Translator: AnubisTL
In the wilderness not far from City No. 89, Feng Jiutian stared expressionlessly at Chen Jiang's mutated beast kill count, which had surpassed two million on the ranking list. He couldn't help but sigh and click his tongue. "Xiao Ba, how did things end up like this?"
"I told Yan Pomen not to use the speaker, but he wouldn't listen."
"The moment he activated it, less than a minute later, a cannon barrel appeared."
"Ah, what a tragedy."
"I lost my fate holder captain status, and now it's suddenly fallen back into my lap."
Boom!
The subordinate driving the armored vehicle slammed his foot on the accelerator. The vehicle shot forward like an arrow released from its bow, and he chimed in, "Lord Feng Jiutian, isn't retreating like this a bit cowardly?"
"Cowardly my ass."
Feng Jiutian couldn't help but curse under his breath before saying with a grim expression, "We're not far from Yan Pomen's territory. Who knows if that Chen Jiang will find us?"
"Yan Pomen died. It was his fate."
"But I, Feng Jiutian, have no intention of dying such an ignominious death."
"We'd better slip away while we can."
"I'll go straight to my grandfather. From now on, I, Feng Jiutian, will never leave his side. The Ten Thousand Races Arena is too dangerous. My grandfather, being an old man, needs my protection."
"Yes, Lord Feng Jiutian."
Soon after, Chen Jiang and his group finished clearing the battlefield. To call it "clearing" was an overstatement; there was nothing left to salvage.
Everything—lootable and unlootable—had been reduced to ashes.
That was the downside of such overwhelming firepower: there was no chance to collect spoils of war.
One blast, and everything was gone.
Enemies vanished, and loot vanished with them.
Thus, Chen Jiang, his pockets now bulging with 2 million mutation points, returned to the base of the world tree.
The mutated beasts and alien race players around the world tree had long been cleared out by Scar Dog and Li Hao during their daily map exploration.
Scar Dog and Li Hao had been mapping the area for several days now.
With sufficient energy blocks, they could instantly teleport to any location they had previously mapped—a testament to the power of their map manifestation innate ability!
When the group returned, everything quickly fell back into its usual rhythm.
"One, two, three, hey! Give it your all, hey!"
"Four, five, six, hey! Jump with all your might, hey!"
Zhao Ritian, riding a slime, bounced back and forth between the perpetual motion machines, cheering on the slimes that were jumping tirelessly on the machines.
Meanwhile, Wang Defa stood once again in the center of the cage, his face flushed with excitement as he unleashed a furious barrage of punches at the opening before him, the ropes stretching and retracting with each blow.
Scar Dog had specially designed this steel pipe.
At the top, a phantom gate exit released a relentless hail of mutated beasts, while at the bottom, a phantom gate entrance swallowed them whole.
Mutated beasts that weren't hit or killed fell into the phantom gate entrance at the bottom of the steel pipe, preventing it from becoming clogged.
After all, no matter how fast Wang Defa swung his fists, he couldn't guarantee hitting or killing every single mutated beast.
Occasionally, a stream of water would descend from the sky, cooling down the sweat-drenched Wang Defa.
Each time the water fell, white steam would erupt from his body!
Nearby, mechanical race slaves continuously flew thousands of meters into the air before plummeting back down, racking up steps to exchange for energy blocks.
Everything was orderly and thriving.
Only Chen Jiang sat on a vine-woven chair, frowning as he pondered a crucial question:
How to spend 2 million mutation points in the mutation shop.
How should he spend this money?
Oh, right, this vine-woven chair was personally crafted by Scar Dog.
It had to be said, Scar Dog's craftsmanship was truly impressive.
Don't ask why Scar Dog knew how to make chairs.
Scar Dog could do anything; Scar Dog always had a way.
"What's this now?"
Chen Jiang, who was browsing the mutation shop for supplies, glanced at the blueprints Scar Dog had suddenly handed him. After a quick look, he frowned slightly. "Four large circles?"
