Mixed Blessing System

"Yes, of course. Did you know that a single such fruit can raise your soul power, increase your talent, and improve your affinity for negative Natural Laws?" He said to her, informing his wife about things she did not know.

Viktoria had studied many times more than Lothur, but she was only a person of about 20 years old. On the other hand, many of the critical books of the Frost family had been lost over the years of decay of this organization.

So she naturally did not know about items like the fruits of those little plants, much less having the ability to identify such resources.

She had a good talent, which enabled her to become an appraiser. But for this, she would have to find someone to teach her this profession, as it was not easy to learn alone.

Lothur, on the other hand, had the system to help him, making it possible for an ignoramus like him to have the chance to teach Viktoria something.

"What? Where did you get that from?" She asked in surprise.

"Our partners in Lenz say that these fruits are useful for controlling demonic powers. They say they can create something like a tranquilizing mist with it, which can knock out demons without requiring a dangerous fight between the parties."

Lothur heard this and pondered. "What do they give you in return for these fruits?"

"A Silver-grade artifact of our choice."

"Hmm, the value is close, but they are the ones who have an advantage over you. After all, that little plant is much rarer than an artifact of that quality." He said, noting how the Frost family had been deceived.

"Why do you think that?" She questioned her husband.

Lothur replied. "That plant is called..."

After he told her the origin of that resource and about the hard-to-reach place where it grew, Viktoria understood why a quasi-Silver-grade item was worth more than a Silver-grade artifact.

Thinking about how the Frost family had followed such an agreement for centuries, she could not help but feel frustrated and betrayed.

"So you think it would be interesting for me to ingest one of these?"

Lothur said. "There is no need to have an affinity with that resource to ingest it. It will induce an affinity for such a thing. On the other hand, while promising, it does have its downsides..."

After explaining to her the slight chance of death and the problem of being unable to use her soul power for two days, Lothur saw Viktoria enter a state of contemplation.

'If I can raise my soul power, it will be worth it to go two days without being able to use my abilities...' She pondered this while disregarding the possibility of death.

Many resources had a slight chance of harming the cultivator who ingested them. After all, nothing came for free in this world.

Dangers naturally accompanied a grand prize!

But according to Lothur, this place was ideal for them to absorb such a thing, and their chances of dying would be lower if they did it in this place instead of outside.

Lothur could feel the negative vibrations of this place, which were precisely what made this environment compatible with these fruits.

So he already decided to ingest one with the Spiritual Bath Pill.

Viktoria decided to do the same as him, knowing that she could also take up to three items from this treasure.

Viktoria did not intend to use that right as she did not feel that the items in this place would make any difference to her, who did not know how to recognize them.

So the two sat down on cultivation cushions they had in their spatial rings and soon ingested their medicines.

Lothur also ingested the Spiritual Bath Pill in conjunction with a little fruit of that plant, not taking long to fall into a trance-like state, somewhat different from Viktoria's.

Viktoria had only ingested the little fruit from that plant. So her state was far less unconscious than his since the pill he ingested naturally caused hibernation in its user.

But even so, since that little fruit could affect the Soul, anyone who ingested it naturally would temporarily lose their senses outside the body.

Thus Viktoria felt her consciousness falling into a sea of darkness, where there seemed to be a storm brewing, without her having any of her powers to help her.

She found herself alone in her fall, watching her life flash past her eyes in the blink of an eye, noting that this must be like dying.

She was intelligent, so even though she felt fear and noticed how realistic this 'dream' was, she could still reason and distinguish the Natural Laws influencing her being.

'Is this death?' She asked herself as if she was trying to understand a puzzle that was difficult to analyze at first glance, but that became easier and easier the more she looked at it.

But Lothur was facing something different from his wife!

When he ingested the two substances together, he suddenly felt his heart beating strongly. At the same time, his eyes gradually lost their light.

He even tried to open his eyes unconsciously. Still, even so, after a few seconds, all he could see was darkness, feeling cold and hearing the devilish rumbling of the winds of bad days.

The combination of sensations he felt in that instant reminded him of something... The day of his transmigration!

'Am I going to die again?' He wondered as he saw nothing, feeling his heart beating hard against his chest.

As Lothur's panic reached its limit, his heart suddenly stopped beating, and his body slumped against the ground with almost no sign of life.

At that moment, in Lothur's deep subconscious, he awoke in a different place, like a desert of black sands, only submerged, with a gray sky and sepulchral silence.

There was only water there, something that covered all the surroundings, and nothing else could be seen for tens of thousands of kilometers as if this was a terrible world. But this water went only to half an adult knee height, enough for Lothur's fallen body not to be completely submerged.

"Hah... Hah..." He opened his eyes and lifted his body, breathing hurriedly as he 'woke up from death.'

'I didn't die?' Lothur wondered as he felt his own body but became momentarily distracted to pay attention to his surroundings.

Then he suddenly expressed pain and brought his hands to his head, feeling a sharp pain in his head, as if his Soul Bone was trying to separate from him.

"You're taking too long!"

A voice arose in Lothur's mind, something extremely ancient but nostalgic to him.

"You are wasting your time!" Once again, that voice arose in his head, causing this young man to look in confusion from one side of that place to the other.

"Look for the leaves, or this will be your end!" After those words were spoken, Lothur suddenly felt his body falling but soon came to a different scene.

Such a place looked like an abandoned battlefield, with rivers of blood still flowing, piles of corpses, dark clouds in the sky, and lightning of different colors on the horizon.

In this place, Lothur did not need much time and soon saw his own body next to those of Viktoria, Elke, Annaliese, in short, all the people he knew in the cultivation world.

"Wake up before it's too late!"

...