The Lord Who Levels Up by Devouring - Chapter 336

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 336. The Frost Empress
The Training Ground within Count’s Castle.
The hour when the Whitewolf Territory’s day drew to a close, beneath the crisp air of early evening.
Kai, as always,
wielded his sword alone.
In the center of the Training Ground, where the glow of sunset gradually surrendered to darkness,
Kai swung his blade, contorting his joints with each movement.
He channeled his weight into the sword along an unnatural trajectory, as though tearing through muscle itself.
A sharp crack! A sickening crunch!
Pain surged through me.
But I had to grow accustomed to it.
So long as my body no longer remained confined within the limits of humanity, pain was not a warning from my flesh—it was merely sensation.
I gritted my teeth and reset my stance.
It was at that very moment.
An unfamiliar presence pressed against my back.
I ceased my movements and turned slowly.
The entrance to the Training Ground.
Three figures emerged, silhouetted against the fading light of dusk.
Black hair at the front.
Silver hair beside them.
And at the very back… a lizard’s head?
Without thinking, I tightened my grip on my sword.
But I released the tension just as quickly.
The black hair and silver hair.
I knew far too well who these two were.
“Oh, Sir Kai!!”
The silver-haired woman, Seraphia, waved brightly with a radiant smile.
That distinctive, crystalline voice of hers.
The pain that had been tearing through me moments before seemed to wash away entirely.
“Were you in the midst of training?”
“Yes, I was.”
I straightened my posture and bowed my head.
After a brief hesitation, I asked carefully,
“But what brings the Count here?”
“I came to train as well.”
“To train… you say?”
“Yes. My brother said he would teach me.”
Seraphia’s expression was bright with anticipation.
My gaze shifted to the side.
Adrian stood there, his expression serene and composed.
Their eyes met for a fleeting moment.
“….”
“….”
Neither spoke a word.
An awkward tension hung in the air.
An indescribable emotion passed between the two of them.
Seraphia observed the space between them carefully.
Adrian on the left.
His gaze was cold and piercing.
Kai on the right.
His gaze was frigid.
‘Did they… fight…?’
…It certainly seemed that way.
Though it had been rare lately.
These two used to quarrel every single day, didn’t they?
Seraphia’s eyes darted back and forth before she forced herself to speak.
“Um… did something happen…?”
Silence.
Cold sweat beaded on Seraphia’s forehead.
“…Ah, yes… nothing happened… right?”
Silence.
Seraphia’s eyes moved frantically from side to side.
“Ah! I understand! You two are making a wager, aren’t you?”
She forced an attempt to lighten the mood.
“Whoever speaks first loses… something like that. I’m sorry if I interrupted. Haha….”
But it was useless.
Adrian and Kai.
Rather than smile, the two of them grew even more serious.
‘Oh no, what do I do!!’
Her mind raced through every possible solution.
Should I act cute?
Like when I drank that late-night beer?
Or suddenly trip to change the atmosphere?
Should I sing a song?
‘Nothing works…! None of it works…!!’
Seraphia cried out internally.
Just then.
Adrian finally spoke first.
“As you’ve heard, I came to train Seraphia.”
“Understood.”
And that was the end of it.
Kai silently withdrew to a corner of the Training Ground.
Adrian remained in place without a word.
In that moment, an odd silence fell.
“Does even an Evolution Lord read the room?”
Zemu spoke up abruptly.
Seraphia tilted her head in confusion.
Read the room?
Surely Adrian hadn’t been deferring to Kai, had he?
Zemu tossed out his words carelessly.
“Reading the room is evolutionarily disadvantageous.”
“Huh…?”
“Hiding one’s true intentions offers no evolutionary benefit—”
“Be quiet.”
Adrian dismissed Zemu’s words in an instant.
* * *
After the brief commotion passed.
Adrian stood in the center of the Training Ground, as if organizing his thoughts.
Kai continued his own training in a corner of the Training Ground.
And so an awkward peace persisted.
“Seraphia, tell me what you know about your authority.”
Adrian opened his mouth.
Seraphia blinked for a moment, then carefully spoke.
“Well… it’s an authority of the cold element. Freezing, chilling, halting… something like that, isn’t it?”
Seraphia trailed off, gauging Adrian’s reaction.
Adrian answered without any change in expression.
“That’s merely the surface phenomenon.”
