Since Getting a Mental Illness, His Mental State Had Improved...

For a hero with the "Shadow Fiend" bloodline, a powerful soul was an indispensable foundation—this was the first warning rooted in the exchange Basim had received, and also the most profound one.

It did not merely mean needing those "powerful souls" from outside. It meant that the demon king who commanded all souls had to possess a truly powerful soul himself!

—"Mindlessly devouring the souls of the weak is no real skill. In the end, it will only turn you into some broken thing neither human nor ghost. Only the souls you hunt yourself, the spirits forced to bow before your strength, can support your abyss of souls, your throne—"

Strangely enough, when he had first obtained this inheritance, the one-armed Arab who had returned from death had faintly heard such a desperate roar within it!

That mad cry of someone driven into a dead end carried an inexplicable sense of familiarity—burning yet cold, strange yet familiar, so familiar that—it was as though another him were speaking!

That undoubtedly made this "teaching" all the more special.

Especially with the stirrings he had felt then, Basim had naturally come to understand something: if he could devour ten thousand souls, or command countless spirits, he would qualify for a further exchange. He could elevate the Shadow Fiend Bloodline, which was merely a "hero bloodline," into the true necromantic demon king from its "backstory," the Lord of the Soul Abyss! He could even climb step by step into higher realms—

Of course, all that was still far too distant—but objectively speaking, that did not stop him from treating it as a benchmark, a direction to strive toward.

After all, by now, he had truly felt his own "limit."

"Devouring" and "commanding" were originally the two fundamental ways the Shadow Fiend Bloodline made use