Chapter 59: The Dark Sage, Asura

Returning to the private room, Dachun logged in with a mixture of nervousness and anticipation, greeted by a massive wall of system messages cascading across the screen!

——System Prompt: Welcome back to the game. Current Golden Continent time is 16:10 PM...
——System Prompt: Congratulations! You have overcome illness and skillfully utilized the combination fishing rod with exceptional wisdom. With the help of the dolphin's blessing, your Fishing skill has advanced to Expert Level 1. You have obtained achievements: Stamina +2, Carrying Capacity +2, Luck +1. Additional rewards: Health +2, Spirit +2. You have acquired the innate skill "Expert Fishing Mastery". You have received the achievement reward from the "Newcomer Three-Day Special Blessing": Wisdom +1.
——System Prompt: ...Your Fishing skill has advanced to Expert Level 2...
——System Prompt: Warning! Your vessel is severely overloaded and at risk of sinking. Auto-fishing is about to be suspended.
——System Prompt: The evil spirit Elena has taken control of your body, distributing the catch to the dolphins to avert the vessel's sinking risk. Your favorability with the dolphins has increased, and your Sea-Clan Personal Guard has received an effectiveness boost.
——System Prompt: ...Your Module Combination has advanced to Expert Level 5...
——System Prompt: Congratulations! Having accumulated a large amount of Wisdom, Spirit, and Negative Reputation within the newcomer three-day period, your comprehensive evaluation has triggered the hidden class "Dark Sage".
...

Fishing Expert Level 2! Reaching the Expert level simply by idling already fulfilled his goal. He never expected the risk of sinking the ship from catching too much fish halfway through, a hazard he certainly hadn't anticipated. Good thing Elena handled it automatically! But—gazing at the final line reading "Dark Sage," Dachun’s breath nearly hitched!

What on earth is this? Is this a summary of his achievements over the past three days? Without the negative reputation, would it just be "Sage"? There was no publicly available information regarding this during the open beta, which meant it was definitely top-tier.

Next, he hurriedly checked his clone. First was still the countdown for the completion of the second-tier trial. It had been counting down for over seven hours now. Was this definitely bugged?

Following that was an even larger block of system message prompts:

——System Prompt: You have automatically idled to complete the daily reputation quest "Gathering Crystal Flowers", and received Giblon’s reward, "Crystal Flower". You automatically consumed the Crystal Flower, restoring your Stamina, Fatigue, and Illusion values.
——System Prompt: ...Your Gathering skill has advanced to Expert Level 9...
——System Prompt: ...Your Gathering skill has advanced to Expert Level 10...
——System Prompt: Congratulations! Activating your innate trait "Essence of Excavation", you successfully gathered a rare Crystal Flower, and your Gathering skill has successfully advanced to Master Level 1! You have obtained achievement rewards: Stamina +3, Carrying Capacity +3, and acquired the innate skill "Master Gathering Mastery". You received the achievement reward from the "Newcomer Three-Day Special Blessing": Wisdom +2!
——System Prompt: You successfully gathered a high-tier Crystal Flower, completing the daily reputation quest "Gathering Crystal Flowers", and gained Giblon's praise, receiving the reward "High-Tier Crystal Flower". You automatically consumed the high-tier Crystal Flower, further fusing your constitution into an Earth-Flame Constitution. Your hands, tempered through the practice of gathering, have taken the lead in achieving a Petrochemical effect.
——System Prompt: Congratulations! Your hands' petrochemical transformation has undergone a qualitative change. Through your exceptional wisdom and Expert Module Combination skill, you have successfully combined the innate skill "Essence of Excavation" with "Master Mining Mastery" and "Master Gathering Mastery", upgrading them into a brand-new racial innate skill: "Essence of Bare Hands".
Essence of Bare Hands: Your hands are filled with hardness, strength, and dexterity. Bare-handed attack power +20%, bare-handed defense +10, carrying capacity +50, parry rate +20%.
——System Prompt: Congratulations! Your racial innate skill "Essence of Bare Hands" has automatically leaped your Primary Pickaxe Disarmament Level 1 skill directly to Advanced Pickaxe Disarmament Level 10. You have obtained achievement rewards: Stamina +29, Carrying Capacity +29, Parry Rate +29%. Your Intermediate Climbing Level 10 has automatically leaped to Expert Climbing Level 1, Stamina +12, Carrying Capacity +12. You received the achievement reward from the "Newcomer Three-Day Special Blessing": Wisdom +2.
——System Prompt: You have gained massive Wisdom within the newcomer three-day period and comprehended the racial innate skill "Essence of Bare Hands". Your comprehensive evaluation has triggered the hidden racial class "Asura".
...

