"Who wants to be your wife?" Ariel shrieked. She had been the center of attention throughout her entire life. Countless people have proposed to her for her hand in marriage. However, no one had ever reached the level of shamelessness as that Bruce.
"Then I guess I won't be telling you my secret then" Bruce winked.
"I don't care about it anymore" Arief huffed and walked away. Being near Bruce only raises her blood pressure.
The other three team members smiled in amusement when seeing the interactions between Bruce and Ariel. Their opinions of Bruce changed greatly after the mission.
"Let's go turn in the corpse and get the reward" Bruce excitedly waved his hands in the air.
The team walked to the reception section in charge of the missions for the Eastern Faction.
Ariel showed the receptionist the corpse of the thunder-winged tiger along with the mission details.
The receptionist gasped when she saw the gigantic divine beast in front of her face.
"I'm very sorry for the inconvenience but I need to get my manager to confirm that the corpse belongs to the thunder-winged tiger" The receptionist bowed and headed toward the back.
An old man with a sturdy body came out and inspected the corpse.
"Indeed, this is the thunder-winged tiger"
"How did you guys manage to obtain this corpse?" The manager asked curiously.
"We have our ways. Could you give us the rewards now?" Ariel refused to tell him what happened.
The manager nodded in disappointment and handed Ariel the reward for the mission.
"Here are 5000 profound energy cubes and 500,000 faction points"
"I'm assuming you want to split the faction points evenly among the 5 of you"
"Correct" Ariel nodded.
The other three members sighed in relief because they felt that they didn't contribute much to the mission. Bruce and Ariel pretty much handled everything.
"Everyone got 1000 profound energy cubes and 100,000 faction points"
"Any complaints?" Ariel asked her team.
No one objected since the rewards were fairly distributed among everyone.
"Good, you guys may do whatever you want"
"I will inform everyone when we head out to a new mission" Ariel left the group and headed back to her house.
Bruce stared at the beautiful angel before heading back to his house as well.
He closed the door making sure that no one followed him as he inspected the rewards. The profound energy cubes glowed brightly in front of his eyes.
He tossed them around a few times to have a feel. The energy stored in the profound energy cubes is much more powerful and pure compared to that of the high energy crystals back in his world.
Bruce estimated that the 1000 profound energy cubes in his possession are equal to 1,000,000 high energy crystals. With this amount of wealth at his disposal, Bruce couldn't help but want to use everything to breakthrough to the next stage.
Before Bruce could do anything, the Monarch's voice rang in his head.
"Don't do anything stupid, you idiot"
"What do you mean?" Bruce thought it made sense to use the profound energy cubes immediately.
"How did you get this far by being this dumb?" The Monarch said in a disappointed tone.
Bruce thought for a moment and figured out what The Monarch meant.
"My foundation is not steady, is it?"
"Nope, it's absolute crap" The Monarch replied.
Bruce's face turned sour after hearing the evaluation from The Monarch. He had just killed a Late Stage Divine Emperor and that still wasn't good enough!
"Your battle experiences are still lacking. You need to master your cultivation stage before moving on to the next one"
"So, I have to gain battle experiences at each cultivation stage" Bruce mused.
"No, you idiot!"
Bruce was dumbfounded when he answered incorrectly again.
"You can gain a better understanding of the universal laws through battles not just through cultivation"
"There should be a balance between the two. Just think of cultivation as theory and battles as application"
"As you cultivate, you gain a deeper understanding into the universal laws, but you should also apply your new understandings in practice"
"Only then could you truly master the laws of the universe" The Monarch concluded.
Bruce walked out of his house and walked back to the mission station. He needed a way to gain countless battle experiences before he could move further in cultivation.
"Hello again miss, do you know a way that I could fight people in the Nether Realm?"
The receptionist looked at Bruce weirdly because this is the Nether Realm, he could just go outside and there would be plenty of people wanting to kill him.
Seeing his sincere look, she thought for a few moments.
"Have you tried the Hell Spire?"
"Hell Spire? What's that?" Bruce asked.
"It is an arena where cultivators in the Nether Realm can fight against one another"
"You are allowed to kill your opponents and absorb their death energy as well"
"The audience would bet on the fighter and win handsomely depending on the odds" The receptionist explained.
"Is there any benefit of being an Eastern Faction member if I were to partake in Hell Spire?"
"Absolutely!"
"Members of the same factions are not allowed to kill each and that rule applies in Hell Spire as well"
'What the hell, that just means I can't absorb Eastern Faction people's death energy!'
"In each faction, there are portals that directly teleport you to the Hell Spire so that you are not killed before you get there"
"With faction points, you can purchase weapons from the store to increase your chances of winning!"
Bruce thanked the receptionist and headed to the store. He couldn't wait to buy a new weapon before trying out Hell Spire.
Bruce arrived at the store in the headquarter and began his window shopping. He saw various Divine Emperor weapons in the store and even Great Emperor weapons!
The price of a Great Emperor weapon was 1,000,000 faction points which made Bruce cough up blood. What made Bruce even more depressed was that the Divine Emperor gauntlet offered by the store cost 100,000 faction points.
Suddenly, Bruce was dirt poor again. He couldn't help but cursed the unfairness of this world.
Bruce tried on his new gauntlet and found it to be much more powerful than the original gauntlet that he left back in his world. The material is made from dragon scales with absolute defense.
Bruce threw a few punches in the air which caused shock waves across the area. After spending one hour getting used to his new weapon, Bruce was confident to try out Hell Spire.
He entered the portal and teleported himself to the arena of hell.