SSS Awakening: Rebirth of the Strongest Vampire God-Chapter 97: Getting in the upgrades

Damon quickly dipped into the blood archive to refill his health and continued exchanging blows with the berserker.

Handling the footwork to avoid the molten fire spillage, constantly maintaining the mana supply to regenerate his health from blood energy, and also circulating blood energy, mana, and keeping his innate strength active at the same time.

Doing all these things at the same time was mentally taxing, but Damon kept at it. The physical damage resistance of the berserkers was also quite impressive. In the end, it took him ten blows to bring down the health of the monster.

At the last 5%, another surprise was waiting. The berserker started spewing out magma randomly, but Damon was already prepared for it. He simply activated a mana shield and focused on the second one, starting to get its health down as well.

The entire fight became a bloody brawl rumble, and after a whole five minutes, Damon successfully dealt with the problematic trio. At a weaker state, they were barely able to move, wobbling around, and he easily absorbed their blood energy.

The result was well worth the trouble.

[Ding! Your Fire Resistance has been upgraded.]

[Ding! Your Fire Resistance has been upgraded.]

[Ding! Your Fire Resistance has been upgraded.]

[Ding! You have gained +1 Fire Affinity.]

[Ding! You have gained +1 Fire Affinity.]

[Ding! You have gained +1 Fire Affinity.]

All three fireborn berserkers had given him both a bump in fire resistance and fire affinity. Damon grinned and continued going.

After the three elites, he met two more packs of magma hounds, which once again gave him plenty of upgrades.

The flames still licking at the cracked stone tiles around him seemed less intense now, as if the dungeon’s inferno no longer bit quite as hard. Damon exhaled slowly, steam rising off his skin, his blood energy stabilizing into a warm pulse beneath his flesh. The upgrades were kicking in fast.

[Fire Resistance: C-Rank (Passive)]

[Effect: Reduces fire-based damage by 15%. Duration: Permanent. Can evolve with continued exposure.]

[Fire Affinity: +6]

[Effect: Slight increase in effectiveness of fire-based spells. Enables learning of intermediate-tier fire magic.]

Damon wiped the sweat from his brow with the back of his hand and cracked his neck. "Not bad at all." The dungeon’s oppressive heat had become more bearable. He was evolving and adapting. And this was just the start.

He took off again, his footsteps sharp and light against the scorched floor. The next corridor was a gauntlet of flame traps, jets of fire erupting from the walls and the floor cracks. frёeωebɳovel.com

With his upgraded resistance, Damon didn’t even slow down. He dashed through, the heat curling around him like mist, barely burning through his mana shield. He also knew which traps he needed to avoid so as not to set off the worst of the traps.

Up ahead, the distant sound of a crumbling pillar and a deep, rumbling growl echoed from the right corridor. "That’s probably Mark." Damon chuckled to himself.

Another explosion echoed faintly from the left, followed by a chain of even bigger explosions. "And that’s definitely Kate." He grinned wider. "Hope they’re not having too much fun without me."

The final stretch of the central path loomed ahead, massive iron gates warped by heat, pulsing with runes. Behind them, the mini-boss chamber.

Before he could reach the massive gates, there was a huge pack of magma hounds prowling the courtyard. This pack was extremely troublesome, and there were many guides in his last life about how to successfully avoid these courtyard hounds.

Damon knew of a sure-shot method, but he did not plan to let go of such a good opportunity to further bump up his fire resistance and fire affinity.

Damon licked his lips. "Thirty-seven of you, huh?" he whispered to himself as he counted the magma hounds slinking through the courtyard, each one radiating heat like a living forge. Their bodies shimmered in the molten haze, lava drooling from their fangs, claws glowing white-hot from constant contact with the searing ground.

He could have easily bypassed the whole pack. There was a hidden wall seam behind one of the flame statues that led to the mini-boss gates. It was how most elite players cheesed this encounter in his previous life. But that was them. This was him.

And he had blood to earn.

Without warning, Damon surged forward, his cloak snapping like a whip behind him as [Blink] launched him into the thick of the beasts. [Blood Lance] appeared in his hand as he began carving a path through the chaos.

His movement was a blur, fluid, violent, precise. The moment he landed, he swept his arm in a wide arc, [Blood Lance] tearing through four magma hounds in a single swing. Their molten blood sprayed like a miniature eruption, but Damon was already on the move.

[Shadowstep]. He vanished from the snapping jaws of the nearest beast and reappeared behind another, driving the lance straight through its back and into the throat of a second that had lunged for him. Both howled and dissolved into puddles of scorched gore, but not before Damon made a quick work of absorbing their blood essence.

[Ding! Your Fire Resistance has been upgraded.]

[Ding! You have gained +1 Fire Affinity.]

[Ding! Your Fire Resistance has been upgraded.]

[Ding! You have gained +1 Fire Affinity.]

The alerts came one after another, but Damon didn’t even glance at them. The courtyard had become a crimson and gold slaughterhouse, the smell of burning fur and superheated blood thick in the air.

The hounds began to respond. They circled tighter, faster, trying to cut off his angles. A dozen at once pounced. It made no difference to Damon at all.

With the evasive manneurs of a rogue, build of a tank and a huge reservoir of mana at his disposal, his figure appeared and disappeared at will as he took down more and more of the magma hounds, quickly absorbing every single one’s blood essence.

Damon did not even let go of a single hound and thoroughly cleaned every one of them of their blood essence.