While Karl answered mundane questions about his mental state for the doctors, Rae was hard at work with her advancement.
She had finished her exfoliation routine, and she had the perfect blend of blood in the bath for her upcoming advancement. She wasn’t entirely certain what sort of skills it would give her when she did become a proper queen, but she had high hopes for this blend with the little bit of Totem Rank blood that she had managed to acquire.
It was only a few drops, but it contained ridiculously potent healing abilities, and it was two full Ranks over her.
She settled into the pool and began the work of pulling all the energy out of the blood. The process was simple for a Bloodbath Spider, and instinctive. You just absorbed all the energy from the bath, and then you found out if your body adapted to it well enough to break through the bottleneck and if you learned any new skills.
The Cyclops species might have an innate skill that she hadn’t gotten to see during their battles, as they were almost all crazed by the spawn, but Karl’s blood definitely had some special properties, as did the Emperor’s blood.
She could feel the energy from Karl and the Newbon Emperor, mixed in with the Monarch Rank cyclops blood, revitalizing her, while the blood from the two creatures that could regenerate also strengthened her resistances.
The Emperor’s blood worked on her elemental resistance, as Trolls were immune to all but fire, where Karl had Limited Invulnerability as part of his core skill set, and the [Iron Within] skill that made his blood into living liquid metal and improved his already impressive invulnerability.
It was the perfect time for her advancement, Rae decided. She had gotten to have fun for most of the night, then a good nap, and now she got to skip all the boring stuff before the trainees showed up.
Rae briefly wondered how fast a baby Rogue would improve their Shadow Step if a giant spider was actually trying to eat them.
Just a little bite would do it, and then the clerics could heal her after, but it would add all the motivation in the world. Even if she did have to chase her down every day to continue the training.
Her mind wandered to many similarly pleasant things as she bathed, and then Rae noticed that there was another source of energy that nobody had bothered to remind her of. That sword and the ghost tree stick both had lots of energy in them, but they were stored separately, and she couldn’t reach them from the bath.
It was unfortunate, but she would remember them for next time. More energy was always a good thing, and who knew how hard it was going to be to get a proper bath for her next few advancements.
Today’s bath was particularly refreshing, Rae realized. The energy just seemed to keep coming as Karl refreshed the energy in her space, and the combination of Karl’s and Emperor Troll’s blood regenerated the damage she was doing in the process of remaking her body as she filtered an entire bath’s worth of blood.
It was like having an energy drink that just didn’t run empty.
She carefully stirred her bath and rolled over to refresh the coating on her back, then floated with her legs up for a few minutes as she enjoyed the influx of energy.
Rae was gaining the faintest hint of a new skill, and though it was going to take some effort to focus on it, she knew that when she got it right, it would be beautiful. Everything that a spider could hope for.
Karl was nearly finished with his interview with the psychology team when Rae finally got it right.
She had invented the most incredible combination of skills with Karl’s [Skill Merger] ability. Ghost Beast had combined with Iron Within and Shadow Step to make a new stealth ability for Rae.
[Night Haunter] Ignores physical damage in spectral form. Allows movement to any point that can be seen or touched with the incorporeal body. Invisible to optical vision. Regenerates life while in spectral form.
But the skill wasn’t the only benefit. Her body was rapidly growing more powerful. The advanced abilities of the blood she was ingesting were remaking her in a much more drastic fashion than her previous advancement, though Rae could see that she still looked like herself.
Her outer shell now would be nearly impervious to attack, thanks to Karl and the Emperor, and her physical strength was off the charts.
If she wanted to, she could now leap over a hundred metres to get into combat faster or take her prey by surprise. From that distance, most of them wouldn’t even know that she was waiting for them until she was already on top of them. frёeωebɳovel.com
But that wasn’t all that she wanted. Trolls and Karl both had humanoid forms, and she wanted one.
She was quite literally the thing that haunted the darkness now, and that only worked if she could get to her prey.
The lingering power of her advancement helped Skill Merger and Skill Master function more efficiently, but the power was waning as she took in more than the blood could regenerate, and imbued her body with the energy.
But she still had the token, and a lot of determination. All she had to do was learn to use the spell without the amulet.
Karl was shaking hands with the doctors now, so they must be nearly done, but Rae was confident that she had the right method. All that was left was to try it out.
A surge of power activated [Humanoid Disguise] and she was in her two legged form in her space with only her own power.
Then a thought activated [Night Haunter] and Rae stepped out to stand beside the door, forgetting that she was still dripping with blood.
The effect when she let the spectral form fade and reappeared in front of the psychologist, covered in blood from head to toe with a row of serrated teeth smiling at the cleric, was even more beautiful than she had hoped for.
The man screamed like Lotus did when she was scared, then vaulted backwards and over the kitchen island before crashing to the ground and scurrying across the floor towards the back wall.
[Ten out of ten. Perfect form.] Cara congratulated her.
“A celebration is in order. Doctors, may I introduce to you Queen Rae Bloodbath, the most powerful known member of her species, and our Nation’s newest Monarch Rank resident.” Karl announced.
Skittles took a drag off one of the Nature Cleric specialty cigarettes as he glared at Karl.
“You’re going to give an old man a heart attack one of these days.”
Karl smiled. “Fortunately for us, not only do we have two clerics present, we also have one that can resurrect. It’s fine if Rae sneaks up on people now and then.”
The terrified man on the floor scoffed. “In my professional opinion, bringing them back to life won’t undo the mental trauma of being literally scared to death.”
Rae gave the man two thumbs up. “I will keep that in mind for next time. No scaring them all the way to death. Halfway is fun enough.”