He looked up at the four circles connected to Wang Defa by ropes in the distance, puzzled. "You want me to modify these four things? Aren't these just enlarged versions of your four perpetual motion machines?"
"Exactly."
Scar Dog nodded solemnly. "Brother Jiang, listen carefully. What I'm about to explain might be a bit complex."
"Wang Defa's physical capabilities are growing stronger. Our current four perpetual motion machines only rotate at 100 revolutions per minute. As Wang Defa's strength increases, this speed is clearly no longer sufficient."
"There's only one way to make these four perpetual motion machines spin faster."
"That's to have Zhao Ritian fuse higher-star slimes—ones with greater power and faster bouncing. But even that has its limits."
"After all, they're still slimes. No matter how fast they bounce, they can't make the four perpetual motion machines spin any faster."
"So, I'm planning to build four larger perpetual motion machines and connect them to the four smaller ones."
"This way, the four larger machines can increase the rotational speed of the smaller ones."
"It's based on the principle of gear ratios: a large gear driving a smaller gear results in increased speed."
"On Blue Star, car engines work on this principle. First gear uses a small gear to drive a larger one, while the highest gear uses a large gear to drive a smaller one. What I'm doing now is building four large gears to increase the speed of the four smaller ones."
"This will make Wang Defa's punches even faster."
"And give us a geometric, explosive increase in the rate at which we acquire items."
"..."
Chen Jiang stared at the blueprints in his hand with a complex expression, slowly falling silent. He glanced at the four small gears nearby for a moment before turning his gaze to Wang Defa, who was vigorously throwing punches.
After a long pause, he murmured, "You actually came up with a solution for this?"
"Naturally."
Scar Dog patted his chest with a serious yet slightly smug expression. "Scar Dog always finds a way."
"Impressive," Chen Jiang murmured, a hint of exasperation in his voice. He tucked the blueprints into his chest pocket. "I understand. I'll start modifying it later."
"Here, take this."
He pulled out something resembling an Achievement Compendium from his chest pocket and pressed it into Scar Dog's hands. "I just exchanged it at the mutation shop. Check if there's anything you want, and ask Wang Defa and Li Hao too."
"What's this?" Scar Dog asked, taking the yearbook-like object with mild curiosity.
"Go look at it somewhere else," Chen Jiang said impatiently. "Let me rest for a bit."
"Sure thing, Brother Jiang. You take it easy."
Scar Dog tucked the compendium into his chest pocket and trotted over to the base of a tree, settling down on a clean rock.
Instead of immediately opening the compendium, he lit a cigarette first.
As the crimson ember glowed and white smoke curled upward, Scar Dog finally took a satisfied drag, clamped the cigarette between his teeth, and glanced at the item's panel information.
He always lit a cigarette before tackling something important.
Not for any particular reason—it was just a habit.
Soon.
The item's description panel popped up before him:
[ Item Name: Time Anchor ]
[ Item Star: Three-Star Item ]
[ Item Details: This is an album for storing photographs, with each page capable of holding only one photo. ]
[ Item Effect: Utilizing spatial energy, it can store 1024 photos without making the album excessively thick. ]
[ Additionally, you will gain the ability to perform Time-Space Retrace. ]
[ You can return to the scenes captured in your photos, observing past moments up close as a detached observer. However, time and space will be frozen, and you will exist as a phantom, able only to observe without interacting. ]
[ Upon using Time-Space Retrace, the targeted photo will be permanently erased, along with all similar photos. ]
[ Simultaneously, the image will vanish from all recorded media. ]
[ Nothing in the world will ever record the scene you retraced again. ]
[ Item Description: "This item allows you to anchor recorded moments in time and space." ]
"A three-star item?!" Scar Dog's jaw slowly dropped, a flicker of shock in his eyes.
Exchanging for a three-star item must have cost a fortune in mutation points, especially for one with no combat capabilities. This was a pure waste of mutation points!
Brother Jiang, you fool!
A pang of suppressed pain flashed in Scar Dog's eyes, but his lips stretched into an uncontrollable grin that reached his ears.
