Leon stood up and rinsed his hand off with some water. It wasn’t actually dirty, but it did make him feel better after touching the panther’s half-rotting lung. Speaking of, Leon spared the body a glance, its mummified corpse as disturbing as he imagined it would be. Its form had turned into a chalky white mummy, reminding him of his time fleeing the city.

That was exactly how the birds fed on their prey.

His stomach roiling, Leon took a deep breath. He needed all the power he could get. This was just another sacrifice he had to make in order to keep those he cared about alive, and as far as sacrifices went, his own comfort was a rather small one to make. Leon seared the image into his mind. The beast’s fur had fallen out, its skin like chalk. Its muscles were dried out and its bones had become brittle, some of them even turning to dust as the wind picked up.

Now its power was his own.

Leon swallowed and turned back to the girls, surprised to find them both shivering with excitement.

Sophia jumped up and down, her age showing. “Ooh, how about World Devourer! Or why don’t you call it Bloodthirst!”

“Bloodthirst sounds pretty cool.” Claire nodded her head, looking appreciative of the name.

Leon smiled. “I was just going to call it Consume or Devour, but I appreciate your enthusiasm.”

“Bloodthirst!”

“World Devouring Claw of Endless Hunger!”

“That’s the end of this conversation. I’m going to Devour the squirrel corpses… No, that sounds like I’m about to eat them. I’m going to Consume the squirrels… Whatever, I’ll be right back.”

Leon walked over to the pile of squirrel corpses and pondered on how to do this. He recalled what happened earlier and decided to start with the aura again. It was clinging to the bodies in a haze, allowing him to absorb it all without physically touching any of them. He focused on the stream of power as it was dragged up his arm. The haze merged into his blood, his muscles and organs somehow absorbing the aura and growing stronger for it.

Opening up his status, Leon checked the numbers. They had gone up again from when he Devoured the panther. He then moved to Devour the rest of the squirrels, turning them into piles of chalk by absorbing their blood. He once again focused on what was happening in his arm.

Blood flowed in and broke down, turning into motes of something. The tiny flakes moved through his circulatory system before disappearing into his heart, his blood slowly becoming enriched over the next minute or two. Checking again, he found that his stats didn’t change from absorbing physical blood, which was odd since he could feel his body becoming stronger with each passing second.

Leon frowned.

Flexing his hand, it was blatantly obvious that his body had been improved by both the aura and blood, but for some reason it was only the aura that increased his stats. Leon pondered on the changes and realised that when he absorbed the aura, his muscles felt stronger. It was almost as if they were being infused with more strength directly, meaning the aura was enhancing his body in the same way that lifting weights or running would.

There was a limit to that kind of growth. Eventually, the aura would stop doing anything as his body reached its natural ceiling. No matter how hard a person worked, they would never be stronger than a random gorilla, and that was after factoring in the weight difference. It was just a fact that at the same weight and muscle mass, a lot of animals could output far more strength than a human. Most of them had evolved for short bursts of strength while humans went the endurance route, hunting down prey by chasing after them for days in hopes of tiring it out.

But what if that ceiling could be raised?

What if he could use the blood to directly refine and elevate the very foundations of his body, allowing him to grow more than any other human possibly could?

Leon would discuss his findings over dinner, but he expected nothing to change. He would Devour the blood and aura from whatever he killed until he found a reason to do things differently. They were both making him stronger after all, so why change anything?

Status

Name: Leon Hartwell

Stage: Middle Foundation Forging

Race: [Mortal] Human

Level: 8

Titles: First Step, Prodigy III, Inspired III, Executioner IV, Refined, Disciple of Fire, Ascended.

Mind: 4.15

Body: 4.53

Spirit: 3.58

Skills

Qi Bullet (R), True Sight (Un), Flame Control, Palm Strike (R), Strengthen (R).

His Mind and Spirit stats had grown quite a bit from his hours of daily training, which had left his Body stat to stagnate, not even breaking four points until he consumed the panther’s corpse. Now his Body stat had skyrocketed, his Mind and Spirit barely receiving any benefits from when he used Devour. If he could continue feeding then he would be able to increase his strength tremendously more than his other stats, which would likely save his life when push came to shove.

Just travelling through the blood forest would raise his Body stat. He was excited to see what happened when it overtook his other two stats, wondering if it would be good or bad for him. At the very least, he hoped that it would enlighten him on the key differences between blood and natural aura.

