"You completed your mission excellently."
Fernandes sat behind his desk leisurely sipping tea, his gaze sweeping over David and Veronica across from him.
"...You even completed someone else's mission too."
"Just happened to be convenient." David shrugged.
Veronica continued, "That master alchemist who was robbed was actually just a duplicate created by the forbidden object. The real Julius didn't lose any potions at all. He just used Dick to 'recover' the Liquid Thunder from the duplicate. As for Dick who turned into a monster..."
"Got it, no need to explain further."
Fernandes tapped on a mission report on the desk—the one Veronica was responsible for filling out. "Your report is very detailed, Hunter Veronica."
"How does the church plan to handle Julius?" David asked curiously.
"Won't handle him." The old man sighed softly. "Although he used the forbidden object without permission, he also created a truly great invention because of it. Now he's handed over the Liquid Thunder formula to both the church and the imperial family...
Given that he voluntarily returned the forbidden object, plus this matter didn't cause any major disasters, and you solved those two monsters, Julius won't face any punishment. He's still that respected master alchemist."
David nodded, not surprised by this result.
"Now then, you two, I, Fernandes, hereby declare that your hunter trial is complete. Starting today, you are true hunters."
Veronica smiled with some excitement.
David remained expressionless. What he cared more about were those "rights only formal hunters could enjoy" mentioned before.
"Mr. Fernandes, when can I perform the second-tier Goddess's Blessing Ritual?"
Fernandes looked at David and chuckled. "Kid, you haven't even completed the first-tier ritual yet. You can't advance like this."
"Haven't completed?"
"That's right. Once a ritual begins, it doesn't stop. Did you think it was just about collecting a few materials and reciting an incantation?"
The so-called supernatural advancement ritual was a process that completely accompanied a supernatural being's growth and couldn't be interrupted.
Theoretically, all path advancement rituals had at most nine stages, corresponding to hunter levels 1-9.
But currently in the entire empire, there were no living hunters who exceeded seventh-tier. Someone like Olivia that David had met could already be called one of the top supernatural beings among hunters, and such existences were extremely rare.
This phenomenon occurred because the advancement ritual process was very complex. The higher the tier, the harder the ritual was to complete. If a hunter couldn't meet certain conditions required by the ritual, then no matter how many hundreds of years or more they spent, they'd never see the day of advancement.
"To advance to second-tier, you must first complete the follow-up to your first-tier Goddess's Blessing Ritual and let the goddess's blessing power completely fuse with you.
Here's some advice—you can try going to the chapel to pray, praise the goddess who granted you the blessing, or bestow blessings on others, until you can fully understand the ritual's power... Actually, you can apply to perform the second-tier advancement ritual anytime. Success or failure depends on you."
Fernandes rarely explained so much to David in one breath. At the end, he added, "You're lucky, kid. The Goddess's Blessing Ritual is the only complete nine-tier ritual in the church. As long as the goddess continues to favor you, maybe you can reach a realm unprecedented in history."
That's right—not all the rituals the Order provided contained complete nine stages. Most supernatural paths, after reaching extremely high levels, were missing subsequent ritual steps.
People simply didn't know how to obtain those more mysterious and vast powers...
After leaving Fernandes's office, David finally understood why he felt the "light wings" inside him emit a warm power when he praised the goddess.
Turns out that was the ritual's follow-up part.
By his understanding, he had to completely "fuse" with these wings, until he could feel the endless warm power they emitted at all times, to meet the advancement conditions.
This was getting a bit mystical...
...
Before leaving the church, David and Veronica still had to visit the Order's workshop to obtain the signature equipment for becoming true hunters.
"Hunter's Blood" recovery potion.
Those small silver bottles had left a deep impression on David. It was called a hunter's second life and was another weapon for fighting evil besides blood bullet guns.
And he only learned today that these recovery potions needed to be prepared using the hunter's own blood.
What delighted David even more was that the recovery potion's healing amount wasn't a fixed life energy value, but directly restored a percentage of health!
This was extremely powerful for someone like David with several hundred thousand health.
Plus, the potion's effects were also linked to the hunter's ritual tier. High-tier hunters could use more complex methods to add all kinds of strange effects to Hunter's Blood potions.
This meant it wasn't just for healing.
After a series of blood drawing and potion preparation procedures, David received his very own, initial "Hunter's Blood" from the potion master.
The small silver bottle was only thumb-sized. It was connected to a chain that could be worn around the neck for safekeeping. When used, the potion could be injected into the body through a silver needle at the bottle's bottom.
Currently, David's Hunter's Blood potion could only restore health equivalent to 30% of maximum life energy, but for David, this was already enough.
...
In the following days, Fernandes didn't assign the newly minted hunter any missions.
Every morning, David would study at home all kinds of knowledge hunters needed to master. These books were all provided by the Order.
In the afternoons, he'd enter the church's cathedral to pray devoutly, constantly feeling the warmth of the light wings inside him.
Worth mentioning—previously he could only restore psychic energy by satisfying the evil spirits' desires, but after obtaining ritual power, praying to the goddess or those light wings could also slowly restore psychic energy.
This finally freed him from the predicament of only being able to restore mana through "peeping"...
At night, David didn't idle either. He began gradually exploring the dark side of this massive imperial capital, starting from the shadowy corners of Michelin Avenue, all the way to the underground of the entire southern district.
Don't forget—he had another way to increase his strength: devouring more cultists' or monsters' arms.
David believed this dim pearl of the north definitely had plenty of these things hiding in the darkness.
That guy Doug could come in handy at times like this. With the lackey's years of experience helping noble young masters access underground black markets, he could easily sniff out those places.
Plus, David had another more important purpose for exploring the dark side.
Investigating the Hand of Divine Corpse...
That dark red arm that served as his trump card was the source of David stepping into the supernatural. He had to find a way to investigate more information about it.
"I'm leaving those matters to you. Remember, you need to infiltrate those circles as someone seeking power, with no connection whatsoever to me as a Church Hunter. If the black market people discover you were sent by me and they want to chop you up, I won't care about you."
Before Doug left, David specifically warned him about many things.
"As long as you complete the task and successfully establish a stable trading line with the black market, I'll let you go do whatever you want..."
Hearing this, the lackey showed a smile like he'd received a great pardon. He couldn't wait to dive into the night and flex his muscles.
David thought for a moment, then said to him before he left, "Blessing upon you, Doug. May you die well..."
Doug's smile froze on his face, like he'd been doused with ice water. All the passion that had just risen was completely extinguished.
But David felt a warmth in his heart.
Sure enough, blessing others could also trigger the ritual's power...
He nodded with satisfaction, waved to shoo Doug away, then took out stationery from the drawer and began writing a letter.
This was a letter to His Highness the Fourth Prince. He got straight to the point at the beginning.
"...Your Highness, I need a method to remove the memory seal on slaves—a potion or some other kind of ritual would work..."