Chapter 7: Card Decomposition

Su Yuan took a deep breath and looked at the corpse of the Big-eared Steel-toothed Dog. However, *his heart was far from calm.*

After all, despite countless practices, this was Su Yuan's first real combat with a Star Beast.

"Luckily, the result matched my expectations. With the six-dimensional qualifications boost from Azure Sky Phoenix, my physical constitution completely overpowers Star Beasts of the same stage. Let alone these two Big-eared Steel-toothed Dogs, who are only at the Seventh Stage and have a singular attack method—not particularly challenging."

The sole difficulty in this battle was the numbers. The two Big-eared Steel-toothed Dogs were highly synchronized; if one were to endure the first dog's assault, dodging the second dog's bite would be nearly impossible.

Thus, Su Yuan opted to ignore the first dog's initial charge and immediately killed the second one first.

*Reflecting carefully on the battle process*, Su Yuan walked to the sliced-open Big-eared Steel-toothed Dog nearby, raised his knife, and extracted an egg-sized white Crystal Core.

"So, this is a Star Core?"

Su Yuan grasped the Star Core and, following the methods taught in the Star Apprentice Class, infused it with his spiritual power. Soon, the Star Core emitted a faint glow.

"There's a reaction!" Su Yuan's eyes lit up as he continued to maintain the output of spiritual power.

After a short while, the Star Core gradually disintegrated step by step into tiny specks of blue phosphorescent dust. Eventually, it transformed into a Star Card that quietly rested in Su Yuan's palm.

The Star Card had a white backing, while its card face depicted a Big-eared Steel-toothed Dog with silver-gray sharp teeth, its jaws wide open as if poised to attack.

[Steel Teeth Bite]

[Element: None]

[Grade: Ordinary]

[Introduction: Enhances the hardness, sharpness, and bite strength of the teeth, enabling an attack with significant destructive power.]

"As expected, it's only Steel Teeth Bite."

Following the curriculum taught at school, extracting Star Cards from Star Cores is a random process, selecting one skill from the Star Beast's existing arsenal.

The Big-eared Steel-toothed Dog only has the Steel Teeth Bite skill, so naturally, that's the only skill extractable.

"Learning this? Definitely not... Right now, I'm only a Star Apprentice, which gives me a maximum of five Star Card skill slots."

The more Star Cards embedded, the greater the burden on the Soul Card. Typically, Star Apprentices can embed three to four Star Cards beyond their Soul Card. Even with Azure Sky Phoenix's high grade, exceeding five is absolutely out of the question.

Embedded Star Cards cannot be destroyed, but with every level gained, more skill slots become available.

While the mantra is "Quality over quantity," having more skills isn't always better, nor does every skill slot necessarily need to be used. But wasting them whimsically is unwise.

Space-element Star Cards are rare. Su Yuan was determined, even if he couldn't find one immediately, to select decent skills from White Cards.

"Although I won't use it, this is the perfect opportunity to test the system's 'Decompose' function."

Staring at the [Steel Teeth Bite] Star Card in hand, Su Yuan attempted to call out in his mind, "System, decompose this Star Card!"

Half a second later, [Steel Teeth Bite] emitted another faint light and then dissolved into specks of starlight dust, which seeped from Su Yuan's palm into his body and vanished.

Simultaneously, the number for starlight dust on the system panel abruptly shot up from 0 to 10.

"It really decomposed into Star Dust—10 points of it!" Su Yuan's eyes were filled with excitement.

*As he had suspected earlier, card decomposition indeed converts Star Cards into system-required starlight dust. And this ordinary-grade [Steel Teeth Bite] Star Card yielded an entire 10 points of Star Dust, exactly the amount needed for one enhancement point to a White Card!*

"This... this is truly a game changer!" Su Yuan couldn't help but swallow hard.

If relying on the original natural recovery rate of Star Dust, which replenishes 1 point per day, leveling an entry-level White Card skill to Skilled would take 10 days, to Master 30 days, and to Perfect 70 days.

*That speed alone is leagues ahead of the norm—after all, once Star Card skills are embedded, increasing their skill levels isn't easy.*

Take Guangchuan Fourth Middle School as an example: currently, most awakened Star Apprentice students only have one Master-level skill. Having two to three Master-level skills is rare, and Perfect-level skills are nonexistent.

