Becoming a God Starts with Acting-Chapter 125: The Corpse Collector (1)

The meeting, which had initially seemed important, ended in a gloomy manner with Layla announcing that she would summarize everything and deliver a final conclusion about the monsters, which would then be shared across the entire continent. As for the gods, it was certain that no human dared to voice any opinion about them anymore.

After all, they could not deny that they needed the gods. Silvanus had been right—it was the gods who had chosen this world of theirs; humanity had never had the right to choose.

At that moment, Benjamin had already arrived at the central sanctuary of the archangel Raphael.

Unlike what he had told the people at the Esper headquarters, there was no meeting to be held at the sanctuary. He walked through the wide, long corridor and finally stopped before a grand staircase. Above it loomed a pitch-black space, within which the faint silhouette of the great archangel’s wide wings could be seen.

Benjamin bowed his head, not daring to look directly upward.

Suddenly, a blinding light engulfed everything around him, so bright that Benjamin had no choice but to close his eyes.

When he opened them again, the scene before him had changed, he now stood in a beautiful garden filled with countless trees and flowers. But what was peculiar was that none of the flowers were in bloom—they all remained as buds. This was the third time Benjamin had been summoned to this place, yet the garden remained unchanged, frozen in this state. No one knew what could ever make the buds blossom.

In the distance stood a small pavilion, typically used for resting and tea. Seated within it was none other than the archangel Raphael.

His entire face—or rather, his whole upper body—was shrouded in light, making it impossible for Benjamin to see his features clearly. Not that it mattered, as Benjamin always kept his head bowed.

"You summoned me here, my lord. Do you have instructions for me?" he asked respectfully.

Raphael rested his chin on one hand, his eyes half-lidded as he gazed in Benjamin’s direction. Benjamin remained unaware that countless large bubbles were encircling him—like a visual display—summarizing everything that had happened inside the dungeon.

"He really is adorable," Raphael said with a faint smile, his voice gentle and cool like spring water, soft and lingering to the extreme.

But Benjamin knew—Raphael was not usually like this. The archangel was cold to the point of indifference, always gentle in manner but never truly warm, and carried an invisible pressure unique to the powerful.

Only that one could bring out such a tone from him.

And so Benjamin had already figured it out: the gods must surely exist on a level even above the archangels—so high that even the archangels endlessly pursued them.

Outsiders may not know it, but as one of the three great devotees, Benjamin was well aware of the odd calmness—mixed with subtle chaos—that overtook the believers’ organizations of the archangels when the gods appeared.

The archangels had never once worried about their status being threatened. On the contrary, they seemed to celebrate joyfully, waiting for that supreme existence to turn their gaze upon them.

If even the archangels acted this way, how could humanity ever have the right to judge the gods?

If they ever displeased the gods, they wouldn’t just lose the gods’ support—but the archangels’ as well.

That was why Benjamin had tried to stop Layla.

"Continue to carry out my principles. I will be away for a while—anything important, you’ll have to decide on your own for the time being."

Raphael was reaching the limit of his patience. This time, he would go meet "him" in person!

Raphael waved his hand as soon as he finished speaking, and Benjamin was instantly sent back to the sanctuary space. Standing upright, Benjamin walked out expressionlessly. Deep down, he couldn’t help but think Raphael’s words were meaningless. Even before this, it had always been him who made the major decisions for the sanctuary. Raphael didn’t even bother to glance at his reports.

In the past, Benjamin would never have dared to harbor such thoughts. But now—after meeting Nerio and witnessing his power—although Nerio was a little overly mischievous, Benjamin didn’t find it annoying. In fact, his heart stirred every time he remembered that cat-like, amused expression on Nerio’s face.

Benjamin placed a hand over his chest as if mocking himself and muttered, "Some things really never change." freēnovelkiss.com

The moment he stepped outside the sanctuary, a flawless smile immediately appeared on his face once more. He was the great devotee of the archangel Raphael—calm and selfless.

Meanwhile, Silvanus quickly returned to his acting space after leaving the Esper headquarters.

