[Soul Latency Detected]

He didn’t react. Neither physically nor with expression. He just slowly turned his eyes toward the wall where the surveillance orbs were installed. Kaela, at his side, frowned.

"Something’s... wrong," she murmured, her wolf ears arched back.

Her amber eyes scanned the base with predatory attention. No new magical presence, no unusual sounds. But her hunter’s instinct was on alert.

Eren knew. The enemy was already there.

No need to break anything. No need to invade. No need to show aggression. All it had to do was exist in silence—like a hidden script waiting for the right function to execute.

That’s when the first strange sound came.

A sharp crack.

The source came from near one of the stone tables, where one of the magical maintenance NPCs was making routine notes. An old man with gray hair, dressed in the brown clothes typical of support mages. Calm face. Neutral expression.

But there was something wrong with his movements. Too precise. Too timed.

Kaela already had her teeth clenched. Eren, for his part, kept his voice low:

"Retreat. Don’t attack yet."

She obeyed with difficulty.

The supposed NPC turned slowly. His eyes met Eren’s. There was no recognition, no hostile intent. It was like looking at a puppet aware of its own script.

"He wasn’t supposed to be here," Eren muttered, more to himself than to the monsters.

Kaela let out a muffled grunt.

"What is he?"

"A... hunter."

With a sharp gesture, Eren accessed his internal interface and sacrificed one of the Lasso Shadows.

The screen flickered with a slight flash.

[Shadows of the Loop: 1/3]

[Emergency Summon: Morwynn – The Blind Weaver]

From the floor of the base, Eren’s shadow distorted, spiraling as if it had a life of its own. Translucent claws emerged from the void, followed by thin, long legs, then a slender, shimmering body.

Morwynn appeared crouched, as if emerging from a crack in the fabric of reality. Her silver hair hung like freshly woven webs, and her multi-irised eyes frantically searched the edges of the visible world.

"What... where...?"

She blinked, confused, sniffing the air with a fragmented expression. Then she saw Kaela. She saw Eren. And finally, she saw the man standing in the background.

Immediately, confusion gave way to calculation.

"Something’s not right with that servant," she whispered, backing away slightly. "He has no scent. No pulse. No... intention."

Eren narrowed his eyes.

"He’s not breathing."

The statement hung in the air like a sentence.

The old man took a step forward. The sound was too perfect. As if it had been pre-rendered by a graphics engine.

A second step.

And a notification flashed discreetly on Eren’s interface:

[Singular Presence Detected]

[Classification: EX (Execution Anomaly)]

[Exploit Hunter – Alpha Unit | Silent Invasion Active]

"Shit," said Eren, finally allowing himself to frown.

Kaela growled but didn’t move. Morwynn was already semi-transparent, her form diluting among the illusory webs of the environment, ready to disappear or attack.

The supposed NPC stopped just five meters away. And smiled.

"Lee Min-Jae," he said, in a perfectly human voice, without moving his lips. "First and only exception in the Tamer class. Recognized. Threat of persistence."

The voice seemed to come from every corner of the base at once. The orbs vibrated, the Core’s communication crystals flashed, and for a moment the world seemed to freeze.

[System: Observation Mode Deactivated]

[Binding Rule: Temporarily Suspended]

[The Dev Observes]

Kaela positioned herself in front of Eren.

"You’re going to die today, you old shit."

"No," Morwynn murmured. "He can’t die."

"Why?" Kaela growled.

Eren answered before she could insist:

"Because he’s not alive."

The Hunter took another step. Unhurried. Unemotional.

The aura around him seemed non-existent, but the codes that sustained the base trembled as if they were being corroded by something deeper than magic.

Eren thought quickly. He couldn’t beat him there. Not yet. But he could test him.

"Morwynn, can you set a trap?"

"Partially. He distorts the field, but he doesn’t touch the roots. I can operate in the shadows."

"Great. Prepare a distraction. Kaela, you hold off direct contact. I’ll test the system’s delay."

Kaela didn’t argue. She just flexed, muscles ready.

Morwynn disappeared.

Eren raised a hand. A silent command. A basic binding spell — "Touch of Presence" — was activated.

The result?

0.4 seconds delay.

Too much. Way too much.

"He’s interfering with my emotional latency."

"He’s not a monster," Morwynn murmured from some invisible corner. "It’s a... response from the game itself."

The next move would come from the enemy. They knew it.

But no one was prepared for the way he would move.

Because the Hunter didn’t launch an attack.

He just disappeared.

And appeared behind Eren.

No sound. No notification. No aura.

Just present.

Eren turned his body, almost reflexively, but it was too late. The Hunter didn’t touch him. He just looked into his eyes, as if scanning something beyond his soul.

And he whispered, in a corrupted code voice:

"You shouldn’t exist."

The Hunter’s gaze was not like that of a creature. Nor was it like that of a man.

