The Lord Who Levels Up by Devouring - Chapter 297

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————

Chapter 297. Current Ruler vs. Former Ruler (1)
The ultimate life form.
An evolutionary competition where the path to that pinnacle opens.
Either T-Rex absorbs my essence.
Or I devour T-Rex’s heart.
One of us gets consumed here. And the survivor advances toward ultimate evolution.
I rapidly retraced my memories from my past life.
I grasped the characteristics of the Beast Lord, T-Rex.
First, the biological evolution abilities I possessed.
T-Rex had them all as well.
I could tell just from witnessing the regeneration moments ago.
A speed and efficiency rivaling ultra-regeneration itself.
In other words, T-Rex possessed superior, more refined and engineered versions of my abilities.
And approximately 67 million years of time.
T-Rex had absorbed the abilities of every living creature in existence.
The Beast Lord, T-Rex.
The apex of evolution spanning 67 million years.
The very embodiment of the Continent’s ecosystem itself.
Merely a creature wearing the guise of a dragon—a ‘species incarnate’.
T-Rex moved.
As the hyper-compressed tail lashed out, the ground exploded.
Boom! Boom! Boom! Crash!!
Rising dust and debris obscured my vision in an instant.
‘…It vanished?’
T-Rex had concealed itself.
The T-Rex that had been right before my eyes disappeared without a trace.
I rapidly checked every direction.
Up, down, left, right, front, back.
…Nothing.
In that moment, my spatial awareness screamed a warning in my mind.
‘Below!’
I reflexively threw my body backward.
And simultaneously.
─Crash!!
T-Rex burst through the ground from below.
Massive jaws surged upward as if tearing through the earth itself.
Had I been even slightly slower, my entire body would have been shredded.
More than anything.
‘…I didn’t see it burrowing underground at all.’
The concealment had been that swift and flawless.
That said.
T-Rex wouldn’t have been able to burrow 10km Underground where Fafnir was sealed without good reason.
“KYAAAAAAAGH!”
T-Rex unleashed a piercing roar.
Her massive spine splayed wide open.
Thousands of spines erupted from within like a barrage of bullets.
Patter-patter-patter-PATTER!!
My entire field of vision turned pitch black.
Evasion was impossible.
I shielded my face with both arms.
I trusted in the defensive power of Rigid Body Fusion [E], which transcended Rigid Body Transformation [U] in the Valley of Kardun.
Thunk-thunk-thunk-thunk-THUNK! Patter-pat!
The cascading spines embedded themselves in my body.
Some ricocheted off, while others burrowed into my flesh.
But the penetration wasn’t deep.
I could confirm it once more.
Epic [E] was a tier of ability capable of resisting even a Beast Lord.
I trusted in Rigid Body Fusion [E] and charged forward without hesitation.
T-Rex remained unfazed.
In an instant, vapor-like gas erupted from T-Rex’s entire body.
Hisssssss─!!
Something roiled within T-Rex’s interior like machinery on the verge of overload.
T-Rex’s heartbeat accelerated dramatically.
The muscles beneath her skin rippled and swelled.
Metabolic acceleration.
An enhanced version of such a mechanism had manifested.
Perhaps.
An ultra-biological acceleration ability that rivaled Dragon Blood Explosive Current [L].
In an instant.
T-Rex vanished before my eyes.
Whoosh!
Her pointed tail hurtled toward my abdomen.
‘Fast!’
The thought arrived a beat too late.
But my body was already responding.
My nervous system of Nerve Hyper-Adaptation [A] reacted of its own accord before I could even become conscious of it.
Reaction speed marginally inferior to Predator [M].
Yet because I wasn’t consumed by instinct, it could be called constant Predator [M].
I immediately twisted my body.
Or rather, my body twisted immediately of its own accord.
T-Rex’s tail, meant to pierce through my abdomen, sliced through empty air.
In that instant, T-Rex’s front claws flew toward my face.
My body reacted first again.
My head ducked down.
The claws grazed my cheek.
But T-Rex’s follow-up attack ultimately tore into my left shoulder.
Crunch!
The defensive power of Rigid Body Fusion [E] shattered helplessly.
Epic [E] merely resists against a Lord.
It wasn’t a skill tier capable of nullifying such power.
My left shoulder, completely torn away.
My body’s balance collapsed in an instant.
T-Rex didn’t miss that opening.
Burrowing deeper into me, T-Rex drew up killing intent.
‘This won’t do.’
I cannot keep pace with T-Rex’s speed and strength.
This is no opponent to underestimate.
This is no opponent to measure casually.
‘I’m going all out.’
There was no time to check my Sanity value.
Without hesitation, I activated Berserk [A+].
◆Consuming 6,400 Sanity.
◆Berserk [?] is applied at rank [A+].
◆Transcendent Skill, Primordial Metabolic Amplification [A+] acquired!!
And once more.
