Volume 4, Chapter 42 – The Beginning of Terror’s Descent

After the torrential rain, Yaxi City not only failed to welcome clear skies, it instead seemed to enter winter early while it was still late autumn.

After a large number of people with ties to Morningstar were exposed, the purge by the government army swept through like a tornado.

The killing chill did not only come from the government army’s purge of Yaxi City. Flames of war had erupted all across the Canyon Continent. Because of the defeat in the Battle of Wutong City, the hydroelectric station had been destroyed, causing most cities in the eastern region to fall into paralysis.

After that, the government army’s offensive against Morningstar’s Canyon Continent branch officially began.

The first surprise attack, carried out with a massive concentration of troops, achieved gratifying results. Morningstar’s forces suffered heavy losses and had no choice but to hunker down on defense. From the look of things, taking down this large base was only a matter of time.

But the situation was far from as easy as imagined. The confrontation between NPCs began to bog down, and the battlefield between players had also been brought onto the stage.

And Yaxi City was the very center of that stage.

The player-versus-player missions within the faction missions made this conflict intensify further and further.

The speed at which No. 1886’s plot was developing left players from other newbie planets staring with their jaws on the floor.

[Wait, why is my side still in the development phase, while your side already looks like it’s about to hit the climax?]

[I killed 3 Santiago idiots again today. Bliss!]

[I found a humanoid field Boss near Yaxi City. Level 23. Now recruiting ambitious comrades to go subjugate him together.]

[Hahaha, my faction contribution has reached 0.0001%!!! Badass!!!]

[Trash. I’m already at 0.0002%.]

Speaking of faction contribution, after completing this series of missions, Anran’s faction contribution had already risen from 0.21% to 1.06%.

Once the faction war ended, she was going to make a fortune.

“Here!”

After putting the blue-and-white striped item into an opaque bag, Anran handed it to Li Zhuying.

“I… I… I…”

After repeating “I” for a long time, Li Zhuying still could not say anything else. She accepted the bag with trembling hands, then placed it into her backpack with extreme care.

Now that she had obtained it, she had to maintain her composure. Once she got back, then she could hehehe…

Well, don’t misunderstand. Li Zhuying was only using it to seek inspiration. Her new work, written purely for her own amusement, was currently stuck in writer’s block.

“This mansion is pretty impressive.”

Anran looked up at the large mansion in front of her. This was where Nine Songs and the others had been staying recently.

Earlier, while they were in the car, she had roughly asked Nine Songs about their recent course of action, but she had not received any particularly useful information.

They had only been receiving missions from their superiors and running all over the place.

From the perspective of the overall situation, the government army’s side currently held the advantage, but the final outcome was still uncertain.

“Tonight, we’ll stay…” Li Zhuying said with a beaming smile.

“Goodbye.”

Anran shut the car door, stepped on the accelerator, and slipped away just like that.

Hm?

“…”

“Hey, hey, hey, wait for me!” Li Zhuying broke into a run, but with her speed, how could she possibly catch up to a car?

In the end, she could only glare blankly at the rear of the car.

“Fuck! Anran ran away again!”

“What?”

Very soon, Tao Tao, the person in charge, and the others also noticed the abnormal situation on this side.

When they saw Anran obediently driving after them back to Yaxi City, they had thought Anran was considering returning to Nine Songs. Who would have guessed that she had only been acting as a driver and giving Li Zhuying a ride?

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Damn.

…

Gene Enhancement Potion [Blue].

It was stored in a white glass bottle and was a fluid reagent.

The drug description noted that it could be taken orally or injected.

It was recommended for players with basic professions. There was a certain chance of awakening a special ability. In accordance with the principle that drop rates had to be disclosed, Anran also saw the exact probability.

0.005%.

Damn your motherboard. With this drop rate, even a luck god couldn’t roll it, right?

Effect: Strength increase (10–20), Agility increase (10–20), Endurance increase (10–20), Low-Level Recovery Resilience: recovery ability increased by 30%.

While taking a bath, after removing all the clothes from her body, Anran took the Gene Enhancement Potion.

She was worried that, like in other novels, black impurities would be expelled from her body.

However, judging from the outside alone, after taking the enhancement potion, she could not see any changes at all. She could only hear the game’s loading prompt in her mind.

“Gene enhancement in progress. Current progress: 1%.”

“Gene enhancement in progress. Current progress: 2%.”

Tch. At this crappy speed, Anran even took a bath, stared at the light-blue panties in her hand in a daze for a long while, and only then did she finally hear that heavenly prompt.

“Gene enhancement complete!”

“Attributes stacked. Basic Elite Coefficient Bonus Template unlocked!”

“New template activated. Please check it yourself!”

Three prompts in a row.

They struck Anran straight in the heart.

