Chapter 540: The First Step
Mr. Fluffy was different!
It made Northern's widened eyes sparkle with surprise. His mind faltered, unable to piece
words together.
'What... what... wha-'
Mr. Fluffy was standing on two bipedal legs, almost like Night Terror. His white fur seemed like it was cut directly from a slab of moonlight.
They fluffed and danced with every stray pass of the wind.
The beast had an intense, fiery, and at the same time, familiar ferociousness in its eyes. Although those eyes were now starkly different than before.
It was like an abominable creature that existed only in fairytales, standing almost seven feet tall, every part of its skin coiling with metal-like muscles.
His pale eyes against the drop of his white sheen fur were striking. It-for a moment-made the beast look harmless, rather stunningly beautiful.
"Mr. Fluffy..."
A wide grin formed on Mr. Fluffy's face; however, it looked like the devil was trying to smile. It would have made a little girl pee her pants.
Northern, however, was not even concerned about the awkward grin on the beast's face.
Instead...
[Monster Profile]
Name: [Mr. Fluffy]
True Name: [Silver Moon]
Rank: [Beast]
Danger Level: [Devil]
Attributes: [Call Of The Wild], [Call of The Moon]
Abilities: [Cleave]
Northern leaned back, his eyes frozen with paling surprise.
'A devil? How did he become a devil!'
It was not out of place for some monsters to become different after evolving to a new danger level. After all, Night Terror had also evolved to Dark Terror at the last minute.
So, this wasn't strange at all.
But the pale shock on Northern's face told a different story.
'The last time I remember, wasn't he just a disaster level?'
It seemed Mr. Fluffy had taken a tremendous leap in danger level.
'Was that what he was doing at the glacier mountain...'
Northern suddenly frowned, 'But wait, wouldn't he have needed a tremendous amount of soul cores for that to be possible.'
His eyes widened even more.
'Please don't tell me this bastard has been consuming the section of soul cores that I left at the glacier mountain.'
That had to be it. There was no other explanation for Mr. Fluffy's sudden growth.
He had deliberately hidden himself in the glacier mountain and was consuming tons upon tons of soul cores, causing him to evolve several times in danger level.
Now, he showed up in front of Northern like he had done some great job, head high with a terrorizing, ugly smile on his animalistic face.
Northern washed his face with one hand, sighing.
'He would have consumed a lot of soul cores for that to happen.'
He wanted to get angry, but he couldn't. He also felt bad that he had been neglecting the monster's growth recently.
Mr. Fluffy had been his first buddy, the one monster that had been there from the beginning, and yet the one that got less attention from him.
'I can't imagine how he must have felt. He must have wanted to be stronger, to be seen.'
Hence, consuming those soul cores and believing he could be stronger.
He might have cost Northern some losses in soul cores, but he had good intentions. Northern glanced at the monster once again before looking away with an exasperated sigh. He leaned on the armrest with his elbow and rested his head, looking at Mr. Fluffy again. 'He did go ahead and become a werewolf, huh.'
Northern's gaze lazily drifted off the beast and went to the others standing.
'Who have I not called yet... Corpse Eater.'
He snapped his fingers, and immediately, the devilish Corpse Eater, placed in charge of managing the general workforce of monsters, suddenly appeared before Northern.
There were still three Void summons left, but Northern felt it was unnecessary to summon them since they weren't that much of a sentient being.
He was going to use them to propagate the rest of the summons he got from Soul Taker shattering.
He paused for a moment, looking down in thought.
'Should I just do that before doing this?'
A bead of sweat rolled down his face as he thought of the process.
Weaving souls together and creating a new form of existence from the depths of the void
wasn't as easy as it seemed.
It was soul and stamina exhausting. The more he did it, the more he felt like he would lose his
hang of it.
So Northern felt it was an art that he should reserve for really extreme purposes.
'But those souls are quite valuable. They'd be a great boon to my force.'
He was somehow in a dilemma. Should he go ahead and do what he wanted to do without
creating a body for them?
Or should he go ahead and create them, knowing very well that some repercussion of some sort would hit him?
He was deep in thought, while they all stood opposite him in total silence.
Amidst it all, Northern suddenly remembered the precious ability he had received. His eyes
glowed.
'That's right. I don't have to use them as soldiers. There's Soul Forge.'
A satisfied grin appeared on Northern's face.
'Then I can carry along with this.'
Northern stood up, a pleased smirk adorning his face. He majestically walked through the
flames and stopped in front of it, about thirty steps away from them.
Then he started:
"I want to set a hierarchy." He observed all their faces for a moment.
And there was no emotional response, no change in facial expression, not even from Mr.
Fluffy.
'Did they all expect this?'
He breathed softly and continued.
"I really don't want to do this. As much as I would love equality to reign amongst all of you, that would be wishful thinking, and wishful thinking is the value of a naive person. In the end, causing utter ruin to one's fate."
His eyes went over all of them with a cold light gleaming out of it.
"I am currently suspecting that the enemies I will be going toe to toe with in the future are ones that no ordinary drifter would be able to face off with. Which is why I want to make you extraordinarily strong. Insanely strong. Hierarchy is the first step for that to be decided." His voice paused, causing absolute silence to instantly settle in the vast hall.
Then, like a ghostly blade, it cut through the silence.
"And how would this rank be decided? It's simple."
A vicious grin curved the corners of Northern's lips.
"Duel."