My Charity System made me too OP

His hand trembled.

"You want a final verse?" he muttered, spitting crimson.

He reached deep—not into his cores, but into the Abyssal Leech King's memory within his soul.

"Then let me teach you silence."

He invoked a full-core merge:

→ Destruction

→ Aether Blood

→ Gold Magic

→ Void Law

→ Shell Reverb: Echo of Origin

Light collapsed around him as the fusion created an anti-sound field—every vibration nullified.

He charged through Mael'Rhun's wall of pain.

The creature raised its arms—

But no voice came.

Leon's staff cracked across its skull. The choir fell silent. With a final strike, he drove the Origin Echo through Mael'Rhun's heart.

The room sang a single, dying note.

Then silence.

True silence.

[Victory: Rank 18 – The Scarred Choir, Mael'Rhun, Defeated.]

[Level Up: 625 → 628.]

[Skill Gained: Song of Reversal – Once per battle, negate all sound-based abilities and reflect one back with double force.]

Leon collapsed to one knee, bloodied, hearing returning in slow echoes. His ears rang with memory, not pain.

Milim caught him. "That one was… weird."

Leon exhaled slowly. "Yeah. But I heard what I needed."

Roselia crouched beside him. "What's that?"

Leon stood, wiping blood from his chin. "Even suffering has a rhythm. And I'm learning how to play it."

Roman raised an eyebrow. "So. Rank 17 next?"

Leon's knuckles tightened. "Rank 17."

He looked up at the next gate.

"And I'll make it scream."

Leon stood before the gateway to Rank 17, his breath slow, measured. The scars from his battle with Mael'Rhun still throbbed beneath his skin—ghostly echoes, reminders that the deeper he went, the more the Obsidian Ant domain tested not only strength but essence.

The doors parted with a hiss like grinding tectonic plates. Beyond them lay a narrow bridge of stone suspended over a void—a rift that seemed bottomless, flickering with strands of red lightning. The air was thin, heavy with pressure. Each step felt like dragging his soul uphill.

At the far end stood his opponent: Threx Volundar, the Riftspine.

A serpentine figure clad in obsidian-scaled armor, its six arms each bearing a different weapon—spear, axe, blade, flail, whip, and a long rifle. But what drew Leon's gaze most was the spine protruding from its back, extending upward like a monolith, etched in shifting glyphs of unknown language. That spine pulsed in time with the rift beneath them.

Threx's voice echoed, distorted. "You who carry so many burdens... will you bear the Spine, or be broken by it?"

Leon didn't answer. He just stepped forward, staff in hand, Shell Pulse humming beneath his skin.

The battle began in an instant.

Threx dashed forward with the spear—blindingly fast, its movement snapping like a whipcrack. Leon pivoted, Shell Reverb already reading the kinetic flow. He parried, redirected the momentum, and launched a counterstrike.

But Threx's body twisted impossibly mid-air, bringing the axe down from above. Leon caught it with his staff, the force cracking the stone beneath him. Before he could react, the flail lashed around his leg, dragging him across the bridge.

Leon flipped up, tearing free with an Echo Step, and launched a Golden Crescent Barrage—projectiles of condensed gold mana.

Threx's whip snapped, unraveling into a thousand ribbons that dissolved the barrage in mid-air.

"He fights like six minds in one," Leon thought grimly. "Every arm has a different intent."

Leon activated Shell Reverb: Absolute Return, letting the damage soak in—the whip across his back, the spear through his side, the blade grazing his thigh.

He stored the pain. Held it like breath.

Then—Release.

He lashed out in a storm of amplified strikes, every blow echoing with the force of Threx's own weapons. The bridge cracked from the pressure. The rift below howled.

One of Threx's arms shattered. He recoiled—but not in pain. He smiled.

The spine on his back surged with energy, and suddenly, Leon felt time slow.

The next instant, Threx was everywhere. Blades from above, bullets from below, axe at his ribs, whip binding his staff, spear toward his heart—

Leon cried out as blood sprayed. Even Shell Reverb couldn't keep up. The Riftspine was warping reality.

Leon fell to one knee, blood pouring from his side. His staff cracked. His body screamed.

"This is the limit… again."

He gritted his teeth.

"No. This is where I grow."

He activated full Core Fusion.

→ Destruction: His aura flared red-black, raw entropy distorting the air.

→ Aether Blood: Time shimmered around his body, accelerating reflexes and warping perception.

→ Gold Magic: His strikes began glowing with pure, piercing resonance.

→ Abyss Magic: A black corona formed, draining mana from the environment.

The rift reacted—screaming. The bridge split in multiple places, unable to withstand his surge.

Leon blurred forward.

He took the spear through the shoulder—on purpose—and used the opening to jam his hand against Threx's core.

Shell Pulse: Origin Echo.

Destruction Lance.

Temporal Implosion.

A soundless burst cracked the air as Threx's chest detonated inward, collapsing into itself. The obsidian spine shattered, sending runes scattering like ash.

Threx dropped his weapons, swayed, and fell backwards—off the bridge, into the rift.

[Victory: Rank 17 – Threx Volundar, the Riftspine, Defeated.]

[Level Up: 628 → 631.]

[Skill Gained: Rift Pulse — Once per battle, bend space within a 10-meter radius, enabling instant repositioning and destabilizing enemy equilibrium.]

Leon stumbled back to the bridge's center, breathing hard, vision swimming. His armor hung in shreds. Blood soaked one leg, and his arms trembled.

Milim and Roselia waited at the gate, both pale.

"You should've waited for us," Milim muttered.

Leon grinned faintly. "You'd only slow me down."

He collapsed in Roselia's arms.

Roman approached, voice grim. "The rift nearly tore you in half."

Leon nodded. "And now I know how it feels."

He looked up at the gate to Rank 16.

"One more song," he whispered. "Let's see what melody pain sings next."

Leon rose from the healer's circle the next day, body stiff but repaired. The fight against Threx had torn open more than wounds—it had forced him to reconcile the dangerous balance of his Core Fusion. He could win, yes, but at what cost?

Still, the next gate loomed.

Rank 16.

He entered the chamber quietly, stepping into a cathedral of mirrored glass and bone. The floor shimmered with prismatic fractures, and the ceiling above reflected every movement—except not quite correctly. His own image stared back from the mirrored dome, but the expression it wore was wrong—twisted in hatred, cloaked in abyssal flames, and wielding a staff warped by madness.

From the far side, the real enemy emerged.

Vaer'Zhul, the Dreambane.

A figure draped in a black mantle of stitched shadows, its face hidden behind a mask of cracked silver. Each footstep left behind a bloom of nightmares that clung to the floor like mold. It carried no weapon—just a single orb pulsing with unreal energies, its surface rippling like water disturbed by thought.

The room dimmed.

"You carry the burden of too many selves, Leon," Vaer'Zhul said. "Let me free you of them."

And the mirrors shattered.