Lin Xiao ultimately did not join a guild.
After finding a place to stay, he spent half a day intently watching the channel to see other players’ interactions, gaining a certain understanding of these so-called guilds.
It’s not entirely true that guilds are useless, they indeed protect you from being bullied by others, but they’re not very useful either. If you don’t hold a high position or haven’t been with the guild for long, it’s only slightly better than being alone. In the end, it all comes down to whether you are strong or not.
Once strong, you’ll have status, but if I am already strong, who can bully me?
A Rank 4 Evolver stands in the upper-middle tier in the Main City, where the highest is only Rank 5 Evolvers.
The evolution limit is certainly not limited to Rank 5, but after evolving to Rank 5, the monsters and instances near the Main City no longer satisfy the accumulation of Evolution Points. One must venture deeper and farther, equivalent to switching to a new map, and it is difficult to return once gone. Currently, the strongest in the civilizations’ main cities are only Rank 5, mostly those who have just been promoted or those who know there is no hope of further progress and thus stay in the Main City to become someone important, isn’t that delightful!
As with many games, once you leave the Novice Village, the strength of the monsters around the Main City significantly increases. However, the area around the Main City is not that strong. After all, you can enter the Main City at Rank 1, and the surrounding are monsters at the level of Rank 1 and 2. Someone like Lin Xiao who has reached Rank 4 must take the Ghost Train to a more distant map.
Without wandering around the city, they, a group of six, boarded the Ghost Train and left the Main City two days later.
Similar to regular trains, but only with six or seven carriages, there weren’t many people on it. Besides them, there was only another small team of five sitting at the other end of their carriage.
The Ghost Train, like steam-powered ones, made a loud noise and clanked forward quickly. The speed was quite fast, with the scenery outside the window rapidly receding backward. From time to time, groups of monsters approached the train, only to be crushed into mush by the swiftly moving train.
Looking at the unrippled water in the cup on the table in front of him, Lin Xiao knew this was no ordinary train.
After nearly half an hour, a loud whistle sounded from the front, and a cold mechanical voice announced:
"Coming up is Spore Village. Passengers alighting here, please disembark. The train will head to the next station in five minutes!"
Lin Xiao looked back, Su Youxin, Wei Dahua, Chu Yue, and Wu Ziqi, two men and two women, stood up. Through their years of experiences, they had already become two couples. They came over to Lin Xiao and said:
"Brother Lin, we’re leaving first!"
Chu Yue bowed to him sincerely and said:
"Thank you for your protection these past days, Brother Lin. If there’s anything we can help with in the future, please let us know."
The others echoed her sentiments.
Lin Xiao nodded his head. Regardless of whether they were sincere or not, it was good to have this attitude. His help hadn’t been in vain.
He waved his hand and said:
"I won’t say more, just be careful!"
The four nodded and left one by one.
Their strength was between Rank 1 and 2, so it was inevitable that they couldn’t continue with him. When they first entered the Main City, the idea of staying together was entertained, but after studying the distribution of monsters near the Main City, they had to part ways.
Besides, after protecting them for so long, he couldn’t keep guarding them forever. He wasn’t a nanny.
```
Five minutes later, Lin Xiao sat down again, cuddling Zhuo Jing in his arms, and turned his head to look at the station platform filled with fantastical colors.
This platform, called Spore Village, was a row of gigantic mushrooms. Every so often, there was a large mushroom with a huge open cap, and lanterns glowing with luminescence hung from the giant caps illuminating the surroundings. Many beings that seemed to have evolved from mushrooms, known as Spore people of Other Races, were standing by the platform.
These were Other Races, but not monsters to be killed; they were the Spore Village natives and belonged to a neutral species.
The platform outside led to a square where one could vaguely see many Evolvers setting up stalls. Farther away were more giant mushrooms, with houses carved out like tree holes inside seven or eight-meter-wide mushroom stems, some even with several stories, all very characteristic.
The Ghost Train soon left the Spore Village. Outside the village were mushrooms of various sizes emitting glimmers, occasionally some brightly colored poisonous mushrooms, and some toxic mushroom people who looked very similar to the Spore people but had colorful bodies. Differently colored spores were continually sprayed into the air, and the void was filled with a light mist.
The train quickly entered a swamp, the tracks submerged in water stirring up a sky full of mist and disturbing numerous swamp monsters.
Now and then, swamp monsters rushed over but couldn’t keep up with the speed of the train.
