"I am going to attack you with a simple thrust. I'll be putting all of my intent into this strike and shan't be holding back," Hubert said. "I am very aware of your ability to heal even the most fatal of wounds so it shouldn't be an issue if you are struck. Try your utmost to block, though."

Lone nodded. "I'll do my best."

He willed Saturn to transform into its Swordspear of Immortal Slaying form, revealing the two long ethereal spears with thick, sword-like tips.

Saturn's Primal energy didn't pale in comparison to Hubert's Spear Intent. To the everyday citizens watching they couldn't see anything special beyond the obvious glowing blades of Saturn, but they could feel something shift in the air.

To those with the strength to witness the visible manifestations of the raw Primal energy and the intense Spear Intent, chills shot up their spines. It wasn't every day that one got to witness actual Primal energy coming from a weapon, of all things. Hubert's Spear Intent was also rarer than a Divine.

His claims to being the most talented spear-wielder on the continent no longer sounded like grand claims to those that didn't know him and had doubted his words.

Hubert narrowed his eyes slightly and then suddenly lunged forward, leaving him only 3-feet away from Lone.

The man then moved his spear in a single fluid motion, sending it straight for Lone's belly with, as promised, nothing but a simple thurst.

Shock and slight hints of fear flashed through Lone's mind. 'He's quick. Very quick.'

He hastily moved Saturn to block the attack with one of its astral blades, shockingly, however, the Spear Intent-slathered strike pierced straight through Saturn's blade. Hubert hadn't done this free of cost, of course. Almost a third of his gathered Spear Intent had been consumed just to give him the needed force to break through the Primal energy protecting the weapon.

"Guh!" With a subtle grunt, Lone felt his guts rupture and twist as what felt like the force of a mountain piercing him struck his entire body.

He was cascaded in the thick Spear Intent and could hardly breathe as it coursed through his body and ravaged his organs. 'Fucking hell! Even Ythmagobla's claws couldn't break through Saturn's Blade!'

Soph was still maintaining her consciousness and she managed to eke out a soft and worried, "Lone..." as she saw what was happening to his body with her Mana Sensing. Never before had she seen so much damage being done to him with a single attack.

Lone smiled as he coughed up a massive amount of blood. The red sticky liquid flowing freely from the corners of his mouth as he said, "Damn good thrust."

"You can talk even like that? Truly monstrous healing abilities," Hubert calmly said.

The noble adventurer then slowly pulled the bladed tip of his long spear out of Lone's body, though there was little resistance since he had punched a literal hole through the foxkin. The weapon was dripping with Lone's blood and even had some of his black and blue bones attached to it along with chunks of flesh and what looked like his entire liver.

"My purpose is not to kill you. Take your time to heal then think on the strike you just saw. We do, unfortunately, have a crowd to please, so you only have a minute or two before they grow hungry for more action," Hubert said as he lowered his stance and took a few steps back.

"Sure." Lone immediately dropped, falling into a cross-legged position. He had recently learned a new enchantment which he chose to use for rather obvious reasons. "Crude Noise Cancelling Enchantment."

It was a very basic spell that could only cover his own body at this point in time, but it served its purpose which was to silence the grotesque gut-wrenching noises his Basic Regeneration made when fixing serious injuries.

You could look through Lone's chest and see straight through his back. Well, you could be it not for the waterfall of blood gushing out of him. With such a heavy injury, noises akin to that of a Lovecraftian being consuming a soul would probably be the only apt comparison.

Congratulations! The host's active enchantment magic skill [Crude Noise Cancelling] has levelled up! It is now Beginner Level 2.

This was expected, what Lone hadn't expected, however, was the following notification.

Congratulations! The host's unique skill [Basic Regeneration] has levelled up! It is now Master Level 10. Congratulations! Due to the host's unique skill [Basic Regeneration] having reached master level 10, it has evolved into the unique skill [Regeneration].

