NOVEL NEXT Chapter 307: Third Challenge and System Uniqueness Rewards
Vanar
Vanar looked at the equipment in the alchemy shop he'd broken into, ignoring the bodies of the F rank shop owner and his two apprentices hidden in the cellar, and smiled.
With the ingredients here, some other ingredients he'd stolen from other shops during the day, and his new Law Larva of Body, he could use the techniques Lord Aalam had taught him to create a magical disease capable of taking out everyone in the small hidden sect they were tasked to destroy, everyone on the entire E rank planet they were on, and, if he managed to activate the teleportation array he had learned was in the sect master's personal chambers, from which the end of challenge forces were almost certainly set to come through, possibly everyone in an entire galaxy cluster.
Empress Li's predictions had been correct. With him, Diana, Raven, and Wen all maximizing their Luck stats and all having practiced the Yin Yang Sage's basic plague making skills, the final challenge of the tutorial had set them up with an environment to shine, and the rewards were going to be massive.
* * *
Diana
Diana was so thankful Vanar had taken Blade Knight as one of his three Legendary grade skills, receiving it as a reward from a quest given by her brother, as it allowed them to share their senses during the final challenge, both taking less of the additional boons the System would give for the challenge to help maximize their trial points.
The man, who she'd learned was over 80,000 years old, was so experienced he had managed to find exactly what they needed to make plagues within just the few hours they had on the first day and then predicted where to release their diseases for maximum effect, making what should have been the most difficult challenge in the tutorial the easiest, Diana's biggest problem through most of it trying to figure out how to keep her mind occupied as she waited for the trial to end.
* * *
Raven
Running through the forest, Raven regretted yet again how he'd messed up.
The disease he'd made was as strong as advertised, but he hadn't hidden well enough and one of the sect's E ranks, after being affected by the disease, had caught on to the fact he'd been the one to release it.
Then they'd started this cat and mouse chase through the forest that had lasted for three days.
And Raven was exhausted.
Thankfully, however, the E rank was slowly dying, quickly weakening at a rate even faster than Raven, so, if he could hold out for just one more day, the man would finally fall, and then Raven could hide in the forest until the damn challenge was over.
* * *
Immortalia
Immortalia sat in the sect leader's office as the seven diseases she'd created traveled through the E rank world and the rest of the galaxy cluster.
As someone with trillions of years of experience, she'd been able to kill the D rank leader and all the other sect members with her own power without any help from the diseases, so she'd done so, sure she would get a reward from the System, and only then did she create and release her plagues.
* * *
Mila
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Through her shared senses with Aalam, Mila had been able to translate the languages used in the final challenges of the monster tutorials Aalam's clones were experiencing, each instance of the tutorial's challenges the exact same to help the System save on energy, and this had allowed all of Aalam's clones to accept none of the extra options at the start of the challenge, maximizing his rewards.
And, adding to the fun, each and every one of Aalam's clones managed to do more than just stay in place, beginning to teleport between worlds after only a day, releasing more and more specialized plagues as they learned more about the makeup of the galaxy cluster, each clone capable of powerful generic diseases through the use of his refined energy control as well as specialized diseases focusing on the clone's element.
By the end of the challenge, even the worst performing clone had gained more trial points than the two of them had in their original tutorial, and the best performing, the space element clone who'd managed to spread his diseases to other galaxy clusters before running away to hide, had managed to gain more than four times what Aalam had earned back in their first tutorial.
And this earned all his clones a new uniqueness, energy flowing into them and activating the latent natural energy Aalam had left in each of their mana wells, causing them to awaken the exact uniquenesses he wanted.
Fire Emperor.
Water Emperor.
Wind Emperor.
Earth Emperor.
Lightning Emperor.
Metal Emperor.
Light Emperor
Darkness Emperor.
Life Emperor.
Death Emperor.
Space Emperor.
Time Emperor.
