Chapter 221 Decision, Abnormality, Battle
Three days passed quickly.
In the past few days, Zhou Chen had first borrowed some money from a few rich natives with the help of the bizarre shoes' invisibility and phasing ability. Then, he collected information about the interspatial ring. In the end, he unlocked the interspatial ring in a shop opened by a Mage and bound it to himself.
The event with the Mage did not go completely well. The other party saw that he was not knowledgeable and had tried to cheat him. It ended up in him beating the Mage and forcing him to help in binding the interspatial ring.
Zhou Chen did not take this small episode to heart. This Mage had ordinary strength. If he still dared to provoke him, it would not be as simple as getting beaten up.
"This Survival mission feels so easy. It's so comfortable living in this city."
At this moment, Zhou Chen was standing in the courtyard of a luxurious house he had rented, drinking wine and eating barbecue. He felt very comfortable.
He was very rich now. Apart from the money he had borrowed from the rich, there were also a lot of money in his interspatial ring.
Dong dong.
Suddenly, there was a knock on the door.
"Come in." Zhou Chen shouted.
Then, a woman dressed in a long robe and a black mask walked in and handed him a letter.
"The information you want is here." A pleasant voice came from the mask.
"Alright, let me take a look."
Zhou Chen took the letter from this person and quickly read it. Then, he handed a few coins to this very well-dressed woman.
"This is your fee."
"Thank you. If you need any more information, please contact me directly. I will be at the same place." She accepted the reward and turned to leave the mansion.
'So this world has so many faiths. It matches what I've learned in the past few days. '
Zhou Chen muttered inwardly as he put down the letter filled with information.
The woman was a mercenary. She had accepted the intelligence-gathering mission issued by Zhou Chen and collected some information he needed, such as some secrets about the gods of this world.
After summarizing the investigations over the past few days, Zhou Chen learned that there were many faiths in this world and many extraordinary organizations. At the same time, he learned some things about the "Twilight of the Gods".
The change in the sky a few days ago was the beginning of the Twilight of the Gods. According to the news from some large churches, there were some changes in the divine realm where the gods lived. Many magical arts that relied on the gods had lost their effectiveness since that day. There were rumors everywhere that a large number of gods had descended to this material world, and the extraordinary experts welcomed the opportunity to kill the gods and ascend.
No one knew how much of this information was true, but it really made many people restless. They began to secretly search for the location of the descending gods. There was even news that suggested that some organizations had long predicted this matter to happen and had already produced some results.
"I don't really want to get involved in these things."
Zhou Chen had already obtained some information about divinity in the past few days. This cost him a lot of money.
Divinity was very precious in this world. It was very difficult to obtain divinity in the material world. After extraordinary experts accumulated enough divinity, they could condense their own godhood and become gods after igniting their divine flames.
The gods in this world were different from what Zhou Chen had thought. Not only were there many of them, but there was also a huge difference in their strength. There were sovereign gods, superior gods, intermediate gods, lower gods, and demigods. Generally, the gods' strength depended on their authority and divine power. The strongest sovereign gods had many authorities and great divine power, while the lower gods had no authority at all. They only had weak divine power, while the demigods only had slight divine power.
"The god descendant I killed should be a demigod. His strength doesn't seem to be very outstanding."
Zhou Chen did not know much about the strength of the gods in this world. He could only say that they had weakened greatly, but he would not lower his guard and deliberately provoke them.
The real reason why Zhou Chen did not want to care about these gods was that after thinking about it for the past few days, he had decided not to walk the path of gods.
According to his investigation, the gods of this world needed the faith of the believers to exist eternally. They were not immortals who lived freely without the need of any external reliance. Moreover, it was said that the stronger the god, the weaker their individuality would be. The strongest Sovereign God seemed to exist according to the natural laws. This did not suit Zhou Chen who valued his individual self.
'Forget about the path of the gods, I should just focus on cultivating.'
