I Spread my Genes to Level Up in the Apocalypse

"Hey, Ray, this is this month's rent," Jose stopped him before he could go far.

Ray saw Jose just as he remembered, but his face was strangely blurry, though Ray was too flustered to notice.

"Just send it to my bank account," he replied casually, brushing off the odd feeling.

As Ray left the house, confusion still clouded his mind. For some reason, he found himself wandering into a dark alley.

Ray's ears twitched as he heard footsteps approaching. Before he could react, a cloth was suddenly pressed over his mouth.

He thrashed in an attempt to fight back, but his strength quickly faded, and he fell unconscious.

When Ray woke up, he was in a dark room, illuminated only by a dim light from a bulb above him. His arms and legs were bound.

"Is this... kidnapping?" Ray muttered to himself.

Then he heard the distinct sound of high heels approaching, making him turn around.

A woman appeared in front of him. Her face was blurry, but her lush golden hair and the seductive outfit that accentuated her figure were unmistakable.

"So, you're experiment no. 908, huh?" she said, lifting his chin with a sinister tone in her voice.

"Who are you?" Ray managed to weakly ask, but instead of an answer, she produced an injection and plunged it directly into his eye.

"Ahhh!"

Ray screamed in agony as his eye was instantly destroyed.

But the torment didn't end there. With his remaining eye, Ray watched in horror as the blonde woman continued torturing him—digging out his nails, breaking his arms and legs, and inflicting countless other horrors.

By the end, Ray's single eye was completely lifeless, blank, as if all traces of humanity had been drained from it.

The blonde woman left with a satisfied expression on her face.

"I... I..." Ray mumbled through his parched lips, a flash of hatred sparking in his eyes.

"I never did anything to them. I'm just an ordinary person living an ordinary life. What did I do to deserve this?"

His teeth ground against each other, rage simmering inside him.

Summoning all the strength he had left, Ray barely managed to crawl across the cold floor, pushing his battered body to the limit. Eventually, he collapsed, falling asleep with his limbs sprawled out.

The next day, Ray woke with a deep, gnawing hunger.

"I'm... hungry," he muttered, slowly straining to open his eyes. He heard a thud outside the door and noticed a plate of mutton chops placed nearby.

"This..."

Ray frantically used all his strength to reach the plate and ate without hesitation. Even if it was poisoned, he would gladly accept it as his last meal.

After gaining some strength, he slowly stood up, a faint sense of clarity returning to his mind.

"I will get my revenge," Ray silently swore to himself.

Without wasting time, he began doing push-ups. No matter how broken his body felt or how intense the pain, he didn't stop for a second.

Strangely, even though it felt like he was dying with each movement, Ray pressed on. He did push-ups, squats, running, planks, and even pull-ups using a ceiling rope, relentlessly pushing his body beyond its limits.

Ray had no idea how much time had passed. His mind was consumed entirely by thoughts of revenge.

The blonde woman never returned, but food was constantly provided, so Ray trained relentlessly, as if his life depended on it.

He was always constantly on the verge of dying, yet death never came.

It felt like centuries had passed before clarity began to return to him. He even remembered dying in the ambulance, but that memory was distant, overshadowed by the relentless cycle of training and near-death experiences.

Though always teetering on the edge of death, Ray never truly crossed it.

His hair had grown down to his waist, and a long beard reached nearly to his chest. Yet, with bloodshot eyes, Ray never stopped.

One day, as Ray was training, a faint memory resurfaced: Vanessa, Freya, Grace, Evelyn, Gina, Daisy, Kaite, Yuna, Elsha, Shelly... all his women.

"Hmm, who are these people?" Ray clutched his head in pain, trying to recall the names.

At that moment, he heard the door finally open with a click.

The familiar sound of high heels echoed in his ears.

"How are you doing, experiment no. 908?"

"Your mother," Ray growled, immediately launching himself at her, his five fingers retracting into a tight fist.

Every fibre of his muscles twitched and worked together in perfect sync for this one punch. Ray could feel his body breaking apart with each movement, the soul-rending pain filling him, but the rage in his mind was far greater than all of it combined.

In a miraculous moment, his body began to heal as fast as it was breaking down, and his punch landed squarely on the blurry face of the golden-haired woman.

Boom!

The world seemed to break apart, shattering like fragments of a mirror. Everything collapsed, and Ray's memory gradually began to return.

As he looked at the golden-haired woman, he could faintly make out her lips.

"Huh?"

"Huh!?"

Ray's eyes snapped open to the familiar ceiling of his gym.

"What the hell just happened?" He gritted his teeth and tried to stand up, or at least that was his intention.

Unfortunately, when he tried to rise, his body seemed to float instead, plastering his face against the ceiling.

"Eh?" Ray exerted a small amount of force, and the ceiling instantly gave way. He found himself on top of his skyscraper, which had hundreds of floors.

At that moment, Ray felt as though his entire body was incredibly light, like a piece of paper.

It felt like he could fly just like this. When he casually raised his palm, a terrifying wind current surged, almost creating a storm in the sky.

Immediately, a palm-shaped imprint appeared in the sky by separating the clouds in place.

"This… Did I really do this?"

Ray's eyes flashed with disbelief as he gently pushed himself and floated effortlessly, like a fish swimming in the water, without using his Overlord skill and this was possible by just exerting his strength on air itself.