Upon turning around, Lucius saw that the Bore Shrew had woken up. It was shaking its head as if it was still groggy and moved around much better than before.

"Oh? Seems like its transformation is complete." Lucius said.

He walked closer to the cage and observed the Bore shrew calming down. While its eyes still seemed to have a hint of madness in them, they were still a bit coherent. 

~skwee~

It cried out again upon seeing Lucius and walked to the edge of the cage and started to chew on the grill.

~kacha~

~kacha~

~kacha~

Lucius raised his brows upon seeing the ease with which the beast was cutting the alloyed metal. Its bites had definitely gotten stronger than before and it took little to no effort for it to bite through it.

Lucius watched the beast and wanted to see what it would do after it got out. Thankfully, the cages were modifiable and were modular. If Lucius wanted to fix it, he could just remove the grill that had the cut part and would not need to replace the entire thing.

The Bore shrew continued to bite the cage and soon made an opening big enough for it to pass through. The edges of the grills that were cut were sharp and rubbed against the skin of the Boer Shrew, but they were unable to cause it any harm.

"Seems like its defense has also increased. Its skin should have gotten tougher now along with its muscles that increased in number." Lucius analyzed.

~skwee~

The Bore Shrew finally got out of the cage and looked at Lucius, who was standing to the side. Its eyes were definitely looking at him with intent and did not move. Lucius waited for about a minute to see if the beast would do something else, but it did not.

"Hmm…" Lucius rubbed his chin as he thought about what to do next.

After thinking for a bit, he extended his finger that flowed with red light. As soon as the bore shrew saw it, it became excited.

~SKREEE~ 

"Go there," Lucius ordered while pointing with the glowing finger.

The bore shrew still looked at it without moving, but after a few seconds, it seemed to have comprehended it and moved to the location that Lucius had pointed to.

"Good," Lucius said before shooting a small sliver of hell energy to the bore shrew. 

The beast pounced at it and quickly consumed the hell energy. To the bore shrew, hell energy was the best thing in the world. And since Lucius was the one providing the hell energy, it would obey what he said.

Lucius observed to see if there would be additional changes or not, but did not see any.

"Go there now," Lucius ordered and pointed to another part of the room, this time a bit farther than before.

~skwee~

The bore Shrew let out a low cry before looking towards the location that was being pointed. After hesitating for a couple of seconds, it moved there.

"Very good!" Lucius said and send another small sliver of hell energy to the bore shrew, who quickly consumed it.

'If this method works, then controlling them would be a bit easier. Though once their numbers increase, it will be hard for me to keep up…' Lucius thought to himself.

But during this entire time, he had a rather wide smile on his face. He continued a few more tests one by one and got even more pleased. The bore shrew was also getting habituated to the orders and was learning quickly.

"Seems like the corruption of hell energy also increased its intelligence to a certain level. A normal Bore Shrew is definitely unable to do anything like this…" Lucius muttered to himself.

Just like this, he ended up spending his entire morning in testing. Soon it was time for lunch and a knock was heard on the door.

~knock~

"Go into the cage," Lucius ordered. 

This time he didn't even have to give the Bore Shrew any hell energy, and it obediently went into the cage. Lucius thought a bit more and narrowed his eyes, before saying something.

"Now sleep." He ordered before sending out a sliver of hell energy at the bore shrew.

As soon as the hell energy was consumed by the bore shrew, it fell asleep.

'Hmm… just as I thought. Small commands can still be transmitted using hell energy.' Lucius thought to himself while moving to the door of the lab.

~Shing~

He moved the latch of the door and opened it. Standing in front was none other than Kiana.

"It's time for lunch, did you forget again?" Kiana said with a knowing look.

"Hahaha! I kinda forgot while working…" Lucius replied.

~sigh~

Kiana took a look around the messy room and sighed to herself.

"Come on now, or Aunt Lita will get upset." Kiana said, while turning away.

Lucius followed behind her, and they soon reached the dining hall, where Lita was waiting for them. The plates were already set up and it was the servants were all standing ready to serve the food.

It was evident that they had all been waiting for Lucius to appear till now.

"Sorry for getting late, mother," Lucius apologized.

"Mmmhmm, just sit down and eat now. Don't delay any further," Lita said before gesturing to the servants.

One of the servants moved ahead to pull a chair for his young lord, and Lucius graciously sat down. The servants then served the food and Lucius saw that there were three different types of fish on the menu today.

"We have fish today? That's a bit unusual…" Lucius muttered.

Lita instead had a smile on her face.

"So you finally noticed." Lita said.

"Oh?" Lucius gave her a questioning look.

"Why do you think we have fish here now, that too of three different kinds?" Lita asked in a teasing manner.

Lucius thought over it and couldn't come up with an answer right away. But then he tried to see if he could remember what kind of fishes they were.

"Wait a minute, aren't these… from Baron Harrels territory?" Lucius questioned.

"Indeed. The extra smaller deals we made with the Baron are finally coming into effect. The fishermen are now allowed to freely fish in the rivers and lakes of the Harrels Barony. These fishes are from the very first shipment that has arrived early in the morning." Lita answered.