Chapter 432: The Legendary Equipment Stone Four-Piece Set

The Blood Bath Queen’s death caused the wave of blood covering the Transylvania Kingdom to vanish. Countless members of the Blood Race, caught off guard by the sudden sunlight, were instantly reduced to piles of ash.

The Church’s military forces immediately advanced, striking straight for the heart of the enemy and occupying the entire Transylvania Kingdom in remarkably short order.

Naturally, they then began to clean up the remaining members of the Blood Race and their loyal ghouls.

Compared to the Son of the Dragon’s Wallachia Kingdom, the Blood Bath Queen’s Transylvania Kingdom was a much easier target.

After all, the people there hadn’t known they were being ruled by the Blood Race; they had always believed humans were the rightful authority.

So, daily life didn’t change much. It was simply a matter of the rulers at the top being replaced by a different group.

However, their personal safety was now far more assured. After all, the Church didn’t eat people, nor did it indulge in such depraved pastimes.

As a result, the disappearance rate plummeted.

Then, the Daywalker was plunged into a flurry of activity. He only made time to chat for a moment when Qi Suian came to visit.

He had expected Qi Suian to urge him to set off and kill the Piercing Demon as soon as possible, but the outcome was not what he’d anticipated.

Qi Suian simply requested various resources—and a considerable amount at that—supposedly for the purpose of studying the Blood Bath Queen’s corpse.

The Daywalker generously gave him everything he asked for without a hint of hesitation.

After all, as far as he was concerned, spending a few resources to appease Qi Suian and keep him quiet was a worthwhile investment.

In truth, he was also worried Qi Suian would urge him to depart. The Church couldn’t afford to lose him just yet.

Besides, the Daywalker wasn’t keen on fighting alone again. Once the situation was stable, he planned to lead the Church’s Extraordinary forces and march directly on Villerlis Town.

Intercepting and killing the Blood Bath Queen had been a last resort.

He simply couldn’t bring too many people, or it would risk tipping off the enemy.

’This feeling... the Blood Bath Queen is like a low-spec version of a Blood Race Sacred Artifact.’

’So this is solid proof: the Blood Race Sacred Artifact *is* the Blood Race Ancestor, Cain.’ Qi Suian thought, comparing the data in his hands. This was good news for him.

’After all, it means I don’t have to fight the Blood Race Ancestor as a boss.’

’I’m not arrogant enough to think I can just ignore a powerhouse on the level of a race’s ancestor.’

’So the source of the Blood Race’s power is actually the Blood Race Ancestor.’

’Only after being divided into so many pieces was he transformed into the Blood Race Sacred Artifacts.’

’The source itself never actually changed.’

’As for why the Blood Bath Queen didn’t have the usual Blood Race weaknesses, that came from her mother’s bloodline. It gave her a vitality that other members of the Blood Race lack.’

’The other members of the Blood Race are just corpses, but she, due to the power of the Red Sea, became one of the living dead... no, more like someone in a vegetative state.’

’The humans she Embraced turned from living to dead, but they didn’t retain that vitality.’

’But these aren’t inherent weaknesses of the Blood Race. Rather, the Blood Race is cursed.’

’A curse, almost like a fundamental rule of the world, forces them into these illogical methods of death—being unable to see the sun, being killed by a wooden stake, and so on.’

’It is what grants them their Extraordinary dark power, but it is also their Achilles’ heel.’

’I suspect that besides the Blood Bath Queen and the Piercing Demon, even the Blood Race Ancestor has these weaknesses.’ As his research progressed, Qi Suian uncovered more of the truth about the Blood Race.

The Blood Bath Queen and the Piercing Demon were special because their mother was the Red Sea Witch Lilith. They used the power of the Red Sea to resist this curse, creating a balance.

Other members of the Blood Race lacked this advantage and were naturally inferior.

’As expected, it’s the story of the fratricide from the Old Testament.’

Qi Suian casually stitched the Blood Bath Queen back together, then tossed her directly into the Melting Furnace.

Because she was already dead, she burned with extreme efficiency, converting into a massive amount of evolution energy in no time.

His armor value began to skyrocket, reaching 170 points. He evolved three times in succession, gaining three new module slots.

’She was actually this valuable?’ Qi Suian was a little surprised.

He had expected one evolution at most. It seemed this second-generation member of the Blood Race was truly something special, especially since she embodied two rules of extremely high quality.

’I’ll have to think carefully about these three module slots,’ Qi Suian mused, pondering his next move.

’Normally, the plan would be to install modules for things like insulation and protection.’

’I could just mindlessly stack defensive stats; being tougher is never a bad thing.’

’But this opportunity is just too perfect. It makes me want to install the Enhancement Stone, Enchantment Stone, and Refining Stone directly as modules.’

’If this works, I can start a complete enhancement, enchanting, and refining process. The power boost would be far greater than what those other modules offer.’

’What is there to even consider? Just slot them in.’ Qi Suian took out the three types of stones he had modified and installed them directly as modules.

[SSS·Legendary Equipment Enhancement Stone]

[SSS·Legendary Equipment Enchantment Stone]

[SSS·Legendary Equipment Refining Stone]

[SSS·Legendary Equipment Quality Stone (Set Module)]

Good news: it formed a set.

The first three modules were enhanced versions of their base effects. The last one, the Quality Stone, had the effect of bestowing the Legendary quality upon a piece of equipment.

