The System Awakens: Rise of the Champion

Damian looked at the damages caused by their battles, for hundreds of meters in radius everything was frozen in ice and ice structures protruding everywhere.

Tiana wasn't the strongest of the five countesses, but she was definitely strong.

She could easily destroy a large city with just one attack using her bloodline ability.

Fighting against the two countesses made him learn about them quite easily.

They both have their own unique way of fighting, and they both use their bloodline ability as their main weapon and use them in a way that would make them advantageous against any kind of opponent.

Akira utilizes her electrokinesis to boost her speed and perception to an insane level and overwhelm her opponent with pure speed and defeat them before they even realize that they are beaten.

Tiana, on the other hand, uses her cryokinesis to freeze everything on the battlefield, turning it into her very own advantageous playing field, crushing them under the freezing cold.

Not to mention her ice is so strong that without significant strength, it cannot be broken through.

After that, he also had a spar with the remaining three countesses, and during the sparring, he didn't use any other abilities other than the bloodline abilities of their own against them.

Also, they didn't use their Ancestral forms either because if they can't defeat him in their base form, then obviously they can't defeat him in their Ancestral forms.

Not to mention Damian's Ancestral form would naturally be more powerful because of him being the Vampire Progenitor.

So Damian wasn't bothered with fighting them in their Ancestral forms.

Also, if they fought in that form, they would destroy the place even more than they already have.

After Tiana, Damian sparred with Amaya Kuroyami.

Her bloodline ability was known as the [Darkness Manipulation], another powerful ability that intrigued Damian.

Her fighting style was somewhat similar to Tiana's.

Her bloodline ability grants her the ability to create darkness and expand it however she wants.

As soon as the fight started, she instantly employed a powerful technique she called the [Darkness Territory] as her shadow expanded rapidly.

In the next instant, hundreds of meters in radius turned dark, completely black as if there was no light present.

Even the three moons illuminating the eternal darkness of the world of Nightingale disappeared, when in fact it was hidden behind the dome of darkness, making Damian not able to see anything past the darkness.

And Amaya disappeared along with her presence, making Damian feel like he was alone.

In this Darkness Territory, Amaya Kuroyami herself seemed to become one with the darkness itself.

She could teleport to anywhere within the Darkness Territory without making any noise or letting off her energy as she transitioned to her attacks.

Not just that, she was even able to create weapons out of darkness which she used to attack.

She even managed to hold off Damian in one place using her darkness to create a chain around him, trying to make him stay in one place.

Once she restrained him, she tried to attack him using weapons made of darkness.

She wasn't just developed her bloodline ability to that powerful, but also her physical strength.

She was insanely fast and physically stronger than Tiana, but slower than Akira.

But coupled with her Darkness Manipulation ability, she was an opponent that only a few could go against in the lower plane.

Obviously, she lost to Damian who can also use [Darkness Manipulation], even stronger than her.

At the start of the battle, Damian actually felt pushed back by her a lot, but not enough to be defeated.

But still, to push him back like that, she was definitely strong.

As the battle went on for more than an hour and all he was doing was on the defense, his control over the Darkness Manipulation rose rapidly, learned from watching Amaya.

This bloodline ability was particularly more difficult to master than the other abilities, as it required a high level of concentration.

But Damian didn't take more than an hour to bring mastery over the ability to match her or even higher than her.

Until then, Damian was only on the defensive stance.

Even without using any powers or abilities, he was just physically stronger than her, so it was enough to defend against her attacks.

Since her attacks were her using weapons made of darkness to attack him from teleporting in random locations within the Darkness Territory, the only problem was she was untraceable.

But since Damian also has the same ability, he could trace her.

Once his mastery over the ability rose higher than her own, Damian created his own Darkness Territory, much bigger and stronger, overwhelming her territory and finally defeating her.

After her defeat, Lillian sparred with Damian.

She was by far the strongest.

She pushed Damian, and he had to use a lot of his base strength, sparring with her using nothing but spear, just with pure spear techniques, because Damian already experienced fighting against her sister before.

Also, the intensity of her flames is totally useless against him.

It was ironic, even though she was the strongest and had the strongest mastery over her bloodline ability, she was the weakest opponent against Damian.

As for Kathryne, he didn't battle her because he knew she had the strongest bloodline ability of all the noble vampires, because he also had it, after all.

Her ability [Hands of Corruption], using it she can create a black corrosive substance that acts like a life of its own, similar to the blood of the Night King.

