Magical Cores are what give Chosens and Demons their supernatural strength.

  Chosens and Demons get their Cores from different sources; Chosens are imbued with new Cores by the Goddess after they pass her trial and receive her blessing, while Demons are born with theirs from the first moments of their existence.

  The strength of a Core depends on its ranks, starting from the ascending Metal Tiers of Copper, Bronze, Silver, and Gold. Cores naturally develop over time, growing stronger as time passes and more magical energy is accumulated.

  However, even the weakest Cores are powerful magical engines; the most basic Copper Core will transform a bedridden weakling into a superhuman warrior far stronger than the average person.

  When an Aspirant receives the Chosen Blessing from the Goddess, the Copper Core newly implanted into their bodies instantly propels them to an existence beyond mundane strength, regardless of their original capabilities.

  Barring outstanding exceptions, a newly forged Chosen with a Copper Core is considered five times stronger than a non-Chosen.

  Similarly, a Bronze Core is considered five times stronger than a Copper Core, and a Silver Core five times stronger than a Bronze Core.

  In other words, the power level between a non-Chosen Aspirant and a higher-ranked Demon is so significant that it is usually impossible for a single Aspirant — or even a group of Aspirants — to kill something like a Bronze-ranked Demon, let alone a Silver-ranked.

  Barring outstanding exceptions, of course.

  ~~~

  “Activate [Iron Wall], now!” Joarris roared.

  [Party Member Artes Detected]

  [Shield Artes, First Form: Iron Wall]

  The group of fighters in front pulled their shields up and interlinked their defences. In union, they pulled forth the mana within their Copper Core and activated one of the basic Artes injected into their minds the moment they received their powers.

  Magical energy welled within their interlocked shields, forming a powerful blue barrier of arcane might.

  The Capragore smashed into their line, and the reinforced magical shield instantly shattered.

  The fighters were flung wide, shouting or screaming as they hit the ground.

  The Demon’s charge was halted, however.

  For Eri, that was enough.

  The boy moved with blistering speed. There was a blur of motion as he dodged a flurry of swings from the Capragore’s heavy blades. None of the demon’s attacks made contact, but neither could Eri’s, whose diminutive reach was far too small against the colossus before him.

  Then, right as the monster lashed out with a kick, the boy jumped over the attack and leapt off its knee, soaring high and slashing his dagger clean across its neck.

  Incredible as the feat was, the attack did next to nothing — a thin line of black blood across the creature’s throat, and no more.

  Eri avoided the creature’s grab and somersaulted over its shoulder, a frustrated grimace on his face.

  Joarris cursed before he turned to the terrified peasants standing at the side. “Crossbows, fire at will! Those with spears, help the injured fighters get off the ground, now!”

  Nobody move. Some of them had already given up, falling to their knees.

  Joarris snarled, adrenaline and fear empowering his voice. “If you don’t wish to die, then MOVE! NOW! GET TO WORK, YOU WORTHLESS LOWBORNS!”

  The peasants jolted, before snapping into frantic action at the familiar command. Those with spears tossed aside their useless weapons and rushed to assist the wounded fighters, some of whom now cradled broken arms.

  The group of peasants armed with crossbows crouched to one knee, as taught by Eri earlier, and channelled their magic.

  Mana bloomed from their Cores and into their weapon.

  [Party Member Artes Detected]

  [Bow Artes, First Form: Power Shot]

  “Firing!” One of them — Julie — shouted, turning raw magic into overpowering Heroic Artes. The crossbow bolts flew with more precision and power than the weapon should allow.

  The magical barrage slammed into the Demon’s back as it was trying to rush Eri. The bolts did not penetrate deeply, but the combined volley forced the creature to stumble.

  Eri did not miss his chance. From his bottomless satchel, he pulled a cluster of spiked dice out and threw them at the Demon.

  There was no warning before a series of ear-splitting explosions rang across the clearing. Joarris hissed as a wave of heat rushed over his injured face.

  Were those miniature grenades? The noble thought with shaking teeth. That crazy mutant is full of surprises.

  There was no time for further pondering, however, as the boy landed by the noble’s side, his white hair a little singed.

  “Good work leading the group,” Eri said. “I need you to keep them moving. Get everyone through the portal. Evacuate the wounded first; keep the crossbows around for as long as you can as support.”

  “What are you going to do?” Joarris asked, his grip on his weapon shaking as he watched the Capragore rise from the smoke, completely unharmed.

  “I’ll act as a dodge-tank and draw its aggro; Buy you as much time as I can,” Eri replied, his voice utterly calm in the face of his suicidal plan. “Get everyone out of here, yourself included. I’ll leave after everyone is safe, so I’m counting on you to move them quickly.”

  Before Joarris could protest, Eri was already charging forth, daggers and grenades in hand.

  The nobleman spat to the side, fear and anxiety threatening to take hold, before he shoved it into a corner.

  The boy trusted him. People's lives depended on him.

  No time to act like an idiot anymore.

  “All of you, get to the portal! Wounded first!” he screamed, ears ringing as another cascade of explosions rang on the raging battlefield, accompanied by a Demon’s howl. “Everyone move! We are leaving!”

