After digesting the information granted to her for completing the Choice Quest, Elizabeth"s eyes glittered with wonder. As soon as she was done, she sat down and began absorbing the unG.o.dly amounts of death energy spilling out of the Spirit Realm Moose Beast she"d just killed. Revolving the energy through the methods Yrre gave her, whilst concentrating on the images with profound insights into Death, Elizabeth"s Mark Of The G.o.dslayer lit with a sinister black glow.For now, Elizabeth ignored the moose calves as they couldn"t damage her even if she sat there defenseless. Her bodily defense was powerful enough to ignore most Soldier level attacks, adding on the armor set which boosted her defense past the King Stage, it would be a miracle for most Warrior Stage beings to even scratch her.
The information she received by itself wasn"t anything ridiculous like another spell or ability. Rather, it gave her an understanding of a highly sought after spiritual item known as a Spirit Vein. If it was just information about Spirit Veins, Elizabeth would have questioned why such random nonsense was thrown her way. However, given the context of the situation, after Elizabeth put her knowledge to practice, she immediately understood how valuable the information she received truly was.
As she finished absorbing the last of the moose"s death energy, Elizabeth stood up and walked over to the moose"s carca.s.s. Subst.i.tuting the Spirit Realm beast for one of the "mediocre" King Stage Beasts she had killed previously, Elizabeth sat back down and continued meditating on Death as her G.o.dslayer Mark continued sucking up the deathly fog around her. With all the potential she"d been building up, it didn"t take long for her Affinity to break through to Bad-tier. At that moment, her bloodline"s purity skyrocketed pa.s.sed the threshold for her to gain a new G.o.dslayer ability.
[Innate Skills
*New) Name: Talent Stealing Blood Seal
Grade: C
Description: As an agent of death, G.o.dslayers Fiends have their foundation rooted in stealing potential from their fallen enemies. Though usually used to prolong battle by revitalizing the body, when trained to the extreme, this ability grants G.o.dslayers the ability to steal Divinity.
Current Effect: Depends on the Level and Talent of the target. The higher the Level, the more vitality and energy is revitalized. The higher the Talent, the greater improvement to the user"s own Talent increases.]
Momentarily stopping to feel the changes in her body, Elizabeth checked her Dantian and sure enough, another Spell Seed manifested to represent her [Talent Stealing Blood Seal]. Although the Talent Stealing wouldn"t be worth much considering her chosen path of cultivation, the other effect was more than welcomed by her obsessive mind. However, a separate part of her thought, "Great… It"s as if I wasn"t already a death-dealing murder machine."
Upon releasing a sigh, Elizabeth continued absorbing death energies with wanton abandon. Hours pa.s.sed before the density in death energy around her waned to the point where the fog had cleared. At that point, Elizabeth stood up and began… digging. To an outsider looking in on her situation, it looked like she was digging for no reason. But in Elizabeth"s eyes — which now blazed with the aura of death — there was a spike in death energy just below the ground.
Naturally, this spike in death energy was a Spirit Vein she recently learned about. Smirking, Elizabeth understood the point of the Choice Quest as she dug deeper into the ground. Had she left and come back to challenge the Moose Beast after gaining more strength, then perhaps she might have only earned herself its corpse. However, with her newfound understanding of Spirit Veins, she"d found herself a treasure dozens of times more valuable than a mere bottom of the barrel Spirit Realm corpse.
Eventually, Elizabeth dug deep enough to see a blackish blue raw crystal. Just touching the crystal left Elizabeth feeling empty, but she long since expected that outcome. A touch was all it took before she could call the crystal"s status, and after reading through, a feverish madness seemed to possess Elizabeth as she couldn"t stop laughing.
[Status
Name: Necrotic Yin Spirit Vein
Grade: Mid-tier Spirit Grade
Description: A Spirit Vein that has recently been nurtured by enough death energies to reach the threshold for Mid-tier Spirit Grade. Originally a Pure Yin Spirit Vein, after enough death was gathered in the wake of several fights to possess the territory wherein the Spirit Vein is occupied, the vein evolved as an amalgamation of both Yin and Death.
