My Goblin System : Levelling up with my SSS Class Devouring skill-Chapter 282

But Merc Assault had spent centuries collecting knowledge, learning forgotten tongues, preparing for situations exactly like this. He’d studied in libraries that no longer existed, learned from teachers long dead, memorized languages that had been deliberately erased from history.

He began to read, and with each line, his fear deepened into something approaching existential dread.

[SCROLL CONTENTS - HOMUNCULUS CREATION RITUAL]

Title: The Temporal Duplication Method - Creating a Secondary Vessel Through Chronal Bifurcation

Warning: This ritual can only be performed once per being. The temporal conditions required will not align again for one thousand years. Attempt at your own risk.

The scroll detailed a ritual so complex, so dangerous, so absolutely insane that Merc Assault’s mind struggled to process it fully. His breath came faster as he read, heart pounding as the implications became clear.

Chronus had used his mastery over time to create what the scroll called a "temporal paradox vessel"—a second body that existed simultaneously with his own, connected through threads of chronal energy that transcended normal space.

The theory was brilliant in its audacity, terrifying in its execution:

By splitting his consciousness across two different points in the same timeline—his actual present self and a temporally displaced duplicate created from a "borrowed" future version of himself—Chronus could create a being that was simultaneously himself and not himself. The duplicate would possess independent thoughts, independent will, independent existence, but would be fundamentally connected to the original through the timestream itself.

The ritual had required astronomical precision. Chronus had to wait for a specific moment when three moons aligned with four different stars, creating a temporal resonance that occurred once every thousand years. At that exact moment, he’d reached forward into his own timeline, grabbing a version of himself from thirty years in the future, and pulling that future-self back into the present.

But rather than simply time-traveling (which would create a paradox), he’d used the temporal resonance to split the future-self into a separate being. The future-Chronus became the template for the homunculus, but in the process of being brought back and separated, it was fundamentally transformed into something new.

More critically—and this was what made Merc Assault’s blood run cold—Chronus had used the ritual to split not just his consciousness, but his power and soul.

The scroll was explicit about this:

"To create a truly independent duplicate, one cannot simply copy oneself. Copies are pale imitations, shadows without substance. Instead, true division is required. I have chosen to invest exactly fifty percent of my total magical power into the vessel, channeling it through the temporal threads that connect us. Additionally, I have divided my very soul—the fundamental essence of my being—allocating half to myself and half to the duplicate."

"The result is two beings, each operating at precisely half of my original strength, but connected in ways that transcend normal magical bonds. We are one mind in two bodies, able to share thoughts and experiences across any distance. We are one soul split across two vessels, each half incomplete without the other."

Merc Assault’s hands shook so badly that the scroll nearly slipped from his fingers as he read the next section:

"The advantages are significant: I can exist in two places simultaneously. I can experience twice as much. I can develop skills and knowledge in parallel. If one body is threatened, the other remains safe. It is, in effect, a form of immortality through redundancy."

"However, there are substantial risks that must be acknowledged and accepted:

1) If the duplicate dies, the fifty percent of power and soul invested in it will be PERMANENTLY lost. The temporal threads that connect us are one-way bonds—they allow sharing but not reabsorption. Death severs the connection absolutely.

2) The soul-link means that if one half dies, the other will experience catastrophic feedback. The sensation of having half one’s soul ripped away is described in ancient texts as worse than any physical torture. Many who attempted similar rituals went mad from the feedback alone.\

3) Even if I survive the feedback, I will be operating at half-capacity for the rest of my existence. The ritual cannot be repeated—the astronomical conditions will not align again for a millennium, and my soul has already been divided once. A second division would be fatal.

4) The duplicate, despite being fundamentally me, will develop its own personality over time. Shared experiences will diverge. Independent thoughts will accumulate. In a century, the duplicate may think of itself as a completely separate person despite our soul-link."

The scroll then detailed the actual ritual process—seventeen hours of continuous spellcasting, reagents that cost more than most demon lords’ entire treasuries, protective circles that had to be inscribed with millimeter precision across an area the size of a small city.

And at the bottom of the scroll, written in Chronus’s distinctive handwriting, was a final note:

"The ritual was successful. The duplicate now exists as an independent being. I have named him Richard Clay, and I have placed specific memories and personality traits into his initial consciousness to make him appear completely separate from myself. As far as anyone knows—including Richard himself for the first few years—he is simply a talented young demon I discovered and trained."

"Only I know the truth: Richard Clay IS me. He is half of Chronus the Timeless, given independent form. And as long as he lives, that half of my power and soul remains separated from me, making us both weaker than I was before the split."

"But the strategic advantages outweigh the risks. No one suspects. No one knows. And Richard grows stronger every day, developing the Decay powers I carefully cultivated in him while maintaining our soul-link in absolute secrecy."

Merc Assault carefully re-sealed the scroll with shaking hands, his nightmare powers working overtime to disguise any evidence that it had been read. The temporal seal reformed exactly as it had been, down to the smallest fluctuation in magical resonance.

His mind was racing through implications that threatened to overwhelm him:

If Richard Clay died, Chronus would lose fifty percent of his power PERMANENTLY. The scroll made that absolutely clear—no reabsorption, no recovery, no way to get that power back. Chronus would drop from tenth-seat strength down to... what? Twentieth-seat equivalent? Maybe even lower, depending on how the feedback affected his remaining abilities.