Chapter 546: Shared Skills and the Newspaper

After all, she was a young girl.

Tiefling Saehir was a spiritual warrior, so she should have had better stamina.

But perhaps the foreplay had worn her out too much, or perhaps she was too nervous — just as guessed, after two rounds of "lessons" she collapsed beside him, exhausted.

It wasn't even the second half of the night yet.

Rod's excitement hadn't faded; for now he had no urge to sleep.

So he leaned against the headboard, gently patting the back of the fresh-red body lying on him.

You know what?

Honestly, you have to admit — a red body really does hit you with full visual impact, that exotic-race thrill keeps stirring him up.

Add to that the uniquely girlish awkwardness and innocence, and that face full of youthful greenness.

It gave him a strangely contradictory pleasure of guilt and joy.

If Saehir really hadn't been unable to take it, Rod would have wanted to go a few more rounds.

But the road ahead is long, after all.

Tally could pretend to be young, but she was a hundred-year-old woman — in the end, she was different from a truly young girl.

The tiefling girl in his arms let out a little whimper.

She buried herself deeper against his chest.

Rod turned to play with her tail.

The tail's surface was a fine, scale-like texture, the feel somewhere between the slick smoothness of a shed snakeskin and the soft plushness of velvet.

A tiefling's tail wasn't as nimble and strong as Rat Girl Thirteen's steel tail.

But it wasn't stiff and motionless either — right now, as Rod gently stroked near its base, the tail pressed in to meet his movements.

"Since it's come to this, it's time to start the shared skills with Saehir."

After enslaving Saehir, Rod had forcibly paused the extraction of shared skills.

Mainly so that he could lift the enslavement later.

Now that things were like this, there was no need to pause anymore.

【Obedience has broken through to 88, unlocking shared skills with Saehir】

【Extraction count: 4】

【Extraction paused!】

【Continue?】

"Continue."

【Beginning random extraction.】

On the panel, skill entries scrolled past one after another, then gradually slowed down.

Very quickly.

The pointer stopped on four skills respectively:

【Hell Muscle: Strength and constitution are tempered by the blazing flames within the hellish bloodline, raising the body's upper limit above that of humans. Strength and constitution are enhanced; the body's upper limit is greatly increased.】

【Scorching Wind Leap: Erupts flame currents around the body to amplify all flight techniques, greatly increasing flight speed; gathers flame currents to burst out damage upon landing.】

【Boiling Bone-Blood: Consumes one's own blood to forcibly enhance any one elemental resistance; the intensity of the boost depends on the amount of blood consumed.】

【Rebound Evil Pupil: When an enemy casts a control spell on you, you can forcibly reverse it so the caster suffers the same effect, limited to once per day.】

Oh!

Rod's eyes lit up.

Worthy of a battle-oriented tiefling race — all four shared skills were extremely practical types.

The most obvious was 【Hell Muscle】.

As a passive skill, almost the moment it was extracted—

Rod could feel his whole body being soaked through by lava, scalding and unbearable.

Then, after that phase passed, it quickly cooled down.

At this point Rod could feel his body's strength had risen by a tier.

He took out a brass spirit-measuring orb from the spell pouch at the head of the bed.

Before extracting the skill, the reading had been 536 notches.

【Paradox Motivation】 could convert others' desire toward him into Origin power.

Presumably this depended quite a bit on the rank of the one feeling desire.

As a peak fifth-tier — wait, no.

Because of the high-grade energy contained in 【Creation Dewdrop】, after just two simple climaxes, the tiefling girl had successfully advanced to sixth-tier.

In this encounter she contributed a boost of 3 notches.

But in the three hours Rod spent shaping his body with Mystra, he gained a full 24 notches.

One could say the difference was quite striking.

Very quickly.

The black crystal face of the brass spirit-measuring orb flickered, displaying the number 563.

At the same time.

As the digestion of 【Hell Muscle】 was completed.

The spiritual accumulation within Rod also skyrocketed, already reaching peak seventh-tier, only a step away from eighth-tier.

"Levels really do come fast."

The next morning.

