Chapter 148: Adam The Artisian

Ivy folded her arms, then continued albeit calmer this time, but no less intense.

“As you know, a typical conduit works by binding with one’s Core Being. That binding is what increases a martial artist’s general star power.”

Adam nodded once.

He already understood that much.

Without a conduit, the star power an average martial artist had would never be enough to face monsters.

“It’s the reason a Martial or even a Profound Lord can use a dirty bronze-ranked conduit,” Ivy continued, “and it would still add to their strength. A low rank limits the grade of conduit a martial artist can use, but remove that limitation and the binding itself amplifies star power regardless.”

Adam watched her closely.

Her eyes were shining as she explained it was very obvious that she loved this.

Not combat or status, just the beauty of one of humanity’s greatest inventions.

“But in order for a normal conduit to function,” she said, raising a finger, “there is a core component it must possess.”

She paced slowly as she spoke.

“Some call it False Life. Others call it an Artificial Soul. Older artisans refer to it as a Life Generator.”

She stopped in front of him.

“Despite the different names, it does one thing.”

Her tone sharpened.

“It emulates life.”

Adam’s gaze shifted inward slightly.

“It acts like a symbiote,” Ivy explained. “It mirrors the wielder’s essence frequency. It adjusts output to prevent rejection. That artificial ’life’ is what allows the conduit to bind to the Core Being.”

She tapped her own chest lightly.

“That is what allows it to increase star power.”

Adam processed it step by step.

So a conduit wasn’t just metal.

It was metal hosting a life-mimicking engine.

A parasite?

No.

A cooperative organism.

Ivy continued, voice gaining momentum.

“But despite this great human achievement… there was still something artisans wanted.”

Her lips curved faintly.

“A conduit that could grow with its wielder.”

Adam blinked once.

That caught him off guard.

“Why can’t that be achieved?”

The question was genuine.

If a conduit could bind to the Core Being.

If it could emulate life.

Then growing alongside the martial artist shouldn’t be impossible.

Ivy’s excitement dimmed slightly.

“Because at the end of the day…” she said quietly, “…a conduit is still an inanimate object made to mimic life.”

“Something that only mimics life will never be able to grow,” Ivy said firmly. “That’s the limitation of a normal conduit.”

Adam absorbed that.

“So this is where the idea of an Adaptive Conduit comes from.”

Ivy nodded.

“Yes. It’s what we artisans refer to as the Ideal Conduit, a conduit capable of growing alongside its wielder.”

Her voice softened, almost reverent.

“But despite all these years, no artisan has even come close to achieving it. Not even the grandmasters.”

She looked at him again, disbelief still lingering.

“And yet you’re holding what most would consider a myth in your grasp.”

She exhaled slowly.

“Honestly… I’m still shocked.”

Adam finally understood the framework.

But a problem surfaced immediately.

If it can grow… how do I trigger that growth?

He wasn’t an artisan.

Judgement had been forged through Fuse.

An instinctive merging.

Not careful craftsmanship.

He wasn’t even fully certain it was what Ivy described.

It behaved like it.

But confirmation required analysis.

I’ll check later.

Ivy clapped her hands once.

“Alright. Let me see the conduit again.”

Adam looked at her.

“Not now.”

Her face fell instantly.

With her petite frame and youthful features, she looked like an angry teenager denied candy.

“But you promised!”

“Yes,” Adam replied calmly. “I promised I would think about it.”

Ivy froze.

Her eyes widened slightly, as realization dawned.

She’d been outmaneuvered.

Before she could explode…

Felecia leaned against the arm of the couch, smirking.

“So, kid… where did you get your new toy?”

Adam walked past Ivy.

As he did, he casually patted her on the head.

She stiffened in outrage.

But he was already moving.

“Well,” he said to Felecia, “it has to do with this.”

Essence moved as his storage ring activated and a corpse dropped onto the polished floor.

And its severed head beside it.

The room went still.

Felecia’s playful expression vanished.

Scott’s eyes narrowed immediately.

The body was wrong.

The flesh had a faint dark sheen beneath the skin. Veins twisted unnaturally around the chest cavity. Residual essence leaked from it in distorted pulses.

Even Ivy stopped fuming.

All her irritation dissolved into focused alertness.

Adam watched their reactions carefully.

So it’s not just me.

The corpse felt unstable even inside the ring. Like something inside it hadn’t fully died.

Footsteps approached, as Remedy’s voice echoed from the hallway.

“Ivy, I need your help with som—”

She stopped mid-sentence.

Her eyes locked onto the corpse.

Her expression hardened instantly.

It has already started…

She looked up at Adam.

“What happened?”

Adam turned back to the corpse.

His gaze lingered on the twisted veins along its neck before he spoke.

“After you dropped me off at the rift,” he said to Remedy, “I was hunting casually. gathering existence.”

He paused briefly.

“Then I ran into someone strange.”

The room remained silent.

“An heir,” Adam continued. “One I met back in Sector 418.”

They all knew about Sector 418.

It had been trending across the alliance not too long ago with Adam’s death.

Learning that this corpse belonged to one of the heirs trapped there with him…

Felt deliberate.

Scott exhaled slowly.

“This has The Family written all over it.”

Adam felt the same.

That was why he brought the corpse back.

In truth, he also wanted to know something else…

Whether the body was safe enough to work with.

Because if it was…

He had plans.

Plans that depended entirely on what Remedy could tell him.

Adam continued calmly.

“After encountering him, I noticed several abnormalities.”

He crouched slightly beside the corpse, observing it again as he spoke.

“First, his star power was extremely low.”

Adam’s eyes narrowed faintly.

“Second…he was reducing mine and the longer we fought, the more his star power ballooned.”

Shock rippled across the room.

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