Outer Demon! External Incarnation

Outer Demon! External Incarnation

Morning light emerged, and the mist dispersed.

When Duncan woke up, he felt as if every bone in his body was about to fall apart. He rolled over and stretched a little, only to realize it had just been an illusion.

His mind, soul, and spirituality were exhausted, but his body was still full of energy. He could even get up early for some training.

"The taste of a Valkyrie..."

"Not bad!"

Duncan climbed out of bed. Servants came in to help him dress and wash up. Once he had fully woken, he rode around the town once, finally recovering a little of his vigor.

Last night, he had truly fought for his life. He had never fought such a difficult battle before!

He slaughtered his way through the enemy and carved a bloody path through Valhalla.

Duncan even remembered that Odin, the Norse Pantheon's main deity, had changed from "Norse Main Deity" to "King of the Wild Hunt."

In the end, Duncan had no idea how many people he had cut down. He eventually encountered a legendary hunter of the Wild Hunt. The outcome was barely acceptable—they had fought each other to the death.

Duncan felt that fellow might have been some half-human, half-divine figure from the Mythological Era. Like Beowulf, he possessed a trace of divine blood.

That was the first Three-Star Golden unit Duncan had ever faced head-on. His strength was like that of a legendary giant. Even with Greater Berserk active and Tireless Carousing stacked to the limit, Duncan could only barely fight him to a draw.

At any rate, he had not lost in the end!

When it came down to trading life for life, he could still kill a Three-Star Golden legendary hero!

Who the hell was afraid of whom?!

Even Reckless had become a positive status effect. Even if a Divine Avatar personally entered the fray, he would still cut it down!

"Tireless Carousing really is a trap. I can barely remember what happened afterward."

Duncan rubbed his head. Everything from last night felt like a grand dream—his blood had boiled, and he had gone completely wild. He had always said berserk was harmful. Once Reckless's negative effect kicked in, it truly felt like an insatiable thirst for slaughter.

Dimensional Space.

Under God's Eye View, Duncan finally sobered up. More memories came back to him as well. There should have been an enormous gulf between Asgard and the real world; they did not belong to the same dimension.

--Duncan [Odin's Gaze] [Thor's Gaze] [Freya's Gaze] [Blessing of Avalon] [Diana's Favor] [Valkyrie's Kiss]!...

Wait.

How had he gotten so many new tags overnight?

Duncan was a little dumbfounded.

Could it be that he had gone too far with the killing last night?

He focused and examined them closely. The first few were fine—they were just gazes, meaning they were watching him. He had no idea when he had received Blessing of Avalon. Diana's Favor had not been there before; it had suddenly appeared yesterday.

--"Valkyrie's Kiss [Special Ability]: Valkyries favor only the bravest and strongest warriors. Through a bloody battle that set all of Valhalla ablaze, you won the Valkyries' favor. They will rejoice at the sight of you and are willing to grant you their blessing of victory."

He did not remember much of it.

Mead was harmful! He had drunk far too much with Tireless Carousing! His status effects had all been stacked to the limit afterward!

Had he fought the Valkyries too?!

Duncan rubbed his forehead and discovered that his Legendary Points had changed as well, becoming "3/7'." He had gained another point of Legendary Points, originating from Valhalla in Asgard.

(The six Legendary Points of the Hengist and Horsa brothers had been accumulated through a lifetime of fighting and founding a nation.)

More details returned to him.

Duncan remembered that there had been seats for the Twelve Norse Gods, but not everyone had actually arrived. Most of the deities had been blurry, and only the Divine Avatars of three beings had been relatively clear.

They were Odin, Thor, and Freya.

--Odin [Norse Main Deity] [King of the Wild Hunt] [Aesir] (Neutral).

--Thor [God of Thunder] [God of War] [God of Strength] [Aesir] (Neutral).

--Freya [Goddess of Love and Beauty] [Magic] [War] [Vanir] (Neutral).

Those three deities had been the clearest last night. Perhaps it was because they received more worship. Aside from Odin and Thor, Freya had been the most interested in Duncan. She had even watched him for a while before he left.

