Chapter 105 - 104: Leaving the Secret Realm

Chapter 105: Chapter 104: Leaving the Secret Realm

BANG! BANG! BANG!

Ji Zhixing’s rod rained down on the Blood Beast, strike after strike.

The creature possessed formidable defense, but its speed was lacking. Though it desperately tried to dodge, Ji Zhixing’s rod followed it like a shadow, landing with pinpoint accuracy every time. After over a dozen consecutive blows, the Blood Beast’s head began to sway, and its movements grew sluggish.

"It’s working!"

Ji Zhixing rejoiced. He knew this was the secondary effect of his Tier Two Five-Star Nine-Tiered Tide Rod—the erosion of tidal power had kicked in. With every strike, the Nine-Tiered Tide Rod injected a surge of tidal force into the enemy’s body, continuously eroding them from within to deal internal damage.

"Undercurrent!"

After another flurry of strikes, Ji Zhixing abruptly seized an opening. The moment the Blood Beast swayed and left a gap in its defense, he executed the Undercurrent stance. His long rod thrust forward silently, as fast as lightning.

SQUELCH!

The tip of the rod accurately pierced the Blood Beast’s eye and burst out the back of its skull. The Blood Beast let out a shrill, agonizing shriek. Its body convulsed violently a few times before it crashed heavily to the ground.

"Store!"

Ji Zhixing withdrew the Nine-Tiered Tide Rod. With a single thought, he stored its corpse into his Genetic Furnace. Then, he glanced over at Xiao Mingyue, who was constantly dodging the attacks of the other Tier Two Blood Beast, and hurriedly rushed to her aid.

By now, this Tier Two Blood Beast was already at the end of its rope, its body engulfed in raging flames. Even if Ji Zhixing hadn’t come over, it would likely have burned to death in a matter of moments.

"How are you doing? Are you alright?" Ji Zhixing asked Xiao Mingyue as he arrived, swinging his rod.

"Don’t worry," Xiao Mingyue smiled. "I could have taken it down even if you hadn’t come over.

"But we should still hurry up. We don’t have much time left."

"Alright!" Ji Zhixing nodded.

"Tidal Roar!"

He raised the Nine-Tiered Tide Rod and smashed it down, sending the Blood Beast stumbling.

ROAR!

It let out a low growl, abandoning its pursuit of Xiao Mingyue, and lunged at Ji Zhixing instead.

"Undertow!"

Watching the flaming Blood Beast lunge at him, Ji Zhixing didn’t strike immediately. He waited until it was right on top of him before suddenly attacking.

SWISH!

The next moment, the dizzy and severely burned Blood Beast was impaled right through the eye by Ji Zhixing’s rod. It collapsed to the ground, dead.

"Finally killed it!" Ji Zhixing let out a long breath and deactivated his gigantification.

The continuous high-intensity battles had taken a significant toll on his stamina and Source Power. Fortunately, his Root of the Earth ability allowed him to endlessly recover Source Power as long as he stood on the ground, preventing him from running completely dry.

"Hurry, don’t rest yet. Refine it quickly," Xiao Mingyue urged, walking over.

Ji Zhixing nodded. He glanced around but didn’t immediately refine the two Tier Two Blood Beasts. Instead, he walked over to a distance and stored the Tier One Blood Beasts previously killed by Gu Zheng into his Genetic Furnace, beginning the refinement process.

These Tier One Blood Beasts had been dead for quite a while now. If he didn’t refine them soon, he was afraid he wouldn’t be able to extract anything at all.

Time ticked by. Over ten minutes later, he had refined six Tier One Blood Beast corpses before realizing he couldn’t extract anything more from the remaining ones. He felt a surge of helplessness. Left with no other choice, he began refining the corpses of the two peak Tier Two Blood Beasts.

"Thank goodness, there’s still time," Xiao Mingyue said. She glanced up at the sky; the blood-red sun was already setting in the west, but there should still be about half an hour before the secret realm closed.

Ji Zhixing nodded and began operating the Genetic Furnace at full capacity. Minutes and seconds slipped away.

About ten minutes later, the refinement was complete. Ji Zhixing swept his consciousness across the Furnace Space, and his eyes suddenly lit up.

"Jackpot!"

Inside the Furnace Space, alongside four Tier Two Gene Source Stones and four Tier Two Blood Crystals, lay an extra item: a suit of Blood-colored Armor. The armor was entirely dark red, giving off a decidedly extraordinary aura.

When Ji Zhixing’s consciousness brushed against the Blood-colored Armor, a stream of information immediately flooded his mind.

"Unnamed Armor, Tier Two Three-Star Genetic Equipment. By channeling Genetic Source Power, it can form a blood-colored light barrier over the user’s body to block enemy attacks."

"Tier Two Three-Star... and it’s a defensive type."

Ji Zhixing looked delighted. The market price for defensive armor like this had always remained astronomically high. This single piece of armor alone could likely fetch upwards of a million Gene Coins.

"What’s more, I can use this armor myself.

"Even though my Monolith Physique gives me pretty good Defense Power, layering this armor on top would significantly boost my survivability."

With a thought, Ji Zhixing decisively named the armor "Blood Beast Armor." In this world, some Genetic Equipment lacked names upon refinement and had to be named by the Genetic Cultivator themselves. However, other pieces of equipment—like his Blood Crocodile Axe and Wolf-Blade Vambraces—came with intrinsic names right out of the furnace.

