Who Designed This Underworld Dungeon?

So we must walk the path of evil!

"My power has declined too much, and I still don’t know how to recover."

Right now, he felt as though his panel was locked; the King’s Soul and levels had all become useless. Although he retained a strong physique, it translated to a power equivalent to around a dozen levels.

Like starting as a useless person.

"I wonder if I can still level up in this state. For now, I should try to collect more souls."

He saw the animated corpse soldier before him and pounced like a hungry tiger. The Dark Hand appeared on his right hand and grabbed the head of the soldier, swiftly absorbing its soul and life force.

"Eh?"

Temude suddenly made a puzzled sound.

He sensed a change in his Dark Hand.

After absorbing several more animated corpse soldiers, he confirmed it.

"The Dark Hand has undergone a positive evolution."

Before, when using the Dark Hand to absorb monsters, it could only reduce the enemy’s life force and absorb some souls. But now, not only did the number of absorbed souls increase, but the reduced life force was also transferred to his body by a certain percentage!

The Dark Hand was given a blood-sucking attribute!

In the future, if his Elemental Bottles and Healing Potions were exhausted, he could use the Dark Hand to temporarily recover life force, serving as a life-saving ability.

But this wasn’t the most significant part. The most surprising aspect was...

When Temude absorbed his twenty-sixth animated corpse soldier, the Dark Hand suddenly "spat out" a black ball of light.

[Humanity]

It was humanity! Each time he used the Dark Hand to absorb enemies, a small amount of faint humanity was absorbed. When enough humanity accumulated, it formed this entire ball of humanity that resembled a little person.

Temude remembered that this thing wasn’t particularly useful, being quite niche in the Sain Dungeon, with the latest discovered use being as an oath item for the White Spider.

But this time was different. The moment he saw the humanity, he felt a surge of... longing?

The Dark Ring on his chest transmitted a feeling of desire, and he pressed the humanity to his chest.

The Dark Ring immediately devoured it, and at the same time, Temude felt an immense sense of satisfaction.

How to describe it? The satisfaction was akin to ash receiving the flame it longed for! Perhaps a tad less, but still addictive, with dopamine releasing in abundance because of it.

To the uninformed, it might have seemed like he was injected with a high-concentration Blood Healing Potion or took several Happiness Eggs.

"Ugh..."

Suddenly, he knelt down, clutching his chest, his body twitching slightly. Moments later, he stood up against the wall, his eyes shimmering with a peculiar light.

"This is good stuff."

The Dark Ring on his chest craved humanity.

And the humanity he provided was so abundant that the overflow was absorbed by the Dark Ring and returned to him as power!

Making him feel as if he had improved comprehensively!

However, after analyzing beyond the illusion brought by the joy in his brain, he found that the so-called comprehensive improvement was negligible.

Simply put, it felt like his strength had increased just a tiny bit.

Calculating this way, he wasn’t sure how much humanity he would need to absorb to enhance the boost effect to the extent of leveling up at a bonfire.

"It’s a bit negligible, but better than nothing."

After sensing the power brought by the Dark Ring, he concluded.

The boost effect, though it brought some enhancement to strength, didn’t seem worth starting an entire extinguishing fire for.

The positive effects brought by the Dark Ring were insufficient to compensate for the mental toll of extinguishing the fire!

"Is this the benefit of becoming the King of Darkness?"

Feeling... a bit hard to assess.

Thus, Temude continued in the Northern Undead Asylum, not letting any soul-absorbable enemy go, considering the humanity enhancement was worthwhile for his locked levels.

It was at this moment he encountered a formidable foe—the Black Knight.

In the Northern Undead Asylum, there seemed to be two or three Black Knights. To newbie adventurers, the Black Knights were terrifying, akin to the Ember King.

Watching the Black Knight he could once easily take on two at a time but now had to avoid due to the disparity in strength made the disparity clear.

Currently, the power gap was so vast that he couldn’t use the Dark Hand on the Black Knight and had to carefully use his magic power and fighting qi for combat skills, the result slightly stronger than a scratch.

"Wait!"

Temude suddenly had a flash of inspiration, looking at the Black Knight and thinking of something.

Oscar’s prowess was not weak. If in the Northern Undead Asylum, what other threats existed besides the Black Knight, it was only the Undead Demon!

What if he dealt with the Black Knight and the Undead Demon before meeting Oscar?

With this thought, he immediately took action. Luckily, he hadn’t lost all the auxiliary items he carried and still had many potions to replenish magic power.

The Northern Undead Asylum’s terrain was ideal for terrain kills. Temude temporarily set aside the warrior’s honor and constantly lured the Black Knight to the edge of a cliff, finally using a gravity wave to push it off.

Feeling a significant soul income, he knew he’d executed the move correctly.

He repeated this approach on the subsequent Black Knights, forgoing suitable terrains and creating opportunities himself, spending a good amount of effort to finally eliminate all the Black Knights.

The next target was the Undead Demon. When its massive, obese body leaped off the high wall, Temude ignored it and directly fled into the side door, settling by the bonfire.

"Level up!"

The souls from the Black Knights were all used to level up, and this time he needed to spend the same amount as he had before to unlock his sealed level panel again.

Although it wasn’t like choosing fire transmission where the levels were completely burned out, it was quite similar, requiring relocking.

"The power is back, not much but sufficient."

Wielding a Shattered Star Great Sword, he charged forth, managing it not due to level increase but purely because of his innate strength from the Warrior Country.

After several attempts, the Undead Demon finally fell at his feet.

Thus, the most threatening beings in the Northern Undead Asylum were all eliminated, leaving only animated corpse soldiers and a few Balder Knights.

To ensure safety, before meeting Oscar, he also slew all the Balder Knights.

"Rumble... Boom!"

A giant stone rolled down the stairs, smashing a big hole in the wall. Taking a deep breath, Temude peered into it with both anticipation and fear.

"Oh, it’s you. You’re not a wandering soul, after all. Did you activate this giant stone mechanism?"

A familiar voice uttered unfamiliar lines.

A perfectly intact Oscar stood before Temude, looking as though startled by the giant stone.

"..."

Temude slowly crouched, brewing his emotions, then jumped up, raising his hands high:

"Fantastic!"

This time he succeeded in saving a residual shadow character meant to die!Not all cycles appearing after extinguishing the fire are bad!

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