Ashen God
Chapter 574 - 573: Legendary Mage

Chapter 574: Chapter 573: Legendary Mage

Even though Zhang Yanhang’s movement speed had already increased significantly compared to before, it had not undergone any qualitative change, merely increasing from seventy meters per second to ninety-seven meters per second, which actually could not greatly enhance his clearing speed. Therefore, he had long been prepared for a prolonged battle ahead.

But precisely because of this, he wanted to wait until the next activation of the transmission channel before returning to clear this monster nest, by which time he expected to stay here for five consecutive days.

Moreover, and more importantly, once he was promoted to the Third Tier, his movement speed would definitely see a tremendous increase, and he might even reach sonic-level movement speed under normal conditions, which would then increase the efficiency of clearing monster nests in environments like the Crimson Iron Ore Vein.

Due to the large size of the monster nest below, Zhang Yanhang was quite worried that even five days might not be enough, potentially forcing him to stay underground for ten days. However, if he were promoted to the Third Tier, then his clearing efficiency would undoubtedly see a massive increase at that time.

Although it was currently impossible to make an accurate estimate, clearing the entire monster nest within five days should not pose any problem, and even leaving some time to search for other monster nests would likely not be too problematic.

"Given this, although it is Time Pause, there is no time to delay, We better start scanning the entire small Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dala Gu right now."

Zhang Yanhang immediately set the scanning range of "Seeking Fortune and Avoiding Evil" to the maximum, and then he was surprised to find that his scanning range had massively increased, possibly due to the recent upgrade of "Seeking Fortune and Avoiding Evil" to Original LV.6, which enhanced its penetration.

Zhang Yanhang remembered that during his last visit to the small Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dala Gu, the farthest "Seeking Fortune and Avoiding Evil" could probe was only a little over three hundred meters. But now, it had tripled, reaching a scanning depth of about one thousand meters, which was quite an astonishing change.

Of course, besides the improvement in penetration, Zhang Yanhang estimated that the increase in the scanning range also played a secondary role. The last time he visited the small Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dala Gu, the scanning range was only 3750 meters, but it had now expanded to 5500 meters.

Compared to before, with "Seeking Fortune and Avoiding Evil" gaining an additional 1750 meters in scanning range, it naturally also increased the scanning limit within the small Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dala Gu. However, compared to this growth, the increase in penetration definitely played an absolutely dominant role.

"Although it still can’t match the unobstructed view of the plains where I can scan freely, it’s still quite good to be able to scan out to a kilometer now."

The reason Zhang Yanhang’s previous clearing speed was so slow was largely due to the excessively narrow scanning range, which prevented him from planning the fastest routes through large-scale scanning, and occasionally, there were no monsters within the scanning range, forcing him to keep deviating from routes and opening the map in the hope of finding new monsters.

But now that the scanning range had reached a thousand meters, this issue was almost half resolved; he should no longer be bogged down by searching for monsters, which would slow down his hunting speed.

Moreover, with his increased movement speed and the reduced number of Crimson Iron Ants, Zhang Yanhang estimated that the time required to re-clear the small Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dala Gu would definitely be substantially less, possibly needing only a third of the time that was previously required.

Of course, the specific situation would still depend on the subsequent scanning results. If the number of monsters was low, his clearing speed would definitely accelerate accordingly, while if there were many monsters, his clearing speed would decrease to varying degrees.

"After the scanning range expanded, the time I needed to scan the entire Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dala Gu should also be reduced, although it doesn’t really matter for Time Pause."

Zhang Yanhang had occasionally thought about what rank he needed to promote Multiple Choice to in order to freely manipulate Time Pause and also inflict damage on enemies during the pause. If he could truly achieve that, then his strength among the Awakener community in the Main World, if not ranked first, would probably be in the top few.

After all, the ability to pause time is basically one of the top-tier powers in any world view and corresponding power system, just like in the DND power system, which is somewhat related to Zhang Yanhang right now, where a Mage can learn the Nine-rings spell Time Stop after reaching the Legendary Realm.

However, if it’s just at the Legendary Realm, pausing time for a few seconds is considered a lot. Time pauses counted by the hour, like what Zhang Yanhang can do, might only be achievable by deities with relevant authorities and Divine Positions.

