The Oculothorax lay in defeat, its ugly, twisted body sprawled across the chamber floor. Its eyes, once glowing with a menacing hue, had dimmed into a lifeless, murky gray. The appendages that had flailed and struck with terrifying force now lay deflated and unmoving, their strength drained. Hundreds of bolt arrows riddled its body, their green shafts protruding at all kinds of angles, embedded so densely that its surface was barely visible beneath the damage.

  It was finally dead. Relief washed over me, but it was tangled up with exhaustion as I took a moment to soak in the sight. But the moment was brief. I barely had time to savor the victory before the reinforcements arrived.

  Around me, battle reigned once again. Half a dozen Eyebats and just as many Gargoyles burst into the chamber. The Eyebats darted around above, while the stone Gargoyles charged forward, barreling toward my forces.

  My slimes didn’t hesitate. By this point, they knew the drill inside and out, and I barely needed to issue a command. All I had to do was load their bolts into the webbag, and my rangers were already firing another round. The green bolts zipped through the air with precision, slamming into the Eyebats. One by one, they plummeted from the sky, hitting the ground with a satisfying thud. I made sure we focused on them first—as I didn’t want additional reinforcements to burst in when I had already lost quite a few of my soldiers.

  

  

  Meanwhile, my vanguards and tanks held the line against the Gargoyles. The vanguards engaged them head-on, while the tanks formed an impenetrable wall, absorbing the Gargoyles' brutal charges and keeping them contained.

  

  The battle dragged on for several minutes. But Slowly, methodically, we gained the upper hand. One by one, the Eyebats fell from the sky, their numbers shrinking until none remained. With the air cleared, the focus shifted entirely to the ground.

  The Gargoyles, tough as they were, began to falter under the combined efforts of my forces. Their movements slowed, their attacks became less coordinated, and eventually, they fell. The last Gargoyle crumbled into a pile of shattered stone under a final blow from one of my vanguards.

  And then… silence.

  I stood there, exhausted, as the dust settled. The chamber was finally clear, the reinforcements wiped out.

  The notification flashed before me, adding to the experience I had gained from the Oculothorax. Though I had already leveled up to 11 thanks to the boss kill, this additional boost brought me closer to level 12. The thought of leveling up again so soon was enticing, but for now, I was just relieved it was over.

  Looking around at the carnage, I allowed myself a moment to breathe. My slimes, though fewer in number, stood victorious.

  “We did it,” I muttered, more to myself than anyone else. “We actually did it.”

  The chamber was ours. For now.

  Even though all I wanted was to flop down and rest, there was one last thing I had to do: looting. After everything we’d gone through, I couldn’t just walk away without grabbing the materials. The Oculothorax’s eyes were basically a goldmine of rare and valuable crafting material.

  I straightened up, and issued the first command. “Everyone, start gathering the Eyebats’ eyes and crystalized hearts.”

  As they got to work, I turned my attention toward the Oculothorax’s massive corpse. The final material I needed to craft that item was within reach.

  “All right,” I muttered under my breath, psyching myself up. “Let’s do this.”

  I started with the smaller eyes on the ends of its limbs.. Carefully, I used my hands to extract them. The process wasn’t easy, each eye was embedded deep within the creature’s tough skin, and I had to dig around to free them.

  One by one, I worked my way along its sprawling limbs, collecting the eyes.

  Finally, I reached the central eye. It was a mess, riddled with bolt arrows and cracked down the middle from the sustained damage. I hesitated for a moment, wondering if it was even salvageable. But I couldn’t afford to leave it behind. Even in this state, it was still a vital material.

  I crouched down, examining it closely. The surface was rough and uneven. With a deep breath, I steadied my hands and began the careful process of extracting it. It took longer than I expected—the damage made it harder to remove cleanly, but eventually, the massive eye came free.

  I held it up, wiping away the residual slime and debris. It wasn’t pristine, but it would do. I tucked it safely into one of my slimes alongside the other eyes.

  Though I had all the materials I needed for the recipe, crafting it wasn’t something I could do here. This required an expert craftsman to forge the item properly. That meant it would have to wait until I made it back to the city.

  For now, I had a different task at hand: extracting the Oculothorax’s crystallized heart. It didn’t take long to find it. As I approached the creature’s central eye socket—now a gaping, hollow cavity—the crystallized heart glinted inside its dark recess, resting just behind where the eye had been.

  

  I leaned closer, brushing away the last of the ligaments clinging to the Oculothorax’s chest.Victory had its price, but this was the reward that made it worth it.

  Carefully, I reached into the cavity where its core was stored, expecting the familiar spherical shape of a standard crystallized heart. But as my fingers brushed against the material, I froze.

  This...!

  My breath caught as I withdrew my hand to get a better look. The crystal's faint shimmer danced in the dim light of the chamber, but the shape—it was wrong. Instead of a rounded, gem-like form, this heart was elongated, sharp, and covered with an intricate design that resembled dozens of eyes mashed together.

  My chest tightened as recognition dawned.

  You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

  The Oculothorax’s Awakened Crystallized Heart.

  I blinked, once, twice, trying to process what I was holding.

  “My Conversion Title…” I muttered under my breath, the realization striking like a bolt of lightning. My 10% chance to upgrade crystalized heart—it had come through when it mattered most.

  A grin spread across my face, and I couldn’t help but laugh. “This is it,” I whispered, holding the heart up to the light. “This is the real prize!”

  The smooth, cool surface glimmered faintly as I turned it over in my hands.

  But before I could savor the moment any further, a commotion behind me drew my attention. My slimes were returning, their tasks complete. I glanced over, still feeling that rush of excitement.