When Aalam eventually reabsorbed all his clones, these uniquenesses would all fuse into Heavenly Spark Emperor, and her husband's affinities with all Laws would increase by a little over 50%.
* * *
Diana
Diana woke up after using the boon to have the System help her soul awaken a new uniqueness and checked her status.
Name: Diana Alvaro
Level: 0
Race: Human Soulform (G-Common)
Bloodline: NA
Abilities
Magic Prodigy (Legendary)
Junior Holy Soul (Legendary)
Class: Citizen (G-Common)
Skills
Underlord (G-Legendary) 100% mastered
Yin Force (G-Legendary) 46% mastered
Yang Force (G-Legendary) 38% mastered
Laws
Law Larvae:
Day - Early
Night - Early
Flesh - Early
Law Eggs:
Spark - Peak
Frost - Peak
Necrosis - Peak
Stats
Strength: 153
Agility: 153
Endurance: 153
Toughness: 153
Vitality: 153
Perception: 153
Magic: 153
Spirit: 153
Soul: 153
Aura: 153
Attunement: 153
Luck: 153
Free Stats: 72
Soulstructures:
Lower Dantian: 1 Large Core Container
Middle Dantian: 6 Huge + 2 Colossal Mana Wells
Upper Dantian: 1 Large Mental Forge
Uniqueness:
Magic Queen
Yin Yang Queen
Soul Queen
Shadow Queen
Personal Servant of the Heavenly Spark Soul King I: Gain the effects of the Heavenly Spark Pure Soul (Legendary) racial ability
Personal Servant of the Heavenly Spark Soul King II: Gain the effects of the Nascent Energy Converter (Legendary) racial ability
Personal Servant of the Heavenly Spark Soul King III: Gain the effects of the Monster Agent (Legendary) racial ability
Shadow Queen.
Like Mila, Diana now had control over faith energy and, if what Vanar had told her about the new common knowledge in the United Federation of Planets was true, she'd be able to deprive gods of over half their power if she could raise the uniqueness by three grades.
For the second time since her death, a slight smile arrived on her lips.
Then, realizing she hadn't yet received her final artifact reward from Aalam, she quickly checked the list of possible artifacts and there, at the top of the list, was something called Messenger Essence Attuned to the Mistress of Oaths and Deception (G-Legendary) which immediately caused her smile to fade.
This was the material Vanar was going to use to form the basis of his new bloodline, Aalam and Mila having found through several information rewards from the System that owning certain types of high grade materials could open up new race and bloodline options, and she had no real choice but to pick it without crippling her new teacher's potential, so she did.
But the very fact she was choosing a material for Vanar when Vanar only needed one meant someone, likely Mila or Nana Xara, had thought it possible she wouldn't accept whatever Aalam actually wanted to give her for her final artifact/material.
"What is it?" She turned to Vanar, who'd woken up from gaining his own new uniqueness a little before her and was meditating in the corner of the room, her voice cold.
"I'm not exactly sure." Vanar lifted his right hand and pointed at the 2 meter diameter spherical metallic rebirth chamber in another corner of the room. "As soon as I summoned it, it appeared inside of that."
Diana would have taken a deep breath if she had the ability to actually breathe. "What was the artifact called?"
Vanar looked at her, and she knew he could see how she was about to fall apart, but he answered truthfully anyway. "Preserved Body of an Unborn Half Dragon."
And this was the final straw.
Diana couldn't hold her emotions back any longer, couldn't maintain her poise.
She fell down to the floor and started crying, unable to think, unable to process, just overwhelmed by grief.
Her baby, her little girl, had been murdered while still within her womb, while in a position where Diana should have been able to protect her.
But she hadn't.
She'd failed.
And her daughter had died.
Aalam, Mila, and Nana Xara had managed to save her life, but her baby had died.
And now Aalam, being Aalam, had found a way to turn her dead baby into her own power, and there was nothing she could do to stop it.