Devourer System : Infinite Paths

'So, these are my attributes,' Nero thought, recalling reading in a book, how the number on the screen represents his actual strength.

Nero was always fascinated by systems, and since he wanted one for himself, he knew a fair bit that could be found in common books. 

Nero understood what each attribute represented, as the attributes of strength increased physical power. Vitality boosted the overall health and resilience of the body, and agility was responsible for speed, reflexes, and dodging ability.

While Dexterity improved his precision, accuracy, and fine motor skills, Mind was directly responsible for magical energy (mana), and Endurance raised his stamina and resistance to fatigue.

Nero also knew that the higher each attribute, the higher his recovery in that field would be.

He knew the screen before him was only visible to him, and if he wished to see something in detail, he just had to focus on it or think about it.

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Name: Devourer

Grade: Primodial

Aspects: Devouer, Assimilation, and Adaptation

Type: Unknown

Nature: Unknown

Skills: [Devour][Devourers Wrath]

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Nero focused on the system, and a detailed display swiftly came before him. It listed the things he already knew but confirmed its grade, alleviating the last remnants of doubt he had.

Nero looked at the four dead spiders, his mind racing with the possibilities of what lay ahead, each thought more exhilarating than the last. 

'So what should I do next,' Nero asked, taking a moment to ask if Draven wanted to warn him of anything specific.

'Make sure you don't pick any skills because, without the bloodline, they will not work, and stay away from the bloodlines and other physical traits as well,' Draven said before quickly adding, 'Before you begin, use the Devour on yourself and cleanse the remnant mana,'

Nero nodded, and after a few deep breaths, he placed his hand on his chest and said 'Devour' even though he could just think of doing it, and the skill would activate.

In a mere moment, his hand turned dark enough to even consume the light that fell on it, and with a moment delay, he placed his hand on his chest, and after a few seconds, a new translucent window appeared before him.

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{Essence Available for Devour}

[Contaminated Mana] Devour to gain a slight boost of Mind and Minor poison resistance.

[Contaminated Flesh] Devour to gain a slight boost of Mind, endurance, and Minor poison resistance.

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Nero focused on both of them, but nothing happened, so he realized that his current limit was just one attribute, and that was what he did, and it worked.

A few moments passed before Nero felt stinging pain all over his body, and while the intensity of the pain was considerable, it did not really affect him much since, compared to the pain he experienced in the astral state, it was, at best, irritating.

The process took nearly a minute to complete, and as it ended, he saw the screen flicker, showing the two notifications for a moment before switching back to the list of things.

{Mind Boosted by +27}

{Gained Resistance: Minor Poison}

Nero did not hear any sound when the notification came, which was not right since he had learned from books that each system had a monotone voice, accounting for every little action.

But for now, he decided to ignore it and quickly checked his status for the changes, and he was delighted to see that his Mind attribute, which directly influenced his mana, had risen from 22 to an impressive 49, and he also gained poison resistance.

Nero focused on the contaminated flesh next, and similarly, once it ended, his Mind rose to 67 while his endurance rose from 29 to the 52 mark.

{Mind Boosted by +18}

{Endurance Boosted by +23}

{Gained Resistance: Lesser-Grade Poison}

"This is just amazing," Nero murmured, feeling bewildered by the rapid transformation. 

"My Mind attribute just tripled, and endurance more than doubled, and all that from just a small piece of the spider queen's heart," Nero said as he clenched his fist, trying to feel some difference.

Nero knew that the simple numbers next to his attributes nearly perfectly calculated his strength, as this information had been tested and proven true.

"I can only wonder how much I can grow by consuming the entire body," Nero said before exhaling a deep breath. Just thinking about the possibilities filled him with thrilling yet nervous energy.

'A normal unawakened individual has the attribute limit of anywhere between 10 and 100 before they hit a wall,' Draven's voice sounded, making Nero quickly pay attention.

