Harem Startup : The Demon Billionaire is on Vacation

Chapter 979 – Skills Evolution

The Devourer roared again, but now the roar cracked halfway through. Water poured from its mouth. Its hollow eyes flickered in panic-bright flashes.

It raised both arms and slammed them into the ground.

The chamber answered.

Roots erupted in a circle around Lux, forming a cage of black wood and wet stone. The Devourer tried to crush him inside it.

Lux spun both daggers once.

Then stopped.

He didn’t attack the roots immediately.

Instead, he looked up through the gaps at the Devourer.

”You know,” he said, voice calm, ”this would work better if I respected cages.”

The roots tightened.

Lux’s smile became cold. ”I don’t.”

He drove both daggers into the floor.

[Dual Effect Triggered]

[Dominion Drain + Delirium Distortion]

Black-gold veins spread through the cage roots.

Crimson distortion followed.

The roots started absorbing from him.

Then forgot what direction hunger worked.

For one beautiful second, the cage tried to eat itself.

Roots twisted inward. Stone cracked. Vines latched onto other vines. The mana-drain circuit collapsed into feedback.

Lux stood at the center of it, hands on both dagger hilts, head bowed slightly.

Then he lifted his face.

Eyes glowing.

”Bad investment.”

He ripped both blades upward.

The cage exploded.

Not outward.

Inward.

It collapsed into a spiral of ash, bark, and stone fragments. Lux caught what was useful, discarded what was not, and walked through the dying cage before the dust even settled.

[Stored Asset: Spring Core Fragment X10]

The Devourer backed up.

The main body actually backed up.

Lux tilted his head. ”Oh?”

The monster’s leg dragged through the broken spring. Its regeneration tried to start.

Failed.

The pool was too empty.

The fragments were gone.

The Devourer’s hollow torso pulsed weaker now, flickering blue-white and green-black.

Lux walked toward it.

Slowly.

That made it worse.

Fast Lux was terrifying.

Slow Lux was inevitable.

The Devourer swung one last massive arm.

Lux stepped inside the swing.

The root arm passed behind him, too wide and too desperate. Lux placed one hand against the creature’s chest and felt the final pull.

Weak.

Starving.

But no longer dominant.

His gaze sharpened.

He could see it now.

The core of the corrupted ability.

Not the spring fragment.

The absorption principle itself.

A twisted imitation of his own Absorb.

A starving universal drain that had been forced to consume anything because its sacred function had been corrupted into survival.

Lux understood suddenly.

The Devourer had not been born evil.

It had been starved until hunger became identity.

A guard left without purpose.

A spring forced to feed a prison.

A sacred warden turned into a mouth.

Lux’s expression did not soften.

Mercy could come later.

First, the knife.

He drove the blade into the Devourer’s chest.

Then another one beside it.

The Devourer convulsed.

The final fragment glowed deep inside.

Lux stood before it, one hand still pressed against its chest, both daggers embedded at his sides. His voice lowered. ”Now...”

His eyes burned. ”It’s my time to do my Greed.”

Lux reached out with his own power.

[Absorb]

Dark-gold authority burst from his body in a circle.

The chamber seemed to hold its breath.

The Devourer tried to answer with its own hunger.

It failed.

Its absorption field flickered once.

The massive body sagged, one knee crashing into the stone floor.

The branch crown lowered.

The hollow lights dimmed.

The Devourer dropped.

[Absorb Output Increasing]

[Warning: Attempting Integration May Cause Skill Mutation]

He pulled.

The Devourer arched backward, silent roar trapped in its broken mouth. Blue-white, green-black, and ash-gray energy tore from its chest in streams, rushing into Lux’s palm. It felt wrong. Hungry. Empty. Like swallowing a drought.

Then Lux caught it.

Compressed it.

Refined it.

Forced the hunger to kneel.

The chamber shook as the stolen consumption law poured into him. His veins lit dark-gold under his skin. His shadow spread across the floor, not crimson this time, but black edged with silver-blue springlight.

Ely watched with wide eyes.

Yue’s expression turned grave.

Sira whispered, ”Lux...”

He did not stop.

The Devourer’s body cracked. Roots dried. Stones fell away. The hollow water inside its torso drained into the air and vanished into Lux’s authority.

The Devourer shrank.

Not physically at first.

Its hunger became smaller.

Less monstrous.

Less endless.

Lux’s expression changed by one fraction.

He saw something inside the energy.

An old command.

Guard.

Preserve.

Feed the spring.

Then corruption.

Starvation.

Consume all.

The system flashed violently.

[Conceptual Override Detected]

[Absorb Skill Resonance Achieved]

[Foreign Absorption Law Successfully Subjugated]

[Skill Evolution Triggered]

The Devourer collapsed completely, its massive body falling into roots, stone, and clean water that splashed across the broken floor. The final core fragment floated out of its chest and hovered before Lux.

This time, he did not store it.

He let it pass through his palm.

Purified.

Then it drifted behind him toward the others, joining the dark-gold vault of recovered fragments.

[Spring Core Fragment Seized]

[All Major Fragments Recovered]

Lux lowered his hand.

The chamber went quiet.

Then the system window opened before him.

[Skill Upgrade Acquired]

[Absorb has evolved.]

[New Skill: Sovereign Absorb (Absolute Reclamation)]

[Description: An advanced evolution of Absorb created through domination and refinement of a corrupted universal mana consumption law.]

[Siphon curses, demonic energy, mana, divine residue, spiritual authority, and external power sources with increased stability. Identify whether absorbed power is stolen, parasitic, corrupted, oath-bound, or naturally owned. Reclaim stolen energy and redirect it to its rightful vessel or convert it into personal reserves. Suppress hostile absorption skills during direct contact. Purify corrupted hunger, mana rot, parasitic links, and forced siphoning channels. Grants increased resistance against mana drain, divine corruption, demonic contamination, and memory-root erosion. When used with Greed Authority, stolen assets may be temporarily registered, contained, audited, and reassigned.]

Lux stared at the window.

Then slowly smiled.

Not gentle.

Greed.

”Oh.”

Sira exhaled.

Yue lowered her spear slightly.

Gula stared at him like he had just become a five-star forbidden dessert with political consequences.

Lullaby blinked sleepily.

Ely looked at the recovered fragments floating behind him.

The spring below them pulsed once.

Weak.

But alive.

Lux turned toward it, the upgraded power still glowing faintly in his palm.

”Now,” he said softly, ”let’s put back what belongs to you.”