◆Ultra-Fusion Skill, Dragon Blood Explosive Torrent [L] activated!!
My heartbeat accelerated explosively.
Thump-thump-thump-thump!!
Every cell in my body burned through its stored energy.
Muscle fibers glowing crimson.
Nervous system surging beyond its limits.
Metabolism transcending combustion, hurtling toward detonation.
Whoosh!
I moved before T-Rex.
I evaded T-Rex’s burrowing attack.
With Regeneration [B+], I restored my left shoulder.
And without pause.
I struck T-Rex’s flank.
Boom-crash!
An impact sound of an entirely different magnitude erupted.
T-Rex gasped, choking on her breath.
The impact sent T-Rex staggering backward.
My Dragon Burst Torrent[L] was different now.
It was because of Rilselenium’s energy.
As a result, Dragon Burst Torrent[L] rampaged as if ignoring the limits of metabolism, amplifying my final stats not by x12 multiplier but by ‘x30 multiplier’.
Each stat surpassed the hundred-thousand threshold.
Law Breaker.
It was exactly what the name implied.
‘I’m stronger now.’
I now held the advantage even against a lord.
I twisted my waist and threw a punch with all my might.
And.
T-Rex couldn’t react.
Crunch!
T-Rex’s streamlined head snapped backward.
I’d intended to shatter her skull in one blow.
But it didn’t shatter.
T-Rex’s exoskeleton was the pinnacle of tens of millions of years of evolution and countless bioengineering marvels.
‘Ranged attacks are meaningless.’
I couldn’t deliver a fatal blow using methods like Dragon Burst[E].
Just wasting calories.
Only direct strikes channeling Rilselenium’s energy could finish T-Rex.
T-Rex’s skull took the hit and she was launched into the air.
Her unbalanced body crashed into the ground multiple times.
Had she suffered a concussion?
T-Rex seemed to have lost consciousness.
Though I hadn’t shattered her skull, the impact had landed squarely.
‘I have the advantage.’
Confident now, I charged forward.
As expected.
T-Rex couldn’t react.
Or rather, she appeared to have lost consciousness.
I gathered the explosively surging Rilselenium energy and unleashed a barrage of punches.
Boom-boom-boom-boom-boom!!
The relentless barrage tore into T-Rex.
T-Rex’s exoskeleton ruptured.
T-Rex’s muscles were shredded.
Yet she didn’t fall.
Each time her exoskeleton ruptured and muscles tore, her body regenerated.
A regeneration far more efficient and precise than my own Regeneration[B+].
No, it wasn’t merely regeneration at work.
‘She’s adapting.’
Adaptation.
One of the Beast Lord’s signature powers.
The Beast Lord, T-Rex, possessed the genetic code of all living creatures, granting her perfect immunity to every environment, circumstance, and phenomenon.
When struck, she restructured her response mechanism at the genetic level.
As a result.
The same attack never worked twice.
Simply put, she was immune to all damage.
It was a derivative ability of Selection Pressure [S+]—precisely predicting the direction of evolution and actively adjusting it.
The only limitation was that Rillenium’s energy was so overwhelming that her adaptation proceeded slowly.
‘Yet she’s still adapting, bit by bit.’
Therefore, there were only two ways to kill the Beast Lord, T-Rex.
1. Strike her with an attack she hasn’t yet adapted to, dealing instant death.
2. Kill her with an attack that cannot be adapted to at all.
The first method unfortunately just failed.
Then the second.
I needed to deliver a fatal blow using an attack that adaptation itself couldn’t overcome.
◆ Fusion Skill, Single-Molecule Blade [S] activated!
Craaaash!
T-Rex was shredded like tissue paper.
Even T-Rex’s skin, layered with countless bioengineered modifications including Dragon scales, was nothing but tissue paper before the Single-Molecule Blade [S].
And the Single-Molecule Blade [S] was a fusion skill infused with the concepts of Extremity [M] and Infinity [M].
Since life was born.
No living being had ever comprehended infinity.
Not even T-Rex, the first Dragon, could reach it.
No, she wasn’t even permitted to approach it.
Therefore, it was an ability and concept that could not be adapted to.
If adaptation was a derivative ability of T-Rex’s Selection Pressure [S+].
Then combination skills and fusion skills were derivative abilities of my Predation [S+].
Predation [S+] and Selection Pressure [S+].
Me and T-Rex.
We differed only in our evolutionary forms; ultimately, neither of us could claim superiority over the other.
But.
I Alone Level Up [EX].
The Successor’s Will [EX].
By Ian filling the gaps in my Predation [S+], I could evolve higher and reach further.
* * *
Craaaaaash!
T-Rex’s entire body was lacerated.
Each time, T-Rex experienced a cascade of devastation.
…I couldn’t believe it.
It made no sense.
My exoskeleton was harder than anything in existence—surpassing even a Dragon’s scales.
