100\% DROP RATE : Why is My Inventory Always so Full? Chapter 768 - Extinction-Grade

There was no enormous phenomenon that appeared announcing that Lucien had reached another level.

His body simply began changing.

Living Creation spread through every part of him.

The Omnigenesis Vessel accepted it without resistance.

His Divine Energy Core shifted with the change.

The boundaries between body, Law, authority, and inner world became subtly less distinct.

Lucien felt Space. Not merely through the Law or through practiced perception.

He felt distance as though it had become another sense.

Nearby locations no longer seemed separated by empty intervals.

He could feel how they were connected.

Time changed as well.

Lucien did not suddenly control it absolutely.

That would have been absurd.

But the movement of moments became clearer.

The difference between one instant and the next gained texture.

He could sense acceleration, delay, continuity, and disruption with a familiarity that had not existed before.

Then Life and Death responded.

Lucien had wielded both.

He understood them.

But now they felt less like Laws he reached toward and more like old presences that had always existed beside him.

Life moved through living things.

Death rested within everything that could end.

Neither felt distant.

Neither resisted his perception.

It did not stop with them.

The Laws surrounding Lucien became easier to sense.

Even those he did not personally possess yet.

He did not suddenly gain mastery over them.

What changed was his relationship with the structure around him.

The universe felt less like an external environment filled with Laws.

It felt more like something his senses could finally touch directly.

Lucien understood.

He had crossed the threshold.

Extinction Grade.

The title had always sounded destructive.

For ancient beasts, reaching it often manifested through overwhelming authority and the ability to become a catastrophe capable of threatening worlds.

Lucien’s advancement was different.

Living Creation did not become more destructive merely because he reached the same tier.

It became harder to separate from reality around him.

His authority expanded.

The amount of space over which he could meaningfully impose Living Creation increased, but range was only the simplest improvement.

The greater change was resistance.

Before, powerful opposing authority could force Lucien to spend considerable effort maintaining what he created.

Now his creations endured interference far better.

Structures supported by Living Creation became more difficult to erase through brute authority alone.

Adaptations occurred faster.

Changes that once required deliberate thought began responding almost instinctively once Lucien understood the pressure acting against them.

His Law had become mature enough to follow his intent without requiring him to explain every step.

Lucien’s own body benefited as well.

The Omnigenesis Vessel absorbed the stronger authority until every part of him seemed capable of holding more.

His recovery accelerated.

His tolerance for Law conflict improved.

The strain produced when he layered multiple Laws together fell noticeably.

That alone made Lucien’s expression brighten.

His recent combat training had been built around using combinations that sensible people would rarely attempt.

Now his body was even better suited to surviving them.

The universe appeared to be encouraging bad behavior.

Lucien appreciated the support.

•••

He remained in meditation until the changes stabilized.

Only then did Lucien open his eyes.

Nothing around him looked dramatically different.

He did.

His perception had changed too much for the same surroundings to feel identical.

Lucien stood.

He moved one hand through the air.

Space responded more readily.

A small structure formed from Living Creation above his palm, changed twice, incorporated another Law, and then dissolved.

The entire sequence required less effort than it would have before.

Lucien smiled.

He knew exactly where he wanted to test the rest.

•••

The Echo Zone received him shortly afterward.

The deeper regions of the zone contained Void Entities powerful enough to make ordinary Eternals reconsider their choices.

Lucien entered without concealing himself completely.

It did not take long for something to notice him.

The darkness ahead folded strangely.

A vast creature emerged without following the geometry Lucien expected from normal life.

Its body looked incomplete from several angles, as though different sections occupied slightly incompatible positions in space.

Lucien had encountered similar entities before.

Previously, simply tracking their movement required concentration.

This time, he frowned, then his expression changed.

He could feel it...

The void around it.

The void had always been difficult terrain.

Laws are faint there, and their expression was thinner and less accommodating than inside a developed world.

Ordinary techniques could become inefficient.

Movement became dangerous over extreme distances.

Even powerful beings learned to respect regions where the surrounding structure offered little support.

Lucien no longer felt that same rejection.

He stepped forward.

The void yielded.

It felt familiar.

For Living Creation, the void was not truly empty. It was possibility without arrangement.

