The Zero-Rank Sovereign

The script

• Min-Jun: A 21-year-old slender young man with messy jet-black hair, sharp tired brown eyes, and pale skin. He wears a scuffed dark-grey utility jacket over a torn black undershirt, cargo pants, and worn boots. Memorable detail: thick white combat bandages wrapped securely around his right forearm.
• Gorgon Hound: A massive quadrupedal subterranean beast covered in obsidian scales, featuring three glowing crimson eyes, curved back horns, and razor fangs. Memorable detail: volatile violet ether continuously leaks from heavy glowing fissures across its armored chest plate.
• The System: A floating rectangular holographic interface with a sharp translucent sapphire border and glowing gold runic script hovering mid-air. Memorable detail: an ornate glowing crimson crest shaped like an eclipsed crown pulses brightly at its top center.

1. Panel 1

   Deep inside a ruined obsidian dungeon hall lit by eerie violet crystal veins. Min-Jun is slammed against a shattered stone column while Gorgon Hound towers over him, blocking the only exit.

   Min-Jun (thinks): The raid party... they locked the gate from the outside.

   Min-Jun (thinks): I was just bait to them.

2. Panel 2

   Gorgon Hound leaps forward with jaws wide, snapping its teeth as Min-Jun rolls frantically across the cracked flagstones, barely dodging the lethal pounce.

   Min-Jun (shouts): Move, damn it! Move!

3. Panel 3

   Min-Jun collapses onto one knee, clutching a shattered bronze dagger. Blood drips onto the stone floor as he glares up with exhausted defiance.