Holy crap, holy crap! The clone is even more exaggerated—Master-level Gathering! A racial innate skill!

Gazing at his two hands, which shone as smooth as fiery jade, Dachun was filled with even greater pleasant surprise. It really did combine into Bare-Handed Mastery! This single talent directly rocketed the Pickaxe Disarmament skill—which he never even had a chance to practice—straight to Advanced Level 10! And Climbing, which had been stuck at Intermediate and unable to advance, directly jumped to Expert!

So this is what it means to become a demon. Many goals that are difficult for human races to achieve become very easy after turning demonic. Moreover, it triggered yet another racial class, "Asura"! Judging by the literal meaning, this is also a bare-handed attack type that requires no weapons? No, what bare-handedness—those are demonic claws!

Now, the most crucial thing is the rankings!

Of course, Dachun was quite confident. Having been reported twice just yesterday, and without the divine artifact ring or the divine core on his body, his ranking certainly wouldn't be too high. Otherwise, the high-level players downstairs would have already started shouting about it.

Sure enough, 260,000th place—30,000 fewer than yesterday. Very nice, very nice.

Dachun felt a great sense of liberation. The exhaustion of this night—no, the hard work of these past three days—could finally be considered a perfectly completed stage report.

Let's take a look at the clone's stats:

Level: 28.
Race: Earth-Flame Illusion Spirit (Advancement and conversion in progress).
Reputation: -100,000
Attack: 27
Defense: 0
Attack Speed: 10
Movement Speed: 11 (Expert Running +1)
Illusion Value: 132
Health: 249 (Level +27, Illusion Value +132, Intermediate Pickaxe Dual-Wielding Level 10 +20, Advanced Pickaxe Disarmament +30, Expert Module Combination Level 5 +40)
Carrying Capacity: 595 (Level +27, Master Mining Level 2 +56, Expert Running Level 1 +32, Expert Swimming Level 1 +32, Advanced Synchronized Swimming Level 10 +30, Advanced Underwater Mining Level 10 +30, Advanced Underwater Construction Level 10 +30, Expert Fishing Level 2 +34, Master Gathering Level 1 +53, Intermediate Pickaxe Dual-Wielding Level 10 +20, Expert Climbing Level 1 +32, Intermediate Marathon Level 3 +13, Primary Cooking Level 1 +1, Advanced Pickaxe Disarmament Level 10 +30, Advanced Throwing Level 10 +30, Expert Piloting Level 1 +32, Expert Module Combination Level 5 +40, Advanced Forging Level 3 +23, Essence of Bare Hands +50)
Stamina: 545 (Level +27, ...)
Command: 40 (Expert Module Combination Level 5 +40)
Wisdom: 21
Spirit: 21
Hunger: 5
Luck: 1 (Expert Fishing Level 1 +1. Note: This luck value is permanent and will not be dispelled by any misfortune effects.)
Special Skill 1: Soul Link. The clone and main body share knowledge and skills.
Special Skill 2: Illusion Growth. Capable of comprehending illusion skills.
Inventory: Damaged Dragon-Skin Spatial Pouch, Iron Pickaxes (2), Advanced Volcanic Giant Lizard Crystal Core...
Pet Slots: 2.
...

These were the clone's stats. Putting aside its combat power for the moment, a carrying capacity and stamina of nearly 600 made it an absolute ox and horse for reincarnation! But the true substance lay in those 21 points of Wisdom and Spirit—these were soul attributes!

