42: Chapter 42 S-Rank Hidden Reward?

As the Mist Demon Giant completely dissipated, the ground at the center of Black Tide Island was no longer calm.

Within the deep pit that had originally been occupied by the monster, as the sludge and black water receded, a metallic luster full of technological aesthetics was unexpectedly revealed.

It was a circular alloy hatch with a diameter of five meters. Although its surface was covered in moss and the marks of time, one could still discern its precise craftsmanship, which was certainly not a product of the modern era.

"What is this?"

Su Xiaoxiao leaned in and poked the door with her gun barrel: "High-strength memory alloy? This doesn't seem to be craftsmanship from this era."

"It certainly isn't."

Lin Yuan crouched down and wiped the dirt off the edge of the hatch, revealing a blurred emblem.

It was a skull logo entwined with a double-helix structure.

"This is a relic from the 'Old Era'."

A sharp glint flashed in Lin Yuan's eyes. In this world, besides martial arts civilization, there were countless technological remains left behind by humans from previous eras buried underground.

Every relic meant immense wealth and advanced technology.

"It seems this Mist Demon Giant wasn't a naturally formed beast, but rather a watchdog for this place."

Lin Yuan extended his Spiritual Telekinesis into the hatch's control panel. Although the circuits had long since decayed, the mechanical locks were still effective.

"Open!"

A musty, dry gust of air rushed out to meet them.

"Let's go down and take a look. The real treasure should be down there."

The three of them followed a rusted ladder down for about a hundred meters, and the scene before them suddenly opened up.

This wasn't a cave at all, but a massive underground laboratory.

Huge cultivation tanks stood in rows; they had long since dried up, leaving behind only some weathered, unidentified remains.

Scattered everywhere were documents and precision instruments. Although most were damaged, that sense of technology far surpassing the modern era still hit them instantly.

"My god, is this an electromagnetic rail accelerator? Is this a biological gene recombination platform?"

Su Xiaoxiao's eyes were shining: "We're rich! Even though these are broken, the chips and design blueprints inside are still there! As long as I take them back, my 'Grim Reaper' cannon can be upgraded to version 2.0!"

Lin Yuan ignored the excited Su Xiaoxiao and walked straight to the deepest part of the laboratory.

There stood an independent main control console.

In the center of the console sat a silver metal box made of an unknown material.

Seemingly sensing the aura of living people, a faint light flashed across the surface of the metal box.

Click.

The box opened automatically.

Inside lay a ring with an antique design, entirely silver-white.

"This is..."

The usually silent Xiang Lie widened his eyes, his breathing instantly becoming rapid: "A storage ring?!"

In this world, although humans had mastered a certain level of space-folding technology, they were limited by materials and energy, and could only manufacture bulky equipment like storage backpacks or storage boxes.

Being able to compress space into a tiny ring was "black technology" that only ancient civilizations could master.

In the current Federation, every storage ring was a strategic-grade resource; only Grandmasters of the seventh rank or higher were qualified to apply to wear one!

"The hidden reward for the S-rank mission, as expected, did not disappoint me."

Lin Yuan picked up the ring.

Extending his Spiritual Telekinesis into it, Lin Yuan was surprised to discover that the space inside this ring was actually a full one hundred cubic meters!

Moreover, it was a vacuum environment, which could even keep food placed inside fresh forever!

"This is a divine artifact!"

Half an hour later, the three sat on the floor of the laboratory and began an exciting "loot distribution meeting."

Piled in front of them were their spoils: one storage ring, several high-computing power chips and a pile of hard drive data, as well as that priceless top-grade soul core and the materials from the hundreds of ghoul corpses outside.

"How shall we split it?" Xiang Lie glanced at the ring; although he coveted it, he remained very restrained.

"The old rules: distribute according to need."

Lin Yuan unhesitatingly put the storage ring on his finger. With a thought, the ring automatically turned invisible and vanished from his finger.

"I am the captain and the main damage dealer, so I will take this ring. No objections, right?"

"No objections!" Xiang Lie and Su Xiaoxiao said in unison.

If not for that heaven-shaking slash from Lin Yuan, they would have long since turned into fertilizer.

"Xiaoxiao." Lin Yuan pointed to the pile of chips and hard drives, "You are from the Weaponry Academy; these ancient technological materials are most useful to you."

"Yay! Thank you, Captain!" Su Xiaoxiao happily hugged the hard drives, already imagining the scene of herself hand-crafting a Gundam.

"As for Xiang Lie..."

