The Insane Regressor: Throne of Pride

Emy was pulling him into an embrace.

Ravian held her back.

For an entirely different reason.

’Devour her.’ His voice in his own mind was calm and without hesitation.

The moment he gave the command, a wave of white energy laced with black threads surged out of his body and lunged toward her.

Shlick!

The tendrils drove their tips into her — passing through her strengthened body as though it were paper. But they did not pierce her flesh.

They pierced her soul.

”Ahhhhhhh!” Emy’s scream tore through the silence of the small house.

She immediately tried to wrench herself away from him, panic distorting her face into something unrecognizable.

But Ravian tightened his arms around her and let the tendrils do their work.

”Shh. Shh... don’t be afraid, Emy.” His voice was soft as he whispered into her ear.

”Why are you so frightened? Am I not Ravian — your dear Ravian? Then why can’t you give me this one small thing?” A faint smile crossed his lips.

”After all... I sacrificed so much for you before.”

As he spoke, he felt her body becoming more fragile with each passing second — with each piece of her existence that was pulled away and devoured.

”Get away from me—!” Emy screamed, struggling with everything she had left.

”Look at yourself. Giving up this quickly?” Ravian’s voice was terrifyingly even.

”I thought you’d at least try to beg a little. Use his feelings against him. But it seems you revealed your true face much faster than I expected.”

He knew the tendrils were doing most of the work. But Ravian had no intention of taking any risks.

Emy was a Tenth-Rank Awakened. He was not. If she found even the smallest opening to resist, he could die before he understood what had happened.

So he held her, and he watched.

Emy’s features began aging at a visible rate. Wrinkles appeared around her eyes, her mouth, her neck — as though years were descending on her with every breath. Her skin tightened and then slackened, over and over.

”Kyaaah—!” Her scream cracked under the strain of it.

”Ravian — please! I’m sorry! I’ll give back everything I took from you, I swear — just let me go!” Her voice shook as though her soul was being peeled away in strips.

She couldn’t break free. The tendrils were stealing her strength faster than she could fight back.

”Give everything back?” Ravian tilted his head slightly, sounding almost curious.

”Do you really think that’s enough to repay what you did to that poor fool?”

Even through the agony, she noticed it.

More than once, without seeming to realize it, Ravian had spoken about himself in the third person.

With tremendous effort, she turned her head and looked at his face directly.

”You... you’re not...” She couldn’t bring herself to finish the thought forming in her mind.

Ravian looked back at her with a faint, patient smile.

”Surprised?”

He paused.

”Now — die.”

Emy’s face began to lose its shape. Her body withered until what remained resembled a dry skeleton wrapped in decaying skin.

Only then did Ravian release her.

He let her fall and rose quickly to his feet.

His heart was hammering. Countless things surged through him all at once — fear, unease, guilt — too many to name, arriving too fast to sort through.

A moment later, the flow of soul energy through the tendrils stopped, and the black and white threads withdrew back into his body.

[Ding!]

[Successfully absorbed the soul essence of a Tenth-Rank Awakened being.]

[Absorbing Emy’s Records... This process will take some time.]

[First condition fulfilled.]

[Establishing the foundation of the Sovereign Pride Physique.]

Then the changes began.

Ravian’s heart suddenly started beating with violent force. Blood rushed through his veins several times faster than before. He felt his bones widen, his internal organs strengthen, and his muscles begin to form and solidify beneath his skin.

A clear transformation.

But not an exaggerated one.

Strangely, despite all of it, he felt no pain. Instead, it was as if a swarm of something was moving through every part of his body — rearranging everything just beneath the surface, quiet and systematic, like a mechanism doing the work it had been built to do.

Ravian barely paid attention to it.

His body was changing visibly before his own eyes, and yet he stood there looking only at Emy’s corpse.

She was the first person he had ever killed.

The feeling was not normal. He had always known it wouldn’t be.

He was not a killer. He was an ordinary young man with slightly extraordinary focus — that was all he had ever been.

But when he had received the previous Ravian’s memories and seen clearly what Emy had done to him, he had felt two things: disgust toward the former owner of this body, and anger toward her. Even so, it hadn’t reached the point of wanting her dead.

At first, most of his attention had been on the memories themselves — and the most important thread running through all of them had been soul power. The awakening of soul power. The benefits, the strength, and the authority it granted a person in this world.

At least, that had been the case until she slapped him and looked down at him with contempt.

In that moment, everything shifted.

Hesitation became cold resolve. Calm became something quieter and more dangerous — steady, suppressed rage.

Ryan had always had pride. But since arriving here, and after everything that had happened leading up to this moment, it felt as though that pride had multiplied several times over. Not grown louder, but heavier. More fundamental. As if it had stopped being a trait and started being something closer to the truth of what he was.

