Chapter 188: A Small Storm
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
If the students who did not practice the Ultimate Style and the members who were in the Ultimate Style study group who had the same fighting strength were compared, the latter generally had a 20% better survival rate on the battlefield.
Even if they were injured, they seldom lost their fighting strength or suffered life-threatening injuries.
Even if they were drenched in blood and looked as if they were suffering from terrible wounds, they could still jump around in a lively manner and run back to the base.
Everyone else’s killing efficiency had largely fallen. The people who could kill thirty or more monsters in a day could now only kill a bit over ten. But the Ultimate Style enthusiasts did not have a clear decrease in killing efficiency.
Based on what they said, when they stepped into the swamps filled with traps and faced the evolved and mutated monsters, they felt as if they were fish in water and could do whatever it was that they wanted to do. In an instant, they could sense the ingenuity of the Ultimate Style.
Meng Chao had taught them many skills, such as repeatedly side stepping when they faced monsters, making their muscles tremble slightly when they attacked, and shaking their heads subconsciously when they launched fatal strikes. It might have seemed stupid and unnecessary before the storm and brought no benefits, just wasted stamina and made them miss opportunities to attack.
But after the storm, it became a crucial tactic. Not only did it allow them to expand their peripheral vision and be constantly prepared to avoid attacks that might come at them from anywhere, they could also use more complicated movements to throw the vastly more intelligent monsters off their rhythm, along with using more attack trajectories that made it difficult for the monsters to dodge.
In other words, the Ultimate Style looked as if it was born for the brand new battles. It was a natural counter to the new generation of monsters.
When the communication lines and the information transfer channels were cleared, though such moments were rare, a lot of battle data and the experiences of the fighters at the frontlines were sent back to Agricultural University’s martial arts course.
Gu Jianbo was shocked and delighted.
Even the pioneer of the Ultimate Style did not expect that Meng Chao’s arrival would bring such brilliant hope for the Ultimate Style.
Even though the northern offense suffered a setback, it offered a unique turning point for the rise of the Ultimate Style.
And as expected, the ten years of experiments and countless researches ensured that Blade Dancer had a lot more theoretical knowledge than Meng Chao.
He immediately gathered all the experimental data of the Ultimate Style and the achievements at the frontlines and wrote a few articles that held a lot of weight.
The martial arts course’s Dean Zong Yue also used his great judgment, authority, and incredible tolerance to seize this tactical chance that would disappear in just a short moment. He used the large network he had gained after he became a Deity Realm elite and reported the various achievements of the Ultimate Style to the university. Then, he sent them out to the alliance of the five universities and the major corporations created by his alumni from Agricultural University, Red Dragon Army, and the Supernatural Tower.
In just a short while, the Ultimate Style was no longer a conjurer’s trick that had caught momentary attention online. Instead, it entered the sights of the powerful people of various areas and the absolute powers who had the right to control the fate of Dragon City.
Of course, since they were now facing a brand new fighting style, countless wild theories and even heretical ideas with false reasoning popped up, just waiting to be tested.
But the Ultimate Style was one that had been refined multiple times in Meng Chao’s previous life, and it was the martial art ideal that was the most suited for the brand new fighting style. It stood out very quickly.
Quite a number of Agricultural University alumni who were now famous became incredibly interested in the Ultimate Style and were willing to invest in their university to expand the scale of the experiments related to the Ultimate Style.
The other four universities in the alliance invited Gu Jianbo to give lectures, attend exchanges, and explore how the Ultimate Style could blend with the other martial art styles and fighting occupations.
As the military school students, Ma Hong, and the other officers who were serving in the army, they promoted the Ultimate Style with everything they had, so even the Red Dragon Army decided to create a lecture team consisting of instructors to learn the essence of the Ultimate Style and verify it with the military’s own methods. If things went well, it would have the chance to spread among the millions of Red Dragon Army soldiers.
When Gu Jianbo happily told Meng Chao about this news, Meng Chao only smiled faintly.
It was not because he was calmer than his tutor, but because he already knew that they had gained initial success when he saw the skyrocketing contribution points at the top of his vision.
He had completed half of the Fight for the Ultimate Style quest, and he had now gained more than one hundred thousand contribution points.
He was just a small b.u.t.terfly who had returned from the apocalypse. He had been covered in wounds and totally insignificant, but as he continued flapping his wings, he finally stirred up a small storm.
The future was changed!
With Blade Dancer Gu Jianbo and Black Tortoise Zong Yue protecting the Ultimate Style, they would continuously perfect and promote it, so Meng Chao felt completely at ease about this.
Now that he was free of worries, he could start killing monsters at the frontlines as he wanted and provide even more fighting data for the Ultimate Style.
Unfortunately, Shattered Starlake was shrouded in fog, and the interference from spirit energy magnetic fields was very strong. Not only did it cripple the internet and the fighting data chain, even the cameras, IR detectors, tactical computers, and other slightly more sophisticated equipment faced interference at an atomic level—their electron sh.e.l.ls were affected. Slight changes occured in these machines, which resulted in their failure and inability to record battles.
Meng Chao could not record himself training madly day and night nor his fights.
Due to various reasons, he could not send all the monster carca.s.ses he killed back to the base either.
