HDXD: Omni Harem System
Chapter 161: Arena of Power

Chapter 161: Arena of Power

"Hmmm... Who do you think’s gonna win the Lamrios Kiden this time?"

The dark-skinned fairy rasped the question with a toothy grin, his shark-like teeth glinting as he shoved the blood-slicked cart forward.

His glowing eyes narrowed with mischief, flicking toward his companion.

The lighter-skinned fairy, smaller but no less twisted, clicked his tongue.

"Tch... It’s gotta be Jachod. The king shared some of his own energy with him, and even gave him a name. That alone puts him above the rest. He is easily the strongest among us chosen monsters."

The first one scoff at this as he replied back saying.

"Don’t be stupid."

"Lady Albedo has been trained since birth, by the former queen herself, Jachod is just a newly born powerhouse. Meanwhile Albedo is a monster among our fellow brethrens. There is no way she loose to the likes of a kid."

The two fairies continued their heated debate, their voices rising as they argued over who among them was the strongest warrior.

Adam listened quietly, concealed and alert.

He could feel the surge of bloodlust in their veins, their desire for violence practically radiated from their skin.

Their words were sharp, feral, and unfiltered, soaked in the instinctual aggression only those of the monsters race could casually carry.

"For something so small... these guys are insanely bloodthirsty."

Adam muttered under his breath, watching them with wary eyes.

As they drew closer to their destination, Adam, still new to the whole monster energy thing began to sense it more clearly: an immense wellspring of raw, oppressive and corrupt power was just up ahead.

It poured from the place like heat from a forge.

Extending a sliver of his slime form outward, Adam carefully peeked beyond the cart, and that,s when he saw them.

More fairies.

Dozens at first.

Then hundreds.

They were everywhere, perched on ledges, clustered in swarms, flitting about with barely-contained excitement. It became clear that the fairies didn’t just work in the castle.

They lived here.

But then and again if you think about, they where the size of dolls. So a place this big was the equivalent of an entire town for them.

Meanwhile up ahead, passing through the corridor, a massive crowd roared, as they go wild with excitement.

ROOOOOAAAR!

Through a wide, open doorway, the sound of a frenzied audience thundered out, shaking the walls.

Adam blinked...

For a second, he thought it was a battlefield, but no.

It felt more like...

An arena.

He stayed low, watching as they passed through the hallway. More fairies lined the path, each radiating a distinct magical presence, along side their own wavelength of Monster Energy. But one in particular stood out.

One power eclipsed the rest

It was crushing.

Suffocating even, yet for Adam as powerful as it felt, it was nothing compared to his infinite reserve of it.

But the monster here, it was an aura so vast and dense it can make anyone shutter in fear.

"By the share amount of corruption that one has, it safe to say that might be there king. This one... was a peak A-Rank monster for sure. Just one step away from transcending entirely, on the verge of completing its final monster evolution. "

The pressure it gave off reminded Adam of Meowroar, Keira and Nyla’s father, even when that titan of a beast lay unconscious in his coma.

They share the same amount of vast energy within them.

It was insane.

As it was unnatural.

But strangely, Adam didn’t feel the same fear he used to, not like those early days, when he avoided Yarquella at all costs just to stay alive.

He had grown stronger.

A lot stronger, and in such a such short amount of time to boot.

Yet still... the thought of clashing with something that powerful made his insides twist.

Not out of fear as one might think.

Rather out of curious anticipation.

At that moment, the roar of the crowd grew louder, the clash of steel, the screeches of beasts, and the unmistakable sound of blood being spilled echoed through the stone halls.

They had were about to enter the heart of the arena.

Adam’s eyes widened in awe.

Never before had he seen so many monsters gathered in one place, all riled up with bloodlust and anticipation.

It was chaos incarnate... and somehow, perfectly organized.

Creatures of all shapes and sizes filled the massive space.

Some stood upright on two legs, their bodies humanoid but twisted. Others prowled on all fours, muscles rippling beneath scaly or matted fur.

There were beast-kin like monster similar to Werewolves, Nekomata’s, and Nekowolves with warped, bestial features. Along with golem like monsters that where hulking constructs of stone, their forms crudely held together by glowing cores embedded in their chests.

He even spotted familiar species, those yeti-like monsters from before, and aquatic merman-like creatures, their slimy skin glistening under the arena torches.

The arena itself was buried deep within the castle, carved into the belly of the stronghold like a gladiatorial pit.

The stands stretched upward in rings, packed with thousands of monsters howling and jeering, throwing bones, coins, or scraps into the pit in excitement.

Anything they find really, most likely from humans they had kidnapped.

It was a coliseum for monsters. The ultimate joy for their kind, if it was one thing that gets the monster species riling up for excitement it was either sex or best of all unhinged violence among kins.

Instinct surpasses all after all.

But just as they crossed the threshold fully into the arena, Adam felt it.

『Your Shinso ability, Local Adaptation, has passively activated due to the influence of of an overwhelming amount of monster kind. As a result, you’re about undergo a serious evolution』

『Your body has now achieved sufficient strength to endure multiple simultaneous alterations. These adaptations are intricate in nature, therefore, your vessel will interpret them not as damage, but as a natural evolution』

A warm, ever-increasing sensation built up in Adam’s slime body.

The crimson liquid of dissolved flesh and brittle bone, began to boil, causing bubbles of putrid blood to rise and burst from the heat.

"Aghhh!...

Adam screamed, though the pain was far less than before, so it was easy to say that it was nothing like the last time, when his body had broken down, torn, and reformed all at once.

When he adapted the traits of the weremonster’s back in Ultima.

