The back of the flea market felt like the basement of a haunted house. The fluorescent lights flickered with a sickly green tint, and the air grew heavy with the smell of ozone and old parchment. This was the "Forbidden Zone"—a single stall guarded by an elderly woman whose mana signature felt like cold iron.
"There it is," Seo-Yoon whispered, her tablet projecting a containment field warning. "The [Grimoire of the Eternal Hunger]. Rank: Unknown. Status: Cursed."
In the center of the stall, resting on a velvet cushion that looked like it was soaked in dried blood, sat a book. It wasn't made of paper. The cover looked like leathery, grey skin, and there was a literal mouth—complete with yellowed teeth—clamped shut across the opening.
"It's... it's snoring," I noted, leaning in close.
"Don't touch it!" Jin-Woo hissed, grabbing my shoulder. "The last hunter who tried to learn a skill from that book didn't just fail; the book learned him. They found his clothes on the floor and nothing else."
The old woman behind the counter cackled. "The boy has eyes. That book is a parasite from a Rank-A Void Gate. It doesn't contain skills. It contains a hunger that can never be satisfied. It's been here for three years because no one is stupid enough to buy their own death."
"How much?" I asked, reaching for my wallet.
Jin-Woo and Seo-Yoon both screamed "No!" at the same time.
"Ten thousand won," the old woman grinned, showing even fewer teeth than the book. "I'll pay you ten thousand won just to take it out of my sight."
"Deal!" I slapped a bill onto the counter and picked up the biting book before Seo-Yoon could calculate the 1,000 ways I was about to die.
"Han-Gul, put that down immediately!" Seo-Yoon's eyes were wide with genuine panic—the first time I'd seen her lose her cool. "The mana-logic of a Cursed Item is a closed loop. If you try to synthesize it, the 'Hunger' will simply consume your System. It's like trying to pour a black hole into a cup!"
"But look at it, Yoon-Yoon," I said, holding the book at arm's length as it tried to nip at my fingers. "It's not evil. It's just... hangry. It needs a snack."
I sat down on a pile of empty crates, ignoring the crowd of hunters that had gathered to watch the "suicidal porter."
[Cursed Item Detected: Grimoire of the Eternal Hunger] [Warning: Item is sentient and hostile.] [Current Objective: Neutralize or Assimilate.]
"Okay, System," I muttered, my voice turning a little more serious. "If I feed it something it can't digest, will it calm down?"
I pulled out a common, boring Skill Book I'd grabbed from the 1,000-won bin earlier: [Analyze Flora (Rank F)]. It was a skill for gardeners to tell the difference between a dandelion and a rose.
"Hey, Book-y," I whispered. "Eat this."
I shoved the gardening book into the Grimoire's mouth. The leather teeth clamped down, shredding the paper. The book glowed with a dark, purplish light, letting out a satisfied burp.
"Now, while it's chewing..."
I activated [Origin Synthesis].
[Select components for Fusion:]
[Grimoire of the Eternal Hunger (Cursed Item)]
[Skill: Analyze Flora (Rank F)]
[Hidden Ingredient: Han-Gul's 'Basic Catalog' (Rank E)]
"Wait, you're fusing your own base skill?!" Jin-Woo shouted, stepping forward to stop me, but a pulse of golden energy pushed him back.
[Synthesis Commencing...] [The 'Hunger' is attempting to consume the System...] [System is counter-consuming the 'Hunger'...] [Logic Error Detected!] [Applying Han-Gul's 'Nice Guy' Filter...]
The dark purple energy of the curse collided with my bright blue mana. For a second, the entire subway station shook. The 'Hunger' tried to eat my mind, but it found something it didn't expect: a vast, empty space where a normal person's "common sense" should be.
It was like a shark trying to bite a cloud. There was nothing for the curse to grab onto.
[Synthesis Success!] [The Curse has been 'Tamed' and 'Redirected'.] [Unique Evolution: 'Basic Catalog' has evolved into 'The Gluttonous Architect's Eye'!]
The Grimoire in my hands dissolved into a swirl of black ink that soaked into my skin, forming a small, tattoo-like mark of a mouth on my inner wrist.
I blinked, rubbing my eyes. When I looked at Seo-Yoon, the text box above her head had changed.
[Target: Seo-Yoon (Human)] [Class: Genius Analyst] [Status: Terrified/Confused/Impressed (33% each)] [Potential Fusions: Fusing this target with 'Coffee' would result in 'Hyper-Calculative Goddess'.]
"Whoa," I said. "I can see potential fusions for people now?"
I looked at a rusty pipe on the wall.
[Target: Iron Pipe] [Suggested Fusion: Fuse with 'High-Frequency Cutter' to create 'Vibrating Harpoon'.]
"Han-Gul..." Seo-Yoon walked over, her tablet forgotten on the floor. She grabbed my wrist, staring at the black mark. "You didn't just destroy the curse. You... you integrated it. You gave the 'Hunger' a job. You turned a Rank-A death sentence into a search engine."
She looked up at me, and for the first time, her analytical gaze felt different. It wasn't just curiosity; it was a realization. "You aren't just a variable. You're the whole equation."
"I don't know about equations," I said, my stomach let out a loud growl that sounded suspiciously like the Grimoire's burp. "But I'm really hungry. Does anyone want to fuse some Bulgogi with a 'Large Pizza'?"
Jin-Woo let out a bark of laughter, clapping me on the back so hard I almost fell over. "That's my boy! Only you could turn a soul-eating monster into a way to find better loot. Come on, I'm buying. But Seo-Yoon is paying, because she's rich."
Seo-Yoon didn't argue. She just kept looking at my wrist, her mind clearly spinning at a thousand miles per hour. "Han-Gul," she said quietly as we walked toward the exit. "If you can see 'Potential Fusions' in everything... what do you see when you look at the Great Gates? The ones the S-Rankers can't close?"
I looked toward the city center, where a massive, swirling vortex of red mana hung in the sky over Seoul.
My new 'Eye' flickered.
[Target: The World Tree Gate (Rank SSS)] [Requirement for Fusion: One 'Synthesis Architect' + Six 'God-Tier Essences'.] [Result: ???]
"I think," I whispered, the goofiness fading from my voice for just a second. "I think the world is just one big unfinished recipe."