“Little Brother, you’ve really made a killing this time, to think the first ability you awakened would be this interesting.” Throughout that entire process, Ferti’nier had been watching over my interaction with that stuck-up rock and its more obedient kin. As an experienced Devil King, she managed to spot the inherent specialness of my ability right away.
“That ability is called Consciousness Impartment, it can be used to impart a temporary consciousness onto inanimate objects. Even though it’s temporary, the possibilities are endless. In fact, Little Brother can probably overthrow the heavens soon.”
[Hahaha, well, I don’t know about overthrowing the heavens but it does seem rather powerful, doesn’t it?]
“That guy was once a part of the genesis of this world, since Little Brother is now a part of his bloodlines, it only makes sense that you awakened a portion of his abilities as well.”
‘A part of the genesis of the world huh…’ The Origin Angels were all created as tools initially. Moreover, they were created before the Creator made the world. In other words, it was highly possible that those Angels had helped create the world as well…especially Lucifer who was the first Angel created by the Creator.
Now that I had gained a new ability, it was naturally time for me to experiment.
Consciousness Impartment was definitely a special power. Technically speaking, it’s more of a passive ability than an active one. In a sense, it would probably be easier to understand if I said that objects touched by my mana would come to life.
However, such life was extremely weak since they would immediately die out once my mana ran out. That was why Ferti’nier called it Consciousness Impartment and not Life Impartment.
The actual effects of this passive wasn’t all that complicated at all.
In order to test out its effects, I performed a simple experiment with my Fireball. Had it been my old Fireball, it would have only proceeded in a straight line and never bend. Yet after gaining my new passive, any Fireball I threw out would now be imbued with consciousness. It was now possible for me to command it to make a turn or even evade an enemy’s attack…sounds ridiculous, right? What was more ridiculous was that one of my techniques, one which I hadn’t used for a long time, actually evolved after I gained that passive.
In the past, my Shadow Guardian was able to tie up my enemies, stretch out to assassinate my enemies and even form a shield to guard me of its own accord. However, it had one fatal flaw: it couldn’t separate from my body.
In other words, it had to maintain some sort of connection to my body via its shadow.
After gaining this new passive however, the intelligence of the Shadow Guardian was actually strengthened and it had even gained a new ability: the ability to function independent of my body for a short duration…in other words, my shadow was essentially a clone!
Since its upgrade, I had taken to referring to it as Shadow Demon Guardian instead.
Without anything to test it out on, I had no way to gauge its current combat strength but given that its combat strength was pretty high in the past, its evolved form shouldn’t be that bad either, right?
Other than that little bit of serendipity, I discovered another interesting fact. Not long after my Shadow Demon Guardian separated from my body, it sought out Shadowfang, which was still lying quietly on the floor, and ate it? Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that it had melded with it. Anyway…
‘Hey hey hey! What are you doing eating up my weapons…don’t think for a second that I won’t hit you just because you are a part of me! Spit it out right now!’
Amidst my frantic calls, the Shadow Demon Guardian did just that… Like a black cloth that had been ripped apart, Shadowfang slowly rose from its center until there was only a tiny portion of its body still connected to the shadow.
Because both of them were equally pitch black, it was rather difficult to discern that fact.
‘So what you’re telling me is…my Shadow Demon Guardian is helping to look after Shadowfang for me? I guess that makes sense too. Shadowfang is said to be a fang from the Moon Goddess’s steed, Nightblade. My Shadow Demon Guardian is of the Shadow Darkness Element while Shadowfang so happens to be one of the rare few Epic-grade Shadow Darkness Element weapons; their compatibility couldn’t be any better. Since Shadowfang has a consciousness of its own, melding the two would only strengthen it.’
More importantly, by acting a portable storage, I no longer had to deal with lugging around a weapon that was bigger than my body.
Speaking of which, the fact it was two meters long had caused me quite a great deal of trouble in the past. Just practising my drawing techniques took hours upon hours, and that was without my wings too. If I still had to deal with that while having wings, my mobility would definitely suffer a lot.
I couldn’t even stow it at my waist because of how long it was…
And that was why I took extremely well to this little tidbit of serendipity. ‘From now on, this brother would just have to draw Shadowfang from his shadow instead of dealing with that whole mess.’
‘Maybe I might even be able to scare off some of my more weak-willed opponents with my cool new blade drawing technique.’
“Little Brother sure has gotten himself an interesting skill, I think you would only be astounded by how many potential uses it has.”
[I never thought this whole encounter with Lucifer would bring so many benefits too.]
“Well, he gave you a mission, didn’t he?” Ferti’nier couldn’t help but reveal a mocking smile. “That fellow isn’t some good samaritan, if he gives you a cent, you can be sure he will take away ten more from you.”
[…let’s not talk about that, that’s just gonna make me even sadder…all I want to do is find Yi Yi, get back my male body, find Nicole and then…]
“Return to your village and get married?” She teased me in a coquettish voice.
[…you know too much…]
Having finished a round of idle banter with Ferti’nier, or rather, after being teased by Ferti’nier, I re-adjusted my condition and prepared to make a trip for the weapons factory down below. According to the clone of Lucifer, there was an army of Abyssal Golems waiting for me down there. Given how I had no troops or authority now, they were all I could rely on in my future conquest of Sable Radiance.
“Sweetie, come to Papa for a second.” Even though I still hadn’t had a chance to test out my new powers yet, I could tell that they had improved to an incomparable level. The next step was to retrieve those golems and take over control of the palace. That was why I called for Mo Na.
