Not a Hero

Knowing that his toilet curses didn't have much effect, Pro resigned to a head-on confrontation.

Boom! The no longer recovering bathroom door was smashed open as Hulk tumbled out of the bathroom, and the first thing that greeted Hulk was bullets to his face.

Tatatatata!

Pro held the assault rifle with two hands as he blasted Hulk's face with bullets. Sensing the danger, Hulk raised his hands and hammer to cover his head, blocking the barrage of bullets while charging towards Pro.

Seeing this, Pro sneered as he saw a wide open target. A yin needle was condensed in his mouth and he shot it towards the unprotected crotch.

"Taste my ultimate move, dirty tactic style ... balls of pain!"

Sensing the danger, Hulk kept his hammer up to block his face as he used his other hand to block his crotch. The yin needle bounced off his hands, but not before leaving a small mark of corrosion.

"Tsk."

After tutting, Pro swiftly backed out of apartment 448 and into the hallway. Hulk continued to charge over with his face covered, but just when he was about to reach the door, he actually slipped!

It was unknown when a pile of cow dung has appeared on the path that Hulk ran on. Hulk obviously didn't notice it until it was too late. An unknown force seemed to control Hulk's body as his whole body fell backwards, and he couldn't even stabilize himself as his hands were still needed for defense.

Thud! Hulk fell to the ground. Just when he wanted to use his hand to push himself up, another yin needle fired at his crotch, causing him to give up the idea. The force from the burst of bullets that landed on his hammer also prevented him from sitting up.

"Since you are not the real hero, you can only be sh*t on! Dirty tactic style ... raining sh*t!" Pro gave his move an ultimate name.

At this moment, multiple piles of cow dung in the air above Hulk! Pro then happily watched Hulk get sh*t on.

After a while, Pro glanced at the holy knight, who was dyed brown, as he frowned in thought. Although it seemed like he currently had the advantage, but he will run out of ammo eventually and, the knight can still fight back.

As expected, Hulk attempted to break out of his current situation, "Holy Light!"

Glaring light exploded from Hulk's hand and spilled out from between the gaps in the layer of cow dung that covered Hulk. Pro sneered and didn't even bother to dodge the sparse light as he continued to pack more sh*t onto Hulk.

"Dirty tactic style ... sh*t burial! I don't believe I can't suffocate you to death!"

Seeing Hulk finally using his hand to clear the layers of cow dung, Pro sneered as he fired a couple more needles. The needles pierced the soft layer of dung and made contact with Hulk's skin, causing black spots of corrosion to appear. Hulk retracted his hand to get these needles off of him to the best of his ability while he choked in pain due to the corrosion.

Unfortunately, what he choked on wasn't air. Choking on a couple mouthful of sh*t, Hulk wanted to throw up so bad, but doing so will only allow the layer of cow dung above him to invade his mouth even more. He did his best to clear a small breathing space around his face as he felt the layers of cow dung become heavier and heavier.

Although Hulk was trained to deal with many situations, being buried by sh*t is not one of them. Of course, if it was just being buried by normal sh*t, he would have no problem getting out, but this sh*t actually had a mysterious force that kept causing him to slip back down to the ground!

Heck! Just dealing with the stench alone made Hulk feel despair. What disgusting evil spirit actually had this trashy ability?! Even though the bullets had stopped firing at him, Hulk couldn't clear the layers of sh*t around him no matter how hard he tried. He doesn't know how deep he was buried already!

Observing his masterpiece through domain perception, Pro nodded in satisfaction. After recovering and shutting all the doors in apartment 448's living room, Pro continued to pile on sh*t until he packed the living room tight.

This was extremely energy consuming, but Pro could keep up with the recovery from the assimilated toilet. Pro could also have done this burial in the bathroom, but he didn't want to deal with the slim chance of the buff knight breaking the walls and escaping.

A small pond can't contain a large fish. So, Pro decided to place him in a bigger space so he can drown in a small lake of sh*t.

After spending a couple of hours to increase the density of the cow dung to make sure the knight couldn't dig his way out, Pro then relaxed as he checked his loot.

[Host has eliminated an intruder in your domain. Domain is now absorbing the remains of the intruder ...]

