I Regressed With a 10,000x God-Tier Multiplier-Chapter 20: The True Awakening

The cold night air hit Lucifer’s face like a physical strike.

He stepped out of the gaping cavern mouth and into the dead forests of the surface. Above him, the sky was a brilliant unbroken stars.

The moment the starlight touched his skin, the newly acquired Astral Regeneration blessing ignited in his veins.

Silver energy rushed into his body. It was completely automatic. His mana pool, heavily depleted from the boss fight, began to fill at a terrifying speed.

He could actually hear his own pulse hammering in his ears as the cosmic energy flooded his system.

He took a deep breath, letting the night wind cool his sweat-drenched skin.

"We camp here for a few minutes," Lucifer ordered.

Elara immediately went to work. The Valkyrie drove the butt of her spear into the frozen dirt, creating a small perimeter of golden light. Sarah sat on a fallen log nearby. The Oracle looked exhausted.

Lucifer did not sit. He opened his inventory.

With a thought, a heavy, bone-clasped chest materialized on the dirt in front of him. It was the ornate loot box dropped by the Legendary Lich. Dark green mist leaked from its iron hinges, hissing as it touched the grass.

This was the reward for almost destroying his own soul.

Lucifer knelt. He gripped the heavy iron latch and snapped it open.

The green mist instantly vanished. In its place, a heavy, unnatural darkness spilled out of the chest. It did not glow. It did the exact opposite. The darkness seemed to absorb the starlight around it.

Inside the soft and smooth box sat a single object.

It was a sphere, no larger than a marble. It was completely pitch-black, swirling with violent, silent storms of purple energy.

Looking at it made Lucifer’s eyes water. It felt like staring into the bottom of a bottomless pit.

[Ding!]

[Legendary Item Detected.]

[Item: The Void Spark]

[Type: Class Ascension Catalyst]

[Grade: SSS-Tier]

[Description: A fragment of pure, unformatted emptiness from the outer realms. It holds the power to overwrite mortal laws and reconstruct a host’s soul. Consuming this item will permanently lock your class path.]

Lucifer stared at the blue interface.

His current class, Apprentice Mage, was a basic, foundational tier. It was the reason his mana pool maxed out at a pathetic 45,000 points, even at Level 30. It was the reason he nearly died every time his summoned troops took heavy area-of-effect damage. His mortal "vessel" simply could not hold enough energy to support a massive army.

If he wanted to conquer the world, if he wanted to survive the coming wars, he needed a bigger vessel.

"Lucifer," Elara warned, stepping closer. Her golden eyes narrowed at the black marble. "That object... it feels wrong. It feels like death."

"It is not death," Lucifer said softly. "It is the absence of everything."

He reached into the box. The moment his fingers brushed the Void Spark, a shock of freezing cold snapped up his arm.

It was heavier than a boulder. He gripped it tightly and pulled it out. The ambient light around the camp dimmed, sucked into the marble’s gravitational pull.

[System Warning!]

[Initiating Class Ascension with ’The Void Spark’ will trigger Soul-Reconstruction. The process involves extreme physical and spiritual trauma. Survival is not guaranteed for hosts with low Willpower.]

[Do you wish to proceed? Y/N]

Lucifer didn’t hesitate. He mentally selected ’Yes’ and pressed the black marble directly against his chest.

The Void Spark sank into his flesh like a stone sinking into water.

For one second, absolutely nothing happened.

Then, the world exploded.

Lucifer fell to his knees, his mouth opening in a silent, agonizing scream. A sound like shattering glass echoed inside his own skull. His entire body locked up, his muscles pulling so tight he thought his tendons would snap.

"Lucifer!" Sarah cried out, rushing forward.

"Stay back!" Elara barked, grabbing the Oracle’s shoulder and pulling her away. "It is a Class Ascension! If you touch him, the system will reject the process and burn you both to ash!"

Lucifer could not hear them. He was drowning in a sea of liquid agony.

The Void Spark reached his mana core and detonated. It did not destroy his magic; it devoured it. It ate his Apprentice Mage class, tearing down the fragile, mortal pathways that channeled his mana. It was ripping out his spiritual veins and replacing them with tunnels of dark, cosmic gravity.

He fell forward, digging his fingers into the frozen dirt.

His skin turned completely pale. Thick, pulsing black veins crawled up his neck and across his cheeks. Blood dripped from his nose and ears, hitting the soil and instantly vaporizing into purple steam.

Reconstruct, the system demanded.

His soul was being stretched. Imagine taking a small, fragile glass cup and forcing an ocean inside of it. The glass had to break, melt, and reforge itself into a steel vault in seconds. Lucifer’s ribcage popped. His bones groaned under the sheer internal pressure of the expanding void.

He coughed, spitting a wad of black blood onto the ground.

The pain was worse than the Lich’s poison. It was worse than the Soul Backlash. His very identity, his baseline humanity, was being rewritten by the system laws. He forced his eyes open. His pupils were entirely swallowed by purple darkness.

He slammed his fist into the dirt, fighting the urge to pass out. If he passed out, the system would register his willpower as insufficient. He would die here in the dirt.

