Chapter 4: Merging the Pearls  

As he felt in the abyss, Liam realized that he can understand every change in the original seed.

This time, he chose not to break down the pearl but to reinforce it.

The seed started moving again. Patterns appeared one after another on its surface as it spun faster and faster.

Inside, the pearl was slowly melting. However, what appeared wasn't creation energy, but a small luminous sphere.

It was the core of the skill. Everything important was directly stored inside this little ball.

Liam wanted to focus on the strengthening aspect of the skill. He planned to use the two previously decomposed pearls as nutrients to enhance the quality of this one, aiming for a very powerful skill.

For that, he had to prepare everything in his mind. He began to make connections between his own fighting skills, the pearl's skill and novarian's anatomy.

As time goes by, a new skill appeared in his mind.

Once he wasn't able to improve it anymore, he sent the accumulated creation energy into the sphere.

The sphere directly absorbed all the energy coming to it, becoming brighter and brighter as the energy continued to pour in.

Finally, it became so bright that it was hard to look at it.

A few seconds later, the light-ball seemed saturated, and no strand of energy could merge with it. Gradually, the runes lost their luminosity, and the original seed stopped spinning.

When it returned to its original state, a small hatch opened, and a new pearl emerged from the seed.

Liam quickly put it on his watch and evaluated it. After a short scan, a hologram appeared in front of him.

Skill Pearl (1 star || Blue) – unnamed: a new technique that allows the user to gain a surge of power for a few time: tripling strength (a rather powerful new technique but quite impractical. The backlash is too violent and leaves you defenseless. Cannot be taught to more than 1000 people.)

Liam nodded as he read the description. It was the reinforcement direction he chose: a pure increase of power.

He wasn't foolish. This skill had two huge flaws. First, the duration of the skill: for novarians, it will probably not exceed few seconds.

The second one is the backlash. After using this technique, almost all the body's energy will be exhausted, and it'll take several minutes just for standing up.

However, we need to consider Liam's race context.

His main race was the novarians. These creatures were so weak that they die in mass facing a few level 1 monsters.

Since they were already so weak, the longer the fight was, the heavier Liam's losses became. It was better to directly eliminate the enemy, even if it means some losses.

He didn't overthink it and decided to name the skill "Spurt of the Fish."

He then took out the novarian's pearl and the spell pearl.

Using the original seed opened his eyes to a new possibility: he could merge pearls of unopposed nature.

That's exactly what he intended to do for these two pearls. First, he would extract the reproduction spell, decompose it, and fuse it into novarian's DNA.

For him, it was killing two birds with one stone: he would save a fusion slot, and the novarians would get a permanent reproduction bonus.

He quickly threw the spell pearl into the seed, which immediately lit up and started spinning.

A few moments later, the pearl has decomposed into a pretty little ball of light.

He then sent the novarian' pearl into the seed. Inside, light ball emitted a warm aura. Liam set his eyes on it and began to analyze it.

The original seed was really an ultimate cheating weapon. Whatever you put in it, it managed to break it down into simpler components.

As you can decompose a polynomial into simple elements, the seed would splat the spell in a condensed structure that Liam could easily analyze.

If he wanted to decrypt the divine spell as it is, it would probably take years. Fortunately, thanks to his brand new artifact, he could understand everything easily.

However, that didn't mean he could directly cast the spell. He only understood how it worked.

Viewed from a certain angle, it's like computers: just because you know how it works doesn't mean you can create one from scratch.

Nevertheless, this knowledge was enough to slightly modify novarian's genes. Again, he can only do so because he had the spell. Once the spell used up, he will be powerless to change anything.

Let's go back to the computer example.

What he was doing with the novarians is akin to replacing and modifying some components of a computer with those of another computer. He created nothing; he replaced and merged.

Of course, Liam couldn't carry out this action by himself.

Even some true gods may struggle to do so if it involved laws they didn't master.

Fortunately, he just has to have some idea of what he wanted, and the seed of origine would take care of the rest as long as he provided enough creation energy.

However, the more he did himself, the less creation energy he would have to spend.

In facts, if Liam had enough creation energy, he could continuously develop this spell to rediscover the fundamental laws of reproduction, and even the law of life.

Seeing how much he had consumed for "just" creating a simple skill, he didn't dare imagine the unreasonable amount of energy it would take to carry out such an extensive operation.

Shaking his head to set aside disordered thoughts, Liam controlled the energy sphere to slowly merge with the novarian's pearl.

The creation energy gradually disappeared, and when there was only thirty percent left, a new pearl was shaped within the seed.

