You have activated a new faction-Bloodshed Land. Current Relationship: Indifferent (0/300)
You have activated a new faction-Klent Kingdom. Current Relationship: Indifferent (0/300)
Summer Night Flower and the others were just about to feel cheerful when more notifications came, stunning them.
Your Grade S Main Storyline Mission (Secret War: Section Zero] has failed. You have received a new mission (Secret War: Bloodshed Land). Accumulated Mission Rating has been reset.
You have joined the opposing faction of the Purple Crystal Civilization.
Relationship with the Purple Crystal Civilization is now (Hostile).
Some of the Colton Star Cluster Star System civilization Relationships have been reset to zero and are now (Indifferent).
You have joined the opposing faction of Section Zero.
Relationship with Section Zero is now [Hostile).
You have joined the opposing faction of the Black Star Army.
Relationship with the Black Star Army is now [Hostile).
You have lost the identity as a Black Star Army member. Faction interface and faction store are shut down. You will no longer receive services from the Black Star Army.
Relationship with the Black Star Army characters has been reset to zero. Contribution Points have been reset to zero.
Summer Night Flower and the others were stunned. Although they did guess that they would lose many things when switching factions, they still felt quite heartbroken when it actually happened.
Suddenly, everyone’s communicator rang. Phillip’s sub-program jumped out. His original cute and child-like voice became cold and robotic.
“You have betrayed the Black Star Army and decided to join the enemy. You will no longer receive services from the Black Star Army in any form. This program will automatically uninstall… Uninstallation complete, hum…”
The next second, the sub-program of Phillip disappeared. It looked like it had uninstalled, but it was actually hidden for background monitoring purposes.
Something like this would not happen if they had just joined a neutral faction. However, joining the enemy meant betraying their former faction, so it was inevitable they would be punished and lose the Favorability of their original faction, thus becoming enemies.
Summer Night Flower felt heartache. Suddenly, he felt the furious looks of the players around him and was forced to the corner.
“You have to give us an explanation!”
Such a colossal loss hurt their weak nerves. They had built up those faction Relationship Points and Favorability through the course of two entire versions, but now they were all completely gone. The hundred or so players were furious.
“Let me explain!” Summer Night Flower said hastily. “I said this long ago. There will definitely be risks in changing factions. The benefits of Klent are more long term. There’s a higher chance of winning the secret war, and there are fewer people to fight for resources with. Most importantly, there is a chance to be affiliated with a Universal Civilization. These are all future potentials. We have to give up the short-term benefits in exchange for long term profits. This is an investment! An investment! Do you get it?”
The others were indeed there because of the future potential of Klent; it was just that the tremendous loss made them lose their senses. After hearing Summer Night Flower’s explanation, they calmed down a little.
Summer Night Flower smiled and said, “Guys, don’t panic. The damage of losing the Favorability of the various factions in Colton is actually not that huge. This is because we will be developing in Klent’s territory in the future, where there’s less competition and more resources. Even though we must start climbing up from the bottom, there will be more benefits in the future. Just wait and see, there will be more people joining Klent because of the Universal Civilization sooner or later, and we will be one step ahead.”
The other players had different looks on their faces. These people only wanted to make profits, not losses, but since they were already there, there was no way of turning back. They could only trust Summer Night Flower and keep walking down this path.
Seeing that everyone had calmed down, Summer Night Flower breathed a sigh of relief.
Among the players, Hate the Heavens was the calmest. His goal was to experience a different storyline, so he could totally accept the losses. Seeing that the gamblers around him were so anxious, he thought that it was quite funny.
At the same time, Summer Night Flower and the others did not know that the moment they betrayed the Black Star Army, a new mission was suddenly pinned at the top of the mission list of the army. It was a wanted notice for Summer Night Flower and the rest.
Bounty Mission: (Army Wanted Order]
Mission Introduction: The Black Star Army shows no mercy for traitors. All members will receive a reward for killing the traitors.
Mission Requirements: Kill or capture the traitor alive.
Reward: Based on the target’s strength.
This is a Repeatable Mission.
The players were not the only ones that received this; the hundred million Black Star Army members could all accept this task.
Issuing a bounty was a definite outcome; this was the standard procedure for how most organizations dealt with traitors. Although the players were important to Han Xiao and he gave them enough freedom and benefits, he was certainly not going to miss out on the necessary punishments. Otherwise, his faction would be a joke where the players could join the enemies whenever they wanted.
If the army did not draw a distinguishable line, he would be the one to suffer losses in the end, which would be even more troublesome.
“Someone betrayed the Black Star Army?”
“It’s actually a group of players? I thought they were NPCs.”
“Summer Night Flower? Isn’t this the guy that said the Klent faction is better? So, he’s making an example of himself? Not bad.”
“This means that these players have joined the opposing faction and will become red names, so will we be rewarded every time we kill them?”
The players in the army were thrilled. It had been a very long time since there were players in the opposing faction; the earliest ones were those unlucky people that joined the Germinal Organization in Version 1.0. After so long, there were finally players who they could PVP in the open.
