1261-1270
Chapter 1261: Newborn Calves are Not Afraid of Tigers
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Lin Huang had an odd expression on his face after reading the thread.
Among the Top 10 Most Deceptive Missions listed, there were three that suited him very well.
Apart from the Wine Ant Queen mission that ranked No.1, there were two other similar missions.
One was the Spider Empress mission in the No.2 spot, while another was No.4, the Tyrant Bug King mission.
The situation with the Spider Empress was more or less the same as that of the Wine Ant Queen. However, the tribe that the Empress produced was smaller. Despite that, preliminary estimation put the number of the tribe at about 50 million spiders.
Not only that, there were countless spider web traps all over the Spider Empress' lair. Many of the spider fighters harbored deadly toxins in their bodies. Overall, hunting the Spider Empress was no easier than hunting the Ant Queen.
The Tyrant Bug King on the No.4 spot was a male Bug King which could not reproduce.
However, this Bug King possessed powerful abilities and could face off in battle against a first-rank True God when it went into berserk mode.
It had conquered dozens of powerful Bug Kings on its own and formed an army with over 30 million bugs.
Although it could not reproduce to replenish its army, this Bug King had the tyrant's divine ability. Under its God Territory coverage, all Protoss fighters would go into berserk mode. Their combat strength would elevate at least two ranks higher, while some could even elevate three ranks higher.
Apart from the Tyrant Bug King itself, the 30-over bug kings under it were all high-level Virtual Gods, including seven first-rank True Gods.
Other people had no second thoughts about skipping over these three missions. After all, bug hordes were no joke. Even a True God would die on the spot if he was smothered in the bug horde with his Divine Power exhausted.
However, Lin Huang was secretly elated.
His main goal in coming to the great world was to hunt a great many virtual god-level monsters so he could retrieve Godheads and refine a sea of them to elevate his combat strength. At the same time, the spiritual energy that he gained from killing Virtual Gods could be given to the Combat Souls of the God's Figurines within him.
"I'm imperial-level grade-3 now. I'll need at least ten Virtual God rank-4 monster Godheads to elevate to imperial-level grade-4, which means I need 10,000 Virtual God rank-1 Godheads. If I calculate it like that, even if all Bug Tribe fighters are on Virtual God rank-1, 100 million Bug Tribe fighters are sufficient to get me to imperial-level grade-8…"
The reason Lin Huang calculated things this way was not because of the 1,000-fold difference in power between Virtual God rank-1 and Virtual God rank-4 Godheads. It was because the effectiveness of the conversion rate for lower-level Godheads would drop each time his combat strength elevated a rank.
If not for the conversion rate, the most that could happen was that he experienced threefold more Godheads exhaustion each rank he elevated, instead of the current tenfold.
Naturally, Lin Huang based his calculations on the most conservative estimate possible.
It was unlikely that all the Bug Tribe fighters under the Bug Queen and Bug King would be at Virtual God rank-1. It was even more unlikely that they were all at beginner-stage virtual god-level. There must be at least quite a few mid-level Virtual Gods and a lesser number of high-level Virtual Gods among them.
Lin Huang only needed a few preliminary calculations to realize that he would be able to elevate to imperial-level grade-9 as long as he completed all three of these missions.
Having considered things to this point, Lin Huang went into the missions section again. It did not take him long to find the three missions, once he had accessed the Black Sickle section.
After making sure that everything was alright, he accepted the three missions without hesitation.
Once he had done this, the number of times these missions had been accepted was updated on the missions list.
Very soon, people noticed the unusual activity and a heated discussion broke out on the forum.
"I remember the Wine Ant Queen mission. There used to be 13 acceptances before, why is it 14 now? Could someone have accepted this mission today? I also seem to remember that the number of acceptances for the Spider Empress was 21, but it's 22 today…"
"What's happening? Someone has fallen into the trap of the No.1 Most Deceptive Mission, the Wine Ant Queen one again?! I wonder if some rookie was tempted by the reward points and took it."
"It's not just the Wine Ant Queen mission, even the Spider Empress and Tyrant Bug King missions have been taken! Three of the most deceptive missions taken on the same day! It's impossible that the same person accepted them all, right?"
"Newborn calves are not afraid of tigers, rookies nowadays are very bold! Best wishes to him, so he comes back in one piece to give up on those missions, hahaha…"
"The ID of the poster above is rather familiar…"
"I think he's the one who took on the Tyrant Bug King mission last year. He was the guy who ran out of the battleground in only his underwear after the bug horde ripped his clothes to shreds."
"Hey! It's been over a year since that happened, why do you have to bring it up in so much detail?!"
…
The forum aside, even some of Death Sickle's upper echelons were discussing Lin Huang.
"Someone accepted the Wine Ant Queen mission on the Black Sickle missions list? I suppose it's a rookie again?" The question came from an old man with a gray beard. He wore a red robe and sat at the head of a long table.
"It's a kid named Xie Lin. He just registered a Death Sickle account today and took less than half a day to complete three reserve missions. He's been promoted to Black Sickle level," an alluring lady in a red dress responded. She wore a black hat with a veil, and through the veil, one could see her faint smile.
"There's nothing so impressive about completing three reserve missions within half a day. The most I can say is that he is highly capable," answered a grim-looking man sitting opposite the lady in the red dress. His face was expressionless.
"Out of curiosity, I looked at this kid's mission record. The three reserve missions that he took on were rather difficult. What's more interesting is that not only did he take on just the Wine Ant Queen mission after being elevated to Black Sickle, he took on three missions at once. The other two are the Spider Empress and Tyrant Bug King ones," the lady in the red dress commented.
"He picked the missions with the highest reward points. That only indicates he's a person who is greedy for points," the grim man said after a moment of silence.
"Haven't you noticed? The targets of the three missions he accepted have the ability to control bug hordes," the lady in the red dress said with some emphasis.
"Maybe it's just a coincidence, it doesn't prove anything." The grim man's face remained expressionless.
"I think he picked them intentionally."
"You're overthinking this."
"Alright, let's end this discussion here. We'll start the meeting," the old man with the gray beard interrupted. Seeing that the pair were going to continue bickering, there was nothing much that he could do except to halt the discussion.
…
Lin Huang had no idea that he was being discussed by the Death Sickle's upper echelons, neither did he check out the heated discussions he had caused on the forum.
This was primarily because he had departed right away as soon as he had accepted the three missions, heading straight for the Wine Ant Queen's colony.
After traveling for a night, it was past 10 the next morning when Lin Huang finally arrived at the area where his intended destination lay—the Bloody Battleground!
To avoid unnecessary trouble, he did a temporary identity registration at the garrison of the Combat God Temple.
"Name?"
"Xie Lin."
"Combat strength?"
"Virtual God rank-3." This was the answer that Lin Huang gave, having used his god rule relic to camouflage his combat strength,
"Organization that you belong to?"
"Death Sickle."
Chapter 1262: Completed Like A Piece of Cake
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
The Bloody Battleground was one of the rare low-grade battlegrounds in the God Territory.
Ever since Protoss won the war in the great world, the God Territory had entered into a time of peace. On unanimous agreement from all the tribes, a few battlegrounds were left behind for army training.
The main reason why all the tribes had agreed to set up temporary battlegrounds like this was so they could train their tribe armies there as well.
The Bloody Battleground was one of the few battlegrounds that the God Territory and Bug Territory had agreed to set aside for Virtual Gods to train their armies.
The battleground had a Great Dao Barrier that had been set up by both the Protoss and Bug Tribe Lords. Only powerhouses under true god-level could enter the area. If someone happened to elevate to True God in the battleground, they would instantly be teleported out.
Initially, the Great Dao Barrier was supposed to restrict Virtual Gods from entering the battleground. However, the God Territory figured that young geniuses below virtual god-level might need to cultivate in there, so they conferred with the Bug Tribe to relax the combat strength restrictions a little.
The purpose of relaxing this particular condition was to benefit people from the God Territory, which now gave Lin Huang his opportunity.
After completing his temporary identity registration, Lin Huang officially became a non-permanent member of the Combat God Temple.
The Combat God Temple had many battlegrounds under their jurisdiction, but they did not restrict non-permanent members' activities.
After registering himself, Lin Huang purchased a set of battleground maps at the Temple. He then donned light battle gear and headed straight for the territory of the Wine Ant Queen.
The Wine Ant Queen had come to the Bloody Battleground more than a decade ago and had soon become an overlord of the area. Since her elevation to Virtual God rank-9 during recent years, it was only natural that she became the No.1 overlord of the entire battleground.
