Chapter 45: [45] : Pushing the Limits, Million Point Gamble

Declan was losing health fast. His vision was starting to flash a dangerous warning red.

[-20 HP]

He was down to twenty percent of his maximum health. If he took two more ticks of the ambient damage, he was going back to the real world in a body bag.

He could not hit Malthus. The Spire Master was immune to physical and magical damage because his body operated on a conceptual law. It was a fancy way of saying the boss was a walking cheat code.

"You cannot punch a concept." Declan muttered, forcing himself to stand up. His legs felt heavy. "You need a concept to fight a concept."

He opened his digital inventory. He ignored his weapons. He ignored the health potions that would not work anyway.

He pulled out a small glowing piece of white jade.

It was the Talisman of Absolute Purity plus 20.

The item had a ten meter Aura of Cleansing that ignored all environmental hazards. It had kept them completely safe in the toxic swamp outside.

But right now, the silver light from the talisman was flickering wildly. The aura was shrinking. It was being crushed by Malthus’s Decaying World Domain. The Level 50 Spire Master’s conceptual rule was simply stronger than a plus 20 scavenged tier item.

"Not strong enough." Declan whispered. "System. Open the enhancement menu."

The familiar blue interface popped up in front of his face.

He looked at his treasury balance. Thanks to Sloane’s aggressive auction house sales, the player tolls, and the millions of Flesh Stalkers that had passively died against the Iron Bastion’s reflected damage walls while he was climbing the Spire, his funds were absurd.

[Origin Points: 2,450,000]

He was carrying over two million Origin Points. It was the GDP of a small country in his pocket.

"System." Declan commanded, his voice cold and determined. "Enhance the Talisman of Absolute Purity. Push it past twenty. Push it until I tell you to stop."

The cost to upgrade an item past plus 20 was supposed to be mathematically impossible. The system charged exponentially.

[System Enhancement Initiated. Calculating cost...]

[Talisman +21... Cost: 50,000 Origin Points]

Fifty thousand points vanished instantly. A bright white light erupted from the jade stone in Declan’s hand.

[Talisman +25... Cost: 250,000 Origin Points]

The light turned a deep blinding purple. The headache hit Declan immediately. It was not just a normal migraine. It felt like someone had shoved a live wire directly into his brain stem. The game was actively trying to stop him from breaking its core physics engine.

Malthus stopped floating. The Apostle of Rot frowned, looking at the glowing light in Declan’s hand.

"What are you doing?" Malthus demanded. "Your code is failing. Accept deletion."

"Shut up." Declan grunted, blood dripping from his nose. "System. Keep going."

[Notice: Critical Error. Item density exceeding server parameters. Neural link failure imminent]

[Talent: Boundless Enhancement overriding error]

[Talisman +30... Cost: 500,000 Origin Points]

Over a million points were gone from his bank. The white jade stone began to crack. It could not hold the sheer amount of data being forced into it. The stone shattered, turning into a floating orb of pure liquid silver energy.

The aura around Declan flared, pushing back the green toxic fog of the Decaying World by a few feet.

Declan’s health stopped draining for a split second.

"Impossible." Malthus hissed. The Entity raised his hands, forcing more dark green magic into the room. "You cannot overwrite a Spire Master’s Domain! The server hierarchy forbids it!"

The green fog surged forward, slamming into Declan’s silver aura and trying to crush it again.

"Hierarchy?" Declan laughed, though it sounded more like a wheeze. His fifteen percent real world synchronization was the only thing keeping his physical brain from melting under the strain of the system errors. "I own the fucking server. Keep going, System!"

[Talisman +35... Cost: 1,000,000 Origin Points]

The remaining balance in his treasury plummeted. He was nearly broke again. But he did not care.

The pain in his head vanished, replaced by a feeling of absolute terrifying clarity. The liquid silver orb in his hand began to spin rapidly, humming with a frequency that made the very air in the cathedral vibrate.

[Warning: Conceptual limit breached. Reality anchor failing]

"Hit forty!" Declan roared.

[Talisman has reached +40]

[Triggering Ultimate Conceptual Mutation...]

The system text in his vision did not appear in blue or red. It appeared in a brilliant blinding gold that completely drowned out the dark red lighting of the cathedral.

The liquid silver orb in Declan’s hand exploded. It did not deal damage. It just released a shockwave of pure unadulterated authority.

[Item Mutated: Domain of the Absolute Sovereign]

↳ Type: Conceptual Override

↳ Functionality: For 30 seconds, the user completely overwrites all hostile domains. Within a 50 meter radius, the user dictates the local laws of physics, magic, and reality.

Declan stood up straight. The blood stopped dripping from his nose. His health bar instantly locked in place.

The silver shockwave hit Malthus’s green toxic fog.

It did not fight the fog. It did not push it back. It simply deleted it. The green magic fizzled out like a blown lightbulb. The bubbling sludge on the floor reverted back to clean white ash.

Malthus stumbled backward, his pitch black eyes wide with genuine coded fear. The Entity looked at his hands. His green rotting magic was completely gone.

"My Domain." Malthus stammered. "You... you erased a Spire Law."

"I told you." Declan said softly. He stepped forward. The air around him shimmered with heavy absolute power. "You need a rule to beat a rule. And right now? I am the rule."

Declan looked at the floating Apostle. He did not pull out a weapon. He did not cast a spell. He just looked at him. 𝚏𝗿𝗲𝐞𝐰𝚎𝕓𝐧𝚘𝘃𝗲𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝕞

"Gravity." Declan said calmly. "Times five hundred."

He did not swing a massive halberd to generate the force. He just dictated the physics of the room.

Malthus did not even have time to scream.

The invisible crushing weight of five hundred times normal gravity slammed into the Spire Master. The Level 50 Entity was slammed face first into the stone floor.

The sound of Malthus’s divine conceptual bones snapping under his own weight echoed through the silent cathedral like a gunshot.

Declan casually reached into his inventory and pulled out his heavy plus 30 Warden Halberd. He dragged it along the stone floor as he walked slowly toward the paralyzed god.

"Let us see how much experience a Spire Master drops." Declan smiled.