Jace sat on a luxurious couch, with a bottle of wine in his hand.
He looked around only to see destruction everywhere in the drawing room. Walls were broken with big holes, and the antique pieces had fallen and were destroyed; he was still in the Mentor of Disorder's mansion.
The only thing that remained in one piece was the bottle of wine in his hand. He took a sip.
"Mm...", it was good stuff.
Beside him, he saw Natalie standing over the Mentor of Disorder, who sat on the ground leaning against the damaged wall.
Natalie was currently talking to him—no, more like bragging and taunting the Lawyer, telling him how she had brought his underground system down step by step.
Meanwhile, the Mentor of Disorder just listened to everything with a complicated expression, not that he could do anything now because Jace had forced some paralysis and weakness potions down his mouth.
Not only that, Jace had also used mild Frenzy and Hypnosis with the help of the Polymath Ring so as to make the Lawyer feel intense emotions, which would help Natalie when she advanced.
Several minutes later, Natalie completed revealing her grand conspiracy.
She turned around. "Jace," she called out.
Jace set the bottle of wine on the table and got up. He walked near Natalie and handed her 2 things.
One was the bottle of potion for Sequence 5 Reaper that he had brewed beforehand for her; the other was the 'lucky' stopwatch.
"Good luck," he said.
Natalie took both things in her hand. She looked at the stopwatch first. According to Jace, the thing actually made people lucky for a limited amount of time, which was quite bizarre.
Without wasting much time, she clicked the top-right button, turned on the watch, and kept it in her pocket.
She opened the bottle of potion and gulped it down in an instant.
She didn't need time to prepare, as she had been waiting for this moment for months now.
—
Jace stood there, watching as the process of Natalie's painful advancement passed.
It took only a few minutes for the whole thing to happen, likely because Natalie had digested her Sequence 6 potion well, and her ritual of bringing down the empire of a Mentor of Disorder was pretty well done as well.
And she also had the 'lucky' stopwatch with her, so it was bound to go well.
And it did.
—
Natalie, after her advancement, stood up from the ground, her breathing still heavy.
Her mind was now clearer than ever before.
Her physical capabilities had been enhanced significantly, though they were still not high enough to escape unscathed by a bullet.
She looked around. Everywhere, everything, and every person she looked at, she could find a weak point within them.
This was one of her new abilities, 'Weakness Investigation'.
With this, she could find a weak point in a building structure, people, attacks—nearly everything!
The other and most lethal ability she had gotten was the 'Cull'!
With this, Natalie could imbue any of her attacks with the power of 'Cull,' which would deal significant damage to anything, even demigods to a certain extent!
'Cull' worked quite well with 'Weakness Investigation,' as she could first find the weak point of something or someone and then attack them with 'Cull.'
The other ability she got was 'Precision'—well, it was more like an attribute than it was a ability, but it was a good one nonetheless.
With this, she could make sure that her attacks were applied exactly where she intended with extreme precision.
Other than that, her Pyromaniac powers were significantly enhanced. The precision of her fire ravens was now really better due to her new ability, 'Precision,' and her flames were now stronger and more destructive.
She could also use her full-body fire transformation for extended periods of time, as her spirituality was significantly higher now. In this form, she could travel hundreds of meters worth of distance in seconds!
She took the 'lucky' stopwatch from her pocket and stopped it. It seemed that she had only used 7 minutes of it; her advancement had been fast.
Natalie was now a sequence 5 Reaper!
Turning around, she looked at Jace, who stood there with a smile looking at her.
Natalie smiled as well and threw the watch at him.
"Thank you," she said.
—
2 days later.
Jace stood at the railings of a steam boat, looking at the increasing distance between the steam boat and Pritz Harbor.
The open wind of the sea was perhaps the freshest air he had breathed since coming to this world.
It was time.
His Faceless potion was digested, and now it was time to advance.
The plan was simple. Right now, this commercial traveling steam boat was going to Oravi Island, then to Bansy Harbor. Bansy Harbor was a messed-up place, but at this point (3-4 years before the plot), it should be fine.
Then, from Bansy Harbor, he would go to 'Bayam' or Rorsted Archipelago.
After Bayam, going to the mermaids would be tricky, as they were near 'the ruins of the battlefield of the gods'.
So he would definitely have to hire and manipulate a ship crew into traveling east of the Gargas Archipelago and stopping exactly at the periphery of the 'Sea of Ruins,' where mermaids could be found.
Going into the Sea of Ruins was not something Jace planned on; he would only become a Sequence 5 and return promptly, as that place was dangerous!
"Meow~"
Jace looked down to see a black cat near his feet, the cat looking a little scared, crouching on the ground.
It was Nyx. She jumped up, and Jace took her into his arms.
Yes, Nyx was joining him on his journey to advancement. She was really reluctant when she heard that she would be surrounded by worlds worth of water.
But Jace was very persuasive, so Nyx placated herself and prepared.
Jace was going to need her help in this endeavor.
—
9 days later, he reached Bayam.
Bayam was different than Backlund—the environment, the people, everything.
Jace found it pleasant enough, meanwhile Nyx was just glad to be on land again.
A few days later, Jace found a crew of 7 men with a ship. The captain was a Sequence 7 of the Sailor pathway.
At first, Jace directly asked that they take him to the edge of the 'Sea of Ruins' where mermaids were found.
And he was outright rejected—which was expected by him. So he gave them a price higher than before, which was more than generous, but he was rejected again with some reluctance.
So he just gave them the address of his inn in case they changed their minds and left.
Of course, this was where Nyx came in and planted small psychological cues and mild hypnosis over the crew over the next few days.
And the captain came knocking on Jace's door, agreeing to it.
Jace smiled and shook his head.
Mind you, Jace was wearing the face of an amicable middle-aged man who was also a researcher.
Since coming to Bayam, Jace had been hunting Beyonders of lower sequences whenever he could, so as to earn the money he was going to give the captain and the crew of the ship.
At first, it was his intention to just disappear after his advancement was done, but the ship captain and the crew were actually risking their lives here, so he decided to pay a generous fee to them.
—
Jace stood at the bow of the ship.
It was morning, and the sea was considerably calm.
He had also performed many divinations to decide when to sail, as the weather in the east was usually pretty volatile and extreme.
And he decided today was the time. The middle-aged captain agreed with him, so they set the sail and headed out to the east.
In a few days, he was going to be a Sequence 5.