Astral Apostle

539 Massacre Of All (1)

“The milestone has been completed?”

Zhou Jing’s heart skipped a beat.

[Massacre of All] was the same type as [World’s Number One]. They were both milestones triggered a few years ago, and the former milestone needed to accumulate 10,000 kills to achieve it.

Because the conditions were harsh, Zhou Jing had never completed it specifically. He decided to let nature take its course.

In the past few years, he had fought dozens or hundreds of small battles. Every time he led the charge, he would reap a large number of enemy troops.

Even so, it took a few years to accumulate and approach the milestone requirement.

Tonight, he had brazenly attacked the camp and started a massacre, killing many enemies. Finally, he managed to clear the remaining kill count.

Zhou Jing still remembered that the reward for this milestone seemed to be even more generous than the reward for being the best in the world. He looked at the message curiously.

[You have received 24,000 Astral Points and 280 Information State Particles.]

[You have received [Aptitude Enhancement – Comprehensive (Great)] x1]

[You have received [Support Function Upgrade] x3]

[You have received [Support Function — The Way of Man] (The Way of Man is one where you can substitute in other ways for what you are lacking. You are now able to snatch the other party’s life force when killing the enemy and turn it into Astral Points or the apostle’s Free Attribute Points.)]

[Additional characteristic of the [Massacre of All] milestone: The higher the number the Astral Apostles has killed, the easier it is to intimidate others. However, if not handled well, it can also breed mental demons, evil spirits, and other negative states.]

“Wew, a little fierce.”

Zhou Jing’s eyes twitched.

This wave of Information State Particles reward directly increased Chen Feng’s current progress by 50%.

The last time he checked, his progress was only slightly above 560. Now, it had directly jumped to more than 840. His clearance evaluation had really increased greatly.

Last time, when Bill was placed in the Mutant World for several years to clear the level, his clearance progress had overflowed to more than twice the minimum standard, reaching the evaluation of “Superior.” The clearance reward was very generous.

And now, before Chen Feng died, his clearance progress had already reached about 3.5 times the standard of 240 points. When he became an Eternal, it would definitely be the highest clearance score he had achieved so far.

The increase in aptitude and the upgrade of the support function were both good things. The more, the better.

As for the newly obtained [Support Function – The Way of Man], in Zhou Jing’s opinion, the long-term benefits were higher than the upper limit of the [Character Level System]. It was suitable for apostles who fought all year round.

Most importantly, the [Character Level System] was an additional bonus. Once this support function was changed, the bonus would disappear. The accumulation of [The Way of Man] was however permanent. The Astral Points and attributes obtained would not disappear when switched off, and the growth rate was far higher than the former.

According to his analysis, these two support functions each had their own focus. One was to quickly upgrade and increase one’s self-protection in the early stages, while the other was a powerful tool for long-term development.

“I can assign one of the three support function upgrade opportunities to The Way of Man. This thing is definitely worth investing in.”

Zhou Jing’s mind raced.

As for the other two opportunities, he decided to continue investing in the map function and the follower function. These were both worth improving as well.

He looked at the additional notes of the last message and came to a realization.

Just like how the milestone [World’s Best] gave him the characteristics of a [Martial Arts Genius], so did [Massacre of All], but it was not obvious. The effect was just to increase his deterrence.

However, the [Fiendish Aura] talent that Apostle #004 possessed naturally had a deterrent effect. Under the combination of the two, it caused the apostle’s talent to mutate… His guess should be in the right direction.

“A mutated talent. It’s said to be condensed from fiendish aura. I wonder if it has a new effect. Could this thing be just a special effect?”

Zhou Jing looked at the black cloud above his head curiously and tried to control it.

In less than three seconds, he had figured out the way. With a thought, the black cloud quickly retracted and attached itself to his body, turning into steaming black smoke. It looked as if his entire body had turned black, like a villain at the final area, filled with pressure.

He slowed down his breathing, and the black aura returned to his body. His appearance returned to normal.

After searching for a while, Zhou Jing vaguely understood where the improvement was. The main point lay in the fact that the deterrence effect had increased qualitatively. It could easily shake the mental states of others at its current level. Even if he did not do anything and just stood there, when others faced him, they would continue to have their willpower judged.

Generally speaking, this talent was like a halo of fear that made people instinctively afraid. When ordinary people saw a murderer who killed people like flies, they might cower in fear and feel a chill in their bones. The deterrence effect of this talent was similar to this, but the effect was more obvious.

The milestone reward was generous, but now was not the time to deal with it. Zhou Jing quickly took stock before closing the interface and looking at the soldiers and reinforcements who had fled.

Since the enemy was in sight, there was no reason to let him off easily.

“Treacherous officials, don’t you dare leave!”

Zhou Jing shouted and threw down the corpses on the ground before chasing after the reinforcements.

His legs spun like the wind, and with every step he took, he could easily jump dozens of feet away. His speed was terrifying, and wherever he passed, dust rose like an earth dragon rapidly approaching.

Ling Fengzi was even more of a show-off. He flew in the sky and chased after Zhou Jing, stirring up even more sand and rocks. From time to time, he would release some wind pressure cannons that missed, blasting holes beside Zhou Jing. At first glance, it looked like he was really chasing after him.

The fleeing soldiers turned around and saw the pair of Crouching Dragons and Phoenixes quickly approaching. They were so frightened that their souls almost left their bodies. Their eyes widened in horror as they shouted in their hearts,

— Don’t come over!

