Strongest Incubus System

The second tremor was stronger.

Dust fell from the ceiling.

The artificial lines spread across the floor lit up at the same time, but not in blue.

Gray.

As though something were checking which paths still worked.

Mu Qing looked up.

"That shouldn’t be able to get in."

Damon was still sitting on the floor.

"You’re saying that far too often today."

"This fold was sealed."

Chen Mo looked toward the corridor.

"It was sealed against people."

Mu Qing fell silent.

Aria raised her head.

"You think this isn’t a person."

"I’m almost certain."

The black plate vibrated.

The Selection circle glowed.

DISTANCE: DECREASING.

Damon read it.

"That’s surprisingly polite."

Ester slowly turned toward him.

"You almost had your identity reorganized."

"I know."

"And you’re still making jokes."

"My identity seems intact."

"Unfortunately."

Damon smiled.

Then tried to stand.

Ester placed a hand on his shoulder.

"Don’t even think about it."

"We need to leave."

"You can barely stand."

"I can stand badly while we leave."

She pressed down.

Damon remained seated.

Xue Lian picked up the plate.

"Wait."

Everyone looked.

She brought the object closer to the wall.

The Selection circle pulsed.

One of the artificial lines responded.

"It isn’t just looking for a way in."

Damon looked.

"It’s using this facility."

"Yes."

Mu Qing approached.

"How?"

Xue Lian studied the pattern.

"The cores belonged to the same artificial network. Even isolated, they share protocols."

Aria wrote.

"So destroying Continuity alerted the others."

"Exactly."

Damon ran a hand over his face.

"I should have asked that before blowing it up."

Ester stared at him.

"Finally, an intelligent sentence."

"Don’t get used to it."

Another tremor.

This time the corridor moved.

It did not crack.

It moved.

The passage they had entered through slid several meters to the left.

A wall took its place.

Yun Shuo went pale.

"The fold is closing."

Chen Mo answered.

"No."

He walked toward the newly formed wall and touched it.

His hand sank a few centimeters.

Then was pushed back out.

"It’s reorganizing."

Damon became serious.

"For what?"

The plate answered.

EVALUATION ENVIRONMENT PREPARED.

Everyone went still.

Aria lowered the notebook.

"I don’t like that sentence."

Damon nodded.

"Finally, we agree on something."

Xue Lian looked at him.

"Selection."

"Yes."

"It didn’t come to capture you immediately."

"It came to confirm."

"Compatibility."

Ester understood.

"Then we don’t let it evaluate."

Damon looked at her.

"How?"

"You do nothing."

"That’s an offensive strategy for me."

"I noticed."

Xue Lian grew more serious.

"It may be worse."

"Naturally."

"Selection doesn’t have to evaluate only power."

Damon looked at the plate.

"Body."

"Root."

"Memory."

"Authority."

"Integration capacity."

Damon sighed.

"So basically everything Vorn spent years measuring."

"Yes."

The mark on his arm pulsed.

The plate responded.

PREVIOUS DATA RECEIVED.

Damon went still.

Ester closed her eyes.

"Of course."

Aria looked at the mark.

"So it already has Vorn’s records."

"Part of them," Xue Lian said.

The plate vibrated.

INSUFFICIENT DATA.

Damon smiled without humor.

"What a shame."

Then the corridor in front of them disappeared.

It did not close.

It simply ceased to exist.

In its place appeared a large space.

Circular.

With dozens of doors around it.

Mu Qing stepped back.

"This wasn’t here."

"We already established that," Chen Mo replied.

In the center of the room was a single black column.

Low.

On its surface, a white symbol.

Selection.

Damon looked at Xue Lian.

"Going in seems like a terrible idea."

"Yes."

The wall behind them began moving forward.

Damon looked back.

"So it seems we have been democratically overruled."

Ester helped him stand.

"If you fall, I’m leaving you."

"Lie."

"Try me."

The group entered.

As soon as the last person crossed, the corridor vanished.

No exit.

The dozens of doors remained closed.

The central column lit up.

The plate in Xue Lian’s hands responded.

CANDIDATES DETECTED: SEVEN.

Everyone went still.

Damon counted.

Him.

Ester.

Aria.

Jian Yue.

Yun Shuo.

Chen Mo.

Mu Qing.

Xue Lian was also there.

Eight.

Damon realized.

