Chapter 50
Chapter 50
“Boy, now you’ve really pissed me off!”
The Magic Dong Genie shrieked in fury.
Qin Lan’s precise and elegant cock strike–no, critical strike–had successfully hit both of the Magic Dong Genie’s weak points, making his enormous golden form shake violently.
“You forced me to do this! You forced me! I’m going to use my ultimate move!” the Magic Dong Genie roared.
He floated into the air, gleaming with golden light, then rapidly expanded before Qin Lan’s stunned eyes.
“Grow bigger!”
“Grow bigger!”
With every shout, the Magic Dong grew to an even more outrageous size. The golden radiance across his surface also became increasingly brilliant, leaving Qin Lan shaken.
Then again, anyone would have been shaken by something so bizarre.
“Now experience… the power of the dong!”
“Dong Charge!”
The enlarged Magic Dong smashed through the roof of the little house and released a terrifying aura.
Like a collapsing hill, he came crashing down with thunderous force. The impact stirred a violent gale as he barreled straight toward Qin Lan.
“I would honestly love to copy that ‘Grow Bigger’ ability…” Qin Lan’s mouth twitched.
“But…”
A burst of curse energy erupted from Qin Lan and shot toward the charging Magic Dong.
“I refuse to be defeated by a goddamn talking dong!”
The instant he finished speaking, the dense curse energy wove itself into an extraordinarily complex pattern and formed a unique curse script. It shot forward and branded itself onto the incoming Magic Dong.
Qin Lan’s expression was solemn. This was the first time he had used his class’s active ability.
“Death’s Curse: Wither!”
The Magic Dong shuddered as the script took hold.
His power drained away like floodwater through a broken dam, and the golden light coating his surface dimmed at the same time.
The Magic Dong Genie cried out in horror.
“No… No!”
“What is happening…? My power…”
“No!”
“I’ve gone limp! How could I go limp?!”
He could not understand why the Magic Dong under his control had suddenly become so soft and feeble, as if he had just fought through three hundred rounds of battle.
This was the curse wielded by the Backup Reaper.
Qin Lan could choose one aspect of an enemy and curse it, weakening the corresponding ability.
This time, he had targeted the dimension representing physical power–Death’s Curse: Wither.
His opponent was a genuine 3-Star anomaly, so Qin Lan did not dare hold anything back. He poured every last drop of curse energy into the curse, exhausting his entire reserve.
The result was gratifying.
Ordinarily, Qin Lan’s curse energy, which had only just approached the Tier 2 bottleneck, would not be enough to contend with an anomaly above 3-Star. Even if the curse took effect, its power should have been drastically reduced.
His Baton Secret Art: Three Strikes, Three Guards had already shown signs of weakness against the Glass Slipper. The occasional stagger it triggered ended almost instantly unless Qin Lan infused the technique with enough curse energy for its control effect to function properly.
But the Backup Reaper was a Unique Hidden Class.
The instance boss at the source of that class was the unfathomable Death, an existence above 5-Star. The curses it wielded naturally suppressed lower-ranked anomalies.
As a result, the Magic Dong Genie’s Strength was stripped away by fifty percent in an instant.
“Only ten seconds… but that’s enough!”
Qin Lan’s gaze sharpened. He raised his stick and charged.
The two burly men rushed in alongside him.
The only truly troublesome aspect of the Magic Dong Genie was the continuous damage from his golden light. His raw Strength was not especially impressive. After losing fifty percent of it, he was pathetically weak.
“Stop! Stop hitting me… I surrender…”
“Ow! That hurts!”
“Spare me… Ah! Don’t! Ah!”
Death’s Curse: Wither left the Magic Dong Genie without enough Strength to resist Qin Lan’s attacks.
But the curse had not reduced his health, so Qin Lan simply pinned him beneath one foot and struck him again and again with savage force.
Ten short seconds passed.
The Magic Dong Genie’s voice gradually weakened. Soon, he could no longer even beg for mercy. Only muffled moans and occasional screams escaped his mouth.
Under normal circumstances, Qin Lan should have died a few times first to extract the full value of this anomaly.
But being impaled to death by a gleaming golden dong was more humiliation than he could tolerate. A death like that would have stained his record for life.
“Guh…”
With one final whimper, the Magic Dong Genie’s sinful life came to an end.
[You have drawn power from an enemy’s death.]
[Strength +2. Constitution +2. Curse Resistance +2.]
“Curse Resistance… This is the third time I’ve seen that.”
“What does it actually do?”
Curious, Qin Lan opened his status panel.
——————–
Name: Qin Lan
Race: Human
Class: Backup Reaper (Unique Hidden)
Strength: 24 > 26
Constitution: 24.5 > 26.5
Speed: 23
Spirit: 22.5
Curse Energy: 89
Curse Amplification: 0
Curse Resistance: 15 > 17
——————–
At Qin Lan’s command, detailed information about Curse Resistance appeared in his mind.
[Curse Resistance: The minimum threshold of the user’s tolerance for curses. Curse energy at or below this threshold will be treated as ineffective.]