As soon as he arrived, he almost couldn’t hold on anymore and collapsed, his face flushed red, sweat pouring down like rain, as though he were being burned by an invisible fire. He curled up, mouth agape, gasping for air.

"What the hell is happening to my body?" Silvanus forced himself to stay conscious, asking the system in a cold voice.

But his voice was now hoarse and rough, completely stripped of its usual commanding, frosty edge.

[Due to the exceptionally high number of faith points obtained, the system has automatically initiated a body upgrade!]

The moment the system finished speaking, it felt as if something exploded before Silvanus’s eyes—his vision was flooded with blinding light, then rapidly swallowed by darkness.

He lost consciousness.

The stars in the space above began to move, twisting together, converging toward Silvanus at the center. The brightest star in the space shone a soft, divine light directly down upon him.

Something was stirring inside the heart of that star—like a massive vortex of energy that could detonate at any moment.

[Upgrade process initiated – Dungeon: The Corpse Collector, Dimension No. 027. Please complete the upgrade mission.]

The system’s voice was icy cold, utterly different from its usual tone.

Silvanus felt cold—bone-deep cold. The chill pierced his flesh, seeped into his bones, and flowed with every breath, making his entire body stiff and frozen.

The system’s frigid voice jolted Silvanus awake!

His face was drenched in cold sweat, eyes slightly wide open, and he instinctively bolted upright to assess his surroundings.

At the moment, he was sitting on the ground—a cold surface stained with strange hues of black and red, even the blades of grass were tinged with a dark brown, as though they’d long withered away.

Before him lay a large lake. The surface of the water drifted quietly without a single noticeable ripple. Everything felt unnaturally calm and still—there was no birdsong, not even the sound of insects.

"What the hell is this place..."

Silvanus couldn’t help but mutter. For safety, he spoke within his consciousness:

[System, system, are you there?!]

No response came. It was as if the system had completely vanished from his mind. Since arriving in this world, this was the first time the system had failed to answer his call.

Silvanus couldn’t help but recall the system’s last message: this was a level-up dungeon targeted specifically at him, and it was taking place in a different dimension.

He frowned. Despite the cold seeping up from the ground, he didn’t sit up immediately. Instead, he continued to ponder.

Perhaps there were worlds being overrun by dungeons—and this was one of them. However, he couldn’t help but wonder: was the livestream channel here the same one used on the other continent? And could he still read the comments?

Just as he thought that the empty air before him was suddenly flooded with comments, filling his view.

[Oh my god, what is this? That face...]

[He has to be a god, right? I wonder if he’s just another role played by Nerio, ha ha ha!]

[Come on, this is obviously a different broadcast channel!]

[Who knows—maybe gods can travel across time and space?]

[Gods are just characters in a bunch of scripts written by screenwriters anyway. I heard the writers from these two channels don’t get along. No way they’d let the other borrow Nerio!]

[Might be stolen ideas.]

[Honestly, this script is always boring as hell... watching it for now, hoping the other channel comes back soon.]

So, it looked like he could still read comments—and it was clearly the same group of viewers, just watching through two different channels.

At that moment, a pop-up window suddenly appeared in front of Silvanus, displaying a block of text:

Welcome, Challenger, to the Level-Up Dungeon. The following is your script:

You are a diver. Several days ago, you and your team received a large contract: retrieve corpses dumped into a river by a notorious criminal near a remote village. The reward is significant. Needing the money, you and your teammates accepted without hesitation and traveled to the village to recover the designated bodies.

Please retrieve all the murdered victims.

Time limit: None

Objective: Return safely to claim your reward!

Note: Please follow the script exactly. Do not allow other characters to notice anything unusual.

Just one glance, and he knew this was bad news. This dungeon clearly had no intention of letting him leave easily. Worse yet, it didn’t even tell him how many bodies needed to be recovered—or how many victims there were.

And... he couldn’t let anything slip.

Unlike the continent on the other side, this dungeon felt more like a full-blown narrative script.

He had no idea what kind of NPCs or characters would exist here...

Silvanus could already feel it—that a future more ominous than storm clouds was waiting to welcome him.