Blows fell by their dozens in a heartbeat. Whatever technique Tyson used didn’t just increase heat; it also raised Tyson’s physical strength, speed, and reaction time. He asked the brand about it, but it reported that the information was undefined. It led him to ask why they would have different techniques, and he gained a lot of information about brands.

 

“Victory in 27 moves,” Vergil said, already envisioning how to end the fight. Tyson used a predictable, if powerful, boxing style. That would be great if he didn’t take time to laugh. 10,000 lumens of golden light gathered around Tyson, and his laughter filled the air. In less than 27 moves, Tyson, in between gouts of Tyson’s laughter, Vergil would point his fingers at Tyson’s face and unleash his terror blade.

 

“Good luck with that,” Tyson said.

 

Vergil flicked a finger and slammed Tyson into a nearby wall.

 

The laughing gold glowing man looked stunned.

 

Vergil lifted a finger and pointed it down. Tyson didn’t have telekinesis resistance and slammed back to the cave floor hard.  

 

Of course, he didn’t. Tyson may have stored psi but didn’t know how to use it or even look into his brand to inform himself.

 

Psions didn’t use telekinesis on each other because they had natural defenses. Vergil doubted they used it even on humans. It was mainly for utility.

 

“Any enemy can be defeated with the right approach. However, resisting telekinesis with ki is difficult when you haven’t practiced it.” Vergil said.

 

Tyson struggled against Vergil’s telekinesis after expending vast amounts of ki for his technique. It took time and cultivation to restore ki. By using it up to power up, his technique Tyson was using up a valuable resource.

 

“There was a reason why I used those psions.” The mass of psi Tyson had stored was quickly turned into ki.

 

Vergil sighed and pointed down harder.

 

Tyson was pushed further into the rock wall.

 

“More ki won’t help you, but it was a good effort,” Vergil said.

 

At the end of the day, Tyson wasn’t that strong. So he practiced only ki cultivation, making himself a gas engine with no car or driver. He was missing whole dimensions of power.

 

Vergil was more surprised he didn’t have to use his terror bade than anything. Tyson had been defeated by basic telekinesis that the weakest psion could have thrown off. Gwen would have considered his attempts to use telekinesis cute, if anything.

 

He felt all the ki flow into Tyson’s technique. The man started laughing uncontrollably, and his skin turned from brown to gold.

 

Vergil tried to use telekinesis again to no effect. Tyson’s new state protected him from direct psionic manifestations or possibly only Vergil’s weak telekinesis.

 

“How long can you hold that up?” Vergil said.

 

Golden Tyson continued to laugh uncontrollably. The heat in the room shot up rapidly. The psions in the room blacked and curled in on themselves like ticks under a match.

 

Vergil struck first, smashing golden Tyson into the cave wall. Molten rock was left where Tyson stood.

 

He felt the skin of his knuckles melt and pop from the sheer heat rolling off of Tyson.

 

Vergil shot off using levitation towards the tunnel leading out of the cave. Golden Tyson followed him, flying with jets of gold under his feet.

 

He dodged punches and clawed as golden eagle talons leaped from Golden Tyson’s form and sliced at Vergil between punches. Burns littered Vergil’s body as they flew out of the cave system.

Out of the cave, Vergil landed, devoted all his telekinesis to protection, and picked up two rocks.

 

“What are you going to do with rocks?” Golden Tyson mocked.

 

Vergil shot forward and hit him in the face with the first rock. Golden Tyson fell back into the second rock.

 

After he ripped more rocks from the ground, he went in for another wave of attacks. With every blow, Vergil upped the power of his attacks a little. Even after suffering the damage, Vergil was confident he would survive. On the other hand, Golden Tyson wasn’t looking good; he looked like Rocky after his first fight with Apollo.

 

Vergil, on the other hand, looked like a half-melted man. But that was ok; he would survive and grow even stronger.

 

He turned his head to the side and saw Jacob. But, unfortunately, the man wasn’t here in the flesh; otherwise, he would be melting.

 

A quick blow from Jacob disabused Vergil of that notion. His head turned to the side before he punched out at Jacob. His blow passed through Jacob’s body then another blow hit him. Fortunately, the attacks were relatively weak; otherwise, he might not be ok.

 

“You can’t beat us, Vergil; you’re by yourself.” At that moment, Golden Tyson fell out of his golden form. He fell on his ass and puked his guts out.

 

“I think it's only two, maybe three of you, and the others are off doing their own things,” Vergil said, picked up a rock, and tossed it at Tyson. A hole opened on the man’s shoulder, large enough to pass two fingers through without touching the sides.

 

Blood poured out of him and evaporated in the still-hot air. Jacob quickly moved and glowed green before healing him. There was no specialized healer, only Jacob, or he was a scout with healing techniques.

 

As he stared at him, he felt good knowing that the main group had split.

 

“So, was the sarcophagus really in the Su Clan treasury?” Vergil asked.

 

He already had a gun, slammed a fresh magazine, and pointed it at Jacob.

 

 “You’ve seen how well you can hit me,” Jacob said.

 

“Before, you weren’t healing anyone,” Vergil said.

 

Jacob froze long enough for Vergil to decide this action was right. It was good to know.

 

“Kill me, and who is going to heal you?” Jacob asked.

 

“I will live,” Vergil said.