Feeling his stomach grumble from suddenly growing so much, Leon hopped up and assisted Sophia to hopefully speed things along.

***

The next few days were largely the same. Leon trained as much as he could, pushing his cultivation and attempting the puzzle while he peppered in some alchemy. He managed to increase the latest batch to twelve percent refinement, but that also spelled the end of his Bloodroot berry supply. He would have to find some more if he wanted to continue practising.

At least they each had a full 600ml water bottle of healing elixir in case they got separated for whatever reason.

Leon had also diluted Sophia’s bottle, reducing its kick and making it easier to consume. She seemed to appreciate the attention. More than Claire, at least. The older sister had made it her mission to beat him in something, even going so far as to receive cooking lessons from Sophia.

Leon wasn’t even that great of a cook. The problem, however, was that he was better than her at most everything. It seemed she just wanted to not be left behind, especially when her sister was blazing through the ranks. It took her less than a week to refine her brain and nerves, and thanks to the puzzle training, she finished her senses the day before Claire broke into the Bone Forging stage.

Leon was curious about what would happen to a genius when their brain was enhanced by Qi. When she finished Brain Forging, he realised that not much had changed. She was still the same person, only a little sharper. The biggest problem had been breaking into Foundation Forging in the first place.

Cleansing all those impurities had been gross, the smell lingering around the area for days. Claire had even teased her about it like a true sister, telling Sophia that the impurities would cling to her skin and make her smell bad forever.

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Of course, all of those things were minor details compared to her progress with the Puzzle. It took Claire seven days to solve the first layer while Leon managed it in five. Sophia, without a single skill and no practice manipulating Qi, finished it in three. Leon and Claire were both shocked despite knowing she was an extremely intelligent child, and then their shock redoubled when she broke through the fourth layer and earned not one, but two titles for her trouble.

[Ascended II: Go beyond the limits of man. +2% to all stats.]

[Erudite: Evolve two or more aspects of the mind. +5% to Mind.]

“You’re incredible, Sophia,” Leon said, turning to Claire. “You’ve been so concerned about me that you didn’t even consider your sister a threat.”

Claire rolled her eyes, pulling Sophia into her lap as she wrapped her in a tight hug. “I already knew not to compete with my favourite little smartie pants. That battle was lost the day she started teaching her Barbie dolls algebra.”

“I told you to stop telling people that!” Sophia blushed, trying to push her sister away.

“And I told you that I will always work hard to keep you humble!” Claire said, making Sophia giggle as she showered her with kisses.

Motivated by his complete defeat, Leon buckled down and repeatedly attempted the puzzle until it became too much for his tiny brain. His head throbbed and his spirit ached to the point that he was forced to take a quick nap. When he awoke, Leon was sore enough that he absorbed some blood aura to expedite his healing. It wasn’t anywhere near as effective compared to the Bloodroot Extract or even the life essence he received from killing something, but it did have a rather unique property. Drawing blood aura into his spirit helped it to recover faster, something only the life essence could do before now.

Claire went over to a neighbouring pocket world and captured a squirrel for dinner. They didn’t need it but she seemed to hate those little bastards, her eyes lighting up whenever she came back with a fresh kill.

Then again, Leon probably would too if they attacked his beloved little sister. It was a shame that he didn’t have one of those.

Finally, his two weeks of daily attempts were all worth it when he gained the Erudite title himself, the Ascended title also upgrading from his second evolution.

[Ascended II: Go beyond the limits of man. +2% to all stats.]

[Erudite: Evolve two or more aspects of the mind. +5% to Mind.]

Feeling good, Leon turned to challenge the puzzle when he saw Sophia already there. She was doing the same puzzle and would likely overtake him come tomorrow. Now, however, Leon could likely solve the puzzle before the end of the day. He was so used to manipulating five strings that his latest evolution had all but guaranteed his victory.

Sitting down on his sleeping bag to cultivate, Leon continued his work on the last bone in his body. He was halfway finished refining his skull. By the time they were eating dinner, he would’ve broken out of the Bone Forging stage and moved on to the next, roughly meeting his two week estimation.

Leon continued his work until he heard a deep clunk followed by a yelp.

Hopping up, he found a hole in the floor where Sophia had been sitting and doing the puzzle. He peered down to find her in a small room. She looked up at him and Claire while rubbing her backside, groaning about how she had landed on her tailbone.

