Chapter 51: The Mana Cycle

"SIR DEON! ARE YOU DONE YET?" Finn shouted from the other side of the Midden. Beside him was Dame Nora who held a decapitated ant head as if it was a very smelly bowling ball.

"I'M COMIIING!" Deon shouted back.

He quickly waded through the tide of corpses and snatched one of the freshly deceased along the way.

"What took you so long?" Finn asked, hand reaching for Deon's monster corpse haul.

But Deon offered no excuse.

He couldn't possibly tell them he was busy mulling things over while they diligently worked, could he?

Mikael swooped beside Finn as he worked, curious about why he asked them to find fresh corpses.

As usual, Finn skillfully butchered them, breaking their limbs as he would to a lobster.

He fished a jar of red powder and opened the lid with one hand. He pinched some of the red powder and sprinkled them unto the ant meat.

Using a soldier ant's skull like a wok, Finn proceeded to stir-fry the monster meat.

Mikael looked at Finn like he was insane—more so than he initially thought.

He turned to his partner in quiet bafflement.

Deon's face had grown pale and his hazel brown eyes shook and dilated in repulsion.

Deon gulped.

"Umm… Sir Finn?" he pointed to the Ant skull atop the blazing bonfire, "A-Are we going to eat that?"

Finn and Dame Nora turned to him with looks that seemed to say: 'why are you asking something so obvious?'

"Yes? unless you want to starve?" Finn answered.

"B-But! Isn't it unsanitary? I mean, we just plucked them off the pile of dead…" Deon trailed off when he saw Dame Nora's eyebrow twitch in annoyance.

"I guess Sir Deon is a privileged knight." She said as she wiped green monster blood off herself, "Never had food from the trash?"

The slight edge in Nora's tone made Deon even more reluctant to reveal his identity for it seemed like the Dame had bad blood with nobility.

Finn sighed.

"Sir Deon, whether you are a noble or not, I assume you know that monster flesh is highly nutritious, right?" Finn said.

Of course, Deon knew about that.

After all, their chef always served them with food made from high-class monster meat—a luxury only available to the royal family.

With the limited supply and so much demand, the market price of monster meat naturally climbed to a point where only the wealthy nobles could afford them.

The higher the danger level of a monster, the more desirable its flesh is.

Sometimes, when hunter mercenaries get lucky and defeat B- to A-class monsters, they put them up for auction where the gourmet, Knights, and Combat Almagi fiercely compete and pay for hundreds of Gold.

The reason?— Mana.

Known as the 'life particles', Mana gets transferred to the body by eating from its source. In this case, the flesh and blood of prey.

As they say, 'you are what you eat'.

For monsters higher up in the food chain, eating the lower species adds to their mana pool, making it denser and purer.

You are reading story Death Ascension at novel35.com

With higher mana purity, the monster will grow stronger and their bodies sturdier.

Similarly, consuming high-class monsters make Knights and Combat Almagi stronger either with their physical attacks or spells.

Simply put, it extends the consumer's life span, makes them healthier, and increases their recovery speed. It was thanks to this that Deon could still move even as he had accumulated numerous injuries.

The freshness also plays a role in mana transfer.

Since mana is basically equivalent to 'life', it dissipates into the surroundings as time passes, leaving only a small amount of mana residue in the corpse which in turn fossilizes to form mana crystals.

And the cycle of mana goes on and on.

"Well, if you don't want to eat that's also fine." Finn smiled as he forked a sizzling chunk of Killer ant meat.

As he blew on the chunk to cool it off, the smoke wafted into Deon's direction.

Deon salivated and his stomach growled.

Unlike its disgusting appearance, the smell was truly mouth-watering!

For the past few days, Deon ate nothing but bread from the space ring. Although the pastry remained fresh inside the space, he still craved meat.

Gulp.

Finn noted Deon's adam's apple bob as he swallowed his saliva.

"Sir Deon? Do you want some?" He teased, his fork moving closer to Deon to fork-feed him.

Just as Deon was about to open his mouth, Finn swiftly retracts his fork and chomps down on the juicy meat.

"Mmph!" he moaned, delighted, as he chewed the delicious food.

With his beautiful face and heavenly expression, Finn made the Midden look like a 5-star restaurant instead of a graveyard camp.

Deon looked at him grudgingly--To which Finn merely chuckled.

"So? Do you want to eat now, Sir Deon?"

"Yes. yes."

In the end, Deon gave in to his hunger and the three of them sat around the bonfire, eating four servings each of the stir-fried monster.

The ant meat was a perfect balance of salty, sweet, and spicy. Its texture was similar to a lobster's but with slightly tougher and more elastic muscle fibers.

Mikael hovered above Deon, watching him hungrily devour his lunch with his appetite now unhindered by the smell of decomposing flesh.

After spooning the last chunk of meat, Deon licked his lips clean.

Now that their stomachs were full, their exhaustion finally caught up with them and they felt sleepy.

"Let's rest first then we'll resume exploring the colony in an hour." Finn stood from his seat, "Or whenever we wake up."

Dame Nora agreed.

They had been moving and fighting nonstop since she regained consciousness and her bruised body screamed for rest.

However, Deon stopped them as they were about to go.

"WAIT! Umm.. can we talk first? I must tell you something."

--Chapter end--

You can find story with these keywords: Death Ascension, Read Death Ascension, Death Ascension novel, Death Ascension book, Death Ascension story, Death Ascension full, Death Ascension Latest Chapter