 

He didn’t want to give his techniques away if he could help it. Every technique he kept hidden was a trump card he could unleash later. Then again, slicing them apart with terror blade would be easy. It was gratifying to feel Jacob’s fear confirm his intuition.

 

The fear bubbling up from Tyson was also useful for further refining his Lord of Terror technique. Compared to the apes, Tyson was worth around 1000 fearful apes. Vergil hypothesized that it had something to do with their prior relationship.

 

Vergil reached out with telekinesis and took ahold of Jacob.

 

He picked him up and held him in place. Jacob struggled but couldn’t break Vergil’s telekinetic hold. It was childish but felt cathartic, like draining the puss from an infected wound. He tossed Jacob on the ground and walked away.

 

After Burst dropped, he had to move with telekinesis. It was a good thing the burns had already ruined his nerves, but they would hurt when they regenerated.

 

“Wait, was that really it after all of that?” Jacob said.

 

“Thank you for the lead on the sarcophagus; getting that to me is sure to earn you some contribution points,” Vergil said.

 

Vergil said and activated Black Goat’s Embryo. He gasped when the healing juices of eldritch embryonic fluids fell over his wounds. He felt some of his face peel off and fall on the ground, black and burnt. Vergil knew he wouldn’t be alive if he had a normal human body. Taking in the flesh of Nyarlathotep had changed him along with his cultivation.

 

As his body started to go through the long recovery process, he felt raw, like an uncooked steak. More dead skin fell off him as he stumbled back towards the cave.

 

“Why go back? They are monsters; no matter what they may say, that is their nature. This world was just like ours until they were destroyed. Even the moon was corrupted by them.” Jacob said.

 

“It's better than living in the undercity where rats are the size of cars and roaches stand seven feet tall and own human butcheries.” An unneeded voice said.

 

Lily stood with her hands on her hips, wearing her black leotard and lime green tentacle hair in a ponytail. Her ki was subdued, but it was clearly the initial stage prenatal realm.

 

“Why don’t you boys come work for me instead of living on the dangerous streets?” Lily asked.

 

“I’m game. Is this your girl?” Tyson asked.

 

“Are you going to try and use her to insight me to fight someone for talking to her?” Vergil asked.

 

“That is oddly specific,” Jacob said and chuckled.

 

All three laughed while Vergil only frowned and glared at Tyson. It was an event that didn’t mean much to Tyson but was very important to Vergil.

 

“That’s right, humans conduct tournament mating. Should I leave so, Vergil can dispose of the both of you to secure mating rights?” Lily said.

 

Her voice was a little hypnotic. She wasn’t quite transmitting her words, but it was close.

 

Vergil thought about killing Jacob and Tyson, but they would already be dead if he wanted to. What Vergil wanted was petty prankish revenge for the most part. While he could kill them and get away with it, that wasn’t his intention. That didn’t mean he wanted to team up with them.

 

“Let’s not get crazy,” Vergil said.

 

He heard Tyson sigh.

 

“How many contribution points do you think we will get?” Jacob asked.

 

He thought about it sincerely for a few breaths before shaking his head.

 

“We are working for a Demon named Mandela,” Vergil said.

 

“Then why bother?” Jacob asked.

 

Vergil understood it from a distance. Jacob had a wife and three kids. It had already been months, and time was still ticking away. How long would it take them to get the Sarcophagus? If they got it, then how many contribution points was it worth? After that, how many missions until they earn enough points to get home? How long would they need to wait between missions? Would the demon Mandela remember that they were supposed to earn contribution points?

 

They could return, and the demon could ask them what contribution points. It made all the sense in the world to the shapeshifting demon.

 

Vergil found a quiet room and slowly healed. The Black Goat’s Embryo sealed itself around him and began to sprout small black limbs. He felt the technique go from low to mid as they spread out. After many uses, it had ranked up.

 

At mid-rank, it sealed him within a sac to hold the fluid inside, grew a wooden shell, and stretched out small tree limbs.

 

It was slow, but his body recovered bit by bit. Strength returned to his limbs, and torn muscles were stitched back together stronger. His body shed burnt flesh and grew new skin while recovering from the damage. Within the embryonic fluid, he felt his vital energy go through a transformation.

 

Dense energy flowed through his body as he recovered stronger. He felt the shackle separating him from the advanced stage of prenatal body refinement loosen and shake. More vital energy poured through his body until he took control of it and formed a key. He used the key to open his shackle, and vital energy erupted through him greater than before.

 

In an instant, he advanced, growing much stronger. He could already feel it; his physical strength had increased massively. Every cell in his body overflowed with vital energy.

 

If before his intermediate stage, gave him 2 glasses of water worth of vital energy advanced upgraded him to a 3. While that didn’t sound like much, having multiple cultivation paths had multiplicative effects.

 

His water without techniques was much greater than merely 3 glasses. Pure physical power was multiplied by his 3 ki glasses of water and 4 psychic glasses of water. That meant his total glasses of water equaled 36. To put it in perspective, Tyson and Jacob each only had 3 glasses of ki. If he could bring all his strength to bear, he would obliterate them, and adding techniques would be overkill. That was the difference between using 3 paths of cultivation compared to 1.

 

In practice, he could pull out around 8 to 9 glasses and with burst 24 to 27 at 3% and 80 to 90 at 10%. The problem was control over the various energies gained from three paths. He was juggling 3 different energy sources and didn’t have enough combat experience to get the best use out of them. So, he would have to work on that.