And everything that comes in contact with this substance disintegrates and is destroyed like how acid destroys anything it touches.

For an ability like this, there wasn't much to go about using it in a strategy other than just covering herself in the corrosive substance to destroy attacks coming her way and just use it to destroy her opponent.

It was a simple but extremely dangerous ability.

For some reason, even without training, Damian somehow has an extreme level of control over this ability.

So he didn't bother with sparring with Kathryne, who seemed frustrated and disappointed that she wasn't sparring with her new husband.

The five countesses looked at the person who was the king of the human race and vampire race, and also their husband, with an expectant expression.

"Why are you guys looking at me like that?" Damian asked, noticing their expressions.

"...W-We want to know what do you think about our strength." They knew Damian was obviously a big shot from the upper plane.

They couldn't be someone more expert in assessing their strength.

"Honestly, you guys are the most powerful beings in all of the lower plane. In fact, if you train a little more, you could probably go against god-king level beings of the lower plane," Damian said his honest opinion.

"What do you think about our strength compared to the beings of the upper plane?" Amaya asked expectantly.

"Not good enough," Damian shook his head.

"You guys are strong but only in the lower plane. In the upper plane, even the low-level gods of the upper pantheons are as strong as the higher-level gods of the lower pantheon. And mortals are just as powerful as them even without achieving godhood."

"You guys rely too much on strategy and clever planning and techniques to overwhelm your opponent before defeating them. That might work well in the lower plane, but in the upper plane, you couldn't get far with this," Damian continued.

"Strategies and clever techniques could only get you so far because the further you go, the more overwhelmingly stronger your opponents will become. And in front of them... in front of their absolute power, your strategies will be nothing."

Damian looked at Tiana as he continued. "Your ice creation is powerful, but you are not the only person with that sort of ice-type abilities or fire-type abilities that could easily destroy your ice. How would you go against such foes?"

He turned his gaze to Akira. "You are fast, but I have met faster individuals. In fact, my wife Avline is one of the fastest beings in the entire upper plane. Compared to her, you fall very behind. And she is a lightning qilin. Unlike you who create lightning, she is the embodiment of lightning, like a lightning spirit. Comparing her lightning to your lightning is like comparing a matchstick to a burning house..."

"How long do you think you can use your speed to overwhelm your opponent when your lightning constantly burns your stamina? Other than your speed, you have no other advantage in a battle. Even if you are fast enough to dodge and confuse your enemy, it won't matter if you don't have the strength to strike them down."

He turned his gaze to Lillian and Amaya. "You two are very powerful. Honestly, I was very impressed with you two. I don't see why you couldn't be as strong as the powerful beings of the upper plane. You guys aren't just focusing on your bloodline ability, also strengthening your other aspects as well. That's a good thing."

"As for you, Kathryne," Damian placed his hand over her head.

"I can feel just from touching you. You have the strongest ability known to the vampire race, and you know how to use it very well. But other than your bloodline ability, you aren't focusing on anything else like your physical strength and speed."

Damian sighed, looking at their frustrated expression to his explanations.

He wasn't going to sugarcoat them.

He wants them to be the strongest.

They were his wives.

He needs them to be the strongest in the universe.

"If you want to be stronger, you have to give up relying on strategies and silly tricks to defeat your opponent and instead focus on increasing your explosive power," Damian continued.

"After a being grows past a certain level of power, they won't rely on tricks anymore because their opponents would be so powerful that strategies would mean nothing in front of their power. Battles between beings like that are decided purely in who is stronger no matter what."

"Beings like that would have extreme levels of stamina, energy reserves, long lines of abilities and magic. There is simply no strategy that would be enough to battle any of it unless in a special case. Unless you have power to challenge beings of such, you are not even an opponent to such beings," Damian sternly said.

"Such beings wouldn't have any physical weakness. They would be as fast as they are strong. Just because you are better in one aspect doesn't make you a winner."

Damian looked at Akira. "How can you win against someone that has infinite stamina? Even if you are faster than them, wouldn't you lose stamina first? And since you don't have the power to strike them down, your speed will become meaningless. You have to find a way to remove your weakness and stamina problem and increase your destructive powers."

Damian turned his gaze to Tiana. "Same goes for you as well. There are many ways to break your ice. Unless your ice becomes so strong that it's unbreakable and even if it can be broken, then your own physical power must be powerful enough to defeat your opponent."

"All of you should stop relying solely on your bloodline abilities and have to train so that you are as powerful or even more powerful even without your bloodline ability," Damian said.