Reach Nirvana, Professor Donna!
Reach Nirvana, Professor Donna!
Although she had grown tremendously since the day she first got the skill, Evelyn still considered the 'Lotus Throne's Nirvana' as her most lethal move. Of course, the conditions to use it were harsh, and there was a price to be paid, but she would only keep growing stronger if she used it effectively.
That being said, using the skill effectively required her to first understand how exactly it worked… and professor Donna was the perfect test dummy.
Despite being at a slightly higher level, her soul power wasn't that great, and as her abilities focused on defense and counterattack, Evelyn knew she could peacefully execute her attack and observe. Most importantly, she wasn't weak enough to be useless, but also not strong enough to make her worry about backlash from the skill.
To get such a perfect volunteer when she needed it the most, Evelyn thought her luck stat must be even higher than her soul value, if there was such a thing.
It didn't take long for Evelyn to establish the flow channels of soul and spirit power between herself and Ruru, as the link was already there, and once the connection was established, Evelyn knew instinctively that the attack was ready.
The final execution of the skill relied on Ruru, as soon as Evelyn pointed her finger at Donna with a smile, the pink fox jumped from her shoulder, her form turning translucent as it rapidly shot through the air towards the startled professor.
"Ahahaha… do you want to test the waters with that pet of yours first? You're unexpectedly cruel—!"
Donna's words got stuck in her throat as Ruru's translucent form passed right through all her barriers, including the laceration mirror. Before she could even jump back in shock, however, the fox jumped… right into her chest.
Even Evelyn blinked in surprise when Ruru vanished inside Donna, and her soul power started dropping at an alarming rate.
Donna's mind froze the moment the fox vanished from her sight, and although her body felt like it was being torn apart from the inside, piece by little piece, she couldn't scream at all. No, not to mention scream, she couldn't even twitch!
Thankfully for her, the agony lasted only momentarily, and… she knew no more.
The junior professor's body collapsed on her knees, all her barriers fizzing out of existence as the floating rocks dropped to the ground. She should have been furious and unwilling in her mind, but her expression in death remained that of goading and mockery.
Thankfully, she didn't have a soul left any longer, so Donna didn't have to feel ashamed of the way she died.
Moments before Donna's body collapsed, the translucent form of Ruru jumped out of her back, and changed back into her normal appearance when her feet touched the ground.
Evelyn smiled as she walked over to her seemingly exhausted little fox. "Good job, Ruru."
The little fox snuggled against the pink haired girl's chest as she picked her up, making Bree give her a concerned glance. 'Seems like even without the backlash, just channeling such a massive amount of energy to use the skill is also quite taxing on Ruru's body. I should give her some proper rest before using it again.'
Not to mention Ruru, she herself could also feel a twinge of pain from the consumption of her soul, though she was already restoring it rapidly using Chaos Incarnate. But even so, taking a look at her system panel, Evelyn couldn't help but be happy.
—Lotus Moon Spirit Fox (Ruru): [Lotus Throne's Nirvana Activated: Continuous loss of soul value…]
-Consumed 580 points of soul value!
—Soul Value: [1,523 / 2249] → [943 / 2,249]
The consumption of the soul value was coincidentally identical to the soul value of Donna, making Evelyn grin. 'That pretty much confirms my theory. The Lotus Throne's Nirvana directly pits my soul value against my opponent, though I have a great edge thanks to the support from Ruru, as well as my own incredibly high base stat.'
Unfortunately, while this theory of hers proved to be right, another one turned out to be completely wrong, leaving the pink haired girl feeling a little despondent. 'If only the skill didn't end so quickly, and I could use spirit cores to restore my soul power slowly… I would be invincible in one on one fights, no matter the strength of the opponent.'
Sadly, even with the opponent immobilized, even in the best case Evelyn would only be able to restore a few points of soul power using a spirit core and Chaos Incarnate before the move ended decisively with one of their deaths. It was utterly impractical.
