327 Ebonmancer And Looming Death (Part 1)



Evan tapped his feet on the ground and a bed came out of his shadow storage.

Since there is a possibility that he might faint once again while advancing to C rank, he brought a bed with him to sleep comfortably.

Taking out the bed he sat down on it and summoned Elysia and his other shadow undeads.

After ordering them to protect him if something happens while he is advancing, he took out some cores from his shadow storage.

All of the cores that he took out were shadow cores because unlike his monarch core which can absorb 100% energy from any core, his prime core can absorb 100% energy only from shadow cores.

"Let's start" Evan muttered and picked up a B rank shadow core.

He channelled his mana into the core and started to refine it. Compared to his monarch core which can refine the energy of cores instantly, his prime core was obviously very slow.

It took Evan twenty minutes just to refine one B rank core, but he wasn't surprised by this because he already expected something like this will happen.

It might look like his refining speed was not fast enough, but this was actually very fast when compared to other normal hunters.

The refining speed of someone's prime core depends on their rank. If a normal D+ rank hunter tries to refine a B rank core it will take him at least one hour if not longer. Moreover, there is a chance that his prime core might even get damaged because of trying to refine such a high rank core.

Evan was able to refine the B rank core so quickly only because of the mutation of his prime core.

After Evan finished refining the core, he noticed some of the small cracks that were left on his prime core also recovered.

Without wasting any time he picked up another B rank core and continue to refine it.

Slowly but surely his prime core started to move towards C rank.

Evan had a total of thirteen shadow cores. He got all of these cores during the monster tide, before the monster tide he was not able to collect any shadow cores.

Among these thirteen shadow cores, eight were B rank while five were B+ rank.

In two and a half hours Evan absorbed all of the B rank shadow cores. After absorbing all the B rank cores Evan picked up the B+ rank core and started to refine it.

Unlike the B rank core that he refined without any problem, Evan felt a little uncomfortable while refining the B+ rank core because of its potent energy. But even though it was uncomfortable, Evan noticed that his prime core was still able to refine its energy so he didn't stop.

It took Evan more than forty minutes to completely refine the B+ rank core.

For the next few hours, he continued to refine B+ rank shadow cores. Suddenly when he refined his fourth B+ rank shadow core, a notification appeared before him.

(You have learned the skill 'Shadow Shroud')

Evan who was about to pick up his last B+ rank shadow core was taken aback when he saw the notification, but soon a surprised expression appeared on his face.

"I didn't expect the two percent chance of getting a skill from a shadow core will trigger here" Evan muttered and looked at the details of the skill.

---) Shadow Shroud: The power to create a protective barrier or cloak of shadows. This skill forms a shield of shadow around the user, providing defence against physical and magical attacks.

"A barrier type skill huh" Evan muttered and was about to go back to refining the cores when another notification appeared before him.

(Shadow Wings and Shadow Shroud skills are compatible with each other)

(Do you wish to merge both skills into one?)

[Yes/ No]

Evan was a bit surprised when he saw this notification, but when he remembered the details of shadow wings he nodded his head.

---) Shadow Wings:- Create two wings of shadow using mana, the more mana you use on the wings the faster you will be able to fly. The wings also have a great defence and can be used as a shield to weaken or stop an attack.

"Those wings can also be used as a shield, so it is no wonder both of these skills can be merged together" Evan muttered and chose no for the time being.

Currently, he just wanted to advance to the C rank, he will merge the skills later after finishing the task at hand.

After choosing no, Evan picked up the last B+ rank shadow core and started to refine it.

After he finished refining it, he checked his prime core and saw it just need little more energy before it can break through to the C rank.

"Just like monarch core, this prime core also became Snorlax after mutating" Evan said with a twitching mouth and took out a few more cores from his shadow storage.

This time he took out Ice and Wind cores due to his wind manipulation and ice chain skills.

Because of having these skills, he can absorb 50% energy of both ice and wind type cores.

A hunter can normally absorb 30% of the core's energy, but if he has a skill related to the same element as the core, he can absorb 50% of the energy from it.

After taking out the cores Evan started to refine them.

One hour later Evan picked up his fourth core and examined his prime core.

"This should be enough," he said and started to refine the core.

Halfway through while refining the core Evan felt his prime core stopped absorbing the energy from the core.

"Finally" Evan quickly put away the half refined core, and focused on his prime core.

The next second surrounding mana started to rush toward his body and his prime core started to advance to the C rank.