"Never mind, I shouldn’t think about these things. After all, no matter how I see it, they are too far away from me. Right now, the most important thing is to scan the refresh rate of the Crimson Iron Ants in the entire Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dala Gu, hoping that there have been enough Crimson Iron Ants refreshed here recently."

Zhang Yanhang immediately began to focus on scanning the monsters around him.

......

Because he was too lazy to count in his head and didn’t know how much time had passed, Zhang Yanhang, after scanning the entire Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dala Gu, found that there were unexpectedly quite a lot of Crimson Iron Ants refreshed, probably about three thousand.

However, what made Zhang Yanhang feel a bit strange was that these three thousand Crimson Iron Ants were all the weakest First Tier One-star Ordinary Monster Crimson Iron Worker Ants. He didn’t encounter any First Tier Two Stars Crimson Iron Flying Ants, which are First Tier One-star Elite Monsters, nor the First Tier Two Stars Ordinary Monster Crimson Iron Soldier Ants.

"I remember back in Raccoon City, besides the weakest Zero Stars Ordinary zombies, the First Tier One-star Zombie Dogs were also refreshed, and after some time, even stronger First Tier Two Stars Lickers and First Tier Three Stars Beta-type Hunters and Gamma Type Hunters appeared in the refresh.

But why is it that only the weakest Crimson Iron Worker Ants were refreshed here in the small Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dala Gu? Even if Crimson Iron Breeding Ants are an exception, it’s a bit absurd not to refresh any Crimson Iron Flying Ants or Crimson Iron Soldier Ants."

But Zhang Yanhang didn’t know whether it was thanks to this, that the refresh quantity of the Crimson Iron Worker Ants was quite abnormal. It had only been less than ten days since he last cleared the small Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dala Gu, and yet three thousand Crimson Iron Worker Ants were refreshed, averaging over three hundred Crimson Iron Worker Ants every day.

Although Zhang Yanhang already knew that the monster refresh rate would increase due to the current area’s clearing progress, he didn’t expect it to increase to this extent. Of course, this might be difficult to understand, but simply put, the fewer monsters there are, the faster the refresh rate becomes.

And the peak of the monster refresh rate is right after completely clearing the entire area. Based on Zhang Yanhang’s experience in Raccoon City, this refresh rate should keep at its peak until the original designated number of monsters in the area is refilled.

Zhang Yanhang didn’t know if this setting was friendly to other people, but for him, it was definitely friendly, because he could continue to harvest incomplete Talent amounts and other needed Equipment and Artifacts by repeatedly harvesting.

"The entire small Crimson Iron Ant Nest, Dalagu, only has a total of ten thousand Crimson Iron Ants, and we have already refreshed about thirty percent of that number. When it comes to the Crimson Iron Worker Ants alone, it’s almost forty percent refreshed. There really is something unusual about this refresh rate.

But the more that refresh, the happier I am. Originally, I thought we might get a thousand at most, but I didn’t expect it could refresh three thousand. With this, it now has a good hunting value."

Although the hunt had not yet started, Zhang Yanhang had already made plans to use the Soul points from this batch of Crimson Iron Worker Ants to level up his Profession level. His Profession level was still only LV.14, which was too low, and he had to quickly level up to LV.20 and unlock the promotion conditions as soon as possible.

After scanning the entire small Crimson Iron Ant Nest, Dalagu, Zhang Yanhang immediately made his choice, "So, I choose Option Thirty-One, First Tier One-star Ordinary Monster Crimson Iron Worker Ant."

...

A few minutes later, the continuously lottery-drawing Zhang Yanhang was surrounded by Crimson Iron Ants, still in the familiar arrangement. Some Crimson Iron Worker Ants hid in the back, spitting ant acid, while others climbed on the Energy Shield, relentlessly biting with their mouthparts, and the rest, the Crimson Iron Soldier Ants and the Crimson Iron Breeding Ants, spat fireballs at him from a distance.

After extracting the last Crimson Iron Ant King, Zhang Yanhang did not hesitate to release the Death Wave Skill immediately. A transparent, twisted wave quickly expanded from him as the center.

Faced with Zhang Yanhang’s massively enhanced Charm attribute Death Wave, aside from the Crimson Iron Ant King, which didn’t die instantly, all other Crimson Iron Ants fell into a silent state instantly.

