Career Planning

Over the past few days, Orsaga had not been idling around.

A three-to-one Time Flow Speed gave him plenty of extra time to sort out his own issues.

For example, the somewhat disordered Inheritance Memory in his mind. He was trying to sift through it for useful information and actively absorb it.

Rather than merely storing it passively in his head.

If he did not fully digest it all, it would never truly belong to him. At most, it would be an external accessory.

Limited by his abilities, Orsaga had mainly focused his efforts on things beneficial to combat.

Most of his time had gone toward excavating the bloodline spell research within himself and improving his hand-to-hand combat abilities.

That was also one reason Salter and the others had been so obedient.

It came from some of those results—certain curse-type and mental-type spells.

As mentioned before, Demons mainly increased their strength by excavating their bloodlines, slaughtering, and plundering souls. But beyond that, the knowledge in their Inheritance Memory also allowed Demons to cultivate Extraordinary Professions like other races.

Unlike many species, which had to gather information about various Extraordinary Professions after birth, Supernatural Creatures such as Demons, dragons, and elemental spirits carried a great deal of such information in their bloodlines. Though most of it was fairly conventional, it still meant they started ahead of the line.

In this regard, Demons held an enormous advantage even among Supernatural Creatures.

If a Demon was not satisfied with the knowledge carried in its bloodline and needed more advanced knowledge, aside from trading with other creatures or plundering it, it could also obtain the desired rewards directly from the Bottomless Abyss by continuously burning, killing, looting, and doing things that pleased it.

As the source of all negative things, the Bottomless Abyss represented the evil side of the Multiverse.

Although it lacked complete Self-Awareness, over its long existence, instinct alone had led it to automatically collect countless precious pieces of knowledge and Secret Treasures. Yet those things held no practical use for it. Thus, for native creatures of the Bottomless Abyss, as long as they gained the favor and attention of the Abyss Consciousness, they would have a chance to obtain countless things they had only dreamed of.

Under such circumstances, unlike many other species, who often had no path forward at all,

the monsters of the Abyss who knew nothing of magical research or professional advancement,

whose brains were nothing but muscle, did not have to worry much about such matters with the vast reserves of the Bottomless Abyss at their backs.

The path was there anyway. As long as they killed enough people, everything was negotiable. As for whether they could successfully walk that path, that depended on their own fortune. After all, Demons who failed to kill others and were instead killed and turned into spellcasting materials or experimental supplies were everywhere.

Under such circumstances, the already eccentric Abyss Creatures often embarked upon strange paths.

For example, a Balrog whose profession was Sword Saint. Since it liked using swords anyway, why could it not be a Sword Saint just because it wielded a decapitation greatsword over ten meters long? An Eight-armed Serpent Demon had eight hands—and nine limbs if its tail was included—so why could it not be a fighter?

It was said that the Bottomless Abyss had even produced Holy Light Demons, the sort of Demons that could hurl holy light to purify evil. Orsaga had nothing to say about that. The Bottomless Abyss had so many oddballs that there was nothing wrong with Demons playing with holy light. Pull out ten Demons and examine them, and you would find all ten were insane. The only difference was how insane they were.

Compared to most of his eccentric predecessors, Orsaga belonged to an even worse type. He wanted to become a spellcaster.

The kind of mage who fought in melee.

The kind who could punch out Meteor Explosion and kick out Hurricane spells. It would be such a waste not to make use of such excellent physical foundations.

As for whether the hell that could be called a mage?

Orsaga simply felt:

As long as I can still cast spells, no one can say I'm not a mage.

After all, Demons like him, who were both plain and hardworking, had always been stubborn about such things.

If anything really goes wrong, then the one at fault probably won't be me. It should be the world.

To improve his learning efficiency and offensive methods, Orsaga had specifically gone to the ancient forest at the border and set several fires, freeing countless wild animals from the disturbances of mortal trifles. Then he went to some more remote areas to harvest a wave of crops, gathering every Evolution Point he could without affecting the overall situation. In total, he scraped together more than three hundred thousand Evolution Points.

He evolved four talents:

Casually Cast: Spells become more flexible and diverse in your hands, as though they were part of your body. (41,500 Evolution Points)

Innate Skill—Martial Combat: You were born for fighting. As long as you possess the conditions to learn any combat technique, you can master it at incredible speed and wield it better than its original creator. (65,500 Evolution Points)

Overclocked Brain: Your Brain Development increases. Many previously unused regions are activated, entering an overclocked state. All learning abilities are greatly enhanced, and your perception is significantly improved. (74,500 Evolution Points)

Source of Death Plague: Disease will become your weapon. Plagues are like extensions of your body in your hands. By expending magic power, you can create plagues according to your will and alter their properties and characteristics. (87,900 Evolution Points)

As his strength increased and his talents multiplied, Orsaga had begun planning his future path.

