CH1139

“For the record, I just want to say that I think this was a terrible idea on your part,” Foast told him as they and the others stood outside, Ben unable to do anything but nod in agreement.

“Yeah, in retrospect, I can see that now.”

While he was preparing to make both bodies and souls for Foast to kill in the hopes that the shifter would be able to take on their superior properties, Abel had gotten bored and decided that instead, it was the perfect time to test her new magic, and given it was at the zeroth level, normally, that wouldn’t have been a problem.

Normally, but Abel’s situation wasn’t normal. After gaining the magic, Ben had filled her head with all of the spell knowledge he could, just as he had for everyone else, but it was a benefit that he’d helped her get previously that was the far bigger issue. She had been allowed to feast on all of the discarded bodies leftover from the world’s demigod production and, as a result, her attributes had exploded to ridiculous new heights.

Her mana alone was almost at nine hundred thousand, and she had no qualms about spending it, filling the sky with fire to an apocalyptic degree that filled the few remaining residents of the city with fear and horror, forcing Ben to speak into what minds he could reach to calm them down before walking through the cloud of flames to reach Abel at its heart.

“Alright, enough of that,” he said, hoisting her like a mother cat and picking the girl up by the scruff of her neck. “Abel, you’re scaring everyone.”

“Huh? With what? A little fire?”

“This is a lot of fire.”

“It’s just enough to give me that little taste of home I’ve been missing.”

“Your old universe was a nightmare; we don’t need it being recreated in this one. Until you get to the ninth level of it, don’t cast any spells that take up more space than you do right now.”

“What? Boring.”

“It’s called learning responsibly. The ratio of your magic level to your pure mana is way off; you need to focus on controlling it. But, if you promise you can do that and you level the skill responsibly, I’ll make sure to give you a proper reward, okay?”

“What sort of reward?” she asked, perking up at the offer while he laughed.

“The surprise kind. You’ll get a hint about it when you come to show me how you awaken your weeping enhancement, okay?”

“Alright, but if I’m going to be holding back, it better be good!”

“Ha, I think it will be at least.”

If she got it to the ninth level, then he’d turn it into a blessed skill for her and help her awaken it without having to spend any of her tears, letting her gain a bonus skill for it at the same time, which he at least thought was an excellent deal. So long as she could remember it when he was no longer with her.

Eh, well, at that point it’s not really my problem so we’ll just see how it goes, he shrugged to himself. At least she’s calmed down, so we can finally move on.

Carrying her back like that to the others, Foast looked him up and down.

“You really must teach me the secret to managing her one day.”

“It’s really not hard; I don’t know why you have so much trouble.”

“Mmh, suppose a lack of talent on my part. You’re also far less crispy than I would have expected from walking into a ball of fire like that.”

“Good resistances, resistance enhancements, and other defensive skills. No matter how much mana she has, a first-tier magic just isn’t going to hurt me at this point. Anyway, you feeling ready?”

“If you are.”

“Perfect, then let’s get started.”

While Yuzu kept by Thera’s side, both remembering the horrors he’d unleashed before them the last time, the rest watched with interest as Ben materialized a new seed, seeing the structure that sprouted from it glow with an eerie yellow light as his new design took shape, only growing stronger until it broke down, the biomass crumbling and leaving only a body behind.

A form focused solely on energy production, it looked vaguely like a black dog in the light, taking in everything the sun had to offer, while also sharing a base with Myriad’s biology to enhance its mana absorption. Specialized entirely to that one task, while Ben didn’t actually expect Foast to be able to use that shape or any of the biological systems it held, he’d still made it the best he could, just to be safe, but with it done came the next step.

Once more, Ben overfilled his soul, and once more, he began to materialize a soul, but unlike the other third tiers, in that case, he didn’t need to consider anything like wastefulness or balance. He’d made ninety-nine the upper limit for the other third tiers since it didn’t make sense to spend so many millions of more points of mana, just to give two tiny extra points to something when it could instead go towards giving someone a potential for magic that would make any other archmage blush.

