"The Crimson Marrow Ghost Claw, after breaking through the limit and fusing to +6 to become Golden quality equipment, didn't grow much in score, only increasing from an original score of 340 to 380, which amounted to an increase of just forty points, while each previous fusion of the Crimson Marrow Ghost Claw increased its score by thirty points.
Despite breaking through the limit, the score increased by only ten points, merely equivalent to progressing from a high-score Light Golden Quality to a low-score Golden Quality…"
In addition to the score, Zhang Yanhang also felt dissatisfied with the growth in additional attributes this time, or rather, it was precisely because the enhancement effect of the additional attributes was not satisfactory that it only resulted in a meager forty-point score improvement.
"The Critical Strike Damage Bonus offered by the original Crimson Marrow Ghost Claw +5 was 40%," he mused, "and now it has only increased by 10%, reaching a 50% Critical Strike Damage Bonus. I had thought it would at least increase by 15%.
I remember that during normal fusions, each one increased the Critical Strike Damage by 3%, so this time, breaking the limit was only equivalent to the previous three regular fusions, while the Crimson Marrow Ghost Mask managed one limit breaking worth all six previous fusions combined. The difference is really substantial."
Although the performance of the Crimson Marrow Ghost Claw was already quite commendable in the past, because the Crimson Marrow Ghost Mask performed even better, comparisons made Zhang Yanhang sincerely feel that the Crimson Marrow Ghost Claw was slightly disappointing.
"After being promoted to Golden quality, the usage requirement for the Crimson Marrow Ghost Claw increased from the original need for 45 Agility to 55 Agility, marking another ten-point increase in Agility requirement, but thankfully, I can still meet it."
After checking the attribute list for the Crimson Marrow Ghost Claw +6, Zhang Yanhang swiftly reequipped the four sets of Crimson Marrow Ghost Claw +6 onto his fingers. The rightful source is ɴovelfire.net
"Originally, all eight hands were adorned with Crimson Marrow Ghost Claws +5 of Light Golden Quality, and now, having switched to the Golden quality Crimson Marrow Ghost Claw +6, each set provides an additional 10% Critical Strike Damage Bonus, totaling a 40% Critical Strike Damage Bonus."
Previously, Zhang Yanhang's Critical Strike Damage Multiplier was 385%, and now, with this additional 40% Critical Strike Damage Bonus, it had increased to 425%, already matching the Attack Multiplier of the extra attack.
Due to the additional effect of nearly sixty percent more Critical Strike Rate, however, the Critical Strike Damage's Attack Multiplier was significantly higher, approaching five hundred percent.
"Each standard Crimson Marrow Ghost Claw provided a 25% Critical Strike Damage Bonus; now, having fused to +6, it's akin to wearing two more standard Crimson Marrow Ghost Claws, which is pretty good. It's just that compared to the Crimson Marrow Ghost Mask, it is indeed a bit disappointing."
From those 1053 Crimson Marrow Ghost Claws, Zhang Yanhang managed to fuse the four most important Golden quality Crimson Marrow Ghost Claws +6, as well as one Crimson Marrow Ghost Claw +4, one +3, and one +2, leaving behind a single normal Crimson Marrow Ghost Claw because it was an odd number and thus not fused.
After putting these leftover Crimson Marrow Ghost Claws into his waist bag, Zhang Yanhang quickly began tallying up his other equipment gains, starting with the Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armor contributed by the Crimson Iron Flame Demon Ants. This time, he totaled 108 pieces of Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armor.
Including the four pieces of Dark Gold Quality Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armor +4 he was currently wearing on his arms and the remaining one piece of Golden quality Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armor +3, as well as one of the same Golden quality Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armor +2 previously in his hands, he had a total of 76 pieces.
Together with the newly opened pieces of Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armor, that made 184 pieces in total, more than enough for the fusion of the four required pieces of Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armor +5. He only needed 32×4=128 standard pieces to fuse four pieces of Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armor +5.