Countless people in the God Territory had tried to kill her, to the point where various powerful organizations had allotted high rewards for such assassination missions, but nobody had succeeded yet.
Nobody below True God level, not even the elites among the Protoss, had managed to withstand the Wine Ant Queen's bug horde attack.
Lin Huang encountered a few God Territory members and some Bug Tribe monsters while he was on his way to the Wine Ant Queen's territory. However, he did not stop at all and headed straight for his destination.
Just as he was entering the Wine Ant Queen's territory, Lin Huang ran into two other Virtual God rank-9 God Territory members.
Upon seeing that Lin Huang was heading in that direction, the duo shouted, "Don't go any further, you'll be in the Wine Ant Queen's territory if not!"
Lin Huang smirked under his mask, "That's where I'm headed!"
He passed the duo before he was done speaking, continuing on his way.
"Another guy who is full of himself. I think his combat strength is only Virtual God rank-3."
"Every now and again, there're always reckless fools who think they're the chosen ones, trying to complete missions that ordinary people can't. We warned him but he refused to listen, so if he wants to go to his death, who are we to stop him?"
Naturally, Lin Huang could not hear the duo's discussion.
After passing the duo, the number of ant beasts increased visibly as he headed some 100 kilometers deeper into the area. Not only that, all the ant beasts possessed virtual god-level combat strength.
Without needing to look at the map, Lin Huang knew that he was almost at his destination.
He then summoned the Combat Soul of his God's Figurine, Nightmare Tapir. Instantly, all the ant beasts ignored them both.
Just like that, Lin Huang led Nightmare Tapir in without encountering any interference along the way. There were more and more ant beasts the further they went, and the distribution of the ant beasts became denser.
Lin Huang finally saw the ant colony's entrance when they arrived in the inner area that was marked on the map. It was a gigantic sinkhole, like a huge crater made by a fallen meteorite.
Hovering above the sinkhole, Lin Huang looked down but darkness was all he could see; he could not tell what lay in the depths of the sinkhole.
However, he did not hesitate at all but headed straight into the sinkhole with Nightmare Tapir.
Only when he was inside did Lin Huang realize that the walls were densely covered with holes.
These caves were of various sizes and were irregularly distributed. There were at least several hundred of them.
Hovering in mid-air, Lin Huang turned his head and looked at Nightmare Tapir beside him.
Nightmare Tapir rapidly sorted out the memories that he retrieved from the ant beasts' brains, picked a cave and slipped in. Lin Huang followed close behind him.
Once inside the cave, the path within twisted and turned. Not only that, there were forks every now and then. Sometimes there were two forks, sometimes three or four, and sometimes there were even more than ten forks.
Very soon, Lin Huang was dizzy from the journey. Fortunately, Nightmare Tapir knew the route like the back of his hand.
There were many ant beasts in the road forks. Initially they were merely Virtual God rank-1s and rank-2s; later there were Virtual God rank-3s and rank-4s, even Virtual God rank-5s and rank-6s. The deeper the duo went, the more powerful the ant beasts' combat strength was.
However, the number of ant beasts above Virtual God rank-4 visibly dropped. They only bumped into a few Virtual God rank-6 ant beasts.
Under Nightmare Tapir's divine ability, all of the ant beasts ignored the duo.
Human and beast entered a barren land with no enemies in sight. It did not take them long to penetrate deep into the core of the colony.
The core of the colony was a gigantic underground space. It was like a massive cave, with ant beasts densely crawling all over the ground and the walls.
All of the ant beasts here were at least Virtual God rank-6. At a cursory glance, Lin Huang saw at least 1,000 Virtual God rank-6 ant beasts, up to a hundred Virtual God rank-7 ant beasts and dozens of Virtual God rank-8 ant beasts.
Meanwhile, the ant beasts had cleared a space in the middle that was approximately hundreds of square meters in size.
A huge red Ant Queen was lying there. There were four Virtual God rank-9 bug guardians at each cardinal point, guarding the Ant Queen.
The Ant Queen and four bug guardians were alerted as soon as Lin Huang and Nightmare Tapir appeared.
The rest of the ant beasts were still under the influence of Nightmare Tapir's divine ability; they ignored Lin Huang and Nightmare Tapir's existence completely.
Without waiting for the Wine Ant Queen and the four bug guardians to react, Nightmare Tapir's pupils turned black in the dark cave. The next second, the four bug guardians had been rendered dazed and immobile.
Meanwhile, the Wine Ant Queen only had time for a struggling gleam to flash through her eyes before she was overwhelmed completely, unable to move.
Lin Huang had thought that the Wine Ant Queen's soul and spiritual intensity were extraordinarily powerful since she was mythical-level and had conquered over a hundred million Ant Tribe members. By right she should not fall prey easily to mind control; he had not expected that she would be completely powerless against Nightmare Tapir.
"Retrieve their memories first, see if there's anything useful. Spare no one after that."
Lin Huang was so decisive mainly because he needed a considerable amount of Godheads to elevate his combat strength. Although massacring this Ant Queen's tribe would almost certainly draw the Bug Tribe here for investigation and revenge, there was little difference in the consequences, whether he killed just the Ant Queen or slaughtered the whole tribe.
A moment after Nightmare Tapir's command, the sea of bug beasts lost their vitality without warning. They looked like they had fallen into a deep sleep.
Those that were crawling on the walls fell onto the ground like chips of rock, stirring up waves of dust…
At the same time, Lin Huang could clearly sense a sea of spiritual energy seeping into his body.
Seeing the Ant Queen slowly losing her vitality in front of him, Lin Huang summoned a Queen Mother army immediately to clear the battleground and pick up the bug carcasses…
Chapter 1263: Mission Complete
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Having settled the matter of the Wine Ant Queen, Lin Huang did not linger in the Bloody Battleground.
Instead, he retreated from the area immediately and headed straight for his second destination—the Hunter Battleground where the Spider Empress was.
Like the Bloody Battleground, the Hunter Battleground was an area for army training.
The Spider Empress and the Wine Ant Queen were similar in terms of circumstances; both rapidly become overlords after coming to their respective territories.
Although the Spider Empress' abilities were not as powerful as the Wine Ant Queen, the traps and poisons in the spider lair scared off many people. The difficulty of killing the Spider Empress was just as high as that of killing the Wine Ant Queen.
Lin Huang spent almost a whole day getting to the Hunter Battleground.
Although he did not refine Godheads during that time, he had allocated the sea of spiritual energy in his body to the Combat Souls of his God's Figurines accordingly.
Ninetails Lynx and Destructive Divine Mammoth who were initially Virtual God rank-8, as well as Shackle Serpent and Undead Styx who were initially Virtual God rank-7 had been allocated 90% of Lin Huang's spiritual energy. All of them had been elevated to Virtual God rank-9 right away.
Meanwhile, the remaining 10% of spiritual energy had been assigned to the other five God's Figurine's Combat Souls, including Divine Sun Tree. They had elevated from Virtual God rank-7 to Virtual God rank-8.
Although there were no changes in their combat strength, their overall abilities were significantly upgraded.
Upon entering the Hunter Battleground, Lin Huang used the non-permanent member identity from his registration the day before at the Combat God Temple. He was approved immediately.
Although the registration staff saw that Lin Huang had just been to the Bloody Battleground yesterday, they did not find it odd that he was here at the Hunter Battleground today.
In reality, there were many non-permanent members like Lin Huang. Most of them would take on missions in different battlegrounds and then head straight to the next battleground after completing their mission at the first one. It was very common.
After entering the Hunter Battleground, Lin Huang followed the map and headed straight to the spider lair
, where he used the same strategy as yesterday. Under Nightmare Tapir's divine ability, the duo managed to go deep into the spider lair without being discovered.
However, as they had to avoid all sorts of traps inside, they spent a much longer time in the spider lair than they had in the ant colony.
The mission took a total of about two hours, from entering the Hunter Battleground to Nightmare Tapir dragging the Spider Empress into his dreamland.
The population of the Spider Tribe was much bigger than initially speculated. The official figure was around 50 million but in reality, there were some 70 million that perished under Nightmare Tapir's control.
Lin Huang gave this round of spiritual energy to Divine Sun Tree, Enchanted Fairy, and Death Butterfly. The three of them elevated from Virtual God rank-8 to Virtual God rank-9.
After disposing of the bug carcasses, Lin Huang recalled all of his cards and God's Figurine's Combat Souls. He then left the Hunter Battleground right away and headed to his third destination.
The area where the Tyrant Bug King had his territory was called the Mad King Battleground.