'Holy fucking shit.' Lone had to suppress the urge to scream 'fucking finally'.

Immediately he noticed the hole in his torso sealing at least twice as quickly as it had been doing even with him pumping 1,000 MP a second to boost it - the limit he could do so, which allowed for the passive healing rate to double.

'I've got time, fuckin' show me Regeneration's new info! I've been waiting for this for years!' Lone excitement was off of the charts and it didn't go unnoticed by the few people that were keenly watching him.

Erion curled his lips. 'Good.'

Soph was a bit confused. 'Why's he so happy?'

Eolande sighed. 'Considering how quickly his wound is closing, I suppose it finally happened.'

Ignorant of their reactions, Lone's eyes glazed over as he read his unique skill's newly updated information.

Unique Skill: Regeneration

A skill unique to the host, Lone Immortus.

Grants the host the ability to passively heal injuries at an incredibly [up from very] fast rate. The healing rate can be increased in exchange for mana.

[New!] Grants the host the ability to passively heal injuries of their own soul. This ability is boosted by the host's Soul Oracle abilities. Current strength of soul healing: Mild.

Cost: 10,000 MP (per second per 1% increase in healing rate) Mastery: Beginner Level 1

'Jesus-fucking-H-Christ.' Lone was over the moon. 'Yes! Now I don't need to worry about anything like what happened to Rachel or what's happening to Soph and Sophie becoming an issue for me. I can also injure my own soul and observe it healing to see if I can learn anything that'll help them.'

His thoughts were quickly interrupted by what felt like... a purging.

His mind suddenly felt like a fog had been lifted from it. Confused, he looked inwardly to observe his own soul.

It was as large as the sun when he looked at it and twice as bright but it was stained with a deep shade of black. Around the black were blotches of pale blue, deep purple, and warm green.

As if someone has hit the rewind button, the black splodge on his soul slowly reduced in size while the other three colours grew, firmly surrounding it.

'What the... Is my soul purging Void or something?' A few moments later he was given an answer. The colours stopped moving when the blue, purple, and green were all three times as large as the black. They now firmly had the colour of Void surrounded.

Lone noticed that most of his soul was free from Primal influence, but he had to wonder if that was because it was so damned big or due to another reason. 'I've never been able to look at my soul for so long before... I guess that means it was injured by Void or something? Was he trying to corrode it? Thank fuck I nipped that in the bud then. I'll have to ask the other Primals about it when I get the chance.'

Lone pulled his mind out of his body and shook his head lightly. He then stood up and fixed his clothes with a light usage of Creation Magic. "I'm good to go. Thanks for waiting."

"I've figured it out!" Divine Rend yelled, pulling his brother's attention away from Lone and Hubert's duel of learning.

Divine Spirit looked at him curiously. "Figured what out, Eldest Brother?"

"Surely you aren't still mulling over the girl, are you?" Divine Weeping asked.

"Girls, Youngest Brother. It's plural," Divine Rend corrected. "Her soul is splitting not unlike how a slime splits. Yes, that's a good analogy. I can use that for my research... I wonder if I can find an Emperor Slime to test a few ideas on?"

"Eldest Brother, we can all see that her soul is splitting. Were you not interested in the how of the matter?" Divine Spirit asked.

Divine Rend nodded. "Indeed, Middle Brother. It's a seemingly complex question but with a rather simple answer. Any guesses before I steal the fun of discovering her secret from you?"

Divine Weeping pursed his lips in thought as his long arms helped him enter a thinking pose. "Perhaps her soul is unique or too weak to cause any external damage beyond the apparent headache and she will actually die within the hour."

Divine Spirit shook his head. "It can't be that. My knowledge of splitting souls is very limited though I'd guess she has a world-skill that's helping her from outright exploding as would be normal."

"Middle Brother is the closest, I'm afraid, Youngest Brother," Divine Rend said.

Divine Weeping shrugged. "I understand souls, not splitting souls."