If the traitors were NPCs, they would be gone after being killed once, but if they were players, they could kill them as many times as they wanted. It was a reusable resource!
On the other side, shortly after Summer Night Flower and the rest calmed down, their friends contacted them privately.
“What? We’re all wanted”
Summer Night Flower’s mouth opened wide with shock.
Doesn’t that mean that the millions of players and hundreds of millions of NPCs of the Black Star Army will all be chasing after us?
This was a much more severe consequence than he had expected!
Summer Night Flower gulped uncomfortably. He suddenly felt a sharp sense of coldness from behind him. He turned stiffly like a robot and saw the enraged looks of the hundred players.
“I–I can still explain…”
Summer Night Flower forced a smile. After a thorough explanation and convincing, he finally put out the flames of rage of the people around him.
Such a severe consequence was something that he did not expect. Summer Night Flower carefully observed the faces of the others still lingering with anger and was scared.
If he had guessed wrong, the people of the army would not even have to chase him; these people beside him would all be waiting at his revive point to kill him countless times over and over again.
In a certain Star System in the Colton Star Cluster, four spaceships surrounded a dark red spaceship. Energy chains and beams locked the dark red spaceship in its place.
The leader of this group of small galactic pirates stared at his prey through the porthole; greed appeared on his malnourished face
. The galactic pirate subordinates behind him were also delighted
Due to the rise of the Black Star Army, the lives of the galactic pirates in the Colton Star Cluster had become much worse. The name of Black Star struck fear into the hearts of even the big galactic pirates. A small galactic pirate group like them could only act in an extremely low-profile manner, like mice.
Finally, they met a lone spaceship, and they quickly came to rob it.
“I found it. This is a Crimson Coated Grade spaceship. It’s very expensive!” A subordinate found the model of the dark red spaceship online and was overjoyed.
The galactic pirate leader clenched his fists in excitement. Intending to seize this dark red spaceship, he hastily threatened them through the communication channel. “Don’t run away, and don’t fight back, or we will destroy your spaceship!”
It seemed like the people inside the dark red spaceship were scared. The spaceship stayed stationary and did not show any signs of fighting back. The galactic pirate leader felt relieved. He controlled the spaceship and slowly moved closer. Mechanical arms extended out of his spaceship and were about to connect with the dark red spaceship.
At this time, a high energy reaction suddenly exploded from this dark red spaceship. A red energy wave expanded in a sphere and passed through the four other spaceships in the blink of an eye, penetrating them like they had no physical form.
The smiles of the galactic pirate leader and his subordinates were fixed on their faces.
Flop, flop!
The next moment, all the galactic pirates on the four spaceships collapsed. The smiles were still on their faces, but their eyes had lost their color. Their minds were shattered in an instant, and they became corpses.
Gray shadows were dragged out of the corpses by an invisible force, turning into a rolling cluster of fog and flying toward the dark red spaceship, gathering on a white palm.
With no expression on her face, Hila absorbed that soul energy. Her Esper ability became stronger by a negligible amount.
She could absorb the remaining mind energy of dead beings to strengthen her own Esper ability. She did not have an opportunity to do so on Floating Dragon, but now that she had entered the galaxy after finally becoming Grade A through intense training, she would have plenty of opportunities to kill people. Hence, she discovered this method of becoming stronger.
In terms of growth potential, Hila was not below the average player.
However, she would not be so mad about becoming stronger and slaughter planets for it like in Han Xiao’s previous life.
“Sis, what should we do with these four spaceships?” Aurora asked while controlling the spaceship.
On Floating Dragon Island, other than training her Esper ability, Aurora had also gained other knowledge and knew how to operate a spaceship.
“Bring them along. Maybe Han Xiao will want to modify them.”
Hila was not very interested in the loot. She reflected on the battle. Since she had always been training with Ames, she did not know how strong she was exactly.
I seem to be… quite strong?
After a long trip, Han Xiao and the other two finally arrived at Austin’s Hidden Red Robe Abbey after more than half a month.
Chapter 730 - Universal Treasure
As a famous Beyond Grade A organization, the location of Hidden Red Robe Abbey was known to the public. It was located in the Gelock Star Cluster and was also known as the Palace of Hidden Spells.
Palace of Hidden Spells was a large palace that floated in the universe, and this palace was Austin’s Mage Pagoda. It was used as the base of Hidden Red Robe Abbey.
The Mage Pagoda was important equipment for a mage, and it was both useful in combat and for research purposes. As the Mage Pagoda of a Beyond Grade A Mage, it was said that the Secret Law Temple had 48,000 different formations. It had a perfect attack, defense, movement, and life support systems. Furthermore, it had projections in a few hundred secondary dimensions and was able to leave the universe and enter those dimensions at any time.
If it was classified into a grade, the grade of Austin’s Palace of Hidden Spells would exceed that of orange equipment and would be at the level of a ‘Universal Treasure’. It was the equipment of the highest grade, the gold grade.
