Chapter 5: Annihilate the Enemy's Entire Faction
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The protectiveness of the Soul Clock Tower also meant they treated their own exceptionally well, and this [Soul Secret Treasure Box] was prepared for the next candidate for Tower Master. One could imagine its preciousness.
[Soul Secret Treasure Box: Can be opened based on your own Soul Strength. When your Soul Strength reaches 20 points, 50 points, 100 points, 200 points, 500 points, 800 points, 1000 points, 1500 points, 2000 points, or 3000 points, you may open it once for each threshold.]
[Tip: This Soul Secret Treasure Box is currently ownerless. You must first perform a Soul Binding before you can open it.]
[Soul Binding in progress...]
[Estimated time: 10 hours and 28 minutes until this permanent binding is complete.]
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Leaving aside the benefits of opening this Secret Treasure Box multiple times, a Soul Strength of 3000 points likely corresponds to the very final stage of Supreme-level power. This growth chest was prepared with meticulous care, no wonder the Soul Clock Tower was so united and protective back then.
Through this Secret Treasure Box, Su Xiao learned about the physical attribute situation at the Supreme level. Even in the final stages, the power system of the Paradise factions didn't seem to allow physical attributes to break past ten thousand points.
The span from 500 to 3000 physical attributes at the Supreme level was already staggering enough. Considering that from First Rank to Absolute Strength, the range was only 3 to 800 points, and ninety percent of Absolute Rank contractors couldn't even push their attributes past 650 points at that stage.
Taking out [Ancient Hatred], Su Xiao equipped this item, replacing [Covenant Item: Life Reversal].
[Covenant Item: Life Reversal]
Category: Covenant Item.
Covenant Effect: Weakness Compensation (Passive): When equipped, increases your weakest physical attribute by 20 to 80 points, along with the corresponding resistance for that attribute (Charm Attribute has been automatically selected, and this selection cannot be changed. Due to your Charm Attribute being -30, this bonus is invalid).
Covenant Cost: Dying Curse (Covenant Cost · Unique Passive): Dying health threshold increased from 10% to 20%.
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Compared to [Covenant Item: Life Reversal], which only had one beneficial effect, both the Covenant Effect and Curse Cost of [Ancient Hatred] were beneficial. As for the Covenant Cost's penalty, the Blade Grandmaster's immunity to mental frenzy states rendered it irrelevant, and the Misfortune Cost was even less of an issue. It was only "Luck -300," while the lowest point of his luck electrocardiogram was "Luck -42000."
Therefore, the Misfortune Cost, which wasn't even worthy of offering a cigarette to the big brother of Law Destroyer luck, now appeared in grayish-white text. It seemed that it wasn't simply a matter of the equipment effect being invalid; after Su Xiao equipped [Ancient Hatred] for a period, this Misfortune Cost attribute would be permanently removed and evaporated.
Checking the time, there were still 16 hours until the next round of the competition. He could finally get a good night's sleep. When he opened his eyes again, he felt refreshed and clear-headed. The previous overload of knowledge intake had given his mental strength a high-intensity workout, resulting in growth.
After washing up and having lunch, Su Xiao felt he was back at his peak. He checked the current rankings. His team was in first place, but that didn't mean their chances of victory were high. There were a total of 50 [Fragmented Origins]. After reviewing the relevant information, he got the distribution:
Rounds 1 to 3: A total of 15 [Fragmented Origins].
Round 4: A total of 6 [Fragmented Origins].
Round 5: A total of 8 [Fragmented Origins].
Round 6: A total of 22 [Fragmented Origins].
The sixth round was the decisive battle. If he wasn't mistaken, the location for the sixth round was the Dawn Ruins. Once there, the [Dawn Badge] would come into play, raising the four attributes from 800 points to 900 points. This would make a qualitative difference in the upper limits obtained after advancing to Supreme.
If he wasn't mistaken, the limit of the former was Supreme Peak, while the latter might surpass the limits of Supreme Peak.
[Tip: The fourth round of the competition is about to begin.]
[A total of eight teams will participate in this round.]
[This round has a total of 6 [Fragmented Origins], located within six [Desire Statues] (Each Desire Statue is guaranteed to contain 1 Fragmented Origin. Upon destruction, it may also yield ??? rare treasures, a large amount of Space-Time Power, exclusive potions from the Tree Store, etc.).]
[The locations of the [Desire Statues] are random, but they will attract nearby Undying Violators.]
[Warning: This world contains a large number of Undying Violators!]
