81: Chapter 81's attributes halved? Sorry, I have a million more in reserve!

Boom—!

The moment the snow exploded, Qin Ji's figure didn't pause for a second due to the recoil of landing. The pitch-black greatsword in his hand seemed weightless; using the momentum of the fall, he swept it across the snow in a perfect half-moon arc.

"Awoo—!!"

Before the remaining nine Ice Snow Werewolves could close their encirclement, they felt a bone-chilling cold instantly seep into their marrow. Their originally lightning-fast pouncing movements suddenly felt like they had been put into slow motion, becoming incredibly sluggish.

Effect triggered: [Frost Command]!

All enemies slowed by 20%!

"That's more like it."

A playful, cold smirk curled at the corner of Qin Ji's mouth.

When experts clash, they fight for that fraction of a second in judgment difference. To an average player, a 20% slow might just mean "running a bit slower," but in the eyes of a calculating schemer like Qin Ji, who factored data to the extreme, this was the chasm between life and death.

With both attack speed and movement speed reduced, it was a dimensional strike against werewolves who relied on Agility to make a living.

"Since you've slowed down, then don't move at all."

Qin Ji stepped off, his figure cutting through the gaps in the wolf pack like a ghost.

In this moment, he was no longer a Berserker who only knew how to meet force with force, but a phantom dancing on the edge of a blade. Side-step, slide, upward slash, heavy cleave! Every movement precisely timed to catch the werewolves during their attack wind-up frames.

Puff, puff, puff—!

The dull sounds of sharp blades entering flesh merged into one.

Blood stained the snow red, only to be quickly frozen into crimson ice crystals by the low temperature.

[Killed Ice Snow Werewolf, triggered "Greedy Grasp," obtained attribute: Agility +50.]

[Killed Ice Snow Werewolf, triggered "Greedy Grasp," obtained attribute: Strength +50.]

...

In just three short minutes, the last werewolf howled and dissipated into white light.

Qin Ji sheathed his sword and stood still, watching the section of attributes on his panel surge once more, exhaling a satisfied breath of white mist.

"As expected, only this kind of high-intensity mob grinding can make me feel the warmth of this world."

Just then, the rickety wooden door behind him, which had just closed, was knocked on again.

Thump, thump, thump.

The sound was dull and aged, carrying a heart-palpitating air of senescence.

Qin Ji's gaze sharpened as he turned quickly. The battle had ended so fast he hadn't even had time to go back inside; where was this knocking coming from?

"Auntie Chen, is that adventurer here?"

A slightly hunched figure had appeared in the wind and snow at some unknown point, standing before Auntie Chen's door, withered fingers lightly tapping the doorframe.

Qin Ji's pupils contracted slightly.

With his current perception attributes, he hadn't sensed when this old man had approached at all!

[Eye of Insight] activated.

[Village Chief Li (Special NPC)]

Rank: ???

HP: ???

Attack Power: ???

Skills: ???

Nothing but question marks!

Qin Ji's heart skipped a beat. In Divine Realm, there were only two scenarios for all question marks: either the opponent was a background character with no data, or... their Rank was so much higher than his that it created a tier suppression.

In this eerie dungeon, it was clearly the latter.

Creak—

The door opened, and Auntie Chen looked at the old man outside with a respectful expression. "Village Chief, why have you come? That brave adventurer is right here."

Village Chief Li slowly turned around, his clouded eyes piercing through the wind and snow to land on Qin Ji.

"Young powerhouse, I am truly grateful to you."

The old man's voice was raspy, like two pieces of coarse sandpaper rubbing together. "However, simply killing these peripheral Ice Snow Werewolves is far from enough to bring peace back to our village."

The plot quest had arrived.

Qin Ji calmly put away his greatsword and gave a slight nod. "Elder, what exactly happened here?"

Village Chief Li sighed, his gaze drifting toward the endless darkness deep within the village.

"We were once a peaceful paradise. Until half a year ago, when a deity from the West passed through... He merely cast a single glance, and heavy snow began to fall, not stopping for half a year."

"Since then, ice and snow have covered everything. Those dead corpses were resurrected under the deity's aura, becoming the monsters they are today."

