43: Chapter 43 Xuan Kui

Above the altar, spiritual light surged around the three vassal phantoms, completely finishing their metamorphosis.

Su Ming swept his gaze across the altar and muttered softly, "After evolving, the Purple Zombie's name has changed to White Zombie, while the names of the Yin Soldiers and Crimson-robed Grievous Maidens remain unchanged. All three types of vassals have been promoted to Grade D. However, the unit price for a single recruitment has now risen to four hundred divine crystals, and I wonder how much their actual combat power has improved."

Su Ming could also sense that the original vassals were equally eligible for evolution, but each individual evolution would also require four hundred divine crystals.

At first glance, evolving old vassals seemed to be a loss of divine crystals, but newly recruited vassals initially only possessed the cultivation of the First Stage of Transcendence; if the original vassals were evolved, their own realms would not drop, and when calculated carefully, it was actually a steady profit with no risk of loss.

With his mind made up, Su Ming hesitated no longer, recalling all the Yin Soldiers in the Nine Netherworlds and lining them up in formation upon the altar.

Two hundred thousand divine crystals were poured entirely into the altar, and spiritual light like an ocean washed over the Yin Soldiers, causing the aura on every single Yin Soldier to undergo a heaven-shaking metamorphosis.

After a short while, the appearances of the group of Yin Soldiers had completely taken on a new look.

The baleful aura around their bodies was condensed and heavy like substance, and they were clad in a uniform standard-issue netherworld heavy armor, with physical bodies as hard as nether iron, making the previous Yin Soldiers seem somewhat frail by comparison.

Only Ada's figure and appearance had barely changed, but the power hidden within his body had surged by a large section, and his potential had even been directly upgraded to C+.

[Name: Yin Soldier]

[Potential: D+]

[Race: Netherworld]

[Skills]

Dark Nether Iron Body: Immune to lower-grade transcendent physical attacks, reduces 50% of mid-grade transcendent physical damage; pain-free and fearless, cuts off distracting thoughts; surrounded by nether iron baleful aura, close combat comes with chill and armor-shattering erosion, eroding vital blood and rusting weapons; when near death, the iron armor locks the nether soul, retaining thirty percent of origin source for brief combat.

Baleful Iron Cleaving Slash: Waves the baleful-tempered bone blade wrapped in nether baleful aura, attacks come with heavy pressure and body-stagnation; hits imbue nether poison and seal spiritual power, striking armor bursts forth internal baleful aura to break defense; charges for an instant to release a baleful wave for ranged supplementary damage.

Soul Gathering (Army Soul Skill): Continuously absorbs soldier baleful aura during fierce battles, attack power continuously rises with the duration of engagement. When an armored Yin Soldier falls, it condenses a wisp of remnant soul, and every remnant soul in the field will continuously stack defense for surviving Yin Soldiers.

[Equipment: Baleful-Tempered Bone Blade, Private Heavy Armor, Heart-Protecting Bone Talisman]

[Description: Formed from the metamorphosis of hundred-battle Yin Soldiers fusing with battlefield meteorite iron and the remnant armor of fallen soldiers, shedding the variegated and thin yin qi to transform into standard netherworld heavy armored soldiers.]

Su Ming stared at the skills on the panel and couldn't help drawing a sharp breath: "This Soul Gathering is simply too outrageous. The longer the drawn-out battle, the more soldier baleful aura it absorbs, and the offensive will only become more and more berserk; the remnant souls transformed from fallen kindred can also continuously stack defense, and the Yin Soldiers surviving on the field will only become fleshier and stronger the more they fight."

To restrain this legion, the only way was to slaughter them all completely in a short time, but a heavy-armored army formation of this scale was by no means something that could be done easily.

"Army Soul Skill... I have never heard of this kind of special skill before. When I return to school, I must ask my teacher for guidance." Su Ming pondered inwardly.

He knew clearly in his heart that even though the Divine Network's information was all-encompassing now, the information barriers between major forces were still strict.

Without sufficient identity and strength to rely upon, many secret inheritances were simply impossible to know, and Army Soul Skills were likely secrets monopolized by aristocratic clans and major families.

Temporarily setting aside the evolved Yin Soldiers, Su Ming felt anticipation rise in his heart for the metamorphosis of the remaining two types of vassals, and immediately gave the order to lead all Purple Zombies to the altar.

Two hundred thousand divine crystals were poured into the altar once again, and the bodies of thousands of Purple Zombies continuously emitted dull roars, while thick yin qi surged and wrapped around their corpses.

Before long, all Purple Zombies completely transformed into White Zombies.

In the past, the Purple Zombie's physical body had a purplish tint, its defense was acceptable, but its attack power was mediocre, and its output relied solely on corpse poison, always being used by Su Ming purely as a meat shield.

But the White Zombie was different. The White Zombie was covered in white fur all over its body, could patrol and hunt for blood at night, and its corpse poison devoured people. It was a truly formed ferocious corpse, far incomparable to a Purple Zombie.

[Name: White Zombie]

[Potential: D+]

[Race: Netherworld]

[Skills]

Frost-Furred Zombie Body: The white fur across the body reinforces the corpse body, completely immunizing against mortal weapons' slashing and chopping, isolating all pain; except for pure yang power, other poisons, extreme cold, and scorching heat cannot harm the main body.

Chilling Zombie Claws: Corpse poison merges with piercing yin frost, after hitting the target the poison invades meridians to freeze vital blood, greatly suppressing self-healing speed, continuously eroding the divine soul, causing festering wounds that are hard to heal for a long time.

Putrid Turbid Corpse Qi: Spreads gray-white turbid yin corpse qi around the body, eroding the divine souls of living beings, weakening physical constitution recovery speed, innately restraining cultivators of the vegetation and living being lineages.

