Skullius looked at his nemesis, wandering how he would deal with this situation. He was a angered by how this world was juggling him between the frying pan and the fire.

The boar didn’t seem to want to leave him alone and it looked more resolute than ever!

The blue flames in Skullius socket blazed with a deep light as he considered his next move.

‘Damn it! What do I do? Last time I was barely able to evade this guy, now I….Wait!’ he thought as it suddenly dawned on him that he was not a Moron imbedded in bone anymore.

He had evolved thrice!

Surely that had to count for something.

In the next second, he took off at top speed, heading to the right!

The wind blew past him as he ran.

Skullius was shocked by his new speed!

“Now we’re talking!” he yelled as he raced forward.

The boar was perplexed by Skullius’ sudden dash, following behind at its full speed as well while the red energy around it refused to die down!

However, it found that reducing the gap between it and Skullius was much more difficult now!

[I can’t believe that with your newfound strength, your first choice is to run away].

“What do you know, VOW bro!” Skullius angrily barked at the Voice of Worlds.

[What I do know is that you should check your own status more often. New skills are available to you even though you haven’t proceeded with the full options from the Lifeless package].

“New Skills?” Skullius thought before he pulled up the guidance field.

~~~

[ Name : Skullius ]

[ Tier :  0 ]

[ Level : 1 ]_.

[ Race  : Null Lifeform (Boneman) ]

[ Inv. Status  : Doomed (Adverse) ×2 ]

——-

[ Stats ]

[ Strength : 20 ]

[Agility : 20 ]

[ Intelligence : 5 ]

[ Endurance : Infinite ]

[ Luck : Atrocious ]

—–

[ Health : 20/20 ]

—–

[ Mana : 40/40 ]

—–

[ Null Life Essence : 50/3000 ]

[ Skills ]

[ Mana Sense | Lv. 10 (Permission to evolve) ]

[ Flesh It Like You Mean It | Lv. 1 ]

[ Lifeless Evolution <Pending> ]

-Static Limbo

-Null Extraction

-Unbound

….

~~~~

“Oh, it changed! Look at all this!” Skullius exclaimed as he ran. “Wait! My luck is still atrocious?!”

[…].

“Oh there’s new skills! Ohhhh! Let’s see!”

~~~

[ Static Limbo ]

Suspend a target at the corridor of life and death. The duration is dependent on the level difference between the user and the target.

Mana Requirements: 50 Mana Points

Duration: Dependent on level difference.

Cooldown: 5 minutes.

—-

[ Null Extraction ]

Extract the Null Life Essence from living creatures.

Mana Requirements: None.

Duration: None.

Cooldown: None.

—-

[ Unbound <Upgradeable> ]

Using Null Life Essence, grant upgrades to any stat, skill or weapon.

-More info accessible-

Mana Requirements: None.

Duration: 5 minutes.

Cooldown: 1 hour.

~~~

“Arrrghhhh too much information!” Skullius clutched his skull with his one remaining hand. “What is all this?!”

[I’m not about to give you a crash course when you are on the run. Get rid of your tail and finish your evolution].

Skullius grunted as he looked at the new skills. He couldn’t understand what they meant, especially the first two.

Null Life Essence?

Limbo?

The third one was a bit more understandable.

Upgrades to any stat?

That seemed simple enough for him.

‘What’s this Null Life Essence? I already 50 points of it?’ he thought.

As he ran, the view changed from the lush forest and to a downward slope that lead into a lake.

Skullius socket flames flared as he saw something that made his core cringe.

As the patches of grass became less prominent, in the vicinity of the lake, the remaining strands of grass transitioned from their green colour to a turquoise blue!

Skullius had seen this before and he wasn’t going to fall for it again!

It was a Territory!

Something overpowered lived in that lake!

Recalling his encounter with Azila, Skillius bellowed. How would he wiggle out another Territory?!

He turned to the boar and felt like he had come to a new realisation!

“FLESH YOU, BRO! It was you all along! You’re leading me into places that will get me killed!”

With that, he took a sharp turn to his left and avoided the lake, going back up the slope which led to the ongoing forest expanse.

‘I can’t keep running away from this socket hole! He’ll lead me into another territory eventually. Might as well see what this Unbound skill can do. If it can upgrade anything, then…’

Skullius activated Unbound.

He felt a unique energy wrap around his bones. It had a bright blue hue and in the next second, a notification popped before him.

[What would you like to upgrade with Unbound?]

“Strength,” said Skullius as he reached the top of the slope, ran a good distance and turned back.

He was going to attack the moment the boar rose up. It would definitely think that he was still running after all. But this time, he had to kill it.

A powerful feeling filled his bones. He felt his strength increase, grinning inwardly as he imagined that right now, he would be able to bully Bonet!

“Hell yeah!” he yelled.

[Unbound is active. +5 to STR]

Skullius didn’t wait any longer.

He bolted towards the slope and as soon as the bellowing head of the boar popped up, he launched his bony fist into its forehead!

Boom!

The boar’s head was slammed to the ground, dust flying up as it squealed!

Skullius didn’t stop there, he brought his arm up and brought it down again with all his strength!

“DIE! DIE! DIE!” he yelled as he pummelled it with all his strength.

The boar tried to put up a fight, but having exhausted itself even before Skullius had entered Azila’s Territory, it failed to find the strength to retaliate especially when Skullius kept hammering it in the head!

After almost a minute of pounding the brown creature, a notification appeared before Skullius.

[You have killed LV1 Dead-end-apocalypse-boar. You have gained experience]

[You have levelled up!]

[You have levelled up!]

Skullius finally stopped when he saw his fist stained in blood and the nasty depression on the boars head.

[Your prey–

“Yes! I’ve finally killed this pain in the pelvis!” Skullius yelled, so relieved at getting of the boar that he didn’t get to see what the last notification said. Levelling up was already good news!

“Disgusting!” he remarked as he saw the flowing blood and innards.

“EAT ON THAT FLESHLINGS!”

[That’s racist].

“What was that?”

[Nothing. You should finish your evolution before your atrocious luck finds you another boar].

“Oh, that’s right!”

Skullius focused on the Lifeless Evolution. It was time to discover what this was all about. A new journey was about to begin and Skullius had no idea how much struggle and benefits it would bring.