"Where am I? What's happening to me?"
Su Zhan woke up slowly, glancing in confusion at the naked Pop girl beside him. He vaguely remembered swallowing the sonic man's ability, then trying to devour Pop girl's power, and then... being unexpectedly drawn in by her appearance. Desire took over, and he lost control.
"It seems I went too far..."
Su Zhan glanced at the embarrassed Pop girl and felt a bit apologetic. He had lost control at the time, but now, after venting his negative emotions in this rather unique way, he felt somewhat recovered.
"Was it because of the evil heart?"
He could not figure out why he'd lost control so suddenly. Aside from the influence of the evil heart, there did not seem to be any other explanation.
"Damn, why did I sleep so long?"
Looking at the dark sky outside and the time on the clock, Su Zhan felt frustrated. By his calculation, less than an hour remained in the dungeon. He still had not found the main characters, nor the boss of the Organization.
Thought control and mind control!
Especially mind control, which was the ability he wanted most. Missing out would be a real shame.
"No, I need to find the protagonist as soon as possible, or at least one of the boss's henchmen. They also have mind control abilities."
Not wanting to miss out on any powers, Su Zhan tried to use his precognition to locate them. But suddenly, he realized his ability had failed. He tried again, but the result was the same.
His sound wave, precognition, tracking, and other recently absorbed powers all seemed to have stopped working—only his fire control remained. That was a small relief, but something was clearly wrong.
"Damn, did all that work go to waste?"
Su Zhan cursed in frustration. Still, looking at Pop girl, he thought at least not everything was lost, he'd had some fun, at least.
With the abilities he'd just absorbed now unavailable, and the plot disrupted, there wasn't much time left. Although he hadn't yet devoured Pop girl's power, he might still have a chance, but she was unconscious now—and seeing the blood next to her, Su Zhan felt guilty.
"Forget it. I can come back in 30 days anyway. Worst case, I'll keep this plane and return later."
Sighing, Su Zhan left some money and a note, helped Pop girl get dressed, and quietly waited for the dungeon to end.
"The dungeon time is over. Returning soon!"
The system's voice sounded, and Su Zhan vanished.
The next moment, he was back in Skye's car—but Skye was not around.
"I'm back."
Su Zhan sighed, then asked the system, "What happened just now? Why did I lose control? Was it because of the evil heart? I felt an overwhelming urge to do whatever I wanted."
"Dungeon mission statistics: main mission complete. Reward: energy for system upgrade."
"What's the reward?"
"Energy required for system upgrade. Specific value unknown."
"Fine, but answer my question: why did I lose control?"
"Losing control was not due to the evil heart, but because you devoured too many abilities too quickly. Although your body can adjust, remove drawbacks, and stabilize powers, this takes time. You overloaded the process, causing you to lose control."
"I see."
Su Zhan realized it made sense—no matter how strong the body, devouring too much at once could cause problems. Since the task required devouring at least three abilities, that seemed to be the safe limit for his current body—at least in a short period.
"What about my devoured abilities?"
"They're not lost, just temporarily unavailable. Your body needs time to adjust. Once the process is complete, they'll return."
"So, it's only temporary? That's a relief. Otherwise, all that effort would have been wasted." Su Zhan exhaled in relief. "System, is this energy enough for an upgrade now? I absorbed so many powers and completed the mission."
"Not enough energy for upgrade."
"Still not enough? It looks like it'll be a while before you upgrade."
Just then, the car door opened, and Skye appeared looking worried. "You're back? Where were you? When I woke up, you were gone, and I couldn't reach you by phone."
Su Zhan smiled. "You were still asleep when I left, so I didn't want to wake you. I found a restaurant with good online reviews and went to check it out since it was a bit far. If it was good, I planned to take you there; if not, there was no need to bother. Unfortunately, it wasn't that great, so it was a wasted trip. As for the phone, I probably lost signal out there."
"My dear, don't do that again. I don't care about the restaurant—I just want to be with you. I was so worried when I couldn't reach you," Skye said, full of concern.
"Alright, I promise it won't happen again," Su Zhan apologized. "But I am really hungry now, so, beautiful, may I have the honor of having dinner with you?"
"Of course, handsome!" Skye replied with a smile.