The Runic Alchemist - Chapter 23: Debt & Price

**MASS RELEASE 10 CHAPTERS ON FIRST NOVEMBER** 2 CHAPTERS DAILY (NOVEMBER)Seraphina Vale grew up unwanted. An orphan passed from one home to another until she learned that happy endings were best found between pages, not in real life. By adulthood, she was a broke writer, living on instant noodles and failed manuscripts, clinging to dreams that never sold.Then her best friend mailed her a “souvenir” — a tiny glass bottle supposedly holding phoenix tears. She laughed, made a wish, and the next thing she knew… she woke up in another world.A world where dragons run corporations, fox spirits manage PR, and even gorgons hold seats in the boardroom.And her? She’s not even the heroine. Just a phoenix side character and worse, a defective one.As if being cannon fodder wasn’t bad enough, the System whispers her only way home: die.Easy to say, but impossible when phoenixes don’t stay dead. Every time she burns out, she rises again, trapped in the same cruel loop.Then there’s her boss… Lucian Drake, the Ice Dragon CEO with glacial eyes and a reputation as the perfect gentleman. In the original story, Lucian Drake was fated to betray her. His carefully planned affection was only a trap to draw out the real heroine.The system keeps warning her: 'don’t trust him, don’t fall for him.'But how can she not when he smiles like that, when his voice softens, when his smallest gestures feel too genuine to be scripted?So she lets herself believe, just a little… that maybe this story could change.Maybe this time, she could change her roles.But stories have rules. And when the truth surfaces, it cuts deep.She was never the one. Just a substitute. A pawn in his plan to lure the real heroine back.And yet, when everything falls apart, when the truth burns through their carefully built lies, Lucian is the one left chasing after the phoenix he broke.If Seraphina wants to escape, she’ll have to survive office politics, respawn cycles, and a love that was never meant to be hers. Because even if the coldest dragon learns to love her too late... it might already be her turn to fly away.[Transmigration] [Fantasy Romance] [Enemies to Lovers] [Rebirth Loop] [Substitute Female Lead] [Cold CEO Dragon] [Phoenix FL] [Chasing Her Back] [Emotional Betrayal] [Second Male Lead Redemption] [Slow Burn]P/s : This story is written primarily in first-person (Seraphina’s POV) with occasional third-person scenes from Lucian’s perspective to show events outside her knowledge. Expect sarcasm, emotional chaos, and dragons with communication issues.

A lost soul from Earth transmigrates to a world of cultivation and finds himself in the body of a playboy noble and complete waste. Except he doesn't have any memories, can't let anyone know he's not the same person and is immediately involved in a conspiracy with a powerful noble family.Luckily he came to this world with a power, whatever he gives to someone as a gift he'll get it back 100 times better.His first target?His new wife, the former top young genius.

Harry Morton was born in an age where magic and mana ruled everything.

He was unable to awaken his affinity and to make things worse he was born with a broken mana core foundation which meant he would never be able to create or develop a mana core. Since he couldn’t create a mana core, he would never be able to draw mana—not even the slightest strand.

He was the first person to be born without a mana core foundation, the only one with the inability to draw mana. Due to this, he was regarded as trash by everyone: his parents, his friends, the society and even the academy he attended.

It was until one day, during a mana beast attack when he almost lost his life.

He saw a strange white line rapidly moving downwards, towards him. Unbeknownst to him, the white streak went into his body.

When he woke up the next day, a strange message appeared in front of him.

DING!!

[Welcome Host to the Manaless mage system]

However things didn’t end there, a lot of secrets were revealed to him, things greater than he could have ever imagined.

Now that he had the power, would he save humanity?

Follow the protagonist in his journey as the Manaless mage, as he rises to the absolute top!

After forming a blood pact with the Saint and Demon ladies, the good-for-nothing young boy obtained the Yin-Yang divine veins, learned the art of alchemy and martial arts, and dominated the world.The young Shen Xiang had a romantic encounter with a goddess and a witch, and obtained their supreme inheritance, acquired a divine vein that defied the heavens, learned peerless magical skills, and mastered superb alchemy techniques, which made him very successful on the road of martial arts... When he was hungry, he would refine some pills as snacks, when he was lonely, he would flirt with the high and mighty goddess, when he was bored, he would play with those martial arts masters who came to ask for pills, and when he was tired, he would let the delicate wives around him give him massages...