Chapter 133: The Start Of The Experiment

Lucius went to the training hall after leaving his lab and saw that John was already waiting for him.

"Were you busy?" John questioned.

"Just a little bit, but I'm done now." Lucius replied.

"Mmm… with all that you are doing, it is normal to be busy. If you want we can reduce the practice time." John said.

"No, it's fine. I need the practice regularly. Don't want to fall back on that aspect." Lucius stated.

Lucius knew how important regular training and exercise were. He himself had never missed it in his past life and the only times he had not done it was either because he was fighting someone or something, or in a place where it was not needed such as during an expedition.

He definitely did not want to lag out here in this world as the power structure here was rather straightforward. Those who had gifts were the strongest but even then they could not battle against thousands in an army.

Lucius wondered to what level the gifts could go and whether they would reach the same level as those of the mass destruction spells. So far, the strongest gifts he knew of were those in the mythic rank.

More accurately the three relics of the gods. But even they did not seem like they could turn one powerful enough to be a one man army. The Tome of Etara was not an offensive relic and while the Sword of Duran was powerful enough to cut anything it could still not kill multiple people at once. 

Even if one wielded the sword and marched into the army. While they would be able to kill thousands, they would still be drowned out by the army's combined attacks. The army would merely need to use a human wave tactic and stop the person.

Though there were a few ways this could be overcome. For example, the sword was wielded by someone that had a defensive gift that made them invulnerable to damage, they may be able to last longer, but even then, the human wave tactic would work.

There was still a limit to the Aether that a person could use and they would run out soon. Even if they did not, the relic would run out as well. And if they wanted to recharge it with the Aether crystals it would not be fast enough and they would get overwhelmed.

Then came the third relic, the Scepter Of Alana which was said to be able to smite the sinners. Lucius did not fully understand what it meant by that and how it decided who was a sinner. He did not know whether this was a restriction on it or something else, thus he could not fully judge this relic, either.

Rather than these three powerful relics, what Lucius thought was more powerful and perhaps more dangerous was actually the gift a certain Mercenary had… Bergan. He had the Infamous Epic Ranked gift Toxic Touch which could create mass hysteria if used right.

It could easily be used as a weapon of dismay by killing people at random and them not knowing where the toxins were. Bergan did not even need to use it that many times. Even putting it in ten places chosen accurately would cause enough chaos to give the kingdom a headache.

That, in Lucius' opinion, was a more dangerous gift than the three mythic ranked relics. He did not know whether the kingdoms viewed it as such or not. And if they did, why had they let him stay alive all this time.

If it were Lucius ruling in their place, he would have found a covert way to get rid of him. Or if it was more favorable to him instead… he may even be willing to recruit the man under his wing.

Of course, would only do this if he was sure that he would be able to control the man. He did not even think loyalty would be worth it, Lucius would rather have absolute control over the man.

And just while thinking of all this, Lucius got to training and practicing his swordplay. He spent about two hours till it was the evening before stopping. Done with it all, he rushed to take a bath and retreated to the lab.

"Are you not gonna eat?" Kiana who had seen Lucius leave, quickly asked.

"Hmm… send the food to the lab. I'll just eat there while I work." Lucius replied.

"Alright, I'll do that. But don't exhaust yourself too much and rest on time. I'll bring the food in a bit." Kiana said before going to get the food.

Lucius nodded his head and entered the lab. 

~SKREE~

As soon as he entered, he could hear the cry of the Bore Shrew coming from the cage. He removed the cloth covering it and saw that the Bore Shrew was still trying to bite its way through the cage.

He looked at the grill of the cage and saw that they were still intact. Except for the saliva of the Bore Shrew staining the grill, he did not see anything wrong with it.

"Hmm… at least it works as I thought it would," Lucius muttered.

He then observed the Bore Shrew for a few minutes, seeing its condition and the peculiarity of its body. Before one began an experiment they needed to make sure they knew the condition of the subject properly.

If they did not know this, how would they compare the results after the experiment? Thus Lucius made sure that he knew the bore shrew's condition properly before wearing a thick leather glove on his hand. 

"Let's see how nexus works on Rune Beasts…" Lucius muttered before activating it.

Gift Name: Bore

Description: The Beast can bore through the earth using its claws and teeth. Cutting through stone and metal is possible for the beast, though certain materials may slow it down.

Rank: Common

Beast Rank: F

Type: Physical 

Evolution: Possible

Evolution Requirements: 9x Aether Crystals

Seeing the information provided by the nexus, Lucius was a bit surprised. He knew that he would be getting nearly all of the information at once if he used Nexus due to the beast being F rank and he really did. 

Plus, since he already knew about several details about the beast beforehand, they directly showed up. The gift, rank and type were all that he had known, but when he saw the evolution requirement, he was rather surprised.

"That's rather high… the other common ranked gifts that I saw did not need these many Aether crystals." Lucius muttered.

The most Lucius had seen was a commonly ranked gift taking 5 Aether Crystals. But this rune beast took nearly twice that number. 

"Is it perhaps the Rune beasts that are the exceptions? Perhaps they just need more Aether crystals than the humans." Lucius hypothesized.

After thinking for a bit, Lucius realized that he would need to check up on other rune beasts before he actually came to a conclusion. There were far too many factors involved in this that he did not understand yet.

And in addition to that, his current sample size was quite small, being literally one.

"Maybe I need to get more of these Bore Shrews for the tests… they are pretty common in these parts, right? The peasants should be able to get me a few, hopefully…" Lucius said to himself.

And with this one sentence, Lucius had sealed the fate of a large number of Bore Shrews. Done with all this, Lucius decided to proceed. He slid out the top lid of the cage and put his hand in.

~SKREEE~

The Bore Shrew let out a cry as it tried to bite Lucius's hand. Thankfully, the leather glove was enough to protect him for the time being. Though if he took longer, the rune beast might really get through the glove with its sharp teeth.

"There you go," Lucius muttered as he grabbed the Bore Shrew with his gloved hand and pulled it out.

The Bore Shrew struggled in his hand and tried to wiggle out of it, but it could not. Lucius was holding the beast in a vice grip and would not let go of it. He made sure the beast was immobilized and could not move before putting his free hand on its body.

"Let's see how you compare to a human…" Lucius said as his hand glowed in a crimson red light.

~shua~

A stream of red energy flowed out of his arm before entering the body of the bore shrew. The beast did not react to it at first, but soon Lucius could feel its body trembling in his hand. 

~thud~

Lucius quickly put the Bore Shrew back into the cage before shutting the lid tight. He had done a similar experiment with animals before this and they did not always end well. Many times becoming messy and bad.

"Let's see how you fare," Lucius said as he started his watch.