Chapter 1: Transformation
The card showed the red plankton algae, a strange species capable of animating dead objects into living creatures. It seemed Lu Li's luck wasn't too bad after all. The card shrank from virtual to tangible form, landing in his hand. After storing it away, Lu Li chose to return with Lilith.
Only three survived the instance. The other two, who hadn't reached the hospital, had medical skills and managed to save each other, which might be considered a blessing in disguise.
At the Hexi stronghold, Lu Li and Lilith appeared in a flash of light. Lilith, being his property, could be transported normally. Squeezing her hand, he assessed the hardness.
Lilith had completely fused with the mask, but since she had a physical body, she couldn't merge into the mask like the Shadow Assassins. This presented a problem. In the real world, where no anomalies existed—at least none that were public—Lilith's serpent-woman appearance, though beautiful, would cause a stir and likely prompt immediate police attention if seen in public.
Lu Li carefully sensed Lilith's body. The shadow energy from the mask, combined with her hybrid magic, was transforming her. Within a few days, Lilith's body could shift from physical to semi-energy form, allowing her to be stored in the mask like the other units and summoned as needed.
While Lilith curiously examined the simple stronghold, Lu Li's touch caused her to go limp, collapsing onto her tail with flushed cheeks and a shy gasp, her tail tip twitching incessantly.
Lu Li, slightly exasperated, glanced at the entranced snake woman and sat at his workbench, contemplating the gains and losses of the recent mission. The mission was highly irregular, primarily due to the bronze tree.
Without the bronze tree, there wouldn't have been anomalous spaces like the mortuary. Normally, the game would start with ten players fighting for eight medical slots. After healing, they'd complete tasks assigned by the hospital, such as handling rampaging animated objects or other hidden dangers. In the relatively small hospital, players would compete fiercely, effectively becoming the hospital's test subjects.
Based on the information from the female doctor, Lu Li confirmed that the hospital had identified them as travelers. Normally, the hospital's tasks would be experimental tests on the players. But the situation deviated due to the bronze tree, adding over a dozen anomalous spaces in the hospital. Judging by the bronze tree's fruits, there were actually over forty spaces.
As a result, what should have been a competitive scenario scattered the players. Lu Li only encountered one other player, Min Zidau, before meeting the ocean species in the anomalous space. If not for his fortuitous knowledge of the bronze tree, Lu Li would have been trapped in the ocean species' stomach, the difficulty wildly mismatched with the mission.
Subsequently, the chain reaction he triggered with the bronze tree inadvertently killed the other players, contradicting the instance's competitive nature.
"This suggests the game officials don't fully control the instances. The bronze tree's presence disrupted everything," Lu Li pondered, recalling the ritual's final four words: "At the Emperor's will."
The ancient figure known as the Yellow Emperor was a legendary ancestor, appearing in both historical records and myth. After the Great Catastrophe of the previous epoch, ancient civilizations were destroyed, leaving only a few human survivors. When small human groups began living in tribes, the Yellow Emperor emerged, defeated formidable enemies, unified the eastern tribes, and established a nation before ascending with his concubines on a dragon.
This earliest legend or myth of the eastern nation was later supplemented by the discovery of pre-epoch ruins. The advanced technology and historical knowledge of the previous epoch revealed another Yellow Emperor. Scholars speculated that the Yellow Emperor of the current epoch likely adopted the name after learning about the ancient one. Lu Li now seriously doubted whether they were the same person.
"Three thousand concubines, ascending on a dragon?" Lu Li muttered. If that wasn't mere exaggeration but a real event, he wondered what kind of being could achieve such a feat. Unless it wasn't human? He recalled the maid in the penultimate instance, whose tentacle-laden original form might have been capable of such.
Finishing his far-fetched musings, Lu Li planned his development. He now had nine shadow masks, three of which housed units: the assassin-type Shadow Assassin, the frontline combatant Claw Ghost, and the healing and spawning Lilith. He needed some ranged units, such as archers.
Then there were his skills. Completing three instances upgraded his skill slots from three to four, allowing for a new skill. He considered creating a detection skill to handle increasingly complex instances.
For the other three skills, Silent Meditation was still usable but needed upgrading. He shouldn't rely solely on Moon Shadow and should find ways to enhance it. Touch of Fear needed strengthening, likely requiring additional modules. The operation method of Shadow Spear needed changing; the current verbal activation was too slow. He hoped to acquire a targeting module.
Completing this mission rewarded him with five modules and 500 game points, adding to his existing 700, giving him a total of 1200 game points. The new modules were: Energy Module: Battle Qi, Rule Module: Awaken, Stability, Integration, and Special Module: Space.
Some modules were unsuitable, but others fit into his plans. He decided to trade the Energy Module: Battle Qi for magic modules, posting a trade request.
Skills were straightforward to handle with modules and combinations, but what troubled Lu Li was the shadow energy within him. One bronze fruit had turned into smoke and merged with him. Though he felt no abnormality and the game's status panel showed nothing, it didn't mean nothing had happened.
He raised his head and saw the snake woman watching him with an enamored expression. His mind raced, forming a vague idea… [TL: Bro got a lover]