Evelyn shook her head ruefully. "Well, there goes my idea of killing the other thrones using spirit cores…"
Of course, it would still have taken her a lot of time and luck to gather enough wealth to pull off such a thing, but at least it had been a possibility. Simply outgrowing the thrones, in comparison, was a very uncertain plan without knowing her opponent's current level.
Shaking her head to clear off her distracting thoughts, Evelyn focused back on her panel.
-[ Killed high-level Human (Donna Redal): Experience +70,000 ]
-Evelyn Knox: Level 77 [17,780 / 29,000] → Level 77 [87,780 / 29,000]
—Current experience exceeds the requirement, level up!
-Level 77 [ 87,780 / 29,000 ] → Level 78 [ 58,780 / 29,500
—All Attributes +8 points!
-Level 78 [ 58,780 / 29,500 ] → Level 79 [ 29,280 / 30,000
—All Attributes +8 points!
-Level 79 [ 29,280 / 30,000 ]
"Huh? So close to the next milestone?!"
This woman really was as infuriating in her death as she was when she had been alive. She really didn't deserve the candy she had planned on giving her corpse for making the right guess.
Evelyn couldn't help but grit her teeth in frustration as she chucked Donna's corpse into her inventory. 'Forget about killing experience. Anyway, she was still two levels higher than me, right? Even if she wasn't a good enough threat for a red mission, was she really so weak? Even that five-year-old brat Tristan gave me 90 experience for smacking him across the face!'
If Aurora hadn't told her that the world channel was a tree-like existence without a higher level of thought, she would have thought it was teasing her intentionally!
Pouting, she decided that she would definitely have to complain to Aurora about the quality of junior professors in the academy, but then she realized that her teacher would only be troubled for no reason. 'W-Well, maybe after she's dealt with all her current affairs, mhm… I shouldn't bother her for now.'
—Ruru consumed 0 points of soul value!
—Lotus Moon Spirit Fox (Ruru): [Lotus Throne's Nirvana: Deactivated]
-No damage to vitality detected.
-[Lotus Throne's Nirvana]: Absorbed 60 Spirit Power!
—Spirit Power: 842 / 1147 [+3] → 902 / 1207 [+3]
"Mhm… so roughly a tenth of the opponent's spirit power is absorbed when all the requirements are met? Or is it random?"
Unfortunately, the only way to find out seemed to be to catch another Donna-like thing, but that would have to wait until her little fox was ready, and she had another opportunity.
Evelyn smiled, thinking about all the possible trial candidates. 'That Rufus guy may be weak, but his cousin seemed alright, and his cousin must know someone stronger, right? Mhm… maybe they'll send me a big gift if I goad them a little?'
Of course, she would have no lack of 'trial candidates' if she publicized the fact that she had killed Craig, but that would be an incredibly risky move, and Evelyn wasn't willing to put her family at such risk.
Compared to the Kingdom of Terra, she was still quite insignificant, after all. They were already an existential threat to her Knox family without ever really caring much about them, and if they really started focusing… her family would probably stand no chance of survival, at all.
Evelyn sighed as she started converting some of her spirit power into soul value. It had become something of a habit to do so whenever her spirit power was high and soul value low, since her most used and effective skills were based on soul power consumption now.
-Converted 10 points of spirit power to 1 point of soul power.
—Spirit Power: 902 → 903 / 1207 [+3]
—Soul Value: [967 / 2273] → [968 / 2,265]
.
.
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-Converted 10 points of spirit power to 1 point of soul power.
—Spirit Power: 732 → 722 / 1207 [+3]
—Soul Value: [984 / 2273] → [985 / 2,273]
Without Amara's second buff, her Chaos Incarnate's conversion ability really was quite inefficient. Of course, as a one-of-a-kind skill that allowed her to actually restore her soul energy, it was still amazing.
Evelyn frowned. 'This should be fine. I'll restore the rest of it once I have both of Amara's buffs back, as it will also boost my spirit power regeneration in addition to lowering the conversion cost itself by half.'
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