"Wait?"

"You didn't give me anything?"

"Avalon in the Mist at least gave me Noden's Bow. The Norse Pantheon is such a huge divine faction, yet it couldn't even spare me a decent piece of equipment?"

Where was his divine artifact?

Where was his huge divine artifact?

Duncan looked rather helpless. He had put on such a wholehearted performance last night for nothing.

But that made sense.

If they really gave Duncan something now, he would probably use it to cut down Germanic Barbarians—and cut them down especially ruthlessly.

Everything that had happened yesterday felt as though he had established diplomatic relations with the Norse Pantheon.

Odin's invitation to visit Valhalla meant: Look, isn't this place perfect for a warrior like you? Fine wine and lavish food every day; once you've eaten and drunk your fill, you can hack people apart and revel to your heart's content. Tempting, isn't it? Want to join the Norse Pantheon's camp?

That had been the plan, but unexpectedly, Duncan's bloody gladiatorial battle set the entire venue ablaze. Even Odin revealed the visage of the King of the Wild Hunt.

Duncan was a Sharpshooter, yet he had not even touched a war bow yesterday. Still, he had single-handedly hacked countless heroic spirits to pieces.

He had directly earned some Legendary Points in Valhalla!

"Combat skills have not improved."

"Looks like Valhalla truly possesses laws completely different from those of the real world."

Duncan checked his abilities.

Everything was normal.

After all, whether he died or his enemies died, they would all revive.

At most, they would gain a little proficiency.

Duncan flipped through the projection interface of the Dimensional Space page by page and, sure enough, discovered quite a few changes, including the newly unlocked Norse Pantheon Sanctuaries.

Odin's Viking Sanctuary permanently increased morale. (Fearless in the face of death.)

Thor's Strength Sanctuary enhanced combat training and had some additional uses. (Greater Berserk.)

Freya's War Sanctuary provided additional skill bonuses and also allowed priests to train Germanic Screaming Warriors.

There were only three Divine Sanctuaries in total.

"Looks like the Norse Pantheon isn't all that prosperous either. It can't compare to the Roman and Greek pantheons at their peak."

Duncan propped up his chin and continued browsing.

That look revealed an unexpected surprise—or rather, it once again made him feel the power of the Dimensional Space!

--"Divine Realm detected—Asgard!"

--"Cross-dimensional entities detected—Norse Gods!"

--"Analyzing divine laws."

--"The Dimensional Space has replicated the Law of Origin of Divine Avatars!..."

--"Law of Causality deduction and evolution."

On the Law of Causality deduction page, Duncan saw a new label: "Divine Avatar." When he focused his thoughts, a line of information quickly appeared.

"Divine Avatar (Supernatural Power): Without severing the connection to the Human Form, replicate your own soul to form a temporary personalized avatar. It is equivalent to an External Incarnation through which a god walks the mortal world. It can act according to the plan you leave behind and retain part of your thought patterns.

After the Divine Avatar takes over the Human Form, the Human Form can no longer improve through unconventional means. However, the main body can reload into the Human Form at any time and review the action logs of the Human Form avatar."

[Current soul strength: "Spirit Soul." You may create one standard Divine Avatar to take over a Human Form.]

(Divine Avatars must rely on soul strength to create additional incarnations. After the soul ascends, the incarnations' action plans will more closely approach the main body's capabilities.)

What was this?

Soul proxy?!

Duncan looked thoroughly stunned. An External Incarnation—was his ascended self really this powerful?

--"Plan 1—Proselytizing: You may designate a faith faction. During the External Incarnation's operation, it will treat this as its primary mission. The External Incarnation's abilities are affected by your own abilities and cannot display unconventional performance."

--"Plan 2—Training Troops: You may designate this as the External Incarnation's primary mission. In its subsequent actions, it will focus on training soldiers, replenishing military equipment, raising military funds, and so on."

--"Plan 3—Land Reclamation: You may designate this as the External Incarnation's primary mission. In its subsequent actions, it will focus on developing territory, expanding production, enriching the treasury, and so on."

