Lord: Sequence Master

Rosen hid within the space of his painting, eagerly watching as the Crypt Demon Leader tore off its armor plates.

Nine pieces of armor were ripped away, allowing the Crypt Demon Leader to break free from the Sacred Space Flame. However, without those nine armor plates, the demon was left with nine vulnerable weak spots.

The Crypt Demon Leader then coated itself in a layer of rock armor, from which countless spikes emerged, making it extremely difficult to engage in close combat.

Outside the Void Gallery, the flames surrounding its Flaming Skeleton form turned a silvery white. This was the Sacred Space Flame, which began to slowly break down the spatial vortex.

Once the vortex was fully disintegrated, Rosen retracted the Void Gallery into his Divine Domain. The Radiant Beacon began charging, and as soon as it finished, it fired a Radiant Beam. This golden beam pierced through a painting placed not far from the beacon, connecting with another painting within the gallery maze, directly in front of the Crypt Demon Leader, and shooting out of the gallery's space.

With the limited space in the gallery maze, the Crypt Demon Leader had no way to dodge the Radiant Beam. Though the Radiant Beacon's damage wasn't particularly high—being only a Sequence 9 divine building—the beam delivered continuous damage over time.

Like steel being forged in flames, the Radiant Beam acted as a slow burn rather than an instant lethal hit. As the gallery maze continually flooded with seawater, the Radiant Beam boiled the water, and the Crypt Demon Leader, submerged in the boiling water, couldn't even scream from the intense pain.

The demon tried to counter by summoning elemental earth, turning the boiling water into mud. With the cooling mud, the Crypt Demon Leader found some relief and prepared to fight back. However, the mud was quickly absorbed by Void Scavenging, which then reintroduced fresh seawater, causing the beam to boil it once again.

The Crypt Demon Leader was forced to summon more elemental earth, creating more mud, but each time it did, the mud was absorbed. This cycle continued as the Sequence 6 Crypt Demon struggled to survive.

Eventually, its elemental magic was exhausted, and its spiritual power drained. Without its rock armor, the nine exposed weak spots couldn't withstand the scalding steam. In the end, the gallery maze filled with the unbearable stench of cooked flesh as the Crypt Demon Leader was boiled alive.

Its corpse vanished, leaving behind three glowing orbs in the Void Scavenging space.

Rosen wasted no time, crushing the orbs to reveal three items: Sequence 6 Extraordinary Essence, a Crypt Space Skill Crystal, and a sample of Crypt Demon Extraordinary Bloodline.

Rosen immediately began preparing the Sequence 7 Trap Hunter potion. Retrieving his alchemy kit, he meticulously followed the process for mixing the ingredients.

The Crypt Demon Extraordinary Bloodline was one of the ideal core materials for a Trap Hunter.

The preparation was complex, but once Rosen added the Crypt Demon Extraordinary Crystal, the potion was complete. Instead of a liquid or solid form, the result was a living red lizard.

Rosen swallowed the red lizard, encasing it in spiritual energy as it entered his stomach. As soon as his spiritual energy dissipated, his stomach acids touched the red lizard, igniting his entire body with intense heat, and his cells began to mutate.

In an instant, Rosen transformed into a writhing lizard-man, and the whispers of the potion echoed in his mind, making him forget his humanity as the voices slowly twisted his spirit.

Normally, a Sequence 7 potion would require the bloodline of a Sequence 7 Crypt Demon, and using Sequence 6 bloodline significantly increased the potion's rejection rate. If Rosen had only 20 points of spiritual power, the mutation would have been fatal. However, with 25 points, he gradually regained clarity, resisting the whispers and asserting control over the potion's power.

After hours of struggle, Rosen's body returned to its human form, and he overcame the mutation. His spiritual power increased from 25 to 26 points.

He quickly checked the unique innate skill gained from becoming a Trap Hunter:

[Trap Space: Grants a customizable trap space]

It was a passive ability with no levels or enhancements. Rosen spent time learning how it worked.

The Trap Space functioned as an independent dimension, similar to the Crypt Space. Pre-prepared traps could be stored in the Trap Space and instantly deployed within his spiritual sensing range.

Additionally, the Trap Space could merge with real-world spaces, allowing Rosen to modify the terrain within the merged space as he desired.

Rosen left the Void Gallery and activated his Trap Space in the dungeon. Its radius was 26 meters, and it would grow as his spiritual power increased.

He sensed the ground beneath him, now as malleable as clay under his control. Quickly, he transformed the flat terrain into a pit filled with spikes.

When he deactivated the Trap Space, the pit vanished, and the ground returned to normal. However, the spike trap hadn't disappeared—it was merely hidden in a spatial layer, ready to be triggered whenever someone stepped into the area.

The Trap Space didn't just store and place traps; it allowed for the creation and concealment of traps within spatial layers, making them effectively invisible.

With enough trap-based supernatural skills, Rosen envisioned filling the Void Gallery with countless hidden traps, transforming it into a deadly labyrinth.

Returning to the Void Gallery, Rosen checked his Nen Ability, now upgraded to LV3:

[Nen Ability LV3: Manipulates life energy (Nen) and combines it with spiritual power to generate and control Nen energy.]

[Enhanced Traits: Grants Nen the properties of darkness, nightmares, gluttony, greed, space, light, and sealing.]

Rosen reviewed the list of traits, realizing they were the attributes his spiritual power had accumulated.

Two traits—water and fire from the Holy Grail Knight and the holy attribute from the Angel's Blessing—had not integrated into his Nen Ability, as they were tied to external sources. However, all other traits had fully merged with his Nen Ability.

