Chapter 95: Killing Spree
Overall, the treatment went smoothly. After leaving Saber's exclusive room, Su Xiao headed straight for the Skill Upgrade Hall, carrying a hefty sum this time.
Half an hour later, Su Xiao arrived at the Skill Upgrade Hall. He walked to the innermost area and entered a skill upgrade pod.
[Skill Upgrade Pod activated. Please select the skill you wish to enhance.]
Su Xiao dismissed the prompt. He planned to first consume the 8 Golden Skill Points he had obtained. If he invested them into Azure Shadow King, it could be raised to Lv.34. He didn't do that; this time, he wanted to enhance abilities like Devouring Core and Slaughter Shadow.
The reason Su Xiao wanted to enhance Devouring Core was that after absorbing the [First Generation Finger Bone] last time, he discovered that [First Generation Remains] could actually increase the upper limit of Azure Steel Shadow's capabilities. As a cost, Azure Steel Shadow required even more high-grade living energy.
Su Xiao had encountered enemies capable of devouring energy, but not many. They were mostly deities from benevolent or neutral factions, manifested as divine avatars.
His idea was this: since opportunities to devour energy were rare, he would address the issue within himself. By enhancing Devouring Core, when future opportunities arose, he would inevitably be able to devour a massive amount of high-grade living energy, thereby raising Azure Steel Shadow's level.
Su Xiao opened the skill list and checked Devouring Core's level: X++. In most cases, the abilities of a Law Destroyer could break through six or seven limits to reach an absolute maximum. For example, Spirit Shadow Constitution had broken through six limits at X, while Dragon Shadow Flash was even stronger, currently at X+++++++.
Su Xiao sensed the Devouring Core within himself, located in his heart. It was an energy-based Devouring Core. In fact, the Devouring Core itself was also a protective ability.
The structure of Devouring Core remained as intricate as ever, dazzling to behold. Su Xiao focused his mind and began consuming Golden Skill Points to enhance Devouring Core. This time, he wanted to settle it once and for all. With 8 Golden Skill Points in hand, he would first push Devouring Core to its limit before considering other matters.
As a stream of golden-tinged energy entered Su Xiao's body and surged into Devouring Core, he immediately felt the Azure Steel Shadow energy within him nearly go berserk, all rushing toward Devouring Core to further refine its structure.
Because Su Xiao was using Golden Skill Points to enhance Devouring Core, when the Azure Steel Shadow energy in his body dropped to less than 10 points, blue water mist filled the skill upgrade pod, and his mana began recovering at a rate of 5% per second.
Mana recovery → Mana converted to Azure Steel Shadow energy → Azure Steel Shadow energy absorbed by Devouring Core → Devouring Core's structure became more precise and stable.
This process repeated continuously. After Su Xiao's mana pool of 38,337 points was depleted dozens of times, the enhancement of Devouring Core finally stopped.
Now, the Devouring Core within Su Xiao's heart was emitting wisps of dark blue smoke, all absorbed by his heart. Whether it was an illusion or not, he felt his heart had become tougher and more vibrant.
Indeed, the Devouring Core in Su Xiao's heart was slowly, using his heart as a starting point, enhancing all his internal organs through a unique energy. The enhancement was minimal, but over time, it would become considerable. Remember, this was a 24/7 continuous improvement.
Su Xiao checked his remaining Golden Skill Points. He still needed to enhance Slaughter Shadow.
[Current Golden Skill Points: 0.]
Seeing this prompt, Su Xiao realized the situation was serious. He had intended to push Devouring Core to its limit, and it had indeed reached its limit, but it consumed a full 8 Golden Skill Points. Could it be that Devouring Core had reached X++++++++++?
[Devouring Core: X (Active Skill).]
Skill Effect: Can absorb high-grade biological energy to nourish Azure Steel Shadow energy. Increases Azure Steel Shadow's level and intensity based on the grade and quality of absorbed energy.
Passive Effect 1: Energy purity filtration +76%.
Passive Effect 2: Energy absorption speed increased by 3.2 times.
Passive Effect 3: Devouring Core energy storage capacity increased by 800%.
Passive Effect 4: When absorbing high-grade biological energy, inflicts energy paralysis on the enemy (this paralysis effect has priority but is only triggered when absorbing high-grade biological energy).
Passive Effect 5: When Devouring Core is fully opened, temporarily gains biological energy insight vision, allowing sight to penetrate barriers, shields, alternate spaces, spatial rifts, dreams, boundary walls, illusions, etc.