At this point, a flicker of hope shone in Village Chief Li's clouded eyes. "Young man, we hope to return to the past. If you can go deep into the snow plains, destroy the Footprints of the Snow Corpse left behind, and cut off the source of Divine Power, we will offer the most precious treasure in the village."

[Ding! Hidden plot triggered!]

[Village Chief Li has issued a quest: Redemption of the Snow Plains.]

[Quest Objective: Destroy the Footprints of the Snow Corpse, purify the Divine Power residue.]

[Quest Reward: Unique Item · Weapon Evolution Scroll ×1.]

The moment he saw the words "Weapon Evolution Scroll," Qin Ji's breath hitched.

Holy crap?!

This kind of legendary item actually appeared in a side quest of a dungeon?

One must know that in the setting of Divine Realm, weapon quality was usually fixed. To upgrade weapon quality, one either had to re-forge it or use extremely rare evolution Materials.

But an "Evolution Scroll" was a Heaven-Defying divine object that could ignore material requirements and forcibly upgrade a weapon by one tier!

Qin Ji instinctively touched the prototype Divine Artifact in his backpack. If he used this thing on that...

Qin Ji, who had originally entered just to grind attributes, now had the fires of greed burning in his eyes.

I'm definitely taking this quest!

"Please rest assured, Village Chief." Qin Ji patted his chest with a righteous look. "Eliminating demons and defending the Dao is my bounden responsibility. It has nothing to do with rewards; I simply cannot stand to see the common people suffer."

A smile finally appeared on Village Chief Li's wrinkled face. "Good, good child. Go then, keep walking west, and do not look back."

After bidding them farewell, Qin Ji set out alone on the road toward the west of the village.

As he passed through the silent village, he could feel countless gazes staring fixedly at him through the cracks of tightly closed windows. There was no gratitude in those eyes, only a bone-deep fear and... a certain inexplicable pity.

It was as if they were looking at a dead man.

"Interesting."

Qin Ji sneered, his pace never faltering.

Once he stepped outside the village boundaries, the wind and snow became even more violent. The snowflakes here were no longer light flakes but like ice shards, making a clinking sound as they struck his armor.

Suddenly, Qin Ji's toe kicked something hard.

He stopped and swept away the thick snow with his foot.

A dilapidated stone tablet was revealed, carved with eight vigorous and powerful ancient seal script characters. Despite the erosion of wind and snow, it still exuded a sense of tragic grandeur.

"The Ancient Eastern Kingdom rests here."

Qin Ji's brow furrowed.

These eight simple words contained a staggering amount of information.

Players from the Dragon Kingdom should have spawned in the eastern cultivation civilization region upon entering Divine Realm. Yet this region, named the "Star Kingdom," was clearly a typical Western fantasy setting, so why was an Ancient Eastern Kingdom buried here?

The background setting of this dungeon likely involved the main storyline secrets of the game world.

While Qin Ji was deep in thought, an invisible, terrifying pressure descended from the sky without warning!

Boom—!

It wasn't a physical weight, but a tremor that acted directly on the Soul. It was like an invisible giant hand had ruthlessly squeezed his heart, making even breathing difficult.

"Is this... Divine Might?!"

Qin Ji's expression changed drastically.

He was all too familiar with this feeling. In his past life, when facing those top-tier World Bosses, just getting close would subject one to this kind of absolute tier suppression.

[Ding! You have entered the 'Land of Divine Gaze'.]

[Subjected to Divine Might suppression, all attributes decreased by 50%!]

[Affected by Extreme Cold rules, attack speed decreased by 25%, movement speed decreased by 25%!]

A series of blood-red System prompts frantically flooded the screen.

"Crack—"

A crisp sound came from his chest area.

Qin Ji looked down and saw that a [Warm Jade Pendant] hanging at his waist, used to resist the severe cold, had actually been unable to withstand the pressure and exploded into powder.

"Damn!"

Qin Ji couldn't help but curse, not out of heartache for the pendant, but for his own stat panel.

He quickly opened his attribute column.

The originally magnificent data now looked like it had suffered a stock market crash, being directly halved!

Attack power halved, HP halved, defense halved...

The most critical were attack speed and movement speed.