In this battleground, although the Tyrant Bug King had conquered the Bug Tribe army with extraordinarily powerful ability, it was not ranked as No.1. Instead, the honor fell to another quadruple mutated prime-grade bug beast – the Horned Beetle.
In fact, the Horned Beetle was also listed in the Black Sickle's mission section as No. 3 of the Top 3 Most Deceptive Missions.
The killing of the Horned Beetle ranked above the Tyrant Bug King because the Horned beetle, a prime-grade bug beast, was protected by a chitinous black exoskeleton. Its defenses were comparable with a god rule relic.
The Horned Beetle's strength and speed were also at true god-level. It could face a first-rank True God head-on with its brute force and thick shell alone.
It was almost impossible even for a first-rank True God to kill it.
Lin Huang had not taken up the mission to kill the Horned Beetle because it was not always in the battleground. It only appeared occasionally, so encountering it would be through sheer coincidence and luck.
Moreover, one could gain a large number of card pieces and complete cards by hunting bug hordes. There was only one Horned Beetle. The chances of getting a complete Monster Card from killing it were almost zero, so this did not interest Lin Huang very much.
After entering the Mad King Battleground, just like before, Lin Huang headed straight to the Tyrant Bug King's territory.
Right as he was about to step into the Tyrant Bug King's territory however, he sensed an intense collision impact from a distance.
The collision impact came from a powerhouse of at least Virtual God rank-9.
"Someone took the mission before I did?!"
Lin Huang could not help but frown as he watched sparks flying into the air from the collision of powerhouses in his target destination.
However, he did not feel troubled. It was not unusual for someone to take up the mission since it had been distributed to all organizations. After all, the Tyrant Bug King was not a Queen Mother. It could not produce a Bug Tribe army, which rendered the mission difficulty much lower.
Despite that, nobody had managed to complete the mission in the two to three years of its initial announcement. Naturally, Lin Huang did not think that the person who had first taken the mission could complete it either.
"Let's just go over and watch, don't do anything yet," Lin Huang said to Nightmare Tapir with a smile.
Human and beast easily made their way deep into the Tyrant Bug King's territory in the presence of countless bug beasts, without being discovered.
Once he was near enough to the battleground to see the situation clearly, Lin Huang's expression was one of great surprise under his mask.
Initially, he thought that the person fighting the Tyrant Bug King would probably be a member of the God Territory, with a high possibility of them being a Protoss. However, now he realized it was actually a Bug Tribe beast that was fighting the Tyrant Bug King.
Meanwhile, the Tyrant Bug King was not fighting alone; it had formed a battle formation with dozens of high-level virtual god-level Bug Kings. They were locked in combat with a black bug beast.
"I guess this is the Horned Beetle? Is it going to usurp the Bug King's place?"
Although Lin Huang had never seen the Horned Beetle before and had not even checked on its mission details, he recognized the bug beast as soon as he saw it.
It was gigantic and covered with a thick, heavy black shell. However, its speed was not affected at all and it was incredibly strong.
The Tyrant Bug King was also a quadruple mutated prime-grade bug beast but even with a battle formation, it could gain no headway over the Horned Beetle. In fact, the Bug King was even at a slight disadvantage.
Lin Huang watched as the Horned Beetle fearlessly collided with the Bug King's gigantic bug beasts and could not help exclaiming, "I'm afraid this Horned Beetle's bodily power and strength might be on par with the Tyrant Bug King. Its explosive force isn't as great, but it's faster and more agile. Monsters with such physique usually have unbelievable stamina. The longer the Tyrant Bug King takes for this battle, the more at a disadvantage it's going to be…"
Lin Huang had only watched the battle for less than ten minutes before he saw that the Horned Beetle was obviously gaining the upper hand. Meanwhile, the Tyrant Bug King's situation was also getting worse.
Lin Huang finally decided to interrupt things when he noticed that the Tyrant Bug King was about to be defeated.
As Nightmare Tapir's pupils turned black, a colorless wave began to radiate outwards over the entire battleground and everything went silent. All of the bug beasts, including the Tyrant Bug King and the Horned Beetle, seemed to have fallen into a deep sleep.
Just as he had done previously, Lin Huang had Nightmare Tapir retrieve all the bug beasts' memories, and send them into eternal slumber.
Lin Huang smirked a little upon seeing the Horned Beetle's carcass, which had lost all of its vitality without the need for a single casualty.
"Seems like I might need to take on the Top 3 Most Deceptive Missions on that leaderboard when I get back…"
Chapter 1264: Where Did The Bug King And The Bug Queens Go?
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Lin Huang returned to the Iron Fist Shelter after he was done with the Tyrant Bug King.
However, he did not hand over the mission items right away upon his return. Instead, after accepting the mission to kill the Horned Beetle on Death Sickle's missions forum, he rented a cultivation room and went into closed-door cultivation.
Once in the cultivation room, the first thing Lin Huang did was to give the Tyrant Bug King's bug beasts' spiritual energy to Fading Petals and Creation Clock.
Although the bug beasts that the Tyrant Bug King had conquered were less powerful than the Wine Ant Queen and the Spider Empress, he had many high-level Virtual Gods under him. He had dozens of Virtual God rank-8 and Virtual God rank-9 Bug Kings; some of them were even mythical-level. The total sum of spiritual energy was not that different from the other two missions.
After this transfer of spiritual energy, the last two God's Figurines' Combat Souls, namely Fading Petals and Creation Clock, finally elevated to Virtual God rank-9.
As of now, all ten God's Figurines' Combat Souls were one step away from elevating to true god-level. Their overall ability was over several times more powerful than before they came to the great world.
After allocating his spiritual energy, Lin Huang checked the cards that he had obtained over the last few days.
Since he used a Double Reward Card every time these days before fighting, he had obtained a total of 450 million card pieces and over 1,200 complete Monster Cards. Most of them were basically triple mutated legendary-level Monster Cards. There were only 52 pseudo-mythical-level cards and 8 mythical-level cards.
There were two Spider Empress cards among the mythical-level cards. The remaining six cards were two bug guardians and a Bug King under the Tyrant Bug King. Since he used a Double Reward Card, the number of complete cards was doubled.
Lin Huang was actually surprised to have obtained the Spider Empress cards; he had not been hoping for much.
After placing the 1,200-over bug beast cards that he had just obtained into the galactic hive, Lin Huang fed all of the extraneous bug carcasses into the hive.
Earlier, Lin Huang had retrieved the Godheads in the bug carcasses when he had summoned the Bug Tribe army to clean up the battlefield. He had since placed them in a corner of the storeroom. Now he brought them out.
Apart from the four Virtual God rank-9 Godheads from the Wine Ant Queen, the Spider Empress, the Tyrant Bug King and the Horned Beetle, there were two Godheads that came from the mythical-level Bug Kings under the Tyrant Bug King.
Lin Huang had finally gathered the main materials he needed, which were the six Virtual God rank-9 Godheads.
Meanwhile, he had over 200 million Godheads for supplementary materials. Naturally, he had sufficient materials now.
Without hesitation, he tossed a Virtual God rank-9 Godhead into his Divine Fire as the main material. Subsequently, he tossed in the sea of Godheads as the supplementary materials.
The Godheads turned into meteors, colliding straight into his Life Palace. Very soon, they were surrounded by ten golden Life Wheels resembling suns. Each Life Wheel spurted dark-red Divine Fire, enveloping the Godheads entirely.
When Lin Huang was still imperial-level rank-1, he needed a full month to refine a Virtual God rank-9 Godhead. Now that he was already at imperial-level rank-3, the refinement period was shortened by almost a third, which meant he would only need 20 days for refinement.
The refinement time would accelerate after level elevation. This was because the Divine Fire's refinement power was restricted by Lin Huang's combat strength.
In the cultivation room, Lin Huang closed his eyes to focus. He concentrated all his attention on activating the Divine Fire.
After being refined by Divine Fire, the sea of Godheads was transformed into a white stream that penetrated his Life Palace.
The stream was merely the thickness of a hair and flowed slowly at first. As the Godheads were refined, the stream grew. Some one to two hours later, it was flowing like a great river in the Life Palace.
Time flew by; 12 days passed. All of the supplementary materials were refined and the Life Palace began to stop absorbing supplementary energy. Lin Huang began focusing on refining the single remaining Virtual God rank-9 Godhead in his body.
Eight days went by just like that. The main material, the Virtual God rank-9 Godhead, had been refined completely, turning into a white river that flowed into the Life Palace.
A moment later, Lin Huang's inner universe experienced a period of upheaval. The Divine Fire retreated back into the Life Lamp while the ten Life Wheels returned to their original positions.