As for the main body, battered by rat plague and crow plague with reduced stat caps, it wasn't even worth looking at. In order to gain Spirit, let the main body stay sick like this.

Just then, Elena spoke up: "You're only just getting here? Good thing it was me, or your boat would have flipped!"

Dachun was deeply gratified and hurriedly praised her: "That's why you're so important to me."

Elena gave a scoff: "I'm the most important!"

"Yes, yes, yes!"

Truthfully, she really was. With her around, even places where idling wasn't possible could be taken over, and situations where Old Jiang got him forcibly logged off wouldn't be quite as critical.

Then Dachun noticed that both the school of fish and the pod of dolphins had vanished: "Where are they?"

Elena replied, "Once they finished fishing and eating, of course it was time to go. It's about to get dark, you'd better care about the ghost town that's about to appear. Besides, the commotion over at the dungeon is huge. The Count has sent people over with ropes, and the sounds of crowds and steam eruptions are echoing from deep underground."

The speed of the consortium's actions shocked Dachun: "The steam must be water from the dungeon meeting magma. Are they trying to find hell?"

Elena sneered: "They'll probably release ferocious demons, and then things will get lively in the city."

Would that trigger a monster siege event? Surely not, that was just a mine.

Elena sighed again: "Other people don't matter, I'm just worried about Mom and Amy. What do you think we should do?"

It was obvious she had triggered an evil spirit quest. Even if he couldn't control it, he had to figure out a way to go along with her wishes, right?

Dachun pondered slightly: "Should we contact the crystal bat and send it out to cause some interference?"

Elena was amused: "You thought of that too? Then let's do it!"

I have a feeling you purely just want to cause trouble for the Count!

Dachun still felt obliged to offer a word of caution: "But they suffered a huge loss last time, so they're definitely coming prepared this time. You must be extremely careful and absolutely not show your face!"

Elena smiled proudly: "I absorbed the energy left behind by the great evil spirit, and I've also got the holy artifact ring that absorbed the grudge of the slime. I'm coming prepared too and want to test out its power. I'm busy, don't bother me if you have nothing to do."

Holy crap!

Dachun felt more than a little panicked. This was practically declaring active war on the consortium! Even if they had no evidence, what if they found him suspicious and decided to vent their anger on him anyway?

As for now, although the clone could go find the chieftain to trigger quests, it wouldn't be ideal if things got too big and he couldn't handle both ends. He might as well continue idling to endlessly collect resources and accumulate tribal reputation. The higher the reputation, the bigger the things he could accomplish. By the way, he could also wait for the volcanic dragon to finish digesting so they could stir up trouble together.

As for the main character—though there were no rare schools of fish left—he could just keep idling and fishing. He always felt that the main character's awkwardness was that, aside from being sick, he had nothing else to do. He had no idea how those professional gamers in legends, racing against every second, managed to operate.

With that, he set an alarm for a short nap to wait for night to fall in the game.

...

Headquarters of the Shrine Front.

The young master, fast asleep, was jolted awake by the frantic screams of the entire guild: "What's the situation?"

A guild member reported: "Young master, that crystal bat has appeared again! Red-name Group Three has been completely wiped out!"

The young master said angrily: "Taka-maru-kun, ring the bell quickly!!"

"Taka-maru understands!"

Following the ringing of the bell, a massive spatial fluctuation surged across the area. The Count's estate butler appeared via teleportation, accompanied by seven fully armed men in black covered in various trinkets. No, wait—one of them was wearing a hooded cloak and seemed to be wearing no equipment at all.

Taka-maru immediately fawned: "Greetings, Lord Butler!"

The butler said in a deep voice: "This time we have made thorough preparations. We will definitely capture both this bat and the magic power stone."

Does this have anything to do with this mysterious hooded person?

Taka-maru immediately probed for information: "The lordly personage yesterday said that treasure-seeking magic pets are not suited for combat. Can we really handle this bat that has mutated multiple times?"

The butler said sternly: "Guild Master, take all the remaining prisoners back to the upper level. The elevator is temporarily out of service!"

The young master was enraged: "Baka? You won't even let the players watch?"