Half a month later.
In the Brandon Territory, at a certain Blood Ring stronghold.
Clang!
A sharp metallic clash echoed as two Blood Ring Heavy Hammers collided violently. They wore identical Blood Ring armor, looking like two steel cans. The only difference was that the one on the left had a ribbon tied around his arm, bearing the emblem of the Brandon Fortress.
Moreover, this particular Blood Ring Heavy Hammer was noticeably more muscular and powerful, knocking his opponent back two steps. Even the opponent's armor showed small dents from the impact.
"The 7 free attribute points from Pureblood's Command all went into the servant's Strength. The improvement is obvious. Unfortunately, Pureblood's Command has a low success rate when trying to enslave elite-template enemies.
"The key issue is that, at this stage, the servants converted by Pureblood's Command are only temporary and can't leave this plane. If I leave, they die. To make Qin my permanent servant, I'll need to advance to a hero-class profession and gain a permanent servant slot."
Behind them, Gu Ning stood holding an alchemical scroll. He looked up at the two Heavy Hammers clashing, their steel mauls sparking, while calmly assessing the situation.
The Blood Ring Heavy Hammer with the ribbon was one of Gu Ning's elite servants, enslaved using his talent skill 2: Pureblood's Command.
Suddenly, the opposing Heavy Hammer let out a loud roar. As his roar echoed, several Plague Walkers quickened their shambling pace, rushing toward Gu Ning.
Adaptive Evolution: Keratinous Skin!
Gu Ning put away the scroll and activated his first evolved form, gaining a significant 50% damage reduction against sharp attacks. Lowering his shoulder, he charged — his spiked iron shoulder guard sent the first Plague Walker staggering backward.
Left strike, right strike!
The Plague Walkers' attacks left only faint white marks on Gu Ning's skin, barely scratching his defenses. Besides his adaptive evolution's defensive boost, Gu Ning had a base Endurance of 15 — that meant 15 base armor points, enough to reduce a significant portion of physical damage.
The blood-red runes of his Flesh Armor glowed on his iron shoulder guard like crimson flames. Wisps of blood-colored energy extended from the Plague Walkers into Gu Ning, forming a translucent blood shield around him.
Class Skill: Flesh Armor!
The Plague Walkers suffered constant magic damage. Though 1-3 points of magic damage per second didn't seem high, it added up — for creatures like them with only 70-80 HP, high armor, and low magic resistance, it was unbearable.
Gu Ning's bone mace struck with precision, each blow smashing into a Plague Walker's head, deforming skulls and spraying black blood from their nostrils and ears.
Soon, the Plague Walkers lay dead beneath his mace, providing dozens of soul energy points.
After clearing the minions, Gu Ning switched to Adaptive Evolution: Fluid Bone Form, advanced, and, together with his servant, finished off the Blood Ring Heavy Hammer.
Thin streams of blood-red mist escaped the fallen Heavy Hammer's body and were absorbed into Gu Ning. Only Gu Ning could see this process.
[You have gained 2 Origin Points. Current Origin: 79/100.]
Origin Points were resources for unlocking the third unknown ability of the Heart of Evolution. Gu Ning had learned through experimentation that only elite or stronger enemies produced them. He still didn't know their full purpose but continued to collect them.
Before him, a blue treasure chest floated into view.
Gu Ning grabbed the chest, feeling a flicker of joy. He opened it and selected one of the blue cards.
The card flipped, showing a lucky bag icon with a small "×3" symbol. A prompt appeared:
[You gained 458 soul energy points.]
"More soul energy… well, at least triple drop rates aren't bad. Better than useless equipment," Gu Ning consoled himself.
"Your combat power has taken shape. Even Zweig's elite knights wouldn't be your match now. Once you gain more combat experience (level up), even Zweig might struggle against you," Qin said from behind, draped in a luxurious wide-fur cloak.
Gu Ning had been fighting across the Brandon northern tundra, with Qin accompanying him, claiming to record his battle data for research.
The Northlands were vast, and Blood Ring outposts were scattered far apart. Even calculating their rough positions, it often took Gu Ning a day or two to reach one.
Along the way, he occasionally encountered Plague Walkers. In total, he'd fought dozens of battles in the past two weeks.
Now, Gu Ning had trained his One-Handed Hammer Mastery to Basic Level 4 (56%), and Unarmed Combat Mastery to Basic Level 3 (99%).
Such rapid skill improvement was impressive. His high aptitude and talent for reflection helped, but guidance from native experts — like Zweig's elite knights — also played a key role.
With Qin around, Gu Ning had a mentor in alchemy. Ten days earlier, he'd officially become an alchemist and learned several basic recipes.
As for loot, Gu Ning had obtained four blue chests from Blood Ring Heavy Hammers and several white chests from Plague Walkers. From the blue chests, only two pieces of equipment dropped; the rest were lucky bags yielding soul energy points.
One item was his current Iron Spike Shoulder Guard, dropped from a deep-blue chest carried by a mutated guard of Bloodhand Goron.
[Iron Spike Shoulder Guard (Sealed)]
Quality: Enhanced Elite (Deep Blue)
Slot: Shoulders
Requirement: Base Strength 5
Armor: +10 shoulder armor
Skill:Charge — Dash at double speed, dealing light piercing and blunt damage with a knockback effect. Immune to slow effects of priority (2) or lower during the charge. Cooldown: 12 hours.
Durability: 18/20
Description: The fangs of the Blood Ring hunger for the blood of the innocent.
The deep-blue quality far outclassed white gear. The active Charge skill provided a valuable mobility tool, and with his current Enhanced Elite template and 3 priority points, Gu Ning was immune to slow effects of priority (5) or lower during the charge.
The other item was a plain white Blood Ring Standard Plate Armor (Sealed): +15 upper body armor, 5 fixed physical damage reduction — but requiring 10 base Strength, far above Gu Ning's meager 5, so it gathered dust in his storage.
His current status:
[Gu Ning / Enhanced Elite Lv.1]
Race: Humanoid / Human
Class: Blood Armor Shield Guard / Alchemist
Attributes: STR 5, AGI 5, END 15, INT 9
Class Skill: Flesh Armor
Combat Mastery: Advanced Weaponry (Two-Handed Hammer) Lv.1, Basic Weaponry (One-Handed Hammer) Lv.4, Basic Unarmed Combat Lv.3
Combat Skills: None
"Time to return to Stedding Town… It's time to leave," Gu Ning said. His free exploration time was down to less than a day, and fatigue had set in. Staying longer held no benefit.
Word had come from Brandon: Duke Wilhelm convened a lord's assembly in Westphalia, where former Swedish Royal Junior Knight Yvette spoke passionately about the Blood Ring Fortress's world-conquering ambitions. Wilhelm called for resistance, but squabbling over troops and command plagued the lords. Even Wilhelm's prestige couldn't quell the discord — after all, there were over 300 autonomous territories.
It's said Wilhelm half-joked afterward: "What we need is a united German Empire."
Without key faction leaders present, Gu Ning had no chance of unlocking Main Quest III or gaining a third-stage residency extension — late-stage main quests were far harder to trigger.
Qin embraced Gu Ning from behind. Even through their clothes, he could feel her soft, substantial warmth.
"Dio, you're too rational. Sometimes, I really doubt my own charm…" she whispered.
Gu Ning turned, reached back, and effortlessly lifted Qin into his arms.