Other than his lower back flaring with intense pain, Zarian knew things were especially wrong when the Star System sent notifications in a panicked tone:
The Star System’s panic changed the public notifications floating in the air from screen size to giant billboard size. The color switched from gold to red, matching the intensity of the System’s warnings.
Zarian hadn’t seen the Star System freak out this much except for when he’d pulled the trigger on himself. Maybe the Star System was especially upset because sothing had gone out of its control again.
Welco to my fucking world! Zarian thought, jaw clenched.
A scream wanted to fight its way out, and he kept holding it back, sounding like a grunting animal as the pain in his lower back redoubled.
He saw white spots in his eyes, and everyone looked shady and out of focus around him.
He felt Gilbert’s Healing Force 3 try to pump into him, but nothing could ease the pain. Then he felt Gilbert’s Tranquilizer Touch 3. That helped soothe so of the pain, but not all of it.
“Breathe, Zarian, breathe!” A fuzzy outline with Naomi’s voice knelt next to him.
She placed her hands over one of Zarian’s own, and he gripped back with all of his Strength. She was strong enough to handle the pressure.
“One, two, three! Breathe! One, two, three, breathe!” she instructed.
From behind him, he heard the panic in Para’s voice. “I can’t stop it! Sothing is erging from his back, and I’m powerless against it. Please, help him!”
“I’m doing all I can, okay?!” Gilbert shouted. “Is he going to die? He has a charge on the Divine Revival Charm, right? That should prevent him from dying.”
“Father, don’t leave again!” Foodie cried out.
“I’m not going to,” Zarian grunted in between big breaths. “Sothing … is … changing.”
“Could it be what I think it is?” Bianca asked.
“The truth of his lineage,” Hannah said in awe.
“One, two, three, breathe! Now push!” Naomi demanded.
Zarian roared with more volu and depth than ever before. His roar resounded far across the Grimrock Castle Mountains, traveling so far that even the citizens at Crossdeath heard the power and anger in his voice.
Hearing that, most humans instinctively scread and acted out in terror. Outright hysteria broke out at the basin camp of adventurers. They acted like headless chickens from hearing Zarian’s massive roar.
The son of ultra gods cared little for the fears of mortals right now. Despite Gilbert’s best efforts and Naomi’s encouraging instructions, the pain rose tenfold.
He felt his body change, especially the end of his spine. Sothing wanted out of his back. It had to co out no matter what.
Instead of suffering this pain any longer, Zarian pushed with all of his might. He listened to Naomi repeat her instructions and pushed so hard he fractured a tooth from between his clenched jaws. Gilbert’s Healing Force 3 fixed that and nothing much more.
A large clot of blood burst free from his back, splattering on himself and his friends, and only then did the pain turn into a deep relief.
Zarian collapsed forward, and Naomi caught him and hugged him close. Her body felt soft and welcoming, and Zarian appreciated all of that despite the tense disappointnt with her class reselection.
Everything quieted down.
He leaned his head on Naomi’s chest for a while and heard her thumping heart beat. He felt his daughter’s grip on his side, which comforted him even further.
Finally, he paid attention to the weighty addition to his back. He could sense it with his wondrous and mystical perception. He also felt how the air swished and fanned as the new addition coiled about.
Zarian slowly broke away from Naomi and looked back at the long and muscular lion tail extended from his lower back.
The damn thing was as long as he was tall. Maybe even a little longer, which was impressive, because Zarian wasn’t the sa height anymore.
Standing firmly to his feet, he noticed the change in his own fra imdiately.
Hannah called it out first. “You’re six feet now.”
“Yeah, I am,” Zarian said.
Just like that, he’d grown an extra three inches.
The only people who’d grown taller while enjoying the splendors of Infinita were Gilbert and Bianca. It seed like the new world and magical food had introduced a late growth spurt for them.
Thus, making them both statuesque to the point of so people looking up to them as if they were half-giants, Gilbert especially.
Zarian had heard people refer to the big blue-eyed blond as if he was part bear. But now Zarian was taller than the average human from Corma. And his viscera-covered tail seed extra long to him for so reason.
Zarian looked as the tail andered back and forth from one side of him to the other. Sotis it would fan against the Parasite Cloak 3 with the puff ball of fur at the end looking heavy, matted with blood.
“Hey, let clean it for you,” Naomi said.
Before he answered, she stroked her hand over the tail from the base to the tip, which Zarian rembered to call a tuft. She used her psychic power to push the blood out of the fur and down the tail.
The clingy ss splattered onto the courtyard floor. The black tuft at the end beca poofy and pristine.
“Hey, you didn’t need to touch him for that.” Bianca pouted. “You did that to touch his tail first, didn’t you?”
“Yo gano.“ Naomi laughed. “I win.”