"Bang!"
A violent tremor resonated from the train, and then blood sprayed, splattering and dripping down the windows. As the blood mixed with swamp water, Lin Xiao saw half of a crocodile corpse, easily over a dozen meters long, lying next to the train.
Their destination was still some distance from here. After being interested in the novelty for a while, Lin Xiao lost interest, having roamed through the Chaotic Void Sea for so long and having seen his share of thrilling encounters. He sat down and rested with his eyes closed while Zhuo Jing, originally a normal person, continued to watch with great interest.
After some time had passed, he heard Zhuo Jing softly calling in his ear. Awakening, Lin Xiao heard the announcement:
"We have now arrived at the Death mountain range. Passengers who wish to disembark, please do so. The next train will leave in five minutes!"
Lin Xiao withdrew his hand from around her and led her off the train by the hand.
Death mountain range was not their final destination. According to the map purchased in the city, this area was active with Rank 3 Evolvers, and the nearby monsters were mostly of Rank 3, though there were quite a few Rank 4 monsters as well.
He planned to get Zhuo Jing accustomed to the place by blending in here first before heading to the next, more dangerous area on the map.
Compared to the others, she was worth the effort to train.
Especially knowing that Talent would undergo a qualitative change at Rank 4, he was very much looking forward to seeing what kind of changes her Fate Talent would go through once it reached Rank 4.
Copying a Time Roaming, he let her rush all the way up to the 27th level of Sky Tower in one go. If another copy could be made after the elevation and qualitative change, or if her Talent advanced another level, that would be even more impressive. It would be akin to a weakened version of himself, already capable of keeping up and lending a hand.
Sometimes, having a teammate who can keep up and lend a hand is quite nice, not to mention she’s pretty, has a nice figure, and can share a bed. Simply perfect.
The station platform at Death Valley was straightforward, located inside a nondescript mountain valley where bone-chilling winds howled through the passageways, piercing to the bone. The walls of the valley were black, the sky above, oppressively dark. Inside the valley, there were only some haphazardly constructed buildings against the walls. The number of Evolvers here was evidently fewer than in Spore Village, with hardly any setting up stalls.
As the two of them stepped out, a burly man with a pipe in his mouth sitting on a stone beckoned to them and shouted:
"Brother, need to rent a room? It gets very cold and windy here at night, and monsters sometimes get in."
Lin Xiao glanced at him and shook his head.
The burly man, persistent, said:
```
"Brother, you might not mind, but your delicate woman will have a hard time being blown around by the wind all night. Moreover, it’s rare to see women around here."
Lin Xiao still shook his head and turned to leave.
This wasn’t like a train station in the real world; in this dangerous place, having someone ask if you want to rent a room as soon as you get off the train was strange no matter how you looked at it. It was better to be cautious.
There weren’t many buildings in the valley. The ones that drew the most people were the connected stone buildings near the station. There were a few shops there, including a bar, where a few apparent evolvers were gathered in the yard, chatting about something.
Just as he walked by, the evolvers looked up. At the sight of Zhuo Jing by his side, their eyes lit up. One of them whistled loudly and called out:
"Where is this beauty from? Let me buy you a drink."
Lin Xiao glanced at them coldly. A killing intent, invisible and intangible yet undeniably real, surged towards them. The smiles quickly disappeared from their faces, and one of them coughed dryly and said with a strained laugh:
"Bro, don’t be angry, it’s just a joke."
He ignored them and went to the general store next to the bar to ask the owner for some information and to buy some things before leaving the station and heading toward one of the valley’s exits.
The evolvers watched him leave until they could no longer see his figure, then let out a sigh of relief.
"Where did that master come from? That was some intense pressure; even our vice-chairmen aren’t that powerful."
"If he’s that strong, why come here instead of going deeper in?"
"Idiot, he must be here to protect that chick."
"Honestly, that chick is really pretty."
"No kidding..."
Outside the valley was a canyon filled with strangely twisted black trees with barbed branches. Just as he stepped out of the valley entrance, he saw a monster with the upper body of a human but a head like a monster’s and a tiger-striped snake tail for its lower body. The creature, standing two meters tall with a several-meter-long tail, threw a spear from afar. The sheer force tore through the air with a shrill whistle, and a black mist could be faintly seen swirling around the spear.
