Budding Illusionist's First Trio of Tricks

After spending a week in the underworld, Roxana noticed an interesting development: both her Strength and Speed stats had increased by 0.1, despite not actively working on them.

Although her flesh wasn't marred by wounds, nor had she consciously boosted her stamina, she sensed an innate potential for her Activity stat to rise.

It meant that adapting to the harsh underworld environment automatically made her body change and adapt.

However, Magic Power proved to be a stumbling block. To advance in the underworld's hierarchy, Roxana realized she needed to master magic—and quickly.

Her only viable path seemed to be enhancing her illusion magic, the lone attribute in her magical arsenal.

While she considered seeking assistance from her system to gain insight into her magical capabilities, she was concerned that it may come at a steep price in souls. In addition, she believed that if she had some skills, she may be able to perform magic, but if her Magic Stat remained stagnant, the skills would be ineffective.

During her observations, Roxana noted that no demon around her wielded magic energy. This absence made her wonder: Was it a lack of innate magic or simply an absence of skill?

Yet, there was a common practice among demons she hadn't adopted: consuming souls. Roxana began to suspect that her struggle to naturally increase her Magic Power, unlike her other stats, might be linked to her avoidance of soul consumption.

She theorized that demons were drawn to souls not just for their flavor but for the boost in magical power they provided. This insight led her to contemplate consuming a soul herself.

Holding the smallest soul she possessed, Roxana experienced an involuntary drool, her desire for it mirroring the hunger she felt for food in her human days.

Yielding to the impulse, she allowed the soul to touch her lips. It dissolved—or rather, vanished—upon contact with her saliva, affirming the lethal potency of a demon's saliva against the ethereal substance of a soul.

A cascade of indescribable pleasure flooded Roxana's senses. Her body thrummed with a euphoria that seemed to defy the dreary confines of the underworld, her mind awash in a cocktail of dopamine and oxytocin. For a fleeting moment, she was adrift among the clouds, liberated from the weight of her infernal existence.

As this blissful state eventually faded, leaving Roxana craving more, she managed to restrain herself from consuming additional souls. She noticed, however, that a portion of the soul had transformed into a warm sensation that coursed through her body before settling in her heart.

Could this warmth be magic power? To verify, Roxana checked her system interface and saw an increase in her Magic Power stat: (+0.2)

This discovery confirmed that consuming souls could indeed enhance her magic energy. While enlightening, it also posed a challenge, as relying on soul consumption for magical growth meant she would need a constant supply of souls.

Other stats could be naturally increased, but magic required souls.

Now that she had figured out how to increase her Magic Stat, she could use her collected souls to create a skill under the Illusion Attribute bracket. Due to her possession of the Illusion Attribute, she was confident that she would be able to create basic illusion magic spells with only 34 souls in her possession.

Roxana began to ponder the mechanics of illusion magic. She had a hunch that a clearer vision of her desired outcome would enable the system to more accurately meet her needs.

After some deliberation, she concluded that illusion magic involves manipulating perception so that the target perceives, hears, or believes something that is not actually true.

It was not possible for this form of magic to alter the physical reality (at least in its most basic sense); rather, it influenced the minds of those who perceive the illusion, creating a false sensory experience in the process.

In the end, she created three skills: Environmental Camouflage(0% Mastery), Simple Visual Deceptions(0% Mastery), and Sensory Overload(0% Mastery). Each skill was a manifestation of her insights into the art of illusion and served a unique purpose in her magical arsenal.

[Simple Visual Deceptions] was the backbone of her endeavor. This skill allowed her to fabricate elementary visual and auditory illusions, such as the sound of misleading footsteps or the appearance of non-existent objects. It was a tool designed to confuse and distract, offering Roxana tactical advantages by manipulating the enemy's perception.

[Sensory Overload] aimed at disorienting adversaries by bombarding their senses with overpowering stimuli, such as blinding lights or deafening sounds. This approach sought to impair their ability to concentrate or react, leveraging the overwhelming nature of the illusions to gain the upper hand.

[Environmental Camouflage], slightly more advanced than its counterparts, enabled Roxana to blend seamlessly into her surroundings. By adopting the guise of innocuous elements within the environment, she could become virtually invisible, evading detection and preparing to strike from the shadows.

Roxana's journey, armed with her new illusionary skills, promised a departure from her previous reliance on the invisible robe—a garment that, while useful, came with its own set of limitations.

The robe, for all its worth, couldn't mask the sound of her breath or hide her scent from the keen senses of the demons she often found herself evading.

It was an amusing, if not slightly inconvenient, truth that while she could disappear from sight, she couldn't as easily erase the other traces of her existence. "A magician can disappear," she mused, "but apparently, they still need to hold their breath and avoid stepping on twigs."

With a mix of determination and a whimsical acknowledgment of her past constraints, Roxana stepped out from the familiar confines of her abode.

Her path was one of ambition, seeking power and mastery over her illusions to ascend beyond the lowly rank that had defined her existence for too long. "Running is an art," she chuckled to herself, "but perhaps it's time to learn how to walk, unseen and unheard, in the midst of my enemies."

"Let's see how these demons enjoy the groundbreaking concept of confusion and doubt," she thought, her lips curling into a mischievous smile.

"Let the exploration of my new powers begin," Roxana declared, her voice a whisper carried away by the wind. She stepped forward, blending into her environment with the ease of a shadow merging with the darkness searching for her first hunt of the night.