  ~~~

  Power worked strangely for Eri.

  Obviously, there was the whole ‘reincarnated Demon King’ business clinging to him, but what gave the boy power was not some lingering remnant of his old life magically bolstering his abilities.

  No, what gave him power was the System.

  Ever since he was reborn, a strange, magical interface had been hovering over his eye, invisible to all but himself. Thus far in the nine years he had been alive, no one he talked to knew or even heard of the System or its esoteric abilities.

  Levels, XP, Quests, Stats, Perks… All of it granted him incremental knowledge, powers, and abilities. It was no wonder he was so much stronger at his age, though the never-ending exposure to the System’s presence day and night might have… slightly hampered his social-mental development.

  Perhaps, more pressingly to his current circumstances, the System granted him information about everything around him.

  Take the Levels, for example. Most creatures without a magical Core — mundane animals, plants, non-Chosens humans — had a level rating between Lvl1 and Lvl20, with most lingering near the lower end of the spectrum. With just a glance, Eri could roughly gauge the strength of an entity.

  Copper Core entities — be they Chosen or Demons — were always within the Lvl21 to Lvl40 range. Bronze-ranked covered the Lvl41 to Lvl60 range, and Silver-ranked existed between Lvl61 and Lvl80.

  When accessing one’s odds against their opponent, information on their strengths and weaknesses was key. And that was why Eri knew for certain…

  The Goat Demon before him was not an opponent beyond his means of killing.

  \-\

  Capragore

  Lvl 62 Goat Demon (Wounded; Poisoned; Dying)

  A dying Silver-Core Demon that somehow found its way into a Goddess Trial. It was already badly wounded beforehand, missing its tail and one of its four arms. A fatal poison currently spreads through its body, slowing its movements and halting its demonic regeneration.

  \-\

  Eri did not know how a dying Capragore ended up in the training grounds, or why it was already so badly injured beforehand. And in truth, none of it mattered to him at the moment.

  The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  All Eri needed to know was that the Demon was sluggish and one good hit away from death. Its level was also only Lvl62, making it on the weaker end of Silver-Core Demons.

  Given the poison and wounds impairing its mobility, engaging the creature in combat was not a suicidal impossibility.

  And neither was killing it.

  However, he needed to evacuate the remaining aspirants first. Not just because their survival was necessary for him to complete his bonus objective, but because he needed to get rid of any witnesses before he executed his killing strike, lest uncomfortable questions arise.

  The nobleman, Joarris, was doing a good job of commanding the aspirants. Half of them were already through the portal, and with the wounded settled first, the rest of them would not take much longer to leave.

  Unfortunately, Eri was running out of means to distract the Demon.

  His handcrafted grenades were spent. His other weapons were worthless. Only the Bronze-forged twin daggers in his hands were of any use — gifts from Matron Elen on his Ninth birthday — but even they couldn’t penetrate the Demon’s steely skin.

  The Capragore’s frustration was evident, even with its complete lack of expression. No matter how it attacked, it could not hit its evasive opponent.

  But there were other prey it could hunt instead.

  The featureless, flat plane that served as its face turned away from Eri, looking towards the remaining aspirants huddled at the portal.

  The Demon gave one final flurry of devastating slashes that forced Eri to retreat before turning suddenly and charging towards the others.

  Only Joarris and one of the peasant crossbowmen — Julie — were left. The girl let out a scream as she saw the enormous Demon descend on her with a harrowing, mouthless roar.

  Joarris didn’t even hesitate before he tackled her away and came into the line of fire.

  The Demon’s cleaver slashed hard against Joarris’s breastplate, slicing the armour apart and drawing a spray of blood.

  Thankfully, the blow was only a glancing one; the quality of the noble’s armour was just enough to turn the attack from instantly fatal to narrowly lethal.

