A few days later, Ringo was supervising the children's training, in fact, he was hiding as Hidden Nightmare while watching Eva train them.
At first Eva seemed a little reluctant about the job, but she soon grew fond of it.
She only needed to make those children suffer every day for a few hours, Ringo could feel the woman's contented emotions as she did it, even though her face was serious.
Looking at her demeanor, Ringo could see Melissa's shadow, Eva seemed like an exact copy of her, but he knew that Eva, despite the resemblance, was completely different from the woman.
Eva was impatient, undisciplined and impulsive, she was just suppressing those traits for now, but once a fight started, the difference became clear.
Ringo had seen Melissa training Eva and Lena.
Eva attacked with everything she had, Lena planned alongside her, providing support and Melissa seemed like an iron post, calmly receiving everything they threw at her and striking their weak points.
But in any case, today Ringo had his eye on Price.
Ringo didn't know how far this boy could go, but there was a feeling inside him that led him to believe that his ability could be much greater than simply improving quality through quantity.
Even if not, that boy was the perfect commander. Imagine a troop with a leader like him? If the troops are balanced at the start, the moment Price activates his ability, everyone is enhanced.
Ringo was very optimistic about the boy.
His friends, Oscar and Bane, had good abilities, Oscar could generate electricity. In the future, if he advances enough, he can go very far, although it's a common ability, once that kind of ability reaches a certain point, it's extremely terrifying.
Bane too, now he can only cause pain, Ringo had already proven it by lowering the quality of his body to the same level as the boy, he can only say that it was the worst pain he had ever felt.
In a battle, for someone with nerves of steel, Bane would be a nightmare.
Sure, for now it's limited to touch, but what about in the future? It could cause pain in the area or even more than just physical pain.
If Ringo had to choose, he would prefer Bane's skill to Oscar's. The only weakness will be dealing with mechanics in the future, as long as those guys don't use their own bodies, Bane won't be able to inflict pain on machines.
Or will it? Who knows how this guy's skill will progress.
Aurora was also progressing rapidly, Eva wasn't going easy on her, in fact, she was going even harder. Aurora had a broken ability in terms of physical training.
Any injury could be healed, so Aurora began returning from training increasingly battered.
Hila, of course, was unhappy, but Ringo managed to stop the woman, it was Aurora herself who asked for it, so Hila couldn't say much.
Aurora had short hair now, it still looked a bit masculine, but it was much better than being bald. The girl seemed to be inspired by all the women around her training and didn't want to fall behind.
Hila could only accept it reluctantly, but her relationship with Eva had cooled. It seemed like they were getting along, or at least hating each other in silence, but now Hila and she... well.
Ringo wouldn't get involved as long as it didn't lead to fights.
All the women around Ringo were constantly being baptized by evolutionary energy, everything about them continued to improve, including their Esper gene, so the advancements were evident. Ringo wasn't worried about their future, none of them would be left behind.
When he finally got his hands on the cube of evolution, that advancement would take off. Back then, creating hundreds of Super Grade S shouldn't have been a pipe dream.
Of course, whether he does that or not is another question, but the fact is that if he wants to, he can, perhaps the holy land of the supers will emerge even sooner than in the original novel, this time the official name will be "Hell".
With his predictive ability, his eyes are fixed on the event where Psyker loses the cube, so he can't slow down, he must reach Grade S before that happens.
Li was also progressing rapidly, he couldn't go through evolutions, but Ringo helped him progress without stopping. If Ringo stopped, his progress would stop. That's Li's misfortune, not possessing the Super gene, but he doesn't care, he only cares about progressing.
Ringo had already stopped fighting Li, now he had learned everything he needed to and could easily beat the old man. On the other hand, Melissa had found out about Li and she had also joined the training.
Li is challenged by Hila from time to time, Eva also trains with him, but Melissa, who seems to really enjoy sparring with Li, practically fights with him every day, even leaving Eva aside.
Sure, she loses badly. Currently in Hell, only Ringo can beat Li. The man keeps getting stronger and stronger, his aged appearance is slowly receding. Maybe in the future he won't look any different from a man in his prime.
But Melissa seems to have a real affinity with Hila, no matter how badly she gets beaten, she wants to keep fighting.