Foast though didn’t need to be bound by that limit, which left Ben wanting to see what was possible. Compared against his own, just how good could a soul ever be?

So, materializing one with the highest light affinity he could, he forced it into the empty flesh and felt it stick. Soul bound to body, all that was left was to confirm that Foast could make it his own, the shifter wasting no time in his attempt.

Reaching out with clawed hands, Foast tore the small creation apart, and Ben’s soul-sight instantly revealed the success. The shifter had claimed an attribute of one hundred and one, meaning that Ben was going to need to repeat the attempt another seventeen times to make him as magically adapt and resistant as possible.

With both the body and the tree that had produced it discarded, Ben ignored Abel sneaking over to them, viewing each as a curious snack, to instead focus on Foast. Reading the other man’s mind, he could see that he was in no pain and no indication of any other side effects. As far as either could tell, it had turned out perfectly fine. But behind that was another feeling, one that left him to crinkle his brow, only deepening with what the shifter did next.

With a casual air about him, Foast looked at his hand as it took on the same pitch black colour of Ben’s creation, absorbing all of the light that hit it in an unnaturally powerful version of photosynthesis, beyond anything nature had produced.

“Zingy,” the shifter commented. “Certainly a feature that could add some pep to me. You really figured out how to make a creature like this by yourself?”

“I did, and you actually managed to take on the characteristic. I mean, I guess it’s not unbelievable. A soul is a record, and by being put in that body, its nature became a part of that record, but… all it took was a few seconds, huh? I guess your skill must be able to specifically read information from that part of a soul when you absorb it, so the time it takes doesn’t matter, which means…”

“Yuzu, Valaria, Tress, we should probably go get some lunch,” Thera told the others with her when Ben trailed off, lost in his own thoughts. “I can already see where this is going and I already know it’s going to be more disturbing than I want to put up with.”

Not offended by the comment, Ben didn’t have the leeway to think about it. If Foast really could take on all of the bodies Ben created, then that meant he needed to push what he’d learned to produce the most powerful monstrosities he could.

By the time Thera and the others returned, it seemed that Ben was done. He sat on the ground in exhaustion, soul overstrained from all of the work he’d put it through, while Foast looked ill at the side in a way that was unrelated to his new attributes.

Other than his light and life resistance, everything he held was now at one hundred and one, marking him as the holder of potentially the most powerful soul in reality, at least as far as outright potential went, but that strength was at the cost of seeing the various monstrosities Ben had brought forth, leaving the man queasy at some of the things that had sprouted from those trees.

It was only Abel who looked well, having as little qualms about what had been created as Ben himself, with the added benefit of getting fed, having eaten her way through all of the corpses and gotten at least some results through her meat strengthening, thanks to the unusual souls they held.

“Done then?” Thera asked him, seeing as he raised a shaky thumbs-up.

“Basically done. Just give me a few more minutes for my soul to stop hurting.”

“Ben, I really don’t need you becoming the first person in reality to destroy your own soul.”

“Probably impossible, at least when it comes to overfilling it. All of my research and experimentation points to the idea that once a soul exists, it can stand up to a lot of damage.”

“You know, I’d love to believe that too, but I’ve got way too much experience seeing how you do things to let myself feel too much hope.”

“Ha, then it’s a good thing my girlfriend is so wonderful and kind and generous and also happens to have the exact sort of skill-set to help me with my aches and pains, pretty please.”

“Yeah, yeah. Just know that one of these days, I’m going to let you sit there and suffer through whatever you’ve decided to put yourself through.”

“And when that day comes, I promise I will be aware of just how much I deserve that,” he smiled, feeling better the moment her magic touched him. “Now, though, what matters is we’re done, and we didn’t even need to take a third day. Not bad, if I do say so myself.”

“Except for the fact that you still have one more thing to do before we get home.”

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“Well, yeah, but don’t worry, I’ll make it quick.”