  The Demon raised its arms for another strike. Julie tried to pull the bleeding Joarris out of the way, but it was no use.

  Faced with impending death, the two could do nothing but instinctively close their eyes.

  The cleaver came down.

  There was the sound of tearing flesh, and then…

  A brief, inexplicable weightlessness as they were somehow lifted off the ground.

  The two were still alive. Julie shakily looked up. The pair were now several dozen metres from the portal and the demon…

  Held safely upon the shoulders of a bleeding, white-haired boy.

  The wounded form of Eri tossed them off his back with nonchalant ease, having somehow carried them both to safety despite his diminutive size.

  The boy’s left arm hung limply at his side. Julie’s face paled, the urge to retch almost overpowering when she saw the boy’s wound.

  His left arm was cleaved apart — a vertical slash from the centre of his shoulder bone down to his elbow. A great slab of flesh and severed bone wetly peeled outwards from his left arm, sticky with blood.

  Julie saw the white of exposed bones, the yellowish marrow within, and the blood, so much blood— She looked away from the wound. Her gaze turned to the boy’s face instead.

  Calm. No, blank. His face was a void — Purple eyes empty, facial muscles utterly relaxed despite the horrid pain he must be suffering.

  It was… It was like…

  The face of a monster.

  “Fuck!” Joarris wheezed, gaping at the boy, even though the severity of his chest wounds was little better than that of their saviour. “Are you alright?!”

  “I am still combat capable,” Eri replied stoically. As if on cue to defy his point, his left dagger slipped from unresponsive fingers, clinking wetly against the pool of his own blood on the ground. He ignored it. “Archer Julie, I will draw the Demon away from the portal. Please get Fighter Joarris and yourself out of here while I pull aggro.”

  “What about you?” Julie asked fearfully. The Demon was still standing near the portal, trying to pull out his cleavers embedded within the concrete pillars. “I’m not a healer, but even I can tell you are going to die from that wound soon.”

  “I have about two minutes of functionality before this body shuts down from blood loss — three if I pass another Willpower check. I will be fine,” Eri said, waving off their concerns despite his paling face. “It will be enough.”

  “We can’t leave you here!” Joarris snarled, forcing himself to rise despite the pain. “I’ll distract it instead! You and the peasant girl get to the portal!”

  “Screw that! You can barely walk!” Julie hissed. “You two need to get through the portal and have the wounds treated before you bleed out. I’m the only one not wounded. I’ll do it!”

  There was a moment of silence. Then, Eri tilted his head.

  “Why?” he asked.

  “Why what?” Joarris panted as he stood. The Demon in the distance was seconds away from freeing its sword.

  “Why would you two so readily throw your lives away?” Eri’s eyes were now intensely focused on them. “I’m the strongest among us; it’s only rational that I be the one who stays behind because I hold the highest chance of survival. The two of you will barely last a second against the Capragore. We have only just met; there is no reason for you to prioritise your life over mine. Do you not enjoy living?”

  “Wha— Of course, I enjoy living!” Julie protested.

  “Then why?” Eri asked again, his tone edging upon confusion. “I don’t understand.”

  “Well, gee, maybe it’s because I don’t want a kid to die on my conscience, you ever think of that?!” Julie pointed out angrily. “Dying is for older people, not for some brat whose voice hasn’t even cracked yet!”

  Joarris chuckled. “Besides, giving one’s life to save another? It’s the most heroic thing one could do. And we… we are supposed to be Chosens, right? Heroes.”

  Julie smiled, despite the frantic panic in her eyes.

  In the distance, the Demon finally pulled free its blades. Neither Joarris nor Julie ran; instead, they stayed steadfast by Eri’s side.

  Despite the threat and the agonising pain in his side, Eri’s thoughts were far away.

  Heroes… This is Heroism?

  Stupid. Irrational. I don’t really get it. But…

  I feel like I am one step closer to understanding why she smiled.

  “… I see,” Eri finally said, stepping behind them. “Nobleman Jorrais, peasant Julie, thank you. With your insights, I am now a little closer to my goal.”

  “What? What do you—”

  “I need you to sleep now,” the boy continued, raising his dagger. “Rest assured, I will get you both out alive.”

  In a blink, Eri slammed the butt of his dagger against the back of their necks. The two of them were unconscious instantly.

  The boy stepped over their bodies. The Demon roared, readying its cleaver.