It was not as if he had lost control. Rather, it felt as if his very essence had changed.

Into something greater.

Something without equal.

He shook his head, trying to push those thoughts aside.

And the guilt alongside them.

’She deserved it. Without question.’

’No — this was simply what had to be done. She was an easy target. Taking the chance would have been the only rational thing.’

’If the same situation came again, I would make the same choice.’

’From now on, I am Ravian Veyr. I exist in a world ruled by soul power, and I need to accept that fully.’

Ryan spoke those words.

No.

Ravian spoke them now.

He looked down at his body. The changes had stopped.

He hadn’t transformed into anything sculpted or mythic. The frailty caused by long-term malnutrition had left him, but his frame wasn’t monstrous or imposing. A modest amount of muscle, a few centimeters of height — he estimated he was now somewhere around one hundred and seventy-five centimeters tall. His build was still ordinary by most measures.

”At least I should be able to take a few hits now without losing the ability to fight back,” Ravian murmured, remembering the kick Max had landed on him earlier.

Then he looked back at Emy’s corpse.

At what remained of it.

’I moved too quickly.’ The frown arrived slowly. ’The entire Black Crow Gang is still behind her, and they have almost complete control over these alleys. Getting out won’t be simple.’

He considered the options available to him.

He found only one.

Leave the area. He was not foolish enough to face a gang whose numbers and true strength he had no way of measuring.

While Ravian weighed his choices, the system — the Book of Sovereign Pride itself — displayed more.

[The foundation of the Sovereign Pride Physique has been established, replacing the host’s previous ordinary body.]

[The host’s body is now capable of breaking through the limits and obstacles others face at every stage of bodily transformation and refinement.]

[The host and the Book of Sovereign Pride have not fully awakened yet.]

[The Gate of Awakening must first be opened for complete awakening and to obtain the first ability of the Book of Sovereign Pride.]

[The second condition must be completed first.]

[Awakening Conditions:]

[1. Absorb the soul essence of a Tenth-Rank Awakened being. ✓]

[2. Absorb a Mana Stone or Soul Stone of any grade.]

[Once both conditions are fulfilled, the bearer of the Book of Sovereign Pride will become Awakened, and the first Gate of the Book of Sovereign Pride will open.]

[Note: Please complete the second condition in an isolated location to protect the host during the awakening process from any external interference that may disrupt it.]

Ravian read through the windows.

’Mana Stone or Soul Stone.’ From the previous Ravian’s memories, these were items the Awakened and other powerful individuals used to strengthen their souls. Which meant there was almost no chance he possessed one right now.

But then something occurred to him.

His gaze shifted back to Emy’s corpse. More specifically, to the leather pouch hanging from her waist.

From the previous Ravian’s memories, Emy had once mentioned — casually, the way she mentioned everything — that she was the one who carried the group’s important items whenever they were on a mission.

”Sorry, my lady. It seems I’ll have to bother you a little longer.” Ravian moved toward her with the speed his newly changed body offered and began searching through her belongings.

The moment his hand closed around the leather pouch—

[Ding!]

[Second condition fulfilled: Mid-grade Soul Stone detected.]

[Does the host wish to absorb it?]

Ravian read the message.

His heart jumped.

”There’s no way I’m this lucky.”

He opened the pouch and found a transparent stone inside. Energy moved within it in slow, shifting currents, cycling through colors that had no name. In his previous world, something like this would have been considered a work of art.

Ravian jumped once, right there in the middle of his ruined house, with complete disregard for the dead woman on the floor nearby.

A moment later, he sat down quickly on the edge of the bed, crossing his legs.

If he could gain power as quickly as possible, he had to do it now — before those people came back for him.

Was it reckless? He could feel that it was.

But could anyone truly blame him?

Not long ago, he had been a wandering soul with no body to call his own. And then, suddenly, he found himself in a world filled with living legends, mythical beasts with the power to level cities, and — most significantly — something that had reignited a passion he thought had burned out entirely.

A faint memory, barely conscious in the previous Ravian’s mind.

Immortality.

It was believed that soul power in this world could, eventually, lead a person there.

In the memories he had inherited, it appeared only as a legend.

But there was no smoke without fire.

Ravian wanted the truth. He wanted power. And he wanted it quickly.

”Begin absorption,” he said aloud, having settled himself and steadied his breathing.

[Absorption and awakening process initiated.]

A refreshing sensation spread through his body.

No — deeper than that.

He recognized it immediately. A change in his soul. He could feel it being nourished by the energy flowing out of the stone in his hand, drawn in steadily like water into dry ground.

Ravian’s expression softened as he felt his soul growing stronger with each passing second.

Unfortunately, he should have listened to his instincts.

Because then—

He heard footsteps on the stairs.