“This isn’t going to be a thing, right? We aren’t all turning into cat people, right?” Gilbert asked. “I don’t need to be a tom cat. Trust on that. I really don’t.”
“It’s not letting fuse with it,” Para said from the cloak. “This is the first ti I’ve been denied like this.”
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Zarian looked down at his taller, bigger, and denser body. He looked back where his daughter stood with eyes opened wide, ears raised, her head turning to follow the motion of his waving lion tail.
She was looking more like a green-skinned cat right now.
I feel like I’m getting set up for so big joke, but I don’t know what it is, Zarian thought. Out loud, he said, “Let’s move on, Star System. We’re over halfway done.”
Everybody agreed. The excitent over his tail’s appearance didn’t die down exactly, but it dipped under the surface for now.
Zarian ignored how hard the others stared at his new body part. The most interesting thing was how Para had to work around it as she ford into a modestly spiky throne for him.
Before he sat down, Zarian thought quickly about his tail. Then his instincts kicked in. His tail swooped around his waist multiple tis until it beca like a wide waistband.
With the warm and fuzzy thing wrapped around his lower torso, he could sit back comfortably.
“One last thing,” Hannah blurted out, taking a seat on a simple stone chair she’d crafted. “Why is Lion Prince a skill and not a trait?”
“I can’t say exactly without looking at it,” Zarian replied. “But it might be like Overwhelming Darkness. Lion Prince has to be a skill attached to my soul instead of ingrained into my soul, or it might take over my soul. My ultra family has to do these things because they are a lot scarier than we thought.”
Zarian held up his hand before Hannah asked another question. “We need to move on, Hannah, please.”
“Sorry.” She quieted down, head tucked low.
Zarian hated to see it, but there were too many factors that weren’t out on display just yet. Right now wasn’t the ti to get bogged down by the minutia.
Still, he didn’t like how stifled Hannah looked.
“After we’re all caught up and updated, we can dig into the nitty gritty later. At least before we head off to our next adventures,” Zarian said in encouragent.
Hannah didn’t respond, but she seed to take that better.
The Star System returned with screen-sized notifications, all gold again.
“WHAT?!” Zarian and Gilbert shouted together, with the Conquest Wizard’s voice resounding with a louder and deeper range.
The two looked at each other as if they weren’t sure who should go first. Then Gilbert pald his face and grumbled unintelligible words into his hand until he grunted sothing more decipherable at the end.
“He’s a saint? How is he a saint? Is that supposed to be a sign or sothing? Does that make him a fallen saint instead of a fallen angel?” Gilbert was clearly exasperated.
Zarian could hardly believe the na change. Would this have happened if he chose anything else other than the Conquest Wizard? Why did the na change happen? Was it because of the feverish dream he had of eting a fake version of the Biggest?
Did his little sister have a na change? What if she didn’t?
What would that do to them going forward now that his ultra lineage renad him as Zarian Sainte-Darkrun?
“Go,” Zarian muttered, trying to get ahead of the complications. “Go, go, go.”
Altogether, that ant they had six alpha skill slots and eighteen beta skill slots in the Level 100s. Zarian didn’t think that was nearly enough with their growing choices in skills and the possible future skills they could earn.
They were going to need skill combiners. Maybe, just maybe, they might get lucky with that as a reward from their achievents. But that was nowhere near as important as the rank up segnt.
“Of course!” Hannah shouted.
Naomi smirked. “I’m the master now.”
“I’m all in,” Zarian said.
Before anyone could applaud or cheer, Zarian urged the Star System onward.
It almost felt like he was cracking the whip. He would’ve felt bad if it wasn’t for how the System had so many unique chanics that took ti to review personally.
That caught them all off guard. Bianca recovered first and got to cheer out. “See, Hannah! You are more than good enough!”
“Not now, Bianca,” Hannah mumbled, cheeks turning red.
“Congrats,” Naomi grouched with open envy.
“Amazing,” Zarian said, enjoying the three levels of significant stat points.
He couldn’t wait to dump his Free Points sowhere after gaining so much post rank up. Only Master Rankers would know how hard each of those levels was to get.
They had experience reductions from the Hell Gate, from hitting Level 100, from not ascending, and from being Master Rankers. So, yes, gaining any level right now was a feat worthy of devout worship from all the human kingdoms around the Walled Continent.
How many Master Rankers are human? Could Zarian even count himself? Did it matter? The Floridians were progressing hardcore.
Knowing all of that, a rumbling tone reverberated from his throat.
A deep, rumbly purr.
He ignored the wide-eyed stares from the others. He paid more attention to Foodie who couldn’t stop herself from crawling into his lap.
She was done with cooking for the morning anyway. The little goblin princess rubbed her hand over his fuzzy waistband tail as the Star System moved on quickly.
It was finally ti for the pièce de résistance.
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