Zhou Chen did not plan to specifically search for gods to obtain divinity. Although divinity was marked as a gold-ranked item by the system, since he did not take this path, then it had no meaning to him. He should spend more time cultivating the Eight Desolates Coiling Dragon Supreme Art and become a Martial Dao Human Immortal before talking about anything else.
After all, he was only nineteen years old. There was still a lot of time to choose for him.
Therefore, Zhou Chen had spent a lot of money to rent this mansion. This mansion had its own large courtyard, and was very suitable for him to focus on training.
He had yet to achieve partial mastery in the Eight Desolates Coiling Dragon Supreme Art. There were still many things he needed to figure out.
Just like that, Zhou Chen focused on cultivating. Half a month passed in the blink of an eye.
On this day, Zhou Chen was meditating in the courtyard when he suddenly extended his hand. A reddish yellow flame rose from his palm, as if his palm was on fire.
"I've finally grasped the first elemental attribute transformation of the Eight Desolates True Energy. I believe I'll be able to finish the other seven attribute transformations soon."
Zhou Chen had not trained in the Eight Desolates Coiling Dragon Supreme Art for a long time, but his progress was not slow at all. This was not only because he could focus easily, but also because of his Pure Yang Overlord Body talent. It was this talent that made his cultivation and breakthrough speed far surpass others.
"It's been a long time since I went out. Let's take a stroll outside."
Zhou Chen felt a little constrained from all the cultivating. Since he had made substantial progress in his training, he planned to go for a stroll.
After changing into a casual outfit, he opened the door of his mansion and walked out.
The mansion he rented was in a quiet area of this city. There were no other houses nearby, and he had to pass a small path through a wood to enter the busier city.
But before he reached the city, he realized a problem.
"Why is it so quiet in front? There is no one outside?"
The city in the distance seemed to be empty, looking quite strange under the light of the day. Zhou Chen did not know if there was some special event going on that the residents did not go out.
"By the way, the information I ordered yesterday did not come. Does that woman not want the reward?"
After thinking about the abnormalities, Zhou Chen quickened his pace and walked towards the city.
A few minutes later, he arrived at the street and really felt the abnormality.
There was no living person on the street, in all the houses, and in the shops. There were only some corpses with painful expressions on their faces.
"Everyone in this city is dead? So suddenly?"
Zhou Chen was very puzzled by this situation. Although he had been training in a rather remote mansion, it was not like he did not have any perception of the outside world. If anything major happened here, he would definitely be able to discover some clues.
But since he did not notice, it meant that the change had occurred very suddenly and quietly.
"Poison or disease?"
He observed the corpses on the street and found that their skin was slightly dark and had some strange red spots.
Puzzled, he continued to walk in the quiet city, searching for more clues.
As for himself, he was not too afraid of being infected by this poison or disease because his physique was different. Most of the people who died were ordinary people. The difference between them and him, who was a high silver rank, was too huge. The fatal factors to these people were basically insignificant to him.
After walking in the city for a while, Zhou Chen finally sensed living people in his Bloodthirst perception. He immediately quickened his pace and approached.
On a street, two strange people in black robes and crow beak masks were walking together. As they walked, they flipped the corpses nearby and discussed.
"The quality of these corpses is too poor, they are not enough to bear our Lord's strength."
"There's not much time left. We have to choose two qualified goods as soon as possible."
Zhou Chen, who was invisible and listening to the two of them silently, suddenly appeared in front of them and asked,
"Who are you? Were you the ones who killed everyone in this city?"
Zhou Chen activated the Suppression passive skill. This passive skill's effect was similar to the pressure of a god. It could make the weaker person feel a lot of pressure and submit.
However, even though Zhou Chen had revealed his strength, the two weaklings in front of him did not panic. Instead, they suddenly began to pray.
"Great Lord! Your humble believer prays for your attention!"
"?"
Zhou Chen was puzzled by their reaction. He was a little puzzled as to why they were so decisive.