After finalizing the count, Zhang Yanhang swiftly removed the Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armor +4 from his arms and placed them in the Alchemy Array to begin the fusion.
As it didn't need to break through any limit and was just a fusion to +5 requiring fewer pieces, Zhang Yanhang completed the fusion in just over ten minutes.
It was slightly regrettable that fusing to +5 was indeed the limit for the Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armor. If it could be directly fused to +6 like the Crimson Marrow Ghost Claw, it would easily attain a quality above Dark Gold.
Unfortunately, a normal fusion wasn't feasible, it would rely on breaking the limit, but breaking through required eight pieces of Dark Gold Quality Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armor +5, which he couldn't gather as Crimson Iron Flame Demon Ants in the large Crimson Iron Ant Nest Tarano were nearly exhausted.
Due to only needing four pieces of Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armor +5, Zhang Yanhang fused just the right amount, leaving behind the surplus fifty-six standard Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armors. Since he couldn't use them even if they were fused, he didn't waste time on that.
Looking at the Dark Gold-glowing Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armor +5 in front of him, Zhang Yanhang quickly began to inspect its attribute list.
[Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armor +5]
[Origin: Ashen World, Crimson Iron Ore Vein, Large Crimson Iron Ant Nest Tarano, Zhang Yanhang.]
[Defensive Power: 55]
[Additional Attributes: Strength Effect +40% (+4%).]
[Usage Requirements: 65 Strength.]
[Score: 485 (The score for Dark Gold Items is from 441 to 530.)]
[Introduction: Watching a female adventurer, who had no idea what had happened to her after a Witch Demon Mage erased her memories with a brainwashing spell, doubting her own life and limping with phantom limb pain every step she took as she staggered against the wall to leave the maze, the Nameless Blacksmith couldn't help but smile joyfully. Indeed, running a maze suited him best...]
"Because it was just a normal fusion and not a breakthrough of limits, so the additional attributes of the Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armor only increased by 4% after fusing to +5, or rather, it was quite standard, still the same as before, enhancing the Strength Effect Bonus from the original 36% to 40%.
I remember that the Light Golden Quality Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armor initially only provided a 20% Strength Effect Bonus, so now, having fused into the Dark Gold Quality Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armor +5, the increase rate of the additional attributes has effectively doubled.
That is to say, instead of wearing four pairs of Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armor on eight hands, I am now effectively wearing one pair on each hand.
These four pieces of Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armor +5 together can provide me a total of 160% Strength Effect Bonus. If it weren't for my high Talent Level, I might not have surpassed this equipment bonus, but after all, it's the sum of four pieces of equipment, so it's normal.
If I could have four identical Talents simultaneously, I would surely completely overshadow all equipment bonuses, but unfortunately, while equipping four pieces of equipment is simple, acquiring four identical Talents is simply not possible."
Zhang Yanhang had previously tried what would happen if he didn't fuse low-level talents directly into high-level talents. The result was that the low-level talents disappeared; without this restriction, he figured he could probably stack a hundred or eighty low-level talents and become invincible on the spot.
After all, even if a talent provided only one point of attribute value, that was still over a hundred points in total, but sadly, it was just wishful thinking.
The reason it was wishful thinking was not only because of the restrictions on acquiring low-level talents but mainly because there was also a limit to the number of talents.
Zhang Yanhang had learned this a long time ago from the group leader; it seems there are only up to a dozen talent slots max, no chance for unlimited acquisition, otherwise nobody would need to cultivate anymore; they could just keep stacking talents.
It was precisely because of this limit on the number of talents that Zhang Yanhang had always been keen on raising the level of his talents. Given that he already had five talents, if he thought only about increasing the number rather than the quality, he could easily fill them all, such as by buying a bit from other Awakeners, or getting a bit from each area.