When the arachne Watching Yuna came to deliver breakfast, she happened to see Rod patting Cecile's head while teaching her a morning yao.

The tiefling girl was extremely embarrassed and hurriedly pulled out.

Her face flushed red as she hurriedly tried to put on her clothes, but her foot got tangled in her pants, causing her to fall flat on the ground.

She fled the ranger's cabin in embarrassment and panic.

The sensible Young Lady Spider said nothing, merely offering a faint smile.

Then, silently, she took out Cecile's IOU and tore it to shreds.

"Watching Yuna, you scared her away; you'll have to make up for it."

Rod sat on the edge of the bed with his legs spread apart, saying with a smile.

Watching Yuna's beautiful eyes trembled, her smooth throat rolled, and she licked her purple lips.

"Understood, Master. Before that, please allow me to set out the breakfast."

A short while later.

Eating from top to bottom.

Mumbling with her mouth full, Watching Yuna asked, "Should I allocate some pocket money for Cecile?"

"Hmm, you handle it."

"Understood."

"No need to bring me breakfast every day from now on. You need to oversee the reconstruction at Coral Bay; I don't trust anyone else with it."

Watching Yuna suddenly sped up, becoming more joyful.

Even in her current state, one could see the corners of her mouth curling up uncontrollably.

【Watching Yuna's obedience to you +3, current obedience: 86】

"Watching Yuna will certainly not fail the Master's trust!"

"As for the money, I'll give it to you directly. If you need Shi Ying Town's cooperation, just find Dimia. If there are problems, come to me directly. However, the biggest issue right now is the lack of people. Coral Bay is not small; to run it, you need population and investing merchants."

Stupid dark elves.

Killing everyone in Coral Bay is truly disgusting.

Rod was sick and tired of these guys who sacrificed people at the drop of a hat.

"By the way."

Watching Yuna didn't let up; she twisted her posterior spider segments and hooked a newspaper from the nightstand.

She handed it to Rod and continued speaking with a muffled mouth: "All major newspapers have started their New Cycle coverage of the Master's deeds. Perhaps we can use this fame to publish ads and attract population, welcoming merchant caravans to settle and invest."

"Not bad. You handle it."

Rod smiled and pinched Watching Yuna's drooping elf ears.

She found this quite pleasing and enthusiastically proposed several plans regarding the reconstruction.

Rod then opened the Snow Hill Evening News among them.

A bold, blackened title caught his eye:

"Fake Death to Scam Dragons · Triple Serial Kill! Ranger Rod Stages the Ultimate 'Oriole Behind the Green'!"

— "First lured the Red Dragon and Black Dragon to tear each other apart, then seized Coral Bay, and finally thrashed the Duke of the Inferno! This human turned 'profiteering from disaster' into an epic!"

Rod nodded happily.

He was very satisfied with this headline.

He switched to another paper and found the section reporting on himself again:

"Dragon Slaying? A Scam! Rod's 'Fake Death' Was Actually a Sacrificial Ritual for the Nine Hells' Agent"

— "Exclusive Intel: Two giant dragons cried out 'In the Name of Asmodeus' before dying; scholars suspect the entire battle was a script by a Hell Lord to harvest souls!"

"."

Rod's face darkened.

He flipped back to the page with the newspaper name: "The Yige Holy Daily."

The Yige Sect's newspaper.

Rod spat "Ptooey!" right onto it and threw it away.

He switched to another one.

"The Truth Behind the Liberation of Coral Bay: Dark Elves Were Just Scapegoats; Rod Signed a 'Mind Flayer Pact' Long Ago"

— "Witnesses claim: On the day of the attack, the bay was filled with the smell of octopus tentacles, suspected as evidence of a Mind Flayer ambush!"

Don't say it.

There really were Mind Flayers on the day of the attack.

Mind Flayer Hart even helped quite a bit; how did these bards know?

Looking at the newspaper name again: "Bahadur Magic Academy · Student Reporter Society."

"."

Well, well.

Rod's two mortal enemies had coincidentally published headlines slandering him.

(End of this chapter)