Lin Huang could clearly feel the Divine Power in his body undergoing another transformation.
However, this was just a minor transformation. It was not powerful enough to trigger a fundamental change in the Divine Power's nature, but the Divine Power's intensity was certainly a bit stronger than before.
At the same time that this Divine Power transformation was taking place, Lin Huang's physical body and soul were strengthened too.
Although once again no fundamental change took place, he could clearly feel that he was more powerful now.
"I've been elevated to imperial-level rank-4!"
After observing the transformation in his body for a little, Lin Huang then looked at the Monster Cards in his body.
Bai and the others had had their combat strength elevated to Virtual God rank-3.
Lin Huang was at peace again after calming himself down. He took out two Virtual God rank-9 Godheads and a large number of supplementary Godheads. Without any hesitation, he tossed them into his inner universe again.
…
While Lin Huang was focusing on refining Godheads to elevate his combat strength, the forum exchange on the Death Sickle's website was a stirring hive of activity.
One of the threads had over 10,000 comments.
The title was, 'Where Did The Bug King and the Bug Queens Go?!'
The thread described the sudden disappearance of the overlords of three battlegrounds, the Wine Ant Queen, the Spider Empress, and the Tyrant Bug King. There were verification photos and videos too.
Before the thread was posted, people had originally been speculating on the internet about the disappearances of the Bug King and the two Bug Queens. It was just that most of them thought this was a rumor started by trolls. Even though there were videos and photos, people still thought they were faked.
However, as rumors continued to spread like wildfire for the next few days, people witnessed a couple of major organizations sending their elite virtual god-level teams to investigate the three battlegrounds, while more videos and photos were posted. Only then did people start to believe that this was the real thing.
More and more discussions about the disappearances of these three Bug overlords mushroomed up on the forums of every organization.
However, basically, everyone on the forums had come to the same conclusion.
All of them assumed that the two Queen Mothers and the Bug King had retreated by choice from the battlegrounds, which explained why there were no traces of battle left behind at the scenes. Not only had the Bug King and the Bug Queens disappeared, but even the Bug Tribe armies had also vanished.
If it were only the Bug King and the Bug Queens that had died, people might have speculated that powerhouses from the God Territory had invaded the core of each bug lair and assassinated the overlords. There was certainly a possibility that this could have happened.
However, a hundred million over Bug Tribe troops disappearing without a trace could not possibly be the work of human agency. Most importantly, there were no traces of battle at all.
Even the upper echelons of a few major organizations in the God Territory were discussing the matter, including Death Sickle. All of them were asking if anybody had taken up the missions recently.
Death Sickle's upper echelons even discussed Lin Huang in their meeting. However, it was merely someone mentioning in passing, "I think that rookie Xie Lin took those missions recently but as I recall, he's only a Virtual God rank-3."
Everyone merely shook their head and smiled before skipping over the subject. Nobody thought Lin Huang could possibly be responsible for the mysterious disappearances.
Chapter 1265: Imperial-level Rank-9
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
In a flash, almost two months went by.
Within this period, Lin Huang elevated from imperial-level rank-3 all the way to imperial-level rank-9 by consecutively using six Virtual God rank-9 Godheads as the main materials and a sea of Godheads from various ranks as supplements.
Initially, he took 20 days to elevate from imperial-level rank-3 to imperial-level rank-4. However, as his combat strength rose, the speed at which he refined Godheads accelerated, as did the speed of his level elevation.
Subsequently, it took him only 14 days to elevate from imperial-level rank-4 to imperial-level rank-5. After that, he merely spent 9 days elevating from imperial-level rank-5 to imperial-level rank-6 and 6 days to go from imperial-level rank-6 to imperial-level rank-7…
Altogether it took Lin Huang a total of 56 days to elevate from imperial-level rank-3 to imperial-level rank-9.
Perhaps for others, such rapid elevation might have resulted in a weak foundation. However, Lin Huang's imperial-level was different from the rest. Refining one Virtual God rank-9 Godhead was the equivalent of building his foundation all over again. In other words, it was making his Life Palace sturdier, which made his foundation all the more stable.
Given that his physical constitution and spiritual resilience were already at Virtual God level, he was able to handle the stress that such elevation methods invariably put his body through. Two months of continuous rapid elevation had no side-effects on him whatsoever.
Naturally, Lin Huang was very careful. Every time he elevated up a rank, he would check his body over very carefully to make sure nothing had gone wrong. He only refined the next round of Godheads after making sure that everything was fine.
He finally stopped refining Godheads after he elevated all the way to imperial-level rank-9.
He did not get out of cultivation immediately either. Instead, he began checking his body carefully again.
"My body is already close to peak-stage Virtual God rank-9 while my strength and speed are at Virtual God rank-9 level already…" Lin Huang examined himself with care, finally turning his attention to his Life Palace.
His Life Palace, which was originally black, was now faintly imprinted with a dark-red divine pattern.
"Life Palace: Monster Paradise"
"Life Palace's Territorial Range: Radius of 10,000 kilometers from the Life Palace possessor (potential for expansion)."
"Life Palace Ability 1: Within the Life Palace's territorial range, the dead summoning beast's soul will return to the Life Palace with its body reconstructed and revived. Those with a broken soul will have their broken soul pieces recalled and recovered."
"Ability Restriction 1: Each summoning beast can only be revived 30 times within 24 hours. Their soul will disintegrate after 30 times and they won't be able to return to the Life Palace (potential to grow)."
"Ability Restriction 2: Each summoning beast can only have their soul recovered 9 times within 24 hours. Their soul will disintegrate after 9 times and they won't be able to return to the Life Palace (potential to grow)."
"Derivative Ability: If the Life Palace possessor dies within the coverage range, he can choose to use a summoning beast as a substitute in death. The summoning beast chosen as a substitute won't be able to be summoned for 24 hours (potential to grow)."
"Remarks: The Life Palace possessor can only be substituted 9 times within 24 hours. He can only be substituted 3 times if his soul has disintegrated (potential to grow)."
…
"Life Palace Ability 2: Within the Life Palace's territorial range, the Life Palace possessor and his summoning beasts would have a nine-fold boost in strength, speed, and spirit. The other summoning beasts would have a 30% drop in their strength, speed, and spirit (potential to grow)."
"Remarks: The Life Palace possessor can turn off the boost and the undermining effect as and when he wishes."
…
Lin Huang's Life Palace abilities had seen great improvement since its elevation from imperial-level rank-3 to imperial-level rank-9.
Not only were the territorial ranges widened, but there was also a significant improvement in the summoning beast's number of revivals, substitution abilities, and ability boosts.
"My Life Power is much more powerful now but it still doesn't seem to be at its peak…" Lin Huang sensed clearly that there was still room for improvement in his Life Palace.
It did not matter if he were elevating to virtual god-level or elevating directly to true god-level in future; he was still not at his maximum potential for elevation.
"Don't tell me I need to elevate to imperial-level rank-10 to go any further?" Lin Huang mumbled softly.
"You should try and see if you can continue to elevate," the stone tablet's thick voice sounded all of a sudden, "Since you feel that your Life Palace isn't at its peak yet, it's definitely possible to elevate further."
"But my Life Palace has stopped absorbing the remaining energy coming from the Godheads. Right after I elevated to imperial-level rank-9, I had a small amount of Godhead energy left behind. I tried making my Life Palace absorb it but there was no response as if it were already full," Lin Huang raised his doubt.
The stone tablet fell silent for a moment, before suggesting, "Since you feel that it hasn't reached its peak, it's very unlikely that it's full. I think you can try refining Godheads from Virtual God rank-1 to Virtual God rank-9. If that doesn't work, then there are only two possibilities. One is that your Life Palace can still elevate further but there's a specific condition attached to it. The other possibility would be there's something wrong with your senses. However, the chances of the second possibility are fairly small. After all, you're not a rookie who has just stepped onto the cultivation path."
Lin Huang nodded. From the storeroom, he took out Godheads from Virtual God rank-1 to Virtual God rank-9 and tossed all of them into his body. He activated Divine Fire and proceeded to refine them.
Time flew by; two days passed. After the Godheads had been refined, Lin Huang repeatedly activated his Life Palace to absorb the energy. However, there was no response from the Life Palace at all.
"I've tried Godheads from Virtual God rank-1 to Virtual God rank-9, it doesn't absorb any more energy…" Lin Huang looked helpless.
"Then there's a high chance there's a specific elevation condition. You'll have to figure out exactly what it is on your own." The stone tablet was out of ideas as well.
