Origin Paradise!

[Hint: You are currently in the midst of a grand ceremony]

[Hint: You have acquired the Alchemy skill "Heartless Death Curse"]

[Name: Heartless Death Curse]

[Category: Active Skill]

[Quality: Rare]

[Effect ①: Applies a curse to the target within the line of sight. Each curse consumes 20 energy points, up to sixteen times per day, and can be stacked. Each curse reduces the target's defense by 1%. The specific effect depends on the target's health level.]

[Note: During the war, a legend circulated on the Somme battlefield that Charles would die there, unable to escape from life after life.]

……

[Hint: You have already met the prerequisite of becoming an Alchemist]

[Hint: You are currently in the midst of a grand ceremony]

[Hint: You have completed 3809 hunts]

[Hint: You now have a rhythmic heartbeat]

[Hint: Your skill Frenzy Rhythm and Heartbeat Engine are now combined]

[Name: Hunting Engine]

[Category: Active Skill]

[Quality: Excellent]

[Effect ①: Increases blood flow, boosting movement speed and reflexes by 30%]

[Effect ②: Each attack applies one layer of Hunting Mark, up to a maximum of five layers. Each mark detonates, dealing 20% ​​additional damage. When fully stacked, the special effect "Hunter" is activated, causing the user's attacks to cause the prey to bleed continuously for 5 minutes. Each skill activation consumes a total of 200 energy points.]

[Note: In the failed grand ritual, you, as the alchemist, unexpectedly became the winner.]

In the library, Jiang He picked up the fragments of the Ant Rider's carapace, listening to the notification sounds. The Heartless Death Curse was an unexpected bonus, but apart from the quality improvement, the Hunting Engine wasn't very innovative; it was basically a combination of the previous Frenzy Rhythm and Heartbeat Engines.

The problem is that he is in the midst of a so-called grand ceremony. The word "grand" is quite significant, as it is far beyond what an ordinary knight's ascension ceremony would qualify him for. It is certain that something dramatic has happened in the underground tomb.

"Let's go," the Grey Knight said in a slightly somber tone.

"Is the porcupine's disinfection ability also part of your plan?" Jiang He asked casually.

The two walked up the spiral staircase and descended.

When questioned, the Grey Knight answered truthfully: "No, how could the Ant Knight's trump card for revenge after death be revealed so easily? I have no ill will towards Porcupine and Tommy, they are comrades after all."

There was only a faint light in the stairwell.

The Grey Knight suddenly smiled and suggested, "You shouldn't carry the raven on your shoulder anymore. It hasn't shown any combat ability. The violators are suspicious of their surroundings. As long as they get close to each other, they won't miss the intelligence officer's guess, or at least they will become suspicious."

Jiang He said indifferently, "If he wants to stay, he can stay up there. Mind your own business."

The raven flapped its wings in a show of defiance.

After a hundred steps, the area ahead gradually brightened.

The Grey Knight chuckled, "I never expected a violator to fight alongside an Executor. The rewards from Origin must be pretty good."

Jiang He said calmly, "I've never seen a fish that's in a hurry to be slaughtered."

“That’s right. There’s only one silkworm. Your gun is indeed worth the effort to cultivate. I also have reasons not to back down. We’re definitely going to have to fight to the death. Do you think the silkworm can develop intelligence if we use it on a skeleton?”

"I don't know. You have a deep relationship with the Insect Sword."

"More than that, he's my wife's brother. We first met at a family gathering. We were both interested in the level above knights, so we founded the Reverse Tree Sword. Of course, he later wanted to grind me to dust."

The Grey Knight sighed softly as he recalled the past, “Life is like a train. The departure point and the destination are fixed. The train runs on the tracks, but there are wildernesses on both sides of the tracks. If you want to see them, you have to risk a train crash and death.”

"What lies at the end of the wilderness? Perhaps high mountains. Once a person can't climb over them, they'll regret it and miss the days on the railway tracks. I regret it now. I shouldn't have become a player. I shouldn't have come to this world to meet her. But how can a derailed train go back?"

"But then again, if you stay on the railway tracks until you reach the end, you might regret for the rest of your life that you never went to the wilderness."

"You have no idea how dazzling she was a hundred years ago. A Prussian became the second-in-command of the Royal Knights. She was my superior, my comrade-in-arms, and later my wife. Unfortunately, a hundred years have passed in the blink of an eye."

Jiang He said, "What a long last words."

"Just a little sentiment before parting with my comrades," the Grey Knight retorted, not to be outdone.

Stepping out of the spiral staircase, a wide-open view unfolds before you: an empty underground palace with 777 load-bearing stone pillars scattered about, its area nearly equal to the combined area of ​​the library's interior and exterior.