It was a code in the form of a slit—a window to something that did not belong to that world.

Eren felt the impact even before the attack.

His body froze. The entire interface shook as if it were about to crash.

[Alert: Link frequency compromised]

[Vitality loss: -4% per second | Source: Unstable Link (Morwynn)]

He widened his eyes.

The summoning was draining his own life energy.

"Hah... so that’s how you want to play," he whispered, feeling the warmth leave his hands.

Kaela tried to intervene, jumping between Eren and the Hunter with supernatural speed, but she was repelled with a single subtle gesture—as if an invisible field had realigned the reality around them.

She was thrown against one of the Core’s columns with a dull thud, cracking the enchanted stone.

"Kaela!" Eren shouted, staggering back. Sweat was already dripping down his temple.

His HP bar was flashing orange.

Morwynn was alive, but at his expense.

From high above in the shadows of the ceiling, the spider’s ethereal voice echoed:

"If I disperse, you survive."

"If you disperse, we die."

He didn’t hesitate.

"Go on."

Morwynn disappeared. Not completely. She spread out. Like a cloud of invisible webs infiltrating the air, covering every point in the room without volume, but with intention.

The Hunter, still standing, looked directly at where Eren had been seconds ago. A second of delay—imperceptible to anyone else. Perceptible to him.

Eren fired in a zigzag pattern.

Each step hurt as if the game itself were charging him for resistance.

[Vitality: 62%]

[Remaining Shadow Bonds: 2]

[Morwynn active: Continuous Drain | Critical Condition in 47 seconds]

Behind him, the Hunter’s feet didn’t even touch the ground.

He just glided, as if the laws of physics had been replaced by his own logic.

Kaela rose with a groan. She was bleeding from her mouth, but alive.

"I’m going to tear that thing apart," she said, spitting blood.

"You won’t," Eren replied coldly. "He’s no ordinary target. We need to be his bug. Not his victim."

From inside the soul necklace attached to Eren’s neck, something glowed.

Nyssa.

The slime appeared slowly. Weak, almost shy, but there was something different about it.

Its form was unstable, swirling in shades of gray and blue—echoing ancient memories that did not belong only to her.

[Ability Activated: Living Memory — Bond Reverberation]

[Effect: Assumes emotional fragments of past bonds to replicate ancient magical states]

Eren understood.

Nyssa wasn’t just a support now.

She held parts of him. Of the emotional connection between them.

And she could use that against something that didn’t understand emotions.

"Nyssa," he said softly, "you’re going to imitate me. But emotionally. Make him feel it."

Nyssa blinked—an almost human gesture.

Then she trembled. Vibrating like a dissonant note, her surface transformed into translucent replicas of moments lived.

Fragments of the first time Eren fed her.

Of the smile he gave when she learned to float.

Of the moment she almost died and he cried without realizing it.

All of this exploded in a wave of vivid sensory data.

The Hunter stopped.

It was enough.

Morwynn launched her sabotage.

The webs, spread out in impossible geometric patterns, vibrated in a reverse pulse—anti-script. A damaged code that infiltrated the Hunter’s lines not with power, but with impossibility.

[Sabotage: Partial Success]

[Anomaly: Unstable reaction to emotional field]

The Hunter didn’t scream.

But he trembled.

His body flickered like a low-resolution hologram. For a second, hexadecimal code pulsed across his forehead. Lines like:

[exec] EVAL: false

[override] heartbeat() - undefined

Eren didn’t waste the moment.

With his vitality at 37%, he activated his last resort:

Focus Transfusion — an unofficial ability, learned via a bug, that allowed him to transfer part of his own mental state to a summoned creature.

[Transfusion: Morwynn]

[Effect: Speed +500%, Code Penetration: Allowed for a limited time]

[Cost: 21% Vitality / Side Effect: Temporary Paralysis of User]

Eren’s body froze.

But Morwynn burst into action.

Like a living arrow, she emerged from the ceiling, piercing the Hunter’s head with a web-blade made of memory and dissonance.

The Hunter stopped again.

His eyes went blank.

There was no scream. There was no fall.

He simply ceased to be.

He disappeared like a process forcibly terminated.

Eren fell to his knees. His body exhausted, his system screaming, his skin sweating cold.

Kaela ran to him, still a little unsteady.

"Are you alive?"

"Technically," he replied, laughing weakly.

Morwynn collapsed beside him. Her form unstable, tired. But alive.

Nyssa also shrank, her surface trembling with effort.

And it was at that moment that the system made a point of not giving any respite.

[System: Anomaly contained]

[Patch 2.7.9-B on its way.]

[New modification to Bonds expected in the next few minutes.]

Eren looked up, panting, his eyes half-closed.

"Of course. Because winning is never the end... in this damn game."

Kaela muttered:

"What was that bastard?"

Eren clenched his fist.

"A warning."

"A warning of what?"

"That the next thing that comes... will be worse."