After killing the last of the vampires, I continued my hunt, searching for a beast. I had collected five silvers from the corpses, along with their cores. Yes—we can extract cores. I also gathered blood from the vampire mage. It will help me a lot tonight during my experiment.
As I walked through the forest, I stumbled across fifteen wolf beasts standing in formation before a larger wolf. His paws were blazing with fire. I think he's at least a B-rank, or maybe even higher. Right now, I wouldn't be able to handle him. Even using spirituality, I could survive only a few of his attacks before draining all of my spirit energy.
I quietly backed away and ran out of the forest. As I exited, the massive wolf turned his head in my direction, but luckily, he didn't follow me.
After running at full speed, I finally reached the city gates. I heard people gossiping about the Finance Minister throwing a party—his son had just become a C-rank blood mage. Apparently, in the vampire community, mages are more respected than qi users… but only up until S-rank. Beyond that, no one knows anything. It's like the information is blocked at the top.
I got this info from the Cat-Bench Tavern. A lot of people had seen me with Lilla, and since I'm a regular there, they willingly shared what they knew. Lilla wasn't around, though. I think she was invited to the party too—after all, she's his leader.
After eating dinner with strangers, I walked back to my room. I had extended my stay for another week. I settled in, kept my sword and knife beside me, and vanished into my mind space.
As I was observing the space, I got pushed from behind. I knew who it was—the baby elephant. He looked a little angry. I calmed him down and fed him some apples I had brought from the city. I also wanted to plant trees here, so I had brought some fruit tree seeds as well.
As I walked alongside the baby elephant, I realized I hadn't named him yet. He really does look like a cute elephant. I thought of naming him Jumbo. But I paused—would that suit him in the future? "Hey," I asked him, "do you like the name Jumbo?"
He tilted his head in confusion. I laughed and said, "Yeah… from today onwards, you will be Jumbo the Great. Heheh."
I scattered the seeds here and there and watered them. I even brought a tub for Jumbo to drink from. After taking care of everything, I sat beside him and played for a while. I could insert elephant blood and raise my power to B-rank anytime—by integrating 60%. But to reach A-rank, I'd have to go beyond that.
For that, I also need to increase my spirit quantity and quality—by expanding this mind space. It will take time. I haven't meditated even once since coming to this city. I need to bring out time to work on both the *Supreme Spiritual Scripture* and *Supreme Strength Scripture*.
And then there's the experiment I've been planning—integrating vampire blood. My aim isn't to become a vampire. It's to see whether I can generate a blood core, which will help me become a mage.
I brought out the vampire blood I had stored and started boiling it. This boiling step may become unnecessary in the future, once I gain more proficiency. Even now, I could feel the blood aligning to me slightly.
After boiling it, I told Jumbo not to disturb me. I cleared my mind—my aim after injection was assimilation, to achieve the blood core.
I brought out the syringe and plunged it into my chest, right where my heart is.
The blood started to flow. I could feel it mixing with mine—flowing through my DNA. I was searching for the origin of a person's talent and core. And you know what?
I found it after sometime.
I tried to move it. There was resistance—a turf war in my own veins—but I managed to push it down to my base-level DNA. The moment I succeeded, my brain exploded with pain. I let the rest of the blood mix freely, since my goal had already been achieved.
But the pain… gods, the pain.
I screamed and ground my teeth. The integration lasted for an hour. It felt like eternity.
And then… it was done.
The red sphere—the bloodline source—transferred me some information about what I had just achieved.
---
After the excruciating pain, I passed out. An hour later, I woke up. Jumbo was lying beside me. He looked different—somehow changed. It was like he had stayed beside me the whole time, sharing my pain.
As I stirred, he made a happy sound with his trunk and wrapped it around my neck, rubbing his face against my chest.
I smiled, rubbing his face too. "I'm okay now," I whispered.
He blinked at me with those big eyes and bushy eyebrows. I stood up.
And the first thing I saw…
Floating next to my spirit core was a blood core.
It was smaller, red, and sat slightly lower than the spirit core. But it was there. This was my blood core my first element !!!. Just as my strength is represented by the elephant, my blood core would be represented by a vampire.
The more I grow, the more he will grow.
Right now, I'm just D-rank. I can only grow up to B-rank with this. But I want more. I want more cores to absorb—and I can do that instantly.
And the most shocking thing?
I don't need to purify the cores before absorbing them.
That means, whenever I hit a bottleneck in my mage path related to particular element, then I need to instigate blood—of said element user it may be vampire, wolf, human or beast with greater talent than the one I previously absorbed. Then my talent will be similar as the blood I absorbed, then I can absorb the cores to jump till my new talent can take me. This pattern can continue until I get stuck again.
What the f*ck…
I turned toward the bloodline source—the one who gave me this ability to do what no one else in this world, or maybe even this **universe**, can do.
Of course, there's a price.
If a normal person needs one core to increase their element power… I need twenty.
But I didn't care. A power this groundbreaking doesn't come for free.
I will hunt.
I will kill.
I will *devour*…
Until I become what I was meant to be.