"Forget it, I'll leave things alone for now." Lin Huang set the issue aside decisively. He began discussing questions about further elevation with the stone tablet.
"I should have two choices for elevating to the next level when my Life Palace is fully elevated. One is to consolidate Godheads to get to virtual god-level. Another is to refine Divine Fire to directly get to true god-level. Which do you think is better?"
"If you would like to elevate your ability in a short period of time, elevating to True God would naturally be faster. However, if you're considering development for the long run, I personally suggest elevating to virtual god-level first," the stone tablet answered after thinking about it for a while.
"Given the stability of your Life Palace, you can certainly use it as a Godhead and refine your Divine Fire directly. However, think about it this way for a moment. Although you would save time by skipping virtual god-level and going to true god-level directly, it would waste what you've been accumulating for the past few years. Your elevation to true god-level would be no different from other True Gods."
"However, if you go through virtual god-level before getting to true god-level, you would be the top powerhouse among the True Gods. Not only that, in the long run, you would have a higher chance of elevating to Heavenly God or even Lord-level in the future."
"There's another reason why I don't suggest elevating to true god-level directly. The gravel world that you were in before had incomplete rules and denies True Gods from entering. For you, the difficulty of returning to the gravel world after elevating to true god-level would be very high. Even if you managed to return, you would be hindered by the rules of the world everywhere you go, unless you seal your combat strength below true god-level."
Lin Huang fell silent for a long time after hearing what the stone tablet had to say.
He had considered those issues before as well. However, the gravel world's impending crisis was getting closer; there were less than nine months left now. Naturally, he was anxious, which had resulted in him wanting to elevate his ability as soon as possible and thus neglect many details.
He had a sudden epiphany regarding the stone tablet's words.
"I know what I should do now…"
Chapter 1266: My Name is Ji Bai
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
My name is Ji Bai. I am a male, demonic plant species. To be exact, I belong to the Charming Flower Tribe.
Our tribe members are beautiful no matter male or female. In the God Territory, our tribe members are responsible for reception tasks in all organizations. For instance, I'm working as a mission receptionist at Death Sickle's branch in the Iron Fist Shelter.
The Iron Fist Shelter is a classic grade-3 Shelter. Although it's only grade-3, in reality, it's more crowded and hectic than some grade-4 Shelters. The Death Sickle estate that I'm working at is one of the most crowded places in the entire Shelter. Therefore, our daily tasks aren't easy at all…
I shouldn't chat anymore, someone is here to submit his mission.
What, you're asking how do I judge if a person is here to submit his mission, taking a mission or announcing a mission?
That's easy, one can announce and accept missions on Death Sickle's website. Submitting missions is the only time one needs to submit proof. Therefore, they would have to come to the estate in the Shelter.
There are only a handful of people who do not know how to navigate our website, hence we would remember them after they visit us once.
Alright, I really can't chat anymore. I need to work now.
"Sir, is there anything that I can help you with?" I smiled at the man dressed in black robe before me.
His black robe was big and loose, no details could be seen from the coverage. Even his face was hidden under his hoodie. I could vaguely see a black mist lingering in the shadow of the hoodie. I could not judge what race or tribe he belonged to.
"I'm here to submit my mission," the man in the black robe replied with his extremely deep and husky voice.
"Sure, please tell me your mission code," I smiled as I replied.
Asking for the mission code was the first step to approving a mission.
"Black SSS13, Black SSS14, Black SSS19, Black SSS21," the man in the black robe read out the four codes.
I was slightly stunned when I heard that.
There were categories to Death Sickle's mission code.
'Black' would mean Black Sickle-level.
The alphabet behind it indicated the mission difficulty.
The mission difficulty was categorized from low to high, which are D, C, B, A, S, SS, SSS.
Black D-level was easy, whereby even a Virtual God rank-1 could complete it under normal circumstances.
Black C-level was similar to killing beginner-stage virtual god-level. Meanwhile, Black B-level was similar to killing intermediate-stage virtual god-level and Black A-level was similar to killing high-level virtual god-level.
Black S-level would mean that it was immensely difficult, which was the equivalence of killing Virtual God rank-9. That was the difficulty level of Black S-level.
The Black SS-level, which was even higher meant that one's hunting target was on peak-stage virtual god-level which would elevate to true god-level anytime.
On the other hand, there were very few Black SSS-level missions. Basically, almost no Virtual Gods were able to complete the mission. Some of the hunting targets even surpassed ordinary first-rank True God. Even a genius with Protoss bloodline could barely complete it.
Meanwhile, this guy before me gave four mission codes that are all on SSS-level. Was he crazy?!
I would not believe that anyone could complete four SSS-level missions at once, and on his own.
With doubts, I found the missions with the four codes and began looking through them.
Black SSS13, killing the Wine Ant Queen in the Bloody Battleground…
Black SSS14, killing the kill Spider Empress in the Hunter Battleground…
Black SSS19, killing the Tyrant Bug King in the Mad King Battleground…
Black SSS21, killing the Horned Beetle in the Mad King Battleground…
After looking through them, I'm almost 120% sure that this guy before me was trying to make a fool out of me.
Although there was punishment in Death Sickle for false mission reports, the punishment was not usually heavy. Therefore, there would be trolls lying about their missions for rewards now and then.
This guy before me was here to cheat his way to rewards. Not only that, something was wrong with his head reporting four SSS-level missions at one go.
Such trolls that would cheat for rewards would usually use mission targets that were already dead and submit unrecognizable carcass parts to pass as the mission target's carcass parts.
In reality, on a certain level, missions such as killing the Wine Ant Queen and Spider Empress were the prerequisite to cheat for rewards. The reason being, they had gone missing without any reason. Moreover, it has been proven that they were no longer in the battlegrounds.
However, this man in the black robe had mistaken one thing. Many people were following the few missions such as the Wine Ant Queen and Spider Empress. Although it has been two months since it happened, as a mission receptionist, I couldn't forget about these missions.
To be honest, I was following these few incidents that happened two months back closely. I even discussed it with people on the Internet. It was concluded that these Bug Kings and Bug Queens retreated from the battlegrounds themselves. Otherwise, it would be impossible that they had disappeared with up to a hundred million of armies without any battle signs left behind.
Naturally, I would not show mercy to this guy before me who lied about the missions. As soon as he took out the fake bug carcass parts, I would report him immediately!
Of course, I would not show it on my face. I would remain smiling professionally.
"Sir, I've checked through the mission codes. You can submit the mission target's complete carcasses or carcass parts now. If you're submitting the remains, we might need some time to verify if they're the mission targets."
"There's no need for those troubles, I brought complete carcasses," the man in the black robe took out four bug carcasses from his storage space as soon as he was done speaking.
Four complete bug carcasses!
I was stunned when I saw them, which I subsequently felt the terrifying aura left behind in the bug carcasses.
The lingering aura was still threatening even after death.
'These bug carcasses are real!' Such ridiculous thought flashed through my mind the moment I saw the bug carcasses.
However, I shook my head in the next second to shake off the ridiculous thought out of my head.
The reason being, to a Black Sickle assassin, it would be impossible for him to complete the four missions.
This guy had used some technique to forge these four bug carcasses!
Since he dares to submit missions under the sun like this, it proves that he's very confident in the bug carcasses that he forged!
I refuse to believe that I could not see any faults in them!
"Please give me a moment to check them, sir."
I stood up and walked out of the counter to the bug carcasses and checked them one by one.
I checked them thoroughly for over ten minutes. I could not find any flaws at all, no matter the bug shell, mouths, even their sizes, and physical characteristics.
I knew that these few bug carcasses had exceeded my verification ability. This guy was too powerful in his forging skill!
"Is there a problem?" The man in the black robe asked in an urging manner.
I knew that the more nervous he was, the more it proved that he was scared that I might find the flaws.
These four bug carcasses were definitely fishy!
"I'm sorry, my verification ability is subpar, I can't verify if these four bug carcasses are the mission targets. I can only inform the headquarters and get their experts to verify again," I said while faking a smile.
This guy would feel guilty that I said that!
"They're bug carcasses, not items. Why do you need to verify them?" The man in the black robe sounded a little doubtful.
See, he's guilty now!
"How long does it take for the second verification to take place?"
"Usually, there would be experts here within 24 hours. If the experts at the headquarters are busy, they would still handle it within 72 hours," I explained while smiling.
"I'll wait then, please let me know when the experts are here." I was surprised that the man in the black robe responded so decisively.
Could it be that this guy was so confident in his forging skill that he thought he could get away from the professional appraisers from our headquarters?!