Hila only refrains from challenging Li more because she has Ringo for that, most of their lovemaking begins with a fight.
Eva, despite liking to fight, prefers real fights, training like this is just training. She likes to have her life truly at risk, a crazy woman, indeed.
Hell was growing well, Ringo glanced again at the children, who were still increasing in number and left for a secret room.
In the room, a bald man with a spider tattooed on his neck was training with weights even heavier than himself, Zoro would be proud.
The clone glanced at Ringo before looking away.
The Black Spider space project was progressing rapidly. Ringo was excited for the moment Black Spider would go into space, currently, it was already a Grade D and was growing quickly.
The clone finished training and went to a capsule next door. Entering it, he exited Black Spider's body and fiddled with some controls. Black Spider in the Pod started screaming.
The clone quickly retreated back inside him and took control, white energy leaking from him.
The Pod emitted large amounts of radiation and the clone was constantly causing Black Spider to evolve inside it.
He didn't want to wait too long, so he took some drastic measures.
Everything he went through in Germinal back then, he made Black Spider suffer while the clone helped him evolve.
The man's soul was stronger now than before Ringo controlled him, but by that point he was already completely loyal, so it didn't matter.
Ringo sighed as he left the room again.
After advancing, his previous nightmare powers underwent synergistic benefits.
He could create up to 9 nightmare marks now, he marked Hila, Aurora, Eva, Emma, Lena, Melissa, Jack and Will.
He didn't place a mark on the Black Spider, not wanting to leave a Back End for a skilled mage, the clone itself had instructions to self-destruct if caught.
On the other hand, in addition to the improvement in his other powers, the number of clones also increased, he now had one more clone available.
The backup clone was sent to scout for talent for Hell, not only that, but he's coordinating a team to bring refugees to Andrea. There's still a lot of radiation from the last war scattered around, but there are also safe zones.
Hell's base itself is being transformed into a city and the refugees will be the first real citizens of this new nation.
Who would have thought that what began as an anarchist terrorist organization had now become a nation?
This was Melissa's idea, Ringo didn't care about it at all. If it were up to him, he would simply keep the mobs and the children, raising them from a young age to ensure loyalty and choosing only the best of the best.
Lena, however, observed that it would be easier to recruit good talent if he had a large target population, besides, the six nations were getting close to turning their attention to the warlords and the settlements, ready to expand their own territories, so it would be very difficult to recruit in the future, so he only helped, in any case he still owed his mother for dragging her here.
The world's reaction to Hell was mixed, he wasn't interested enough, but Melissa said that business deals were already being discussed. As for what did Andrea have to offer?
Well, a large amount of mutant material that just grew here, some weaker genetic serums and medications produced by Emma also sold well.
Emma, who was very focused on her work, was truly a goldmine, things she discarded could be reused in various areas if she wanted to. Producing drugs better than those currently on the market would be very easy, but neither Melissa nor Ringo saw value in improving the quality of drug addict's addiction.
Emma herself wasn't interested in it either, but it was a possibility.
Speaking of Emma, the relationship between him and her was... strange.
Ringo could feel the emotions, but he never told anyone, so Emma seemed not to be taking precautions against him trying to cloud her inner feelings.
The fact is, he sensed that the woman's attachment was growing, nothing was happening between them, but he knew she was falling in love. It was undoubtedly strange.
The fact that the Parasite could sense the same thing didn't help, its insistence was growing stronger, but Ringo still didn't know what to do about it.
He doesn't hate her and has practically forgiven her already, after all, they see each other almost every day, he doesn't consider what she did to the previous Ringo to be an act against him.
But that doesn't change the fact that he's still Ringo now, so he doesn't know how to deal with that contradiction.
It's like having an identical twin and knowing he was rejected by a girl for being ugly. It has nothing to do with you, but you're identical to your brother, so... you're ugly too!
He doesn't love her, his interest is also mediocre, with her hair growing, Emma is becoming more and more beautiful, but it's not like he lacks women around him.
If it weren't for the parasite, he would have already left Emma behind, but there are no "ifs", at least for now, he doesn't know what to do about it and doesn't intend to deal with it right now.