Chapter 547

In the Dark Void, Jake had leveled up more than one hundred times, rising from level 209 to 339, which granted him 650 points to allocate. He had also completed several challenges throughout the dungeon, earning additional points as rewards for completing them.

As a result, he had accumulated quite a substantial amount of points. He knew that every ability in the fourth section of the Genetic Development Interface came with demanding attribute requirements, especially the five powerful abilities he had earned for clearing all five levels of the dungeon. So he invested the vast majority of the points he had earned in the dungeon into his attributes.

His Body attribute had increased from 415 to 671. Mind had risen from 519 to 722, while Magick had climbed from 450 to 633. The increase was nothing short of tremendous. As a result, he now possessed 771,000 health points, 733,000 mana points, and 1,105 command points.

The last number pleased him the most. Command points dictated how many creatures he could have under his control at any given time, making them one of the most important resources at his disposal. The Saurian Prowler alone consumed 100 CP. All of his worker creatures combined required somewhere between 300 and 400 CP. A single wyrmcaller cost 10 CP, more than three times as much as a crawler or a wingclaw. Because of that, he didn’t have much CP available for his regular army of monsters.

His regular army had consisted of around fifteen crawlers, fifteen wingclaws, and a swarm of smaller creatures, blastfiends and wasps. The latter two were only about the size of cats. Because of that, they each cost just 1 CP, allowing him to maintain them in large numbers. Individually, they posed little threat to stronger opponents, but as a swarm, they were capable of overwhelming enemies.

However, that had been before he was teleported to the Dark Void anomaly. Back then, his command point limit had forced him to be selective with every creature he created, carefully balancing numbers with strength. Now, with 1,105 CP at his disposal, those limitations had been eased. He could now have a far larger army than just thirty regular-sized creatures and could even now afford to create a second Kaiju without sacrificing the size of his regular swarm of monsters.

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Name: Jake Turner

Race: Ex-Human Morphus

Evolution Stage IV: “Damage Master”

Level: 339

XP: 1,442,155 / 2,010,000

HP: 515,000 / 771,000

MP: 550,000 / 733,000

Shield Integrity: 0 / 771,000

CP: 1,105

SP: 1

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Body: 671

Mind: 722

Magick: 633

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Foresight: Rank I (Upgrades: 1 of 5) (Epic)

Psychic: Rank I (Upgrades: 0 of 5) (Epic)

Rigging: Rank I (Upgrades: 0 of 5) (Epic)

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Other than increasing his attributes, Jake had also acquired the three remaining skills from the third section of the Genetic Development Interface: Foresight, Psychic, and Rigging, as well as unlocking the first upgrade for Foresight. Now every single skill from the previous section was acquired.

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Foresight: When you find yourself in a predicament where a wrong choice could lead to severe consequences, before taking any action, you can first perform that action mentally and observe a likely outcome unfold in your mind. This allows you to anticipate the potential consequences of your decisions before committing to them. The further into the future you attempt to look, the longer the vision takes to unfold and the more mana the ability consumes. It takes several seconds to view several minutes of possible immediate future events. 

Mana Cost: 250,000 MP

Upgrades:

1. You can now view very brief predictions, extending only a few seconds into the future. Such outcomes can be observed nearly instantaneously, allowing you to use this ability even during combat. The prediction reveals the most likely sequence of events based on the current circumstances, though it is not guaranteed to be the outcome that will ultimately occur, as even the slightest change in actions or conditions can alter the future.

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Psychic: By closing your eyes, you can extend your psychic senses, revealing the emotional states and even the general thoughts of nearby humans. At its initial stage, the skill primarily allows you to gauge the overall mood of individuals, as well as perceive the broad nature of their thoughts without revealing specific details. You can detect fear, hostility, panic, confidence, suspicion, and other emotions that may influence a person’s actions. As the skill is upgraded, it will unlock additional abilities, allowing for deeper and more refined interactions with the minds of others in a variety of situations.

Mana Cost: Mana consumption depends on the duration of the skill’s use.

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Rigging: Allows you to hack into sophisticated electronic devices and computer systems by mentally interfacing with their software and security protocols. The more advanced the technology, the harder it is for you to gain access and get through more powerful defensive countermeasures. Successfully breaching a system grants you control over its available functions, though the extent of that control depends on the complexity of the device. Upgrading Rigging will improve your ability to infiltrate increasingly advanced systems, reduce the time required to bypass their defenses, and unlock additional options when interacting with various electronics.

Mana Cost: Mana consumption depends on the duration of the skill’s use.

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These three skills were definitely quite useful. One detail of Foresight immediately caught his attention. It consumed 250,000 MP with every use, an enormous amount of mana, especially for an ability that wasn’t directly offensive. Even with his greatly increased mana pool, he could only use it a couple of times before nearly depleting his inner reserves. Still, there was no denying its value. In certain situations, it would definitely be very useful.

Rigging also piqued his interest. At first glance, it seemed very similar to one of the upgrades to Enhanced Intelligence, which already allowed him to hack into electronic devices. That immediately made him wonder how the two abilities differed. After all, he could already gain access to various devices such as PDAs, so what exactly did Rigging offer that Enhanced Intelligence did not?

He figured he would find out soon enough once he encountered humans and had the opportunity to use the skill on their technology. From what he could tell, unlike the Enhanced Intelligence upgrade, Rigging appeared to be a far more specialized and sophisticated ability. Rather than simply allowing him to break into simple electronic devices, it seemed to be designed around the entire process of infiltration.

