After briefly inspecting the appearance of the Flame God's Crown, Zhang Yanhang quickly placed all thirty just-opened Flame God's Crowns into the Alchemy Array to start the fusion. ɴᴇᴡ ɴᴏᴠᴇʟ ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀs ᴀʀᴇ ᴘᴜʙʟɪsʜᴇᴅ ᴏɴ Nov3lFɪre.ɴet
Because the Flame God's Crown was Golden quality full-score equipment, it was not at all surprising that, after the first round of fusion, the fifteen Flame God's Crowns +1 in the Alchemy Array began to flicker with a Dark Gold glow.
Then, the second round of fusion produced seven Flame God's Crowns +2 that still maintained the Dark Gold Quality, followed by the third round of fusion. When this round ended, the three Flame God's Crowns +3 in the Alchemy Array immediately flashed with dazzling Orange light.
After three rounds of fusion, Zhang Yanhang now had a total of three Orange quality Flame God's Crowns +3, one Dark Gold Quality Flame God's Crown +2, and one Dark Gold Quality Flame God's Crown +1 in his possession.
"If only I had two more Flame God's Crowns, I could fuse a fourth Flame God's Crown +3, how frustrating."
During the fusion process, Zhang Yanhang could clearly feel that the difficulty of the first three fusions was quite low, and the overall fusion process was exceptionally smooth. Therefore, he estimated that this Golden quality full-score Flame God's Crown could probably also be fused up to the fifth time before reaching its limit.
However, rising to Orange quality only from the third fusion also showed that even with two more fusions, it might still not be possible to rise to a quality above Orange. So, he might as well save the effort, as the bonuses from four pieces of equipment were definitely much higher than one, and there was no need to pursue higher numbers of fusion at this time.
Mainly, it was because the quantity did not allow it. If Zhang Yanhang were given another thousand or eight hundred Crimson Iron Prince Ants, then he might have more confidence, but for now, forget it.
"What can I say, this gap in the Flame God's Crown is just like the previous Crimson Marrow Hell Finger, only hoping on the chance that the Lucky Slot Machine's third-place prize pool of the large Crimson Iron Ant Nest Talano refreshes at some unknown time."
Zhang Yanhang planned to check after opening the Treasure Boxes later to see whether the Lucky Slot Machine had refreshed or not. Based on experience, Zhang Yanhang felt that the Lucky Slot Machine's refresh times were nothing else but two time points.
One coincided with the refresh of the Transmission Channel of the smaller Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dalagu, which is at eleven o'clock at night, and the other coincided with the refresh of the new Transmission Channel of the larger Crimson Iron Ant Nest Tarano, which is around six o'clock in the morning.
So, if he doesn't see a refresh later, he will likely have to wait until six o'clock to see it. Since he's about to be promoted to Fourth Tier, Zhang Yanhang doesn't care much about which exact time it refreshes.
No matter which time it is, once he is promoted to the Fourth Tier, the return on investment will drop significantly anyway. So, he guesses this might be the last time he could get some return. After he's promoted to the Fourth Tier, it's uncertain if he can get four Treasure Boxes after killing a hundred Monsters.
Of course, the most important thing right now was still the Flame God's Crown, so Zhang Yanhang quickly began to check the attribute list of the Orange quality Flame God's Crown +3.
[Flame God's Crown +3]
[Origin: Ashen World, Crimson Iron Ore Vein, Large Crimson Iron Ant Nest Talano, Zhang Yanhang.]
[Defensive Power: 55]
[Additional Attributes: Power Effect +50% (+15%).]
[Usage Requirements: Strength 75 points.]
[Score: 575 (Orange item score ranges from 531 to 680.)]
[Introduction: A nameless blacksmith, after helping Cecilia Josephine, the Princess of the Kingdom, return to the Kingdom, became an esteemed Forging Master revered by all due to his excellent and solid skills. He was responsible for handling all the forging needs and order distributions of the Royal Family, supervising dozens of outstanding Forging Masters belonging to the Royal Workshop...]
"The Orange quality really is impressive, the additional attribute provided a 10% higher boost than what the Dark Gold Quality Crimson Marrow Flame Demon Armor +5 offered, reaching a 50% Power Effect bonus.
