Carlos put this matter on the back burner and started thinking about how to use this precious Brain Beast.
First, he absolutely couldn't copy the Dusk Faction's playbook to build a Brain Tower.
Setting aside whether he could get his hands on the technology,
This Brain Tower was basically a mini Dark Mist node that only human traitors could use.
More scary, within the Brain Tower's range, normal humans' hearts would gradually get twisted until they joined the Dark Mist—this was absolutely unacceptable.
Digging through various Brain Beast uses from his memories, there wasn't much intel and he quickly ran through it all.
One use grabbed his attention:
"Arcane Method: Vision Sharing
Main Material: Brain Beast
Supporting Materials: Blood Essence x5, Blue Light Powder x2...
Effect: Strengthens the connection between main and secondary bodies, allowing the main body to get the secondary body's vision!"
Carlos immediately got interested.
Once he could share the Purple Thornblade Skeleton Guards' vision, this meant he could totally use this to keep tabs on battlefield movements.
He could even confidently send Purple Thornblade Skeleton Guards on solo missions—if any problems popped up, he could handle them ASAP and call the shots.
"Vision sharing is huge!"
Carlos's heart was itching, wanting to start right away.
But while those supporting materials weren't too pricey, he didn't have them in his storage space.
"Still need to get back to Ember City."
Pushing down his inner urge, he stashed the Brain Beast in his storage space.
His attention fell on the Spiritual Essence progress bar on his status panel.
[Spirituality: 8 (Spiritual Essence: 6869/8000)]
"This battle netted around 5000 Spiritual Essence total."
This was within Carlos's ballpark.
Over 300 low-level human traitors yielded around 2000 Spiritual Essence, plus the complete camp destruction bonus of 3000 points.
"Bonus reward for faction missions?"
"Only 1131 Spiritual Essence away from 9 Spirituality—the day to bounce isn't far."
After Carlos finished collecting loot, he chilled briefly with the Purple Thornblade Skeleton Guards.
Then he headed straight for nearby monster groups, eager to bump his Spirituality up another notch.
...
Two days later, Carlos took out another monster group, and his Spiritual Essence accumulation finally hit 8000!
[Spiritual Essence accumulated to 8000, Spirituality +1, current Spirituality 9]
[Gained Attribute Points +1, Skill Points +1]
He dumped 1 point into Strength but saved the skill point for learning a particular skill from an upcoming opportunity.
[Name: Carlos Valois]
[Path: Death Herald Path]
[Spirituality: 9 (Spiritual Essence: 1/9000)]
[Health: 700 (Constitution x50)]
[Psionic Energy: 140 (Spirituality x10 + Mental x10)]
[Attributes: Strength 14/Speed 5/Constitution 14/Mental 5]
[Skills: Child of Nature (Max Level), Skeleton Revival (8+4) Level, Sun Emperor's Court Swordsmanship Level 4]
[Remaining Skill Points: 1; Remaining Attribute Points: 0]
From entering the Withered Lands, Carlos had taken less than four months to reach Spirituality 9.
This insane improvement speed was enough to go down in human history.
Looking back on everything in the Withered Lands,
Not only had he evolved 12 more powerful Purple Thornblade Skeleton Guards according to plan,
He'd wiped out three Dark Mist nodes, scored 3 Fantasy Equipment pieces,
And destroyed a micro human traitor camp, snagging precious material: Brain Beast.
Carlos was pretty stoked about this trip.
At this point, the Withered Lands journey was finally wrapped up.
"Head east! Going home!"
Carlos's current spot was deep in the Withered Lands, where Dark Mist power was most concentrated.
The further east he went, the closer to the Withered Lands' edge, the lower the monster groups' numbers and spirituality would be.
Carlos simply switched to a more comfortable large black sedan chair carried smoothly by four Purple Thornblade Skeleton Guards.
The other eight Purple Thornblade Skeleton Guards flanked the sedan—two each in front, back, left, and right directions, enough to keep any monster from getting within striking distance of their master.
...
Several days later,
Carlos half-reclined in the sedan chair, mulling over how much of his strength to show upon returning to Ember City.
He definitely couldn't expose his full Spirituality—this improvement speed was way too scary.
It wasn't fear of getting targeted by human leadership, but worry that human traitors would catch wind and spare no expense sending powerful Psionics to take him out.
Then he'd have to be constantly watching his back.
He could show off partial strength of the Purple Thornblade Skeleton Guards—nothing more than running into special opportunities and going through powerful sublimation.
This was common in human history, with people researching totally new sublimation arrays.
He might get some attention, but since more powerful sublimation methods required more precious materials and tougher conditions,
Most people had enough sense and wouldn't be too interested.
Finally, Fantasy Equipment—this couldn't leak at all.
Once exposed, who knew how many would want a piece of it!
While thinking things over, Carlos suddenly heard explosion sounds mixed with human shouts.
"Fighting up ahead?"
...
"Anna, quick! Quick, run!
Don't get bogged down with them!"
A curvy woman swung her greatsword with serious power, taking out a Black Beetle that came at her.
"Riley, listen to your mother—don't sweat us, we have ways to get out!"
Fighting alongside the curvy woman was her best friend, also a Guardian wielding a greatsword, tall and lean.
The two worked together like clockwork, actually going toe-to-toe with over a dozen beetle monsters, occasionally dropping monsters with their greatswords.
But their faces showed zero joy, only extreme worry.
Because in their peripheral vision, not far away, a bigger monster group had spotted them and was hauling ass their way.
Just one look let the two women, who'd spent years hunting monsters in the Withered Lands, recognize several seriously problematic Yellow Beetles among them.
Spirituality 7, maximum attribute 4.
This filled these two Spirituality 6 Psionics with dread.
...
On a nearby hillside, two girls with delicate, cute faces stood small in stature,
With big eyes—one black pupil, one white pupil.
Looking closer, their faces were identical.
Except one girl had her black pupil on the left and white pupil on the right, while the other was exactly opposite.
"Mom, Sister Sara!"
Riley and Anna were twins who'd awakened as Concealers not long ago, with only 1 Spirituality.
Facing this group of monsters with higher spirituality than theirs, at level 1, they couldn't make a dent in the battle at all.
"Sister! What do we do?"
Sister Anna was bawling. Usually, Mom and Sister Sara would take them to hunt scattered monsters and rack up Spiritual Essence.
Who would have thought they'd get unlucky and run into monster groups—two of them!