As I watched him leave, I posted what happened with the encounter with the guy together with a few pictures that I took sneakily here on the Death Sickle's forum. Let me show you guys how crazy forgers were nowadays…
Chapter 1267: Young Man with Gray Hair
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Never had Lin Huang thought that the bug carcasses that he submitted for the missions could not be verified. He would have to wait for the experts from Death Sickle's headquarters to verify themselves. He could only submit the missions when everything was made sure to be right.
Initially, he was planning to leave the Iron Fist Shelter and head to the next destination. Now he could only stay.
Feeling helpless, Lin Huang could only put up at a nearby hotel temporarily.
After checking himself into the room, the first thing he did was to log onto Death Sickle website's mission section to look for missions that were suitable for him.
He only returned to the message section after some filtering and accepting two missions. He wanted to see if there were any news.
He had his eyes on the first message on the first page of the message section.
The title was 'The Missing Bug Kings and Bug Queens Suspected to be Killed!'
It had been less than ten minutes since the thread was posted and there were already hundreds of comments.
Lin Huang was stunned for a while before he then clicked into the thread.
He frowned slightly under his mask after spending a couple of minutes to finish reading the thread.
"So, this is what happened, I was wondering why do they have to verify the bug carcasses…"
The thread had a screenshot of another thread from the forum, as well as some pictures too.
After reading the thread, Lin Huang realized that the mission receptionist who attended to him thought he was a liar who had forged the bug carcasses. He was mistaken for wanting to use fake bug carcasses to cheat for rewards.
However, the person who posted the thread on the message section seemed to know something about the Bug Tribe. He speculated that the bug carcasses were most probably real judging by the many angles from the pictures taken. Not only that, he concluded that the Bug Kings and Bug Queens that went missing out of nowhere two months back might have been killed.
Meanwhile, suspicions drowned the comment section.
Most people were convinced that the bug carcasses were forged, while only very few people thought they might be real. However, they disagreed that the Bug Kings and Bug Queens were killed. Instead, they thought someone picked up Bug Kings and Bug Queens' carcasses after they were dead for some other reasons.
After reading the thread, Lin Huang could not help but return to the forum exchange section. He wanted to check out the original thread and the comments on it.
He clicked into the forum exchange section, the thread that ranked No.1 was the original thread that he was looking for. There were over 10,000 comments by now.
As he looked through the original thread, Lin Huang was almost 100% sure that it was the mission receptionist attended to him who posted it.
Judging by the original thread's use of words, the poster made it clear that he loathed Lin Huang the 'forger'.
Lin Huang smiled and proceeded to read the comments below.
Up to 10,000 comments on the comment section were condemning the forger. Many of them even condemned that Lin Huang did that to be viral.
Only a few of them could tell that the bug carcasses were real through the pictures. However, their voices were soon drowned in the comment section.
Lin Huang forced a smile and shook his head after reading the comments. He even saw some of them claiming to be Death Sickle's mission receptionists who supported the poster in the comment section.
"I suppose things would turn out the same way even if I was attended by another mission receptionist. It seems like I can only wait for the people from the headquarters to verify the carcasses over again."
After putting the missions aside, Lin Huang began to plan his next step.
Following Bloody's plan, elevating his combat strength was the No.1 priority. However, since he had already elevated to imperial-level rank-9 while he had yet to find the way to elevate further, he could only look for other ways to do so.
According to Bloody's plan sequence, the second priority was to elevate his God's Figurine's Combat Souls' combat strength. Now that all ten of his God's Figurine's Combat Souls had elevated to Virtual God rank-9, he would need to hunt for True Gods to obtain True Gods' spiritual energy to elevate further.
Lin Huang thought about it and decided to put this aside as well. The reason being he was only a Black Sickle member at Death Sickle at the moment. He could not take on any missions to kill True Gods, neither could he obtain true god-level targets' details easily.
Bloody's third priority for him was to expand the hive army.
In reality, Lin Huang was already doing that. When he killed the Bug Kings and Bug Queens earlier, apart from obtaining their spiritual energy and Godheads, expanding the hive army was one of the main reasons to take up the missions.
"I must look for more missions to kill Bug Kings and Bug Queens. Since there's no such mission now, I can look if there's any information about Bug Kings and Bug Queens on the message section. Or I'll look for related information through some other ways."
Lin Huang had already put that in his schedule.
"Fourth is to elevate my brute ability, such as cultivating Sword Dao and Divine Telekinesis. I can't slack on them…"
"Fifth is to obtain all sorts of cultivation resources…"
After sorting out his next plan and route roughly, Lin Huang thought he would cultivate Seamless the few days while waiting for the experts from Death Sickle's headquarters.
What he had no idea was that a 'young man' came to Death Sickle's estate in the Iron Fist Shelter soon after the mission receptionist posted the thread.
The young man had gray hair and looked exactly like a human. He looked to be 15 or 16, was short at only approximately 1.6m tall.
He wore a black and red intersected long jacket with the collars lifted. He wore a black scarf on his neck, covering his neck entirely. The jacket's hoodie covered most of his hair, only revealing a little of it to show its gray color.
He wore a pair of black long pants, both of his hands were in the pockets.
He walked into Death Sickle's estate as if it was his home.
"Sir… Is there anything that I can help you with?" The lady attendant at the entrance was startled at first when she saw the young man, but she became respectful subsequently.
Only Protoss dared to walk around in human form in the God Territory as they wished.
Although the person looked young, she dared not delay her service at all.
"Who was the attendant who attended to the forger on the forum exchange section some half an hour earlier?" The young man lifted his head to look at the lady attendant and asked. "Although he was anonymous on the forum, you guys should know who he is?"
"Well…" the lady attendant looked rather troubled.
"He's not in trouble," the young man with gray hair added.
"Oh. His name is Ji Bai, he's at counter 11," the lady attendant only nodded and gave the name.
"Thanks," the young man thanked her briefly and walked to counter 11 directly.
The lady attendant watched as the young man walked to the counter and only looked away when the counter's shield was activated automatically. The counter was covered now.
"Why does that young man look rather familiar? I think I've seen him somewhere but I can't remember who he is…"
The lady attendant was pondering for a moment when she saw the counter's shield deactivated automatically. The young man with gray hair had walked away from the counter.
"What is he doing? He only went to the counter for only less than five seconds…"
Chapter 1268: Heavy is The Head That Wears The Crown!
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Lin Huang thought he would just stay at the Iron First Shelter to cultivate for the next two days after planning his route and booking the cultivation room. He would get out of closed-door cultivation anytime when Death Sickle's news came.
Just when he had booked the cultivation room and turned off the reservation page, a voice came before him all of a sudden.
"You're Xie Lin?"
Lin Huang was shocked to hear the voice. He lifted his head. Someone had appeared less than three meters before him without him realizing.
The person wore a black and red intersected long jacket with the collars lifted. He had a black scarf on his neck. He was merely 1.6m tall. Although he had gray hair, he looked like a young man aged 15 or 16.
Lin Huang secretly had his guard up from the glance alone.
He did not sense the 'young man' appearing at all. Even until now that he had seen him before his eyes, his territory showed nothing at all, as if the person never existed.
Most importantly, Lin Huang could not sense any aura on the person at all, as if he was merely air.
The 'young man' before him was definitely older than he looked to be!
Was he a high-level True God or a Heavenly God?!
If he was a Heavenly God, did he see through my god rule relic and found out that I was a human?
What was this guy's intention to be here?
Though thousands of thoughts flashed through his head, Lin Huang spoke while looking calm.
"That's right, I'm Xie Lin."
He knew that it was futile for him to deny that. Since the person found him, it proved that he had confirmed his identity. Moreover, this 'young man' before him might be a heavenly god-level powerhouse. Lying to him might upset him.
"Hah, you sure are quick to respond to that." The 'young man' with gray hair smiled calmly, "Aren't you afraid that I'm looking for trouble?"
"With your ability, sir, I can't escape even if I want to if you're here for trouble. Therefore, there's not much difference in me admitting my identity or not. I'd rather be honest with you," Lin Huang was relieved when he heard that. Since the person asked that, there was a high chance that he was not here for trouble.
"You should be grateful that you didn't lie. I hate people who lie!" The 'young man' with gray hair walked to the couch and sat down after he was done speaking. He crossed his legs and lifted his head to glance at Lin Huang, saying, "Let's talk."
Lin Huang nodded, he sat down on a single couch that was closest to him.
"I wonder if there's anything that I can help you with, sir?"
The 'young man' with gray hair laughed out loud, "Didn't you submit Death Sickle's missions earlier? I'm the person responsible for the assessment."
