The moment the word left Atlas’s mouth, he paused in place, completely dumbfounded and confused, because he himself had no idea what he had just said. It was not a word he remembered learning. It was not a word he had heard in Ormolio, inside the Explorer Guild, from the nobles, from the commoners, or from anyone else in his life. It had come out of his mouth naturally, as if his tongue already knew how to shape it, but his mind could not connect any meaning to it.

"What was that?" he said, his brows pulling together as his own voice echoed faintly in the ruin. "What language was that? Why did I say something I don’t even understand?"

He stood there for a few seconds, still looking at nothing in particular, and the first thing that came to his mind was the Codex. This thing had already changed his body, accepted blood, written numbers, opened pages, shown strange conditions, and dragged him into situations he could not fully understand. So it was natural for him to think that this was also the Codex’s doing. Just as he was about to accuse it again for whatever had happened to his tongue and mind, his gaze shifted down to the page in front of him, where new text had already started forming in that same direct and emotionless way.

[ Classification: Koyu-Kokuin (固有刻印) — Inherent Inscription ]

[ Progress: Rei-Kokuin (零刻印) — Zero Inscription ]

[ Active Vector: Kankon-Rei { 還痕零 } ]

[ Kankon-Rei {還痕零}: User’s Bloodline’s Inherent 1st Inscription — Zero Inscription’s Active Vector Core Ability ]

[ Note: User must press the name of the Active Vector to assimilate its knowledge directly into the user’s mind ]

Atlas stared at the page for several seconds without moving, and the longer he looked at the words, the stranger his expression became. He was confused, but underneath that confusion was something else he could not ignore. A strange familiarity rose inside him when he looked at the words on the page and even at the script itself. It did not feel like something completely foreign being shown to him for the first time. It felt closer to something he had seen many times before but could not place where, when, or how.

He exhaled slowly and rubbed his forehead with his fingers, as if that would make the strange feeling settle down. "Hah... Unknown things again? But this time something feels familiar, even if I still don’t understand any of it. It feels like my body remembers it, but my mind doesn’t."

His eyes moved down toward his legs, then toward his hands, then toward the skin visible beneath the torn parts of his attire. At first, he thought it was only the lighting of the ruin or the faint glow from the Codex affecting his vision, but after staring properly, he realized that was not the case at all.

His skin had turned shadowy white.

Atlas’s eyes widened, and his fingers immediately pressed against his own wrist, then his arm, then the back of his hand. The color was real.

’What in the world. What happened to my skin?’

The shock lasted only a moment before he pushed past it, because he had already gone through too many impossible things to freeze for long. He turned his attention back to the Codex and looked at it with a sharper gaze.

"It’s you, isn’t it? You did this to my body. I don’t know whether this is because of the Bloodline page, the Inscription, or whatever this Active Vector is, but this is definitely connected to you."

The Codex hummed faintly, almost like it was agreeing with him.

Atlas narrowed his eyes at that. Suspicion flickered through him for a second, but he dismissed it quickly because he already knew there was no point pushing the Codex for answers. It could not speak, could not explain things like a person. It could not write on it’s own outside of the information it was already showing him. Even if it miraculously could write, he highly doubted it would spill things out readily.

He looked at the name of the Active Vector again, brushing his fingers against his own mouth while his thoughts stayed on the word he had spoken. He did not know its meaning. He did not know why the pronunciation had come so naturally. The Codex had always been mysterious, and with every new thing it showed him, it felt less like a relic and more like something else entirely.

With a quiet sigh, he held the Sanguis Stylus above the page. The stylus was still familiar in his hand, but now even that familiarity felt different. Before, it had only been a strange tool that used blood to write numbers and force changes into his body. Now, while holding it, Atlas felt like the stylus was not merely writing on the Codex. It was acting as a connection between his blood, the page, and whatever had just awakened inside him.

He moved it toward the Active Vector name, Kankon-Rei, and pressed it gently against the text.

The moment the tip touched the page, his head snapped upward on its own. His back straightened without his permission, his fingers tightened around the stylus, and his eyes shone faintly, a slight glow becoming visible inside his pupils.

He stayed like that for a long moment, completely still, as if his body had been stopped while his mind was being forced to receive something directly. Several seconds passed, then more time passed, and he still had not come back. It was only after a full minute that the light inside his eyes faded and his breathing returned to normal.

He lowered his head slowly, but his expression was not the same as before. The confusion was still there, but now it was mixed with understanding, and that understanding made the entire situation feel even more absurd to him.

"...Active Vector Kankon-Rei — 還痕零. This is absurd. Beyond absurd. What is this?"

He did not register that he had spoken in the same unfamiliar script again. He was not focused on his own tongue anymore. His head turned toward the Codex immediately, almost like he already expected it to show him more, because the knowledge that had just entered his mind was incomplete. It told him what the ability was, but not everything required to use it properly.

[ Active Vector: Kankon-Rei { 還痕零 } ]

[ Kankon-Rei { 還痕零 }: Forming a [ + ] slash, the user can nullify the rank of anything in this world and restore it to ’Zero’. This Active Vector is only usable after the user increases the new Attribute ’Null’. ]

For the first time, Atlas was not confused by what he was reading. He understood the meaning directly.

He turned to the first page where all his attributes were listed. His eyes moved past Strength, Stamina, Agility, Vitality, and Spirit, then stopped below Spirit where a new line had appeared that had not been there before.

Null: _ _ [ LOCKED ]

Atlas stared at the blank space, and the number came to his mind immediately.

’Fifty, Nothing less, nothing more. This will finally make my revenge against them take less time.’

He brought the stylus closer to the blank space without hesitation.

He wrote the number cleanly.

Null: 50 [ LOCKED ]

The moment the number settled into place, Atlas felt it.

His mind went blank.

It was not like normal exhaustion. It was not simple pain either. His thoughts scattered before he could hold them, his senses dimmed, and the ruin around him started becoming distant. He was losing consciousness, but even as it happened, a smile formed on his face, because he only felt that he had taken another step toward the people he wanted to reach.

’Heh...Finally. I am coming for you, you bastards.’

His body dropped onto the floor of the ruin with the Codex still open nearby.

The scythe, still embedded in the ground beside him, hummed quietly, as if it understood exactly what its wielder was going through again.

The Codex remained silent, the same way it always had.