Burial of Ten Thousand Corpses (Army Soul Skill): Can draw out the corpse baleful aura hidden within the enemy's body, reviving them into temporary Purple Zombie minions; minions share their own physical body damage reduction effect, corpse poison contaminated by minions will flow back to the main body, layering the chill poison power, and cannot be activated under the scorching sun.

[Equipment: Frost-Eroding Corpse Claws, Bone-Wasting Chilling Robe]

[Description: A low-level ferocious corpse formed by absorbing the thousand-year yin qi of the underground through metamorphosis, covered all over with cold white corpse fur, swift in action, bloodthirsty and fond of killing.]

"This ability is simply too tricky." Su Ming sighed in a low voice.

"The White Zombie's physical defense and corpse poison power have both improved. Previously, it could only rely on its claws to imbue toxins, but now the corpse qi around its body can spread corpse qi to erode the divine soul."

"The most terrifying thing is still this Army Soul Skill. Not only can it transform slain enemies into Purple Zombie minions, but with every additional minion, its own chill poison and physical strength will synchronously improve."

As soon as his voice fell, Su Ming's gaze suddenly locked onto the midst of the five hundred White Zombies.

A figure far more stalwart than the rest of the corpse zombies stood in the center of the corpse group, covered in a tattered, blood-stained military official's python robe. A cyan-gray skin set off a pair of crimson resentful eyes, four pure white fangs exposed, ten inch-long black armor sharp claws glowing with piercing cold intent, and the corpse qi around its body enveloped a heavy battlefield soldier's baleful aura, looking completely out of place.

Joy suddenly surged into Su Ming's eyes: "A hero has evolved out!"

His inner guess was soon verified, and a complete panel surfaced before his eyes.

[Name: Xuankui (Elite)]

[Potential: C+]

[Race: Netherworld]

[Realm: Sixth Stage of Transcendence]

[Skills]

Rigid Corpse: The physical body condenses countless years of accumulated corpse qi, the physique is incomparably hard, vastly weakening physical damage, immunizing against the vast majority of low-tier exorcism secret techniques, solely fearing pure yang spiritual power and holy light Daoist magic.

Corrosive Poison: Claws and body corpse qi both contain severe poison. When an attack hits, it implants corpse poison, continuously wearing down vital blood and blocking spiritual power operation. After multiple layers of toxins are stacked, it can briefly paralyze the target's entire body.

Treading Yin: Breaking free from the shackles of ordinary zombies that can only hop, it treads on yin qi to speed swiftly through the air, its movement technique is cryptic and silent, close combat attack speed is vastly enhanced, and small patches of chilling miasma breed wherever it lands, slowing down the movement speed of surrounding enemies.

Blood Baleful: Absorbs the vital blood of living beings and heaven and earth yin baleful aura to quickly repair injuries, synchronously surging physical strength; the heavier the injuries, the higher the physical body burst upper limit.

Yin Frost: Instantly immunizes against all binding and evil-suppressing spells upon release; the more the self vital blood is depleted, the higher the offense and defense bonuses; when attacked, it spreads a large-scale corpse fog outward, stacking continuous corpse chill curses for enemies.

Burial of Ten Thousand Corpses (Army Soul Skill): Draws the remnant soul and corpse baleful aura within a hundred zhang, reviving corpses everywhere to transform into temporary Purple Zombie minions; minions share their own physical body damage reduction, corpse poison contaminated by minions flows back to the main body, layering chill poison to strengthen claw strikes, cannot be activated in a scorching sun environment.

[Equipment: Baleful-Tempered Bone Claws, Military Official Brocade Robe]

[Description: A battlefield military official who died with a grievance in ancient times. After death, resentment entangled him, and he was nourished by the underground netherworld yin qi to transform into a ferocious zombie. Retaining complete intelligence, abandoning the foolish and bloodthirsty nature of ordinary zombies, his personality is arrogant and aloof, his actions are capricious, the baleful aura around his body is piercingly stern, he has hibernated in the world through bitter cultivation for years, and his combat power is formidable.]

After reading the panel, Su Ming had only one thought left in his heart: outrageous, incomparably outrageous.

Xuankui's level of difficulty could be called unsolvable, and his mechanisms were comprehensive in every aspect: his physical body resisted physical attacks head-on, low-tier exorcism arts were completely ineffective, and his claws' corpse poison sealed spiritual power and paralyzed enemies; the heavier his injuries, the stronger his strength and defense, and he could also rely on vital blood to self-heal and sustain himself.

Yin Frost could provide crowd-control immunity and resist evil-suppressing spells, spreading corpse chill curses whenever he was beaten, while Treading Yin's movement technique increased speed and could also perform group deceleration.

Offense and defense, sustain, restriction, and crowd-control immunity were all-inclusive. Only pure yang and holy light could restrain him, and against ordinary vassals, he had virtually no rivals.

"Xuankui greets the God Lord."

Xuankui stepped forward slowly with an elegant posture, cupping his hands in a salute toward Su Ming with thorough etiquette.

A trace of surprise flashed across Su Ming's eyes.

Ordinary zombies had rigid physical bodies, making it difficult even to bow flexibly, yet Xuankui's movements were smooth like flowing water without any sluggishness.

Seemingly perceiving the doubt in Su Ming's heart, Xuankui slightly raised his lips and explained warmly: "God Lord, my corpse body has long since shed the ailment of stiffness, and my actions are no different from ordinary people."

"Good, good!" Su Ming said twice in succession, filled with joy.

It was just that the Crimson-robed Grievous Maidens had not yet completed their evolution, so it was inconvenient for him to converse at length with Xuankui, and he raised his hand to signal him to retreat to the side and wait.