Chapter 556: Chapter 555: The Curse of Comparison
Noah paid close attention when the changes reached their climax.
Up until now, the unstable surge of mana had been the only truly violent factor.
From a visible standpoint, almost nothing about them appeared drastically different.
However...
At nearly the same point, each of them underwent subtle changes that felt far more impactful than they initially appeared.
Fenrir was the easiest example to notice immediately.
The molten seams running beneath his fur spread noticeably further throughout his body than before.
At the same time, the isolated patches of flesh across his body gradually became covered by dense layers of hardened plating instead of remaining visibly exposed like before.
Ailetta’s aura became far more cohesive, and the violet mana flowing throughout her gelatinous body radiated far more brightly than before.
But what stood out the most were the countless eyes embedded across her surface.
Before, the creatures within her body always felt childlike. Unless responding to Ailetta’s thoughts, their gazes wandered aimlessly, reacting more to emotion and curiosity than actual understanding.
Now, however, there was noticeably more attentiveness behind them. There was a visible focus as though they were slowly beginning to process what they were observing.
Meanwhile, Bolas remained entirely motionless throughout the process, but his presence felt more dangerous than before.
His mana didn’t grow abundant, but the dread in his miasmic properties radiated more dread than before.
There wasn’t one creature that didn’t show a change of some kind.
Subtle changes, but changes nonetheless.
What couldn’t be denied is that every single one of them felt fundamentally stronger than before.
—
Eventually, the pressure slowly settled down.
Several moments of silence followed while everyone observed themselves.
At least everyone.
Ava, Diablo, and Dummy took the changes as if they didn’t happen.
Though in Dummy’s case, it was genuinely difficult to determine whether the beast even cared enough to notice a difference at all.
Noah observed everyone again, his Nexus Eye glowing faintly as he tried to peer deeper into their changes.
Unfortunately, it quickly became apparent that it wasn’t enough.
His mood wasn’t affected by this at all. This result still aligned more closely with what he originally expected.
The others earlier underwent drastic transformations because they were still incomplete in many ways.
But these creatures, they were already far closer to the peak of what they currently were.
Instead of being fundamentally reshaped, Noah’s blood seemed to reinforce and refine the traits already rooted within their existence.
At least, that was Noah’s current understanding. He would only know after hearing their experiences.
—
It didn’t take long afterward for Noah to hear them recounting their experiences.
For those like Ailetta and Fenrir, their changes almost perfectly reinforced the conclusions he had formed while observing them earlier.
However, despite their changes being predictable to what Noah believed, their changes had more subtle outliers, preventing their changes to be seen as anything but simple.
Fenrir’s molten streams of veins also provided Fenrir with greater raw intensity and control behind his flames.
If this kept up, the temperature of his flames would surely become something that would rival Bolas’ flames before his evolution. Maybe even the colors of his flames would change.
Meanwhile, Ailetta’s changes were even more interesting.
The creatures within her became far more responsive to her thoughts.
Before, the tiny creatures could only properly react to extremely simple commands.
Now, Ailetta could sense that they were beginning to understand the intent behind those commands instead.
The distinction itself was massive.
She was perhaps more excited about the changes than anyone else present.
Because now she felt she was even closer to achieving the ability to create a golem. And that was only the beginning of her many unfinished attempts to create abilities of her own.
As Noah continued listening to each of them afterward, most of their explanations followed a similar pattern.
From what he could tell, it was a matter of quality versus quantity. When the transformation centered around a single trait, the results were often far more pronounced. But when multiple traits were involved, that growth seemed to spread itself across all of them instead.
Eventually, Noah’s gaze shifted toward the final person, who was rather reluctant to come forward.
"What about you, Arachne?" Out of everyone present, Arachne was the only one whose expression carried even the faintest trace of dissatisfaction.
Even worse, she clearly didn’t want anyone noticing it.
The slight hesitation before answering already revealed enough.
"...I can sense and communicate with my... soldiers, even when we’re apart now." The explanation came out almost in a whisper.