Lin Huang raised his brows when he heard that. The staff said that the experts in charge of assessment would usually come within 24 hours. They might even take 72 hours the most. Not only that, he was told that he would be informed when the person came. It had only been some half an hour, this 'young man' found him on his own while there was no news from Death Sickle.
Lin Huang hesitated for a moment and decided to voice his doubts directly.
"I haven't received any news from Death Sickle that the expert for assessment is already here."
The 'young man' raised his brows a little when he heard. He turned on his backend page on Death Sickle's website and projected it.
"See for yourself."
A glance was all it took for Lin Huang to see the person's verified code name – Buried Heaven!
His pupils shrunk immediately. He was familiar with the code name.
On the first day he joined Death Sickle, he had already seen the code name on Death Sickle's Gold Sickle Leaderboard ranking No.1
Buried Heaven, the powerful ninth-rank Heavenly God!
The supreme powerhouse whose rank was closest to the seven Blood Sickle members in the entire Death Sickle!
Lin Huang was secretly puzzled. Why would this supreme powerhouse whose position was after Death Sickle's seven leaders would come here himself for the assessment?
"Based on normal procedure, there would only be someone coming for your mission assessment tomorrow no matter what. I saw the thread about you on the forum earlier. Since I happened to be nearby, I thought I would drop by," Buried Heaven explained briefly.
Although the explanation made some sense, Lin Huang was not convinced. He did not think that Buried Heaven would come to assess his mission for nothing.
He came here to assess the missions of a Black Sickle member who had joined for a few days just because he was nearby?
Only fools would believe that!
Lin Huang did not bother to expose him. Since he had confirmed his identity, naturally, it would not be a problem to let him assess his case.
However, Lin Huang had his guard up.
Instead of bringing all the bug carcasses out, he only took out Wine Ant Queen's carcass.
Buried Heaven did not mind that. He merely glanced through the bug carcass and nodded after scanning through with Divine Telekinesis.
"Alright, it's genuine."
As Lin Huang was about to bring out the second bug carcass, he saw Buried Heaven waving his hand.
"You don't have to take out the rest, assessing one is enough."
"I don't have to submit the bug carcasses to you?" Lin Huang asked in slight confusion.
"No need, you've passed my assessment. You can submit them at the local estate tomorrow," Buried Heaven shook his head.
"So, that's it?" Lin Huang did not expect that the assessment process would be smoother than he imagined.
"It's only a bug carcass, I can tell if it's real just by scanning with Divine Telekinesis," Buried Heaven said and took a good look at Lin Huang. "Your combat strength level is rather odd though…"
Lin Huang secretly jolted when he heard what Buried Heaven commented.
"Forget it, let's not talk about that… I have a question for you, I hope that you can answer me honestly."
Lin Huang nodded lightly, "Do ask, sir."
"Did you really kill these Bug Kings and Bug Queens?" Buried Heaven stared intently at Lin Huang. It looked like his stare could see through everything. "I don't need to know any of the process and details of the killing. All I want to know is whether you killed them yourself!"
Lin Huang felt that he could not hide any secrets from those eyes.
"I guess I did."
Lin Huang responded after thinking about it for a moment. Although it was his God's Figurine's Combat Soul who did it, he considered himself killing them too.
Buried Heaven stared at Lin Huang for a while more, "I hope that you didn't lie."
Buried Heaven merely warned and continued, "Someone might contact you a few days later, they might ask you to take up an extremely difficult mission. If you didn't kill the Bug Kings and Bug Queens such as the Wine Ant Queen, my advice to you is to reject this mission. Otherwise, you would die a horrible death."
"Heavy is the head that wears the crown. You better watch out…"
His voice was still trailing when Buried Heaven disappeared without a trace. It was just like how he came earlier without Lin Huang noticing, as if everything that had just happened was Lin Huang's illusion.
"Extremely difficult mission? I'm dying to know how difficult it is exactly…" Lin Huang smirked slightly as he sat on the couch.
Chapter 1269: I'm at Your Door
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Noche Super Star Zone in the God Territory.
As one of the six super star zones in the God Territory, there were many grade-5 and even a couple of grade-6 Shelters' headquarters here.
Among them, Death Sickle's headquarters was also located in the grade-6 Blood Sickle Shelter. In this super star zone, the Blood Sickle Shelter that was closest to grade-6 was undoubtedly the overlord here.
At the moment, it was rather crowded at Death Sickle's headquarters' meeting room in the Blood Sickle Shelter.
Seven people gathered at the round table in the meeting room.
A young man with gray hair stood five to six meters away from the round table.
If Lin Huang was here, he would recognize immediately that the young man was Buried Heaven who had just visited him not long ago.
"How was the assessment, Buried Heaven?" A voice came asking from the round table.
"The bug carcasses are real," Buried Heaven had his eyes on the person who had just spoken as he continued, "The entire bug carcass' body had no injuries at all, must be killed with some Spiritual secret skill."
"Are all of the bug carcasses the same?" Another person asked.
"I've only seen one, the rest of them looked like they're perfectly intact judging from the photos," Buried Heaven responded with a poker face.
"So, what's that rookie Xie Lin's combat strength like?"
"His combat strength is rather weird. His aura intensity seems Virtual God rank-9 to me, there's Divine Power activated in his body and there's even Divine Fire's aura. However, he has no Godhead consolidated in him. He must have some unique cultivation method," Buried Heaven could not help but frown at the mention of Lin Huang's combat strength.
"Do you think this rookie is reliable?"
Buried Heaven hesitated for a while on that question. He then gave a puzzling answer.
"I don't know."
After saying those three words, Buried Heaven added, "He said 'I guess' when I asked him whether he killed the Bug Kings and Bug Queens. Although he didn't deny that, neither did he give a definite answer. I can't confirm his exact, real ability."
"Also, he has a fake identity. His past experiences were also made up. I was skeptical about this in the beginning, but my suspicion was all gone after meeting him."
"And the reason?" Another person at the round table asked.
"He's a human." The entire meeting room fell into dead silence upon Buried Heaven's words.
At the meeting table, six of them looked at the seventh person almost at the same time.
The man in a skull mask tapped the table with his translucent, jade-like finger once and chuckled softly as he spoke, "Never had I thought that kid is of my kind."
The female creature with white fluorescent light glowing on her body sitting next to the man spoke too, "Given the situations of humans in the God Territory at the moment, it's forgivable that this rookie disguised himself. There's no need for us to get to the bottom of this."
"Combat God Temple and we, the Death Sickle, are the only top organization in the God Territory that are recruiting. He could only hunt around the outer ring if he joined Combat God Temple with his fake identity. Naturally, joining our Death Sickle would be a better choice."
"Since we give rewards based on the missions, with his combat strength access, he would not have access to any confidential information."
The flame monster sitting across the white fluorescent light creature spoke as soon as she was done speaking.
"But that mission is top secret, are you guys sure that you want to get an unknown kid to join?"
"Only god order-level (True God) life forms can only enter that place. If that unknown kid that you're talking about had really killed the Bug Kings and Bug Queens, he's undoubtedly the most powerful destiny-level (Virtual God) in this era. There's a high chance that he's the person who can bring out the thing that we desire."
"Moreover, with his destiny-level (Virtual God) combat strength, he would have no ability and guts to pocket the thing himself. As soon as he brings the thing out, it will naturally belong to us Death Sickle. By then, I believe that he would give the thing willingly to us as long as we give relevant compensations and promises." It was the human man with the skull mask who spoke this time.
As the argument on both sides was still going on, a man at the round table asked Buried Heaven all of a sudden.
"Buried Heaven, since you came in contact with that rookie in person, do you think he should take the mission?"
Buried Heaven went silent for a moment upon hearing that question.
"Based on my instinct, there's something in him that I can't see through. That mission has been hanging for years. If there's someone that could complete it, he might be the one with the highest chance of completing it among everyone that I came in contact with."
"Of course, that's only my instinct, it might not be accurate," Buried Heaven added.
"Then… let's vote on that," the questioner turned his head left and right to look at the other six.
A moment later, the seven of them at the round table had voted.
"Five in favor, two opposes," the creature wearing a golden crown on his head announced in a unique voice. "Then that's settled, rookie Xie Lin will be added to the list!"
"Buried Heaven, if you're available, you'll be handling everything related to this mission."
"Sure, but I have a condition," Buried Heaven requested shamelessly.
"Do tell."
"If he got it, I want a share of that person's inheritance!"
"Sure!"
Buried Heaven bowed at the seven of them after getting the confirmation. He turned around and left the meeting room.
The seven of them remained in the meeting room.