[Warning: Some powerful Undying Violators still retain their former consciousness and abilities. Other Undying Violators may undergo mutations such as "Qualitative Fission Aberration" or "Bloodthirsty Transformation."]
[Warning: Being injured by any Undying Violator will cause you to take damage and also lose a certain amount of Primordial Life Force, reducing your maximum Health Points from 100%. This portion of Primordial Life Force will be taken by the Undying. If you fail to reclaim it within a certain time, you will permanently lose that portion of your maximum Health Points. If you successfully reclaim it, you must go to a designated location, consume a large number of Soul Coins, and undergo purification through a facility certified by the Void Tree before you can safely absorb it and restore your maximum Health Points.]
[Tip: Every 24 hours, the location of one [Desire Statue] will be announced.]
[Starting from this round, any [Fragmented Origin] obtained cannot be stored in storage space/team storage space or any other spatial storage. They must be carried on your person.]
[Having detected situations and results in the three completed rounds that exceed the scope of certification, the Void Tree has activated a real-time reporting function. You may report participants with abnormal behavior to receive a certain amount of Soul Coins as a reward.]
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[Warning: You have been reported a total of 26 times in a short period. It has been verified that you caused a change in the world characteristics of the Cursed Land. This report has been approved. You will be deducted 12,950 points of Void Tree Reputation.]
[Your current Void Tree Reputation is -???]
Seeing this prompt, Su Xiao was very calm. He was so calm that he opened the report list. Was he going to retaliate? Of course not. He decisively chose to report himself.
[You have reported Reincarnation Paradise Hunter · Kukulin Bai Ye.]
[This report was successful, and you have submitted the most comprehensive reporting evidence to date.]
[You have received 4,850 Soul Coins as a reporting reward.]
[Your Void Tree Reputation has decreased by 1,539 points.]
[Having detected the erroneous contradiction of this behavior, the temporarily established reporting certification has prohibited self-reporting.]
[Due to your act of reporting yourself, your Void Tree Reputation has decreased by 35 points.]
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Picking up 4,850 Soul Coins for free. What is seasoned experience? This is the reaction speed of an Absolute Rank Hunter. It's a pity Kaiser wasn't around; otherwise, there would definitely be an operation with even greater gains.
As for whether reporting himself this time would backfire, the answer was no. In fact, Su Xiao kind of hoped it would fail, leading to a bigger punishment. But one could only say, this is the Void Tree after all; it had already anticipated his move and nipped it in the bud.
Let's ask, in Su Xiao's operations during the second and third rounds, who were the biggest beneficiaries? The answer was himself, along with Reincarnation Paradise and Apocalypse Paradise.
If the Void Tree imposed a substantial penalty because of this, Su Xiao could apply for certification from Reincarnation Paradise and Apocalypse Paradise, thereby obtaining compensation far greater than the penalty. He had just helped Reincarnation Paradise and Apocalypse Paradise seize two worlds. If he were penalized for this without even getting compensatory benefits, that would be an unfair certification.
Closing all the various prompts, Su Xiao was quite looking forward to this Undying Nation, even though it came with the terrifying risk of losing maximum Health Points.
This world should be where Dawn Paradise exiled and imprisoned Undying-type Violators. As for why Dawn Paradise was so strict in punishing the "Undying" characteristic, Su Xiao didn't know.
But one thing was certain: the Undying Violators in this world still had Violator certification. That is to say:
[Old Hunter]
Category: Title
Title Effect 2: Old Hunter (Passive): When killing Violators or Abyss-type enemies, you gain 1 to 500 Hunter Gold Coins.
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The full-potential title [Peak Masterpiece] obtained through Hunter Gold Coins was indeed too powerful. This title could even raise his Alchemy, which had already reached the conventional max level of Lv.95, to Lv.96, and even to the limit level of Lv.100, thereby transforming it into Alchemy X.
The existing knowledge-type title [Original Sin Scholar] was very strong, no doubt, but its limit could only raise Sealcraft to Lv.95. To go further, one would need a full-potential title like this.
One thing to note: the "Undying" characteristic of Undying Violators was considered one of the most troublesome types of prey in the judgment of the Old Hunter title. Therefore, all Undying in the Undying Nation were defaulted to grant 500 Hunter Gold Coins upon being killed.
For Su Xiao, who had a Health Point total of 4.33 million, permanently losing even 1% of his maximum health was an extreme loss. So, this time, the risk was maxed out, and the reward was also maxed out.
[About to enter the Undying Nation. Teleporting...]