[Host has absorbed the life force from the remains of two living being. Host gained 100 life points.]

[Host has absorbed an owner-less wind attribute mysterious origin of yellow rank. Host gained 1500 life points. Host gains new ability .]

[Host has absorbed an owner-less spiritual attribute mysterious origin of yellow rank. Host gained 1500 life points. Host gains new ability .]

[Host has absorbed the souls of the invaders. System Library updated with new information.]

"Sweet! That's already a whopping 3100 points! That completely covers the 320 points that I used to stop the buff knight's rampage. There's even new skills! If I add the knight as well, I have a chance of getting even more!" Pro couldn't help but roll around on the bed in excitement.

After calming down, Pro excitedly checked his new skills.

[Curved Trajectory] When host shoots projectiles, host can send the projectile on a curved path with the aid of this mysterious power. Projectiles can at most curve at a 120 degree angle.

[Spiritual Sea] A spiritual sea is opened in host's mind. Host can perceive the sea with eyes closed. With the opened spiritual sea, host can send spiritual sense out to perceive the surrounding environment and energy. Spiritual sense can penetrate obstacles, but can be blocked by spiritual and energy barriers. Current perception range is 20 square meters.

Without hesitation, Pro began to test out his new ability that his spiritual sea grants him, spiritual perception. Closing his eyes, Pro activated spiritual perception with a thought and felt his senses enter a completely dark space in his mind. The only place in this dark space that Pro could 'see' was a vague 3D model that was being rendered as he felt his senses spread out.

The model only had a vague outline of his surroundings and even the outlines became blurry at the edges of the model. Pro was only able to recognize some objects because of his familiarity with them.

However, this is not what the ability is mainly used to perceive. Through this ability, Pro was able to see vague traces of black mist floating in the model. He was also able to notice some particularly dense spots of black mist.

Two of these dense spots happen to be nearby, and Pro knew they were Alice and Ali. As for his own location, Pro was able to sense a dense ball of mist. Pro watched as the ball of mist move as he took a step forward.

Reopening his eyes after confirming his ability, Pro then concluded, "This ability should be very useful for discovering other spirits. Not only that, this ability can be used outside my domain. However, I can already sense yin qi without using this ability, so it is kind of redundant. Perhaps it may be used to sense other types of energy, but I'll have to look into that later."

Pro then stepped out into the hallway where Alice was happily cleaning away with Ali following behind her trying to be cute and helpful. After a glance, Pro smiled and turned away to take aim down the hallway.

With a thought, the door to the security office was opened. Pro then attempted to use his ability curved trajectory to send yin needles flying into the room. After many attempts of test and trial, Pro finally got the hang of the ability after having a bunch of needles nailed into the walls and floor.

Cleaning up the traces, Pro checked his other gains.

[Host's domain has absorbed the power from a mysterious sapphire staff. Host has gained a special ability, .]

[Empowered Spells] Host's mana spells gain a small empowerment.

[Host's domain has absorbed the power from two mysterious pistols with holy power. Host's resistance to holy light has increased by 5%.]

Glancing at the useless empowered spells ability, Pro rolled his eyes as he complained, "I don't even have mana spells to use, what's the point? Even if I have the spells, I won't have the mana to cast it. Well, I can't always get useful abilities because it's RNG after all. At least my holy light resistance got boosted from 20 to 25 percent."

After checking the body and finding three talismans on the old man's body, Pro cursed the gunner for being a poor ghost before stashing away the talisman. After making sure both bodies are searched clean, he carried both bodies down to floor 3's neighborhood trashcan.

Returning to his bedroom not long after, Pro checked on the knight with domain perception to make sure he is still buried in deep sh*t. Then, he began to surf through the information of the two mystics he killed.

The old man was named Joe Byedan. He was a level two mystic of the Magician pathway, an Acolyte. As an Acolyte, he had learned many level 1 spells after gaining access to them from the magic network. However, the number of spells he could cast instantly were still limited to three.

To cast spells instantly, an Acolyte must engrave the spell model of the spell into their spiritual sea, which was opened once they have become a Magician. The spiritual sea is what allows them to gain the ability to perceive their surroundings.