“…Pardon?”
“Cold is not a simple state. It is the concept of severing the flow of energy, impeding motion, and halting structure itself.”
Seraphia said nothing.
“Therefore, your authority is not merely the theft of heat, but the power to arrest change itself.”
Seraphia stared blankly at Adrian.
‘I don’t understand a single word!!’
Energy? Motion? Structure?
She couldn’t grasp any of it.
Fortunately, Adrian added further explanation.
“Simply put, the principle of your authority is ‘annihilation.'”
Seraphia remained silent.
“Not annihilation through mere physical action. Annihilation through conceptual action.”
Seraphia said nothing.
“It is the most terrifying concept any being can possess.”
Seraphia blinked.
She still didn’t understand what he meant.
Adrian continued speaking.
“Then what do you think is the opposite of annihilation?”
Seraphia paused to consider.
Annihilation meant to vanish and cease to exist.
So the opposite would be…
“Regeneration or restoration… isn’t it?”
Adrian nodded his head.
But it didn’t mean she was correct.
“I knew you’d answer that way.”
“Am I wrong?”
“Completely wrong.”
Adrian looked toward Zemu.
“Zemu, do you possess regenerative ability?”
“I do.”
“Whose is it?”
“A troll’s.”
“Just a regular troll?”
“Yes.”
“So you didn’t acquire the Icetroll’s. Well, that makes sense—they only inhabit the Snowy Mountain, after all.”
Adrian nodded as if things had worked out for the better.
“Zemu, try receiving Seraphia’s authority once.”
“Are you telling me to become a test subject?”
“Do you mind?”
“I do.”
“Do it anyway.”
“…Then why did you even ask?”
“Just because.”
Zemu stared directly at Adrian.
Adrian shrugged and spoke.
“Scared?”
“…”
“Weren’t you the one who called Seraphia an inferior specimen?”
In that instant.
Crash, crash-crash-crash!!
A tremendous roar erupted.
In one corner of the Training Ground.
Kai’s blade swung with fury burning within it.
Adrian and Zemu glanced at each other simultaneously, then locked eyes once more.
“Fine, I understand.”
Zemu extended his arm.
Seraphia cried out in alarm.
“W-wait a moment?! You’re really going through with this?!”
“Yes.”
“B-but…!”
Still, Seraphia found herself unable to act hastily.
No matter how you looked at it.
Freezing his arm solid without warning—
“Do it quickly.”
Zemu’s face twisted into a grimace.
“I’d prefer to minimize wasting time on inferior specimens.”
“….”
“The Evolution Lord is quite generous indeed. Spending time on such a lowly creature.”
Seraphia’s expression hardened.
Adrian spoke.
“Show me.”
Without hesitation, Seraphia raised her hand.
Zemu continued his rambling.
“Well, if this experiment proves its meaninglessness, that too would be an evolutionary benefit—”
Crackle, crackle, crackle—!!
Zemu’s arm froze solid in an instant.
“W-what—?!?!”
The frigid cold did not stop at his arm.
It spread to his shoulder in a heartbeat.
“N-no, wait—!!”
Crackle, crackle, crackle—!!
“Aaaahhhhh!!”
Zemu leaped into the air with a violent bound.
His entire arm shattered with a sharp crack.
It fell away in countless frozen shards.
“W-what is this—!!”
Zemu stared wide-eyed at his own shoulder.
His arm, completely severed and gone.
Had he hesitated even a moment longer, his shoulder would have been consumed as well.
Only fragments of shattered ice scattered across the ground.
“T-this is impossible—!!!”
“Zemu, try regenerating your arm.”
It was Adrian’s command.
Zemu inhaled sharply.
“Regeneration… it’s not working…???”
Zemu’s eyes widened in shock.
As if he couldn’t believe it.
Zemu kept glancing down at his shoulder.
“Cellular activity itself has… stopped… How is this even…???”
Zemu’s lips trembled violently.
Then Adrian spoke.
“This is it, Seraphia—your authority is Erasure.”
“What, what did you say?!”
“You erase things as if they never existed in the first place.”
“Then, then that means…!!”
“Therefore, regeneration and divine power are meaningless before your authority.”
Adrian’s expression darkened slightly.
Perhaps recalling some unpleasant memory.
Adrian swallowed once before continuing.
“The opposite of your authority is ‘Creation.'”
