Formless Ascension: My Affinity Is Limitless

If this beast were a human, its natural affinities would have placed it somewhere around Epic grade or at least a Rare grade in terms of talent level.

The beast controlled four different aspects of cosmic essence. Each of its four sub-cores catered specifically to a single attunement and affinity.

Through his direct palm connection, Uhtred could feel the earth magic aspect running through one sub-core. He could sense sand magic manipulation flowing through another. He even picked up on a general physical enhancement aspect running through a third congregation of essence...

The fourth sub-core was somewhat vague and alien to his senses since he hadn’t encountered that specific attunement pattern before, but the main takeaway was clear:

The four aspects of cosmic essence that the Wonambi Dune Strider possessed were all compartmentalized into separate sub-cores.

These four nodes were all anchored to a massive central congregation at the very center of its core, which regulated and fed all of them at once. It was within this deep central core that Uhtred discovered exactly what the serpent was doing to protect itself from the trial grounds.

The Clamp technique Uhtred had developed earlier in the afternoon was active inside this beast, but it was running to an even more refined, automated extent than what Uhtred had casually put together.

The efficiency was so immense that even without the added benefits of its sub-cores, the serpent’s primary core method alone was enough to block the essence leak by at least ninety percent!

The same disadvantage Uhtred’s clamp technique had was also present inside the snake’s core. Its primary core was locked down by the clamp, making it impossible to cast magic directly from the center.

But because the beast possessed four separate sub-cores orbiting outside the line of the clamp, each catering to a specific elemental aspect, the serpent could easily bypass the lock.

It could freely project its magic out into the desert without disrupting the primary clamp that kept its main essence from bleeding away.

As Uhtred stood on the carapace, analyzing what he had just deciphered, a critical question crossed his mind:

Is this something the beast came up with on its own to tackle the essence leakage after evolving in this barren environment for generations...?

Or is this something particular to all beasts that reach the Nascent realm?

The question was highly valid based on what he was feeling. The primary factor that kept this beast safe from essence leakage was its superior mastery of the Clamp technique, something Uhtred had already figured out on his own and could easily refine to greater heights with enough time.

If the serpent only wanted to survive, it could have simply relied on that single method, releasing the clamp whenever it needed to kill a target and locking it back down immediately after the threat was cleared. Its raw physical strength alone was more than enough to handle anything in this sector.

But instead of going with that simpler route, the titan had structurally altered its anatomy to maintain four sub-cores just so it could cast high-tier magic while the clamp remained fully active.

This complexity made Uhtred strongly suspect that this sub-core configuration was a native trait unlocked automatically by entities that breached the Nascent realm.

Uhtred was very curious. In fact, for a moment, he considered whether to open his streaming interface and ask the question to the multiversal entities watching him right now.

But after a second of thought, he decided against it. He had an active, high-stakes bet running with them regarding his survival. Seeking their opinion was entirely counterintuitive to his pride, and more importantly, he had no intention of letting those cosmic sponsors understand how his mind operated.

Of course, the fact that they were already watching him meant that once he found a method to replicate this sub-core configuration as a Mortal realm cultivator, their opinion of him would shoot up exponentially.

They would immediately recognize him as an anomaly, but at least they still wouldn’t know the exact logical steps he took to achieve the breakthrough on his own.

Uhtred gritted his teeth and pressed his palm harder against the wet flesh wall. Even if this technique was something locked behind the Nascent realm, he was going to attempt to mimic it regardless. Cultivating up to level 25 was impossible right now anyway, so there was no other choice but to adapt somehow.

.

.

.

Meanwhile, out in the open world. Hours later...

While Uhtred remained trapped inside the belly of the serpent attempting to break through his limits, the trial grounds of Australia had devolved into utter chaos.

The number of human ascenders in the trial grounds, which had been significantly less than the ancient variants, had now skyrocketed.

Individuals who shouldn’t have even come here in the first place, people with levels lower than Level 10 filled the bottom third of the trial ranking leaderboard.

Yet as their numbers continued to rise, in the same manner, their names began to disappear from the list as they were killed in droves.

”What a fucking shitshow!”

Antoine, along with several new human ascenders he had teamed up with over the past few hours to form a survival party, had just finished mowing down a fierce horde of souped-up Australian desert beasts when they were instantly hit by a brutal ambush from a squad of roaming Neanderthal warriors.

The representative of United New Eden breathed heavily, his chest heaving as he violently wrenched his sword out from the bowels of a muscular Neanderthal warrior.

The ancient man stared up at him with dull, fading eyes as the last remnants of life seeped out of him.

Antoine flicked his sword of the blood coating it and kicked the corpse backward to let it fall flat to the ground.

Without a single moment of hesitation, he squatted next to the dead warrior and dug his hand directly into the chest cavity, harvesting the bright essence core that lay within.

The exact same brutal display was playing out all around him in the dark. Every single human ascender in his party who had successfully managed to cut down an opponent began to harvest their cores immediately.

In this barren trial, cores were the most vital, irreplaceable resource available. Morals had long been thrown out of the window. Their group wasn’t just harvesting from the Neanderthal warriors alone, they were also digging into the chests of their own fallen comrades who had died during the sudden ambush.

Every surviving member of Antoine’s party were frantically harvesting cores from anything that lay dead around them.

As Antoine caught his breath after the brutal fight, he pulled up the trial rankings very quickly. His eyes went to the bottom of the list, which had been less than a hundred when he had first arrived in the trial grounds, but now sat at a staggering 3.56 million participants.

That number had been up to 3.9 million just an hour ago. More than two hundred thousand humans had died within the past hour alone... hundreds of thousands of Level 8s, 7s, 6s, 5s, probably even 4s and 3s.

Some irresponsible individuals with a territory had likely opened their portal for people to just pour in wantonly, not heeding the System’s warning that only Level 10s had what it took to survive within the trial grounds.

”Fuck! Wasting our fucking ascenders for nothing! This is why a structured authority is needed!”

Antoine cursed under his breath before barking out to his party:

”That’s enough! We need to get a move on right now!”