Chapter 700: First Culling (1/2)
The situation with the Twilight Energy was even better than Zac had anticipated, but he wouldn’t take anything for granted going forward. He was still at the outer edge of the Mystic Realm where the Twilight Energy was at its weakest. Who knew if he would be able to so effortlessly deal with the environment in the inner reaches. For example, his [Void Heart] couldn’t infinitely swallow energy. It followed a cycle of absorption, purification, and release.
The same was true for his soul. He hadn’t figured quite out what was going on, but his Soul Aperture wasn’t a true world. There should be limits on how much energy it could absorb before it became satiated. Finally, the elites of the trial would still be able to exhibit pretty much their full power all the way to the midway point from what he had gathered, so he definitely wasn’t able to run amok with this small advantage.
Putting the matter of Twilight Energy aside, Zac eventually reached the small forest of swaying seaweed, and his arm turned into a blur as he cut down over a dozen plants that emitted a weak hint of spirituality. His actions didn’t garner him a single contribution point though, proving that there was no point in just wantonly destroying the surroundings to ‘Release Dao’. It probably had to be real treasures to count.
Having gotten a decent understanding of the situation he finally took out the small black stone he got from Catheya and infused it with some Miasma. He soon sensed a number of distant presences, with one particular connection being far stronger than the others. It was hard to accurately estimate how far away Catheya was, but he felt it would take a couple of hours to get there.
Even then, her starting location seemed pretty lucky, just like his. Catheya should already be out in the ocean by the looks of things, while most of the markers were pointing toward the continent where most people were dropped off. They would probably have a much harder time gathering up with the ruthless rules of the trial. Of course, he didn’t expect his own journey to be completely free from worries.
[Love’s Bond] appeared on his back and he started to make his way forward, choosing to run on the bottom of the ocean, his movement slightly boosted by small bursts of Miasma. Moving on the beach would definitely be easier, but people would keep appearing one after another on the shores and further inside the continent. The entrance time was staggered, but it would still be a bloodbath as over ten million participants would come flooding inside.
A pang of danger suddenly erupted, and Zac looked down with surprise at a spear shooting out from the ocean floor. It was infused with a powerful penetrative force, but it wasn’t at a level that that could kill him. Still, Zac pushed himself away by expelling a burst of Miasma, but his brows rose when he found himself stuck after moving just fifty meters.
An azure rope had appeared out of nowhere and attached itself to him, and it was connected to a large totem that had appeared right where the ambush took place. It was five meters in height, and it looked a bit like an anchor that was dug into the seabed. Zac immediately understood it was some sort of binding skill, not dissimilar from the array the cultists had used against him a long time ago.
A living humanoid rose from the sandy floor the next moment, and he gave Zac a look of superiority after confirming he was caught by the rope. He actually spoke up as well, another odd feature of the Twilight Ocean that Zac had read about before. Sound traveled just fine in the liquid, though voices appeared slightly muted.
“Good catch, a Draugr! I’m sorry, but you will have to become fertilizer for my pa- HEURK!” The man didn’t get any further as a black chain had exploded out from the sandy ground and wound itself around his leg.
The next moment he was dragged like a ragdoll toward Zac, who had already summoned [Rakan's Roar] and activated [Gorehew]. The man flailed about as he tried to stop the chain, and he even managed to launch an extremely powerful stab at the black links of [Love’s Bond]. Unfortunately for him, Zac had already infused the chain with the Fragment of the Coffin, allowing it to withstand the attack.
A moment later he was dragged right in front of Zac, and a haze of blood spread through the area a moment later as two pieces of a decapitated corpse slowly landed on the ocean floor. Zac shook his head in reproach as he quickly looted the corpse and his spatial ring before he ran away. He should have known that the contribution value of cultivators wouldn’t be visible unless he actually spotted targets, making it useless as a way to prevent ambushes.
Luckily, the attacker was most likely some young lordling who had never in a real struggle of life and death. His power wasn’t too bad; both his restrictive skill and the proficiency he displayed when striking his fetters were respectable. But his actual combat experience was utterly lacking.
What kind of fool stops to talk in the middle of a death match? It allowed Zac to send a chain into the ground and ambush the spearman right back. Certainly, Zac would still have defeated him soon enough, but it would have wasted some time. And any second wasted was another moment some real powerhouse might target him.
It was a good reminder of how dangerous things could get even out in the seemingly empty waters. The weaker cultivators were definitely just trying to hide and survive at this moment, while the more powerful and ruthless people took advantage of the early chaos to gather some wealth and contribution points.