The air was thick with the smell of dust and mildew, as well as the pungent stench of blood. Two or three hundred corpses lay scattered on the ground, including knights from Great Britain and Prussia, as well as monsters with human bodies and insect heads. Every living thing was dead, and blood seeped out, making the corpses look extremely dry.

Blood flowed continuously from the walls and countless narrow passages connecting to the outside world. The essence of the Death Knights outside the library gathered here, spreading through the obscure alchemical patterns on the ground to cover the surface of the seven hundred and seventy-seven stone pillars. All of this together formed the vessel for the grand ritual.

On the skeletal throne in the center of the mausoleum palace, a burly man rested his hands on a heavy sword, his expression deathly still.

The golden-haired lion knight knelt at his feet, headless. The old man, whose aura was as sharp as a falcon, had his legs severed and bled to death. His gray eyes were fixed on the alchemical pillar closest to the Bone Throne, filled with greed and resentment.

Following Falcon Sword's gaze, Jiang He saw dense alchemical symbols. Once the importance of the symbols was understood, the interpretation was not difficult, or rather, it was simply an experimental deduction note.

Alchemical rituals have four fundamental elements.

First, it is a carrier; second, it is a symbol; third, it consists of four major elements; and fourth, it is the original formula.

Firstly, the carrier is easy to understand; it is the basis for alchemy to take effect.

Secondly, the symbols are all-encompassing. The higher the level of the ceremony, the more symbols are needed, and they must be rigorous and closed-loop.

The four elements are wind, fire, earth, and water, among which water and fire are the most common and convenient. "Blood" is contained in the concept of water.

Finally, the original formula remains: past, present, future.

The "carrier" and the "present" need to be integrated.

Jiang He understood the contents of the journal. Taking his knight promotion ceremony as an example, the vessel was the human body, the symbols came from various materials, and the element used was blood.

The original formula was that the mortal self (past) merged with bat blood (present) and became the Blood Bat Knight (future).

The human body, which serves as the carrier, and the bat blood, representing the present state, are placed in a pool, thus completing the "fusion".

This formula applies to all knight promotion ceremonies. Bat blood can be replaced with pork bones, eel skin, gorilla meat, and so on, but the essence remains the same.

The original formula in this journal entry is: After the Aphid Emperor (past) merged with the Tomb (present), he became the XX Knight (future).

The element used is "earth"—a tomb.

Jiang He explained the meaning of XX, which could be roughly translated as "lord" or "title".

In short: The aphid emperor, as the vessel, merged with the tomb of the earth over a thousand years, gathering symbolic power and sublimating into a titled knight.

Chapter 94 The Aphid Emperor

However, as things stand, this grand ceremony has failed.

It requires as many as 777 symbols, a terrifyingly large number.

Jiang He quickly calculated and understood the immense difficulty of this task; the derivation of the alchemy formula was truly astonishing.

Therefore, the aphid emperor adopted the "covering method".

Using far more than 777 materials, relying on sheer quantity to cover the required amount.

All the knights who died in the library possessed at least 36 symbols because they had undergone the ascension ceremony. Even if you killed hundreds of them, and the symbols were repeated, there would still be tens of thousands of them.

If the fusion of the vessel with the present in the Blood Bat Ritual is like being in the same pool as the bat's blood, then the fusion of the Aphid Emperor with the Tomb of the Earth is like slumbering here for a thousand years.

The two differ significantly in difficulty and are of different ritual levels.

Jiang He said, "He failed. The leap from knight to titled knight is too great. The earth's power, which had been dormant for thousands of years, was integrated into his soul weapon, not him. There must have been a major stage missing, as well as the necessary accumulation and foundation."

In short, if the Knight is a Bronze level, the Aphid Emperor's grand ceremony will jump directly to the Gold level, skipping the Silver level.

He took too big a step and tore his pants in one swift motion.

This is why the remaining power of the grand ritual flowed to someone who was an alchemist, resulting in the creation of two active skills.

The Gray Knight stroked his chin. "You're in cahoots with the Aphid Emperor, so you can understand the messages?"

Jiang He was too lazy to answer such a boring question.

"You're very perceptive."

On the skeletal throne, the burly man opened his eyes.

"What do you think should be done in this so-called major phase?"

Jiang He remained silent. The essence of the titled knight ritual deduced by the other party lay in integrating external forces to influence the outside world. This required that one's inner self be complete, and the prerequisite was to further control the power of the soul armor, which had very high standards for the carrier.

Knightly rituals are derived from a variety of animals.

Humans are also animals.

The key to reaching the Silver Life Level is most likely to be truly mastering the power of animals and undergoing a second sublimation of the Soul Armor. That is, the Knight's past self merges with the Soul Armor (present) to become the X Knight (future).

