My Charity System made me too OP

Vael'Kriss did not rush. It simply moved—and pressure changed.

A crushing weight slammed into Leon from every direction. Not a spell. Not a skill. Just pure environmental dominance.

Leon's breath seized in his lungs. His blood slowed. Even Shell Pulse felt… lagged.

He grounded himself using Karmic Loop, channeling his tension outward to reinforce his bone structure and breathing with deliberate cadence.

The Wyrmarch circled, creating whirlpools of bone and vapor.

Then it struck.

A tendril of compressed seawater, sharper than a blade, whipped toward Leon. He blocked using Shell Reverb—but the moment the force was stored, Vael'Kriss dissolved into mist, denying him the opportunity to return it.

"That's new," Leon hissed, adjusting his stance.

Vael'Kriss dove back in, now attacking in pulses—appearing at random vectors around Leon, striking with limbs and pressure claws.

Leon couldn't rely on brute counters anymore.

He shifted strategy—Tripart Echo split his movements into phased timings, dodging in three patterns at once. The first got hit, the second absorbed, and the third retaliated.

Bit by bit, he broke Vael'Kriss's rhythm.

A clean strike landed—shattering a section of the Wyrmarch's armored carapace.

But the retaliation was vicious.

The arena surged into a full tide inversion—Leon was hurled against coral-razor walls, blood bursting from his shoulder as his Shell Pulse fractured under extreme overload.

He gasped.

"Too slow..."

Leon's skin split. His right eye bled black.

He touched his chest. The Convergence Core hummed.

"I didn't want to use this yet…"

But the Wyrmarch was already descending again, conjuring a sphere of null-magic. A prison of void.

Leon whispered.

"Activate Origin Sync."

Flames of three colors exploded from his body—Destruction red, Aether blue, Gold light—converging into a tri-circular seal beneath him.

He raised both hands.

"Destruction Pulse: Shatter the Veil!"

The ocean boiled.

The prison cracked.

Vael'Kriss reared back—but it was too late.

Leon's staff formed from the core itself, his eyes lit with Origin Drive.

He stepped into the Wyrmarch's charge—dodged using Shell Reverb—and planted the staff into Vael'Kriss's throat.

Boom.

Aether Blood surged into the bone structure.

Boom.

Gold Magic sealed its mist-body.

Boom.

Destruction ruptured its pressure control.

The tyrant screamed—a roar that shattered the soundless sea.

And then it imploded.

[Victory: Challenger Leon. Rank 7 Defeated.]

[Shell Reverb Mastery: 96% → 97.2%]

[Core Magic Synchronization: Stable]

[Abyssal Mana Integration: 12%]

Leon fell to one knee, gasping. His body was scorched from within, but he was still standing.

Milim whistled. "That thing almost broke you."

Roselia ran to his side, helping him up. "It wasn't just physical. That thing… tried to erase your sense of self."

Leon nodded. "And almost succeeded."

Roman handed him a cloth. "Don't worry. You're still ugly enough to be you."

They laughed softly.

But all eyes turned forward.

Six more.

And the next presence on the horizon…

felt ancient.

The arena this time wasn't built.

It was grown.

As Leon stepped through the obsidian archway, he emerged into a surreal cathedral—a dome of pulsating flesh and translucent crystal, its surfaces humming with unnatural resonance. The walls wept light. Every step he took sounded not like a footfall, but like a memory screaming to be remembered.

Roselia's voice came softly through the whisper stone.

"Leon… this arena's called the Memorium Chamber. The Elder said it reflects echoes of those who enter. Be careful—it won't just fight your body."

Leon gave a single nod.

Then the chamber trembled, and the rank 6 champion rose—Fleshglass Echo, a being of mirrored nerves and shifting form. Its body constantly restructured itself to resemble Leon in various past states—broken, furious, triumphant, grieving.

It was him. All of him.

Fleshglass Echo attacked with a mimicry that bordered on cruelty. It struck with Leon's old techniques—Tier II Shell Pulse, old Destruction spells, even Tripart Echo, but imperfectly, corrupted by the Mirror Core that formed its spine.

Leon countered with exact precision, recognizing his own patterns.

Until the mimic grew faster.

Then it switched form—becoming Leon from his worst memory. The day he lost Roman, briefly, during a failed Tandav invocation. Bloodied, desperate, half-mad.

It screamed—not words, but thoughts.

"I failed—I let him die—"

Leon gritted his teeth. "You're not me."

He activated Karmic Loop, turned a deflected blow into momentum, and drove a boot into the creature's neck. The arena flared red with tension.

[Shell Pulse Mastery: 97.2% → 97.8%]

Fleshglass changed again.

Now it was Leon in World Destroying Berserker form—unstable, veined with abyssal mana, his eyes mad with divinity.

Leon hesitated. He remembered this version. The one that almost killed everyone.

The echo whispered:

"I'm your truth. You'll always become me."

"Maybe," Leon growled, "but not today."

He summoned his core magics in tandem:

Gold Magic surged around him as concentric orbits of runes.

Aether Blood turned his strikes into accelerants.

Destruction built in pulses beneath his skin.

They clashed midair—Leon vs. his Berserker self—and the arena screamed under the strain. Shell Reverb absorbed blast after blast. Blood and fragments of memory scattered across the glowing walls.

Leon feinted right, planted his heel, and launched Shatter Echo, his most evolved Shell technique.

The impact cracked the Mirror Core.

The echo paused.

Leon stepped forward, staff ablaze.

"Let me show you what I have become."

Leon gathered all his previous echoes—each stored kinetic trace, each fragment of pain.

And then—returned it all at once.

"ABSOLUTE RETURN: CLOSED CIRCUIT."

A wave of pure retaliatory force exploded from his staff in perfect spiral motion, crashing into Fleshglass Echo and shattering its mirrored body into a thousand glowing fragments.

Silence.

And then—

[Victory: Challenger Leon. Rank 6 Defeated.]

[Shell Reverb Mastery: 98.6%]

[Core Conduction Efficiency: 91%]

Leon dropped to one knee, panting, blood dripping from his mouth. "That was… too close."

Milim and Liliana raced to his side.

Roselia pressed a hand to his back, her voice trembling. "You were fighting yourself the whole time. And you still won."

Leon whispered back, "That's what the last floors are, aren't they…? They're not trials of strength anymore."

Roman stepped in, solemn. "They're trials of identity."

They all looked toward the glowing doorway beyond the ruined chamber.

Only five more.

And now, Leon's greatest battle was no longer just survival—

It was remaining himself.