Lin Yuan looked at this tough guy from the front lines and pushed the top-grade soul core emitting blue light, along with all the ghoul materials on the task list, in front of him.

"You are following the path of achieving sainthood through the physical body; what you lack most is resources and money. Although this soul core is of the spiritual type, if you sell it on the black market, it can fetch at least 50 million Alliance Credits. Plus these materials..."

"With this haul, you can get 60 million in cash."

"Si—sixty million?"

Xiang Lie's hands were shaking. He worked his fingers to the bone on the front lines for a year and could only save a few million.

This one mission directly allowed him to achieve financial freedom!

With this money, he could even buy high-level body-tempering potions enough to let him break through to the third rank, or even the fourth rank!

"Old Lin, this is too much." Xiang Lie said, feeling a bit embarrassed.

"Just take it."

"Alright!" Xiang Lie nodded heavily, his eyes filled with gratitude and determination, "From now on, this life is yours!"

Three days later at Modu Martial Arts University.

The mission hall was bustling with noise; countless students were gathered in front of the big screen, refreshing the mission list.

"Have you heard? That elite junior team that took the S-rank Black Tide Island mission has been confirmed as having lost contact; they're probably done for."

"No kidding, that's Black Tide Island! A quasi-level four restricted area! I don't know what the school is thinking, actually opening up this kind of mission to New Students."

"By the way, that New Student top scorer, Lin Yuan, also took this mission, right? He must have died in there too, right?"

"Definitely. Even though he's strong, in such a bizarre place, he wouldn't even know how he died. It's a pity, a generation's prodigy..."

Just as everyone was discussing it, the automatic sensor doors of the hall slowly opened.

Sunlight spilled in, and three figures walked in with their backs to the light.

The young man leading them wore a clean black trench coat, hands in his pockets, his expression indifferent.

The burly man on the left, although his arm was wrapped in bandages, had an imposing aura.

The pigtail-wearing loli on the right carried a huge cannon pack, and was blowing bubbles with her gum.

"Is that Lin Yuan?!"

"They didn't die?!"

The originally noisy hall instantly went quiet, and everyone's gaze was fixed on the three of them.

Lin Yuan ignored the surrounding gazes and walked straight to the VIP counter marked "S-Rank Mission Settlement."

Without any nonsense, he raised his hand. Although the ring was invisible, he focused his thoughts.

Clatter—!

Countless foul-smelling ghoul claws and hundreds of gray common soul crystals instantly piled up on the wide counter, even spilling over onto the floor.

"These are the tokens from five hundred Mist-Hidden Ghouls."

Lin Yuan said in a flat tone.

Before the elder and the onlookers could recover from their shock.

Lin Yuan took out a sealed transparent box from his pocket (actually from the ring) and casually placed it on top of that pile of miscellaneous items.

Inside the box lay a pitch-black crystal fragment that was still emitting residual spiritual fluctuations.

That was the core fragment Lin Yuan had specifically kept after the Mist Demon Giant died, serving as proof of the kill.

"And this."

Lin Yuan looked at the dumbfounded elder and smiled slightly:

"I happened to slaughter that big guy; this is its core fragment. It should be enough to prove the mission is complete, right?"

The elder tremblingly picked up the fragment, feeling the residual quasi-level four pressure on it, his voice changing pitch:

"This, this is the aura of the Mist King?!"

"You, you three New Students, killed a quasi-level four Domain BOSS?!"

The whole place instantly exploded.

"Did I hear that right? Quasi-level four?!"

"That's an existence that even instructors wouldn't dare to provoke easily!"

"Are these New Students? These are clearly three monsters!"

"A miracle! This is the greatest miracle since the founding of Modu Martial Arts University!"

Amidst the crazy exclamations, the system's settlement voice echoed in the hall:

【Beep! S-rank mission "Clear Black Tide Island" completed!】

【Mission Evaluation: Perfect (SSS-rank)!】

【Basic Reward: 50,000 credits.】

【Extra BOSS Kill Reward: 50,000 credits!】

【Total: 100,000 credits! And awarded one Second-Class Military Medal!】

One hundred thousand credits!

The surrounding students' eyes turned red upon hearing this number; that was a huge sum of money they might not be able to save up even after struggling in school for ten years!

"Finally, I have money."

"Since the equipment is upgraded and the money is in place."

Lin Yuan looked at the skyrocketing balance on his wristband, turned around, and his gaze pierced through the crowd to look at the electronic list in the hall — 【Modu Martial Arts University · Combat Power Leaderboard】.

It was time to go and meet that "old friend" who had occupied the top spot for two years...