"Let's move on to the next subject. There's something that my real body has to deal with, I better not clone myself further."
"My real body is somewhere rather dangerous too, let's get this meeting done with soon."
…
At the Iron Fist Shelter, Lin Huang rushed to the cultivation room that he had booked as soon as Buried Heaven left. He began a short, closed-door cultivation.
Since Buried Heaven said that the assessment was over, there was no need for him to submit the missions immediately. He had to wait for a few days for new missions to be announced, hence it would not be too late for him to submit the missions when he got out of his cultivation then.
Time flew by, one day had passed.
As Lin Huang was deep in his Seamless cultivation, a message came all of a sudden from a stranger's number.
"Pause your cultivation, there's something that I need to talk to you about."
Lin Huang was stunned for a second when he saw the message, "Who is this?"
"We just met yesterday," the person replied within seconds.
"Buried Heaven? Why is he looking for me again? Could it be that he's going to tell me about the mission that he mentioned earlier? Why didn't he just text me directly or announce the mission from the back-end?" Lin Huang was puzzled. Nevertheless, he replied anyway, "Where are you? I'll get out of my cultivation and go to you."
"I'm outside your cultivation room."
"Err…" Lin Huang was speechless. He got up immediately and opened the cultivation room's door.
As expected, a 'young man' with a black scarf was waiting at his door.
"Let's go inside and talk," Buried Heaven walked into the rather small cultivation room when Lin Huang opened the door.
"Shouldn't we go somewhere that's more suitable for a chat?" Lin Huang raised his brows.
"It's pretty good here," Buried Heaven had sat on the floor with his legs crossed by then. He patted the floor space next to him and said, "Close the door, let's sit and talk."
Chapter 1270: Great Heaven Territory
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Lin Huang sat next to Buried Heaven with his legs crossed. The cultivation room was silent at the moment.
Buried Heaven seemed like he was not in a rush to talk. He brought out two bottles of drinks from his storage space and passed one to Lin Huang.
Lin Huang took it and could not help to ask before he opened the bottle.
"Are you here to talk to me about the mission that you mentioned yesterday?"
Buried Heaven opened the bottle leisurely. He only nodded after taking a sip.
"That's right."
"Isn't it faster for you to tell me this through text?" Lin Huang asked in slight confusion.
"Short messages won't be able to explain it. Moreover, I dislike typing," Buried Heaven explained.
Lin Huang thought to himself secretly, 'You can send voice recordings if you don't like to type…'
However, Lin Huang did not say that out loud as there was a possibility that Buried Heaven did not know of such a voice message function, or perhaps he had other reasons for visiting. No matter what it was, it would be awkward for Lin Huang to expose him.
"So, what is this mission about?" Lin Huang almost teased Buried Heaven but he held back. He began asking about the serious stuff.
Buried Heaven put down the drink in his hand and turned his head to look at Lin Huang. His expression turned serious and said, "Go into the Great Heaven Territory, retrieve Great Heaven's inheritance and secret treasures!"
"Great Heaven Territory?!" Lin Huang was familiar with that name.
Noticing that Lin Huang's tone seemed to be a little doubtful, Buried Heaven explained briefly, "Great Heaven was the No.1 genius of the last era in the entire God Territory. He was also the most powerful powerhouse among the Heavenly Gods of the last era. The Great Heaven Territory is the God Territory he left behind after he passed on."
In reality, Bloody had described this place to him when she was sorting out the information earlier.
The Great Heaven Territory was one of the most popular secret zones in the God Territory. Rumor had it that Great Heaven's inheritance and treasures were hidden in this secret zone.
Meanwhile, the documents that Bloody left behind had information about Great Heaven too.
In the last era, Great Heaven was known to be invincible among the Heavenly Gods. He had suppressed other genius powerhouses in the entire era. Regardless if it was Protoss or other tribes, no Heavenly Gods were a match for him. Rumor had it that he had even defended a Lord's attack that contained Great Dao Power.
Theoretically, it was easy for such a talented genius to become a Lord.
However, Great Heaven had chosen a cultivation method that was different from the ordinary. Eventually, the cultivation failed, and he died.
The God Territory that he had left behind after his death slowly evolved into a secret zone.
The documents that Bloody left behind also recorded that although the Great Heaven Territory was a Heavenly God's remnant, Great Heaven seemed to have set up some restriction in his God Territory when he was alive, whereby people above Virtual God were prohibited from entering.
The reason why Lin Huang remembered so many things about the Great Heaven Territory was because Great Heaven was a powerful sword cultivator too.
Lin Huang could not help but ask after pondering in silence for a while.
"It's been many years since Great Heaven left behind this secret zone. Theoretically, it should've been opened many times. Nobody managed to retrieve his inheritance and secret treasures?"
"Heavenly Gods' God Territory's size is calculated based on the star zones. There are up to a billion stars alone in the Great Heaven Territory, excluding other celestial bodies. Meanwhile, all participants would be teleported in there randomly. Nobody knows which celestial body the inheritance and secret treasures are hidden," Buried Heaven shook his head.
"Why are you guys sure that I would be able to retrieve the inheritance and secret treasures?" Lin Huang asked while finding it strange.
"We're not sure about that, we merely felt that the chance of you retrieving the inheritance is higher than the rest," Buried Heaven replied honestly. "You're a sword cultivator, so was Great Heaven. Moreover, your ability is more powerful than people of the same combat strength."
Buried Heaven even glanced at Lin Huang when he was speaking halfway. He seemed to be observing his reaction.
"I guess this mission isn't mandatory?" Lin Huang thought about it and asked Buried Heaven.
"No." There were not any emotions on Buried Heaven's face, however, a gleam of disappointment flashed through his eyes. "You can reject the mission."
"What are the benefits if I were to accept it?" Lin Huang asked immediately.
Hearing Lin Huang's question, Buried Heaven turned his head to look at him again.
"If you managed to retrieve the inheritance, it would belong to you. Death Sickle is only asking for a copy. If you managed to retrieve Great Heaven's secret treasures, you'll take 50% of them. If you managed to retrieve other inherence and secret treasures, everything would belong to you if they didn't belong to Great Heaven himself."
"50%…" Lin Huang mumbled softly. He seemed to be unsatisfied with the ratio.
"50% is quite a lot." Buried Heaven added, "Great Heaven's secret treasures are worth nothing below a Lord's secret treasure. You can request if there's anything that you desire among the secret treasures."
Lin Huang thought about it and figured it was Death Sickle who gave him the quota after all. Otherwise, there was no way of him getting in at all. Therefore, he stopped grappling on the ratio. He knew that even if he fought for it, it would be great if he could get 5% extra, which made not much of a difference.
The rewards that Death Sickle offered were indeed handsome.
"Apart from that, I can personally give you something in advance," Buried Heaven took out a golden mask from his storage space as he spoke.
Lin Huang's entire body went into alert mode automatically as soon as he saw the mask.
The aura on the mask terrified him a little.
"This mask is a…god sequence relic?" Lin Huang asked in a testing manner.
"Yes. It's called Thousand Face, I used it in the past," Buried Heaven nodded lightly. "If you managed to retrieve Great Heaven's inherence, I'll give you Thousand Face. If you failed, I'll be lending you temporarily. You can return it to me when you get out of the Great Heaven Territory."
"Alright then…" Lin Huang thought about it. He figured it made sense he would not be given a god sequence relic that was used by a Heavenly God for nothing.
He thought of something else immediately. Buried Heaven giving him this mask meant he had found out about him as a human. Giving him this god sequence relic was to give him a better disguise to prevent others from detecting his real identity.
'Since Buried Heaven already found out that I'm a human, there's a high chance that other Death Sickle's upper echelons are aware of it too. Under such circumstances, Death Sickle is still willing to give me the quota to enter this secret zone. It seems like Death Sickle isn't against humans. At least I don't have to worry about exposing my identity at Death Sickle from now on.'
"There will be a total of 300 people entering the Great Heaven Territory this time. They're all top geniuses trained by major organizations. I bet most of them are ranked on top of the Gods Leaderboard and a handful of them are supreme geniuses that are secretly trained. Their abilities are not to be underestimated."
"There's a low chance of you encountering them, but if you did, don't show mercy if you need to kill. There are no consequences for you if you did kill. It's very common to die in a secret zone. Nobody would hold you responsible after you exit from there."
"This time, Death Sickle has four quotas. Try not to fight with the other three. Do whatever you want with the rest."
"The secret zone's opening time would be on the 8th of next month. Someone will pick you up by then."
"Ask if you have any questions now. Don't text me after I leave, I dislike typing."