Chapter 241: Imprint
Xiao Mingyue carefully crept forward, his entire body hidden in the low grass, minimizing the risk of being discovered by other wild beasts.
Before participating in this trial, he had once ventured into one of Huaxia's Secret Realm Forests with a group.
Though they had only skirted the periphery back then, the myriad dangers they encountered left all survivors with lingering fears, making them swear never again to return to such a hellish place.
Out of the eight-person team, only five returned alive, and even they were more or less injured, with one having even lost an arm.
In the Spirit Qi era, as long as one had the money to acquire the corresponding heavenly materials and earthly treasures, even a lost arm could be restored to its original state within half a year.
However, if these people had money, there would have been no need for them to become adventurers in the first place.
In the end, when they divided their spoils, they found that after fighting for their lives, each person's share was only worth about five hundred thousand Hua Coin. It would have been better to just risk it all and rob a bank; after all, it was still gambling with their lives.
But after their investigation revealed that banks now employed large numbers of cultivators as guards, they never entertained that idea again.
Ultimately, at that time, Xiao Mingyue and his companions were merely low-level, newly awakened Ability Users, likely unable to defeat even armed soldiers, let alone professional Ability User guards.
"Without considering my trump cards, all I have are Ghost Fire Bombs and ordinary Spirit Energy Missiles..."
After a moment of thought, an energy sphere glowing with an eerie green light began to form in Xiao Mingyue’s hand. He cautiously remained hidden, not daring to make the slightest sound, lest the alert beast discover him and ruin the ambush.
At this point, he was less than twenty meters from the mutated wild boar. At his speed, that was a distance of under two seconds.
He poked his head out and, with all his might, hurled the Ghost Fire Bomb, which had grown somewhat overly swollen from his continuous power infusion, towards the boar's head.
"Hooooo!" The casually grazing wild boar sensed the impending danger and twisted its head at the last second, but still couldn't entirely evade the highly corrosive Ghost Fire Bomb. Half of its snout became a pockmarked mess, and it immediately began to rage.
It looked in the direction of the Ghost Fire Bomb, instantly identifying its assailant.
Thus, it accelerated towards Xiao Mingyue, charging like a freight truck, the tusks on its unmarred half-face eager to shred the anomaly that had brought it such pain.
Though his own strength was not weak, there was still a significant gap compared to such a monster. Furthermore, the opponent had already begun its charge; choosing to meet it head-on at this point would mark one as either a fool or an absurdly powerful expert.
"Contestant Mingyue is diligently maintaining his distance, continuously launching Spirit Energy Missiles, attempting to slowly wear down the enraged wild boar."
"But the commotion from the battle between one man and one beast seems too great. They are far from the only inhabitants of this forest. Will such a reckless chase and evasion battle draw in a third party? Let us wait and see." The host, speaking from a god-like perspective, narrated the battle for the live-streaming audience.
The primal struggle made the off-site audience watching the live stream feel their blood boil. Most people rarely had the opportunity to witness such a reality show on the brink of life and death.
Just as the female host predicted, at the height of their fierce battle, five forest wolves arrived, drawn by the commotion. The atmosphere instantly became awkward.
Yet, the wild boar seemed oblivious to the smaller creatures with green glints in their eyes. It only wanted to crush the human before it, again and again, to vent the madness brought on by its searing pain.
"This is trouble. A few more troublemakers have appeared, and it’s likely they’ll attract even more creatures later." Xiao Mingyue knew that kiting this heavily wounded wild boar to death wouldn’t be difficult for him, but how to escape from a pile of monsters—that was the real problem.
"Damn it! They’re actually ganging up on me!" The mutated wolves didn't want to provoke the already enraged wild boar, so they simply turned their attention to the seemingly weaker Xiao Mingyue.
Against these wind wolves whose agility matched his own, his kiting tactic immediately became useless. They also possessed speed and could even unleash small compressed air cannons from their maws for ranged attacks.
Even if these compressed air blasts merely tickled his composite shield, they could effectively impede Xiao Mingyue’s movements, making the situation instantly perilous for him.
Without the advantage of mobility, he quickly found himself caught in an encirclement of five wolves and one boar.
"You forced my hand!" Faced with the relentless advance of the beasts, he finally decided to reveal the trump card he had just acquired in the third stage, otherwise he wouldn’t even pass this one.
He knew countless people in the live stream were watching him; how could he possibly give up the test without even killing a single monster? He still wanted to be the first person to ascend to the third level of the Heaven-Reaching Tower!
"Spirit Energy Storm!" When his enemies were less than twenty meters away, Xiao Mingyue resolutely activated one of the temporary Spirit Arts recorded in his mind, draining all his Spirit Energy to unleash a storm composed of a vast number of Spirit Energy Missiles.
The four monsters outside the encirclement had absolutely not anticipated that their relentlessly pressured enemy, who was on the verge of death, would suddenly launch such a desperate counterattack.
Unable to evade, they were quickly ground down piece by piece by the endless missile rain, their existence in this virtual world steadily eroded.
As for Xiao Mingyue, the initiator of the attack, he felt his body completely hollowed out. Now, even moving a single finger required immense willpower.
However, his immobilized body couldn’t hide the heartache he felt. In his desperate struggle through the third stage, he had only managed to acquire two high-tier Spirit Art Thought Imprints etched into his mind.
Each imprint allowed him to use the corresponding Spirit Art once, even before truly mastering it, and also enabled him to slowly ponder and eventually genuinely learn how to use it.
He had originally intended to learn the powerful Spirit Arts represented by these two imprints after leaving the trial, to significantly enhance his combat strength. But as it turned out, he had wasted one right here... What was worse, these Spiritual Imprints were things that, once used in the virtual world, could not be regenerated.
The reason for developing the method of engraving Spirit Arts into Spiritual Imprints was originally because Bai Mo wanted to try creating magical talismans capable of sealing a powerful expert's single strike, just like in novels.
However, he felt that the items he produced using rune technology had actual destructive power roughly equivalent to a hand grenade, yet their cost was significantly higher. So, he decided to find another path, to create something new and meaningful.
As a result, after referencing the Heaven and Earth Seal that Hua Taishan had left him at the time, he finally created the even more advanced Spiritual Imprints, which could mobilize the host's power to use certain powerful Spirit Arts beyond their current stage.
Of course, one could also, through prolonged contemplation of the imprint, eventually truly master the corresponding technique.
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