"I need to submit it near Dongwu City. Don't worry, since you discovered this pattern, once I get the reward, I won't treat you unfairly." He patted the Guard Brigade member's shoulder.

Excitedly, he opened the forum and started looking for similar posts near Dongwu City.

If you're not actively searching, you might not pay much attention; you'd just feel a bit sorry for how unlucky the players are.

However, if you notice this and search the keywords, the forum on this side of Dongwu City is truly shocking.

Baiyi was the missile launched five days ago, and in these five days, similar posts have numbered in the hundreds. There's even a bizarre one where someone inexplicably charged into the Dawn Potion Shop and got blown up by skeletons.

The complaints grew louder, but the game company hasn't given any response.

The impossible tasks received responses last time, which indicates that this is all normal—meaning, there's a force messing with the players.

Or rather, some force is using the players.

Demacia started seriously watching the videos players posted and carefully observing each NPC.

The Guard Brigade member's mission is Divine Level, which is different from his.

The Divine Level mission seems to be against the entire Federation, while the Hell Level is mainly about Dongwu City. As long as the Black Night Rose can no longer stay in Dongwu City, his mission would be complete.

The two top players stopped wandering aimlessly and started staying in the city, searching for posts and making PowerPoint presentations. Once their mission is accomplished, the secrecy of the Black Night Rose will be completely broken.

At least the players would know how to target this terrifying organization.

Meanwhile, in the Inner City District, at the Dawn Potion Shop.

[You crafted the Silver-Level Energy Gun·Barrett, Experience Value +1000, Extra Experience Value +1000.]

[You crafted the Silver-Level Frenzy Potion, Experience Value +800, Extra Experience Value +800.]

[You crafted the Silver-level Flesh and Blood Seal, Experience Value +2000, skill points +1, Extra Experience Value +2000.]

[You crafted...]

After continuous crafting for several days, Baiyi's Experience Value has reached [Level 44 (295600/370000.)]

He manufactured a batch of items the soldiers could exchange for, including one hundred Silver-Level Barrett rifles, one hundred Silver-Level potions, and something that should be able to store that Mutated Lord's body.

Because as soon as Bodun brought back the Lord's body, Baiyi could feel the Dark Side stirring. The initial power of that thing comes from the Abyss, and the Lord watching over the Mutated Zone from the Abyss might be related to desire.

The Dark Side primarily consists of Evil Thoughts, and the desires from the Abyss are mostly related to rage, killing intent, and devouring emotions.

This means the body can continue to strengthen Evil Thoughts.

The reason for not strengthening it right now is that his Spiritual Power is lagging. The growth of Evil Thoughts is extremely rapid; slaughter can make it stronger, transformation can make it stronger, even restructuring the foundation can make it stronger.

This is an imperfect transformation. The stronger his spirit, the stronger the transformation will be.

During the crafting process, he continually consumed Soul Crystals, and now his Spiritual Power has terrifyingly reached 530.

This isn't weak, even if placed at the Golden Middle Tier level. So far, the Spiritual Power the Soul Gourmet brought him is close to two hundred, adding to the enhancement from the Spiritual Growth specialty.

This allowed his Spiritual Power to surpass all others, and the power of his soul kept gaining strength, ultimately making his defenses extraordinarily formidable.

If with current Spiritual Power, encountering that Clown again, perhaps the Dark Side wouldn't even need to act; the Light Side's combo alone could instantly defeat the Golden Lower Tier.

The educational districts Baiyi mentioned also published tasks for the Ministry of Education, but establishing a college isn't that rapid. It takes about three months to complete the recruitment of various talents and construction.

However, Baiyi wasn't in a rush to hide the Black Night Rose, and he couldn't find it either.

What made Baiyi a bit uneasy was another phenomenon. In true game timeline, version 1.0 is a development phase, helping players to familiarize with the game and level up.

Version 2.0 extends beyond the Federation; once players switch roles, various Mutated Zones outside the city will increase.