“You okay?” Claire said, quietly amused. “You want us to pull you out?”

“No, there’s some cool stuff down here. It looks super messy though.”

Leon glanced over at Claire and shrugged. He helped her down and followed soon after, clinging onto the edge of the hole before dropping down about half a metre. The room was like the house above, only it hadn’t decayed and been left to rot. Enclosed, the floorboards were a varnished pale gold rather than the white above them.

While the rest of the room was well maintained, the items strewn about spoke another story. There was a knocked-over bookshelf with the accompanying books all over the floor, a rack of weapons with all of its sharp objects scattered everywhere, and three crystals that had been knocked off a high shelf.

Leon didn’t know what to make of things before Sophia gasped and crouched down beside a desk. Leon and Claire followed, kneeling beside her and only seeing darkness. When he looked closer, he almost jumped when something stared back at him. The pitch black panther cub looked at each of them curiously. It was totally relaxed, even yawning as it woke up from a nap.

They all moved back, giving the little beast some space.

What were they supposed to do now? It was an incredibly dangerous animal, especially if this thing was also going to grow up into a car-sized murder cat. Thinking of the potential threat it could pose and the number of people it could slaughter, Leon began to wonder if they should leave it trapped in this pocket world or put it out of its misery. They would really be doing it a favour at that point.

A cub without a parent would probably die from starvation, and that was if it was lucky enough not to get eaten alive by some other creature of the forest.

Leon was about to ask Claire if she would do it a kindness and put it out of its misery when the panther walked over to him, nuzzling his arm with its soft fur. The little beast purred so hard that it tickled his hand, and when it looked up at him, its eyes big and round and sad because of how hungry it was after being trapped in the room for over two weeks, Leon felt his heart ache.

“Meow?”

“Any ideas on a name?” Leon said, glancing over at Claire and Sophia as he scratched the cub behind its ear. “Ah, how stupid of me. We should check if it’s a girl or a boy first. Then again, Captain Fuzzy Pants is gender neutral, isn’t it?”

***

It was a dark day. Not only was Captain Fuzzy Pants vetoed by order of democratic vote, but Leon was also banned from submitting any new name suggestions after he put forth Panther McPantherFace. Ridiculous! He had even suggested the names Red and Chilli because of the wine-coloured fur he would eventually grow into, and what did they do? They laughed in his face! In the end, the panther seemed to think of Sophia as its parent. It acted very differently with her, choosing to sleep in her lap while it outright refused to sleep with Leon or Claire.

Maybe it was smelling its parent on Sophia after she had butchered it for dinner?

Since he was a boy, Sophia had decided to name him Peter… Peter the Panther. How they had criticised his naming sense, he had no idea. Thankfully, there was a massive haul of cool stuff to distract him from the outrage. Leaving Sophia to care for the sickly panther cub, Claire and Leon cleaned up the room. They put the bookshelf in its original place, moved the crystals back onto the high shelf, and hung the weapons on the rack.

There was only space for three weapons on the rack, the others simply left in a pile in the corner. None of them had any kind of varnish on the wood or wraps over the handles. They looked like failures by an amateur craftsman, and that included another pile of failed armour. Cracked chest plates without straps, snapped leg guards, warped gauntlets, and so on.

Leon ignored the two piles in favour of the most incredible item in the room by far. It was a deep purple bow, the item made of some ethereal purple wood. There was a quiver with ten arrows in it, but when Leon pulled one out he found that the arrow tips were very strange. It was like a normal arrowhead, only its tip was missing and its centre was hollowed out, leaving four separate plates of metal around the outside.

It was almost like it was designed to grip onto special arrowheads that the user slotted in depending on the target, but no matter where they looked, there was nothing of the sort to be found. Leon checked around the room once more before he moved over to the bookshelf. He was interested if any of it was readable, but when he opened up the book and found it an illegible mess of scribbles, he tossed it back onto the shelf. Not even True Sight could decipher the writing.

Claire called him over soon after.

There was a strange hollow shape in the wooden wall, and considering how every wall had something pressed against it, the gap looked even stranger. Claire pressed her hand on it, and a moment later her eyes went vacant as her Qi began to pour into the new puzzle.

Leon sighed, realising that his days of suffering to solve a damn puzzle were not over yet.