In this snowfield already full of slow debuffs, having another 25% of both speeds cut away felt like being fitted with a thick layer of shackles; even lifting a hand felt incredibly heavy.

"Is this the true face of Hell difficulty?"

Qin Ji gritted his teeth, and instead of backing down, a surge of ruthlessness welled up in his eyes.

So what if my attributes are slashed?

The attributes I've stacked from killing mobs were already overflowing! Even if you cut them in half, I'm still ten times stronger than you average players!

"Hiss—"

Just then, a scalp-numbing friction sound suddenly came from beneath the snow ahead.

No nonsense at all.

Boom!

The snow exploded, and a white giant python as thick as a water bucket soared out from underground. Its entire body was covered in crystalline ice armor, and its gaping maw spewed white frost, its two fangs as sharp as daggers.

[Ice and Snow Demon Snake (Bronze Boss)]

Rank: LV.55

HP: 30,000,000 / 30,000,000

Attack Power: 12,000

Skills: Frost Breath, Constriction, Snow Escape.

A Bronze Boss with thirty million HP!

Outside, this was an existence that would definitely require a hundred-man elite raid group to grind down for half an hour.

Worse yet, snake-type monsters had smooth, flexible bodies with tiny hitboxes, making them extremely difficult to stagger or launch into the air.

"Trying to use this to disgust me?"

Qin Ji narrowed his eyes, feeling the heaviness of his body.

With his current attack speed, it would indeed be hard to perform infinite combos like before. Every lengthened interval between attacks meant giving the Boss a gap to counterattack. Once entangled by this snake under the Divine Might suppression, he might truly end up dying here.

But...

Who said my attributes were fixed?

With a thought, Qin Ji opened the long-dormant "Free Attribute Points" interface.

Ever since obtaining "Greedy Grasp," he had barely touched the free attribute points gained from leveling up, keeping them as a reserve fund. After all, the attributes plundered from killing mobs were usually enough.

At this moment, the remaining points shown on the interface were: 12,800 points!

"System, add points."

Qin Ji gave a cold command in his heart. "Go all in, target—Agility!"

Since you slashed my attack speed, I'll bury you with pure numbers!

As the thought fell, the number instantly hit zero.

Boom!!!

A violent heat wave instantly washed through Qin Ji's entire body. His body, which had become heavy due to the Divine Might suppression, actually emitted a crisp sound like a bowstring being pulled taut.

What did twelve thousand points of Agility mean?

Even if weakened by 50%, the remaining value was still an astronomical figure sufficient to make all current-stage Assassins fall into despair!

"Hiss!"

The Ice and Snow Demon Snake clearly hadn't expected the aura of the prey before it to surge so suddenly. It instinctively sensed danger and its massive body lunged forward, trying to strike first.

But in Qin Ji's eyes, the giant python's movements were... too slow.

"Sorry, the turn-based game is over."

The greatsword in Qin Ji's hand vanished, replaced by a longbow emitting a faint glow—a piece of spare purple gear he had just fished out from a corner of his backpack.

Although he wasn't skilled in archery, as long as the attack speed was fast enough, the arrows would form a continuous line.

Twang, twang, twang, twang, twang—!

The sound of the bowstring vibrating was no longer a crisp single note, but a dense, continuous hum, as if a thousand bees were flapping their wings at once.

In this instant, Qin Ji's arm became an afterimage.

Countless pitch-black arrows poured out like a torrential rain, every single arrow precisely pinning the same spot on the snake's vital seven-inch mark!

-11023!

-11024!

-22048 (Critical)!

...

Densely packed damage numbers rose like a waterfall, directly obscuring Qin Ji's vision.

The Ice and Snow Demon Snake, which had just lunged into the air, didn't even have time to land before it was pinned in mid-air by this terrifying kinetic energy! Its body trembled violently under the impact of the arrow rain, like a rag struggling in a storm; it simply couldn't land, much less counterattack.

This was the violent aesthetic brought by ultimate attack speed—Infinite Airtime!

Amidst the swirling snow, Qin Ji's expression was indifferent, his fingers mechanically and frantically plucking the bowstring. His violet-gold pupils reflected the Boss's constantly dropping health bar, as cold as a killing machine without emotion.