Chapter 140: The path already chosen
Hundreds of meters long.
It cleaved down onto the mountain across from them.
The entire range shook. A crack appeared from the summit, then stretched downward. The peak, thousands of meters tall, was split into two halves, rock and earth tumbling into the abyss below, the sound echoing between the mountaintops for a long time before finally fading.
Laira stood still.
The fist she’d been clenching slowly uncurled.
Ruo Yan looked at the mountain, then at the bamboo staff in QingZhu’s hand.
QingZhu smiled. "Shall we begin?"
Laira immediately forced a grin. "I was just kidding."
Ruo Yan nodded very seriously. "I can vouch for that."
QingZhu looked at the two of them for a few seconds, then didn’t push it. "Very well."
She turned around. "Continue."
Laira watched her retreating back, then leaned down close to Ruo Yan. "I’m starting to think everyone here has a problem."
Ruo Yan replied very quietly: "I’m starting to think you’re the one with a problem for wanting to fight a Sovereign tier one right after breaking through."
Laira couldn’t argue with that.
Inside the tower, Ethan had absolutely no idea the two of them had just nearly gotten themselves killed. After stabilizing his realm for close to half a day, he finally opened the Primordial Armor’s storage.
Four Mystery Boxes appeared before him one by one.
Ever since receiving these rewards, Ethan had been holding back from opening them. Not because he wasn’t curious, but because QingLian’s words had made him realize that choices made after Gold would be entirely different from before.
Now, he had crossed through that door.
No more reason to wait.
Ethan took out the first Mystery Box, the Floor 18 milestone reward from the Abyss Tower. At the time, the system had given him a choice of type, and Ethan had selected the Support Mystery Box but hadn’t opened the item inside.
He placed the box before him.
A notification appeared.
[User detected to have entered Gold.]
[Path has been established: Partner.]
[From this point forward, Mystery Box rewards will begin to be influenced by the chosen path.]
[Support Mystery Box may contain items that support the self, Partners, or the bond system between both.]
[Continue?]
Ethan finished reading. "Yes."
The box opened, light spilling upward, while the Eye of Truth silently activated. No analysis panel appeared before his eyes, but each item hidden within the stream of light became clearer to him.
A necklace that increased recovery speed.
A talisman allowing Partners to share damage.
A type of crystal that stabilized bonds.
A ring that accelerated energy absorption.
All very good.
But Ethan didn’t stop.
His gaze continued deeper. Only when a small ivory-white vial appeared in his vision did he pause. The energy around the vial wasn’t the strongest, but inside was a depth so profound the bottom was nearly invisible, the walls covered in patterns related to vital energy.
The corner of Ethan’s mouth curved upward.
"This one."
The light around the other items instantly vanished. The vial dropped into his right palm, and the notification appeared.
[Life Vessel.]
[Rank: SS.]
[Function: Can absorb, refine, and store life energy.]
[Stored life energy can be used to heal the self or Partners.]
[In cases where the target is in a near-death state but vital signs have not been completely severed, the Life Vessel can forcibly replenish vital energy, helping the target sustain or recover.]
[Capacity scales with the owner’s level.]
Ethan looked at the vial, then immediately thought of something else. His left arm glowed faintly, and the Life Sphere taken from the earlier test round appeared beside it.
Thump.
Thump.
It was still beating steadily.
The dense vital energy immediately made the Life Vessel tremble faintly. Ethan looked at the two items in his hands.
"What a coincidence."
On one side, a source of life.
On the other, a container.
Used correctly, this was practically a lifeline card for all three of them.
Ethan didn’t absorb the Life Sphere right away. He stored both back in the Primordial Armor, then took out the second Mystery Box.
The Weapon Chest.
Minimum rarity rank A.
He opened it.
This time the selection was far larger: swords, spears, bows, gauntlets, daggers, and staves. Ethan looked for only a few seconds before skipping past most of them. He didn’t like close combat. All the times he’d previously had to charge in using the Primordial Armor for direct melee were because he’d had no better option. If he could stand at range, identify the weak point, and end things with a single precise strike, he had no reason to run within reach of someone who could punch him.
His gaze swept across the rows of weapons and finally stopped on a black-silver handgun.