Although she had not awakened a special ability, the words “Basic Elite Coefficient Bonus Template” made Anran so excited that she almost slipped in the bathroom. She bent over, grabbed the faucet with both hands, the light-blue panties falling straight onto her toes, while she kept giggling foolishly.

Aila, worried that something had happened to Anran, came in and saw this “stimulating” scene.

“Anran, Anran, are you all right?”

“I’m fine.”

Anran straightened up. She wrapped herself in a bath towel and placed the panties into the basket.

“I’m done washing. Aila, hurry up and wash too.”

“Anran, Anran, why does that Li Zhuying want your panties?”

As she spoke, Aila took Anran’s panties into her hands, pinched them, looked them over, and even gestured with them. They did not seem to have any hidden mechanisms.

Stop that!

“…”

Anran was speechless for a moment.

Aila was not that young anymore. She was already half a year old. It seemed it was time to let her learn more things, or else she might get tricked by others in the future without even realizing it.

“This is because…”

Anran walked to the side of the bed and sat down. She took out her computer and began giving Aila an in-depth education.

Like a mother educating her daughter, Anran was very diligent.

Aila also studied very earnestly and worked very hard.

BG, BL, GL…

XX OO was forbidden. It was a very scary thing.

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After listening, Aila nodded in deep agreement, and Anran showed a satisfied smile.

“So that means girls and girls can…”

“Mm-hm.”

“Anran, Anran, do I count as a girl too?”

“Of course you do!”

“Then to express our intimate relationship, Anran, let’s soothe each other!”

“Pfft!”

Wait.

The lesson lasted until dawn.

In fact, nothing strange happened.

But Aila’s knowledge began to grow richer. “Anran, Anran, you’re so amazing. You understand everything so clearly.”

“…”

The corner of Anran’s mouth twitched. Are you praising me or insulting me?

Fine. From Aila’s perspective, this was definitely praise.

How utterly shameful… as if.

When she thought about how she had spent the entire night stuffing strange things into Aila’s head, Anran felt, well, extremely refreshed.

Slowly raising a blank daughter into the shape she wanted felt really great.

Aila also greatly enjoyed the feeling of staying together with Anran.

According to the dictionary, this was a very “Anran” sort of mentality.

Aila placed her hand on her own chest, but there was no heartbeat. Then she lowered her head and looked at the part under her skirt. She was still different from humans.

Leaving Aila to absorb the new knowledge she had just learned, Anran began checking her various attributes.

Name: Anran [Elite]

Age: 16

Level: 17

HP: 1310/1390

Stamina: 960/1170

Six stats: Strength 44, Agility 52, Endurance 56, Intelligence 68, Spirit 23, Charm 9

Reputation: 125

Faction favorability: Morningstar Resistance: -960

Nine Songs: 210

Taking the Gene Enhancement Potion had greatly increased Anran’s recovery ability, while also giving Strength +13, Agility +15, and Endurance +12.

As for the Basic Elite Coefficient Bonus Template, aside from raising many resistances that were not displayed on the primary panel, its main effect was the correction to the Endurance conversion coefficient.

For ordinary NPCs and players, 1 point of Endurance equaled 10 HP and 12 Stamina.

But under the enhancement of this new template, Anran’s 1 point of Endurance was equivalent to 15 HP and 20 Stamina.

Base attributes plus the HP and Stamina bonuses attached to her title.

HP = 56*15 + 400 + 150 = 1390

Stamina = 56*20 + 50 = 1170

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Raising strength, now this was what raising strength meant!

In addition, the extra blueprints she had obtained could also raise Anran’s combat power by a large margin.

But she was not in a hurry to turn those blueprints into physical objects. Instead, she contacted Nine Songs again.

“I have Rainer’s research materials here. Want to make a deal?”

“…”

“Anran, that damn swindler!”

“…”

“I’m Lü Changming!”

Before long, a new call was transferred in.

“Good morning, Minister Lü! You sound really energetic.”

“…”

“Ahem. All right, I won’t waste words. My goal is the set of materials in your hands.”

“Ahem, well then, I won’t waste words either. My goal is 200,000 Bilu.”

“…”

Lü Changming fell silent on the other end of the phone.

From his conversations with Feilian and the others, he knew that Anran liked money very much, but was it really fine to say it so bluntly?

“If you return to Nine Songs now, forget 200,000. Even 2,000,000 would be easy for you to earn,” Lü Changming said.

Anran refused. “I don’t really like being restrained. After Morningstar is dealt with, I’ll leave No. 1886. The world is so vast, I want to see it.”

As she spoke, Anran threw out a famous saying.

It could be considered her resignation announcement.

“…”

Lü Changming pondered for a moment. “Fine. Then what method of transaction do you want?”

“Transfer the money to account xxx. I’ll hand over half the materials to you first. After the money arrives, I’ll give you the remaining half.”

“No problem.”

Lü Changming agreed without the slightest hesitation.