And almost immediately after saying it, Arachne subtly glanced toward Fenrir from the corner of her eye.
Making sure he didn’t hear, or rather, making sure he didn’t react to it.
Her mood quickly grew worse when making eye contact with the beast. There was no way Fenrir would ignore her changes, even if she tried to whisper it.
His ears were perked up the moment Noah addressed her.
The werebeast tilted his head under her undesired glare. The enhancement was out of his scope of understanding.
He didn’t know whether the ability was truly impressive or not.
So instead, he instinctively tried placing himself in her position.
Fenrir thought about being able to communicate with his pack regardless of distance.
Not having to personally search for his subordinates every single time.
And, more importantly, not having to constantly track down Dummy whenever the glutton wandered off somewhere.
The more he thought about it, the more Fenrir concluded that the ability was at least useful.
Still... He didn’t believe it was superior to his own changes.
A small part of him immediately wanted to rub that fact directly in Arachne’s face.
To proudly point out that even Noah’s blood appeared to favor him more.
However, he was becoming wise enough to restrain himself temporarily.
At least until hearing Noah’s opinion first.
And unfortunately for Arachne, she could already tell that her attempt to hide the change only made everyone else even more interested in it instead.
Her embarrassed gaze quickly shifted toward Noah, expecting disappointment, or perhaps no reaction at all.
Instead, what she found was a small shine in his eyes.
Noah’s expression hadn’t changed much, yet Arachne could sense his interest in her ability. Her heart stirred while her mind shifted even more as she wondered what about her ability she had missed.
"Arachne, power isn’t just determined by strength. Your ability is more useful than you realize. Quit putting yourself down so much."
Surprisingly, the person who reacted the strongest to those words wasn’t Arachne.
It was Fenrir.
The werebeast’s ears immediately stood upright while his expression visibly stiffened.
At first, he only felt surprised, and then the alarm kicked in.
Because the more Noah spoke, the more Fenrir began to realize that Arachne’s ability may have actually outshone his own in ways he initially failed to consider.
"Just think about when your underlings get stronger, to be able to coordinate together without letting the enemy hear what you’re planning."
"If we could communicate on the field like that, so many things could be avoided. If I could do that, I would feel less pressured when allowing you all to venture off on your own."
Arachne’s eyes widened more so to the fact that Noah desired her ability that she deemed useless.
"And not just that."
"What happens if one of your spiders notices something dangerous before the rest of us do?"
"A powerful creature, a hidden enemy, or humans about to ambush our territory."
"If they can immediately relay that information back to you instead of needing to physically search for you first..."
"...Then there may be situations where the only reason we react in time is because of your underlings."
Now, everyone else was beginning to understand the implications as well.
"I get the feeling that you’ll appreciate the ability much more in the future without realizing it."
"And eventually, there will be a point where you couldn’t imagine yourself without it."
Hearing Noah praise Arachne’s ability so highly, unintentionally caused several others who were previously satisfied with their own changes to begin doubting themselves instead.
Originally, Kratos considered his own improvement worthwhile enough.
The ability to transition between his two forms more freely and far faster than before was already useful in his opinion.
But after hearing Noah praise Arachne’s evolution so heavily, even he began to wonder whether his own change simply wasn’t as valuable by comparison.
Noah quickly noticed the shift in everyone’s demeanor. He felt the urge to sigh aloud. His creatures were not only too competitive with each other, while they also had surprisingly fragile self-esteem.
"...You’re all overthinking it." Noah rubbed the side of his head while their gazes snapped to him.
"The changes you received are exactly what you need. There’s no need to compare yourself to anyone else."
"If any of you looked as doubtful about your abilities as Arachne did, then I would’ve explained your changes more, too."
The explanation seemed to have settled their lingering worries. At least, that’s what he thought before Eve quickly walked up to him.
Her crimson eyes stared up at him with enough concern to make it seem as though she had completely missed everything he had just said.
"...I don’t think mine is very good either." Eve hesitated briefly when she met Noah’s deadpanned stare.
"W-what, do you think?"
