Chapter 92: Seed of Chaos
Inside a magnificent grand chamber, rays of golden sunlight filtered through the window, falling upon a young man with his eyes tightly shut.
Slowly, they fluttered faintly, then with a soft groan, snapped open to reveal a striking crimson gaze.
Inhaling sharply, Ulric sat upright, his gaze sweeping across the room where the others lay snugly asleep.
Carefully, he removed Lyra from his embrace. Her eyes fluttered for a moment but soon sank back into sleep.
Rising to his feet, a smile slowly spread across his face. He felt fully refreshed and more than that, he could feel massive reserves of energy thrumming deep within him.
If it were any other time, he would have rushed into a dungeon and gone on a murderous spree. But now, he had other plans.
Walking to the center of the room, a mist of darkness rose to envelop him. When it receded, all impurities clinging to his body had been purged as he slipped back into his robe.
It was upgrade time. He mused inwardly as he lowered himself into a lotus position, his eyes snapping shut once more as he entered a meditative state.
Good thing he knew exactly where to start.
His core skills, the ones he had unlocked at the beginning. He had been putting them off for a while, always having something more urgent to attend to. But now, he finally had all the corruption points he needed.
Speaking of which. He issued a mental command, summoning his system interface to check how much he had acquired.
[Unallocated corruption points: 807,421]
The number was staggering. With this much, he could upgrade a large portion of what he had planned.
But first. He pulled up the random system shop reward.
"Gauntlets, huh?" Ulric muttered. Nothing impressive. If anything, their quality was even lower than his scythe when he had first acquired it.
Still, it didn’t matter. It only reaffirmed a thought that had been lingering in his mind, the system shop likely contained everything he could ever imagine.
Good thing it was already high on his list. It wouldn’t be long before he unlocked it.
Satisfied, he nodded faintly, muttering under his breath.
"Intermediate Appraisal... Lewd Touch... Seed of Corruption... Dark Lord’s Conquest..."
He paused, exhaling lightly before speaking again.
"Corrupt."
Instantly, waves of energy surged from his surroundings, piercing into him and wrapping him in a thin film of darkness.
But it didn’t take as long as he expected.
Within seconds, the energy receded, replaced by a flurry of notifications.
[Ding! Corruption Successful!]
[-8,100 corruption points.]
Swiping through, he pulled up the updated descriptions.
[Skill: Lewd Touch – Allows the host to magnify suppressed desires of any woman when activated. Limited to once a day]
→
[Skill: Lewd Touch – Allows the host to magnify suppressed desires of any woman when activated. Limited to thrice a day]
(0/500)
"Not bad," Ulric muttered. Then he moved on.
[Intermediate Appraisal: Analyze objects and people to procure more than basic information]
→
[Advanced Appraisal: Analyze objects and people to procure advanced information and weaknesses. Limited to D-rank] (0/5,000)
"Woah..."
His eyes widened slightly as he read through it. At first, it seemed mostly unchanged, but the last part was a complete game changer.
Before, he used it mainly to get a read on opponents in battle. Now, it could do far more.
Testing it, he cast the skill on Amber, who was closest to him. Her panel appeared, similar to before. But now there was a new tab.
[Weakness: Susceptible to fire attacks.]
He cast it across the others in the room, his grin widening each time.
Only after a few minutes did he regain his composure, shifting his focus to the final two skills.
[Dark Lord’s Conquest: Brand loyalty onto female subjects. By drinking your seed, you gain 1% experience from all their kills.]
→
[Dark Lord’s Conquest: Brand loyalty onto female subjects. By drinking your seed, you gain 5% experience from all their kills.] (0/10,000)
"Hm."
Ulric nodded slowly. A significant improvement. Previously, the gains had been too small to matter. But now, they could stack meaningfully over time.
His thoughts drifted further. Perhaps one day, it could reach 100%.
At that point, he wouldn’t even need to act, he could grow stronger passively at an absurd rate. He nodded at the thought before turning to the final skill.
Instantly, his eyes widened in surprise, his breath hitching slightly. The previous upgrades had been impressive... but this was something else entirely.
He reread the description multiple times, almost as if expecting it to change.
It felt unreal.
Then, unable to hold it back any longer, a chuckle escaped him, his crimson eyes gleaming with excitement.
[Seed of Corruption: By draining your seed into any female subject, you gain the opportunity to extract skills, talents, or bloodlines of your choice and brand them onto the host.]
→
[Seed of Chaos: By draining your seed into any female subject, you gain the opportunity to extract any skills, talents, or bloodlines of your choice and brand them onto the host, with a rebate of 2 to 10,000x.]
It was absurd. Ulric exhaled heavily.
Before, he hadn’t paid much attention to the extracted talents, they had been too weak to matter.
But now... This could change everything.
His gaze drifted across the room, where the others were beginning to stir awake.
With a high enough rebate, he could potentially obtain S-rank talents or even the legendary SSS-rank and beyond if such a thing truly existed.
There was no limit. The only strange thing was there was no corruption cost listed.
Had he maxed it out? Or was his body simply too weak for further upgrades?
Either way, it didn’t matter. This was already more than enough.
But he wasn’t done. A feral grin stretched across his face as he issued a command he had been waiting to use.
"Assimilate Amber’s Earth Elemental Heritage."
Barely a moment after the words left his lips, the air around him rippled gently as a mist of green energy rich with vitality, shot into his body, wrapping him in a cocoon