He trusted Anran, and he was not afraid of Anran playing any tricks either, because Eudora was still recuperating in Twinmoon City.

Anran had no extra plans. After Lü Changming transferred the money, she immediately withdrew it and had Aila deliver everything over.

“Anran didn’t come?” Li Zhuying was extremely disappointed.

When Aila looked at Li Zhuying again, aside from wariness, her face was full of disdain.

“???”

Li Zhuying was somewhat confused, but overall, she was still very happy.

After using Anran’s original-flavor panties last night, her inspiration had immediately become like the source of the Yangtze, stretching thousands of li without end. She wrote more than ten thousand words in one breath.

She wrote until her whole body was burning hot, and in the end, she got so hot that she took off all her clothes.

Emmm…

The strange descriptions could all be skipped.

After obtaining the money, Anran immediately went to purchase all kinds of raw materials.

The things she wanted were not lacking in Yaxi City.

First, she replenished firearms, bullets, and bombs. In yesterday’s battle, all these things had been used up.

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Next came the maintenance of her mechanical footgear and mechanical armguard.

After this whole round, Anran gained another 10,000 EXP.

Among the new blueprints, the Explosive Round was a powerful tool for close-range gunfights. Paired with a double-nozzle short gun, it could fire 2 bullets at once, and the bullets would rapidly explode after flying out, causing large-area damage. Its power was much stronger than a shotgun’s.

The paired attack power was 30–45 points.

A killing range of 50 meters was already quite good. In most situations, Anran only needed to use a sniper rifle and a spray gun.

Then came the Low-Intelligence Chip. After spending 15,000 Free EXP and raising Basic Programming to Lv6, she successfully completed the analysis and obtained the blueprint.

Low-Intelligence Chip blueprint + Aila’s production blueprint + 3,600 EXP synthesized into the [Low-Intelligence Humanoid Robot Blueprint].

Then, combining the auto-aim code, the machine-gun blueprint, and some EXP, after failing twice, Anran obtained the more specialized [Machine Gun Warrior Generation 1 Blueprint].

Quality: Blue

Attributes: Armor 90/90 (same as Aila’s initial state), Energy 150/150.

Electric charging. Low-intelligence combat robot. Rated movement speed: 50 km/h. Load: 0–200 kg. Rated operating time: 75 minutes.

Equipped weapons:

1. A pair of machine guns on the chest. Rate of fire: 250 rounds/min. Magazine capacity: 75*2.

1. Backpack-mounted assault rifle.

Active skill: [Berserk] Overload shooting. Empty the magazine within 15 seconds, then complete a lethal finishing attack through self-destruction. Coverage plane: 15*15. Base damage: 400 points, depending on resistance reduction.

Each robot cost around 20,000 Bilu to build and provided 15,000 EXP.

Aside from these blueprints, Anran’s greatest gain should have been the Crude Exoskeleton Armor blueprint.

Previously, her Intelligence had not been enough. Once the analysis reached 56%, it had become difficult to continue. Now that her Intelligence was as high as 68 points, she quickly filled in the remaining progress.

The complete Crude Exoskeleton Armor possessed the basic attributes of both the mechanical footgear and the mechanical armguard. The 20-point Strength increase became a full-body increase. At the same time, the coverage area provided 50 points of armor protection, equivalent to gaining 500 HP out of thin air.

And by integrating the jetpack, the Crude Exoskeleton Armor gained flight capability. The more lightweight jetpack kept its maximum speed unchanged at 20, and its battery life was 20 minutes.

Purple equipment.

This was the first piece of purple equipment Anran had ever obtained!

An exoskeleton armor made from Lig Alloy, costing over 140,000 Bilu.

“Ding! You have successfully created [Low-Level Exoskeleton Armor (Purple)] and obtained 30,000 Free EXP.”

Anran worked with her head down for three full days before finally hearing this heavenly prompt.

If she had not gotten 200,000 Bilu from Lü Changming, Anran would already have been buried in debt.

Thank you, good comrades of Nine Songs!

This Low-Level Exoskeleton Armor made from Lig Alloy was lighter and more compact, but its combat power was not weak in the slightest.

The most obvious change was in the armguard section. In the past, it had bulged up like a huge pillar. Now, it was only a band wrapped around the arm, making the visual effect much lighter.

The whole set had a cold metallic color, paired with bluish-purple exterior lines, giving it a full technological style.

Next came the beautiful era of enjoying the hunt.

Anran closed the dark web and stuffed everything into the car.

She discovered that Lü Changming had already withdrawn the bounty on her, while Morningstar had raised the price to 1.5 million Bilu.

Hmph!

“Aila, get ready to set off!”

“Mm!”

Aila climbed into the passenger seat very swiftly.

Anran stepped on the accelerator, and the off-road vehicle sped out of Yaxi City. In the back seat sat the Machine Gun Warrior Generation 1, currently in dormancy.

“Rumble, rumble, rumble!”