Chapter 276: Why So Skilled?

Chapter 276: Why So Skilled?

Pets were usually just things like cats and dogs. Zheng Yichen looked at the “little pets” kept in separate rooms and yawned. He would definitely not personally do any poop-scooping work. Normally, there were plenty of Alchemical Puppets to handle such tasks. In the beginning, some of the raised Magical Beasts were disobedient and bit apart several Alchemical Puppets. But later, when they saw dozens of Alchemical Puppets approaching together, these raised Magical Beasts backed down.

They were already captive-raised, and knowing they were being kept by a dragon, their spirits weren’t that high to begin with. Their biting was just due to leftover wildness from before. Now that they realized those Alchemical Puppets weren’t to be trifled with, they obediently complied. Besides, it wasn’t so bad here… They usually ate and drank well. Apart from that annoying owner’s daily “forced exercise” plan, even their living spaces were cleaned by Alchemical Puppets. It couldn’t be better.

Being kept here wasn’t about taking their lives. Usually, it was just scraping a bit of skin, trimming claws, or taking a little blood… It seemed acceptable.

“Hmm, not bad.” Seeing these “little pets” had adapted to the environment, Zheng Yichen nodded slightly. The Magical Beasts kept here were all extremely special. He certainly wouldn’t let them die easily. As for the exercise plan, it was to prevent them from losing their wildness, getting too fat and lazy from overeating and lack of activity, which could lead to a series of complications…

It also allowed Zheng Yichen to collect relevant parameters—the combat parameters of those Alchemical Puppets. You see, even with a Puppet Core, initial Alchemical Puppets couldn’t immediately possess combat experience. Even if they were intelligent, they needed some actual combat records to break in. After breaking them in, that core could be recycled, and the recorded information stored in the cores of the production line. Newly produced Alchemical Puppets would then naturally possess related combat experience.

If troops mass-produced couldn’t level up together, what kind of mass production was that?

After scanning the area, Zheng Yichen left. Those seemingly energetic Magical Beasts instantly returned to their previous laziness. That annoying exercise plan Zheng Yichen came up with was really tiring. Apart from having no fatal danger, upon closer comparison, it seemed even more exhausting than fighting in the wilderness before. The only difference here was not having to worry about being found by external enemies after getting injured.

As for those who pretended to be sick, there had been some before. But after Loris made a slight inspection tour here, these Magical Beasts became completely docile. If Zheng Yichen made them feel fear, Loris made them feel death looming over them. One was just scary, the other could literally scare someone to death. The difference was huge!

Not long after he left, a white fox with a large tail jumped out from a nest hanging on the wall. It walked with quite elegant steps past the Magical Beasts staying in their respective rooms…

Looking closely, this fox’s large tail wasn’t purely white but revealed a faint tinge of other colors. This fox was also a peculiar and rare Magical Beast. Its combat strength wasn’t high, but its intelligence wasn’t low. Its main ability was attribute transformation. Normally, its attribute was non-attributed, but it could swallow free elements from the environment to temporarily change its mana attribute to that of the swallowed free element.

Want to become a thunder fox? Swallow Thunder Element. Want to become a fire fox? Swallow Fire Element… Basically, if it knew Magic, it could completely achieve, after transforming its attribute, freely casting various magics enhanced by that attribute. Unlike others, once their mana attribute was decided, it was hard to change.

With its cute and pleasing appearance and not-low intelligence, this little thing, not long after arriving here and understanding this place’s “combat power level,” gave up all sorts of thoughts and obediently submitted. Plus, although its ability was magical and versatile, its combat strength wasn’t high, and its destructive power was quite limited. So, after confirming it really had no issues, it gained a certain degree of freedom. It didn’t need to stay in a small room when nothing was happening normally, only having rare outings periodically. Though that was just switching to a larger activity area.

“Roar! Grr!”

Watching this smug little thing walk past many Magical Beasts, some quiet Magical Beasts with low external reactions directly ignored it. For those with more explosive tempers, this little thing was just too arrogant. They couldn’t help but let out angry roars, yet they were helpless!