Originally, the Golden quality Flame God's Crown could only provide a 35% Power Effect bonus, but now that it has become Orange quality, it offers 50%, which is an increase of 15% Power Effect bonus over the original—equivalent to a 5% increase per fusion, not bad."
Besides the increase in Power Effect bonus, Zhang Yanhang also noted the significant increase in the score.
"The Flame God's Crown previously only had a score of 440 points, but now it has risen to 575 points, which is an increase of 135 points in total, equivalent to being upgraded from a full-score Golden quality to a low-score Orange quality.
If you convert that to the three fusions, it's an increase of 45 points per fusion which is five points higher than every fusion of the previous Crimson Marrow Hell Finger."
"However, it seems that even after two more fusions, the Flame God's Crown is still unlikely to break through to a quality above orange. After all, even if you add up a score equivalent to two fusions, which is ninety points, to the original 575 points, you only get a score of 665 points, which can only be considered a high score within the orange quality range; it's still fifteen points short of a full score."
"One could say that Zhang Yanhang's earlier estimate was pretty accurate. Of course, this is mainly because the scoring range for orange quality equipment is rather high, with a full 150 points. If it had been like the golden and dark gold qualities, each with only ninety points, it would have been effortlessly possible to upgrade directly from golden to a quality above orange."
In addition to the additional attributes and equipment score, Zhang Yanhang also noticed that the usage requirement for the Flame God's Crown had increased from the original requirement of just fifty-five points of Strength to seventy-five points of Strength, an increase of twenty points of strength requirement. On average, each quality tier would correspond to an increase of ten points in strength requirement.
This was a standard increase; all the equipment previously forged by Makarov had increased the attribute value requirement by ten points for every increase in quality.
After reviewing the attribute list of the orange-quality Flame God's Crown +3, Zhang Yanhang also glanced at the attribute list of the dark gold quality Flame God's Crown +2 and found that the Flame God's Crown +2 provided a 45% Strength Effect Bonus.
"If only there were a dozen more Crimson Iron Prince Ants, I could gather the incomplete pieces for the two Flame God's Crowns. Unfortunately, the set number is just that many. I'll have to make do with one Flame God's Crown +2 for the time being."
As he spoke, Zhang Yanhang put on three Flame God's Crowns +3 and one Flame God's Crown +2 on his four heads, respectively.
"Each orange-quality Flame God's Crown +3 can provide me with a 50% Strength Effect Bonus. Three together gives a total of 150% Strength Effect Bonus, and the dark gold quality Flame God's Crown +2 can provide me a 45% Strength Effect Bonus, making it a total of 195% Strength Effect Bonus when all are combined."
Zhang Yanhang remembered that his XX-tier Talent "Longbo's Power" could only provide a 265% Strength Effect Bonus. If he could wear five Flame God's Crowns +3, he would almost catch up to Longbo's Power. Unfortunately, he only had four heads, and he couldn't even gather the fourth Flame God's Crown +3, let alone the fifth.
After equipping the four Flame God's Crowns, Zhang Yanhang quickly took out a large amount of Crimson Iron Ore from his Waist Bag and began testing his current strength. Having just obtained a whopping 195% Strength Effect Bonus, Zhang Yanhang was very confident and directly set the weight at eight hundred tons.
As expected, even with eight hundred tons of Crimson Iron Ore stacked on his right hand, Zhang Yanhang still felt a lot of leeway, so he quickly added another hundred tons. Unexpectedly, even with nine hundred tons, he could still feel plenty of leeway.
After thinking for a moment, Zhang Yanhang added another fifty tons of Crimson Iron Ore to his right hand. This time, when the total weight reached nine hundred and fifty tons, the leeway he felt had finally reduced—probably to only about fifteen to twenty tons left at most.
So, slowly adding one ton at a time until the fifteenth time, when the total weight on his right hand reached nine hundred sixty-five tons, Zhang Yanhang finally felt his leeway disappear.
"The whopping 195% Strength Effect Bonus is indeed fierce, directly increasing my strength from the original 739 tons to 965 tons—an increase of 226 tons in strength. The strength gained this time is roughly fourteen times the total strength I had in the Second Tier Period.
If I were to convert my single-hand strength, it's nearly equal to an instant increase of five hundred thousand jins of huge power compared to my previous fourteen million jins, reaching a level of nineteen million three hundred thousand jins with one hand. Not only did I easily complete the previous goal of fifteen million jins, but I'm also close to finishing the next goal of twenty million jins."
