Devil Fruit Powers In The Tower Of God - Chapter 37

Four months later. Lumen had grown during that time and was now as tall as Anak. He had a small growth spur at the beginning, but that had stopped and he had to find a different way to help him mȧturė faster.

Lumen was currently standing in front of Hatsu, who was laying on a bed. The rest of the group was behind him, waiting to see what will happen. The swordsman looked uncomfortable as he was squirming around in the bed.

“Stop fidgeting.” Lumen told him.

“Easy for you to say,” Hatsu replied back while wiggling in the bed.

“Stop fidgeting, or I will burn you to ashes!” Lumen threatened him.

“You almost did that once! Who’s to say you won’t do it again?” Hatsu responded, remembering how Lumen nearly roasted him the last time he tried healing him.

“That’s it, I tried being nice.” Lumen hit him on the head and knocked him out.

During the past four months, Lumen has been practicing his control over his Phoenix flames. He had some success in that regard, but knowing how his last attempt at healing his teammates was a failure, he had some “volunteers” that he used as test subjects.

They were also nice enough to help him learn more about his black flame. It had the attribute of harvesting life from enemies. The amount that it harvests is extremely low, and he had gotten no more a day’s worth from those “volunteers”.

However, that had helped Lumen with his growth. He had a growth spurt the first month, but since then, it had slowed down. Thankfully, those “volunteers” were happy to provide him with their life force.

Taking a deep breath, Lumen focused, and summoned his Phoenix flames. Unlike before, the flames were no longer fluctuation between white and black. Now they were a constant white color, emitting a gentle warmth. He left them to burn atop his hand for a bit, making sure that nothing goes wrong. Seeing that the flames were stable, he felt ȧssured that the operation will go smoothly.

Lumen formed a Baang of Shinsoo and infused it with the white flame. Confidently, he brought his hand on top of Hatsu’s missing leg. Just as the flame touched the swordsman’s body, he was instantly able to see an immediate effect. Slowly, but surely, his leg was being restored.

“Aahhhhh!” Despite being knocked down, Hatsu had immediately woken up as soon as the white flame touched him. His leg was being regrown, but the pain he felt was like it was being slowly burned.

The group hearing him scream, momentarily thought that the operation was a failure again, but they were able to see his leg slowly being grown back. It wasn’t a fast process, but it was definitely a sure one.

Four hours later, Hatsu was quietly sleeping on the bed with his leg restored. After yelling his heart out, the swordsman had finally fallen asleep.

Lumen let out a sigh of relief, he had to keep his concentration during the whole operation. Had he lost focus even once, the white flame could have turned into the destructive black one.

“I’m all out of gas after this one, so I will heal the rest of you in the following days.” Lumen looked towards Anak, Vespa, and Tiana, who each had their own injuries.

The next day he healed Anak’s missing arm, and the green-skinned girl didn’t even let out a sound during the three-hour process.

“Did that not hurt you? Hatsu screamed his lungs out when I healed him.” Lumen asked her.

Anak just smiled brightly at him and hugged him with her now regrown arm. “That was nothing. It hurt a lot more when you were gone.”

Lumen hugged her back, and the green-skinned girl passed out in his arms. He carried her off to bed and tucked her in.

“You don’t want me to knock you out as I did with Hatsu, right?” Lumen asked her.

“No…” Vespa replied back.

“So stop fidgeting around.” Lumen told the squirming blue-haired girl. Shortly, she calmed down, and Lumen began healing her wings.

Like Hatsu, the girl started screaming the moment the white flames touched her wings. Vespa’s operation continued on for six hours, and the girl had passed out and woken up from the pain numerous time during it.

Just as Lumen had finished healing her wings, Vespa had woken up. Feeling her wings on her back, she flapped them around to test them out. Seeing nothing wrong with them, she hugged Lumen by tackling him to the bed.

“Thank you, thank you, thank you!” Excitedly, Vespa thanked him and gave him a peck on his cheek before she passed out. Lumen covered her with a blanket and left her to rest.

The last person on his list was Tiana. The injury was on the head, so Lumen had the least confidence in being able to heal it. He had a few “volunteers” that were badly injured on the head, he made sure of that, but just a single mistake could potentially end her life. He had to make sure not to lose focus even for a second. Otherwise, everything could go to waste.

Tiana didn’t want to lay on a bed but rather chose to lay down on his tights.

“Are you prepared? This might hurt a lot, but you have to endure it.” Lumen asked the purple-haired, laying on his tights. Tiana nodded to him with eyes full of confidence.

Taking a deep breath, Lumen concentrated, and gently brought his Pheonix flame to her injured side. He saw her clench her teeth in pain as the flame touched her, but he couldn’t stop now. Lumen watched, as slowly but surely, the left side of her face was being restored.