"It didn’t detect Xue Lian."

She realized it too.

"Because I no longer have authority."

"Or because you refused."

The column pulsed.

A white line passed over Ester.

She immediately drew a needle.

Nothing happened.

Another passed over Aria.

Then Jian Yue.

Yun Shuo.

Chen Mo.

Mu Qing.

Finally Damon.

The line stopped.

The mark on his arm opened.

PRIORITY CONFIRMED.

Damon raised an eyebrow.

"This is starting to feel personal."

One of the doors opened.

There was no corridor behind it.

There was a person.

Or something close to one.

Tall.

Thin.

With grayish skin.

No clothes.

No hair.

The face had no eyes.

Only a vertical white line in the middle of the forehead.

Jian Yue raised his sword.

Xue Lian spoke immediately.

"Don’t attack."

He stopped.

The creature stepped out.

Then another door opened.

Another creature.

Then another.

Seven doors.

Seven figures.

One for each candidate.

Aria looked around.

"This is individual evaluation."

Damon looked at the creature in front of him.

"We have bad experiences with copies."

The figure tilted its head.

Then changed.

Its body grew slightly.

Hair appeared.

Facial features.

Until Damon was looking at himself.

Not perfectly.

The eyes were white.

The mark appeared on both arms.

"I don’t like this."

Ester looked at her own copy.

It held needles.

"I like it even less."

Jian Yue’s copy materialized a sword.

Chen Mo’s simply lost definition around the edges of its body.

Damon looked at Xue Lian.

"It’s copying abilities."

"Not exactly."

"Then?"

Damon’s copy spoke.

"Demonstrate."

Damon frowned.

"Demonstrate what?"

"Capacity."

"No."

The copy went still.

Damon smiled.

"That word remains useful."

The column pulsed.

REFUSAL RECORDED.

"Great."

REFUSAL DOES NOT INVALIDATE EVALUATION.

"Less great."

The copy attacked.

Without warning.

Damon blocked by reflex.

The punch hit the ordinary sword and nearly ripped the weapon from his hand.

He stepped back.

The copy did not follow.

It waited.

Damon understood.

"It wants me to respond."

Xue Lian looked at the absence of an opponent in front of herself.

"Yes."

"The more we show, the more data it gets."

"Probably."

Ester shouted from the other side.

"Then nobody uses anything!"

Her copy advanced.

Ester dodged.

Did not counterattack.

The creature stopped.

Aria ran from her own copy.

"This is much harder for people who don’t know how to fight!"

"Keep running!" Damon replied.

"Excellent advice!"

Jian Yue remained motionless in front of his copy.

The creature attacked.

He blocked only with the sheath.

No technique.

No energy.

Chen Mo did the same.

Mu Qing simply backed away.

Yun Shuo avoided the confrontation.

Damon smiled.

"We’re ruining the test."

The column pulsed.

INSUFFICIENT DATA.

"That’s the point."

Damon’s copy attacked again.

Faster.

He dodged.

Another punch.

Another.

The creature began gradually increasing its strength.

Not because it was learning Damon.

Because it was forcing a response.

Damon noticed.

"It’s going to keep increasing until I show something."

Xue Lian nodded.

"Selection needs a limit."

"Then we’ll give it a false limit."

Ester heard him.

"Don’t invent anything."

"Already did."

"Damon!"

He let the copy attack.

At the last instant, he deliberately dodged badly.

The fist struck his shoulder.

Real pain.

Damon fell.

Ester cursed.

The copy stopped.

The column pulsed.

PHYSICAL RESISTANCE: BELOW RECORD.

Damon smiled from the floor.

"Excellent."

Xue Lian understood.

"You’re contradicting Vorn’s data."

"Yes."

Ester looked at him.

"You let that thing hit you."

"It worked."

"I’m going to hit you too."

"Later."

The copy advanced again.

Damon stood with difficulty.

This time he let the blow graze his face.

Blood appeared.

REGENERATION: NOT DETECTED.

Damon almost laughed.

The Heavenly Body was active.

But he was keeping it quiet.

Not healing.

Not reinforcing.

The Fourth Door had taught him exactly how to command that.

"You wanted to evaluate Damon with everything active," he said to the column. "You came at a bad time."

The mark pulsed.

The column responded.

DIVERGENCE IDENTIFIED.

"That’s right."

REEVALUATION REQUIRED.

