Ashen God
Chapter 563 - 562 Sky Demon Orange Crystal Grass

Chapter 563: Chapter 562 Sky Demon Orange Crystal Grass

After sending a message to Zhou Muxi, Zhang Yanhang didn’t leave immediately; instead, he observed the topology of the Nameless Mountain under his feet.

Soon, he concluded that this Nameless Mountain was also likely a branch of the southwestern spur of the Lao Mountain Range, but it was significantly smaller compared to Beiling Mountain. It was so small it almost seemed like a branch of a branch, or it might well be a spur of Beiling Mountain itself.

"So it seems," he mused, "the Sky Demon Crystal Grass and similar Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures are indeed mysteriously connected to the Lao Mountain Range, or perhaps Sky Demon Crystal Grass is a signature product of the Lao Mountain Range."

Considering the current situation, Zhang Yanhang thought it would be better for him to continue searching the other branches of the southwestern spur of the Lao Mountain Range next, hoping to find the remaining two pieces of Sky Demon Orange Crystal Grass and Sky Demon Blue Crystal Grass.

"But honestly," he reflected, "most of the small hills within Qin Island City’s urban area are offshoots of the southwestern spur of the Lao Mountain Range, so it might be best to just comb through all of them."

Just as Zhang Yanhang was about to leave the small hill located between Lao Mountain and East Mountain of Shuiqing Gully, he suddenly stopped. It wasn’t for any particular reason, but it seemed he had unexpectedly triggered his quota of odd encounters for the day.

"Would you like to continue your night run?"

"Option One: Head to Licang District for a night run (Although you’ve been running at night for a while, the mere five kilometers from home to Beiling Mountain hasn’t been enough to satisfy you. You feel you might as well continue the night run, especially since you have nothing else to do tonight.

As with the Nameless Mountain near Beiling Mountain previously, you also aim to find a Nameless Mountain in Licang District as your next target. However, due to your unfamiliarity with Licang District, you open your smartphone map to start looking for a suitable Nameless Mountain.

Choosing the furthest one due to the multitude of options, what surprises you upon reaching the Nameless Mountain on Miaofu Road is an old hanging rope on a dead tree at the summit, and next to it looms a fearsome middle-aged fierce ghost.)"

"Option Two: Head to the Southern City District for a night run (The five-kilometer distance from home to Beiling Mountain not only failed to satisfy you but felt like a mere warm-up that has left you even more eager to continue your night run. You think you might as well head to the nearby Southern City District for a night run.

From the Nameless Mountain near Beiling Mountain in North City, you run along Cuobu Ridge to the Southern City District’s Dunhua Road. As you are about to continue south, you suddenly feel something odd on a Nameless Mountain on the west side of the road. Upon investigating, you find a Sky Demon Orange Crystal Grass halfway up the mountain that can increase your stamina limit.)"

"Option Three: Give up on the night run (After running the five kilometers from home to the Nameless Mountain near Beiling Mountain, you feel that you’ve already covered a significant distance for tonight’s night run and there’s no need to continue looking for other Nameless Mountains in North City as targets for your night run. Thus, you return home along the same route you came.

After concluding your minutes-long, long-distance night run, returning home makes you realize indeed there’s nothing more comfortable than lying in bed. Since you’ve just woken up, you don’t fall back asleep, but instead, take the opportunity to fuse up your Thermo-baric Bomb +7, feeling that this is the most important thing at the moment.)"

"What’s up with the hanging rope in the first option? Are people still hanging themselves nowadays? Isn’t jumping off buildings more popular? After all, the sensation is unexpectedly comfortable, and death is remarkably swift, much better than the suffocation from hanging."

As an experienced expert on jumping off buildings, Zhang Yanhang felt he had a certain authority on this topic. Of course, the most important aspect was to jump head-first and in a straight line downward; only then could one experience the fastest death.

If the angle was significantly off, one might just break their neck without dying instantly, maintaining consciousness for a futile struggle.

If one were to jump feet-first, it’d be even worse. Although one might end up paralyzed, the death would be the slowest, and one might cough up blood froth for up to half a minute or even a minute before truly succumbing.

However, there are advantages, such as enjoying the bystanders’ reactions and hearing their opinions before ultimately succumbing.

Hanging couldn’t compete with this because the death process was excruciating, even worse than jumping feet-first, considering that upon hitting the ground, one wouldn’t feel much pain, or might become insensitive to it.

And hanging, well, that was truly painful. A normal person struggling without air for just a minute or two would find it intolerably distressing, let alone a complete suffocation from hanging.

So, it’s quite normal for jumping to have taken over hanging, and most importantly, during a jump, one can still enjoy a bit of the air around, a pleasure hanging simply can’t offer.

"Just from that hanging rope, you can deduce this middle-aged fierce ghost is likely a hanging ghost, probably an old ghost, hanging around for decades, previously lurking underground or on the rope before the Spiritual Qi Recovery brought it back to emergence."

But despite being an old ghost, Zhang Yanhang believed it could be easily handled if reported to the relevant authorities or to Zhou Muxi.

After all, Zhou Muxi was a Third Tier Awakened with a Talent Ability particularly suited for combat. Although somewhat slow in advancing to the Fourth Tier, Zhou Muxi still ranked among the top compared to the vast majority of Awakeners.

Since only a minority of Awakeners could ascend to the Fourth Tier within half a year after the Spiritual Qi Recovery, Zhang Yanhang estimated that in all of Qin Island City’s twenty thousand Awakeners, maybe one in a thousand reaching that rank would be quite impressive.

Maybe even less than one in a thousand; otherwise, group chats wouldn’t be so resourceful. Ultimately, it’s because the relevant departments were understaffed and had to depend on these socially idle Awakeners.