However, only Acolytes or above can begin to engrave spell models into their spiritual sea. Once a Magician becomes an Acolyte, besides opening a mana container in their bodies, they will be also able to perceive 'slots' opening up in their spiritual sea that would be filled with darkness otherwise. Acolytes can then engrave level one spell models onto these slots to gain instant cast time.

This process can be somewhat dangerous because there is a chance of failing if the spiritual power of an Acolyte is not strong enough. However, this only causes a weakening in spiritual power that can be recovered over time.

What is truly dangerous about this process is that spell models may conflict or become unstable. Either one of these can cause the spiritual sea to collapse. If this happens, it's game over.

Of course, there are supplements and research done to assist Acolytes in this process. The old man had already engraved two level one spells of Detection and Physical Barrier. Once he engraved his third spell, he can begin the process of advancing to level three mystic, a mage.

Unfortunately, he was planted here. He didn't even get the chance to use his other spells he knew. These include small fireball, mist and a couple more level 1 spells.

Of course, none of these non-engraved spells were instant cast and will require temporary spell model construction in the spiritual sea to cast. This can be done by channeling mana into their spiritual sea.

There is still a small chance of failure in this, and failing will result in spell-cast backlash, which is common for many lower level mystics of the Magician pathway. This is why Acolytes must focus during spell casting and can't be disturbed unless they are a talented genius or if the spell model is engraved.

Reading this, Pro couldn't help but mock the Acolytes, "It seems they are even weaker than the Magician! I remember that Magicians have a bunch of useful techniques for combat, but this old man failed to use them because he didn't want to carry props. Seriously, how lazy could he be, and I thought he was a wise old man, but he was actually old just because he joined the mystic side at an old age."

"Although he did seem to have a bit of experience, he paid more focus on life saving spells such as detection and shield because of his cautious attitude," Pro shook his head in disappointment, but also felt lucky that it wasn't an aggressive mage that engrave attack spells like fireball.

As for the three talismans the old man had, it was two life saving Heal talismans and one for curse resistance.

"Not too useful as the heals can't be used on dead spirits like me, and I already have the other one that I still haven't used. Why didn't this old man bring an exorcise talisman. It could have been a protection charm for me," Pro complained while recalling that powerful spirit he had provoked.

As for other guy, he was named Kane Bane. Kane was a level two mystic of the Gunner pathway, Sheriff. Upgrading to a sheriff brings an increase to dexterity, mental power, and a minor buff to physique. Sheriffs' eyes are also enhanced for better vision. As for the real specialty, gunners can curve bullets while Sheriff can use bullet time.

Bullet time simply enhances the perception of the user and speeding up the user's mental thoughts. This lets the user see his surrounding as if time has slowed down.

The user can still move slightly in this environment, but the more movements made, the more stamina that will be drained. Hence, bullet time will be very taxing for the user's body, and will usually only be used to deal with enemies with guns or enemies that can move super fast.

As for how powerful a Sheriff will truly be, it will depend on their gun skills that did not come from being a Sheriff. Kane's skill was mediocre and was only seemed better mostly due to his enhanced eyes and bullet time.

"Well, seems this pathway has part of its power 'sold separately'," Pro was amused by this thought, and easily eliminated this pathway from his future choice list.

After seeing no other important info, Pro then began to think about his gains, "It seems that all level two mystics can drop their mystic powers as loot after I slay them. However, the dissipation after death causes most of its power to be lost so I can't gain all of its power. Otherwise, I might have gotten 'bullet time' or unlocked some spell slots in my spiritual sea. Well, not like I have a connection to the magic network anyways."

Pro did find the ritual to connect to the magic network, but he didn't have the materials to do it.

"Well, but based on my knowledge from reading novels, the magic network should be some trap of some magic goddess I bet. The ease of access granted may have detrimental effects if the network disappears. It's best not to connect to it. It's not like I need it anyways," Pro concluded.

After taking note of all his gains, Pro finally went to check on his final loot box. Watching the poor guy struggle from time to time, but still buried in sh*t, Pro had ... no sympathies.

"It won't be long before I will be able to harvest this fake hero. Afterwards, I can finally expand my domain big time!"

Pro's eyes glistened in excitement as he saw the stairs to the next level awaiting him to climb.

"I wonder how much stronger I can get after this ..."