  As I surveyed the materials they had collected, my eyes landed on something that made my heart skip a beat for a second time. One of my slimes was holding an object that didn’t match the rest. It was clutching something similar to what I held in my hands—similar, but smaller.

  I squinted, leaning closer to get a better look. The moment my eyes focused on the item, my breath hitched, and I nearly dropped the Awakened Heart in my hands.

  “A—Another Awakened Crystallized Heart!” I screamed, my voice echoing through the chamber.

  The slime held it up proudly, the crystal gleaming in the light. Unlike the multi-eyed heart from the Oculothorax, this one was simpler, shaped like a single eye. The difference in size and detail was clear, a stark contrast in rarity. But it didn’t matter. It was still an Awakened Crystallized Heart, and that made it immensely valuable.

  I clutched the heart I had pulled from the boss and stared at the one my slime was holding. Two Awakened Crystallized Hearts. One from the Oculothorax and one from the Eyebat.

  I couldn’t believe my luck. I’d been trying for days to get the Eyebat’s eye, thinking I’d be stuck here a lot longer, and now I had both of these in my hands.

  I grinned as I reached out, taking the smaller heart from the slime. Both hearts were now in my possession

  Lila’s voice snapped me out of my thoughts. “So, what are you going to do with them?” she asked, her eyes wide with excitement.“I mean… if you’re not planning to use both, I wouldn’t mind taking one off your hands.”

  I turned to her, her enthusiasm mirrored in my own expression. But I couldn’t help but let out a small chuckle. “Sorry, Lila,” I said, shaking my head. “These aren’t exactly… compatible with your skill set.”

  Her face fell slightly. “What do you mean? I could totally use one! I mean, they’re Awakened Crystals. They’re powerful, right?”

  Holding up the smaller Eyebat heart for emphasis. “These hearts are all about abilities that align with the creatures they came from. Shared Vision? Petrification? Corrosion? None of those scream ‘healer’ to me.”

  Lila crossed her arms, clearly disappointed but reluctantly nodding.

  I turned my focus back to the hearts. The boss’s heart was a gamble—it could provide me with any of its twelve abilities, including the Shared Vision ability from the Eyebats. But the Eyebat’s heart, on its own, only offered Shared Vision. That was the ability I had been looking for all along. If I used the Eyebat heart first, it would remove Shared Vision from the boss’s ability pool. That meant I’d have an eleven-ability pool for the boss’s heart instead of twelve. It was still a gamble, but a better one.

  “Yes,” I muttered under my breath. “That’s the way to go.”

  First, I’ll use the Eyebat’s heart. That’ll guarantee Shared Vision, and it’ll narrow down the options for the boss’s heart.

  I focused on the smaller heart, holding it up as the system prompt appeared in front of me.

  Without hesitation, I selected acquire a new skill. Upgrading my summon slime skill with this heart would be pointless; Shared Vision’s effect wouldn’t do much for my slimes anyway. I needed something new in my skill set.

  The heart dissolved in my hand, breaking apart into particles of light . I felt a faint tingling sensation as the energy settled within me, and the system chimed again.

  I exhaled, a grin spreading across my face. This was exactly what I had been aiming for. From the moment I stepped onto this floor, I knew what my first acquired skill had to be: Shared Vision. The Eyebat wasn’t exactly versatile—it had only one ability, and that was Shared Vision. Because of that, I knew acquiring its Awakened Crystallized Heart would guarantee I’d get this skill. And now, here I was, holding exactly what I’d worked so hard for.

  With Shared Vision at my disposal, things were about to take a serious turn. It would let me cover way more ground and seriously boost my scouting capabilities.

  “What’d you get?” Lila asked, peeking over my shoulder, her curiosity practically radiating off her. Her eyes sparkled with excitement, and she leaned in closer, clearly eager to hear what skill I've acquire.

  “Shared Vision,” I said. “It lets me see through the eyes of my slimes for a short time. Perfect for scouting.”

  Lila’s face lit up. “That’s amazing! So you can keep an eye on everything without even being there? Imagine the strategies!”

  I nodded, already imagining the possibilities. But there was still one more heart to deal with. I held up the Oculothorax’s Awakened Crystallized Heart, its eerie surface glinting in the dim light.

  “Now for the big one,” I said, my voice steady despite the nervous flutter in my chest.

  The real gamble was about to begin. I wasn’t planning on using the Oculothorax’s Awakened Crystallized Heart to gain a new skill outright. Instead, I was aiming for something the other option—an upgrade to Shared Vision. The two abilities synergized perfectly; both were vision-based support skills, and enhancing Shared Vision with one of the Oculothorax’s abilities could take it to an entirely new level.

  That left me with 11 options. The Eyebat’s Shared Vision had already been removed from the pool, but the rest of the Oculothorax’s abilities were still in play. There were utility upgrades, like Petrification or Fear, that could enhance my control over the battlefield. Or I could get a damaging ability, like Ignition Eye or Decay Eye.

  Frankly, I was hoping for a damaging ability. My arsenal was sorely lacking in magical attacks, which was a glaring weakness. In the mid to late floors, where many monsters had immunity to physical damage, I would need magic to even stand a chance.

  I took a deep breath and held the Oculothorax’s heart in my hands. This was the moment of truth.

  As I focused on the heart, the system prompt appeared before me.

  I selected Upgrade an Existing Skill. Another prompt flashed across the screen.

  Without hesitation, I selected Shared Vision. The heart began to glow, its light intensifying as it dissolved into particles .

  I held my breath, the anticipation almost unbearable.