"Indeed. The answer, brothers, is that she holds more than one unique skill," Divine Rend said.

His brothers looked enlightened.

"Ah, unique skills... Certainly, having more than one would make it possible to survive a splitting soul, but that's not the only possibility, is it?" Divine Weeping asked.

Nodding, Divine Spirit said, "Yes. I can think of a dozen explanations, none absolute. Eldest Brother, what makes you so certain it is the existence of multiple unique skills?"

The stoic man and tallest of the three extremely tall men smiled, which was rather rare for him. "My first primary conclusion was that she was, in fact, a secret Ancient unknown to history. I quickly dismissed such a theory since she clearly does not possess the soul of an Ancient. I would feel it if she had, all of us would. Even if she tried to conceal it."

"Indeed," Divine Weeping answered.

Nodding, Divine Spirit also agreed. "Yes, besides, I doubt Divine Time would tempt fate by claiming an Ancient was his disciple. Strong among Divines he may be, a fool, he is not."

"I did not consider that," Divine Rend admitted.

"You never consider the social aspect of things, Eldest Brother," Divine Spirit sighed.

"Yes, not something that I can fix nor should I," Divine Rend said. "With that possibility out of the way I was truly lost. I could see 784 other possible routes of thought to explore, most of which were likely impossible. I thus decided to simply attack her splitting soul to see what would happen."

"Ah, I see. Indeed. Wise, though foolish," Divine Spirit said. "Had you killed her and destroyed her soul then no doubt Divine Time would have fought you to the death. He seems very partial about his new disciples."

Divine Weeping nodded. "It's unlike him, and thus, dangerous. His soul burns with the desire for his disciples to do well."

Divine Rend shrugged. "A risk I was willing to take, though again, I did not consider that a possibility."

"As always," Divine Spirit sighed.

"What I learned, however, was quite fascinating. I attacked her soul in two ways. First, I tried to forcefully split the soul. If I had succeeded the soul would have likely ruptured, detonating within her," Divine Rend explained. "Peculiarly enough, while the attack landed, nothing happened."

"How odd," Divine Spirit said.

"I've never heard of such a thing ever happening before, Eldest Brother," Divine Weeping claimed.

"Neither have I," Divine Rend answered. "I was stumped, and thus, simply tried to end her life, of course, with an undetectable attack on her soul. Again, nothing happened. I have thus come to the conclusion that she either does not exist and is an imagined being that all three of us can see, or, more reasonably, she is a summoned hero with two skills. The first is some form of immortality, whether permanent, temporary, or expendable, I am unsure. She didn't react so the latter is unlikely. She would have been notified by the system otherwise. Her other skill is likely related to ignoring negative effects or malicious attacks not intended to kill her."

"A solid hypothesis," Divine Spirit said with a thoughtful nod.

"What do you plan to do now, Eldest Brother?" Divine Weeping asked. "I doubt such a mortal has not failed to escape your eyes simply because you have deduced why she is not dead or dying."

"I intend to take her under my wing. If she truly is immortal and her soul cannot be destroyed, then I greatly desire to have her. She is the perfect test subject for my research, even more so if her split soul retains the unique skills," Divine Rend explained.

"I feel it will be difficult to make her part from the foxkin mortal," Divine Weeping said. "Both sides of her splitting soul deeply yearn to be with him. Such love is rare and nigh-unbreakable."

Divine Rend nodded as he looked over at Lone for the first time since the competition had begun. "His peculiar healing holds some researchable merit. I could extend the hand to encompass him as well, if need be. I do have some interest in his Primal-covered soul, though such a thing is more your speciality, Middle Brother."

"Indeed. Should you take him I would no doubt visit you often to perform my own tests. It's decided then. I do not mind playing diplomat with Divine Time should the need arise if you can give me 15 favours, Eldest Brother," Divine Spirit offered.

Divine Rend lifted his arm from his chair's armrest and shook it dismissively. "Easily done, Middle Brother."