"I am... the Warlord," Lucifer snarled through bloody teeth.

He forced his mind to focus on the pain, owning it, commanding it. He envisioned the swirling void inside his chest and forced it to stop spinning.

He clamped his iron will down on the chaotic energy, forcing it into his newly forged spiritual veins.

With a final, earth-shaking gasp, the black veins on his face receded.

The oppressive gravity vanished. The ambient light of the camp returned to normal.

Lucifer collapsed onto his hands and knees, panting heavily. Sweat poured down his face. Every muscle in his body trembled from sheer exhaustion. But the agonizing pressure in his chest was gone.

Before, his mana pool felt like a small, tight knot in his stomach. Now, it felt like he was standing on the edge of a bottomless canyon. The depth of the power inside him was staggering.

[Ding!]

[Soul-Reconstruction Complete.]

[Class Ascension Successful!]

[Congratulations! You have ascended to the SSS-Tier Class: Void Arcanist.]

[Base Stats recalculated. Massive multiplier applied to Intelligence (INT) and Spirit (SPR).]

[Status Update]

[Name: Lucifer]

[Class: Void Arcanist (SSS Tier) / Tier 2 Warlord]

[Level: 30 (Mortal Cap)]

[Mana: 250,000 / 250,000]

[Active Summons: 9,850 / 10,000]

Lucifer stared at the numbers. He blinked, wiping the blood from his mouth, making sure he was reading it correctly.

Two hundred and fifty thousand.

His maximum mana capacity had multiplied by more than five times in an instant. The crushing limitation of his Apprentice class was completely obliterated.

With 250,000 mana, the Soul-Drain penalty from a dying unit (-250 mana) was barely a scratch. He could lose a thousand Snipers in a single blast, and he would still have over half his mana pool remaining.

He let out a low, breathy laugh. He had done it. He had finally solved the mana crisis that had haunted him since his regression.

"Lucifer?" Elara asked softly. She stepped forward, her weapon lowered. "Are you... are you still you?"

Lucifer pushed himself up to his feet. He felt light. He felt invincible. He turned to look at his heroes. His eyes were back to their normal, piercing gray, but there was a faint, purple ring around his irises now.

"I am still me," Lucifer said. His voice was deeper, vibrating with a strange echo. "Only better."

He dismissed the main status window and pulled up his new Class Skill tree. A SSS-Tier class didn’t just give raw stats; it came with proprietary magic. He expected to see a list of devastating, city-leveling spells.

The interface opened.

[Void Arcanist - Skill Tree Unlocked]

[New Skill Acquired: Void Step (Level 1)]

[Description: Fold the fabric of space to instantly teleport to any visible location within 100 meters. Bypasses all physical barriers and traps.]

[Mana Cost: 5,000 Mana per use.]

Lucifer’s confident smile froze on his face.

He stared at the mana cost. Five thousand.

He read it again. It wasn’t a typo. A single, short-range teleport cost 5,000 mana. That was more than his entire maximum mana pool just a few days ago. 𝗳𝚛𝗲𝕖𝕨𝕖𝗯𝚗𝚘𝕧𝕖𝗹.𝗰𝗼𝕞

He quickly scrolled down to look at the locked skills further down the tree.

[Locked Skill: Gravity Crush]

[Mana Cost: 50,000 Mana.]

[Locked Skill: Arcane Singularity]

[Mana Cost: 100,000 Mana.]

Lucifer closed the interface, rubbing his temples. The elation of his massive new mana pool vanished, replaced by a cold, sobering reality.

The system was perfectly balanced. It never gave absolute power without a massive drawback. Yes, he now had an ocean of mana.

His summoning limits were practically removed. But his new Void Arcanist class was an absolute mana-guzzler.

If he actually wanted to fight personally, using his SSS-Tier Void magic, he would burn through his 250,000 mana in seconds. He was no longer a weak, fragile summoner who couldn’t cast a basic fireball. He was a weapon of mass destruction. But firing that weapon cost a fortune.

"A double-edged sword," Lucifer muttered to himself.

He looked at his hands. The power was there, humming just beneath his skin. He just had to be incredibly careful how he spent it.

He could summon his army and let them fight, acting as an untouchable commander. Or, he could step onto the battlefield himself and erase his enemies with Void magic, risking his entire mana pool in just five spells.

"Is something wrong?" Sarah asked, stepping to his side. She reached out, her fingers lightly touching his arm. He felt a tiny trickle of mana flow from her Soul Link into his massive new pool, a drop of water in an ocean.

"No," Lucifer said, dropping his hands to his sides. "Nothing is wrong. The rules of the game just changed, that’s all."

He looked out past the treeline, toward the distant mountains where the trade hubs lay. He had the power, he had the class, and he had the heroes.

Now, he needed money, crystals, and an unkillable frontline army. He needed to make sure he never had to cast these new, ultra-expensive spells unless absolutely necessary.

"Pack up the camp," Lucifer ordered, his Warlord aura flaring with dark, purple authority. "We are heading to the trade hub. It is time to build a real army."