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{Chapter: 238: Development}
Three Days Later
Dex had returned to the same inn where he had once spent half a year in near isolation—resting, scheming, and preparing. The room was familiar, its walls still bearing faint traces of magic residue and shadowy smudges left by his prolonged experiments. Now, once again, it served as his command post.
Floating before him was a massive, semi-transparent light curtain—like a digital screen carved from light and magic, suspended in midair. It shimmered quietly, gently pulsing like a living thing. Upon it were nearly a hundred distorted lines, each one a different color, all writhing their way upward like twisted snakes crawling toward a summit. Scattered among them were countless glowing points of light, blinking on and off in a rhythm that mirrored a starry sky—except this sky shimmered in every color imaginable.
Every passing second, new lights would flare to life while others dimmed and faded, creating a mesmerizing ebb and flow. The shifting lights weren't random, though. This dynamic display was a comprehensive visual map of the various diseases Dex had unleashed into the world.
Each rising line represented the trajectory and growth rate of a particular disease strain, while the colored dots symbolized infected individuals. If a light dimmed, it didn't necessarily mean death—it could signify recovery, natural immunity, or effective treatment. For now, Dex had refrained from releasing truly lethal pathogens; the infections he seeded were mostly mild to moderate. Thus, recoveries were common and rarely drew attention.
That was intentional.
Even in this magical world, death was never a trivial matter—especially when tied to the soul. Most of the people here were devout followers of one god or another. Their souls, upon death, were marked and claimed by their respective deities, like property owned under divine contract. Reaping a soul prematurely or unnaturally would undoubtedly trigger celestial alarms.
And Dex had no intention of poking that divine hornet's nest.
His strategy was far more subtle. Rather than harvesting souls directly upon death, he extracted minute amounts of soul energy while they were still alive—slowly, quietly, like a parasite feeding without killing the host. The rate of extraction depended on the severity and progression of the disease. This ensured he remained invisible to the watchful eyes of the gods. As long as no one died prematurely, no divine investigation would be triggered, and Dex could continue operating in peace.
In many ways, it was a masterpiece of slow corruption—deathless, gradual, and nearly undetectable.
Dex folded his arms and stared at the light curtain, his eyes analyzing every flickering detail. The spread was progressing nicely. The growth curves of his lesser plagues were stable. Even the more virulent ones were spreading in predictable waves.
Still, it wasn't perfect.
He raised his hand and snapped his fingers, releasing a pulse of will. The glowing dots on the screen immediately transformed—shifting into small, clearly defined icons. They now carried visual identifiers based on race and species: humans, elves, dwarves, orcs, beastkin, even a few lesser-known hybrids. Each icon gave him insight into how specific diseases interacted with different physiologies.
After observing the racial breakdowns, Dex traced his finger across the light curtain, drawing connecting lines between clusters of icons. As he did, the image reshaped itself into rough maps, grouping the infected by region and territory. Unlike commercially bought maps, which were often outdated or biased by political borders, this visualization was real-time, pulled from the pulse of living data.
During the six months since he had begun his grand experiment, the infections had spread to a staggering 300 million square kilometers. If this were his former world—Earth—that area would have covered more than half the planet's surface. But here? In this sprawling, near-endless realm of continent and ever-expanding territories, it was still but a drop in the ocean. The scale of this world dwarfed his previous life beyond comprehension.
Dex let out a low sigh.
The biggest bottleneck wasn't the diseases themselves—it was the people. This world lacked the high-speed transportation networks of his old one. No planes, no bullet trains, no highways cutting across continents. Travel here was slow, fragmented, and often dangerous. Even magical transportation was reserved for the elite or the truly desperate.
Because of this, relying on commoners to spread the infection had serious limitations. They simply didn't move fast enough. They lived and died within the boundaries of small villages or isolated regions, making disease propagation frustratingly sluggish.
Of course, there were faster alternatives. He could supercharge the infectiousness of his pathogens, making them easier to transmit through magical means. Or he could personally deliver the diseases across space, using portals and waypoints he controlled. Either option would drastically accelerate the spread.
But Dex had no intention of doing that—not yet.
Right now, he wanted control, not chaos. He needed data, not panic. If he expanded too quickly, he'd lose the ability to carefully monitor the evolving conditions and responses. Worse, a widespread outbreak could alert the very gods he sought to avoid. The current pace was just right—manageable, adaptable, and most importantly, safe.
He sat back in his chair, lacing his fingers together, eyes still fixed on the floating screen.
"Slow and steady," he murmured to himself.
"This disease has mutated into a certain branch due to environmental factors… but the mortality rate is a bit too high. That doesn't align with my goal of staying under the radar, so I'll delay the onset of symptoms for now."
"This particular mutation looks stable enough. No need to intervene—let's leave it alone for the time being."
"How in the world did a simple cold evolve into a mouth ulcer? That's not even consistent with your base genetic identity… completely unacceptable."
"Cancer has become hereditary in this group? That would eventually eliminate the entire bloodline—no offspring, no long-term harvest. I can't allow that to happen..."
'...'