The design was very compact. The body had no conventional magazine; instead, a small energy core sat between the grip and the barrel. Across the surface ran a few very thin blue lines that could shift color depending on the type of energy channeled in.
Ethan looked more closely. A layer of information was peeled away by the Eye of Truth.
He raised an eyebrow slightly. "Now this is something."
The gun dropped into his right hand.
[Boundary Breaker.]
[Type: Energy Firearm.]
[Rank: Mythical.]
[Trait: Does not use physical ammunition.]
[The user may channel elemental energy or personal energy into the weapon’s core. The energy will be compressed, stabilized, and amplified before being discharged.]
[Maximum amplification limit: x10.]
[Warning: The higher the amplification, the greater the compression time and accumulated heat.]
Ethan held the gun and found it fit his hand perfectly. More importantly, it sat in his right hand, his natural hand. The Primordial Armor on his left could handle defense, while the right hand used the gun for ranged offense.
He raised the gun and aimed at the wall, then immediately lowered it.
"Probably shouldn’t test it in here."
If he accidentally amplified ten times and blasted a hole through QingLian’s tower, he had no idea how he’d explain that.
Ethan inspected it a while longer, then stored Boundary Breaker away. The third box was brought out.
The Random Mystery Box Chest.
He opened the lid.
This time everything was far more chaotic. There was food, weapons, materials, creature eggs, and items with such bizarre functions that Ethan couldn’t immediately understand them even with the Eye of Truth.
He didn’t try to find the highest-ranked item.
After Marcus’s ambush, Ethan had realized something: the ability to escape a battlefield was sometimes more important than one more offensive skill.
If QingLian hadn’t appeared that time, he would have had almost no way to break free of Marcus’s barrier.
Ethan’s gaze began searching for anything related to space. A long while later, a small blue-green gem appeared. Inside it, folded spatial lines shifted continuously.
Only Epic rank.
But Ethan chose it immediately.
[Return Gem.]
[Rank: Epic.]
[Can transport the user back to a location they have personally set foot in.]
[Maximum range: 1,000 miles.]
[Maximum passengers per teleportation: 7, including the activator.]
[Cooldown: 24 hours.]
[Cannot penetrate spatial seals whose level exceeds the item’s limit.]
Ethan turned the gem between two fingers.
One thousand miles.
Seven people.
Once per day.
Not Mythical, but if he’d had this when Marcus ambushed him, at the very least he would have had one more option.
"Good enough."
Ethan stored the Return Gem away.
Only one box remained before him.
The Limit Mystery Box.
The reward he’d obtained from the trial space connected to Owin, minimum rarity rank S, while its upper ceiling remained unclear even now.
Ethan had thought about this box many times.
A powerful skill? He had the Cataclysmic Thunder Gate.
A weapon? He now had Boundary Breaker.
Defense? The Primordial Armor was still the best thing on him.
Mobility? Thunder Wing plus the Return Gem already covered most situations.
Recovery? The Life Vessel had just filled that exact gap.
Ethan sat still, his finger tapping lightly on the box’s surface. QingLian’s words surfaced in his mind again.
’The more Partners you have, the more the energy has to be divided.’
The path he’d chosen from today onward was set.
Partner.
He didn’t regret it.
But if he was committed to this path, the biggest problem going forward would only grow clearer.
Resources.
A single Partner was already enough to drastically slow an Awakened’s absorption rate.
He had two.
In the future, there could be even more.
Crystals could be earned.
Trial Gates could be found.
But if every level-up required feeding an ever-growing number of Partners through conventional means, no matter how good the rewards the Eye of Truth helped him find, his pace would still be dragged down.
Ethan looked at the box, his expression gradually shifting.
’If I’ve already chosen this path...’
He placed his right hand on the lid.
’Then what I need most isn’t another move for killing people.’
Ethan drew a deep breath. The Eye of Truth slowly activated.
Inside the Limit Mystery Box, countless lights appeared. Some things Ethan could tell were terrifyingly powerful with just a glance: skills, talents, items, even a few that carried fluctuations strong enough to make the Primordial Armor on his left arm tremble faintly.
Ethan passed them all.
He kept searching.
A very long time later, his gaze stopped on a single point.
Ethan didn’t blink. He stared at it for a few more seconds, then the corner of his mouth slowly curved upward.
"Decided."