Two hours later, she looked as beautiful as before. She had passed out during the operation, so Lumen was about to leave the room after he covered her with a blanket. Just as he was about to step out, he heard her ask him. “Do you remember what you asked me on the 3rd Floor?”

“I’m not sure what you are talking about.” Lumen had asked her a lot of things on that Floor but had a feeling what she meant by picking on her emotions.

“Just know that whatever you ask of me, I will gladly do it,” Tiana said as she fell asleep.

A month later, they were preparing to go take on the Test on the 21st Floor.

“There’s no way this works,” Androssi exclaimed while looking at Lumen. He was wearing black shorts and a black long-sleeved shirt. He had a mask on his face that covered it from below the eyes down. The mask continued down his throat, connected to a tank top.

“Trust me. I’ve seen it happen, but it would have been even better if my hair was silver. I should consider doing that on the next Floor.” Lumen replied.

“I don’t believe you.” Androssi though he will surely be recognized since his face was as famous as a Princess of Zahard. The incident with him happened three years ago, but that to the residents in the Tower is a short amount. The news was still fresh in their minds.

A short man with rosy red cheeks, thin eyebrows, and narrowed eyes approached them. He was wearing a red kimono with a red hat that had the yin-yang symbol on.

“Are you the Regulars for the Test?” He questioned them.

“Yes,” Leesoo confirmed while the rest nodded.

The short man observed them one by one and then stated. “Good. I’m Noma, a Test Administrator on the Floor. Follow me, I will lead you to your Test will take place.” He led them a small flying ship, able to fit all eleven of them.

Androssi was looking at Lumen wide-eyed as she mouthed. “No way.” To which he just winked in response.

Noma, controlled the ship to fly quite the distance, and they were currently floating over an ocean. The 21st Floor has a few places on it, where the Shinsoo density is extremely high, and giant pools of water like the ocean below them could be found throughout the Floor. The short man came to explain their Test.

“Well, Regulars, this is where your Test will take place. More specifically, down there.” Noma pointed towards the ocean.

“Right under those water of Shinsoo lives a giant Iron Mackarel Shark. That one is as big as a mountain, so it’s impossible for you to kill, but your Test requires to kill at least one of its offsprings for each Regular on your team. The Shark would usually produce over a hundred children every year, so the place is filled down there. They, unlike their parent, are only as big as a five-story building.” He showed them a picture of the Iron Mackarel Shark. The creature looked like a giant white shark covered with an iron-like armor covering its body.

Noma pulled out disc-like objects that had a handle coming out of them, making them look like scooters. “You can use those to go down there. The ship won’t go any lower, in case the big one wakes up. It usually spends its time sleeping, but you never know.”

“So, we have to kill at least one Iron Mackarel Shark for each Regular on the team? We don’t all have to kill one as long as a team we have killed at least eleven, right?” Lumen questioned him.

Noma felt the question is a bit weird, since even as a team of eleven E-Rank Regulars, they would find it very hard to hunt eleven Iron Macakrel Sharks. “Yes, so if one person kills five and another six, all of you will pass the Test.” Nonetheless, he confirmed that to them.

“That’s perfect.” Noma was surprised by the confident tone of the masked Regular and was even more surprised when he saw him jump off the ship without the flying disc. E-Rank Regulars normally don’t have the ability to fly, nor can they fight in that area with an extremely high concentration of Shinsoo, like the water below.

He walked up to the side of the ship and looked down, just in time to see Lumen mid-flight burst into black flames. Noma felt the temperature of the flames from where he was standing, and he a few drops of sweat on his forehead.

“What in the hell?” Noma exclaimed, seeing those ominous black flames.

The 21st Floor is ruled by the Yeon Family, who is known for producing powerful Flame users. It is said that members of the family are “flame” itself from the moment they are born. He had seen a lot of strong Flame users, but those ominous black flames were unprecedented. Their temperature was so high, that he was sweating despite his distance from them.

Noma watched in shock, as he witnessed the black flames burning, and evaporating the water made of Shinsoo. He had never seen such a sigh in his entire life. As a Ranker, he felt scared of the flames created by an E-Rank Regular. He didn’t know what to think of this situation, so he immediately contacted the Ruler of the Floor.

[Miss Jina, is there a Flamer user from your prestige Family that uses ominous black flames?] Noma only sent her a message, not daring to contact her directly.

In a moment, he received a response.

[No, I have no knowledge of such a Flame user. Why do you ask?]

Just as Noma was about to respond to her, he heard an explosion come from the ocean and saw a giant black pillar made of fire. A massive part of the entire ocean had already been evaporated from the black flames. Noma couldn’t see a single Iron Mockarel Shark, even the gigantic one that even he didn’t want to deal directly with.

[Well, Miss Jena, I think a Flamer user with flames like that, had just killed absolutely all Iron Mockarel Sharks on the floor.]