Scourge Messenger

Chapter 168 A Milestone in Natural Disasters

"Continuing the skull"

Rank: Earthly Fiend

"Absorption: Absorbing the skull will increase your Divine Soul by 50 points and grant you the Life Extension skill. The more damage you take, the faster you recover. This skill reaches its maximum when you take fatal damage, increasing the recovery speed of all injuries tenfold. This effect ends after Foundation Establishment."

"Injection: Injecting the token into the skull will enhance the healing ability."

"Reforging: By reforging the skull and relic, players can obtain more desired restorative abilities."

Click to view outfit combinations

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"Bodhisattva Jade Pendant"

"Rank: Third-tier Rare"

"Durability: 80/80"

Equipment requirement: 15 points of Divine Soul

"Equipment effect: +5 Divine Soul"

"Effect - Compassion: After activating Compassion, all damage you receive will be delayed by three seconds and reduced by 30% (up to a maximum reduction of 300 points of actual damage). Activating Compassion requires 50 points of Spirit Power and consumes 3 points of Spirit Power per second, stopping when Spirit Power is exhausted."

"Effect - Blessing: If you are not equipped with a defensive token or the defensive token does not have a damage reduction effect, you will gain 15% base damage reduction; if the token has a damage reduction effect, you will gain 5% damage reduction stacking, but the maximum cannot exceed 50%."

"Evaluation: Seeing the suffering of all beings, he appeared to save them."

Big bang!

The loot dropped by demons is not fixed. It is normal to only get spirit jade when you are unlucky. When you are lucky, Yan Qing even got a second-level rare white iron straight sword from Zheng Shan. After grinding it into a flame pattern long sword, he gave it to Ye Si.

While Earthly Fiends can potentially drop in the Third-Tier Secret Realm, the probability is probably only 1-2%, and you're unlikely to encounter one without trying dozens of times. Third-Tier Rare Treasures are the ultimate reward from the Third-Tier Secret Realm, and under normal circumstances, they should drop rare Third-Tier Tokens.

Yan Qing didn't think he was lucky. If he were truly lucky, he should have started as a hero blessed by four gods, or he could manipulate the world's situation at home. At the very least, he should have been surrounded by beautiful girls like sweet princesses, sexy female generals, and cute maids, and lived a happy and carefree life. Instead, he ended up in a thief's house without even sunlight, scheming against a group of thieves and having to go on field missions with them from time to time.

However, this assessment seems a bit unfair to Black Wolf and White Fox, since they are both quite reliable teammates, unlike someone else...

If Yan Qing is not mistaken, this huge success probably has no element of luck at all; it is all due to his hard work and effort.

After they reduced the Skull Tower's karma to zero and killed them, a message popped up in the game that Yan Qing had never seen before. At the time, Yan Qing didn't have time to look at it carefully, but now he could finally analyze it slowly:
"You have freed a criminal from the deepest abyss."

"In this battle, you successfully freed a criminal with a challenge level greater than 10. Your overall contribution was 36%, exceeding the 25% passing threshold but not reaching the 50% doubling threshold."

"You have absorbed 1 points of karmic force from natural disasters!"

"You have triggered a natural disaster milestone!"

"Catastrophe: You currently have 1 point of Catastrophe Karma, which unlocks the secondary milestone [Calamity]. Accumulating more Catastrophe Karma will unlock secondary milestones."

Calamity: All your attacks can deal true damage equal to the amount of Calamity Karma, currently 1 point.

Yan Qing noticed that it didn't show that the Bunny Girl killed the Undying Skull Tower, but rather that she 'liberated a perpetrator of the Underworld'. Regardless of what a perpetrator of the Underworld is, the connotation of the word "liberation" is completely different from that of killing, because death is a tragedy, while liberation is a joy for the person involved, with a sense of 'I never have to come back.'

If liberation means completely eliminating this demon, so that it won't reappear even if the secret realm refreshes, then a massive loot drop would be perfectly reasonable.

After all, this monster can't be farmed again. If we don't take this opportunity to get the best rewards, are we going to save them for the developers' grave during the Qingming Festival? — Yan Qing could already imagine how the forum players would comment.

The detailed battle report that followed was also quite intriguing. The reason why the Bunny Girl was able to absorb 1 point of natural disaster karma was based on the premise that the Undying Skull Tower was 10 levels higher than her and her combat contribution was greater than 25%.

To achieve the goal of defeating enemies of significantly higher levels and making a major contribution, and not just against low-level monsters but elite ones, is an absurdly demanding requirement. Out of the five players, only Bunny Girl likely meets this condition; even someone with similar damage output like Hannya wouldn't qualify—his level is probably higher than the Skull Tower's. Despite the extreme difficulty, few players would consider it a waste.

One point of natural disaster karma can cause one point of true damage!
While 1 point may not seem like much, what about 5 or 10 points? More importantly, it has no built-in cooling, no prerequisites, and works in any situation!

It's important to know that this game features many high-frequency damage-dealing gameplay styles, and the power of natural disasters and karma can bring about a qualitative leap in these styles!

