Utopian System

Selene had rushed to rescue Diana and told him to take the core to the central building.

Therefore...

The moment the soldier deposited the core in his hands, Lucien didn't hesitate for a second.

Without waiting for the soldier to finish explaining the situation, he launched himself from the parapet toward the city's interior.

The combined impulses catapulted him through the air at vertiginous speed.

He controlled each movement with millimetric precision, gliding through the air at great speed to maintain the most direct possible trajectory toward the center.

When he landed before the great door, he didn't hesitate to use his muscles to the maximum to shoot like lightning through the hallways.

Some unfortunate citizens found themselves pushed against the walls when Lucien passed by them like a contained hurricane. His wind impulses left a trail of flying things and people staggering as they fell after the tempest.

"OUT OF THE WAY!" His voice resonated through the corridors, but most only felt the gust of wind pass.

When he finally burst into the central park, God's statue rose before him, as imposing as ever.

With a final impulse, Lucien stopped before it and extended the core.

The appearance was instantaneous.

♢♢♢♢

God's disheveled figure appeared with his characteristic light flicker.

"Oh! Congratulations to the Elian boy for barely surviving those ten monsters..." He interrupted himself, noticing the mentioned's absence. "Wait, where is he?"

Lucien barely paid attention to him, his eyes fixed on the new interface that had appeared before him.

His fingers moved frantically among options and menus.

"They haven't escaped," he responded without diverting his gaze. "Someone barely managed to bring the core. If there's anything useful in this new interface, I need it now to go help them."

"What a boomer!" God crossed his arms, making a pout.

"I wanted to see the boy... Well, since we're here I'll tell you instead, did you know the artromus are all level 100? Though in the first ring they're nerfed by the tutorial rules and..."

His words mixed while he digressed, clearly excited about being able to share information that the rules previously prevented him from revealing.

"Oh! And there's so much to say about the barriers, and the new city, and the goddess, and the artromus..."

"Please, shut up!" Lucien interrupted abruptly.

The interface was full of new options, different types of food, tree varieties, color palettes for houses... nothing useful for the battle developing outside.

"Ah, sorry, sorry," God smiled, scratching his unkempt beard.

"Seems like Nala caught me again. She knew I would be here when no one would have time to listen to me... Very clever."

With a movement of his hand, the interface changed, highlighting two specific options. "As far as fighting goes, these are the best for directly increasing your battle power."

The first option showed an elemental sword. Though costly, its 50 damage points, half the power of Elio's sword, made it a formidable option. Its size perfectly matched Lucien's fighting style.

The second option made Lucien raise an eyebrow: "Metamorphosis Potion?"

"Only lasts five minutes," explained God, his childish enthusiasm returning.

"But isn't it cool? I found the goddess's creatures' skill fascinating, so I demanded humans have something similar in one of my counter options to make it fair."

He continued talking while Lucien quickly selected the sword and only three equally costly potions.

"Of course, I had to yield to the demand that the artromus also could summon from the deposits... Which ended up becoming that sea of monsters. Maybe it wasn't so worth it, but hey! The potions are cool!"

Lucien grunted upon seeing his available mana balance.

Since delegating resource management to Ren, who had proved exceptionally efficient in distributing mana for city programs, he didn't carry as much with him as before.

"It's all I can buy right now," he muttered, ignoring God's continued monologue about divine balances and negotiations.

Urgency pulsed in his mind.

Somewhere out there, Selene and the others were fighting for their lives.

There was no time to listen to the ramblings of a deity who seemed more interested in commenting on irrelevant things than the real battle developing.

Without wasting another second, Lucien uncapped one of the potions. The liquid glowed with an unsettling radiance as he brought it to his lips.

"Wow, I see you're in a hurry!" God clapped with childish enthusiasm.

"But let me tell you something interesting about the transformation. You know? It's silly that they see us as monsters, right?" He giggled. "When those insects become 'monsters' like you humans, they gain more strength and resistance, but..."

The liquid went down Lucien's throat, burning like liquid fire. Every nerve in his body began vibrating with new energy.

"...they have to sacrifice mana control to gain that power," God continued, apparently oblivious to the transformation beginning before him.

"On the other hand, for our 'monstrification', its negative aspect being that it's expensive and temporary, only 5 minutes, brings us closer to their vast mana reserve and doubles everything else, same as theirs... hahaha the irony, right? very similar to what they..."

Lucien didn't wait to hear the rest.

Power flowed through his body like an unleashed storm. Every muscle, every fiber of his being pulsed with energy he had never experienced.

He launched himself toward the exit, leaving God gesturing and talking to himself in the middle of his explanation.

While running toward the wall, he felt something strange in his back. The system armor was... changing.

No, it was evolving. New structures sprouted from it, extending like insect wings but maintaining an almost crystalline aspect.

'No time to be surprised,' he told himself while his new appendages responded instinctively to his will, propelling him forward with a speed that made his previous impulses seem slow in comparison.

He flew directly from the central building to the parapet.

From the wall's peak, the scene unfolded before him with crystalline clarity.

His vision, enhanced by the transformation, caught every detail: Selene, bleeding and exhausted, retreating from a monster that once was an artromus.

There was no time to doubt, to process the changes in his body, to marvel at his new capabilities.

Selene needed help, and she needed it now.

Lucien launched himself from the wall's height like a living projectile. The wings folded against his body, optimizing his aerodynamics while diving. The ground approached at vertiginous speed, but his new senses allowed him to calculate every aspect of his approach with supernatural precision.

At the last instant, when the artromus was about to deliver the final blow, Lucien deployed his wings and redirected all the force of his descent into a single devastating strike.