MTL - Have You Ever Met Such a Cold Author - Chapter 16 The old man who won the laurel

Koi Niles has always been alone. Quiet halls and empty lunchtimes are his familiar companions. Grades matter to him; they’re his way out.Ashley Miller owns the school corridors. Captain of the ice hockey team, confident smile, and a name everyone knows. When a class project pairs them together, Connor sees a chance. But Ashley disappears, leaving Connor to carry the weight.Days later, under the harsh lights of Connor’s part-time job, Ashley returns. This time, it’s different. He stands up for Connor, turns the tide against the bullies. A simple act of kindness that feels new and warm.They share moments—short walks, brief talks, the understanding of two worlds colliding. Friendship grows where none was before.But Ashley holds a secret behind those bright eyes. One evening, worry leads Connor to Ashley’s door. What he discovers there changes everything he thought he knew.

Thrown into the chaotic “god Verse,” Ryan Stone awakens a power beyond imagining: the SSS-Tier “Ultimate Infinite Extraction System.” While others struggle with mundane abilities, Ryan can deconstruct anything, from monster corpses to ancient artifacts, even the fading signatures of defeated foes, assimilating their essence to achieve limitless growth.From a desperate survivor in a starting outpost, Ryan’s unique talent propels him to unimaginable heights. He outwits cunning rivals, crushes powerful challengers in Sector-wide scrambles, and seizes control of a god Weaver, becoming a Sector Lord. But as he unravels the secrets of the lost Precursors and the cataclysmic Reality Schism that shattered their universe, his system evolves, granting him the power not just to extract, but to impose his will on reality itself.

If human life could continue to grow stronger indefinitely, reaching infinite heights, then one day it might connect with the heavens!

At first, when he learned that he was forced to go to many different routine worlds and be reborn into all kinds of cannon fodder, he was against it.