Chapter 384 - 284: A Bustling Wilderness Dungeon

Chapter 384: Chapter 284: A Bustling Wilderness Dungeon

The first to be fused was the Virtual Divinity from the Master of Billions of Flesh. Its Divine Name was [Virtual Divinity: Blood Banquet], its Divine Powers were [Flesh Mutation], [Flesh Creation], and [Flesh Withering], and its Divine Authority was [Flesh Banquet]. The Divinity appeared as a wrinkled, red finger.

The subject of the fusion was a dusty-gray Demonized Slime. Under the influence of Demon God Power, the once-sluggish Slime, which had virtually no aggression, had become exceptionally irritable. Almost half a day had passed since its capture, yet it was still hissing and posturing aggressively at Isaac.

But this was to be expected. The vast majority of Demons were all brawn and no brains. Naturally, Isaac wouldn’t stoop to bickering with an idiot. He gave a casual wave, and an invisible hand of Magic Power brought the Slime before him, shoving the wrinkled finger straight into its mouth.

The next moment, an aura of dark red Divine Power ignited on the Slime. Isaac took two steps back, a faint light glimmering in his eyes as the Magic Array beneath the Slime began to emit a soft white glow.

Unlike the last experiment, this time Isaac not only used his [Analysis] Authority to collect data, but had also added an Observation Array to make the data he gathered more comprehensive.

Before long, the drab, gray Demonized Slime had transformed into the bright red Master of the Blood Banquet. The being, which previously could only hiss, now used its absolute power to break free from Isaac’s hand of Magic Power. It opened a cavernous maw that took up most of its body and lunged at Isaac!

But it was utterly futile.

Facing the Master of the Blood Banquet’s counterattack, Isaac remained perfectly calm. With a mere thought, crimson flames of Divine Power once again enveloped the Master, incinerating its unparalleled Divine Power along with its body, until all that remained was a wrinkled red finger floating in the air.

With the data collection complete, there was no reason to keep the entity around. Isaac had always been clear about his objectives: his current goal was to gather more experimental data to perfect the ritual of Becoming a God.

As for training it...

He could, but there was no need.

After fusing with the Divinity, a Demon’s intelligence would be enhanced and would see a dramatic increase in a short period. However, as a saying from Isaac’s past life aptly put it: morality and intelligence are not correlated.

The same was true for these Virtual Deities. At their core, they were still extremely bloodthirsty Demons. Training them, even if possible, would require an immense amount of effort. It just wasn’t worth it.

Next, Isaac repeated the procedure, collecting seven more sets of data. Including the first set from the [Evil Eye], he now had data from a total of nine instances of the ritual for Becoming a God. His next step was to spot the differences.

He would compare this data against a normal ritual for Becoming a God, identify the discrepancies, and finally, attempt to modify the process.

This task wasn’t difficult for Isaac, merely a bit tedious. After all, he possessed the plans for a proper ritual of Becoming a God; as he’d just concluded, it was simply a matter of spotting the differences.

For other professions, a ritual for Becoming a God might be a priceless treasure. But for Wizards—especially Tier Four or even Tier Three Wizards—such a thing was nothing special.

After all, Deities were subject to many restrictions in the Real World. To say nothing of Outer Gods, even True Gods couldn’t move about freely in the Real World—a far cry from the freedom Wizards enjoyed.

Besides, becoming a True God wasn’t so easy. Every position was already filled. A god’s strength was tied to their Divine Authority, but all the powerful Divine Authorities had long been claimed, leaving extremely limited room for growth. And any who managed to become a High-level Mage was a genius, were they not?

But I digress. After collecting the experimental data, Isaac didn’t immediately bury himself in research. Instead, he found several locations and tossed out all the Divinities—aside from the Evil Eye—leaving them to develop freely.

This, too, was part of the experiment. Isaac wanted to see whether he could still maintain absolute control over the Virtual Divinities after they had been beyond his grasp for a long time, especially when both their numbers and distance from him exceeded normal limits.

Opportunities for such an experiment were rare. Isaac only dared to attempt it in a special domain like the Endless Tower, a place completely isolated from the outside world and where the power level was capped at Tier Four. Anywhere else, this wouldn’t be an experiment—it would be a death wish.

Once the Virtual Divinities were deployed, Isaac paid them no further mind. He found a place to hole up and began his research on how to optimize them.

...

Meanwhile, while Isaac was holed up conducting his research, Prince Norns made a very different choice.

The moment he arrived, Norns’s first act was to gather his men with all possible speed. Compared to Isaac, Norns had a much smoother start. Not only had most of his subordinates landed nearby, but his Trial mission was simply to eliminate three Sects.

The task, however, was far less difficult. A Sect’s forces were relatively scattered and could be picked off one by one. Moreover, compared to an Underground Palace, a Sect was much cheaper to establish. From an Evil God’s perspective, if one was destroyed, so be it; it wasn’t worth granting its followers a sudden, cheat-like power boost.

In other words, under normal circumstances, the strongest enemies they would face in a Sect would not exceed Tier Four. At most, there would be a higher number of them, but this actually suited Norns’s intentions perfectly.

This was because in order to truly possess Tier Five power after leaving the Endless Tower, he not only had to complete the Trial, but also had to perform a blood-combat ritual to hone his Combat Techniques. And this ritual, as it happened, required him to engage in life-or-death battles against a large number of same-tier enemies.