The exoskeleton of all the Crimson Iron Ants, including the Ant King, showed signs of fracturing inch by inch, squeezed by the powerful twisted wave releasing copious amounts of dark red viscous fluid that splattered everywhere, making the surrounding red Crimson Iron ore even more vivid and striking.

The sound of the bodies of Crimson Iron Flying Ants and Crimson Iron Breeding Ants hitting the ground coincided with the kill notification sound, which Zhang Yanhang loved the most.

[Successfully killed a First Tier Three Star Monster ’Crimson Iron Breeding Ant (Ordinary)’ ×1, Soul points +12.]

[Successfully killed a First Tier Three Star Monster ’Crimson Iron Breeding Ant (Ordinary)’ ×1, Soul points +12.]

[Successfully killed a First Tier Three Star Monster ’Crimson Iron Breeding Ant (Ordinary)’ ×1, Soul points +12.]

...

However, compared to the kill notification sounds ringing in his ears, Zhang Yanhang was more anxious to finish off the kill. What he hadn’t expected was that the bulky Crimson Iron Ant King, almost the size of a rhino, also fell into a silent state.

"Although it indeed resisted the Death Wave by relying on thick blood, it seems it only blocked it for a moment, and the next second, it just exploded on the spot."

Zhang Yanhang could understand this situation after some thought. After all, his Death Wave Skill’s fixed damage was only over six hundred points, which left nearly a hundred points of Life Value for the Crimson Iron Ant King with 740 Life Value.

Even though it had a hundred points left, it would still be in a near-death state, and if a hundred points were like that, ten points didn’t need mentioning at all; it wouldn’t live past the next second and would instantly explode on the spot.

That was exactly what happened this time. Zhang Yanhang’s current Death Wave fixed damage had reached 730 points, just ten points shy of instantly killing the Crimson Iron Ant King. Although it didn’t manage to kill the Crimson Iron Ant King instantly, the King with only ten Life Value left could not possibly survive any longer.

After all, if one could check the status, the Crimson Iron Ant King was currently suffering from a series of DEBUFFs like limb cutting, bleeding, tearing, fractures, coma, and naturally couldn’t last through that dangerous situation for even a second.

So, after listening to the other Crimson Iron Ants’ kill notification sounds, the killing notification sound for the Crimson Iron Ant King immediately rang in Zhang Yanhang’s ears.

[Successfully killed a Second Tier Two Star Monster ’Crimson Iron Ant King (Elite)’ ×1, Soul points +120.]

"Really nice, all my effort in increasing my Charm attribute value is paying off."

Zhang Yanhang’s Death Wave Skill could roughly kill any Second-tier Monster with a Constitution of 36 points or below, which included Second Tier Three Star monsters, but he still felt the fixed damage was rather low.

"Going forward, I really should level up the Death Wave Skill to Original LV.6. That would improve the fixed damage significantly. My requirement isn’t excessive, just to kill a Second Tier Four-star Monster would be enough."

Zhang Yanhang felt this requirement was quite reasonable; after all, he was about to promote to Third Tier. If the Death Wave remained this way, then in the hunting process at Third Tier, it would definitely be underwhelming.

Naturally, in theory, such a situation shouldn’t arise, as once he promoted to Third Tier, Zhang Yanhang’s attribute limit would be unlocked to seventy-five points. By then, just relying on the Third Tier Intelligence and Charm attributes should increase his Death Wave Skill’s fixed damage significantly.

Then, the Death Wave might not be able to instantly kill some Third-tier Three Star or Third Tier Four-star Monsters, but it should still easily kill monsters like Goblin Chief Nu Shan, a Third Tier One-star Monster.

Because he was about to promote to Third Tier shortly, Zhang Yanhang felt it was indeed time to start preparing for his Death Wave Skill’s fixed damage.

After emptying the prize pool again five days later, Zhang Yanhang stood in place for a few seconds, then picked up four Treasure Boxes from the ground: two from the Crimson Iron Worker Ants, one from a Crimson Iron Flying Ant, and one from a Crimson Iron Soldier Ant.

After putting the Drop Treasure Boxes into his Waist Bag, Zhang Yanhang immediately headed out of the C-shaped channel. He was now ready to start hunting monsters officially.