As Su Xiao had predicted, Devouring Core wouldn't directly boost combat power but would accelerate growth. The insight vision was excellent. Aside from anything else, it would be highly useful when capturing the Goddess of Fortune soon.
With Golden Skill Points exhausted, Su Xiao took a scroll from his storage space: Basic Passive: Spirit Toughness. He could confirm that enhancing this basic passive would be very costly. This ability was essential, but the question was when to master it.
Basic Passive: Spirit Toughness mainly improved soul damage and soul energy tier. The latter wasn't needed yet, at least not urgently.
Regarding soul damage enhancement, Su Xiao estimated that before investing massive resources into Basic Passive: Spirit Toughness, the soul damage it provided wouldn't be significant.
The importance of this ability in the later stages might be on par with Technique Sublimation. The current issue was that the combat power gained from enhancing Technique Sublimation far surpassed Basic Passive: Spirit Toughness by countless streets.
Assuming raising Technique Sublimation by one level increased Su Xiao's combat power by 300 points, raising Basic Passive: Spirit Toughness by one level might only add 0.5 points. Developing this ability now wasn't feasible with limited resources.
Understanding this, Su Xiao put away Basic Passive: Spirit Toughness. It would be a "big eater" in the future. For now, he'd stash it in storage and focus on developing Technique Sublimation.
Although he wouldn't develop Basic Passive: Spirit Toughness for now, Su Xiao planned to develop a new technique-type ability. The surplus of Soul Crystals (Complete) was overflowing. Selling this resource, even at a high price, felt like a loss.
Su Xiao considered Scythe Specialization, Spear Specialization, Sword Specialization, etc. After careful thought, he decided to develop Gun Mastery.
Scythe Specialization, Spear Specialization, Sword Specialization—Su Xiao wasn't completely ignorant of them. He was a Blade Grandmaster Lv.60. When melee techniques reached a profound level, even without mastering other melee technique types, he could still use those types of melee weapons.
For example, when Su Xiao fought the Ultimate Insect, he held Dragon-Slaying Flash in his right hand and Blood Spear in his left, suppressing the Ultimate Insect to the point of confusion.
It wasn't boasting. Even if he were given only a spear to fight a Spear Master X, he could still take the opponent's head. The reason was that he wasn't just a Blade Grandmaster; he was also a Melee Grandmaster Lv.58.
With Blade Grandmaster Lv.60 + Melee Grandmaster Lv.58 as a foundation, Su Xiao had no problem using Blood Spear as a secondary weapon in short bursts.
In contrast, even if Su Xiao's Blade Grandmaster and Melee Grandmaster reached sky-high levels, his Gun Mastery Lv.5 would forever remain Lv.5, gaining no advantage. This wasn't just changing channels; it was changing servers.
Su Xiao had a plan: first push Gun Mastery to Gun Grandmaster, then acquire an Immortal-grade sniper cannon, preferably enhanced to +10 or higher, and finally equip [Ancient Killing Spree Ring (Holy Spirit Grade·Ring)].
[Ancient Killing Spree Ring]
Quality: Holy Spirit Grade
Category: Ring
Durability: 1/1 (Extremely low durability consumption during wear and use, extremely fragile when taking damage, weak against all characteristic attacks).
Equipment Requirements: None
Equipment Effect 1: Precision (Passive·Unique), Base·Neural Reflex Speed +12 points, Base·Dynamic Vision +12 points...
Equipment Effect 2: Weakness Slaughter (Passive), when attacking enemies at range, triggers Hillis's soul power to continuously enhance ranged attacks (enhances bullets, arrows, etc.).
Tip: If a ranged attack hits an enemy's vital point, the resulting vital damage is increased by 4.72 to 6.32 times (depending on the chosen vital point; head is highest priority, followed by neck, heart, etc.).
Equipment Effect 3: Fragile (Passive), extremely prone to damage. Due to its overly precise internal structure and being an item formed by multiple coincidences, once damaged, it cannot be repaired by any means.
Rating: 1000++ (Holy Spirit Grade equipment rating ranges from 700 to 1000 points).
If he were even more devilish, he could buy a few expensive but terrifyingly powerful bullets. Stacking all these bonuses together, one shot to the enemy's head—even an Eighth Rank top-tier heavy tank system—one shot and they'd be babbling, two shots and they'd be dead on the spot.