At the same time, he increased his vigilance and observed his surroundings to guard against any new force.
However, the current situation was very obvious. Zhou Chen did not need to observe carefully.
The two strange people in black robes with bird beaks in front of him suddenly turned into a ball of disgusting pus. Then, this nauseating liquid quickly gathered and changed, quickly forming a thin and tall man wearing a tattered black robe whose face was covered in moss.
This man had a strange appearance, making it impossible to tell his age. He seemed to be very old, but also seemed to be quite young. His entire body emitted a strange pressure, making Zhou Chen know that his strength could not be underestimated.
"Who are you?" Zhou Chen asked solemnly.
However, this strange person in front of him did not seem to plan on talking to him. He only looked at Zhou Chen for two seconds before his entire body suddenly exploded and turned into a large ball of mucus that enveloped him!
"Hehe, you want to fight? I'll take you on!" Zhou Chen was not afraid of the strange person's sudden attack. He might not be good at other things, but he was very experienced in fighting.
He quickly gathered all the Eight Desolates True Energy in his body into his right fist and punched at the incoming liquid. A reddish yellow fist imprint that was larger than a building appeared in the air and collided with the mucus.
In the next moment, a mushroom cloud formed out of thin air. The surrounding street area exploded. An intense explosion mixed with an unknown sizzling sound was heard. The mucus that covered the area was directly scattered by the punch and quickly gathered, attacking him again!
"You want to catch me? With your speed?"
Zhou Chen could clearly understand that the other party, who had turned into mucus, wanted to wrap him up, but he clearly would not let him succeed.
Although this strange person's speed was very fast in the eyes of others, it seemed very ordinary to Zhou Chen. It was only a pipe dream to rely on this speed to attack him.
"With my body's strength, I can probably withstand the mucus even if it touches me, but it's better to be careful."
Zhou Chen was very confident in his body, but he would not be brainless and rash. He used his advantage to constantly use the Eight Desolates True Energy to attack it from afar. Although this guy seemed to be very capable of withstanding it, the feeling of being beaten one-sidedly was definitely not good.
The duration of this battle was forcibly extended. Zhou Chen used the Gravity Control, Windrun, and the Eight Desolates True Energy to maintain a high speed. He attacked the other party from afar again and again, shattering him.
There were even two times when the other party activated the effect of Zhou Chen's Freeze and temporarily turned into an ice sculpture. Zhou Chen grabbed the opportunity and smashed it into pieces.
However, after this battle, Zhou Chen did not see the other party weaken too much. Instead, he felt that something was wrong.
"Cough cough, my body is being infected. This guy is poisonous."
Zhou Chen had already realized that this opponent seemed to be releasing some invisible contamination. It was not wise to fight a protracted battle with him. If this continued, he would be dead before the other party was exhausted.
"I have to risk it."
It was not like Zhou Chen had never encountered such a situation. As a martial artist, he had to have the courage to take the risk.
"This mucus state is really disgusting. The effect of my Eight Desolates True Energy with the fire attribute is not that great, and it's even more useless to use the physical attribute to attack from afar. Looks like I have to try close combat."
Zhou Chen did not panic when his external attacks did not have much effect on this disgusting guy, because he had a passive skill called Enforce. This passive skill was a divine art for martial artists as it allowed them to attack all kinds of strange opponents.
"Die!"
Zhou Chen suddenly stopped kiting and charged towards the mucus that was chasing him.
Under the protection of the Shield passive skill, he charged into the enemy's embrace and punched the other party.
After this punch, Zhou Chen faintly heard some strange sounds. At the same time, he realized that the mucus did not gather as quickly as before after it was blasted away. Its speed had decreased greatly, and it lessened in volume.
At the same time, he felt an uncomfortable pain in his body, and his head felt a little dizzy.
"I have to finish it quickly!"
Zhou Chen knew that he had to persist and destroy the other party as soon as possible.
