Bro, I'm not an Undead!



Replicus paced around Araeyn for a few dozen minutes, analyzing and dissecting everything about him.

The Apostle's stats, according to what he could see, made him more or less equal to that of a high-end Master Stager with a very high-quality blue core, and even more than that.

In fact, whether or not he was technically stronger didn't matter.

What made Araeyn fearsome in terms of physical strength alone, was the fact that his raw attacks had the same properties that Null Life Essence at its base had.

Genuine Incarnations wouldn't work against even Araeyn's physical attacks. If he got a very good hit in, he could probably start to mess up his opponent's coordination of mana altogether, since Null Life Essence was also very invasive. It could pour into things very easily and most importantly, unnoticed.

It annoyed Replicus more and more how his Apostles were just that good at everything Null Life.

He too could accomplish this feat in his Penetrator form – quite frankly Masters weren't a problem for him to deal with if they relied too much on their Incarnations – however, he couldn't do it as easily, since he focused on both mana and Null Life Essence.

Araeyn's experience requirement also seemed to be in the form of Null Life Essence instead of cumulative mana experience. Replicus guessed that like him, the Apostle would collect Null Life Essence from dead foes, only, for him, it was what he needed to grow from Tier to Tier.

'That's going to be a hefty price to pay...' Replicus thought.

Indeed it was.

In his experience, Null Life Essence for every species was fixed, which made the journey to Araeyn's growth a tough one.

Replicus pulled out a set of armor from his storage and was about to hand it to Araeyn when...

"Hmm... Almost forgot," he said.

He had just read about it, but it was hard to keep it in kind when even he couldn't sense it.

Around Araeyn was a fatally dangerous fixed space that made it nearly impossible to reach him as long as he didn't allow it. Replicus, while being used to having subservient Apostles and subordinates in general, would have almost forgotten that his current bro wouldn't mind too much to see him hurt himself in an instance of ...

"You have a ready good set of annoying abilities..." Replicus said.

~~~

[Inverted Boundary | Lv. 1]

A cubical space that constantly masks itself by taking the likeness of surroundings passively encases the user and transports all that approaches to a place of the Duke of Transversal's pre-set location.

...

~~~

And as if this wasn't enough...

~~~

[Accelerated Inverted Boundary | Lv. 1]

A thin, but refined barrier fuelled by a mix of Null Life Essence which flows furiously in the opposite any attacks that manage to bypass the 'Inverted Boundary' and rebounds them back to the 'Inverted Boundary'.

...

~~~

Twofold measures against contact with the Astute Duke of Transversal.

Replicus had finally gotten an idea of how strong Araeyn's fleshly evolved skills were. This was the best example. While originally these two particular skills had likely been strong, Replicus did some probing and found that now, perhaps only some exceptions among Special skills, and Super skills could bypass one or both of Araeyn's boundaries.

"Why are you so afraid of being touched?" Replicus scoffed.

If another time and reality, he would have been commenting on how the little ones grew so fast, but he didn't have the heart for it.

Just thinking about difficult it would have been for him to tame this Apostle if he had all these abilities from right when he left his egg, doused his mood.

Araeyn was freakishly strong with all this alone, but he had even more cards. For that reason, Replicus was yet to grant him a class from the options provided.

He would have to see what the Apostle lacked first.

...

Moments later, Araeyn had donned a fitting set of armour a grey and silver gradient, simplistic and standard in design.

It suited him pretty well, especially with the pale skin and now brushed hair.

Replicus had forced the Duke to turn off both of his boundary skills and worked on that hair until it made sense. It hadn't been an easy endeavor, unfortunately. The hair had turned out to be saturated with Null Life Essence and difficult to comb into shape.

In the end, Replicus' determination to capitalize on his only non-skeletal Apostle's salvageable beauty paid off.

The Apostle wasn't so pleased, however.

The only thing to even remotely soothe him, as it seemed, was the fact that the name on his chest showed despite the chest plate of his armor covering it.

This, and perhaps the Empyrean Ribbon wrapped around his forearm.

Replicus gave the Apostle a nod of satisfaction.

Other than feeling that this Apostle was a very good investment as a combat unit, the Penetrator saw an even better benefit far removed from anything close to offensive power. When the optimal time came, he would be sure to make it count.

"Let's go meet a few friends. Some whom you even share similar hair colors with," Replicus said.

The barrier he had set up around his barrier collapsed at his will, and he generously allowed the Apostle to walk out first.

On emerging in the corridor, however, Replicus found the figures of Allora and Grim already waiting.

"Master, are you...al-alrigh..." Allora was the first to speak, at first with an anxious high tone before her eyes locked onto the unfriendly creature staring right at her.

"Whoa..." Grim remarked with surprise while backing away.

Replicus was amused.

"I wish I could say you've seen the worst of him," he said, but Allora and Grim couldn't pay him any attention yet. Their interest was still in Araeyn.

At that moment, the great vessel suddenly slowed down and stopped.

Grim and Allora immediately tensed.

Why did the ship stop? Nothing on the open sea could cause it to come to a halt when Pherdanta was at the helm.

With such thoughts stacking within their minds, the two Unlimited flashed to the deck.

Replicus did so too, leaving Araeyn behind.

On arriving, he sighed as he saw the problem.

Another ship like this one could be seen in the far distance, rapidly approaching.

The glow that hid everything on deck was nowhere to be seen – purposefully so, it seemed – and thus whom this ship belonged to was exposed.

"Of course..." Replicus said.