In a couple of minutes after the horn sounded, lines of monstrosities marched into the yard, coming from different directions.
The castle yard directly faced the road leading away from the kingdom. Although it was not the same direction where Northern and the Nightterror had come from and fought the last battle.
Before Northern knew it, the yard was filled with dark-furred monsters, his own squad of a hundred lost amidst the throng.
Northern bit his fingers as he waited on the sideline, several other generals like him, Hellions almost as intimidating as the Nightterror, beginning to appear.
For some reason, they stood apart from him. But he didn’t care right now.
‘Dammit, Northern! What is wrong with you? Remember, we’re supposed to be survivalists, remember!’
He intentionally bit down hard on his finger, using the pain to jolt himself back to reality.
The other generals glanced at him the moment he let out a muffled shriek, trying not to shout.
Mr. Fluffy was sitting gently right beside his leg, staring inquiringly at the horde of monsters, the poor thing probably having never seen such a scene.
Having regained his focus, Northern glanced long at the generals, then looked at the gathering of monsters and the Nightterror as he made his way to the podium.
‘It’s a war, nothing about that will change. What I have to do now is think about how I can raise my chances of survival…’
He paused, thinking deeply for more than a second. Then he summoned the panels displaying his talents.
[Copied Talents]: [1/1]
Talent: [Advanced Cloning]
Class: [A]
Talent (True) Name: [Many Of One]
Description: [I am one, I am two, I can be three… four or five. My personas are limitless and only limited by my imagination, in my hands all objects are more than one]
Talent Ability: [Self Clone]
Attribute: [Your soul rank is too low to access this information]
Talent progression: [0/600]
This was the answer. It was staring him right in the face.
Northern took a deep breath.
He had always wanted to take this step, but because he had to be very economical about spending talent fragments, he had hesitated a lot. Six hundred was not an easy amount to spare.
What made him feel slightly better about the one thousand fragment mark was the six hundred that was there – he felt like losing it would scar his soul.
And he wanted to reach a thousand talent fragments as soon as possible and witness what would happen, but he had to consider survival first; he’d have to deal with starting from the beginning.
He had no choice. If he upgraded the talent using six hundred talent fragments, there was a chance he’d be able to summon more than one clone.
That should at least give him an edge in this battle. He had observed several things from having one clone, such as the muscle experience of the clone being ingrained into his own after it returns.
Which meant if he had two clones and they continually fought, apart from receiving talent fragments twice the same amount simultaneously, he’d be gaining muscle experience and memory that he didn’t even work for.
It had a nice ring to it.
‘Yes, let’s evolve the talent,’ Northern nodded.
[Are you sure you want to use 600 talent fragments to evolve talent ‘Advance Cloning’?]
Northern did not hesitate, he nodded affirmatively.
[600 Talent fragments have been added to Talent progression]
[Talent Advanced Cloning can be evolved]
[There are two evolution pathways…]
The Path Of Many: [Advanced Cloning prioritizes many over one. Upon further evolution, the number of clones will keep increasing but their sheer power will keep reducing]
The Path Of One: [Advance Cloning prioritizes one over many. Upon further evolution, the number of clones will be restricted to only one, however, sheer power will be built upon that one alone]
Northern had first grinned when he saw the first pathway, it was what he wanted after all. But upon seeing the second pathway, his expression became grim.
‘Many or one. If I have many, I’d have the power of numbers to back me up while I grow stronger and eventually absorb other talents. But if I invest my all into this one… and make him way stronger than I am…’
The former sounded so intriguing that Northern couldn’t help but want to go for it. He would be able to focus on growing stronger while having the numbers – but Northern wasn’t entirely dumb.
It just sounded fancy on the outside, but in the long run, this would come back to bite him. If he judged based on his current situation in this hellish rift, he’d choose numbers, that way he’d be able to guarantee his safety and find a way to escape the realm.
It’s called multitasking.
But what about the future, what would happen when he needed quality too, but they only keep growing in quantity – would he now have a house full of weak Northerns?
It was a difficult decision, but he had to make it either way. Northern removed his hand from his chin and looked down with determination –
[You have chosen ‘The Path Of One’]
[Are you sure you want to choose this pathway?]
‘What? Trying to make me change my mind now? Yes, I am sure.’
[Seeking Access to evolve talent ‘Advanced Cloning’]
[Access granted]
[Talent ‘Advanced Cloning’ is evolving…]
Northern suddenly bent and held his stomach. He could feel something hot welling up inside him, it made his pale skin boil and redden.
He gripped his tummy tightly and opened his mouth, trying to release whatever was boiling his insides.
The pain was intense and heart-gripping for a moment – worse even, in a place like this, he needed to avoid screaming, so Northern tried his best to stifle every trace of a scream that threatened to disgrace him.
The generals were beginning to look at him with puzzled expressions, even Mr. Fluffy was tilting its head left and right.
But Northern couldn’t pay them any mind, he fought himself from crumbling to one knee and managed to stay on his feet through it all.
Then a soothing voice resounded in his ears:
[You have used 600 talent fragments]
Northern at that point felt a great deal of strength leave his body.
[TALENT “ADVANCED CLONING” HAS EVOLVED TO “SINGULARITY”]
It was then that the heat in his belly began to calm down. He couldn’t tell precisely where, but he could tell that something had changed about him.
[Congratulations, you have succeeded in evolving a talent for the first time]
[Because True name is tied to Talent and Attributes, you have succeeded in evolving a true name for the first time]
[You have succeeded in evolving an attribute for the first time]
Northern couldn’t help but stare wide-eyed.
‘What is this? What was going on…’
This far exceeded his expectations.
‘T—True Name? Even Attributes?!’
He had evolved everything!