It was a perfected armor forged from tens of millions of years of evolution and the combined biological structures of hundreds of millions of species.
Yet it was being shredded like tissue paper?
…It made no sense.
Such a thing didn’t exist in this world.
If it did, I would know of it.
And even if something like that existed.
‘I can’t even adapt to it?’
This truly made no sense.
More precisely, it *shouldn’t* make sense.
My eyes flickered with bewilderment for an instant.
In that moment—CRACKLE—!!
My body was torn open once more.
I gritted my teeth and recalibrated my adaptation algorithm.
I rewrote my genetic code.
And then—CRACKLE—!!
Again, the same location tore in exactly the same way.
…I couldn’t comprehend it.
Why was I sustaining identical damage in the same manner again?
What was the reason?
How was this even possible?
…I simply couldn’t understand.
At least regeneration still worked.
It was merely a simple attack that tore skin and exoskeleton without any special properties.
Yet I couldn’t believe it.
I couldn’t comprehend it either.
And that wasn’t all.
I couldn’t counter it… at all.
I couldn’t adapt… whatsoever.
And an attack I couldn’t counter or adapt to could lead me to death.
…That couldn’t happen.
Yet I instinctively sensed death approaching.
Primordial terror bloomed from the depths of my heart.
Eons of evolution to survive.
An evolution that even nature’s great extinctions couldn’t break was now bowing.
“KYAAAAAAAA—!!”
I hurled my body forward with a scream-like roar.
Adrian didn’t let the opportunity slip away.
He pursued relentlessly, tracking T-Rex’s every movement to its end.
Persistent.
No—ruthless.
T-Rex lashed her tail wildly at Adrian.
The tail tore through the air in indiscriminate arcs, yet failed to complete its trajectory.
Crack!
It was severed cleanly.
Despite wielding hundreds of tons of destructive force, the tail proved powerless.
Yet it wasn’t without purpose.
A momentary opening.
T-Rex seized that fleeting instant.
She released a virulent toxic current from her entire body.
Poison.
An asymmetric weapon capable of nullifying weight class differences in a single stroke.
Even if physical specs were inferior, poison could inflict catastrophic damage.
But Adrian remained unmoved.
He possessed toxin immunity.
Yet it mattered not.
After all, it would merely be a natural immunity.
T-Rex’s poison was no ordinary toxin.
A synthetic venom engineered by combining and designing the biological toxins of millions of species throughout history.
It even contained toxins from extinct species.
No natural immune system could withstand it.
Precisely because this toxin didn’t exist in nature, no immune system capable of countering it could possibly exist.
A faint sound.
Adrian halted his advance.
He’d sensed the danger of the poison.
After a moment of contemplation, he retreated his body backward.
T-Rex finally couldn’t catch her breath—
Generating poison consumed tremendous energy as a high-level biological response.
It devoured dozens of times more biological resources than regeneration.
This was precisely why, despite poison’s biological advantages, so few creatures in nature possessed it.
Therefore, an enormous amount of energy was being consumed now, but there was no other method available—
“Krraaagh—!!”
Blood erupted from T-Rex’s mouth.
A sign that her internal organs had suffered damage.
…It was the first time.
She’d been driven into such a desperate position.
T-Rex narrowed her eyes and fixed her gaze upon Adrian.
He was clearly just an insignificant human.
Though the genetic factors within him were diverse.
Yet his essence was ultimately that of a human.
The weakest link in the ecosystem.
And T-Rex knew this well.
In ages past, when dinosaurs ruled the earth, mammals had cowered in underground burrows.
Pitiful creatures that fed on insects and vermin.
In other words, mammals were a species designed by nature to be prey.
Yet now that very mammal was hunting T-Rex, the apex predator itself.
It was utterly incomprehensible—
‘…A rival.’
The worst rival I’ve ever faced, at that.
T-Rex was no longer the predator.
Pride must be cast aside.
The law of the jungle.
Within this law, pride was utterly useless.
Life isn’t won by the strongest.
It’s won by those who survive.
‘Awaken, my Beast Legion!!’
T-Rex immediately activated the collective consciousness.
A vast wave of consciousness rippled across the entire territory in an instant.
Boom, boom, boom boom—!!
Roooaaarrr!!
The beasts emerged, shaking the earth itself.
Thousands upon thousands of them.
—Hunt! Tear and destroy! And offer this human’s genetic code to me!!
As T-Rex’s command fell, the entire legion moved as one.
And then Adrian spoke.
“All of you, stop.”
And the legion stopped?
* * *
“…What?”
T-Rex’s eyes went wide with shock.
Something utterly impossible had just occurred.
‘This actually works.’
…I never thought this would actually work.
Even though I possess T-Rex’s genetic factors, T-Rex herself stands right before me.
So naturally, I assumed her commands would take priority.
‘This actually works.’
…I really never thought this would actually work.

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————