The little fox’s alluring eyes scornfully glanced at those Magical Beasts howling at it, gently smoothing its large tail. It earned its freedom with its looks, what right did they have to be dissatisfied?

“That’s about enough, time to work.” Feeling the after-meal stroll was sufficient, Zheng Yichen yawned lazily and went to his Laboratory. He immediately made modifications to the Magic Weapon Summoning Book, enabling Magic Weapon Evil Gods to log into the Magic Weapon Forum. This sounded somewhat like entrapment, and in reality, Zheng Yichen had such intentions. Using the Magic Weapon Summoning Book to communicate with those Magic Weapon Evil Gods, if they ignored Zheng Yichen, he still needed to find a way to communicate.

As long as he could establish communication, there was plenty of time. After all, he held their weaknesses in his dragon claws. Take it slow, no rush!

“Hmm?” In a certain small city, the Magic Weapon Evil God Azure Wrath looked somewhat puzzled at its hands. A Magic Weapon Summoning Book gradually materialized, making it raise an eyebrow. Although connected to Magic Weapons, it couldn’t summon the Magic Weapon Summoning Book. But now it could summon it to a certain extent. Though the book was empty, containing no recorded Magic Arms, through this incomplete Magic Weapon Summoning Book, it could access the Magic Weapon Forum.

It had previously paid attention to information in the Magic Weapon Forum, but at that time, it was through the Magic Weapon Summoning Books in the hands of believers. Simultaneously, to protect its “dignity,” it had to secretly observe on the sly. If discovered by believers, it would be too embarrassing.

Now, with Zheng Yichen opening this permission, it avoided such trouble. Looking at the information in the Magic Weapon Forum, Azure Wrath browsed the content with great novelty. Unlike the effect when peeking at the Forum content through believers’ Magic Weapon Summoning Books—back then, it couldn’t control what information its believers viewed; it could only see whatever they saw, at most multitasking—with the Magic Weapon Summoning Book, it could look at whatever it wanted. It could even post in the Forum as long as it filled in some personal information.

What name should it use?

Tyrael? Uh, using this name its master once called out wasn’t really suitable for its current identity. Probably because it inherited some traits from its master… Azure Wrath found itself quite inept at naming too. In that case, let’s keep it simple. It filled in the name field in its personal information as “Azure.” Changing names wasn’t that troublesome… If it didn’t work or if its master found it unsuitable, it could modify it later. Just treat it as a side account.

Then Azure posted a thread… Not a thread preaching doctrine. Dan Marina had found a great initial development area for it, giving it immense convenience in early-stage development. However, posting such a thread on the Magic Weapon Forum would definitely attract attention from the Sanctuary Church or other forces. That would be somewhat self-destructive. It wasn’t that foolish. Although it couldn’t do it so blatantly, there were many methods.

For example, starting a thread looking for “like-minded individuals.” In the memories passed down by its master, there was the concept of “using a side account.” Using this method could work too. But after posting a thread, it found the thread wasn’t very popular. As for getting pinned, it couldn’t compare with the top ten pinned threads either. Those threads were all big mana spenders. It still needed to develop itself now, and shouldn’t waste its mana here.

“Oh? So there really is a Magic Weapon Evil God that connected.” Zheng Yichen looked at the information in the Magic Weapon Summoning Book, feeling slightly disappointed. It was only Azure Wrath, not Holy Spirit Hammer and Apophis. Glancing at the thread posted by Azure Wrath, the Forum ID was “Azure”. Well, even on Earth, that was quite an ordinary online name. This naming style really shared his dragon flair.

Putting away the Magic Weapon Summoning Book, Zheng Yichen then began processing the Supermagic Crystal block that would take a long time to handle.

“Saintess… you.” Achille stared somewhat dumbfounded at the young woman speeding over. The Saintess’s age was a secret, but he still knew a bit of inside information. Anyway, with sufficient strength, one’s appearance generally wasn’t a limitation—of course, the premise was having good Talent. If someone reached a breakthrough allowing maintained appearance when already old, generally, their appearance would roughly remain in that state. Even if they could rejuvenate somewhat, it wouldn’t be by much.

