I Wrote Trash Novels to Level Up, Now Everyone Thinks I'm the Hero

Lucian went rigid where he stood.

His back pressed flat against the cold stone wall, his eyes blown wide, pupils shrinking to two pinpricks.

Point-zero-zero-zero-zero-zero-six percent?

The part of his brain trained on years of financial spreadsheets ran a basic division problem automatically, without being asked.

One part in sixteen million six hundred thousand.

The 411,892 Combat Power she'd used to dodge thirty-six of Golan's strikes was only one sixteen-millionth of what her body actually produced.

Take four hundred eleven thousand and multiply it by sixteen million... and the bare minimum, before accounting for any burst multipliers or divine skills, already came out to roughly 6.8 trillion.

Nearly seven trillion Combat Power. At sixteen years old.

A doomsday-class monster was sitting on a splintered wooden bench, bandaging a scratch on her finger.

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Lucian stood there for several long seconds, recalculating the number twice just to make sure he hadn't lost his mind.

Clack.

Astra finished tying off the bandage, admired her finger with satisfaction, and stood up.

The moment she rounded the corner of the corridor, she startled — a ten-year-old boy in a grey traveling cloak was leaning against the wall, eyes glazed over, face as white as if he'd just watched his entire family go bankrupt.

Astra blinked.

She looked at Lucian's dusty cloak, his pale face, then at the half sweet potato still in her hand.

Apparently, she reached the most obvious conclusion.

She reached into the rough cloth pouch at her hip and pulled out the other half of her roasted sweet potato, still steaming and fragrant.

Astra stepped closer, gentle and light-footed, and held the half potato out toward Lucian, her voice soft and utterly sincere.

"Are... are you hungry? I got a really big one from the arena kitchen. I already ate half. You can have this half."

Lucian slowly lowered his gaze.

He looked at the golden, steaming half potato resting in the girl's calloused palm, then lifted his eyes to her soot-smudged face and completely sincere smile.

A girl carrying nearly seven trillion Combat Power in sealed potential — was standing in front of him, offering half a sweet potato because she was worried he might be... hungry.

Lucian looked down at the sweet potato.

Then back at Astra.

Seven trillion.

Half a sweet potato.

"You..." Lucian's voice came out hoarse, his fingers trembling slightly as he took the warm potato. "Do you know what's inside your own body?"

Astra tilted her head. She answered honestly.

"You mean the Seven Sacred Seals? The High Priests said it's a sacred blessing of self-sacrifice. Those seven chains are what keep me from being corrupted by the power of darkness, so I can use my whole life to protect humanity when the great calamity comes."

She smiled, her clear ash-grey eyes without a trace of doubt.

"It's my destiny."

Destiny, my ass.

Lucian's grip tightened around the half potato in his hand.

Through the eyes of a former finance worker who'd spent years dissecting fraudulent contracts, this so-called "Divine Blessing" and "Seven Sacred Chains" were nothing more than the single most brutal labor-exploitation contract he'd ever laid eyes on.

To Lucian, the structure looked less like a blessing and more like a contract written directly into Astra's soul: seven layers siphoning away 99.999994% of her output for some unknown purpose while the Church taught her to call it sacrifice.

She was sitting on power measured in trillions, living in patched clothes and eating a roasted sweet potato while believing the drain was a blessing.

Deep in Lucian's mind, the System gave a quiet pulse.

[Language structure of the Divinely Chosen Covenant identified.]