But now, Su Yuan only needs 1 White Card to level a skill to Skilled, 3 to reach Master, and 7 to achieve Perfect.

*What kind of speed is this?*

Forget Perfect; even reaching the Transformation Realm can be achieved in an incredibly short time!

Su Yuan walked to the corpse of the other Big-eared Steel-toothed Dog and repeated the extraction process from its Star Core, obtaining another Star Card and decomposing it into Star Dust.

With this, he now had 20 points of Star Dust in total!

"At this rate..." Su Yuan gazed at the undulating mountain forest ahead, his eyes burning with intensity. "This Great Barbarian Mountain Area is nothing less than limitless skill progression for me!"

Gripping his longsword, Su Yuan set off without hesitation toward the depths of the forest...

Half a day passed, during which Su Yuan encountered Wild Lizards, Earth Ground Pangolins, Little Tree Demons, and Double Ringed Patterned Snakes—four kinds of Star Beasts.

All of these beasts were six- to seventh-stage Star Beasts with only one skill each. They posed no threat to Su Yuan, who effortlessly crushed them with his physical constitution, yielding four White Star Cards:

Wild Lizard's [Monster Power Punch], Earth Ground Pangolin's [Ground Boring Assault], Little Tree Demon's [Beginner Stage Vine Dance], and Double Ringed Patterned Snake's [Poison Kiss].

None of these skills met Su Yuan's expectations, and he decomposed them all.

"Finding even one skill that's barely acceptable from White Cards is this difficult..."

Su Yuan walked along the hillside, watching the sun dip close to the horizon. He sighed, opened his backpack, and took a few sips from a water bottle.

"At most, I can keep moving for another hour before I need to find a reasonably safe place to spend the night."

For Star Card Masters, spending ten days to half a month in dangerous zones or secret realms is not unusual.

Although Su Yuan was still a Star Apprentice, survival skills such as locating water sources, setting up perimeter defenses, and light sleep had been simulated multiple times in school training. With ample supplies, staying on the outskirts of the Great Barbarian Mountain Area for a week wouldn't be an issue.

*Being alone, however, meant exercising extra caution.*

Su Yuan was deep in thought when he suddenly detected faint yet pronounced Star Power fluctuations ahead. He quickly snapped back to attention, shifting his gaze forward warily.

Up ahead, near a distant gray-black boulder, a half-human-height Star Beast rested against the stone.

It was a humanoid Star Beast, standing on two feet with a body composed of black rock. Only its fire-red pupils shone with an ominous glow.

Upon seeing the beast clearly, Su Yuan's eyes lit up in surprise: "It's a Rock Melt Beast! My luck really isn't too bad after all!"

[Rock Melt Beast]

[Grade: Ordinary]

[Species: Elemental Life]

[Elements: Earth, Fire]

[Talent: Solid Rock—Increases the density and hardness of black rock to a certain degree]

[Six Dimensions: Strength E, Agility F, Defense E, Constitution F, Spirit F, Star Power E]

[Skills: Black Rock Punch (Ordinary), Steel Flame Finger (Ordinary)]

This Rock Melt Beast was precisely the target Su Yuan had marked earlier in the "Low Stage Star Beast Skill Evaluation" text.

Its [Steel Flame Finger] skill ranked as mid-to-high level among ordinary White skills. It packed power, burst damage, and, being a humanoid Star Beast skill, was perfectly suited for human usage. Its market price ranged between 20,000 to 30,000.

Its other skill, [Black Rock Punch], might fetch only seven to eight thousand, while the previously obtained [Steel Teeth Bite] might not even sell for 4,000 due to its extreme niche appeal.

"Speaking of which, so far, each decomposed White Card has yielded 10 points of Star Dust. Selling a [Steel Flame Finger] card could buy multiple [Steel Teeth Bite] cards—could this be a trick for stacking Star Dust?"

*Su Yuan contemplated the matter—could this be an exploit in the system?*

However, Su Yuan later learned that only Star Cards extracted by himself from Star Beast Star Cores could be decomposed. Cards given by others or purchased were completely ineligible for decomposition.