Rise of the Devourer

Book 2: Chapter 31 — New Abilities

Noah took a moment, just feeling the strength in his body. He felt a powerful itch to test just how much he could do now, but he resisted the impulse, opening his Astral script to take a look instead.

Astral Script:

Name: Noah Brown

Race: Human (Symbiont/Modified)

Rank: E

Paths:

Exsanguinator (Rare) - level 72

Astralwalker (Epic) - level 69

Void Hunter (Epic) - level 70

Attributes:

Power: 299

Agility: 246

Constitution: 286

Mystic: 359

Attribute points: 122

After nearly a month of nothing, his attributes had jumped up all at once, and Noah could keenly feel the difference this time. His higher sub-attributes meant each increase of his attributes translated to more strength, making the actual changes even more substantial than they had ever been previously.

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Taking his attributes, he added fifty one in agility, thirteen in constitution and one in power.

Power 299 → 300.

Agility: 246 → 300.

Constitution: 286 → 300.

Free attributes: 122 → 57.

He felt his spirit straining once again and decided to leave it there for today. “Phew, that’s a jolt,” Noah said, feeling the energy distributing itself across his body. He stretched his limbs, feeling a rush filling his head urging him to run till he dropped.

“You’re feeling the post rank up high. I can’t imagine dealing with three at once with my first rank up.”

“It’s definitely… something else,” Noah replied, letting out another breath, yet no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t help but burst out in laughter every few seconds. To distract himself, he decided to open the description of his new abilities.

[Blood Debt (Unique/Basic) - level 1]

A debt is owed with each reaping.Target any opponent with your aura, reaping the blood they owe. Consume each instance of [Poison], [Bleed], [Toxin], [Rot], [Necrosis], [Madness], [Frost], [Burn] and any other damaging status effect from your target, while doing the damage the abilities would do within fifteen seconds immediately.

Noah stared at the ability dumbly. He went back through the description, reading it carefully again to make sure he understood what he was seeing correctly.

“You look shocked, what did you get?” Aurelia asked, walking closer.

Noah looked at the woman, and a moment later, he sent the description towards her through their party menu.

Aurelia looked at the description, as her expression morphed from curiosity to a frown, to shock. “This is… powerful. If you can use it correctly, this… you could kill things far above your own strength level.”

“I think so. If I’m reading it correctly. I’m having a hard time believing what I’m seeing to be honest. Maybe I’m interpreting it poorly,” Noah replied.

“You’ll need to test its limits. Abilities like these typically have harsh limiters on how they can be used. But even so… this is such a you kind of ability. A reckless unrelenting strike with extreme damage and just as much risk,” Aurelia said.

“I wonder if I can use the ability on myself,” Noah wondered.

“Are you sure you want to?” Aurelia asked.

“Probably not,” Noah replied, closing the description. Feeling his excitement only increasing, he opened the next ability that he had gotten.

[Astral Projection (Unique/Basic) - level 1]

You have connected to the Astral on a deep level, now find yourself capable of drawing upon its essence to project yourself onto reality. Creates Astral projections that are sustained by the mana put into them at inception. All experiences by the projection are sent to the original upon their collapse.

Noah read the description, sending it to Aurelia at the same time. “This one feels a little disappointing for the final ability. Projection seems neat, but my other abilities are more useful overall,” Noah said.

“Why don’t you try it out? This one isn’t difficult to test,” Aurelia said.

Noah agreed, and channeled the ability, feeding it mana. It took him a moment to get a hang of it, but his instincts guided him through the steps. The world distorted around him, and a moment later he saw himself standing in front of him. A strange shiver went down his back as the projection looked at him in silence, not replying.

“Hey, can you talk?” Noah asked, before realizing that he could just command the projection.

“Yeah,” the projection replied glumly. “Fuck me. Guess I’m just a clone.”

Noah looked at the projection warily for a second.

“Nah, I’m not gonna kill you, that would be so stupid. We’ll merge back anyway. It just sucks to know that I’m not real, that’s all,” the projection Noah replied.

“Well, sorry about that,” Noah said, patting the projection’s shoulder. A moment later, he pulled his hand back, realising he could touch the projection.

“Wait, you’re real?” Noah asked.

“Yes. Don’t you know that already?” The projection asked.

