When facing an enemy stronger than yourself, the first step is to weaken them.

If you can’t break through their defenses, you must first soften them to the point where they can be broken.

A Death Priest’s specialty isn’t just using Dead Souls to cast skills.

They have another defining trait.

Sacrifice.

[Death Priest Specialty—Sacrifice]

[Sacrifice Dead Soul: Increase Skill Proficiency, enhance Skill Power, heal your own injuries, call upon power...]

And the strength of the Sacrifice...

...depends on the number of souls and their Spirituality.

The greater the Spirituality of the Dead Soul... the better the effect of the Sacrifice.

It’s not just for Sacrifice.

The strength of any skill that consumes Dead Souls is tied to the souls’ Spirituality.

[Divine Level Noble Soul]

[All souls you use for Sacrifice are considered supreme Noble Souls, possessing Supreme Spirituality and capable of meeting the ultimate requirements for any soul-related need.]

Heh...

’What a monstrous Profession.’

Lu Cang knew a thing or two about Spirituality.

The Spirituality of intelligent species like humans far surpassed that of Demons.

Among humans, the younger the child, the greater their Spirituality.

Of course, the Spirituality of High Level Professionals was also typically much greater than that of an ordinary person.

As for Demons, they really had no Spirituality to speak of, no matter how high their Tier.

This was because Demons were dull-witted creatures of extremely low intelligence, driven far more by instinct than thought.

No wonder the Death Priest was considered a forbidden Profession.

It wasn’t hard to imagine.

Someone who chose this Profession would have to kill countless people for Sacrifices—they might even resort to killing infants and children.

’But thankfully, I don’t have to.’

With [Divine Level Noble Soul], even a Demon’s soul could exert the highest possible spiritual effect.

[Sacrifice—1,000 souls]

[Enhance—Deep Curse Arrow]

Lu Cang used Corpse Replacement Technique to appear at the farthest point, and fifteen deep-black Curse Arrows materialized before him.

On each Curse Arrow...

...it seemed as if a thousand Dead Souls were wailing.

’Right now, I possess nearly all the Dead Souls on the battlefield—a total of 321,352.’

All of them were the Dead Souls of Demons.

According to the principles of a Death Priest, these Demon souls would probably be considered worthless scraps.

But for Lu Cang...

’These souls should be no different from those of newborn infants, perhaps even more potent. But as for how much more... I can’t be sure without a comparison.’

PFFT!

In the next instant.

Nie Ye appeared where Lu Cang had been, but Lu Cang himself had already vanished again.

[Deep Curse Arrow (Level 201) (1,000 souls)] x3

But the Deep Curse Arrows passed right through, merging into its body like ripples in water.

[Sacrifice—1 soul]

[Increase—Corpse Explosion Technique Skill Proficiency]

[Corpse Explosion Technique—Skill EXP +100,000,000]

’Oh?’

’Sacrificing one soul to increase proficiency is equivalent to training painstakingly ten thousand times?’

It was easy to see why. With a training method like this, who would bother with arduous practice? You could just kill people.

Moreover, a Death Priest’s magic consumed Dead Souls just to be cast, and they had to be from creatures the priest themselves had killed.

Almost in the same instant as the Sacrifice,

Lu Cang’s [Corpse Explosion Technique] had already reached Level 100.

’Evolve Corpse Explosion Technique.’

’Evolution Path: Power.’

[Corpse Explosion Technique Evolution—Power: Corpse Soul Shock Burst]

[Sacrifice—100 souls]

[Increase—Corpse Soul Shock Burst Skill Proficiency] 𝒻𝘳ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝒷𝘯ℴ𝓋ℯ𝘭.𝑐ℴ𝑚

...

[Corpse Soul Shock Burst—Skill EXP +10,000,000,000]

[Corpse Soul Shock Burst (Level 200)]

Two consecutive Sacrifices.

He had instantly raised his Corpse Explosion Technique from Level 1 all the way to Level 200.

"Evolve. Power."

[Corpse Soul Shock Burst Evolution—Power: Spirit Burst]

Meanwhile, the Demon before him had grown even more sluggish under the effect of the Deep Curse Arrow.

’A thousand Supreme Souls to enhance a single Skill...’

’Few people would be so extravagant.’

Even for the most depraved Death Priest, this would be a grievous sin of slaughter.

Never mind a thousand Supreme Souls.

Even killing a thousand Demons would take a considerable amount of time.