"Done refining? How did it go? How many Blood Crystals dropped?" Xiao Mingyue immediately sidled over and asked upon seeing him finish.

Ji Zhixing reached out, withdrawing two Tier Two Blood Crystals and three Tier One Blood Crystals from the Genetic Furnace, displaying them on his open palm.

"Two Tier Two, three Tier One," Ji Zhixing said.

"They actually dropped? And two of them, no less?" she asked.

Seeing the two Tier Two Blood Crystals, Xiao Mingyue’s face lit up with immediate joy. "Counting the one from the Blood Wolf earlier, all three of the Tier Two Blood Beasts you refined today dropped Tier Two Blood Crystals!

"This kind of luck is simply off the charts.

"And adding in the Tier One Blood Beasts we killed earlier, you can earn a total of 61,000 points today." She had quickly run the numbers in her head.

"Sixty-one thousand..." Ji Zhixing muttered the number to himself.

"Should we go look for more?" Xiao Mingyue glanced at the sky. "We should still have a little over ten minutes. 61,000 points still feels a bit low. I’m afraid it won’t be enough to surpass Cao Zhenxing."

Cao Zhenxing typically hauled in upwards of sixty to seventy thousand points each day. With only 61,000 points today, their hopes of clinching first place felt rather slim.

"Alright, let’s look around some more," Ji Zhixing nodded. He also felt it would be difficult to secure first place now, unless Cao Zhenxing had absolutely terrible luck today.

Having agreed on a plan, the two left the area and continued their hunt for Blood Beasts throughout the secret realm. This time, however, they searched for over ten minutes without spotting a single beast.

"Looks like we won’t find any more," Xiao Mingyue sighed.

Ji Zhixing shook his head in agreement.

WHOOSH!

Right then, a blood-colored vortex abruptly manifested in front of them. The vortex wasn’t large; it rotated slowly, emitting faint spatial ripples.

"It’s time." Xiao Mingyue looked at the vortex, then up at the sky. "Time to hand in our Blood Crystals."

Ji Zhixing nodded and extracted the day’s harvest of Blood Crystals from his Genetic Furnace: three Tier Two Blood Crystals and thirty-one Tier One Blood Crystals. He tossed all the Blood Crystals into the blood-colored vortex before him. As the last of the crystals was swallowed up, the vortex blurred and vanished into thin air.

"Let’s wait. The points leaderboard should appear any second now," Ji Zhixing said.

Xiao Mingyue nodded silently.

HUM!

Suddenly, as they waited, the space around them rippled violently. The next moment, their vision blurred in a dizzying whirl. The ground beneath their feet seemed to vanish, and they felt as if they were being hauled upward by an invisible giant hand.

The sensation was fleeting, lasting only a second or two. By the time they regained their bearings, the scenery before them had completely changed. The dark red sky was gone, replaced by a normal vista of blue skies and white clouds.

They had been transported back to Yu City University.

"We’re out..."

Looking at the sudden shift in the world’s colors and the densely packed crowd of Yu City University students on the athletic field, Ji Zhixing appeared somewhat dazed, taking a moment to process the transition.

Xiao Mingyue was also stunned for a moment before letting out a long breath. "It seems the school is going to announce the points rankings on campus this time."

Ji Zhixing nodded in agreement.

"It’s just a bit of a shame. I’m afraid it’s going to be hard for us to get first place this time," Xiao Mingyue said, glancing around with a trace of reluctance in her voice.

"Don’t worry about it this time," Ji Zhixing consoled her. "When we get the chance in the future, if we run into him, we’ll snatch back everything he took from us today."

Xiao Mingyue nodded. Although she was still somewhat indignant, there was nothing else to be done right now.

"We’re out! We’re finally out!"

Meanwhile, all around the athletic field, the students of Yu City University were buzzing with chatter after emerging from the secret realm.

"I hauled in 130 Blood Crystals this time. That should net me over 100,000 points."

"I only got ninety."

"Did any of you run into a Tier Three Blood Beast? I got smacked right out of the realm in one hit."

"Today’s points rankings haven’t come out yet. Do you guys think Ji Zhixing from our regular class has a shot at surpassing Cao Zhenxing for first place today?"

"Hard to say. But I feel like there’s a chance. Ji Zhixing’s pace of racking up points these past few days has been absolutely insane."

Discussions rose and fell as everyone debated the final standings of the points leaderboard. Ji Zhixing and Xiao Mingyue exchanged a glance and both shook their heads.

"Ji Zhixing!"

Just then, three figures hurried over. It was none other than Zhou Han, Tie Shan, and Su Qing.

The three immediately surrounded them upon arriving, bombarding them with questions. "How did it go? Did you get the Underground Blood Ginseng?"

Ji Zhixing shook his head. "No."

Looks of disappointment instantly washed over their faces.

"But even though we didn’t get the Blood Ginseng, I managed to unlock the ability I needed." Ji Zhixing smiled and proceeded to recount the series of events to them.

"You can do that?!" The three were left dumbfounded after hearing his story.

"You guys stayed next to that giant snake for hours?" Zhou Han gulped.

"You guys are too bold!"

The three shook their heads in disbelief.

"It was mainly because Ming Yue had a plan. If it were just me, and I couldn’t grab the Blood Ginseng, I’d probably have had to leave empty-handed," Ji Zhixing laughed.

"What about points, then?" Zhou Han eagerly asked. "How was your points haul today? Are you confident about getting first place?"