But that was truly unnecessary, at best, it would initially boost a part of his power, but later it would only slow down the pace of his strength improvement, especially since talent earnings from clearing different areas were quite important gains to him, and using talents recklessly without being able to upgrade would only invalidate that part of talent earnings.
"Although it has fused to +5, the Crimson Marrow Flames Demon Armor is still of Dark Gold Quality, so the Attribute Requirements are still just sixty-five points in Strength Attribute, there's no need to worry about not being able to use it."
Compared to Attribute Requirements, Zhang Yanhang cared more naturally about the Equipment Score. This time, the score of the Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armor had still only increased by 35 points, bringing its Equipment Score from the original 450 points to 485 points, which is equivalent to moving from a low score in Dark Gold Quality to a medium score in Dark Gold Quality.
"Previously, I was thinking that if I could fuse it a sixth time, the Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armor might advance to a quality above Dark Gold, but looking at the current score, it seems a bit far-fetched, after all, a score of 485 points, even with an additional 35 points, would only be 520 points."
"The highest score for the dark gold quality is 530 points, and it still falls short by 11 points. It still requires a seventh fusion to be promoted to a quality above dark gold."
Zhang Yanhang did not regret that the Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armor had not been promoted to a quality above dark gold because it is indeed unlikely that a piece of equipment could achieve three consecutive quality upgrades solely through regular fusion.
Perhaps some Alchemy Masters specialized in this field or some Alchemy Sages could achieve it, but that clearly had nothing to do with someone like him whose alchemical knowledge entirely depended on skill infusion.
Of course, if he could enhance his alchemy skill level a few more times in the future, it might still be possible. However, the alchemy that had only been enhanced twice recently indeed lacked the support for him to perform such high-end operations, unless the equipment itself had an exceptionally good foundation, which he had not yet encountered.
After examining the attribute list of the Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armor+5 in dark gold quality, Zhang Yanhang quickly re-equipped all four pieces of Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armor+5 to his arms.
"Each piece of Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armor+5 provided a 4% strength effect bonus, totaling a 16% strength effect bonus for all four pieces, not considered very high, especially after I just enhanced my strength effect by 60% with Longbo's power."
However, Zhang Yanhang swiftly took out the Crimson Iron Ore from his waist bag and began testing his current strength.
Since a 16% strength effect bonus wasn't much, Zhang Yanhang cautiously placed 730 tons of Crimson Iron Ore in his right hand, and indeed, he could immediately feel that there was not much spare capacity left.
Then he tried adding another ten tons. This time, the spare capacity vanished instantly, and he even slightly exceeded the weight he could bear. So he reduced it by one ton, making it feel much better—there was just enough spare capacity without any extra load.
"With this adjustment, my single-hand strength should be around 739 tons, an increase of 18 tons from the previous 721 tons, which is passable. It's just a bit more than the strength increase during my Second Tier period.
Converting that, my single-hand strength should now be about 1,480,000 jin, up by 40,000 jin from the previous 1,440,000 jin, just 20,000 jin short of my small target of 1,500,000 jin."
Zhang Yanhang had initially thought that maybe the enhancement from the Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armor alone could fill this gap, but it seems that he still needs to make an effort.
"It's a pity. If the Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armor could provide an additional one or two percent strength effect bonus, that would fill the gap. But since that's unattainable now, I can only consider gaining more strength effect bonuses through other means."
Since the Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armor+5 had already been fused to its limit, and the Talent with Mystic Steed Power could no longer be enhanced, Zhang Yanhang would likely have to rely on new equipment to continue increasing his strength effect.
Yet, as the probability of obtaining such new equipment that provides strength effect bonuses isn't high, he still thinks it might be more reliable to acquire a strength effect achievement when he later exchanges achievements.
After all, since the main feature of the Talent with Mystic Steed Power is to increase the strength effect, it is almost certain that at least one position will be allocated for strength effect bonuses in the achievements, perhaps even two, considering that the Large Crimson Iron Ants are best known for their strength.