Once you have mastered the original formula, you can begin development and derivation.

Jiang He put aside her thoughts. To become an X Knight, she knew that with her current abilities, she was still far from it. Not only did she need the symbolic alchemical formula, but considering the precedent of the Aphid Emperor's failure, she also needed sufficient physical fitness, mental strength, and energy.

The primary objective now is to complete the side quests, acquire the superior-grade treasure Silkworm Life, and kill the violators.

The burly man rose from the skeletal throne, pulled out a fleshy tube from the back of his head, and the tube immediately turned to ashes.

Wuhe, with his dark eyes, said, "That's a planarian treasure. Even if this creature is cut into six pieces, it can still retain its memories. The Aphid Emperor is currently in the form of the treasure. After reading its memories from its previous life, it is similar to the original Aphid Emperor, at least in terms of its thinking and memories."

"If you want to control me, then you two can run away."

The Grey Knight drew his lightning blade. "We have come for the life of the silkworm."

"court death."

The former emperor launched the first attack.

As he moved, the library made of aphids seemed to freeze, with only the thunderclouds rolling endlessly in the sky above, and a faint rumbling sound coming from above.

Before someone's eyes, the emperor's imposing figure appeared in an instant. The heavy sword in his hand was exceptionally wide, more like a heavy shield. As the blade swept horizontally, golden sword light overflowed, and the sword's fierce momentum contained hidden majesty.

Jiang He holds the gun sideways; the brilliance of the close-range spear technique, "Overlord Lifts the Tripod," lies in its unwavering and steady stance.

The wind from the sword whistled against my face.

The blades clashed, and a clear, lingering tinkling sound echoed.

A hint of surprise flashed in the emperor's eyes. The quality of this gun was beyond his expectations. It remained intact under the sweeping blow of the heavy sword. In the instant of the clash, he vaguely saw the disdainful sidelong glance of the dragon on the pattern on the gun.

Jiang He shifted several steps to the side, his tiger's mouth trembling slightly. In the first round of probing, the enemy's strength was in a dominant position.

After the emperor swept across the battlefield, he took a step to adjust his attack position and followed up with a straight thrust. The heavy sword was like a chariot, and the sword moves were smooth and effortless, full of the simplicity honed in the midst of battle.

Jiang He pushed the spear tail forward with his left hand, and the initial form of energy armor covered his entire body. Close-range spear technique - Black Dragon Tail Swing - is a spear move that uses the spear tail for close-range attack and defense, which is short and fierce.

The spear blades clashed again, and both sides retreated several steps.

A hint of seriousness appeared in the emperor's eyes. Just as he was about to strike upwards with his sword again, a white light suddenly appeared in his line of sight.

A short arrow made entirely of lightning arrived before him. The gray knight let out a low shout, and the lightning arrow exploded. A dense web of lightning arcs fell forward, covering the emperor's entire body and causing him to freeze.

In the brief pause, Jiang He thrust out a spear with one arm, a flash of silver light, and the spear tip pierced the enemy's body, leaving a wound the size of a human head.

An eerie weight poured out, sending the emperor flying backward and nearly landing back on his skeletal throne.

But Jiang He and the Gray Knight's expressions both turned serious.

The emperor's horrific wounds showed no signs of bleeding, and within a short time, they were completely healed.

Jiang He quickly scanned the 777 alchemical stone pillars in the mausoleum palace. The enemy's self-healing ability even exceeded the advanced level. The previous Aphid Bloodstone contained powerful life force. If it were used to heal wounds instead of extending lifespan, it would be wasteful, but it would indeed be very effective.

At the same time that the emperor was recovering from his injuries, the light of a stone pillar quietly dimmed, becoming inconspicuous among the many other stone pillars.

"Lehman, cut the stone pillar."

Upon hearing the command, the Gray Knight did not hesitate. A long, white thread emerged from his left hand, moving swiftly like a serpent. In the blink of an eye, it wrapped around more than a dozen stone pillars. With a forceful pull, the sharp lightning thread sliced ​​the stone pillars, turning them from intact pieces into countless fragments.

"No, there are too many."

The Grey Knight felt a sense of unease. The tomb of an emperor was a place where the manpower and resources available to him during his lifetime were unimaginable. It would take at least half a day for one person to completely destroy it.

"Troublesome guy."

As the emperor moved away from the vicinity of the skeletal throne, the broad greatsword once again approached someone. This time, with a slash, wind and energy emanated, and hundreds of golden sword energies materialized.

The golden sword energy slashed at the initial energy armor, creating deep cracks. The moment the heavy sword struck, the remaining sword energy exploded, completely destroying the energy armor.

The emperor swung his heavy sword down, and the golden light shone like the sun releasing its unparalleled brilliance.