Moreover, this is only the first effect of the Cataclysmic Milestone. If even the first one is this powerful, won't the later ones take off? Yan Qing can't wait to unlock more Cataclysmic Milestones. He has confirmed with Ye Si that the Cataclysmic Milestone can also affect all characters on the same account.

This is probably the content of the natural disaster version, Yan Qing thought to himself.

Although only a corner of the natural disaster version has been unveiled, Yan Qing has already felt the charm of this version.

Even disregarding the Cataclysmic Milestones, the ability to permanently free monsters and obtain massive loot drops through specific methods is enough to drive players wild – who would want to grind dungeons until they're exhausted? If they can find ways to exploit resources to the point of exhaustion, who would care about sustainable development?

The fact that monsters disappear after being freed will intensify competition among players. Previously, the world's first kill only brought fame and no other benefits, but the freed-upon mechanism ensures that the 'world's number one' gets everything, while the second-place player can't even get a decent meal.

Imagine you finally manage to crack the boss's escape mechanism, but someone else escapes before you, gets the super loot, and gloats it out in the world chat. Tell me, wouldn't you want to sneakily kill them?

However, both liberation and karmic retribution require players to have an extremely deep foundation. For example, the Undying Skull Tower requires Buddhist tokens, while the liberation mechanisms of other demons may require other types of tokens, or even multiple different types. Without sufficient resources, even the most skilled cook cannot make a meal without ingredients.

Natural Calamity Karma requires challenging elite monsters of higher levels, which is difficult even for those below Foundation Establishment, let alone those above. Some might think of accumulating Natural Calamity Karma by suppressing their level, but the result of Bunny Girl killing monsters ten levels higher was that she immediately comprehended a secret technique and leveled up by 4 levels, clearly indicating that the game developers had anticipated this.

If Yan Qing wasn't mistaken, when the Cataclysm version was first released, the first to suffer would definitely be the low-level dungeons. Experienced players would definitely create alt accounts to defeat all the bosses in the low-level dungeons, and then it would be the Foundation Establishment dungeons' turn. In this way, the low-level dungeons that were previously ignored would become popular tourist attractions that players flocked to... Thinking about it this way, it really is a perfect game plan!

"Wow, impressive!" Yan Qing, also a game planner, couldn't help but applaud the lead planner of the "Natural Disaster" version. However, he had a vague feeling that there seemed to be a slight problem with this approach, but he couldn't quite put his finger on what it was.

He quickly ignored these minor details and looked again at the Earthly Fiend Skull and the Three-Turn Rare Treasure Bodhisattva Jade Pendant in the warehouse.

The Bodhisattva Jade Pendant is naturally given to the Rabbit Girl first, but what about the Earthly Fiends?
Yan Qing clicked on the skull continuation icon to view the combination options.

"The Heavenly Gang reverses Yin and Yang + the Earthly Fiends continue the cycle → Life and death are reversed, disrupting the foundation of the Dao."

"The Heavenly Gang mends the sky and bathes the sun + the Earthly Fiends continue the head → the Tai Ri Yao Ling Dao Foundation"

"The Heavenly Gang Embryo Transformation and Change of Form + The Earthly Fiend Continuation → The Formless Transformation Dao Foundation"

They actually implemented the Dao base combination chart into the game...

Yan Qing had previously seen many players on the forum complaining about why the official didn't put the tips for matching the Heavenly Gang and Earthly Fiends in the game. After all, not all players go to the forum to read guides. Many players either don't absorb them or absorb them randomly after getting the Heavenly Gang and Earthly Fiends. By the time they realize this, it's too late to back down.

This made things easier for Yan Qing. He looked around but didn't see any of the top-tier Foundation Establishment experts he had seen on the forum. So he decided to have his alt account absorb the skull to continue the process. As for which alt account... well, that would depend on which one had the best chance of Foundation Establishment.

Maybe Night Four will have a chance too?

He wasn't in a hurry to establish his foundation. He could wait until his lower-level character established his foundation before looking for suitable Heavenly Gang and Earthly Fiends. After all, there was no regret in establishing one's foundation. Without a top-tier foundation, it would be difficult to ascend to immortality after seven revolutions.

Speaking of which, he could remind the pharmacist which Heavenly Generals could be paired with Earthly Fiends to immobilize the body, so he switched back to the Bunny Girls' account and found that they were already asleep.

Bunny Girl was naturally sitting cross-legged on the bed on guard, while Pharmacist Yuan lay on her side beside her in a single garment. Even with a thin blanket covering her, her voluptuous curves were still visible. Her sleeping posture was quite bizarre; one hand was on Bunny Girl's thigh, her right leg was raised as if trying to clamp something, drool dripped from the corner of her mouth, and she was muttering something.

Yan Qing had never seen anyone in the Pingcheng military camp who was inferior to her in terms of sleep. Was she really the daughter of a Duke?

However… after traveling together for several days, this was the first time Yan Qing had seen her sleep so peacefully and relaxed. Was she just too tired tonight, or was it because she finally saw hope for Foundation Establishment? Or was it simply because the bunny girl was beside her?
"Goodnight," Yan Qing said softly, then turned off her phone, washed up, and went to bed.

I don't know who he was saying that to.

(End of this chapter)