46 Darkness Source

Nobody lingered around. In these elimination rounds, there were no winners, every side could only lose, Lucien being the only exception this time, but considering the side he was on, they still lost a prince, so he didn't show any happiness, his father was still vastly stronger than him.

Not long after the conclusion, they were back in the throne room, with Henry who sat on his throne looking at his 2 sons, there was no more disappointment in them when gazing at Vlad.

"Do you think what I did was wrong?"

"No."

The answer came from both Lucien and Vlad at the same time. It was still acceptable for Lucien to say so, since Dorian was only half-brother and he never really met him before today, but Vlad was his blood brother, they had the same mother.

"Why do you think so, Vlad?"

"He lost, that is a reason enough, the moment he lost, he ceased to be my brother."

"You said it already, trash has no place in the palace wasting resources."

"You still have to explain to mother, through."

Henry looked a bit depressed at that thought, if he considered that before, he might have given a Rank 2 herb, just to get rid of this trouble.

"What about you, Lucien?"

"Blood is not enough for me to support him, he didn't give me anything in the past, and maybe even tried to cause me trouble all those years ago, why would I go out of my way to speak for him? He didn't pay any price for me to be on his side, he preferred having useless ministers on his side and look where that got him."

Henry gazed at Lucien for a while, lost in thought, he was realizing his son could leave the empire one day, if there was nothing tying him down. He didn't care about blood or familial connections, he was only interested in power, and it was obvious he didn't care about organizations and followers, his power was the most important.

'Should I perhaps rope him with further with resources. That is not good enough, he could just take them and still leave. Marriage is off the table, he wouldn't care about that connection either.'

'This is troublesome, how is he so detached from the world.'

"You are quite cold, aren't you? He was still half-brother of yours."

"What does that change, you also had half-brothers where are they now?"

Lucien was speaking in a pretty bold tone towards his father, but he was sure he didn't mind, it was a right of a genius.

"Hahah, true. Only the strong survive, blood doesn't matter much, but don't abandon those connections, Lucien, they might be useful in the future, even if they don't seem have their benefits right now."

'I'll have to think of a plan, he is too much of a monster to let go, I have to keep him in the Scarlet Empire.'

"Okay, scram now. Go practice, in 10 years there will be another examination round, both opponents are the eldest sibling from their respective Empires, so the age difference is large, you have to overcome that in this time."

.....

Lucien was sitting in his cultivation chamber, looking at the flower in his hand, it was the Rank 2 Darkness Magic Herb.

There weren't 10 000 varieties of these magic herbs, there were only differences in Rank. There was no specific name, if it was aligned with the Darkness Path, it was a Darkness Magic Herb. Once a Darkness Magic Herb had absorbed enough of a special energy, it would release seeds which would then grow into new Rank 0 Darkness Magic Herbs.

The special energy they absorbed came from the ground, the soil they were planted on, it was the energy of the world, the Neutral Particles. They were acting like converters, changing Particles into Particles of a specific Path.

The Rankings of these Herbs could advance, but it was incredibly hard.

To go from Rank 0 to Rank 1 Herb it required them to release seeds 10 times, depending on the environment, once cycle of releasing could take over 3 year.

To go from Rank 1 to Rank 2 Herb it was 100 seed releases and the release cycle slowed down to 5 years.

This was only for normal soil, as Lucien had found about the higher grades of soil, he was sure the speed would be much faster. And he was sure the Empires had a way to do the same, there was no way they waited 500 years for a Rank 2 Herb.

If a practitioner was to eat the Herb, it was like a large amount of Particles were being injected directly in the body, it could help in breaking through a boundary or a large increase in a stat.

If the Herb was left, the vicinity of it would be covered in Particles of that Path, but the benefits would be over a period of time, not like one time large leap.

Normally if a Herb released seeds, if they were left in vicinity of the Herb, they would be absorbed back as nutrition for that same Herb, speeding up the next release, the soil and the ground couldn't sustain more than 1 Herb in a place.

'So if my soil can sustain more than 1 Herb at a time, I could make an Eden for cultivation of the Darkness Path, I can imagine the density of Darkness Particles when I'm surrounded by Rank 2 Herbs.'

Lucien entered the Crimson World with the Herb in his hand, it was not sentient so there was no problem even if the Rank was high.

-Darkness Path Source detected-

-If Host plants it in low level soil, Rank 2 Source would take 10 years to release seeds, it releases 100 times more than Rank 0 Sources-

-If Host plants it in mid level soil, Rank 2 Source would take 5 years to release seeds, it releases 100 times more than Rank 0 Sources-

-If Host plants it in high level soil, Rank 2 Source would take 2 years to release seeds, it releases 100 times more than Rank 0 Sources-

-If Host plants it in peak level soil, Rank 2 Source would take 1 year to release seeds, it releases 100 times more than Rank 0 Sources-

'It was detected upon entrance, hmm.'

'Convert 10 square meters high level soil to 1 square meter peak level soil, that should be enough for this small flower.'

'And set the speed of time to 10x.'

-All Existence mentioned speeding up is possible, but never mentioned there is no price for it-

-Time Manipulation is expensive-

-It would be 100 existence points per day for 10x in the Crimson World-

-Outside world Time Manipulation is not possible in the current state-

'If it takes 1 year in peak level soil, it will take 36 days and a bit for the first release in this mode.'

'36 days is 3600 existence points, I still have 32 000 after buying All Lower Paths to Rank 0.'

'I'll bite, I have to make an environment I can cultivate in at faster speed.'

'Do it.'

'I wonder how much is 100 times more, growing a Rank 0 Herb to Rank 1 shouldn't take more than a couple of days in peak grade soil at 10x speed.'