Below that was a vast array of backup plans for the External Incarnation, which could even be customized according to his wishes.

"Some of these plans seem unusable, though."

"Is it because my own abilities are insufficient, and I'm not skilled in those areas?"

Duncan fell into deep thought.

For example, the plan regarding "commerce" showed that it required the cooperation of professionals, while the Human Form itself was not skilled at doing business.

"So this is basically putting an alt account on autopilot!"

"Using my own soul to form a replicated personality consciousness and having it do all sorts of things for me."

Duncan tried it out a little.

Very soon.

The Human Form in the projection began moving. It directly ordered the army to assemble at the drill grounds, then began training the soldiers. It even trained them in planned batches, with completely different content. The Human Form's ability in training troops was first-rate.

Because under the Divine Avatar proxy state, many of his own combat skills took effect, providing additional bonuses.

--"Master of Archery: Greatly improves the training results of archers."

--"Master of Weapons (Spear, Axe, Sword): When training corresponding troop types, greatly improves their training efficiency and teaches the corresponding basic combat forms."

--"Mastery of Horsemanship: Significantly improves soldiers' learning efficiency when training horsemanship."

Holy shit!

This was way too satisfying.

So the biggest gain from entering the Norse Pantheon's territory had been this!

Dimensional Space had replicated the Divine Avatar abilities of all the Norse Gods.

"This is even more ridiculous than using Fengling Yueying!... But I like it!..."

Duncan was like a child who had just gotten a new toy, pondering how to use this External Incarnation ability.

There was simply too much room for manipulation.

The Norse Gods had no human forms in the real world, so their Divine Avatars probably only operated in Asgard. But Duncan could use human forms to carry External Incarnations, giving him far too many things he could do.

Even if he was now an Outer Demon, he was the one and only top-tier Outer Demon!

Just as Duncan was reviewing the logs, he discovered an unexpected surprise—information captured somewhere other than Human Form No. 1.

"Detected a compatible human form."

"Law of Causality calculation!"

"Target is an anomalous life-form!..."

A line of text appeared.

--"Human life-form (Soul Compatibility 100%)."

--"Humanoid life-form (Soul Compatibility 50% to 90%)."

--"Anomalous life-form (Soul Compatibility 20% to 50%)."

Huh?

It had found a new human form?

Humans had 100% compatibility? Humanoid creatures had much less? And anomalous life-forms had extremely low compatibility?

Had it captured some bizarre creature?

"Attempt capture?"

After thinking it over, Duncan decisively confirmed it. He only had one human form at the moment. If this one turned out unsuitable, he could always abandon it and leave it directly to the Law of Causality.

Dimensional Space began to change.

In an instant!

That enormous feather-shaped nebula began to operate. Countless streams of light streaked across the void, as though piercing through the river of time and space within Dimensional Space, directly anchoring onto some inconspicuous existence.

"Capturing target!"

"Detecting reality laws!"

"Locking onto No. 2 Human Form. Law of Causality calculating Soul Compatibility—45%!..."

"Target is an anomalous life-form—Dragon Egg (Ice Dragon)!"

"Marking reality plane [Lost Sky: Ice Age]!"

"Please bestow the dragon's true name."

After thinking for a moment, Duncan directly named it "Augustus."

The next second, the projected interface of Dimensional Space changed. It split into two. Human Form No. 1 was training soldiers, while the second projection displayed a pitch-black ice cave. After Duncan adjusted the view, a progress bar appeared.

--"Loading (Possession) complete!"

--"Dragon Egg (Ice Dragon) (Augustus) [Remaining incubation time: 21 days and 6 hours]."

--"Soul Compatibility: 45%."

(After consciousness is loaded into No. 2 Human Form, the new body may cause severe discomfort due to Soul Compatibility.)

Holy shit.

This was a real Outer Demon now.

Duncan eagerly watched the Dragon Egg, wondering what his second human form would look like.

Hurry up and hatch.

I've never tried being a giant dragon before!

(PS: Valhalla won't be visited just once. There will be more chances to go later.)