Zhou Jing seemed to understand their prayers. He suddenly sped up and caught up to the back of the reinforcements. He raised his spear and stabbed in, instantly causing everyone to be flipped over, and soldiers flew everywhere.

Immediately after, Ling Fengzi also caught up. The dust storm immediately swallowed the last few troops, and its destructive power was much greater.

Just as the two of them were wreaking havoc on the reinforcements, a group of Dragon King Stronghold troops appeared in the distance and approached the already dilapidated camp.

They were the troops that had followed Zhou Jing to the battlefield. They were stationed in the distance, waiting for an opportunity to attack.

Because Perfected Master Windwalker had come to help, the aftermath of the battle was astonishingly lethal. The bandit soldiers thus followed Zhou Jing’s instructions before he set off and did not reveal themsleves.

Later on, when both sides stopped, they wanted to come out to receive them, but they were shocked to discover that the entire camp had been wiped out. Their boss did not need their help at all to kill all the soldiers in the camp.

They originally thought that there would be a tough battle during this attack on the enemy camp, but they did not expect that they would be reduced to spectators. Their only use was to come out and clean up the mess. Their trip was in vain, and they were even more respectful and fanatical towards their Chief’s martial prowess.

The leader was worried that something would happen to the chief, so he split up a troop to chase after Zhou Jing to reinforce himself. Then, he brought the others to the broken official barracks to clean up the remaining enemies.

Walking in the muddy and bloodstained camp and looking at the tragic scene, although everyone was used to seeing dead people, they could not help but feel their hair stand on end.p

“Leader, before Chief left, he said that he wanted to build a spectale. Do you think we should still build Jingguan?”

Ab adjutant asked carefully.

The leader looked at his feet and the corners of his mouth twitched. “It’s all shattered. Can this still be built?”

The adjutant thought seriously, “It’s broken a little, but if the corpses are piled together, the effect should be similar…”

“Shut up! Let’s wait for Chief to come back and make a decision.”

The leader quickly interrupted the adjutant.

Although he was not a kind person, he could not help but feel that this battle was a little too perverted..

Not long after, Zhou Jing returned with the reinforcements, covered in blood.

Those Imperial soldiers slipped away determinedly. He chased after them for a while, but he only dispersed the enemy. Seeing that the enemy had mostly fled in all directions, he stopped chasing and returned the way he came.

As for Ling Fengzi, he did not follow and retreated on his own.

The leader hurriedly went forward to welcome Zhou Jing.

“Is Chief injured?”

“Ha, with these useless people from the Imperial Court, how can they hurt me?”

Zhou Jing replied casually.

Having a protective layer of Internal Energy surrounding him consumed more energy. Although he had two First Order Traits, [Rapid Force Recovery] and [Prolonged Endurance], it was not enough to support continuous acitvation. Therefore, he occasionally relied on his powerful resistance to withstand attacks.

His body was naturally not injured, but the leather armor he was wearing on the outside had been torn apart, making him look like he had suffered badly in battle.

He casually tore off the damaged leather armor and checked the Coiling Dragon Spear in his hand. He realized that this spear was also severely damaged. The dragon patterns had been ground flat, and it was slippery under the blood.

He had used this weapon for several years, and under his huge strength, it was already covered in scars. If not for the fact that it was wrought completely from damascus and had a tough exterior, it would have long been snapped.

After tonight’s battle, the Coiling Dragon Spear finally could not take the burden and died of old age.

“Looks like it’s time to change to a new weapon. This spear is only 50 kilograms. It’s getting more and more incompetent to use. It should at least weigh a few hundred kilograms.”

Zhou Jing started laying out his plans.

However, there was basically no need to think about being able to balance a few hundred kilograms spear on one arm. His moveset would also be reduced to next to nothing… Why not just use a hammer instead?

Actually, there was nothing bad about the hammer. It was powerful and heavy. Although he had never specially practiced it before, at most, he would use the Disorder Splitting Wind Hammer Technique (read blindly waving and fighting).

Or if he improved it, he would take a hammer from both hands and tie it to his arm with chains. It could even be used as a meteor hammer. On the battlefield, the attack range and lethality were higher than the iron spear. He could truly be said to be a human-shaped meat grinder then.

After all, there was no need to use the exquisite moves of spearmanship to deal with the small fry. He could really consider it when he returned…

He temporarily suppressed his thoughts and looked at the tragic scene on the ground. He felt that there was no need to build a feature here any longer, so he spoke out,

“Let’s leave this place for the officials to tidy up. Let’s treat it as a deterrent to them… we’ll withdraw our troops and return home.”

With that, he retreated with his troops, and the journey was naturally smooth.

On the other end, the wind howled, and the moon was pale.

The entire camp was filled with corpses, and no one was alive.

The originally noisy battlefield was now dead silent.

After an unknown period of time, a general who had fled finally got rid of his fear. He reorganized his troops and carefully returned to investigate to confirm if the ferocious devil had left.

Realizing that the enemy had already retreated, the soldiers could not help but heave a sigh of relief. They felt that they had escaped a calamity.

However, when they saw the bloody scene of shattered corpses everywhere, many people’s faces turned pale, and some even vomited on the spot.

The commander of the troops still had lingering fear. He swallowed and muttered to himself,

“Demon! Criminal Chen must be a man-eating demon! Otherwise, how could he be so violent?!”