Unless they used some method or artifact to restore their youthful state, or intentionally maintained an elderly appearance. Doing so wasn’t without benefits—at least it seemed more dignified… For example, the senior members of the Sanctuary Church all had middle-aged or elderly appearances. It wasn’t that they couldn’t become younger. With the Sanctuary Church’s resources, reversing their appearance to become younger was easy. They intentionally kept it that way.

Appearance wasn’t important. Anyway, a Saintess in a young maiden state was definitely more meaningful than an aunt-like Saintess. What truly shocked Achille was that the Saintess from the Church actually sped over on a bike!

Recently, many “Magic Cycles” had been sold on the Magic Weapon Forum. The first batch was mostly acquired by the Sanctuary Church. However, the special mana layer covering them and their special protective structures meant they couldn’t research anything at all. Forcibly cracking them only yielded a pile of scrap. With no alternative, the remaining Magic Cycles were simply used by the Sanctuary Church as special rewards, to be given to some promising youths within the Church. The Sanctuary Church also snagged some of the second and third batches, but not as many as the first.

Overall, about seventy-plus Magic Cycles were currently out in the world. Not a large number, but they successfully created a group of speed demons. The one who started this trend was the Female Knight who first posted that “live thread” on the Magic Weapon Forum… Dan Marina!

And this was the Otherworld. There were many people with power. Those who could ride Magic Cycles were mostly Warriors or Spellcasters, and their reaction abilities were definitely not poor. Although some Warriors’ charging Combat Techniques or Spellcasters’ teleportation Magic could achieve high speeds, the feeling was completely different from riding a Magic Cycle!

Magic Cycles hadn’t been around for long, only about a month, yet people were already showing off, developing fancy riding styles, skill displays, etc. Some looked down on it, while others said it was a good way to hone skills. Without sufficient control, how could you ride on the edge?

That was one thing. Besides, there was the most important matter: the holders of those Magic Artifact keys had already found that Witch’s Arcane Treasure. However, they encountered some obstacles at the treasure site, and it hadn’t been deciphered yet. To decipher it would take at least another half month. Of course, forcefully deciphering wasn’t impossible, but doing so would blow the entire hidden treasure location sky-high. The Sanctuary Church didn’t mind doing that, but those craving the treasure disagreed.

They could also clear the area, but it wasn’t necessary. They understood some tricks of Witches and knew that among these tricks, many things were experiments by Witches. Really lucky individuals could leap over the dragon gate because of this. In fact, quite a few people in the Sanctuary Church were once beneficiaries of Witches’ “favors.”

So, under the premise of being unable to reverse this, the Sanctuary Church simply adopted another method: since everyone wanted it, then compete. Whoever got the item first would have it. If it was confirmed that the Arcane Treasure had no backdoors belonging to the Witch, even if there were minor hidden dangers, the Sanctuary Church could still accept it. Creating one or two special powerhouses based on such things was completely viable. Even if not used against Witches, they could be used elsewhere.

Dealing with Cults, guarding the Abyss Entrance—which couldn’t they do?

The Sanctuary Church, even with its long history, hadn’t developed any “time sickness.” It wasn’t the least bit rigid!

Achille came here precisely for this matter. The area storing the Arcane Treasure had strength restrictions. Exceeding a certain range meant one couldn’t enter that area, or something would happen. But he never expected the Saintess coming to pick him up would arrive speeding on a bike, and even performed a difficult high-speed drift stop. The difficulty was so high that the chunks of dirt kicked up by the tires scraping the ground were forcefully suppressed, landing less than twenty centimeters from his feet.

This didn’t use any special powers; it was purely skill. Not something an ordinary person could do. So, Saintess, what mindset drove you to become so skilled with this thing?

“Ahem, I found this thing is quite good for honing observation and skills, so I put in a little effort.” Deya cleared her throat, glancing at him somewhat puzzled. “With your status, you should be able to get one from the Church too, right?”

“…” Achille’s eyebrow twitched involuntarily. Seeing the Saintess like this, he thought for a moment. “I’ll go get one when I have time.”

He wanted to see what charm this thing had that made the Saintess play with it so much… Also, it could serve as a means of transportation. It ran pretty fast anyway.