Among them, players near Beiyuan City posted about getting instantly killed by a monster full of question marks.

The video shows a fleeting shadow.

Baiyi wasn't unfamiliar with that figure. It's from the prelude of version 2.0, which tells of Ancient God Believers starting to appear on Xiya Continent, recruiting those intelligent beings surviving in the wild and establishing one after another Ancient God Kingdom. Most beings in these kingdoms are brainwashed.

They are belligerent, rational, fearless, gradually mutating under the influence of the Ancient Gods.

Those Ancient God Believers are eccentric; they don't seem in a hurry to make their gods descend. Their wars have no purpose; they fight simply for the sake of fighting, repeatedly attacking the Federation in waves, causing tremendous casualties.

Not only the Federation, these kingdoms also drive monsters from Mutated Zones to fight the Federation relentlessly, inflicting significant losses on the Federation.

It's just that from the first appearance of Ancient God Believers, it was supposed to be at least ten years before they arrived.

Now the 3.0 Black Night Rose got exposed ahead of time, will the 2.0 Ancient God Kingdom also come early?

It seems like there's nothing left from 1.0...

Baiyi pondered, as the lab's beeping started again.

Baiyi shook his head, no longer thinking about these things. The rise of Ancient God Kingdoms from emergence to true establishment took over a decade. Even if the Ancient Gods speed up their pace due to his actions, it can't be completed in the short term.

The current Ancient God Believers are likely only using God's name to save those chaotic intelligent beings outside. At least in the next few years, it shouldn't be a big problem.

"What's up?" Baiyi pressed the communicator and asked.

"Boss, Miss Diane is here; she says she's looking for you." Luoning's voice sounded, with a somewhat peculiar tone.

Baiyi paused, suddenly recalling a fat sheep. His face lit up with joy; was his Legendary Equipment ready?

He quickly got up and walked out.

As soon as he stepped out of the lab, he immediately saw the much-anticipated big... lady, and he warmly said, "Welcome, Miss Diane, to our grand occasion. I've been looking forward to you for so long. You look quite well."

Diane glanced at him with pleasant spirits, then took out a pendant from her Space Ring and tossed it to Baiyi: "Here you go, the size you envisioned wasn't feasible, this is the best I could do."

Baiyi caught it with both hands, staring at the thumb-sized lantern, somewhat stunned, and he checked its attributes.

Perhaps because he provided the blueprint, the scanner that could originally only identify Golden Equipment scanned out this item's data.

[Name: Soul Lantern. (Pendant)]

[Quality: Legendary. (Superior)]

[Durability: 30/30.]

[Equipment Effect: Can absorb the souls of targets killed by the wearer, and purify and compress them into Soul Crystals. The more souls absorbed, the higher quality the Soul Crystals will be. If the soul reaches maximum capacity and the crystals are not extracted, excess souls will continuously enhance the crystal's quality.]

Soul Collection: 0%

Equipment Requirements: None.

Introduction: Could the dead just lie still, not utilizing their value? --- Baiyi.

Price: 100000 Gold Coins.]

Baiyi was taken aback, then a sincerely radiant smile appeared on his face: "Though it's a bit off from what I anticipated, this is already excellent."

Diane: ....

She rolled her eyes: "This is an improvement; the one you envisioned could only produce fixed Soul Crystals and at most only produce one batch a day, whereas this can produce energy of Soul Crystal Core quality as long as your Soul Energy is sufficient. You got lucky and you are still complaining; your face is really thick."

"Don't mind those details, Luoning, serve coffee... wait, serve milk, I have a business deal to discuss with Miss Diane." Baiyi said with a smile, leading Diane towards a corner of the hall.

Since no one came to buy items anymore, the hall no longer displayed those models; instead, it became Luoning's Divination House and laboratory.

The original set of sofa and table with a living room was also moved into the hall.

"Yes, Boss."

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