Noah realised that he had known that instinctively. The ability had told him the projection would be physical, he just… hadn’t realised.

“This is creepy,” Aurelia said, watching the interaction. “One was enough of a headache, now there’s two of you.”

The projection suddenly began to fizzle and it looked down at its hands. “Well, there’s my time. Maybe put more mana in me next time,” the projection said, as it fizzled out into nothingness.

Noah felt a flood of memories and sensations fill his mind, making him feel oddly dissociated. He took a deep breath. He had not enjoyed the memories from the projection either. It had been… gloomy, knowing its existence was just confined to an ability and meant just as a test.

Just as he recovered from the experience, a terrible idea formed in his head.

“Hey, do you think I could make a clone, and then test out my Blood Debt ability on it?” Noah said, looking at Aurelia.

“I’m not so sure you should do that. Not with how much intelligence the clones seemed to have.”

“It was the fact that it had no purpose, more so than the fact that it was going to die,” Noah replied, knowing the feeling very well. A meaningless existence felt… not pleasing.

“Well, it’s your ability. Do as you like,” Aurelia said.

Noah gathered his mana, this time putting half of everything he had into the ability. The world distorted in front of him once again, as another clone formed.

“You can use all my abilities right? Including Lifeblood?”

“Yup,” the projection replied.

“Great. Let’s do this then,” Noah said, reaching into his Dimensional Pocket, as he took out his spear. The projection turned off its resistances and Noah used [Bleed] as he slashed it across the chest.

You’ve inflicted [Bleed] on [Astral projection].

You’ve inflicted [Crimson Rot] on [Astral Projection].

“I’m so glad we have pain tolerance leveled to Advanced rank,” the projection said as it bled freely from its chest.

Noah didn’t stop, letting Bloodfly Swarm manifest as he let it attack his projection.

The projection had a resolute expression as the swarm of bloodflies descended upon him.

You’ve inflicted [Bleed] on [Astral Projection] x 15

[Bleed] has increased to [Bleed - II].

[Bleed - II] has increased to [Bleed - III].

As the notifications poured in, Noah reached out with his aura. Red mana flowed around him in a swirl as he reached out with his hand, and then with a pull, reaped the status effects.

[Blood Debt] has affected [Astral Projection].

A flood of lifeforce moved from the projection, forming a sword of blood above its head. The projection blinked away, trying to dodge, but the sword remained above his head as it struck down, striking his body.

Within a moment, lifeforce exploded forth as the projection collapsed. The memories flowed into Noah, and he fell onto his knees. There had been no pain, yet the sensation of the power tearing apart his body within a second still sent him reeling.

Groaning, Noah slowly stood back up. “I’m not doing that ever again,” Noah said. Tony sent him a shiver of agreement.

“I’ve heard a lot of stories of abilities like that going wrong, so I’m with you there,” Aurelia replied.

Noah moved on to the final ability.

[Netherflame Burst (Unique/Basic) - lvl 1]

The flames of the Nether realms are yours to command. Use your lifeforce to launch a burst of netherflame, inflicting the fire upon your target. Upon infliction, the flames will eat the target's lifeforce for a short amount of time.

Noah shared the ability with Aurelia one last time, reading through it. The idea was fairly simple with this one. A flame that ate life-force. With everything else relating to the void following the same concept, this was just a natural extension of the ability.

“Simple but effective. Fitting for a Path like Void Hunter,” Aurelia said.

Noah nodded, before he reached out to the ability. Letting his lifeforce flow into the ability, Noah saw a ball of black fire manifesting in his hand. Aiming the ball forward, he continued to pour more lifeforce into the ability, till the ball of fire was sucking in the light from its surroundings, casting a shadow around it.

With a simple command of his will, Noah launched the flames. A burst of fire exploded outwards, spreading throughout the arena. Dark flames covered the ground, erupting up into the air. Noah watched in fascination as he felt the lifeforce from the air itself being sucked into the flames as they burned. Aurelia had stepped back, behind him, not willing to let the flames touch her body.

After a few minutes, the fire ran out of fuel, burning out. Noah looked down at his fist, clenching it, as Lifeblood had already recovered the lifeforce he had lost.

“You know what Noah?” Aurelia said, looking at the last vestiges of the black flames before she turned to face him. “This was already true, but all the more so now. I would hate to fight you,”

Noah simply grinned back at the woman.