At least he had gained 102 Contribution Points from the lesson, indicating that Zac should be in the upper part of his Value span of 100-250. After all, Zac doubted that the young lordling had anything better than a Middle-Stage Dao Fragment. Otherwise, he wouldn't have fallen so easily.
A large amount of Miasma stormed into the skill fractal for the movement skill on his chest, and the world suddenly inverted after almost two seconds had passed. He had activated [Abyssal Phase] multiple times by now, but he was still filled with marvel as he felt his incorporeal form. He could barely be considered a ghost at the moment, rather a congregation of miasmic energies.
Activating the skill normally didn’t take him to that ancient darkness, but the skill rather turned the world monochrome the moment it activated. However, it turned out that the Twilight Ocean had an interesting effect on his augmented vision.
When he had used the skill in his courtyard everything mostly stayed the same except objects looked like they had turned into energy instead. The effect even allowed him to see through walls to some extent, but not pass through them. But here in the things had undergone a more drastic change.
Some plants and stones on the ocean floor shone like small beacons, whereas other items were so muted they almost seemed invisible. Other features on the seafloor looked mottled like they were full of faults and holes. Zac quickly realized what was going on.
Some of the items in the Twilight Ocean were like some trees in the Dead Zone; they had an extremely pure aura of life even when surrounded by death. Similarly, some plant life and even materials only retained half of the Twilight Energy, expelling the other half. And the purely life-attuned materials around him had turned extremely bleak when he entered his current form.
It was pretty interesting since it was almost the opposite of his normal Draugr-vision where life-force was clearly visible to his eyes unless it was masked. Still, Zac’s main goal was currently to get away since it was possible more powerful warriors could arrive at any moment. His blob of energy pushed forward through the seemingly frozen water with amazing speed, each second taking him over five hundred meters from his original position.
Only when he had moved ten kilometers from where he fought did he stop. He looked around and saw no powerful signatures around, at which point he returned into his corporeal form. With a flash, the world turned back to normal, and a scan indicated he really was alone unless someone could hide from his peak mastery [Cosmic Gaze]. Zac activated [Spiritual Anchor] to scan his body just in case, but the spear wielder hadn’t left any brands on him before dying.
Only then did Zac keep moving, this time working even harder to mask his aura. In normal situations, he would do the opposite and blast his killing intent to keep opportunists at bay, but he felt that might have an opposite effect in this place. It felt like a better idea to move along the lush undergrowth at the ocean floor while masking his aura.
Even then Zac was attacked twice over the following ten minutes among the corals and rocky outcroppings at the bottom of the Twilight Ocean, and the attackers were actually both undead this time around. One of the battles ended with a Corpselord getting trapped and bisected by [Blighted Cut], but the second attacker instantly fled the moment he realized that he had attacked someone far too powerful.
Zac snorted in annoyance but he didn’t pursue. The attacker's Contribution Value was marked as 50-100, and Zac wouldn't follow him toward dry land for something like that. The previous two targets didn't possess many valuables except their equipment and pills either, except a few top-quality healing pills. He instead kept moving forward ignoring most people he saw in the distance.
Four hours passed, during which Zac found himself embroiled in eight consecutive battles, including one where he was forced to trap the attacker inside [Profane Seal] before using an escape talisman. It wasn’t that Zac was completely overmatched, but the attacker was pretty powerful and she had activated some sort of communication crystal. It was better to get out of there before he found himself besieged.
Finally, Zac closed in on Catheya’s location. She had been steadily been moving out from the shore at a middling pace, which no doubt was the best option considering how hectic things were on land at the moment. He was moving further and further away from the starting continent, but he could still sense energy eruptions every single minute from desperate battles on the shores.
His ranking had steadily dropped over the past hours as well, and he was currently relegated all the way to 64,334. Part of it was no doubt thanks to the constant flow of participants, but he guessed that some had passed him by through slaughter as well. He only started with a bit over 6,000 Contribution Points, and he had already made five hundred points without even trying. Some fiends had probably accrued thousands of points by this point.
The best bet for Catheya's group was to keep a decent pace the first days and create some distance from the general mob. That tactic increased the odds of running into other powerful squads, but Zac doubted too many of the elites wanted to go all-out on the first day, even with the allure of Contribution Points in front of them. Even if they won, so what?
They might be forced to use up their aces with three years remaining on the trial. Besides, even if you planned on climbing the ranks through slaughter, it was better to wait a few months so that you would also gain Twilight Fruits from the kills. For now, innumerable treasures were waiting in the depths, and it was more important to gobble them up and gain powerups before targeting others.