Chapter 189: Test Or Torture?

With new information in hand, Lucius felt pleased and felt like he should proceed ahead now.

"Let's get to the main course, shall we?" Lucius said as his hands glowed in red light.

Streaks of red energy came out of his hand and they highly swirled around them. This was the second time Kiana was seeing the hell energy and found it to be just as stunning as before.

Lucius lightly touched Doyle on his head and injected the hell energy.

"HNGHHHHH!" Doyle grunted out as he stretched his body taut.

The gag prevented him from screaming and the restraints prevented him from thrashing around. The injection of Hell energy was not something that could be easily handled by normal humans.

Even back in Lucius's past world, most people that became the Lost were not actively injected with hell energy. Instead, they were kept in an area tainted with hell energy and left to passively absorb it.

This was more of a passive method of making Lost. After all, why would the Great Barrom Clan spend extra hell energy in making something as lowly as a Lost? It was far easier for them to just stuff a bunch of people in their dungeons where there was plenty of ambient hell energy.

Due to the large number of Great Barrom Clan members living above and around the dungeons, the entire territory was usually tainted with hell energy. This was also the reason why the great Barrom clan was protected from invasions and attacks.

After all, no one would carelessly attack a territory and go there, when merely being there could kill them. This was also the reason why the area where the servants of the Barrom clan lived was in a separate area.

The living areas of the servants were especially enchanted with hell energy repelling barriers. This way they would be safe from the effects of the hell energy for the most part. 

But even then, most adult servants of the Great Barrom clan knew how to use hell energy and were mostly immune to its effect. It was actually the children of the servants that this barrier was maintained.

In a way, this was just the Great Barrom clan rearing human servants for their needs. They would care for the young until they were strong enough to survive on their own. Plus, with the harsh competition that existed in the clan, and even among the servants, the weak would perish quickly.

Lucius himself had killed over ten siblings of his own to come out on top. Perhaps only the True bloods of the clan were free from the competition and could live in a relative life of luxury. Of course, a majority of them didn't actually do this.

After all, the great Barrom clan was mostly a warring clan and wastrels would be wiped out either actively by the higher ups when they failed and died in a mission, or passively by simply letting them die out.

With a few memories of his past passing through his mind in a flash, Lucius was brought back to the reality by the clanging of the metal restraints.

~DENG~

~clang~

~clang~

Various metallic sounds were heard as Doyle tried his best to struggle and get free. But even then it was no use, as the energy within him was hurting him far more than he could hurt himself. 

About a minute later, his eyes started to spasm and rolled back into his head. His veins popped up and a red hue spread over his body as if he had just been brought out of a tub full of hot and steaming water.

Kiana, who had been watching it all with rapt attention, finally spoke, seeing that the man had done silent.

"Is it… over?" She questioned.

"Over? No… it's only just starting." Lucius answered as he took a seat in a chair.

Picking up a notebook from the side, he started taking notes. And of course, these notes were written in the language of his past world, which would make it impossible for anyone else to read it. Lucius didn't mind Kiana seeing it anymore either, as her loyalty was more or less guaranteed.

Besides, she was seeing the actual live process of turning a human into a lost, a little notebook would be the least of Lucius's worries if she was had not pledged her loyalty to him. The two watched on as small changes started to occur within Doyle's body.

The red hue on his body became darker and darker until the muscles below his skin started to get thicker. 

'Hmm… muscle fiber density is increasing… the first step is nearly complete…' Lucius thought to himself as he noted down the time period it took for it to reach this point.

The process was uneven at first, almost seeming random. Some parts of Doyle's muscles bulged out more than the others. For example, a part on his neck swelled into five times its size, looking like a tumor instead.

But over time the increase in muscles got more and more even, until it reached equilibrium. The restraints on Doyle's hands were almost cutting into his skin due to how much it had increased.

~Kaching~

Lucius loosed the mechanism on the restraints which increased the size of the hoop that held Doyle's hands in place. The injury made by the restraints also stopped bleeding rather quickly and filled up with more muscles.

"Hmm… the regenerative ability is significantly faster… though the question is if this is a permanent change or a transient effect of the transformation?" Lucius questioned himself.

Kiana was lost at several words that Lucius was speaking and just shook her head, thinking that it was best left to him. Lucius observed the man for about another hour before deciding that the first step was fully completed.

"Ah, now we can give him a bit more of the energy…" Lucius spoke.

"More energy? But didn't you give Keith only a little bit back then?" Kiana questioned.

"I did yes, but it also took him a long time to transform. We will be accelerating it a bit here." Lucius answered.