This time, the pain was more bearable, an ever-rising burn. Still intense, but contained within the boiling soup of power that made up his being.

And in that churning broth of energy, his body began to change again.

He was adapting the natural abilities of every race present here, every monster within this shared, localized society. Integrating their genetic code directly himself, piece by piece.

And the more he changed from within, the more the system updated him on his internal transformation.

『You have adapted the Nameless Monster Race – Regulator Rings』

『You have adapted the Nameless Monster Race – Water Affinity』

『You have adapted the Nameless Monster Race – Anti-Energy Manipulation』

『You have adapted the Krog Race – Water Breathing』

『You have adapted the Krog Race – Bubble Space』

『You have adapted the Krog Race – Sonar』

『You have adapted the Yarnam Race – Veracious Lightning』

『You have adapted the Yarnam Race – Truth Fire』

『You have adapted the Jroflin Race – Illusion Casting』

『You have adapted the Jroflin Race – Enhanced Condition』

『You have adapted the Archane Race – Supernatural Balance』

『You have adapted the Archane Race – Silk Creation』

『You have adapted the Archane Race – Aura of Dread』

『You have adapted the Archane Race – Accelerated Breathing』

『You have adapted the Archane Race – Venomous Fangs』

『You have adapted the Archane Race – Accelerated Breeding』

A torrent of racial traits surged into Adam all at once, an overwhelming flood of abilities and newly aquired instincts.

As power beyond reason coiled and swelled inside his core, reshaping him from the inside out.

Still partially in his slime form, his body began to shift, slowly knitting itself back into a humanoid shape, only now far more stronger than before.

His muscles became denser, thicker, optimized. Not just for strength, but for energy efficiency.

Each fiber compressed to maximize output with minimal waste. His body felt like it could passively regulate his own monster energy for better control and use.

An inherited trait common among monster that has family ties to the Monster King of Force.

His entire frame grew more conditioned in every sense. Resistance and immunity to worldly phenomena layered into his form like unseen armor; heat, cold, pressure, and much more.

It all dulled now beneath his passive resilience.

Behind him, a ring of monster energy took shape. But unlike the usual halo seen around the fairies thus far his didn’t hang behind his back like a tail of glory.

Rather it shrank and condensed.

And floated around his head like a crown, a radiant halo forged from his own raw Monster Energy. That was boiling more and more.

The crown being a symbol of his current strength, among the nameless, it was the shape and nature of their rings that defines who is the strongest among their race.

His teeth thickened.

His bones grew denser.

He could feel the strength in every joint, every ligament, every tiny twitch of his reconstructed flesh.

And in the stillness that followed, deep within the pile of meat. Adam felt a sense of invincible calm wash over him.

Power surged through him, not wildly, but in steady, controlled waves. He could feel it more clearly than ever before, his own Monster Energy, sharp and distinct.

No longer a blur of instinct, but a tangible force he could now manipulate with intention to a level degree.

His senses expanded as well.

His awareness now extended beyond his physical body, roughly a 20-meter radius of absolute clarity.

The world responded to his presence, as though it were an extension of his will.

And the stronger he became, the closer he was to finally understanding Minerva’s true intentions.

"Hehehe...

Adam chuckled softly to himself as it echoed outwards.

"So this is what she meant by conditioning my body. A lot of these traits... until today, I had no idea what they even did."

He paused, the grin spreading across his face.

"And yet here I am, my instincts boiling over. I can hear them... no, I can feel them. It’s like the abilities themselves are whispering to me, telling me exactly what they do."

A deep breath escaped him, slow and satisfied.

"I feel like I was reborn this day. Ahhh... what a nice feeling. I feel so free. So detached from the problems around me. From everything I care about."

He tilted his head back and laughed.

"Getting high off power... there’s no experience like it."

Adam spoke aloud, though his mind was elsewhere. Something inside him had shifted, noticeably at that.

The energy flowing through his body moved smoother now.

More organized that ever.

"Hm... I wonder if I can pull this off."

Without saying another word, he focused on both the energy and his own DNA coding.

Traversing the complex library of different monster DNA, he started to transform, and change his form into a more fitting one to fit this environment.

Each genetic strand was a blueprint. Each one unlocked something new, and unique.

And right now, those blueprints told his body how to shrink, how to shift his skeleton, how to balance his weight.

He was shaping himself into one of the many fairy monsters that inhabits this environment, right down to the proportions, skin texture, and energy signature.

Then, using illusion magic, he altered the Monster Energy crown around his head, disguising it as a standard ring behind his back, just like the other normal fairies to better blend in.

A moment later, he activated Memory Point, and teleported instantly, he appeared high up in the spectator seats, blending in perfectly with the others.

Leaving the meat cart behind, to the spectator he look like ball of purple light as he manipulate the miasma passively around him in the form.

Creating a natrual barrier of corruption around him at all time.

He crossed his arms and calmly watched the chaos unfold below, completely unnoticed.

But then, from the upper right section of the arena, something shifted.

The vast pool of Monster Energy he had sensed earlier... it was getting closer. Closer and heavier, like a gravitational pull pressing down on the air itself.

Adam glanced upward, past the stands, beyond the roaring crowds, and his gaze landed on the highest pew.

There, seated above all others in the maenianum primum, was the source.

For the first time, Adam laid eyes on the King of the Fairies.

"This energy signature...

Adam said with open eyes.

"No doubt about it, this has to be the leader of this place."

In a coliseum overflowing with monstrous power, this one presence dwarfed them all.

A pressure so immense, so ancient, it felt less like a being and more like a force of nature.

Energy so dense and overwhelming, it was like staring at the living lifeblood of an entire planet.