c11 – Speedy Regeneration!
"Sheep."
Lightning coiled around his colossal form, crackling fiercely. With every swing of the Raijin Whip, arcs of thunder surged outward. Each strike cleaved through a towering Gillian-class Menos. Since evolving into a Menos Grande, Ye Chuan's mastery of Flash Thunder had advanced dramatically, merging brute force with finesse.
"Boom!"
The Raijin Whip, infused with lethal voltage and terrifying reach, slashed a massive, worm-like Hollow clean in half at the torso. In the same motion, Ye Chuan's segmented tail pierced forward, activating his unique ability Ghoul Soul Devour.
"This ghoul ability really suits my taste…"
With each kill, he absorbed fragments of his enemy's Reiryoku. It was not merely consumption it was assimilation. As a result, his spiritual pressure surged, steadily climbing with every vanquished opponent.
Though locked in continuous combat, Ye Chuan showed no fatigue. On the contrary with every blow, every devouring, he seemed to grow more ferocious, an unstoppable reaper in a battlefield of shadows. A storm-wreathed monster born for slaughter.
Every flick of the thunder whip felled another Gillian.
He had just crushed a gorilla-like Menos when three more Gillians launched a surprise assault from behind, roaring and reaching out to dismember him.
But before their claws could land, Ye Chuan's figure vanished with a Sonído, reappearing a hundred feet away in a resounding hum of displacement.
After absorbing the gorilla Hollow's spiritual energy, Ye Chuan turned to face the three attackers. Beneath the pallid mask, a sinister smile curved his lips.
"Relax. You'll get your turn."
Having witnessed Ye Chuan's blood-soaked rampage, the remaining Gillians had all begun converging on him. But it was futile. Now, for Ye Chuan, killing Gillians beings once equal to himself was no more difficult than breaking twigs beneath his feet.
Before long, only one opponent remained: a Gillian resembling an indigo-scaled lizard. Its spiritual pressure was visibly weaker likely newly evolved into the Menos Grande class. Both in size and aura, it paled compared to its fallen brethren. Ye Chuan intentionally saved it for last.
The lizard Hollow trembled, despite its primal instincts. Its basic intelligence could still feel the suffocating terror emanating from Ye Chuan the aura of a true predator.
Ye Chuan didn't bother with words. With a flick, the thunder whip lashed forward.
"Bang!"
The strike landed with a vicious snap, shearing off half the Hollow's massive body. But just as Ye Chuan prepared to consume it with Ghoul Soul, something unexpected occurred.
The ruined half of the lizard began to squirm sprouting dense granulated flesh at an incredible pace. In mere seconds, its body regenerated and reassembled itself, albeit slightly smaller and with diminished Reiryoku.
Seeing this, Ye Chuan's indifferent expression cracked into astonishment then unrestrained excitement.
"This is… High-Speed Regeneration!"
"Hahaha!!"
"It's like finding a Hōgyoku in a junk pile!"
His manic laughter echoed through the vast forest of Menos.
Without hesitation, his tail wrapped around the lizard Hollow, pinning it tightly. This time, he didn't use Ghoul Soul to merely feed. He activated its once-per-target ability: Skill Seizure.
From the first moment he discovered the Ghoul Soul's ability to steal traits, Ye Chuan had dreamt of acquiring this overpowered Hollow-exclusive skill High-Speed Regeneration. He originally assumed he wouldn't encounter such a rarity until reaching the Adjuchas level or even closer to Vasto Lorde. But here it was mere days into the Forest of Menos.
"You're a damn gold mine," he muttered.
Coiling tighter with his centipede-like tail, he blasted the Hollow's core with lightning, paralyzing it, then forced his segmented tail into its gaping jaws. The Ghoul Soul activated, its eerie glow pulsing.
Not out of fetish or cruelty this was ritual. The Ghoul Soul's Skill Seizure required contact with the spiritual nucleus of the target. In this case, devouring from the inside was a necessity.
"Urghhh—!"
The lizard Hollow trembled violently, limbs spasming. Something within it was forcefully stripped away the cornerstone of its mutation. As the ability transferred, a bright flash burst outward. The Hollow's form began collapsing in on itself.
Its mass shrunk. Its spiritual pressure diminished. Soon, the once-towering lizard Hollow had been reduced to a four-meter-tall creature no longer a Gillian, but a weak Stray Hollow with its evolution forcibly reversed.
"Did it just… devolve?" Ye Chuan blinked, stunned.
He raised his right hand. A golden bolt flickered between his index and middle fingers. He slashed across his left wrist, drawing bright red blood. But within seconds, pale flesh writhed, and the wound sealed shut, leaving only drying blood as evidence.
"High-Speed Regeneration. It's real. I've got it!"
His laughter returned, even louder than before.
In the brutal world of Hollows, the ability to rapidly regenerate was a divine gift. Especially in the Hueco Mundo, where every encounter could be lethal. This was the very reason most Adjuchas avoided group battles the risk of injury and stagnation was too great. But Ye Chuan now held a card that even many Vasto Lordes didn't possess.
If his body were ever damaged during his future ascension to Adjuchas a process that demanded perfect spiritual cohesion he wouldn't risk evolution failure. Not anymore. High-Speed Regeneration gave him security.
Ye Chuan looked down at the now-pathetic Hollow trembling before him. Once a mighty Gillian, now a pitiful fragment of its former self.
He raised his tail again. This time, there was no Skill Seizure. Only feeding.
With a final surge of lightning and spiritual suction, he devoured the weakened Hollow whole.
"It's not that I wanted to eat you," Ye Chuan said casually, licking blood from his lips. "But you've lost your edge. A powerless Hollow can't survive in this forest. Better to become fuel for my future."
"And besides… you gifted me an incredible ability. Think of it as a noble end."
He sighed with mock sorrow.
"Sigh… I'm far too compassionate. It's my only flaw."
Thus concluded Ye Chuan's arrival in the Forest of Menos. In one battle, he had slain nineteen Gillians. Well eighteen, counting the lizard's regression.
Through the aftermath, Ye Chuan's spiritual pressure had risen by over 10%. More importantly, he had acquired one of the most coveted Hollow powers in existence.
"Only 10% from eighteen Gillians? Hmph… how do I now compare to that freakish aberrant Gillian I saw before?"
No matter how far he climbed, Ye Chuan always returned to that encounter. The aberrant Gillian who had mastered Cero and Sonído techniques thought beyond reach for regular Menos had left an indelible impression.
It was that anomaly who had planted the seeds of obsession and ambition in Ye Chuan.
And now, he was catching up.
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