A split second later, all of them had received the answer written boldly on the screen...17501 BF!

"Is this real?" In disbelief, Felix mumbled while staring widely at the number, not daring to register it in him mind!

Who could blame him?

His strength was increased by a whopping 10k BF just from hitting the 1st Mark!

"As expected, your mark is truly too exceptional." Lady Sphinx commentated, "As far as I know, the most gifted Devourer to ever appear had a mark that allows him to obtain 8k BF equivalent of strength in each stage. He went to reach the 26th stage, making him slightly stronger against dragons, physically wise."

Felix grinned widely at the sound of that. Knowing that he had a 10K strength limit in each mark, implied that he would surpass the dragons in strength while he was still in a lesser stage than that gifted Devourer.

He also understood that it would take tremendous work to hit the limit in the mid and late stages since the amount and quality of natural treasures he would require would increase substantially.

But, he wasn't complaining in the slightest as he officially had a method to break off the stigma that humans were limited in strength!

17501 BF while in the 2nd stage of replacement! Even peak legendary 6th stage bloodliners wouldn't amount much before him!

However, Felix never took humans as his enemy or competitors.

His true rivals were the primogenitors' champions who were extensively trained and nurtured by the primogenitors themselves to bring them as many profits as possible in the games!

Now, he finally had a cultivation system that would help him go tow to tow with them!

"Elder Sphinx, if I managed to somehow reach the 30th stage, which is the peak, how will you rank me in strength compared to the strongest in the universe?" Felix asked with a curious tone. 

Lady Sphinx thought about it for a second and replied, "It's doubtful that you could even reach the 10th stage."

"Is it because of the resources?" Felix asked.

"Yes, your body absorbs only 50% of the consumed natural treasures. This meant you are paying always double what you require to hit a stage." Lady Sphinx clarified, "If it wasn't like this, you would have needed only 6 natural treasures that cost 60 billion SC to reach your 2nd mark."

"This might not seem like a lot now but imagine wasting 50% of a natural treasure that would cost a trillion SC if placed in the market?" Lady Sphinx said with her eyebrows frowned, "That's half-trillion worth of resources lost just to increase your strength by a little."

"Indeed, that's a massive loss of resources." The Jörmungandr nodded his head and gave his own intake, "I suggest you stop at 10th stage. To reach it, you will require 61 Trillion worth of resources. This is a conservative number as it would probably reach even 100 trillion if you decided to buy everything instead of getting them with your own hands in the universe."

Felix shook his head firmly, "I am not a retard to buy expensive ones."

Felix firmly believed that getting those resources on his own would be far more economical.

It would be dangerous of course but he couldn't avoid it either ways if he wanted to collect as many natural treasures as possible.

After all, he had other expenses to take care of and it wouldn't be a reliable plan to place all of his capital on getting them.

"I still have 50 billion SC, I can dedicate 30 billion for online purchases while the other 20 billion would be used to turn Erik and Malak into primogenitors bloodliners."

"They would be of great help to me in ruins exploration or I can even give them the coordinates and let them lead the exploration teams to further enhance my earnings without wasting too much time being in every exploration." Felix pondered out loud.

He was always sleeping on them since they were given a task to protect his grandpa. But now?

It was finally time to carry on the private squad that would be his greatest assets in exploring the universe!

'I will contact them later after I gather enough essence again.' Felix thought while moving towards another machine.

This machine was meant to test his mental defenses. Felix already knew that the devourer's cultivation system wasn't able to enhance his mental defenses as well as his physical strength.

However, with such a massive boost, there was bound to be some splash on his mental defenses, turning them a bit better.

Alas, when he finished testing, he realized that the increase was barely noticeable. As for his elemental energies, they were also left untouched.

"Well, it was worth the shot." Felix shrugged his shoulders and moved back to the punching machine to get some practice done with his newfound strength.

...

After spending two hours getting a good feel of it, he stopped and went for quick sparring with the sand warriors.

Unsurprisingly, they weren't a real match to Felix as one punch was enough to obliterate them.

When Lady Sphinx created them, it was based on the assumption that Felix would have at max 12k BF.

Thankfully, they were sand made and she could easily increase their strength by adding to the density of the sand they were made from, making it tough for Felix to break through them with one punch.

Since they were equipped with extraordinary battle techniques and senses, they were giving trouble to Felix, making it almost impossible for him to utilize his full strength.

Naturally, he wasn't using poison or the lightning active abilities that he unlocked after reaching 51% in his integration in the earliest three months.

He wanted to beat them fully by relying on his physical strength but sadly he spent two hours trying but still failed to achieve it.

"Your melee combat needs heavy improvement now that you have enough strength to fight in a close battle." The Jörmungandr mentioned.

"Yes, I will also need a weapon to bring out the most of it." Felix said while wiping his sweaty forehead, "I can't rely on my elemental abilities all the time since my capacity is bound to get exhausted one way or another."

"Let's focus first on close combat." The Jörmungandr said, "The weapon will come on its own after you find your fighting style."

"Now, start again from the top!"

Felix exhaled a long breath and dashed towards a bunch of sand-warriors, getting right in their formation...After throwing a couple of punches heroically, he got the beating of his life under Asna's sadistic laugher.

***

After three days of hard training, Lady Sphinx finally allowed him to leave the room as she had gathered the data she wanted.

After all, she needed to see how would Felix's body perform with the added strength from the devourer's heart.

Right now, Felix was lying on the bed in Lady Sphinx's castle, having no plans to return to the Academy yet.

His absence was already dealt with by the headmistress after she was spoken to by Lady Sphinx.

The excuse used was that Felix went out for a long-term mission to learn under Sage Dalilia and improve faster than in the academy. 

This naturally sent a shockwave through the campus and also the universe as it just emphasized how much love Felix was receiving from Queen Allura to make her own adviser teach Felix privately.

If the kidnapping attempts lessened after emerging, it would simply mean that some individuals were affected by it and decided to give up on capturing him for either his eyes or bloodlines.

Not that it mattered right now as Felix was planning on returning to the academy after he deals with the promotion game.

"I have now enough strength to fend for myself against those races with their unique cultivation systems." Felix said while bringing out his holographic profile.

Without further ado, he clicked on start a new game that was at the bottom.

Immediately after, the Queen asked him, 'You are eligible to enter the promotion game that will promote you to the Universal Individual Supremacy Games Platform.'

'Before deciding, please read this white sheet that explains the rules and terms of the entire process.'

Since Felix had never reached this point in his previous life, he didn't skip this step but carefully read everything, wanting to see if there were any differences from what he read in the network.

//UISG PROMOTION GAME RULES:

1) Each Game can have up to 30 players.

2) There can be only two players from the same race.

3) The use of coupons in promotion games is forbidden...except, in-game coupons.( Such as World Announcement Coupon.)

4) After the game is chosen, the players will be given ten days of preparation.

5) The players receive only 0.5% of streaming revenue if they won the game.

6) Winning the game will instantly promote you to a low-tier gold rank in the UISG platform.

7) Losing a game will disqualify you from joining another promotion game for four months.

8) Most of the promotion games are extremely deadly.

9) Players have a chance to drop out if they got cold feet after reading the details of the game mode. (Rule number 7 will apply in this situation)

...

41) The wish value of the promotion game is capped at 3 billion SC.//