Although Talent had never thought of achieving the small goal of two million jins of Strength before, considering that he should still be able to obtain new achievements related to Strength bonuses from the Achievement Vending Machine in the future, Zhang Yanhang felt that this previously unimagined small goal should not be too difficult to accomplish.
"With my current Strength, if I simply bolster it with a bit of Spiritual Energy, I can immediately achieve a Huge Power of 3.86 million jins. As for Double-handed Strength, that has already reached as much as 9.65 million jins, which is only 350,000 jins shy of ten million. I'm sure I'll be able to complete that with ease later on."
Zhang Yanhang often saw those Mystical and Medium Martial novels where a mere million jins of strength could punch through the void, yet now, he was nearly at ten million jins and still felt nothing of the sort. And besides, a million jins of Huge Power? A road roller could do that, but it's not like you see road rollers breaking the void all day long, right?
Moreover, he had never seen any of the large 10,000-ton presses responsible for integral components like aircraft carrier steel plates, nuclear power plant parts, or airplane beams breaking through the void either. Let's not even talk about 10,000 tons; he hadn't heard of 100,000-ton presses doing anything of the sort.
Regarding this, Zhang Yanhang could only say that it might be because the space structures of the Main World and the Ashen World are relatively stable. He felt that space structure must vary from world to world, just like gravity does between the Moon and Earth—on Earth, a person can only jump two meters high, but on the Moon, that's starting at five meters.
Therefore, perhaps some weak worlds could have their spatial structure broken by a road roller. One can't blame them for not being able to achieve modern industrialization and staying in the ancient era; indeed, the strength of space is one of the core supports for modern industrial construction.
Of course, Zhang Yanhang thought this might also have to do with the speed of the punches. However, he felt that his eight times the speed of sound was already fast enough. Those from Mystical World probably couldn't even catch up with him. After all, they fight for days and nights or even years. Who the hell takes that long for a brawl?
Even the current Zhang Yanhang, if he got serious, could throw hundreds of punches in a second, resulting in several hundred thousand punches in an hour. With one point of damage per punch, he could probably scrape the opponent to death, and over a day, it would be at least ten million punches. You ask him to smash open Taihang Mountain and Wangwu Mountain with his fists, and it would probably all collapse in less than a day.
So, to this day, he couldn't understand how someone could fight for days and nights and then, at a critical moment, finish the opponent with one charged punch. It was absurd! Are they all just playfighting?
He could only say that at least under normal circumstances, sheer Strength, and speed alone are indeed very unlikely to break the spatial structure. But when Energy is added to the mix, it's a different story. Zhang Yanhang could interfere with the spatial structure with a simple spell. Perhaps this idea of punching through the void with a million jins of Strength has something to do with that.
Speaking of punching through the void, Zhang Yanhang was reminded of something called Light Particle Strike. Put simply, it involves accelerating a mass point to the speed of light and then relying solely on kinetic energy to destroy a star.
"I wonder if I'll ever have the chance to increase my punch speed to the speed of light and turn a Normal Attack into a Light Particle Strike. But considering that light speed is 880,000 times faster than the speed of sound, such a Light Particle Strike is still very far off for me, or rather, extremely far off."
Zhang Yanhang even doubted whether he could ever reach that level of speed without assistance in his lifetime. After all, for a Normal Attack to reach Light Particle Strike status, at the very least, his overall combat level would have to be River System Level or even Super Star Cluster Level. Little Earth most certainly wouldn't be able to hold him. Fortunately, the Ashen World was infinitely vast and could still accommodate him.
"The speed of a Light Particle Strike is 880,000 times the speed of sound, while my current punch speed is only eight times the speed of sound. That means light speed is currently 110,000 times my punch speed. I wonder what Rank I would need to reach to increase my punch speed to that extent?"
Zhang Yanhang felt that perhaps he might never reach such a speed with just pure physical strength and speed alone. It would still require a combination of Energy to achieve it. However, exactly how much Energy would be needed to turn a Normal Attack into a Light Particle Strike and punch out a star, he had no idea. At least the Fifth Tier and Sixth Tier definitely wouldn't suffice; it would probably need to be Seventh Tier or higher to complete it.