Just outside the suburbs of New York, Dio had locked himself inside a room. He didn’t know what happened to the universe right now as the only thing in his mind right now was evolving his current Stand. He had the Stand Arrow with him now, but he hesitated which he could evolve.
In theory, all Stand had the potential to evolve, and the chance of evolution varied between the Stands. It all depended on their potential after the evolution. Meaning, the stronger the evolution was, the harder it was to evolve!
It has been quite a while since Dio came to this world, and he already used 2 Stand Arrows in total. He used his first arrow during his experiment on [Gold Experience] and helped his snail to have its own Stand. The second one he used on [Galaxy] went a lot smoother than the snail as the Pegasus was more compatible with having a Stand.
Now Dio had two Stand Arrows that he could use, but he didn’t know whether he should use them to increase his pet army or evolve his own Stand. After all, the Earth has become somewhat more dangerous thanks to the Demons, Aliens, and Dark Dimension that wanted to take the Earth for themselves.
When he thought about the risk, Dio thought about giving up the idea to evolve his Stand as the risk of failure would render him incapable of saving the Earth when the time came. However, after giving it a long thought, Dio decided to give it a go! Otherwise, he wouldn’t have the power to save the Earth in the future!
The determined Dio immediately summoned [The World]. When it came to evolving his Stand, his first choice was definitely [The World]! Dio looked at [The World]’s condescending expression and felt a surge of confidence that he would succeed! Without hesitating any further thought, Dio stabbed [The World] with the Stand Arrow!
Dio immediately felt an intense pain in his leg, where he stabbed [The World] earlier. He felt a weird numbing sensation crawling up on his body as the Stand Arrow on [The World]’s leg melted inside its body. Dio suddenly felt something strange and found that his soul was leaving his body, like the spiritual body that Stephen has experienced so many times before.
Dio frowned and immediately tried to enter his body. He didn’t have any intention to leave his body as he knew that the evolution has to be experienced firsthand as it was happening. Although he knew that it was risky from the beginning, he had to calm down and ride the flow!
But suddenly, Dio felt an extreme suction of souls towards his own soul. He realized that evolving a Stand would be dangerous to his surroundings, which was why he chose such an isolated area. He realised now that every living being’s soul around him was forcefully sucked into his, strengthening it to a degree. Dio frowned as he didn’t expect the requirement for the [The World] to evolve was souls!
But it didn’t matter now, as there was no one around here to become the sacrifice of [The World]’s evolution. But after swallowing every living being’s soul in one kilometre radius, [The World] still seemed unsatisfied! The absorption rate suddenly increased, and the power was doubled this time!
Dio’s soul was the first thing being affected this time as he felt that his soul was slowly getting absorbed inside [The World]. Dio knew that he wouldn’t be unscathed just because he was the user, so he had planned for such a thing to happen.
Dio has long tempered his Mental Fortitude. Coupled with the Hamon Energy he used to wedge his soul into his body, the soul wasn’t absorbed that easily! However, the souls of other living beings within 5 kilometres area were sucked into [The World]!
Dio recalled the Stand Evolution in JoJo’s universe. He remembered that Polnareff died shortly after [Silver Chariot] was stabbed with Stand Arrow, making [Chariot Requiem] went berserk due to the absence of master! It was one of the most prominent evolution failures that he remembered, as [Chariot Requiem] that directly controlled souls wreak havoc everywhere he went while protecting the Stand Arrow as his master’s final wish.
Dio knew that he couldn’t let that happen at all cost!
Because of that thought, Dio knew that he had to try his best to survive the evolution no matter what happened. Nevertheless, he didn’t know that the most difficult test to evolve the Stand came from the Stand itself!
Beyond 3 kilometres from Dio’s secluded place is a cemetery. At the same time, many souls from the cemetery were absorbed into [The World]! While no one really knew just how many souls [The World] has absorbed, [The World] has started to shine as faint light envelopes its body.
Several seconds have passed, and the white light finally dissipated, revealing evolved [The World]! The evolution was a success, and [The World]’s appearance has changed!
“Is this a success?” Dio wondered as he didn’t know for sure yet.
From his perspective, [The World] didn’t really change, which made Dio frowned. He immediately used his user interface in the game system to find the [World] card. He was shocked the moment he checked the description on the card.
Not only did [The World] successfully evolve, it also exceeded his expectation!