“A minimum threshold?”
Qin Lan finally understood how absurdly powerful Curse Resistance was.
For a simple example, suppose the Magic Dong Genie had been the one who cast Death’s Curse: Wither just now.
As long as the curse contained no more than seventeen points of curse energy, it would have been completely ineffective against Qin Lan–no different from empty air.
In other words, if another Anomaly Hunter attacked Qin Lan, they would have to infuse at least eighteen points of curse energy into their Talent before it could affect him.
“If I raise this threshold any higher… Won’t I be able to take a 3-Star anomaly’s abilities head-on?”
Qin Lan was stunned.
Whether anomaly or Anomaly Hunter, everyone possessed a limited reserve of curse energy. They could not infuse enormous quantities of it into every attack or ability.
Matchstick Bro’s fireballs, for example, had been extraordinarily powerful, yet each one contained only two or three points of curse energy.
That was enough to strengthen the fireballs without draining his entire reserve in a short time.
If Qin Lan fought Matchstick Bro again, he could stand still and take several fireballs head-on. At worst, his skin would suffer a few minor burns. He certainly would not end up half-charred as he had at the beginning.
“No wonder that golden light didn’t seem to do much damage. It hurt, but that was about it…”
Qin Lan considered the matter. “The special effect produced by its curse energy must have been nullified by my resistance.”
Curse Resistance gave Qin Lan an absolute advantage against enemies of the same level.
If they infused too little energy, they could not hurt him.
If they infused too much, they would exhaust themselves before he did.
It was shamelessly unfair.
“Hmm. There is still a little curse energy left in the corpse…”
Qin Lan looked at the Magic Dong Genie’s remains with distaste, hesitation flashing through his eyes.
The thought of absorbing energy from him felt strangely… disgusting.
“Forget it. I’ll let the Anomaly Hunter Bureau deal with this headache.”
In the end, Qin Lan gave up.
He would exchange the anomaly’s remains for Bureau points instead. Absorbing anything from that corpse would leave him feeling disturbed.
With his current stats, ordinary 3-Star anomalies could no longer exert much pressure on him. He might not defeat them effortlessly, but the fights would certainly be easy.
He did not feel pressured in the slightest.
A physical 2-Star anomaly possessed average values between six and fifteen across its four attributes: Strength, Constitution, Speed, and Spirit.
An exceptionally powerful 2-Star anomaly could utterly crush one at the bottom of the same rank.
The gap between different 2-Star anomalies was simply enormous.
When Qin Lan first entered Fairytale Town–or rather, Abyss Town–his four attributes had already placed him among the strongest physical 2-Star anomalies.
After tempering himself against three consecutive 3-Star anomalies, he had now stepped fully into 3-Star territory.
Once his curse energy broke through the one-hundred-point barrier, he would become a human-shaped 3-Star anomaly, and one approaching the middle of that rank at that.
“The stronger 3-Star anomalies have average values above thirty across their four attributes… But even then, I can use Death’s Curse to narrow the gap.”
“Winning isn’t impossible.”
“Give me two more 3-Star instances, and I’ll be able to run rampant at the 3-Star level…”
Qin Lan drew a deep breath. His eyes shone with exhilaration.
A 3-Star Anomaly Hunter?
Luo Yue had helped him just now, but Qin Lan could actually have defeated the Magic Dong Genie alone.
That meant he genuinely possessed the qualifications to advance to 3-Star Anomaly Hunter.
Not long ago, one order from the Qian Group’s young master had been enough to steal Qin Lan’s results and leave his life hanging by a thread. His only option had been to seek protection from the Anomaly Hunter Bureau.
Even after becoming an Anomaly Hunter, the Qian Group had continued targeting him and hired a 2-Star Anomaly Hunter to assassinate him.
But now, Qin Lan finally possessed enough power to swagger through his Safe Zone without fear.
Well… a certain 4-Star old bastard was still stationed there, so swaggering around might not be entirely realistic.
Qin Lan felt somewhat helpless.
Even with his present strength, he did not dare underestimate Lu Xingshan.
A 4-Star Anomaly Hunter had a genuine record of killing a 4-Star anomaly alone.
Lu Xingshan had held the rank for many years. No one knew how much stronger he had become since then.
Back in Terror Subway, he had sealed a rampaging 4-Star anomaly so casually that it could not move.
That alone proved Lu Xingshan ranked among the strongest of the 4-Star tier.
“Still, this is enough.”
“More than enough to make the Qian Group regret ever crossing me.”
Qin Lan could not help grinning.
Young Master Qian’s university life in the Central Region was about to come to an end.
What expression would he make when he learned that he had offended a 3-Star Anomaly Hunter?
Just imagining it was entertaining.
Luo Yue walked over at that moment and rolled her eyes when she saw Qin Lan grinning to himself.
“What are you smiling about?”
“You plan to hand the corpse over to the Anomaly Hunter Bureau, don’t you? That thing is disgusting. There is no chance I’m putting it in my storage bracelet.”
“Carry it by hand.”
Qin Lan’s smile vanished.
“What?”