His vision was not good in the fog, and he was gradually going deeper into Shattered Starlake, to the point that he reached the border separating Shattered Starlake and Graveyard Forest, which was a dangerous region where superbeasts might appear. The normal students could no longer match his rhythm.
Aside from Wu Wu, Chu Feixiong, and another handful of people, few people knew just how Meng Chao had become.
Everyone just had a blurry idea that after he practiced the Ultimate Style, he became far stronger than a normal broken-star superhuman.
But in their minds, there was a limit to his strength. At most, he was at the same level as Sun Ya, Xie Feng, Duan Lian, and Jiang Rui, the Four Great Kings of Agricultural University’s martial arts course.
Even Sun Ya and the other three thought the same way.
They admit that Meng Chao had been improving very quickly recently. They could see him going through a change almost every day. His gaze became sharper, and the killing intent coming from him was getting stronger. If anyone came into contact with him at close distance, they felt as if they could not breathe.
But the amount of monster carca.s.ses that Meng Chao brought back every day in exchange for monster coins was not that much higher when compared to theirs. After they got through the most brutal first few days, they got used to the all-new fighting style, and their strength as well as experience increased by leaps and bounds.
Besides, the Ultimate Style had a fatal weakness. It could only be used to harvest normal monsters and could not deliver a fatal strike to superbeasts!
This meant that Meng Chao was fated to only fight in Shattered Starlake. It was difficult for him to enter Graveyard Forest and join the more intense fights, because there were plenty of superbeasts there.
Due to this, Sun Ya and the other three had a psychological advantage over Meng Chao. They were people who treated going into Graveyard Forest as their goal!
Then, one day in early December, they formed a party with Meng Chao for the first time after the storm to go to a dangerous zone near Graveyard Forest.
Before the storm, the danger level of this region was registered as Deep Yellow, which meant that there might be a normal monster’s nest over there. There was even a possibility that there would be normal monsters who had mutated into superbeasts as well.
After the storm, the lakes connected, and the areas around them turned into swamps. The danger level appraisals in the past lost all their significance, especially in areas that were close to Graveyard Forest. Superbeasts from the forest might pop up there at any moment after fleeing from Heaven Realm elites.
Among the freshmen, only the people who were at the level of the Four Great Kings from the martial arts course would dare to form parties and go there, because they had been improving at lightning speed during the fierce fighting over the past few months and had a great understanding over the subtleties of spirit tattoos.
But Meng Chao walked in front of them with two Surging Lightnings at his waist. With light footsteps, he stepped on the muddy ponds.
Sun Ya and the other three watched his back and discussed him.
“Using the Ultimate Style to harvest mooks is pretty good, actually.”
“Next time, when we go into Graveyard Forest to fight, we should bring Meng Chao. Even if there are a lot of normal monsters in Graveyard Forest, with him around, we can save a lot of our stamina and pay more attention to fighting against superbeasts.”
“That’s right. Even though the Ultimate Style doesn’t have enough power, its users are very agile, and they’re really good at dodging. When we face superbeasts, Meng Chao should be able to run and attract the superbeasts to kite them, thereby giving his party members the chance to deliver a fatal strike,” Xie Feng said. “With such a deviant in the team, our efficiency would increase by leaps and bounds.”
“Besides, he also knows how to poison, set traps, launch sneak attacks, perform injury examinations, and harvest!” Duan Lian added. “With Meng Chao around, we won’t need to bring a harvester with us. If we had another person with us, we’d be wasting more of our strength, and that harvester would be a burden. It’s better if a party is as simple as possible.”
“Agreed,” Jiang Rui said. “Let’s get a clear grasp of Meng Chao’s strength today. We’ll see if he has the right to join us in Graveyard Forest!”
As they spoke, Meng Chao suddenly froze in front of them.
Sun Ya and the other three also smelled the abnormal stench in the air. When they heard the hissing sounds that came from the depths of the fog, gooseb.u.mps broke out on their skins.
A dozen slithering figures appeared vaguely in the rolling fog.
There was a long, vertical slit in their murky eyeb.a.l.l.s. Their fangs were in rotting flesh, and their scales stood high like blades. They shone with a dim, chilly light. The pythons were longer than ten meters, and they formed monstrous looking slithering lines in the swamp. They were one of the most powerful existences among normal monsters—Blade Shattering Pythons!
Compared to the Blade Shattering Pythons Meng Chao and the others had encountered during the national college examination’s practical exam, the wild species were thicker after they evolved and their blade-like scales were more compact and sharp.
The pythons could also move faster. The fierce light that shone dimly in their eyes showed that they possessed incredibly high intelligence. Based on the number of bodies that popped out in the fog, there were about thirty of them!
“No good, it’s a nest of Blade Shattering Pythons!”
The expression of Sun Ya and the other three changed.
Even though the Blade Shattering Pythons were normal monsters, once so many of them appeared, they were still very difficult to deal with.
Besides, since there were around thirty Blade Shattering Pythons gathered together, there might be a python king among them, and it would be a Grade One superbeast known as Blade Shattering Python King!
The group was solemn.
“If there are so many Blade Shattering Pythons around, not even Meng Chao can—”
Before the sentence could be completed, Meng Chao stepped forward lightly and jumped into the thirty Blade Shattering Pythons baring their fangs.