Maria played around with the vial for a bit before opening it and releasing the disgusting, yet familiar aura that Elizabeth completely detested wafted into the air.
“...Your Highness.”
Maria saw Elizabeth’s repulsed reaction and giggled, “I see that you really hate this thing.”
“It’s only natural…Your Highness.”
Elizabeth was clearly displaying a lot of hostility towards Maria, or rather, the vial that she was holding.
“Watch closely.”
Maria did something that was pretty much unbelievable to Elizabeth. She opened her mouth and downed the contents of the vial, which were Garm’s Essence.
“Your Highness!” Elizabeth exclaimed in shock.
“Don’t worry, it should start kicking in soon,” Maria said with a smile.
Garm’s Essence certainly wasn’t obedient, as it was still sentient even after it had been destroyed by Maria. It struggled as it entered Maria’s body, which was something she hadn’t been expecting at all. Usually, whenever she consumed something like this, it would just disappear into her body before she’d be assaulted by pain and gain a tremendous boost in power. This time, it was different.
“Hm?”
The Essence continued to struggle for a moment until suddenly, Maria’s [Metamorphosis] activated on its own. The Seven Deadly Sins’ Essence, which was devoured by her and merged into a unity inside of Maria despite being in 7 different parts, began to move towards Garm’s Essence and started devouring it. Maria could feel it happening inside of her, which was a little surprising, but the notification window that she received the next moment was a first for her.
*DING*
The [Seven Deadly Sins] have devoured [Garm’s Essence]
STR +50
AGI +50
VIT +100
INT +50
Your Soul Weapon has gained the form: Evil Blade Gram
“...This is new.”
Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more.
She was expecting the usual pain to assault her body but all she felt earlier was a little bit of discomfort from Garm’s Essence resisting her before feeling a pleasant sensation from her Sins devouring the resisting essence.
“Does this mean that all of the future essence items I eat will be devoured by the Sins and I’ll only gain a small bit of power?”
This was certainly troubling, since now, all future essence-type items she obtained would only boost her stats by a small increment as opposed to the usual major increase she received before.
“Oh well, all good things will have to end eventually. Besides, it’s not like I’m not gaining anything from them anymore,” Maria mumbled.
The increase in her stats was still significant as they amounted to a few levels in total. It wasn’t as large of a jump as before, but at least it was still something. She turned off her [Metamorphosis] and reverted to her normal form. Elizabeth noticed that the foul ‘stench’ she had detected earlier had disappeared and asked, “Your Highness, did you…devour Garm?”
Maria turned to her and nodded, “I did. Now he’s completely gone and you don’t have anything you need to worry about anymore.”
“...Your Highness…”
“The only thing you have to worry about now is your performance as you serve me in the future. Please don’t make me disappointed. I have high expectations of you since you’re Ash’s wife. He’s my first subordinate and I’ve relied on him greatly, so I hope you can do a good job and support him~”
“Yes!”
Maria didn’t know how, but she could see that earlier and, throughout the day, Elizabeth was still worried that somehow, Garm was still alive. She had his essence tucked away in her [Inventory] but Elizabeth could still sense him. The item she had in her [Inventory] was the only thing that was left of Garm after she had destroyed him, so she commended Elizabeth for still being wary.
Elizabeth had been feeling this way because she had constantly been around Maria, who possessed her enemy’s essence. Now that Maria had shown it to her, she realized that the evil spirit was still alive. However, the moment Maria devoured Garm’s Essence, the awful feeling that had been tugging at her mind and body thoroughly disappeared. As of that moment, she was completely free from Garm, who had been controlling her for the past few centuries.
This sense of relief was a bit overwhelming and Elizabeth could only smile. In her eyes right now, the person she was serving seemed to be glowing with a splendid light.
“Your Highness, shall we head back? It’s getting late.”
“Yeah, let’s go. I want to see something about the castle anyway.”
The two of them returned to the castle and Maria quickly entered the castle’s Ancient Blood Hall. The hall which had been previously destroyed had returned to its grand and pristine condition before the epic battle between Maria and the evil spirit-possessed Elizabeth happened.
“Okay, let’s get down to business. The system notification said that I needed to enter the Ancient Blood Hall in order to customize my dungeon, so let’s see what this is all about!”
Maria opened her system [Menu] and opened the [Dungeon] tab that had just been generated. This tab had only appeared after she conquered Castle Bran and made it into her territory using her subclass’s authorization.
“Oh yeah, speaking about subclass, didn’t I get that subclass advancement book?”
She quickly opened up her inventory and searched for the item.
“Ah, here it is!”
Maria took it out and held the [Subclass Advancement Book: Blood Empress] in her hands. It wasn’t different from the Blood Lord or Blood Queen title she was expecting. She thought that as long as she declared herself as ruler over the continent, she’d obtained some kind of title, but to think it was a class was beyond her imagination.
“It’s not Blood Lord or Blood Queen, but Blood Empress instead. Judging from the name, it’s probably a better class!”
She quickly tapped the book on herself and a notification window appeared.
*DING*
Would you like to advance your Subclass: [Queen] into the Advanced Subclass: [Blood Empress]? Y/N
This system prompt's answer was a no-brainer as Maria quickly tapped on the [Yes] button as she said, “Yes sa~”