Normally, Qi Suian himself wouldn’t have an equipment quality, since he wasn’t a piece of gear from a game.

He only had base stats. But with this module, he could grant a piece of "equipment" the Legendary quality buff.

Even a piece of basic, un-statted equipment could become a Legendary item.

’First, I’ll use it on the Tai Sui God... no, wait. First, I’ll use it on myself!’

Qi Suian didn’t immediately begin the full enhancement process on his modules. Instead, he used the ability on himself first.

And what do you know—it actually worked.

It even brought up a status panel for him.

[***]

[Quality: Legendary]

[Attributes: All Stats +100 (Equipment Max)]

[Enchantment: +100% All Stats (Max Enchantment)]

[Enhancement: +12 (All Stats +120%)]

[Equipment Requirement: Cannot be equipped]

"Holy shit... I feel like I could kill a hundred of my former selves with a single punch," Qi Suian thought, his expression one of pure awe.

’But this "All Stats +100" probably doesn’t refer to the stats from the apocalypse game, but the stats from the game world that used to exist within the Ghost World.’

Still, this panel was ridiculous. It was treating him like a piece of equipment.

It was most likely because he had merged with the Tai Sui God.

[Warning: Supernova Strong Nuclear Reactor power level has dropped to the alert threshold.]

The AI Brain immediately sent a warning, telling Qi Suian to pay attention.

"The power consumption is this high?" Qi Suian hadn’t expected that.

[Correct. Although your baseline power consumption from the Supernova Strong Nuclear Reactor has decreased significantly since you merged with the Tai Sui God, it is clear that each use of the Legendary Equipment Stone module expends a massive amount of energy.]

[It is projected that you will only be able to augment one module per day.]

[Furthermore, according to my calculations, you will need to re-apply this augmentation to all modules every time you evolve to enhance them. The good news is that subsequent augmentations, aside from those on newly added modules, will not have such a massive energy cost.]

"That’s reasonable." Qi Suian wasn’t displeased. This was never meant to be a one-and-done deal.

As he evolved and grew stronger, his modules would naturally grow with him, becoming even more powerful.

’The "Equipment Max" brings my base potential to the absolute limit, while the Enchantment and Enhancement provide additional stat boosts on top of that.’

’As for the Legendary Quality, it allows me to reach the peak of my existing potential. It’s the foundation for the Enhancement, Enchantment, and Refining, allowing those three effects to reach their maximum potential.’

’No wonder this is the set bonus for the Legendary Equipment Stones. It seems the most useless, but it’s actually the most powerful.’

’The results you get from calculating with the stats of normal equipment versus the stats of Legendary equipment are completely different.’

Qi Suian quickly grasped the augmentation effects of the Legendary Equipment Stone set.

This was just the beginning. He would have to enhance one module every day from now on.

’For the next couple of days, I’ll use the Legendary Equipment Stone to augment all of my energy-related modules.’

’My energy reserves should be more plentiful then. I won’t say I can do it many times, but I should be able to manage at least two augmentations a day.’

[Negative. You will still only be able to perform one augmentation per day. After augmenting your Energy Modules, you can then choose to augment the Legendary Equipment Stone module set itself, creating a recursive loop, before augmenting other modules.]

[This will grant a stronger augmentation effect, but the energy consumption will also increase once more.]

The AI Brain had just given Qi Suian a powerful method for recursive enhancement.

Qi Suian fell silent.

’If the recursive loop works, doesn’t that raise the upper limit? And if I loop it again... I could infinitely Enhance, Enchant, and Refine without even needing to evolve...’ Qi Suian had found a potential loophole.

Augmenting it once would raise its own upper limit. Then, using that new, higher limit to augment itself again would raise the limit even further.

By repeating this recursive process, he could become invincible as long as he had enough energy.

[Theoretically, this is feasible. However, it does not align with your best interests.]

[You could indeed continuously augment the Energy Modules and the Legendary Equipment Stone module set to give the set an extremely high upper limit.]

[However, this would be of no use in improving your own personal strength.]

[Therefore, I recommend you perform augmentations in rounds. One round consists of augmenting every module once. Repeat this process continuously.]

[After all, your goal is to enhance your own strength, not merely to raise the upper limit of the Legendary Equipment Stone module set.]

Qi Suian’s idea was clever, but it put the cart before the horse.

He was upgrading the Legendary Equipment Stone set to make himself stronger. But trying to maximize the stone set’s augmentation potential at the expense of his own power progression would be counterproductive.

The gains would not be worth the losses.

The best method was just as the AI Brain had said: proceed with augmentations, round by round.

Only then would his gains be maximized.

Otherwise, no matter how good the augmentation potential became, if he couldn’t actually use it to empower himself, it would be useless to him.

"So, I can do two augmentations in the first round, but only one per round after that?" Qi Suian narrowed his eyes, feeling he had been too hasty in augmenting himself first.

Fortunately, the total energy cost was the same; it would just take a bit more time.

[Correct. Alternatively, you could choose to install more Energy Modules to increase your energy capacity.]

The Legendary Equipment Stone set was similar to the Tai Sui God’s own infinite growth, but its energy consumption was truly massive.

So massive that the AI Brain had no choice but to suggest that Qi Suian install even more modules.

’Looks like I’ll have to free up some more slots for Energy Modules.’

’The return on investment isn’t low, after all.’ Qi Suian had to admit the AI Brain had a point.