It might be extravagant, but he loved this item!
With a hint of excitement, he laid the photo album flat on the ground and opened the first page.
It was a blank sheet of paper with a translucent frame in the center.
After a moment's hesitation, he pulled a photograph from his pocket and placed it within the frame.
The next instant—
The photo was drawn tightly into the frame by an invisible force.
Then, the blank paper began to transform. The pristine white background morphed into a faint, ghostly image of the photograph's background, and a line of bold, forceful characters slowly materialized beneath the picture:
[ Please enter a description for the photograph. ]
"Heh."
Scar Dog couldn't help but grin, flicking off his cigarette ash and murmuring in admiration, "As expected of a three-star item—truly high-class. Tsk tsk, the sheer prestige is undeniable."
This photo was the first one he and Brother Jiang took together in the wilderness.
It was taken after they found a relatively hidden shipping container in the heavily polluted river, and they snapped the picture in their excitement.
In the photo, he's grinning widely, a slightly damp cigarette dangling from his lips.
When he first arrived in this world, there were no cigarettes.
Only the pack in his pocket had come with him.
He stopped smoking when only one cigarette remained, believing that as long as he didn't finish the pack, he wouldn't die.
But that night, he lit the last one.
They had pulled off a major heist that day and found a secure hideout. Life was finally improving, and they were slowly establishing themselves in the wilderness.
In the photo, Chen Jiang is sitting on the ground, leaning against the shipping container, his head tilted to the side in exhaustion, clearly fast asleep.
Yes, Chen Jiang had fallen asleep. Before finding the container, they hadn't slept properly in days, especially after dragging their weary bodies to City 18 for the heist, which had completely drained their energy.
He had secretly taken this photo.
Scar Dog's eyes darted around a few times before he glanced at Chen Jiang, who was resting nearby with his eyes closed. He raised the photo album to his lips and quietly typed a brief description beneath the image.
Satisfied, he flipped to the second page.
From his chest pocket, he pulled out an iron box wrapped in oilcloth. Inside were stacks of photos, each individually wrapped in white cloth. He prepared to place them one by one into the album before him.
The second photo showed him and Brother Jiang in the wilderness, finally having gained some real strength.
It was a staged shot from the first time Brother Jiang's turret roared to life.
"Not bad," Scar Dog muttered.
He lit another cigarette, sat cross-legged on the ground, and hummed an unfamiliar tune as he unwrapped the photos from their white cloth coverings and placed them into the album.
The album could store 1024 photos—more than enough.
When they were old, this album would undoubtedly be their grandchildren's favorite thing to flip through.
As for the other functions of the "Time Anchor" album, he found them somewhat useless.
Being able to relive the scenes captured in photographs up close sounded impressive, but the cost was that all similar photos in the world would vanish.
That price was far too steep.
It was like destroying all the backups on your D drive for a single VR experience.
Clearly not worth it.
Overall, this item didn't deserve its three-star rating. Although he didn't know how many mutation points Brother Jiang had spent to acquire it, he felt it was a terrible value.
But... he loved it.
Soon, Scar Dog had inserted all the photos into the album, adding brief descriptions beneath each one.
"Excellent," he nodded, satisfied as he tucked the album into his chest pocket.
At that moment, Li Hao approached and casually sat down beside Scar Dog, asking with mild curiosity, "Working on blueprints? Why didn't you call us?"
"No worries, no worries," Scar Dog chuckled, pulling out a pack of cigarettes and offering one to Li Hao. "Want to share a smoke?"
"No thanks."
Li Hao waved his hand, forcing a wry smile. "Thanks, but I really don't smoke anymore. I quit a long time ago."
"Tsk."
Scar Dog didn't press the issue. He clicked his tongue in mild annoyance, then pulled out a flamethrower with an alarmingly large caliber and propped it up beside him. Grinning, he lit a cigarette and tossed it into the weapon's barrel.
"Come on, keep me company with one."
This was a flamethrower with a peculiar quirk.
(End of the Chapter)
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