Michael’s body arched as the pain slammed into him. He let out a raw, guttural scream, "Aaaargh!" The sound echoed off the dungeon walls, torn from deep within his eyes.
Michael felt like clawing out his own eye. By now, Michael was shouting his lungs out from the pain, and his face was covered in so much blood, as if Michael was crying out a fountain of blood for his pupil. He had tried shutting his eye, but the pain continued. It was like someone was ripping out his eyeballs from his skull.
Lost in the blinding pain, Michael’s sense of time shattered; minutes, hours, and days melted together until every second felt like an eternity stretching on without end. Each breath was a struggle, and the world faded away until there was only pain—relentless and all-consuming, trapping him in a place where nothing else existed but the agony he couldn’t escape.
Gradually, the agony that had held Michael captive began to loosen its grip. The sharp, tearing pain dulled to a deep, pulsing ache, and he could finally catch his breath. Little by little, as each wave of pain faded, Michael felt a shaky sense of relief washing over him, but still, Michael would never forget this.
[Reward claimed: kurogan] Original content can be found at novęlfire.net
Michael couldn’t be bothered with the system notification right now as he was covered in blood; all he needed right now was to be sent out of this hellish dungeon.
Just then, Michael was sucked out of the dungeon, appearing right in front of the dungeon door David Blackwood and he had walked through. Michael could see the dungeon gate crumble, signaling the clearing of the dungeon.
[You received dungeon reward]
Michael already knew that at the end of a dungeon, whoever landed the last blow to the dungeon boss would be rewarded at the end of the dungeon.
Just as Michael appeared through the dungeon gate, Instructor Keal was very happy that Michael was able to survive this dungeon because he clearly knew how high the chance was for a student to die in a dungeon test such as this one.
Instructor Keal immediately rushed towards Michael, seeing he was covered in blood; he thought that Michael must have seriously suffered an injury.
"Instructor Keal approached Michael quietly, noticing the boy was standing with his back turned, shoulders tense. Gently, he placed a reassuring hand on Michael’s shoulder and leaned in, concern etched across his face.
’Hey, Michael, are you okay?’ Keal asked softly. ’Are you hurt, my boy?’ His voice was filled with worry as he waited for Michael to respond, hoping to comfort him and find out what was wrong."
Michael, feeling Instructor Keal’s touch, turned his body to face the instructor. Immediately, their eyes met; Instructor Keal froze up and didn’t move as he was drawn to something.
If Michael were to look in a mirror, he would notice his purple eyes had changed and instead turned black.
The eye was unlike any mortal gaze.
Its sclera had turned pitch black, darker than shadow itself, as if ink had flooded the whites completely. From the center, a sharp crimson glow pulsed outward in fractured lines like cracks etched into volcanic glass.
Floating within the deep obsidian iris was a perfect double red ring, luminous and unblinking, rotating ever so slowly like a seal of power.
Inside that ring sat the silhouette of a crow—sharp-beaked, wings folded, talons carved in eerie stillness. It wasn’t just a shape; it felt alive, as if the crow was watching, waiting, thinking.
The entire eye radiated a cold, heavy presence—ominous and ancient, like a cursed relic sealed within flesh. Looking into it was like staring into a storm trapped behind glass... and knowing it could break loose at any second. And that gaze was focused on Instructor Keal.
"How is his eye ability so strong as to pull me in?" Instructor Keal thought.
Instructor Keal knew a lot about eye abilities and had seen a lot of eye wielders and knew only special people could be born with it and it is usually triggered. And for Michael’s pupil ability to pull him in so easily that he couldn’t resist only spoke more of how powerful his eye was, which was kind of scary.
Instructor Keal channeled his essence to break off the hold and free himself.
"You never told me you possessed an eye ability," Instructor Keal said, looking at Michael mysteriously.
"Eye ability? I don’t know what you are talking about, sir," Michael said, scratching the back of his head. "Ouch!" Michael shouted, realizing that was his injured hand.
Instructor Keal, seeing Michael’s injured hand, asked for them to call a healer to attend to Michael, but it would take a while for a healer to arrive.
Instructor Keal actually thought Michael was lying to him, but seeing the shock on his face when he was asked about his eye ability goes to show he didn’t know about it. "Congratulations, Michael, you have awakened your eye, so tell me, kid, what’s it called?" Instructor Keal asked.
Michael was generally confused, so he blinked a couple of times, and his eye went back to their normal purple color.
"So tell me, kid, and stop keeping me in the dark, what name is your eye called?" Instructor Keal asked. Being a professor, he found it his task to learn new things, and seeing Michael’s eye, he knew it was one of a kind and was very powerful to be able to lock him in place.
Michael didn’t know what to reply as he never remembered anything about awakening his eye ability; in fact, he didn’t even know what any of those were, so he couldn’t understand what was going on. That was until it hit him. "Could this be the system’s reward?" He asked himself. He finally remembered what the system told him.
[Reward claimed: kurogan]
"Kurogan," Michael said to Instructor Keal.
"Kurogan, hmm, that means black eye," Instructor Keal said. Just immediately, a healer arrived and started healing Michael.
Instructor Keal decided to leave and give the healer time to work, but somehow that name kept repeating in his head: "kurogan".