These diseases were all sown before Dex had entered his six-month slumber.
And now, half a year later, they had fully germinated—roots entrenched deep, branches reaching wide across populations, and their effects quietly echoing through society.
But while their foundations remained intact, the unchecked growth over months had led to unforeseen deviations—twists and tangents Dex had never intended. It was like tending a garden only to find the vines choking the very plants you meant to grow.
Left to evolve on their own, the diseases had begun to adapt—mutating not just according to host biology but also local climate, geography, and even magic density. Entirely new strains had appeared, some harmless, others threatening to expose his careful secrecy.
Dex couldn't allow that. He was not ready to make bold moves that could draw divine scrutiny. Not yet.
To maintain subtlety, he began carefully pruning each deviation, manually recalibrating the symptoms, progression rates, and interactions with various races' immune systems.
Over the course of several days, Dex immersed himself in this fine-tuning—tweaking viral latencies here, suppressing overly aggressive symptoms there. By the time he was done, all the minor wild developments that had crept in during his absence were either reabsorbed or contained.
Finally, satisfied with the adjustments, Dex exhaled and flipped his hand.
A crystal—clear as diamond and glowing with a mesmerizing inner brilliance—appeared in his palm. It was about the size of a clenched fist and shimmered with layers of shifting, dreamlike color.
The moment it manifested, the entire room was flooded with ethereal hues—soft pastels, shifting auroras, a kaleidoscope of color that felt less like light and more like memory.
It was the color of the soul—a brilliance that no living being could resist admiring. It shimmered with the essence of life, with the truth of emotion, with the echo of death.
Dex admired the way it pulsed gently in his palm, like a living nebula.
"Beautiful…" he whispered, his voice filled with genuine appreciation.
This was the payment Sarah had provided him earlier—a high-grade soul crystal, condensed and purified from all the soul power Dex had harvested over the past six months via his long-spreading diseases.
Even a single piece of this magnitude could rival the value of a small kingdom. It wasn't just rare—it was priceless. Such soul crystals weren't openly traded, not because they lacked value, but because nobody with the ability to produce them would willingly part with them.
Gathering the raw material alone—fragments of pure soul essence—required extraordinary coordination and subtlety. The purification process was an arcane discipline, somewhere between science and sacrament, that very few could master.
Dex gently ran his tongue along the smooth surface, savoring it.
It had a sweet scent—almost like candy—and a faint aftertaste of something nostalgic.
"Mm… like a soft lollipop," he mused. "Guess the seasoning I added during refinement wasn't wasted after all..."
Then, without the slightest hesitation, Dex brought the soul crystal close and swallowed it whole.
As the gem disappeared down his throat, a euphoric wave rushed over him. His body trembled, not from pain, but from bliss.
"Ahhh…" he moaned softly, his eyes fluttering shut. "Delicious… unbelievably smooth, rich… with a depth that clings to the senses."
He savored the experience like a wine connoisseur tasting a rare vintage.
Only after a long moment did he exhale, his expression filled with satisfaction.
"Definitely worth it. A crystal purified from the pain and struggle of millions… it even surpasses the filthy remnants of that divine soul I devoured from the copper plate…"
---
At the same time…
In the city of Augusto, within a lavishly decorated mansion filled with the scent of incense and the glow of magic crystal lamps, an important conversation was nearing its conclusion.
An extremely beautiful woman, dressed in elegant, midnight-black robes embroidered with abyssal runes, lounged confidently on an ornate chair carved from obsidian.
She regarded the middle-aged man standing before her with a smile that was equal parts charm and pressure.
"You've been pondering for a week," she said, her voice silky but firm. "What's your answer?"
Though phrased as a question, the confidence in her tone made it clear she wasn't expecting rejection.
The man stood silently for a long while, holding an old, weathered family crest in his hand. The symbol had represented his lineage's honor for generations.
But now… that honor had become a burden.
He sighed heavily, closed his eyes, and gave his answer.
"We are… willing to submit. We shall serve the great demon lord Carto, in loyalty and silence."
There was no pride in his voice—only resignation.
The woman's eyes sparkled, and her smile widened with satisfaction.
"Excellent," she said smoothly. "You've made the right choice. In time, you will see how wise it truly was."
She rose from her chair slowly, almost ceremoniously, her presence expanding like a shadow blooming across the room.
"The weak and fading gods will be offered to the glorious abyss as tribute," she continued, raising her hand with zeal. "And we, as loyal hounds of our master, shall bask in the divine twilight of his coming!"
Her words were mad, her faith absolute.
The man—formerly a devoted believer of a local god—did not argue. He merely lowered his head in quiet shame and nodded.
The choice had already been made.
Seeing his hesitant posture, the woman's eyes narrowed. Her expression twisted into something between amusement and contempt.
"Pitiful fool," she muttered, shaking her head. "If you're going to switch sides, at least pretend to be faithful to your new master."
"Don't grovel like a worm halfway through the gate."
Her voice dripped with disdain.
But the man said nothing.
Because deep down, he knew—he had already crossed a line he could never return from.