  “I was hoping to fight with you a while longer,” Eri said as he approached the monster. “There are so many things I want to know. Who wounded you? How did they send you here in the first place? But I am out of time. So I’m finishing you off now. I hope you understand.”

  The Capragore howled, frenzied by pain and rage. It charged.

  Eri breathed out, the air exhaled misting with flickering crimson.

  The bloodied flank of his left arm began hissing with heat.

  The Demon leapt and brought its blades crashing down.

  But—

  [Bloodflame Demonic Arts, First Form: Bloodflame Lance]

  Foul magic pooled into Eri’s mangled left arm.

  The crippled limb moved in defiance of its wounds and struck.

  The Demon’s chest exploded out from its back as a dark lance of sanguine fire ripped through its torso.

  There was no surviving that attack, not even for a Silver-ranked. Weakened as it was, the Demon’s body instantly went limp. It fell to its knees.

  The faceless monster gave a distorted breath before it spoke weakly. “Bloodflame? My Lord? Is that you?”

  Eri’s blank purple eyes wavered for a moment before they softened. “Go to sleep now. May you finally find peace.”

  “... Thank… you…”

  The Demon shuddered once, then became still.

  [Dungeon Boss Defeated!]

  [Capragore looted! Goat Demon Essence (x2) obtained!]

  [Boss Loot: ‘Caprahorn Daggers’ obtained!]

  [‘Goddess Blessing’ Perk received; Copper Core obtained!]

  [Minimum Level raised to Lvl 21]

  [Maximum Level raised to Lvl40]

  [Perks +1, Key Skills +1]

  [Attribute Points on Level Up increase from +3 to +5]

  [Mana Capacity increased from 5 to 20]

  [Orphan Eri promoted to Heroic Level 21 Rookie Rogue!]

  ~~~

  Outside the portal, panic and chaos raged.

  The Church priests and healers attended to the wounded. Overseers rushed to hear the accounts of the surviving aspirants. Incredulity first took over, not just at seeing so many successful Chosens overcoming the trial, but also at the ludicrous claims they were making.

  A nine-year-old boy who helped them all unlock their Copper Cores, and a Silver-ranked Demon that was somehow released into the training grounds.

  Just as Overseer Hardin and Matron Elen rushed to the scene, the portal widened once more.

  And widened…

  And widened yet again.

  Everyone stared, jaws hanging, as a blood-soaked child dragged two unconscious aspirants out of the portal…

  …. Along with the giant corpse of a Capragore Demon, its broken horns clutched in his tiny right hand as he pulled the dead beast through.

  Nobody could move. After the boy unceremoniously dumped the two aspirants aside and left the mangled Demon carcass slumped across the Church stairs, he noticed Matron Elen and nodded.

  “Matriarch, I’m happy to report that I have successfully subdued the Tutorial Boss and earned my Copper Core. Under the eyes of the Church and the Goddess, I am now officially a Chosen,” Eri announced, his dull voice carrying only the slightest hint of pride. “I have also completed all bonus objectives and ensured every aspirant survived, as the System requested.”

  “... Good work,” Matron Elen finally said. “Well done, Eri. I’m proud of you.”

  “... Am I a real Hero now?” the boy hesitantly asked.

  “Not yet,” the woman answered, almost a little too quickly. “But I think you are a little closer after today.”

  “I think so too,” the boy nodded. He looked down at his mangled left arm, still squirting blood, and then back at the Matron. “I believe I’m in need of medical attention.”

  Eri then promptly collapsed face-first into the floor.

  Amidst the closing darkness and frantic shouts, he saw a final slew of notifications and smiled.

  [Tutorial Dungeon Cleared! Perfect Score!]

  [+1000 XP]

  [+200 Heroism Points]

  [+200 Reputation with the Church]

  [+5 Attribute Points]

  [Bonus Objective Complete! ‘A Good Start’]

  [+500 XP]

  [+100 Heroism Points]

  [+100 Reputation with Chosens]

  [+3 Attribute Points]

  [Bonus Objective Complete! ‘No One Left Behind’]

  [+500 XP]

  [+100 Heroism Points]

  [+50 Reputation with Nobility]

  [+50 Reputation with Peasantry]

  [+3 Attribute Points]

  [Tutorial Complete!]

  [Main Quest Advanced! Begin your Heroic journey as a Chosen!]

  [Map region expanded]

  [Quest Rewards raised]

  [Now Loading Act 1: Kaldreach…]