Chapter 39
Chapter 39
“Ding!”
[You have used Sovereign’s Descent, successfully copying Tingfeng Xiyu’s Talent Extreme Shadow and raising its rank by 1!]
“Ding!”
[Your Talent has transformed into Godspeed (SS Rank)!]
[Godspeed] (SS-Rank Talent): Movement Speed +100% and Attack Speed +50%!
Tsk!
Those bonuses were fantastic!
“Move farther back so the Mining Centipedes don’t one-shot you!” Zhou Ming warned.
“All right!”
Tingfeng Xiyu hurried to a safe area. “Be careful, Brother Zhou. These centipedes are packed too closely together. You’ll be in trouble if they surround you!”
“At my speed, they can’t catch me.”
Zhou Ming shook his head and shot toward a Mining Centipede like the wind.
“What the hell?!”
Tingfeng Xiyu stared in shock.
Zhouyou Shijie was moving even faster than he could!
How strange. Was his SSS-Rank Talent related to speed as well?
Slash, slash, slash…
Zhou Ming attacked without mercy. The Blackwind Sword granted 20% Attack Speed, while Godspeed added another 50%, allowing him to deal damage at an astonishing rate.
-320!
-638! (Critical Hit)
-324!
…
“Hiss!”
After taking hit after hit, the Mining Centipede naturally refused to wait for death. It opened its mandibles and activated Venomous Bite.
MISS!
Zhou Ming casually stepped aside and avoided the attack without interrupting his assault, rapidly draining its HP.
An extra 100% Movement Speed provided an enormous advantage this early in the game. It not only made enemy attacks much easier to evade, but also dramatically reduced the time spent crossing maps and searching for monsters.
Relying on Godspeed, Zhou Ming was struck only once before easily killing the Mining Centipede.
“Ding!”
[Congratulations! You have killed a Venomous Centipede. Current-level EXP +20.41%!]
Killing a monster nineteen levels above him granted an abundant amount of EXP. He only needed five common monsters to level up.
Whoosh!
Off to the side, golden light rose directly from Tingfeng Xiyu.
He hadn’t dealt a single point of damage, but because they were in a party, he still received somewhere between 5% and 10% of the EXP.
“You can grind like this?” Tingfeng Xiyu stared with his mouth hanging open.
If Zhou Ming lost so little HP each time, he wouldn’t even need to stop and rest while using potions.
“Ding!”
[The Mining Centipede has used Death Throes. Two seconds after death, it deals 200% damage to enemy units within a 5 × 5 area!]
The fallen centipede abruptly began to swell as it twitched. Its black shell turned bright red, clearly on the verge of exploding.
Zhou Ming’s expression didn’t change. He darted out of the self-destruction radius.
MISS!
“At this grinding speed, I should catch up to mainstream players by noon!” Tingfeng Xiyu said excitedly.
Zhou Ming frowned, not entirely satisfied. “Grinding this way is far too slow!”
“I-Is it?” Tingfeng Xiyu’s face filled with question marks.
Zhou Ming fixed his gaze on a nearby cluster of centipedes and activated Demonic Flame Armor. A fiery suit of phantom armor appeared around him. Then he clenched one hand as fire-element energy surged.
Sizzle!
Blazing Heaven Sword appeared and crashed into the group of monsters. The resulting wave of fire sent them trembling and even knocked some backward.
-2,662!
-426!
-412!
-433!
…
A flood of damage numbers rose into the air. Zhou Ming followed up with Greater Fireball, swallowed potions as he fought, and charged into the pack with sword in hand.
Fighting a group made attacks harder to evade, but his killing speed increased by far more than double.
There was no need to track each centipede’s remaining HP. Zhou Ming simply dealt damage while doing his best to keep his own HP above 50%. The moment twenty seconds passed, he unleashed Blazing Heaven Sword again.
In just five minutes, six Venomous Centipedes fell.
Whoosh!
Golden light scattered around them.