Current Effect: Slowly releases and nurtures — or corrupts — its immediate environment with Yin and Death Energies. Lifespan: 150 Years]
"Heh..." Slowly, Elizabeth whistled a happy little tune as she carefully excavated the array of crystals that made up the Spirit Vein. With her index finger acting as a micro sensitive drill, Elizabeth looked exactly like a paleontologist working to uncover a fragile fossil. Once the whole thing was unearthed, Elizabeth temporarily stored it in her spatial ring, crying crocodile tears at the sight of yet another beast corpse being wasted.
Gazing up at the sky, Elizabeth decided it was best that she hurry back to the Inn as the evening was coming to a close. She"d finished investigating the sources of the unending Death energy and gotten a nice little treasure for her efforts. However, just before leaving, the thought of the two moose calves came to mind.
Originally Elizabeth intended on ignoring them altogether as their lackl.u.s.ter excuse for strength would not help her in any way. However, as she thought through their circ.u.mstances she couldn"t help but entertain the thought of taking one as a pet. After all, In the recently evolved world, their mother had been the first, if not one of the first beasts, to evolve into the demonic beast category after ascending to the Spirit Realm. Knowing what she did from the [Basic Beast Rearing Manual], those two calves probably had the genetic apt.i.tude to become strong demonic beasts if she reared them.
Her own Demonic Beast Egg still had quite a ways to go before it hatched as it contained a beast that would naturally grow out of the Spirit Realm. So, even if though it probably wouldn"t match up in the long run, it was nonetheless a good idea to take on another beast companion. Moreover, Elizabeth already knew that the moose beasts should have affinity towards death, which was one more affinity they would have in common with her than she could say for the unborn Demonic Beast Egg.
However, a new dilemma arose as Elizabeth thought of which calf to take. After all, she only wanted one. Luckily, her [Basic Beast Rearing Manual] had written in it, a method that would resolve this issue in the most concrete manner possible. Revising the method in her head, Elizabeth"s eyebrows rose in surprise as she found the method to be "a bit" extreme.
Still, she didn"t really care how extreme it was as she"d stuck true to her ideals of only caring about results. Walking over to one of the moose calves, Elizabeth was still a bit confused as to why they hadn"t run away after watching her kill their mother. But, as she remembered that they were situated in the very heart of the eastern forest, where all around them there were King and Warrior Stage wild beasts, she stopped her thoughts.
Elizabeth picked one of the moose calves up and walked it over to the other calf, completely ignoring any pitiful attempts the immature animal tried to either escape her grasp or cause her some damage. When the two were put right next to each other, Elizabeth used her Magic Connection to immediately flood the two beasts with berserking killing desire. Because she thoroughly outcla.s.sed them in every regard, the effects of the bewitchment were nigh instantaneous and soon the two moose calves" eyes had gone red with hatred, seeking to destroy everything around them.
Of course, with there being nothing but Elizabeth and the two beasts, surrounded by the corrupted forest landscape, after Elizabeth released the two beasts and moved out of their sights, they began to try killing each other. Elizabeth a.n.a.lyzed the battle, struggling to not lose concentration from how boring it was. Unfortunately, because the two calves were relatively close in strength their fight took over ten minutes to end.
When the end finally came, Elizabeth nodded her head thinking "Finally!" as she moved to stop the triumphant moose calf from eating its sibling"s flesh. She calmed the moose down by reversing the effect she had instilled in it with her Magic Connection, and then after performing a ritual with a drop of her blood, she forced the surviving moose calf into a contract.
[Status
Name: Unnamed Moose Beast
Level: 7
Rank: Early-Phase p.a.w.n Stage Tamed Beast
Affection Rating: Null; Not intelligent enough to sustain conscious emotion.
Innate Skills
Death Affinity
Tier: Sub Trash-tier
Wind Affinity
Tier: Sub Trash-tier]
Oddly enough, even after entering a contract with her and losing its berserk state, after it was let go, the moose returned to eating its sibling. Although the sight slightly disturbed Elizabeth, knowing the moose already had an affinity for death, she let it do as it pleased. Ten minutes later, after a pile of bones was left over, Elizabeth pet her new companion in the head and led it out of the forest. It was scared beyond belief as various King Stage Beasts tried to make it and its master their next meal, but before the King Stage Beasts could so much as breath on the moose calf, Elizabeth would always kill them.