Lucien understood that instinctively now.

His movement accelerated.

The Void Entity reacted.

But it’s too late.

Lucien crossed the distance faster than he expected and struck.

The creature’s warped body folded around the impact.

It attempted to displace itself through the surrounding void.

Lucien followed.

That surprised him more than the attack itself.

Previously, he would have tracked the disturbance and pursued through spatial manipulation.

Now he felt the path forming before the creature completed it.

Lucien entered the distortion with it.

The Void Entity emerged thousands of kilometers away.

Lucien appeared beside it.

The creature reacted in what Lucien suspected was confusion.

He could sympathize.

He was also confused.

That did not stop him from attacking again.

•••

The battle lasted less time than he expected.

Lucien deliberately avoided using his trump cards.

He wanted to test himself.

Living Creation flowed around his other Laws with a smoothness that had not existed before.

Where the Void Entity distorted Space, Lucien no longer fought the distortion directly.

He adapted to it.

When its strange existence interfered with conventional attacks, Lucien altered the structure of what he created until the interference stopped mattering.

The Void Entity changed.

Lucien changed faster.

That was the greatest difference.

Extinction Grade had not simply given him more power.

It had shortened the distance between understanding a problem and producing an answer.

Against weaker opponents, the effect would be excessive.

Against Primordial-level enemies, Lucien suspected it might be exactly what he needed.

The Void Entity eventually collapsed beneath a combination it had already adapted to once.

The second version was not the same attack.

Living Creation had learned from the first failure along with him.

Lucien stood over the remains and slowly exhaled.

Then another presence approached.

He smiled.

Apparently, practice had volunteered.

•••

By the time Lucien finished, several powerful Void Entities had disappeared from the region.

He did not waste them.

They contained enormous essence useful to multiple Lootwell facilities.

Lucien could serve as precious batteries.

He inspected his reserves afterward.

Still comfortable.

His authority remained stable.

The layered Law combinations that once imposed noticeable strain had become far easier to maintain.

Even his movements through the void consumed less energy because he was no longer forcing Space to accommodate him in the same crude manner.

Lucien looked into the distance.

For the first time, the void did not feel like hostile emptiness surrounding scattered islands of civilization.

It felt traversable, almost welcoming.

That thought made him pause.

"That is probably not normal."

There was nobody nearby to disagree.

Lucien decided to worry about it later.

•••

He returned to Lootwell satisfied.

The Tree of Creation was still quietly consuming divine energy.

Lucien checked the newly forming Fruits again.

They had grown by an amount so small that anyone less familiar with the Tree probably would not have noticed.

He noticed.

And immediately understood another problem.

If he wanted to produce Fruits continuously, the Tree would require extraordinary amounts of energy over time.

•••

He turned his attention inward again.

The timing could not have been better.

Lucien had spent months teaching himself how to become unpredictable.

Now his breakthrough had made changing between those unpredictable options faster.

Still, Lucien did not mistake Extinction Grade for the end.

He remembered the feeling from his previous meditation.

The Omnigenesis Vessel had pointed beyond the threshold before he reached it.

Now that he had crossed it, that sensation had not disappeared.

If anything, it was clearer.

Extinction Grade fit him.

But it did not complete him.

The Omnigenesis Vessel accepted the stronger authority too naturally, almost as though it had expected this level all along.

Lucien could sense something farther ahead.

It was still unreachable and impossible to define.

He did not chase it yet.

He had just advanced.

Rushing toward another unknown threshold immediately would be stupidity disguised as ambition.

Lucien had enough experience with both to recognize the difference.

For now, he would stabilize Extinction Grade properly.

He would return to the Echo Crucible.

He would test what his new authority could do against Primordial Incarnations.

He would continue searching for more Bark.

And, slowly, the Tree of Creation would grow another generation of Fruits.

Lucien’s smile widened.

He had spent years worrying that there was never enough time.

For once, something had finally become more valuable the longer he survived.

The thought should have been comforting.

Instead, his attention drifted toward the distant pressure he could still feel surrounding the Black Mass.

The three-year point was approaching.

Extinction Grade authority moved beneath his skin with unfamiliar ease.

He had wanted more time.

Now he simply needed to make sure whatever was coming regretted giving him the time he had already received.