…
Zhou Ming and Tingfeng Xiyu leveled up one after the other. Tingfeng Xiyu was already on the verge of reaching Level 17.
“Let’s go. Time to find the next spawn point!” Zhou Ming said after picking up the ten silver coins that had dropped.
“Oh… Right!”
Tingfeng Xiyu hurried after him.
From then on, Zhou Ming farmed monsters at a steady pace. Every Mining Centipede he killed sent his EXP bar surging forward by a visibly large chunk.
By around noon, after four hours of grinding, Zhou Ming had reached Level 35. That averaged out to a terrifying one level per hour.
Of course, the Talent bonuses that further increased his leveling efficiency had played a major role.
He had also obtained two pieces of equipment, both Silver-grade items that required Level 40.
“That should do it!”
Zhou Ming looked at Tingfeng Xiyu. “What place are you now?”
“Ninth!”
Tingfeng Xiyu glanced at the Level Rankings, overcome by complicated emotions.
His level had originally ranked tens of thousands below the leaders.
Yet after a single morning, he had somehow risen to ninth place on the Eastern Region’s Level Rankings!
That alone was extraordinary, but the key point was that he hadn’t done anything. He had merely loafed around nearby and been carried into the top ten through such an undeserved method. It made him feel awful.
This was…
Way too awesome!!
“Should we… stop here for now?” Zhou Ming asked.
“Honestly, we should’ve stopped ages ago!” Tingfeng Xiyu scratched his head in embarrassment. “But getting carried while doing nothing is so much fun that I couldn’t pull myself away.”
“Ding!”
[Tingfeng Xiyu has left the party!]
“All right, then!”
Tingfeng Xiyu waved. “Thanks for the carry, boss. I’ll head out first. If you ever run into trouble and need my help, just say the word!”
“What a coincidence!” Zhou Ming suddenly said.
“…”
Tingfeng Xiyu froze mid-step.
“As it happens, your brother truly does need a favor!” Smiling warmly, Zhou Ming placed a hand on Tingfeng Xiyu’s shoulder. “Since you told me to just say the word, keeping quiet would mean I don’t consider you a brother. Isn’t that right?”
Gulp!
Tingfeng Xiyu swallowed nervously. “What kind of favor?”
For some reason, this conversation gave him an intense sense of déjà vu.
“Relax. It isn’t difficult!” Zhou Ming said solemnly. “Please help me find a Gold Boss. The requirements are a little stricter this time, though. It has to use the fire element!”
In theory, neither Zhou Ming’s current equipment nor his level should be remotely sufficient to challenge a Gold Boss.
But if the boss’s skills were fire-element attacks, that was another matter entirely.
“I see!”
Tingfeng Xiyu immediately understood Zhouyou Shijie’s plan.
He intended to push his advantage to its absolute limit and forcibly claim the first Gold Boss kill!
“Consider it done!”
Tingfeng Xiyu’s joking demeanor vanished. “Since Brother Zhou asked me, I’ll do everything I can!”
He understood perfectly well how important a first kill was.
The honor of being the second player to defeat a Gold Boss couldn’t begin to compare.
After watching Tingfeng Xiyu leave, Zhou Ming decided to continue grinding alone for a while.
“That’s a good idea,” Qianying praised.
Using every method permitted by the rules to obtain greater benefits was a quality any true expert ought to possess.
Zhou Ming smiled. “The second stage of the Trial of the Seven Sins is about to activate. How could I possibly make no preparations?”
The Sin of Envy would activate within forty-eight hours.
How could he not be in a hurry to acquire more trump cards?
Besides, immunity to fire-element damage was an enormous advantage. Failing to capitalize on it would make him a laughingstock.
“Right!”
Zhou Ming suddenly remembered something. He took the God-Demon Orb from his inventory. Inside, a miniature Qianying sat cross-legged in meditation, dainty and exquisitely beautiful.
Qianying was a supreme expert who had reached Stage Six of the Talent Trial.
That meant her Talent had to be SS Rank, didn’t it?
…