It might also grant him multiple options after gaining access, allowing him to manipulate systems in different ways depending on the situation. While the Enhanced Intelligence upgrade appeared limited to relatively simple electronics like PDAs, Rigging could potentially allow him to infiltrate sophisticated computer systems, communication networks, military hardware, and likely any other advanced technology.

So far, he had never encountered any device that he couldn’t hack into with the Enhanced Intelligence upgrade. However, to be fair, all the devices he had hacked were relatively simple, lacking any real complexity.

Besides, while he had been absent, the world had clearly changed, and humans had most likely made significant progress during that time, developing technology far more powerful than what had existed before. The Enhanced Intelligence upgrade might no longer be enough to break into their most advanced systems, at least not the devices that went beyond the ordinary. And that was likely where Rigging would come in handy.

The fourth section of the Genetic Development Interface now contained one skill and ten abilities. Of those ten abilities, the first five had become available when he evolved into Stage IV, while the remaining five had been awarded for clearing all five levels of the dungeon. They all had steep requirements and high mana costs.

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Evolution Stage IV: “Damage Master”

Abilities: 0 of 10

Skills: 0 of 1

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Ability: Internal Storage

Requirements: Body 420, Mind 520, Magick 455

Cost: 125,000 MP

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Ability: Spiteful Roots

Requirements: Body 425, Mind 525, Magick 460, Internal Storage

Cost: 125,000 MP

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Ability: Vengeful Branches

Requirements: Body 430, Mind 530, Magick 465, Internal Storage

Cost: 125,000 MP

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Ability: Malicious Bugs

Requirements: Body 435, Mind 535, Magick 470, Internal Storage

Cost: 125,000 MP

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Ability: Deadly Duplicate

Requirements: Body 440, Mind 545, Magick 475, Internal Storage

Cost: 125,000 MP

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Skill: Mental Intruder

Requirements: Body 420, Mind 535, Magick 460, Mind Reader (Rank V)

Cost: 120,000 MP

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Ability: Bio-Plasma Cannons (Epic)

Requirements: Body 525, Mind 470, Magick 550

Cost: 250,550 MP

–––––––––––––––––––––––––––Ability: Acid Mortars (Epic)

Requirements: Body 545, Mind 495, Magick 575

Cost: 275,075 MP

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Ability: Head Cannon (Epic)

Requirements: Body 585, Mind 515, Magick 600

Cost: 290,100 MP

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Ability: Siege Beast (Legendary)

Requirements: Body 655, Mind 685, Magick 590

Cost: 310,750 MP

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Ability: Living Railgun (Legendary)

Requirements: Body 670, Mind 720, Magick 630

Cost: 350,900 MP

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Allocating nearly all the points he had earned in the dungeon to his attributes had paid off. As he looked through the requirements for the abilities one by one, he saw that he now met the requirements for every available ability, even the most demanding ones in terms of both attributes and mana cost, such as the two legendary abilities Siege Beast and Living Railgun.

And that meant he could now begin purchasing whichever abilities best suited his needs as he continued leveling up and earning additional skill points. He no longer had to worry about investing points into his attributes simply to unlock future abilities. From this point onward, every new skill point could be spent directly on expanding his arsenal.

At the moment, however, he had only a single skill point available. There was no reason to hold onto it. Without giving it much thought, he spent it on the very first ability on the list, immediately unlocking the foundation upon which several other abilities appeared to depend.

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Internal Storage: Allows you to attach processed biomatter to your body. The stored biomass spreads evenly across your exterior, forming an additional protective layer over your body. The first layer has little effect on your speed, agility, or maneuverability, but each additional layer gradually increases your weight, reducing your mobility while improving the amount of biomass available for use. Through future upgrades, this ability can provide a variety of additional benefits, increasing both its capacity and functionality. Internal Storage also serves as a biological reserve required by certain other abilities. Whenever those abilities are activated, they consume a portion of the processed biomass contained within your Internal Storage. The more biomass you have stored, the more frequently such abilities can be used before your reserves must be replenished.

Current Capacity: 100

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It was clear that this ability was required for four other abilities on the list, Spiteful Roots, Vengeful Branches, Malicious Bugs, and Deadly Duplicate, to function. It was also obvious that those four abilities were exclusive to his Corruptor subclass. They relied on Internal Storage as their foundation, meaning that without this ability, they wouldn’t be able to work.

On its own, Internal Storage didn’t seem particularly useful, at least not in its current state without any upgrades. Simply storing processed biomatter and adding additional layers to his body didn’t appear to provide any significant advantages. However, the fact that several abilities depended on it meant that it was far more important than it initially appeared. It would clearly become much more valuable once he unlocked its upgrades and obtained the other abilities connected to it.

Jake finally opened his eyes, and all the information displayed before him vanished. He took a quick look around, taking in his surroundings. He was back in the Apex Hollow, having returned half an hour earlier. Everything in his lair was running like clockwork, just as it always did. The various structures continued operating smoothly, and nothing seemed out of place despite his extended absence.

Now that he had checked his stats and examined the abilities he had gained, it was time to inspect the new structures that had been unlocked after he evolved the Apex Hollow’s mana core some time ago. Those structures had been waiting for him ever since before his journey into the Dark Void, and he was finally ready to see what new capabilities they could bring to his lair.