God of Zero Cost

Ethan glanced up at the dungeon boss as he fed another stone into his sling.

Let's see if the new plan works, Ethan thought to himself, getting ready to take down the boss for the second time.

The four-meter-tall Rephaim giant didn't roar. It lurched forward with an uneven, heavy stride, its rotten robes trembled as it descended the sloping stone theater.

The Scarab beetle golem surged forward. It dropped its heavy, bulbous lower frame directly into the main stone floor. With a wet, grinding churn, the golem discharged a thick wave of raw, unrefined tar across the limestone floor, creating a massive, sticky mire right in the giant's charge.

The Rephaim Usurper ignored the trap. The moment its heavy feet hit the tar, its momentum carried it forward like it didn't exist. But Ethan's golem still stood between them.

The titan swung its massive fist down, trying to crush the golem suppressing it.

MK II.5 didn't try to dodge or strike back. It simply leaned its massive weight forward, trying its best to keep the titan immobile. The golem's structural durability began to tick down under the giant's blunt strikes, but the heavy golem did it job.

Ethan stepped wide, his boots planted firmly on the clean rock edge of the trench. He raised his sling. The giant was trapped, its neck completely exposed as it struggled against the golem’s grip.

Ethan focused entirely on the flashing nephesh target at the center of the giant's throat.

The cords of his sling whipped through the dark air with a sharp, rhythmic crack-crack-crack. Ethan didn't stop to calculate the damage numbers. He just kept feeding iron-oxide bullets into the pouch, spamming high-velocity critical shots directly into the giant's throat while his golem held the titan pinned.

Ten shots. Twenty shots. The iron bullets tore into the boss, chipping away with critical hit after critical hit. The giant thrashed wildly, its heavy fists fracturing the golem's limb sockets with a loud, muddy snap, but the sticky tar continued to build up and slowly reduced its speed.

With one final, deafening crack, the iron-oxide bullet struck the nephesh for the final time.

The four-meter-tall Rephaim Usurper froze, its giant frame and heavy, mismatched robes slumped over the scarab beetle golem. The crooked jewel crown rolled off onto the tar-stained floor with a dull, metallic clatter.

Ethan lowered his arms, his chest heaving slightly in the silence of the amphitheater. He ran a quick check on the golem: 75/515. It was heavily cracked and missing some of its limbs, but it was still standing.

"Well, that went better than expected," Ethan whispered, a thin smile touching his lips as he walked around the room to collect all the loot.

Ethan pulled his bronze trowel from his belt and went to work. He started with the six perimeter guards. Moving methodically from one fallen warden to the next, he used the edge of his trowel to pry the green-patinated bronze scales off their leather armor plates. He piled the metallic scales into his pack alongside their heavy, mud-crusted shields and the remaining weapons he hadn't smashed. Every single scrap of bronze was growing to be worth more than gold in this tin shortage.

Finally, Ethan turned back toward the altar steps where the giant’s massive garments lay piled on the stone floor.

The robes were magnificent. Even from a distance, he could see thick, shimmering veins of gold thread woven directly into the tattered Canaanite fabric. His heart hammered in his chest as he calculated the potential market value if he could strip the threads and melt them down.

He knelt by the pile, reached out, and eagerly grasped the edge of the cloth.

The moment his fingers made contact, the brilliant hue instantly faded into a dull, ash-grey. Before Ethan could even pull his hand back, the entire four-meter mound of royal robes disintegrated, collapsing into a heap of worthless, fine grey dust that scattered across the tar-stained floor.

"No, no, no—" Ethan lunged forward, his hands clawing through the dirt, but the gold threads were completely gone.

He sat back on his heels, a sharp pang of absolute regret hitting his stomach.

Then, something glinted in the middle of the ash pile.

Resting in the center of the grey dust was a heavy, oversized cylinder seal made of polished hematite, an iron oxide mineral. Ethan picked it up. The metal felt remarkably cold against his skin, and etched into it were cuneiforms.

The moment his grip tightened around the heavy metal object, a rectangular system window flared to life directly in front of his eyes.

It's just an iron oxide seal, not worth much, Ethan pondered. Could it be a potential quest item?

Shrugging, Ethan threw it in his pack. But where is the boss loot?

He looked over at his golem and remembered the crown falling off at the end of the fight.

Ethan walked over to the corner and kicked aside a layer of ash, his boots squelching against the wet tar until the toe of his boot struck metal.

The crooked Canaanite circlet sat lopsided in a puddle of tar, its surface dull but intact. He bent down, picked it up, and wiped the black grease off. It was a thin, warped forehead band of beaten bronze, embossed with faded Canaanite rosettes that had lost their luster.

The system interface blinked.

Ethan read the short description, his eyes tracking the brief mention of Abram’s rescue mission. Abram... that name sounds familiar, yet not really... Well, more importantly, this circlet hadn’t dissolved into dust like the robes. It was physical, salvageable bronze. He tucked it deep into his pack.

Ethan turned back to stare at the giant slumped over Mk II.5. Sigh.

Ethan reach out and swiped away the leading golden character א (Aleph) off the golem.

The word Emet—Truth—severed instantly into Met. Death.

The beetle liquefied instantly. Without the golem’s massive frame propping it up, the four-meter corpse of the Rephaim giant crashed violently forward onto the floor of the amphitheater.

Ethan relit a torch and turned to exit the dungeon.