No one could be proficient at everything.

Even with the Evolution System, Orsaga did not believe he could cover every aspect. Thus, deciding where to place his emphasis was something he had to consider.

Within the Bottomless Abyss, slaughter was the eternal main theme. There was no leisure for him to slowly deliberate—destroying everything in front of him was what he needed to think about. But this world's one-third Time Flow Speed gave him the chance to make detailed plans.

Spells, physical body, soul, Source of Death Plague, Suffering Torment, elemental talent—Bloodflame, and magic power trait—corrosion: these were the directions he had decided upon for the future over the past month!

He could fight at close range or from afar. Though it could not be called flawless, it had no obvious weaknesses. As long as he developed properly, he would be able to thrive anywhere.

From then on, aside from keeping some Evolution Points to make up for his own shortcomings, most of his resources would be directed toward those areas.

Orsaga also changed the Evolution Point allocation rules in the Evolution System. Only one-quarter of all gains would be kept in reserve, while the remaining three-quarters would be distributed among various aspects of those abilities according to his settings.

After making all the adjustments, Orsaga finally understood his own position and formed a basic summary of his detailed future plans.

1. Practical but somewhat crude fighting techniques.

2. Bloodline Spells whose results he understood but whose principles he did not.

3. Strength that had kept pace, but horizons and knowledge that lagged behind, leaving him lacking in all kinds of experience.

The value of a person lay in self-awareness. The same was more or less true for Demons.

Identifying his own flaws, then finding every possible way to make up for them—that was what Orsaga wanted to do now.

Retracting the gray-black mist in his hand, Orsaga rose from his seat. He casually picked up an apple, brought it to his mouth, and took a bite.

His calm gaze passed through the plants growing over the pavilion roof and settled on the blazing fireball in the sky, at the height of its power at noon.

Feeling the sunlight shine upon him, Orsaga was, honestly, somewhat uncomfortable.

No matter the world, things like the sun represented holiness and were endowed with certain special meanings. The sunlight it emitted also had the effect of dispelling evil. If not for the effects of the Armament Rune—Scarlet, then although mere sunlight would not injure him as a Lower Demon, Orsaga would never want to expose himself to it.

It was a sensation that Demonic Instinct found repulsive, like a fish hauled out of water. It would greatly weaken their strength, and combined with the suppressive force automatically imposed by the world, it made them even more uncomfortable.

Demons at the Infant Demon rank, when placed in this world, could be directly scorched to death by sunlight alone under the effects of the world's suppression.

That was also why many dark creatures learned spells such as Darkness Curtain and Summon Overcast. Without sufficient home-field advantage, groups like Demons that enjoyed invading other worlds did not have an easy time getting by.

The apple in his mouth was brightly colored and plump, one of the finest varieties of apple. But because a Demon's sense of taste differed from a human's, it tasted only like dirt. Even though Orsaga had used his Overclocked Brain to extract the residual memories of eating apples in his Previous Life, he could no longer taste what they had tasted like when he was human. All he could taste was an indescribably strange flavor.

To a Demon's palate, the most delicious things were always souls and flesh, preferably from creatures rich in emotion. The two extremes of pure goodness and pure evil were the finest kinds. They were the most precious to Demons, luxurious goods of exceptionally high quality, with all kinds of uses beyond mere consumption.

As for the flesh and souls of their own kind, although they would not refuse them either, they found them somewhat monotonous to eat—only barely enough to make do.

With a wave of his hand, a long snake hidden in the grass of the courtyard was drawn through the air into Orsaga's hand.

It was roughly a meter long, with a somewhat pointed head. Fine scales of emerald green and dark red formed tattoo-like patterns resembling ghost faces across its body.

Ignoring its desperate struggles, Orsaga gently exerted force with his fingertips, cutting open its throat and severing the blood vessels and venom sac within. Then, as if pouring seasoning, he poured them over the apple.

He took another bite.

Mm...

It had a little flavor now. The Venom was slightly spicy, but acceptable.

After finishing his food, Orsaga casually tossed away the snake corpse, picked up a handkerchief from the table to wipe his hands and mouth, then headed toward his laboratory.