Let's take a closer look at Luz's body for a moment. The decentralized swarm consciousness is slowly being invaded more and more by a group of parasites fighting for control of the hive.

As mentioned in one of the previous chapters, the parasites in Luz's mana core had developed far more because of the mana in which they lived. Living in mana stimulated their mental development to a far greater extent compared to their brethren outside the mana core.

Previously, the five parasites could send strong signals that interfered with the communication of the decentralized hive or pushed their desires to the forefront, but now it has changed further.

[From now on, the parasites in the core are called the kings.]

By now, they could command in which direction the parasites should evolve.

The following dilemma existed in every parasite hive. A parasite could focus on individualism, the magical plane, or the material plane.

The Individual level is the level of intelligence. With intelligence comes power over the decentralized network. Only an individual can demand more resources than he needs to survive from his brethren. Those following such a path have more evolutionary options and evolved the fastest. Intelligence is also the area that influences magical and biological evolution.

Those focussing on the magical plane usually increase their mana capacity. Other abilities that get boosted are mana purification and mana regeneration.

Generally, focusing on this level would also lead to mental and physical advancement due to mana. But kings take their toll, which is why this point is obstructed in the hive.

The few following the biological evolutionary aspects had the highest resistance to environmental changes. Also, hives focussing on these evolutions could survive for a certain amount of time outside the host, allowing them to find a new host after the death of their former host.
The regeneration of the host, as well as their reproduction speed, are boosted.

A decentralized hive focuses on all aspects, resulting in an even evolution. Specialization generally does not take place.
However, in Luz mana core, the kings chose the evolution path of the other cells. As expected, they were ordered to focus on either a more biological or a magical evolution.

In the end, Luz is the one who benefits the most from such an evolution. His body will be nourished. But the question remains when the conflicts between our host Luz and the parasites will arise.
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In a distant place, deep inside a dungeon, a young boy was running through a dark tunnel as the sound of water droplets echoed through the tunnel. He just shuddered at what he had done earlier.

Sure, he had killed someone before, but it's easier to convince yourself that a rapist deserves to be killed. Killing a child who grabbed your leg is another matter.

Slowly Gab walked through the tunnels while his left hand remained against the wall. His other hand tightly clutched a large bone, ready to strike at anything moving.

Rotting corpses and skeletons were seen left and right on the floor from time to time. In hopes of finding anything useful to loot, Gab forced himself to examine each of them. Except for a dagger and some tattered clothes, he did not find anything on them.

"Other people have already looted the dead here," Gab sighed before moving on, cleaning his dirty hand on the clothes of one of the dead.

''To be honest, I'm unsure if I want to find a group of people. On the one hand, it would be nice to have allies in a place like this, but on the other hand, I'm not sure if I can trust anyone here," Gab muttered to himself,
while kicking a stone in boredom.

The more bodies he saw, the more confused Gab was. On the one hand, it looked like some bodies had been murdered by other people, and sometimes they had injuries that could only have been caused by animals. The strangest was the bodies that had no injuries but were still dead.

"I wish I ended up somewhere else," Gab muttered to himself as he continued to wander.
Suddenly he heard footsteps, and Gab decided to hide behind one of the entrances. Two girls were running through the corridor while screeching for help.
His first instinct was to join the duo, but after thinking for a second, followed by the thought: 'Why? From what are they running from?'

A group consisting of 10 humanoid creatures ran after them and slowly jumped on them.

Their screams were haunting Gab, and as he watched their limbs getting torn from their bodies piece by piece.

'Another sign that I am weak. I should have starved to death in front of the dungeon rather than given myself such horrors. Thank god that I didn't try to play the white knight,' went through Gab's head as he sighed.

Watching these former people behave like animals, he noticed that they all had red eyes. Some of them had gems sticking out of their bodies. Others were deformed and had like three arms or a third eye.

"Strange. At first glance, these creatures look like humans. But somehow, they are anything except humans. They don't even communicate with each other in any kind of language." Gab muttered quietly to himself as he watched the human-like creatures tearing off the women's shrieking heads and drinking their blood.

One of these monsters walked in Gab's direction, getting closer and closer.

Gab held his breath as he heard the loud and deep inhales and exhales within a meter distance. It didn't take long for it to disappear, and Gab could breathe a sigh of relief.

"What kind of goddamn place did I end up in," Gab muttered to himself as he watched the group of monsters slowly dragging these corpses towards the entrance of the tower.

'I see. I see that's why I fell on so many corpses. It also explains why the child was hiding there in all places.'

Their screams made sure that everyone knew where they were.

'You know what. I better fuck off somewhere else before these creatures find me,' were the last words that went through Gab's head before he continued running.

It didn't take long till he found a group of people around his age that was made up of four members. Gab decided to follow them in the dark and listen to them to see if he should approach such people.

The group cursed quietly, and one could hear names sobbing at regular intervals. They consisted of two guys and two girls, and all of them were better equipped and armed than himself. Each of them carried crossbows and was also equipped with melee weapons.

As he continued spying on the group, he suddenly felt a knife pressing against his throat as a hand covered his mouth.
'Shit, I'm screwed,' he thought to himself, as he felt scared.

"Yo, I found a little spy," he heard a female voice calling out to the group.

"Who the hell sent another one. I'm sick of spies," an angry voice shouted back.
Before Gab knew it, he was grabbed by the collar by someone a head taller before getting punched in the face.

Gab yelped as his opponent dragged his sword along the ground as he approached him. He closed himself to stand up while holding the big bone with both hands.

"I've never seen such a badly equipped spy. They really must be desperate," one commented.

"I'm not a spy," Gab stuttered as he decided to lunge at the guy with his bone.

The latter shattered his bone with a simple sword strike before kicking him in the stomach. Gab fell to the ground and gasped.

"A bad spy who has no idea how to even fight properly. I'm beginning to doubt if he's a spy," the man laughed as he slowly pressed his sword against Gab's throat.

"So, are you a spy?" he asked Gab coldly.

"Of course not. I don't even know where I am. I only want to leave this god-forgotten place," Gab quickly replied as tears formed on his face.

'I hope I'm not pissing my pants right now.'

With a sigh, the guy replied: "Me too, man, Me too."