The spaceship approached the Palace of Hidden Spells, and the trio looked out of the window and admired the gigantic palace from afar.
The Palace of Hidden Spells was majestic and luxurious with essence gold and dense silver as its foundation. It was decorated with colorful magical crystals all around and looked like a dream-like castle in the universe. The palace could be broken down into many different layers with plenty of subsidiary pagodas all around. A magical glow enveloped the entire palace and covered it with five colored gas. Numerous energy source formations were inscribed all around the protective shield of the palace to absorb a portion of the dark energy from the universe to replenish the consumption of the various formations.
“How majestic,” Feidin said with admiration.
“How luxurious,” Marian said with reverence.
“How rich,” Han Xiao said with envy. He truly saw things differently from others.
If those from the Mechanic class were like merchants, then those from the Mage class were like local tyrants. Especially a Mage of Austin’s caliber. The thickness of his wallet was something that even Han Xiao could not help but feel envious about.
Han Xiao then sought permission from the Palace of Hidden Spells to land, and after receiving permission, he piloted the spaceship toward the dock.
At this moment, the dock was filled with many different models of spaceships that came from different Star Systems. They were all there to seek apprenticeships. The Palace of Hidden Spells had always been open to the outside world, and countless mages chose to research magic in this place. If one threw a random brick out over there, at least two mages would end up being hit for sure.
Hidden Red Robe Abbey was a neutral mage organization. Austin did not work together with any Star Cluster civilizations and did not attempt to expand his armed force either. He allowed the majority of mages to enter Hidden Red Robe Abbey to cultivate and shared knowledge with them. As long as one raised their membership level, one would be able to gain access to knowledge that was of a higher grade. The organizational structure was extremely loose, and their number of members was certainly greater than that of Bloodshed Land. However, only the Forbidden Sorcerers and a few other armed forces were considered Austin’s direct subordinates.
According to Han Xiao’s understanding, Hidden Red Robe Abbey was like a private mage school, and Austin was the principal. His direct subordinates were the lecturers, and the various armed forces under him was like the security detail of the school.
The trio stepped onto the dock, and there were already people waiting for them. The one waiting for them was Desoro, who had previously appeared to bring Lagi back.
“It’s been more than ten years. You haven’t increased your rank?” Han Xiao remembered him and began to joke.
“You must be joking. His Excellency Magus is waiting in the main hall. Please follow me.”
Desoro’s attitude was much more respectful than before. Ten years ago, he had still dared to exchange pointers with Han Xiao, but now, he did not even dare to compete with Han Xiao.
The few of them then chatted casually as they entered the Palace of Hidden Spells.
“The energy level of this place is so high.” Marian took in a few deep breaths and felt extremely refreshed.
“Hmm. The Palace of Hidden Spells is capable of absorbing the dark energy and magical elements floating around in the universe and can raise the density of magical energy here,” Desoro explained. “A mage who meditates in this place will see their efficiency increased greatly, and there is also sufficient energy to conduct various magical experiments. Even if one isn’t a mage, breathing in the air here will allow one’s spirit to be greatly refreshed.”
Feidin then frow
ned and said doubtfully, “I feel my Psychic energy being suppressed in this place. I am unable to release it too far, and it’s greatly restricted after fifty meters.”
“It’s like this. Because many mages carry out their own magical research in this place, they set up various restrictions to prevent any mental probing. Releasing one’s Psychic energy in this place carelessly is a taboo,” Desoro said.
The few of them then entered the main hall.
Numerous thick magical books floated in midair, releasing a silver glow like the stars in the sky, seemingly forming a milky way in the main hall. There were a few hundred half-transparent Austins floating in midair and reading different books. They were all his doppelgangers, and Austin’s main body was seated atop his throne with his eyes shut. His hand was currently supporting his head up, and it was as though he was having a good nap.
The moment Han Xiao and the others walked in, Austin detected their presence and woke up from his slumber with a lazy yawn.
“Black Star, you’re here.”
Austin wiped off the saliva by his lips, and his saliva transformed into a small, sky-blue dragon about the size of a finger and flew away.
“Your Excellency Magus,” Han Xiao greeted, and both Feidin and Marian followed after him.
Desoro left tactfully and shut the doors.
“It is so rare for you to seek my help. We can talk later. Let me see what Psyker did to you.”
Austin got off from his throne, and his numerous doppelgangers returned to his main body like birds returning to their nest. He then walked in front of Han Xiao, and his height was only at Han Xiao’s waist. His large and baggy red robes were dragged along the floor like a carpet.
Austin then shook his head, and his feet left the ground. Levitating until he was at Han Xiao’s eye level, he raised his tiny hand and tapped on Han Xiao’s forehead lightly. After taking a look at the psychic toxin in Han Xiao’s mind, he let out a gasp of surprise.
“How is it?” Han Xiao felt his heart sink. For a Beyond Grade A Super to be startled, could it be that his situation was terrible?
The Legendary Mechanic c1-1385 Page 464