Of course, specific statistics were only accessible in the databases of relevant departments, so although Zhang Yanhang felt his estimates might be slightly off, he believed it was highly unlikely for Qin Island City to have a three-digit number of Fourth Tier Awakened; at most, there would be double digits, but no more.

Although there may not be many Fourth Tier Awakened, Third Tier Awakened like Zhou Muxi were still quite common, otherwise the appropriate departments wouldn’t send them to campus recruitment.

After another one or two, or maybe two or three months, these Peak Third Tier Awakened might break through to the Fourth Tier, and the Fourth Tier Awakened population would then undergo a drastic expansion, easily breaking into the triple digits, but four digits would still definitely be impossible.

After all, there were only about two thousand Awakened in Qin Island City, and the ratio of Awakened entering and not entering the Ashen World was naturally fifty-fifty. Moreover, those who entered the Ashen World would also die for various reasons, leaving probably less than a thousand.

With such a base number, how could there be four-digit Fourth Tier Awakened? They couldn’t just shout, "I’m splitting!" and then undergo mitosis right there.

"As for the matter of the Hanging Ghost, let Zhou Muxi handle it. No doubt, compared to the first option, the second option is very useful for me, allowing me to find a Sky Demon Orange Crystal Grass on a small hill near Dunhua Road, which can increase my stamina limit.

Despite having increased my stamina limit by 30% just yesterday afternoon with those three fruits from Li Zerui, more stamina limit is always better. Increasing the stamina limit not only prolongs the duration, but also increases the number of times I can release the Death Wave Skill, thus correspondingly enhancing my efficiency in hunting monsters.

Speaking of which, Dunhua Road isn’t that next to my university? And nearby, there should be Fushan, the place I’m most familiar with. How come I didn’t notice any Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures during the day on those hills? Could it be that they matured only at night?

Oh, no, it seems it’s because I was quite busy during the day that I didn’t scan the nearby environment."

Zhang Yanhang mainly became lax about scanning because he had scanned too frequently before, but each time, the surroundings remained the same and he couldn’t find anything useful. Of course, this was just a secondary reason; the main reason was definitely because he was busy during the day.

"Even though the second option is indeed great, what on earth is this ’Night Running Heart’? How did this strange thing suddenly appear on me, and moreover, talking about ’unbearable hunger’, where did these terms of desperate desire come from?"

Although it might seem absurd, since he’s not really fond of night running, Zhang Yanhang later thought about it and realized that he does love the byproducts of night running, such as the Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures. In that regard, it could indeed be described as ’unbearable hunger’.

By the way, if you ask Zhang Yanhang why he doesn’t really like night running, the main reason would probably be because of the painful experience of trying to sleep by night running, but still not being able to sleep afterwards. If it hadn’t been for the opportunity to collect Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures, he definitely wouldn’t go night running.

Zhang Yanhang thought it better to spend his spare time at home studying the Three Tier Spell Silent Field as a foundation for later learning the Fifth Tier Spell High-level Silence Field.

"As for the third option, although I don’t really like night running, giving it up is definitely not an option, as I still need to extensively scan the small hills within Qin Island City looking for Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures."

Although there might not necessarily be a discovery, Zhang Yanhang could rely on Time Pause to do this, so it probably wouldn’t waste much time.

"Speaking of this, I suddenly think of a question, should I take advantage of this Time Pause to scan all the hills right now?"

After briefly considering, Zhang Yanhang eventually gave up the idea, thinking it better to initiate a separate Time Pause later. Compared to searching for Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures on various hills, he currently wanted to acquire that Sky Demon Orange Crystal Grass more urgently.

Zhang Yanhang planned to start investigating the growth of Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures across the hills within the city area after consuming the Sky Demon Orange Crystal Grass.

"So, I choose Option Two, to go for a night run in the Southern City District." After making his choice, Zhang Yanhang immediately opened his phone to check the map, and coincidentally found that this unnamed hill in the Southern City District was exactly five kilometers away from an unnamed hill near Beiling Mountain.

After quickly searching the route map, Zhang Yanhang immediately headed towards the unnamed hill on Dunhua Road.

In just over a minute, Zhang Yanhang had already arrived at the west side of the road at this unnamed hill, which he had specifically looked up on the map and found to be less than a thousand meters away from Fushan near his university.

"Since Fushan is a branch off the southwest spur of the Lao Mountain Range, then I guess this unnamed hill on Dunhua Road could also be a branch of it, or perhaps a spur of Fushan."

The hill between Beiling Mountain and Shuiqing Gully East Mountain was previously determined by Zhang Yanhang to be a branch of Beiling Mountain, and this side was likely a spur of Fushan.

It just goes to show, Multiple Choice lately does seem to favor these small hills, while the previous scenarios for obtaining Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures have been diverse and varied, including places like high school girls’ bathrooms, crematoriums, graveyards...

Alright, maybe the Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures obtained in these settings are generally the Yin attribute ones that he can’t use.

Fortunately, now things are different. After obtaining these Yin attribute Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures, aside from feeding them to the female ghost to increase her goodwill, Zhang Yanhang had found another channel to utilize them, or rather, to benefit from them. What is that? Naturally, it’s Zhou Muxi; she’s been in constant need of these kinds of Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures that can replenish Yin Qi.

If Zhang Yanhang found similar Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures in the future, he should be able to trade them with her for something more useful to him.

As a Third Tier Awakened, Zhou Muxi certainly has plenty of good things, and apparently, she also has a close friend who can support her during critical times. This makes two natural resource reservoirs, Zhang Yanhang believed that as long as he brought the Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures to them, he would likely be able to exchange them for something useful to him.

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