Damon looked at the others.

"Everyone look worse than you really are."

Aria shouted while running.

"Finally a task suited to me!"

Jian Yue deliberately dropped his sword.

His copy stopped.

Chen Mo pulled the void away from himself.

Mu Qing sat on the floor and simply crossed her arms.

"I’m an old woman."

Damon looked at her.

"Convincing."

"I am an old woman!"

"I know."

Yun Shuo raised his hands.

"I surrender."

His copy stopped too.

Ester was the only one who seemed incapable of cooperating.

Her creature advanced.

She dodged.

Again.

Then took a hit to the arm.

Her expression became dangerous.

Damon saw it.

"No."

"It hit me."

"It’s a copy."

"Doesn’t matter."

"That is exactly what it wants."

Ester clenched her teeth.

Put the needles away.

"I hate you."

"But it worked."

The column pulsed.

One by one, the evaluations began to fail.

CANDIDATE 2: INSUFFICIENT.

CANDIDATE 3: INSUFFICIENT.

CANDIDATE 4: INSUFFICIENT.

Damon smiled.

Then it reached him.

The column went silent.

The mark on his arm reacted.

One pulse.

Two.

Three.

Damon’s copy remained in front of him.

Then it smiled.

Damon lost his own smile.

The creature spoke.

"Manipulation detected."

Silence.

Aria stopped running.

"It noticed."

"Yes," Damon replied.

The column lit up completely.

PRIORITY CANDIDATE INTENTIONALLY ALTERING RESULTS.

Damon shrugged.

"I have no idea what you’re talking about."

The copy advanced.

This time it did not attack.

It placed a hand over its own chest.

Damon’s Heavenly Ice Body reacted.

Not because he ordered it.

Because something on the other side called.

Xue Lian’s eyes widened.

"Damon!"

White Ice exploded across the copy’s arm.

Not black.

White.

The same ancient signature as Xue Lian’s authority.

Damon went still.

"How?"

She looked at the column.

"It isn’t copying you."

Then she understood.

"It’s accessing records from the artificial network."

The copy changed again.

The ice vanished.

Spiritual lightning appeared.

Then artificial circulation.

Then a root.

Abilities from ancient candidates.

Hundreds of years of data.

Selection did not need Damon to demonstrate.

It could present options and observe which ones made his body react.

"That’s smarter than I expected," Damon murmured.

Ester looked at him.

"Don’t praise it."

The copy touched its own chest.

Red energy appeared.

Damon felt his vampiric nature respond.

The column pulsed.

COMPATIBILITY CONFIRMED.

Another energy.

Demonic.

Damon’s body reacted.

COMPATIBILITY CONFIRMED.

Cold.

The root responded.

COMPATIBILITY CONFIRMED.

Damon became serious.

It was not testing what he knew how to do.

It was testing what he could receive.

The copy spread its arms.

Dozens of different signatures began appearing at the same time.

And Damon’s body responded to almost all of them.

The column glowed.

RESULT SUPERIOR TO VORN’S RECORDS.

Ester lost color.

"Shit."

Damon agreed.

"Yes."

The black plate in Xue Lian’s hands vibrated.

Selection stopped pulsing faintly.

It lit up completely.

The presence that had been outside the fold finally found the path.

The ceiling of the room opened.

Not physically.

Space separated.

High above appeared a black sphere.

Smaller than the true Seed.

Larger than the Continuity core.

And different from the others.

Hundreds of tiny white eyes covered its surface.

All of them opened at once.

All of them looked at Damon.

The column announced:

EVALUATION COMPLETE.

Damon slowly raised his sword.

"Finally."

Xue Lian looked at him.

"No."

"I only raised it."

"Your face."

Damon sighed.

The sphere descended.

The copies disappeared.

All of them.

Selection’s presence filled the entire room.

Then the message appeared.

IDEAL VESSEL IDENTIFIED.

Damon waited.

The second sentence appeared.

INITIATING CLAIM.

Ester drew every needle she had.

Jian Yue raised the ancestral sword.

Chen Mo opened the void.

Mu Qing ran toward the symbols on the column.

Aria closed the notebook.

Damon looked at all of them.

Then at the sphere.

"Now you can stop pretending to be weak."

The Selection core opened all its eyes.

And for the first time, it answered him directly.

"That is exactly what I was waiting for."

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