Creation.
The power to bring something from nothing.
Extinction.
The power to reduce something to nothing.
“Then, then this inferior specimen-!”
Zemu’s body shuddered.
His reptilian eyes darted left and right.
Cold sweat dripped profusely.
“No, no… Does this mean this inferior one has been… biologically extinguished…?”
Zemu studied Seraphia’s expression intently.
His tone had become formal and respectful.
Adrian let out a soft chuckle and answered.
“Yes. Zemu, your troll regeneration ability itself has been erased.”
“Good heavens!!”
Zemu staggered.
Unable to steady himself, overwhelmed by the magnitude of the shock.
“Then my regeneration ability…?”
“No longer exists.”
Zemu collapsed to his knees.
His arms hung limply at his sides as his vacant eyes stared into the void.
* * *
The Frost Lord’s authority [P].
Primordial [P] rank—superior to Transcendent [T].
And the roar of the lord who had annihilated T-Rex was of transcendent grade.
In other words, the Primordial was of lord rank or higher.
It could be said to be the highest rank in existence.
‘So that’s why T-Rex was so submissive to Seraphia in my past life.’
Even if the Beast Lord, T-Rex, possessed every genetic factor in the world.
It meant nothing before the Frost Lord, Seraphia’s annihilation.
It wasn’t just T-Rex.
The Immortal Lord, The Abyss Lord, The Death Lord.
Every lord except The Darkness Lord watched The Frost Lord’s every move.
They didn’t even dare approach the Northern Region that The Frost Lord governed.
Had they done otherwise.
They would be despairing with faces like Zemu’s—as if the world had ended.
“Ah, no… my only restoration mechanism… disappearing….”
Why did he have to provoke her in the first place?
A mere legion commander at best.
A newly born legion commander at that, barely past infancy.
And he dared to defy a lord.
To defy The Frost Lord no less—I had to admit, his audacity and nerve were commendable.
“My evolution… has ended….”
…Though only his audacity and nerve, mind you.
I shook my head once and spoke to Zemu.
“Zemu, stop your pathetic whining. Go hunt some Icetrols on Snowy Mountain.”
Fortunately(?), the ability Zemu lost was the regeneration of a common troll.
All I needed to do was extract the superior regeneration of an Icetroll [B+] and grant it to him.
“Huh. Huhuh….”
But it seemed he couldn’t hear my words.
Perhaps the shock had been too severe.
His consciousness had fled, leaving him utterly vacant.
‘I’ll just leave him be. He’ll come to his senses on his own.’
I turned my attention away from Zemu.
When I turned my head, Seraphia was tilting hers side to side in confusion.
Her expression was blank, her face bewildered.
I couldn’t fathom why she was like this.
“In any case, Seraphia, your authority can be strengthened through the expansion of concepts.”
* * *
Adrian’s words suddenly reached her ears.
Seraphia tilted her head again in confusion and asked back.
“Expansion of concepts…?”
“Yes. Your authority grows as deep as your thoughts.”
“…?”
“Take an example. You just erased Zemu’s arm.”
Adrian pointed at Zemu with his finger.
Zemu knelt in despair.
I hadn’t bothered to control my strength in that moment of anger.
“I… I’m obsolete now….”
There was something pitiful about it.
Adrian, on the other hand, showed no concern whatsoever.
“But that was merely a physical body part—a result that only affected tangible, visible matter.”
“Mm.”
“Reconsider the direction of your power.”
Adrian continued slowly.
“What if you erased the ‘memory’ that the arm ever existed?”
Flinch!
Zemu’s body trembled.
“Or what if you erased the very ‘concept’ of an arm itself?”
Flinch!!
Zemu’s body shook violently.
“If you did that, Zemu’s arm wouldn’t simply disappear—it would be as though it never existed at all.”
Scramble!!
Zemu hastily retreated backward.
His eyes, wide as saucers, were filled with indescribable terror.
Fortunately (or perhaps unfortunately), Adrian paid no attention to Zemu this time either.
“This power extends beyond mere legion commanders… no, beyond Zemu as an existence.”
Primordial energy, mana.
Time and space.
Nature and the laws of physics.
“Everything within the realm of concepts halts and perishes beneath your hands.”
A power truly divine in nature.
Seraphia stared blankly down at her own palms.
‘…Did I really possess such power all along?’

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