A chill swept through the surroundings as the tip of the staff began to form a sphere of ice.
When the ice orb reached a certain size, Bai Qiu adjusted his aim and hurled it forward.
It traced a graceful arc through the air before smashing into a Dragonfang Soldier.
“Crack! Snap!”
The moment the orb struck, it shattered, bursting into a spray of icy crystals that coated the Dragonfang Soldier in frost.
In the next instant, the Dragonfang Soldier froze midair and dropped straight to the ground.
“Crack, crack!”
The frozen soldier had become extremely brittle—upon hitting the ground, it shattered into several pieces and dissolved into white light, dead beyond doubt.
Bai Qiu glanced at the quest panel—sure enough, it didn’t count toward the quest progress.
At first, the Frost Staff’s basic attack disappointed him; it clearly had flaws.
But after witnessing its full properties, he began to appreciate its design.
The ice orb’s direct damage was mediocre—like being pelted by a snowball.
Its true power lay in the burst of ice crystals after detonation.
The crystals had a strong penetrating effect, and once they seeped through a target, the victim’s body became extremely fragile.
A mere fall from a few meters could shatter a Dragonfang Soldier with ninety percent of its HP remaining, instantly emptying its health bar.
Bai Qiu concluded this was quite a decent basic attack—control, armor break, and vulnerability, all in one.
Even if he altered it to deliver instant kills on weaker monsters, it might lose its intended versatility.
Still, to complete his quest, he had no choice but to find a way to boost the Frost Staff’s first-stage damage.
After several rounds of testing, Bai Qiu gathered the frost energy into new configurations—and at last, he created a true ice spike.
The condensed ice took the shape of a triangular cone, shooting forward in the direction of his finger.
Its speed and range far surpassed the previous ice orb.
The icicle pierced clean through the Dragonfang Soldier’s abdomen.
The monster died instantly, and the spike continued flying for over ten meters before dissipating into a gust of cold air.
Common Monster Progress: 1/100
Bai Qiu frowned slightly as he watched the updated progress.
Truthfully, while the power was up to standard, he wasn’t satisfied—there was still much room for improvement.
Moreover, the system didn’t acknowledge the attack as a new skill.
In exchange for power, he had discarded the original effects of control, armor break, and vulnerability.
Clearly, this kind of attack wouldn’t be effective against elite monsters…
“Forget it—just consider it practice,” Bai Qiu muttered, continuing to refine and experiment with new attack methods.
By noon, he finally managed to slay his first Dragonfang General of the day using the Frost Staff.
Unfortunately, since he hadn’t quite dealt enough damage for an instant kill, the system judged it as a failed attempt after the monster crashed into a wall.
Checking the map, Bai Qiu noticed that another Dragonfang General four kilometers away had vanished—most likely slain by one of the top-ranked players using a Noble Phantasm.
Elite monsters on the map were gradually dwindling, and many players had now received the “Ten Dragonfang Generals” quest—the same one as his—but with different rewards.
Bai Qiu’s reward was an ocular-type skill, but in the Cross-Zone Chat, he saw another player share theirs:
Overclocked Soul (C-Rank)
Passive Effect: Increases base stats by 10%. Taking damage grants additional boosts—the higher the damage taken, the greater the amplification.
Active Skill — Overclock Mode (C+): Unlocks when HP falls below 50%.
Upon activation, all attributes, skills, and even Noble Phantasm power are increased by 200% for 30 seconds.
During Overclock Mode, the Overclock Will takes control of the player’s body, fighting with perfect efficiency and utilizing the player’s full potential.
After Overclock Mode ends, the player enters a weakened state lasting 5–30 hours, with all attributes reduced by 60% and experience gain reduced by 50%.
Skill Cooldown: 48 hours.
That skill caused an uproar in the chat channel.
But since it was a unique skill, once the first player completed the first and second stages of the quest, all other players who had accepted the second-stage quest automatically failed it.
They were then required to return or purchase the skill that had been granted in advance for stage two.
This, in turn, triggered a massive wave of competition.
Teams began to fracture, and many well-developed players split off to hunt on their own.
Zhang Shiyao had mentioned this to Bai Qiu before—she had also tried to take on the quest.
But once Bai Qiu completed the second stage, her quest was immediately marked as failed, though she still kept the first-stage reward.
However, Zhang Shiyao considered the downgraded version of the skill too weak, and believed it would be difficult to upgrade later on.
So, she chose not to learn the skill Triple Arcane Crystallization Eye.
After all, apart from the top-ranking player, the regional exclusive version of that skill had a maximum cap of only D-rank.
Before long, such skills would probably become as common as cabbage.
Only C-rank skills were the true core of future power, and Bai Qiu could already foresee that the C-rank threshold would trap him for a long time.
And just as he thought, the first and second stages of regional exclusive skills were mere warm-ups—only the final complete version brought true transformation.
While others merely had screenshots of the third-stage final reward, Bai Qiu had already personally obtained that very reward ahead of time— the Sevenfold Arcane Crystallization Eye.
However, with his current strength, he was still far from capable of controlling it.
If he tried to learn it now, it might even backfire on him in the short term.
Closing the chat window, Bai Qiu shook his head slightly.
He decided it was better to keep practicing— he needed to be absolutely certain he could instantly kill a Dragonfang General before attempting to complete the quest again.
Otherwise, at this rate, all the regional quests around here would end up completely neutered by his progress…
At that moment, in the chat channel:
Player 1: “Hey, isn’t Zone 2233 developing really well? Has anyone there completed the first-stage quest yet?”
Player 2: “Yeah, you guys have that merchant who sells all kinds of supplies, gear, and potions. Someone must’ve completed the first stage by now, right?”
Player 3: “Nope. Nobody here’s completed the first-stage quest.”
Player 1: “Why not?”
Player 4: “That doesn’t make sense. People in Zone 2233 are thriving thanks to that merchant. Don’t tell me the first stage is that hard?”
Player 3: “No, it’s not that. It’s because someone already finished the second stage—and it’s the same person who took the first one. For most of us, when we reach the required level and talk to the [Sage], it just says we can spend 1,000 Sanctum Coins to buy the nerfed version of the skill — Triple Arcane Crystallization Eye (E-Rank).”
Player 2: “Hiss… that’s kinda scary. So you’re saying someone in Zone 2233 already has the full C-rank version of that skill?”
Player 3: “Umm… yeah, pretty much.”
Player 5: “It’s true! I’m from Zone 2229. I just checked the map — every elite monster within a 50-kilometer radius of Zone 2233 is gone! They even cleared into other zones!”
Player 6: “Haha, guess developing too fast really isn’t always a good thing. Now most of the slower players can’t even freeload the twice-downgraded version of that skill.”
Player 7: “+1”
Player N: “+1”
— The end of the Chapter–
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