This wasn't surprising, given that these traits were all passive and deeply embedded in his being. Since Nen was essentially life force, it made sense that Rosen's life force had absorbed these traits, making it easier for him to develop Nen-based abilities in the future.

Rosen then began experimenting with his Gluttony Beast, remodeling it using the various traits he had integrated.

The transformation of the Gluttony Beast went smoothly. The addition of space-attributed nen granted its stomach a vast internal space, while sealing-attributed nen suppressed any resistance from its prey. Light- and shadow-attributed nen gave it powerful stealth capabilities.

Next, the nightmare-attributed nen enabled the Gluttony Beast to devour nightmares. Finally, greed-attributed nen enhanced its digestion abilities.

After these modifications, the Gluttony Beast was fully strengthened and significantly more powerful than before.

Rosen then turned his attention to upgrading the God-Slayer Crossbow to increase its destructive power. There were several ways to boost the damage of nen-constructed firearms: increasing the caliber, augmenting damage through hunter skills, and enhancing the quality of nen. All of these could elevate the lethality of the God-Slayer Crossbow.

First, Rosen enlarged the caliber and gave the crossbow the ability to change size. At its smallest, it could shrink to the size of a handgun. In its regular form, it resembled a crossbow with a shortened barrel, but when the barrel extended, it became a sniper rifle. At its largest, it could even transform into a ballista for long-range sniping.

After increasing the caliber, Rosen focused on skill enhancement and nen amplification. Enhancing the crossbow's power required Death Strike to be upgraded to LV4, and further improvements depended on Nightmare Slime advancing to Sequence 7.

Lastly, Rosen modified the abilities of the God-Slayer Crossbow. Its existing features included Hunter's Magic Eye and Artist's Magazine. The Hunter's Magic Eye had automatically improved alongside Rosen's sequence rank, advancing its scouting, recording, uploading, synthesis, and destruction capabilities.

Rosen's focus was on revamping the Artist's Magazine. This magazine's value lay in its ability to materialize drawn bullets and arrows into reality. When Rosen had initially designed it, he was still low-level and poor, limiting its capabilities. Now, however, he had access to extraordinary resources and intended to enhance the Artist's Magazine so that bullets and arrows, upon hitting their targets, would transform into a different spiritual painting.

This wasn't a modification that could be completed in a single day, so Rosen reactivated the Time Loop Spiritual Realm. By now, Li Shiqing was no longer the protagonist of the realm—the original male lead had become the new anchor point of the time loop. However, this man remained unconscious and unaware that he was trapped in the loop.

After half a month, Rosen finished modifying the Artist's Magazine and, after two months, successfully painted a spiritual work.

The painting was a two-sided artwork, far more complex than a typical single-sided one. The front depicted a Sequence 9 Spatial Armor-Piercing Bullet, while the back featured The Rose of the Poor.

Rosen was stunned by the result, a masterpiece that had taken two months to complete. During this process, he traveled to Shafick Province to acquire an actual Rose of the Poor from the Shafick Financial Group. He personally detonated the rose, enduring death and a drop in his spiritual energy threshold to 25 points, only to resurrect in his domain afterward. It took two more months to finally capture this explosion in a spiritual painting.

On the Human Skin Canvas, the painting depicted the Rose of the Poor mid-explosion. The smoke and virus, resistant to high temperatures, formed a cloud shaped like a rose, rising into the sky with the dismembered remains of the Wolf Pack Adventurer Group scattered inside. The death scenes of each member were rendered with horrifying realism—except for Fritz, the Count, who survived.

Though the Rose of the Poor was powerful, it couldn't instantly kill a Sequence 6 being, since individuals at that level could easily escape into the spiritual realm or use space-related skills for survival. Staying alive was key to endless future possibilities.

Thus, even if the Rose of the Poor from the painting manifested in reality, it wouldn't instantly kill Fritz, the Count. However, the virus contained within the rose posed a deadly threat to him.

While a painter could theoretically paint anything, the strength of the painted objects depended on the artist's spiritual energy. Rosen had initially doubted whether he could create the Rose of the Poor painting. Ultimately, its success was due to the inherent spirituality of the Human Skin Canvas, the enhancement provided by the Divine Pen, and the Gluttony Beast's endless supply of spiritual energy. Only through these combined factors was Rosen able to complete this extraordinary artwork.

Rosen loaded the painting into the Artist's Magazine, converting it into a Spatial Armor-Piercing Bullet, and chambered the round.

Finally, he exited the Time Loop Spiritual Realm and inspected the God-Slaying Crossbow:

[God-Slaying Crossbow, Gluttony Beast]

[God-Slaying Crossbow LV3: Full-Nen Ability]

Attributes: Increases base damage by 40%, greatly amplifies nen damage, can hold and store all of the user's nen.

Attachments: Hunter's Divine Eye, Artist's Magazine.Passive Abilities: 360-degree vision, 30x vision enhancement, automatic recognition, and tracking.

Active Abilities: Size alteration, recording, uploading, synthesis, destruction.

Extraordinary Ability: Hunting—Killing spiritual entities allows slight recovery of one's spirituality, minuscule growth of spiritual power, and a chance to gain extra rewards by capturing spiritual energy.

As Rosen prepared to leave the dungeon, Gray Mouse approached and handed him a chest, reminding Rosen that he had forgotten to open the treasure chest.

Upon opening it, Rosen found two light spheres containing rewards. Crushing them, he received two free skill crystals: Spatial Trap Construction and Elemental Trap Construction.

Both skills were exactly what Rosen needed, but he didn't have time to fully master them yet. There were only 30 minutes left to collect the dungeon's spoils after clearing out its demons.

(End of Chapter)