Beast Tides didn’t just invade whenever you wanted them to.

As for Nie Ye,

its eyes were filled with disbelief.

’This little brat.’

’His Magic actually had an effect on me?’

’And such a significant effect, at that.’

Its strength had plummeted in an instant, and its injuries began to worsen.

It was mainly due to its existing injuries.

The wounds left by those Level 5 Adventurers who had fought to the death were already difficult to heal, and the Deep Curse Arrow had only aggravated them further.

"Corpse Explosion."

But before it could even recover!

A dim light suddenly flickered all around it.

[Spirit Burst (Level 201)]

[Sacrifice Soul: 1,000]

HMMMM!

’No...’

’Impossible.’

’How could this child possibly possess the power to threaten me!’

BOOM!

Lu Cang watched impassively as the cloud of souls billowed upwards.

’It dodged so fast.’

A massive crater had appeared in the earth.

That last strike...

...had blasted out a massive, circular crater with a 200-meter radius.

But it had still managed to dodge.

Its speed was truly incredible.

Even suppressed by the gravity here and weakened by the Deep Curse Arrow...

...it was still able to evade the blow.

[Sacrifice—1 soul]

[Increase—Corpse Replacement Technique Skill Proficiency]

[Sacrifice—1 soul]

[Increase—Soul Absorption Skill Proficiency]

[Sacrifice—1 soul]

[Increase—Soul Devouring Curse Skill Proficiency]

...

Lu Cang sacrificed one soul after another, pouring the energy into increasing his Skill Proficiencies.

’Having [Divine Level Skill Evolution] is so convenient.’

Sacrificing one soul was equivalent to sacrificing ten thousand.

Otherwise, to raise the levels of so many skills, it was hard to say if all the souls on this battlefield combined would have been enough.

Now, he only needed to sacrifice 101 souls to reliably raise a skill’s proficiency to Level 200.

’Evolve Extreme Ice Lake. Path: Freezing Effect.’

’Evolve Ice Blade Technique. Path: Power.’

’Evolve Dark Curse Entanglement. Path: Weaken.’

’Evolve Flame Wave Skill. Path: Range.’

’Evolve Corpse Replacement Technique. Path: Substitute.’

...

SWOOSH—

BOOM!

[Death Substitute (Level 201)—Preset a substitute, trigger medium, more trigger methods, wider activation conditions, greater trigger range, corpses can be used three times, controllable post-swap corpse position, can use long-dead corpses]

In the instant before Lu Cang was about to be struck,

Death Substitute activated.

SWOOSH!

Lu Cang instantly teleported to the preset corpse.

"How convenient."

His survivability had increased significantly.

’As I thought, relying solely on a Mage’s Magic provides poor survivability.’

’And now, whenever I’m about to be hit by an attack, even if I don’t react in time...’

’...I’ll instantly swap places with a preset corpse.’

’Unless it destroys every corpse here...’

’No, even destroying them would be useless.’ Now, he could use them even if they were chopped into a paste.

Instead, as it had tried to ambush Lu Cang,

...it had fallen right into a trap.

[Eternal Frozen Deep Lake (Tier Two) (Level 201) (Sacrifice: 1,000 souls)]

The moment Lu Cang vanished, an extremely cold, deep lake materialized on the ground.

CRACKLE—

The instant one of its feet touched the lake’s surface, a deep chill surged upwards!

BOOM!

Simultaneously,

Thick, massive walls rose up!

From within the deep lake’s water, a dark curse crept up its frozen calf and onto its body!

[Evil Binding Curse (Tier Two) (Level 201)]

Poison Vines shot out from all directions, wrapping around its body in an instant!

It all happened in an instant.

With [Eternal Frozen Deep Lake] as the foundation, all of his Magic erupted at once!

[Soul Wound Curse (Level 201)]

[Inflicts the target with a curse of Death. Before the countdown ends, its soul will suffer damage equivalent to all damage sustained.]

Above its head, three beams of Soul Light condensed.

Triple Casting—[Spirit Burst].

[Sacrifice Soul—10,000]

"You think you can trap me like this?!"

"How could I possibly die at the hands of a mere Level 2 Mage!"

"You! You’re courting death!"

Lu Cang remained silent, simply sacrificing a massive number of souls at top speed.

All his skills erupted at once!

With Multiple Casting, he wasn’t just simultaneously casting a Mage’s Magic, but also the Death Spells of a Death Priest.

And it was a Triple Release, as well.