"Bleurgh—"
Zhou Yuan gagged.
How was he even supposed to describe this smell?
It was like taking a dead rat that had rotted for ten thousand years, mixing it with a septic tank left to bake under the sun, then adding in the unwashed inner lining of a Death Guard suit of power armor, blending the whole thing into sludge, and finally stuffing it straight into his brain.
This wasn't mere physical stench.
It was spiritual contamination carved directly into the soul.
Even after spending a whole year on this cursed hive world eating radioactive wasteland and industrial heavy metals, Zhou Yuan had never once felt that eating could be this painful.
"Great Sage..." Zhou Yuan asked in a trembling voice, "this thing... can I really eat it?"
[Answer: Analysis confirms that this energy is highly concentrated Warp essence. Although it is extremely toxic, for a host possessing the Devour All Things trait, it is premium-quality nourishment.]
[Not only is it edible, it can also provide an enormous amount of experience. Recommendation: consume it as soon as possible while it is still warm. The texture may worsen once it cools.]
"How is this any different from eating shit?! Can I refuse?!"
[Host, please correct your understanding. Slimes do not possess taste or smell in the conventional sense. Your discomfort is purely the result of your human soul being overly delicate. Besides, surely you do not wish to end up in the coming Plague Wars as one of those pus-dripping idiots smiling and shouting about how wonderful Grandfather is?]
"...Easy for you to say when you're not the one eating it!"
Zhou Yuan fell silent for a moment.
But reason told him that, irritating as this damned system was, its logic was sound.
In this cesspit of a Warhammer universe, strength was everything.
If you did not grow stronger, then you got mutated.
Staring at that faintly writhing green cluster of light in front of him—a thing that radiated both deadly temptation in the form of experience points and deadly nausea in the form of everything else—Zhou Yuan grit his teeth.
"Fuck it. I'm doing this!"
"The spirit of Lao Ba lives on! Ollie give! Down the hatch! I'm eating it, eating it, eating it!"
Having made up his mind, Zhou Yuan abruptly lashed out with his tendrils, wrapped that sliver of Nurgle energy up tight, and—
downed it in one gulp.
Boom!
The moment the energy entered his body, an indescribable shock swept through him.
It was more than nausea.
It felt like countless flies buzzing madly inside his soul, like endless swollen abscesses bursting open inside his consciousness.
"OOOHHHHH!"
Zhou Yuan's true body convulsed violently, and outside, Claire started trembling just as fiercely, as though she had been plugged into an electric current.
"Claire?! Brother Yuan?!"
Standing at the bedside, Will turned pale with fright. He stood there helplessly, wanting to hold his sister down but terrified of interfering with Zhou Yuan's treatment.
Fortunately, the instant Zhou Yuan fully swallowed that cluster of energy, the eerie green glow went out.
Claire, who had been spasming a moment ago, suddenly went still and fell completely unconscious.
And inside her body, a war belonging to a slime had only just ended.
A moment later, the overwhelming wave of revulsion finally began to recede, replaced by a strange... sense of fullness.
"Great Sage..." Zhou Yuan said weakly.
He was as limp as a puddle of sludge. Digesting even that tiny bit of Chaos energy and resisting the venomous corruption hidden within it had consumed an enormous amount of his mana and mental strength.
"Urgh... didn't you say... urgh... I don't have taste? Then why... urgh... do I still want to throw up?!"
[Because Chaos energy acts directly upon the soul. This discomfort is a rejection response at the spiritual level. Put simply, your soul's cleanliness obsession is acting up. But that is fine. Do it a few more times and you will get used to it. Humanity's adaptability is limitless.]
"You mother—!"
Zhou Yuan offered Great Sage an extremely heartfelt greeting, one with a very high maternal content.
"Urgh... I swear! Urgh... even if I die, even if I jump from here, I absolutely... urgh... will never eat this kind of hell-spawned filth again!"
[Before establishing another dramatic flag, I recommend first checking your status panel.]
With perfect calm, Great Sage projected a translucent screen before him.
Fighting down the urge to vomit, Zhou Yuan narrowed his eyes and glanced at it.
That single glance nearly made his nonexistent jaw hit the floor.
[Level: LV.36 -> LV.51]
[Skills Gained: Toxin Resistance LV.6 -> LV.15, Life Restoration Aura]
"What the hell?!"
In an instant, Zhou Yuan stopped retching. In fact, he suddenly felt a little invigorated.
"Fifteen levels?! That tiny speck of energy made me jump fifteen whole levels?!"
He had spent an entire year here eating garbage and ore just to reach level 36.
And now this one mouthful of shit was worth a full year of bitter grinding!
[As I said, it was an extremely nutritious mouthful of quality nourishment. So then, host—does your oath from just now still stand?]
"..."
Zhou Yuan fell silent.
He stared at that dazzling LV.51, then recalled the hellish sensation from a moment ago.
After a long pause, he spoke in his mind with complete seriousness.
"When you really think about it... the taste was a bit aggressive, sure—but the kick... damn, it was strong. Great Sage, next time there's something this good, make sure you call me early."
[...The law of "famous last words" remains undefeated.]
"Brother Yuan? How is she? My sister..."
Seeing Zhou Yuan lie motionless and Claire on the bed equally still, as though dead, Will's heart rose straight into his throat.
"Relax. I just ate something unclean and got a bit queasy."
Zhou Yuan's muffled voice came from inside Claire's body.
"The thing most responsible for poisoning your sister has already been digested. Now we move on to phase two—system reinstallation."
"Re... installation?"
"You can think of it as replacing a few of your sister's parts."
As Zhou Yuan spoke, he began drawing upon the mana brought by his explosive increase in level.
"Will, you don't mind, do you?"
"Not at all! Of course I don't!"
Will shook his head repeatedly. By now, he understood that reconstruction meant strength, and strength meant the power to protect oneself.
Soon, a gentle blue glow began flowing beneath Claire's skin.
It was a network of pure magical circuitry.
If Will was walking the path of a hulking Astartes-type bruiser, then Claire—with her latent psychic aptitude—was born to become a mage.
Zhou Yuan not only repaired her failing organs, but also implanted large numbers of slime cells saturated with high-density mana into her body.
In this world, where mana did not naturally exist, Claire would become Zhou Yuan's first mana terminal.
Put simply, a battery-powered mage.
Once Zhou Yuan's own mana and mental strength grew sufficient in the future, he intended to try turning Claire into a being capable of generating mana on her own.
Several minutes later, that mass of blue jelly flowed smoothly back out of Claire's mouth and re-formed atop the bedside into a springy little blob.
"Hah... all done."
Zhou Yuan bounced once or twice, feeling somewhat tired.
Will leaned in for a closer look, puzzled.
"Brother Yuan... Claire... she doesn't seem... bulkier?"
He still remembered how his own reconstruction had ended with muscles bursting through his clothes. Why did his sister still look so thin and frail?
"What are you even thinking?" Zhou Yuan said with disdain. "Why would a girl build muscle? That's the sort of thing brutes like you do. Claire is taking the archmage route."
"Oh... oh!"
Will scratched his head, clearly not understanding much, yet somehow feeling that it sounded extremely impressive.
-------
My : pat*eon*com/RuneA
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