'But there are gifted individuals as well as races like elves and dragons who are born with greater strength and can easily surpass the wall of one hundred,

'Yet, even the best among those gifted individuals can only dream of reaching the wall of a thousand in a single attribute, let alone multiple attributes,' Draven said, making Nero grin from ear to ear, as he thought surely he would be different.

Since Draven was explaining things, Nero decided to ask a few questions of his own and confirm whether he was right.

'What do these attributes thresholds represent? What are the average attribute points a normal individual would have on each Rank, and if there is a certain limit in each Rank, what is it,' Nero asked, knowing little about ranks besides their names.

'A normal individual starts as an unawakened, and as they progress along the path of power, they ascend through seven ranks, namely, Awakened, Transformation, Cleansing, Lawbound, Law Adept, Void Ascendant, and finally, World Ascendant.'

'An unawakened would normally have less than a hundred points in each attribute, and an Awakened would have any were between a hundred to a thousand, and on the second rank, the threshold could reach two thousand, and on the third rank, it could reach four thousand,'

'The promotion to the fourth rank slightly changes things, as depending on how much strength one had built in the first three ranks, all his attributes would rise by 1.5 times to 2, 3 times the original, with the known limit being 10 thousand points,'

'The fifth Rank pushes the limits to twenty thousand points for each attribute, and doubling again each subsequent rank,'

'So around eighty thousand at Seventh Rank,' Draven said, and after a pause, he continued.

'But these supposed rank caps are just created based on a few real results that are nearly impossible to replicate,'

'In my timeline, the strongest known individual, a generational talent, had advanced to the eighth Rank with only seventy-nine thousand points in four attributes,' Draven said before calmly adding. 

'While things could be different for you, we must also be very careful with your growth. Otherwise, it could very well kill you,' Draven said, but the warning did little to lessen Nero's excitement.

Nero stood up with a new idea in his head and quickly placed both his hands on the same spider corpse that Draven used before, hoping he could double the effects of the skill with two hands, but it did not work.

It was a bit of a letdown, but nothing much, as Nero eagerly began to wait for the list of things to appear that he could devour. Since the body was already scanned, it took just five seconds for the translucent window to appear.

He could only take one attribute at a time, and knowing it would involve pain, he began with agility since it was the lowest at 40 points.

While the assimilation process was painful, it was nothing that he could not handle, especially when he knew his agility would rise by threefold, from 16 to 56.

The process took two minutes to complete, and once it was done, Nero quickly selected the attribute of mind before finally choosing the strength, growing five of the attributes nearly four times.

Now the only things the spider had to offer were its skills and essence traits, and with both skills and bloodline out of option, the only thing he could take was resistance to venom.

Nero did not move on to the second spider, as Draven was quick to warn him about growing too quickly and asked him to stretch out and exercise.

Nero could feel his eyesight was much more focused and sharper. His strength was different, and so was the entire feel of his body.

He began by doing pushups to test his physical limits. He quickly beat his personal record of eighty without feeling any fatigue and stopped after doing three hundred in less than fifteen minutes.

While he was inside a training chamber, besides having shock and magic resistance walls, there was nothing to test his strength on, so with no other choice, he decided to test his strength on a crumbling husk of a spider.

It took just a single punch to tear a hole through the cracked crystal carapace, which was surprising, to say the least. He did not expect it to fall apart like rotten wood since it belonged to a third-rank creature.

With no other choice, Nero decided to test his strength on the fresh spider. He started with slow and measured pushes before picking up the pace, throwing a push every other second, and the chamber rang with the noise of solid impacts.

Once he was done, his fists were bleeding, and his knuckles were cracked, with barely a few cracks on the spider's chitin carapace, but Nero had a big smile because he had grown stronger and would continue to do so with every passing day.

Nero repeated the same thing with all three spiders, quickly realizing that every spider gave him slightly fewer attributes than the last, but still, all his attributes except dexterity and endurance were past the two-hundred mark, with his vitality going past three hundred points.