He quickly took it out of his spiritual sea and evaluated it.

Race Pearl (1 star || purple) – novarians (special): contain 459 novarians. For some reason, they have all mutated and possess a reproduction rate twice as high as others (247 females, 212 males, including 20 apprentice novarian warriors).

Liam's eyes shone of excitement as he observed his new pearl.

Even if he lost 41 novarians, it was predictable. After all, not everyone can withstand genetic mutation. At that time, there is only one possibility: death.

Fortunately, only mortals died.

On the other hand, the effect of the spell pearl seemed to have been reduced, but Liam didn't care at all.

He was instead completely satisfied with it. After all, the spell last only fifteen years.

After that, it was over.

Now everything was different. It became an inherent talent of the novarians, and it will surely be passed on to their descendants.

Although it is less effective in the short period, in the long run, the benefits may end up being ten, or even a hundred times more significant.

Liam couldn't help but cast an appreciative look at the seed that slowly rotated in his spiritual sea, praising his luck for receiving such an artifact.

He left his spiritual sea and glanced at his divine realm, and then at his faith points. From over 193 000 the yesterday, there were now only about sixty thousand.

Liam decided to merge the novarians pearl first.

He took out pearl and began to unfold the space of the pearl. The pearl grew visibly, and in a few minutes, it had already reached several hundred meters in diameter.

At that time, Liam made it touch the spatial wall of the demi-plane.

Under his meticulous control, the outline of the pearl gradually merged with the spatial wall. Liam used his faith energy to make the fusion go as smoothly as possible.

After spending nearly twenty thousand faith points, the pearl had completely disappeared, and only hundred meters ball of light remained at that place.

Liam personally guided the ball a few kilometers away from the novarian tribe and then released it in the ocean.

Hundreds of novarians appeared on the water's surface, still completely disoriented.

Then he used the skill pearl. He spent again many faith points and the pearl melted into the spatial barrier, leaving only a shiny golden sphere.

Liam controlled this light to move at the center of the demi-plane before suddenly make it explode, attracting the attention of the novarians.

A golden rain fell on the realm. Whenever a drop touched a novarian, some data enter their mind and they would master the Spurt of the Fish technique.

However, Liam wasn't naive enough to give them a gift without getting anything in return. Before merging the pearl, he had already set conditions for the technique to be used.

While this condition is not met, the information would remain sealed inside the novarians' mind.

The condition set by Liam was very simple: one had to be a true believer.

(Believers from top to bottom: saints, fanatics, fervent believers, true believers, pan-believers, false believers and non-believers).

Saints were extremely difficult to get; even some demigods may not have one.

Fanatics were the craziest believers of a god. Their faith was undeniable, but it often led them to make various judgment errors.

Fervent believers often were the leaders of churches, while true believers formed the backbone of a gods' society.

The three others had fundamentally almost no value and would hardly bring anything to the gods.

In the demi-plane, the novarian chief, who was fishing with the tribe, suddenly stopped, and a golden light flashed in his eyes before returning to normal the next second.

The surrounding novarians swam in the shallow sea to hunt sardines or to have fun.

They didn't even realize that a large number of their kind appeared, or that their chief's body was possessed by Liam.

Liam, now novarian chief, quickly summoned all the tribe and headed to the place where the new novarians had appeared.

As he passed a reef halfway, he suddenly shouted to the other novarians,

"Some may have already noticed, but the great Lord of the Azure Abyss has just given us a new power."

The other novarians looked at him with strange looks.

After all, even if some had unlocked the technique, they were... well, simply too stupid.

If he didn't take the lead, it would probably take months before they discovered it by themselves.

Liam took out the bone knife at his waist and rushed towards a rock a few meters high sticking out of the water's surface.

In a few seconds, he covered a hundred meters and reached the rock, striking it with all his might with his bone saber.

BOOOOM

The thick rock broke, sending fragments flying everywhere and creating a dozen meter high wave.

As soon as he finished, he immediately felt weakness assault his body. Hopefully, he communicated with his real body outside, which used a few faith points to heal him.

Meanwhile, every novarian was looking at him, dumbfounded and open-mouthed.

Liam turned slowly and threw the broken handle of the knife, which hadn't withstood the impact, before letting out a wild roar.

This finally gets the rest of the novarians to react, and they rushed enthusiastically around the remains of the rock to congratulate him.

Liam immediately began to preach.

To his great surprise, the effect was much more significant than expected, and more than ten pan-believers became true believers, while two true believers became fervent believers.