Lin Xiao reached out his hand, and a glowing, gold Libra Holy Sword and a Golden Holy Shield adorned with intricate patterns appeared. He calmly handed them to Zhuo Jing, saying:
"Take care of it yourself!"
The source of this c𝐨ntent is freeweɓnovēl.coɱ.
She took the weapons and shield and nodded earnestly.
Watching her dash forward and engage in combat with the tiger-striped snake monster, she seemed to be in no danger. Lin Xiao stretched out his right hand, and a prismatic crystal materialized.
This was the essence of the Ancient Ice Soul Kard, which he hadn’t opened yet.
With a thought, the essence burst into a brilliant azure light, growing brighter and brighter until it was no longer visible to the naked eye. However, Lin Xiao knew that the essence had been opened, and a random relic from the Ancient Ice Soul Kard had been acquired. As the light slowly faded, he fixed his gaze on it and exclaimed in surprise:
"Damn, it could actually yield something like this?"
Main World, Yan Huang No.5 Super War Fortress.
Lin Xiao had returned from his hometown quite some time ago. During that period, he specifically took his parents on a trip to the Giant Divine Crystal Wall System. As the son of the Crystal Wall System, he used top-tier Transcendent Divine Arts to grant his mother a True Body of Divinity. He forcibly enshrined her as a deity there, fulfilling his mother’s dream.
It’s quite normal for one’s status to be elevated by their children’s achievements, isn’t it? As his birth parents, for him to grant them godhood seemed natural, as did assigning them a few kingdoms and a few hundred million followers to form their Faith Area.
If it were not for the fact that she never experienced divine enthronement and lacked expert knowledge of it, he would have wanted to stuff tens of billions of followers into her Faith Area, allowing her to jump straight to Medium Divine Power.
What was somewhat amusing and exasperating for Lin Xiao was that he intended to strip himself of the Godhood of the Cave-dwellers and give it to his mother. As the son of the Crystal Wall System and creator of the race that the King of All Gods had made, the current Cave-dwellers numbered over twenty billion. By holding the Cave-dweller Godhood, she would not take long to obtain a firm Medium Divine Power. Adding any Powerful Godhood on top of that would make her eventual promotion to Powerful Divine Power a certainty.
Then his mother refused on the grounds that the Cave-dweller race was too ugly...
Yes, she refused.
She’d rather have the seemingly less promising Flower Fairy Godhood than the Cave-dweller Godhood, leaving Lin Xiao speechless for a long time.
With no other choice, he had to peel off the Magic Godhood and bestow it upon her, and gave the Order Godhood to his father. Both these Godhoods were capable of being promoted to Powerful Divine Power.
In any case, his Incarnation had already become the de facto King of All Gods of the Giant Divine Crystal Wall System, so peeling off these two Godhoods did not affect his strength.
He put his parents aside for the moment. With his Incarnation sitting firmly there and each of his girlfriends sending over an Incarnation to accompany her, his mother was rather enjoying herself and hardly thought about her son at all.
During this time, Lin Xiao’s main task was fostering the development of the Huge God Regiment. Now that he had officially ascended, along with Xie Yufei giving him a hand, he could directly requisition Demigod-level Sons of the Divine Realm from the Yan Huang Warzone Reservist Pool into the regiment. The Huge God Regiment was not lacking in Reservist Demigods or lower ranks; the total number had already reached several hundred thousand.
Excluding the six Guardians, the overall power of the regiment was already matching those mid-to-low ranked veteran regiments, and if the six Powerful Divine Powers were included, it was among the strongest.
After all, the six Powerful Divine Powers were immensely strong. The entire Yan Huang’s fifth War Zone only had twenty-eight such powers, so he alone commanded a force that matched one-quarter of the entire warzone.
Ever since his promotion to a Powerful Divine Power, both Commander Xie and Radiance, as well as the people from Jin Sisi’s race, seemed to have accepted the fact that he was involved with three women simultaneously. The three women moved in openly to live with him, and now all that was left was a wedding.
They had decided that once Lin Xiao had some free time, he would go to the Wizard World to rescue Jin Sisi’s father, after which they would hold the wedding ceremony.
This time should not be too far off, for now Tishar has almost entirely recovered after Refining the Innate Origin of the Primordial Death, and it is estimated that she will be fully healed after this expedition to the Tidal Crystal Barrier System. She will then head to the Wizard World.
He had left coordinates in the Canglan World of the Wizard World, where Jin Sisi’s father was. With Tishar’s power, they could directly arrive in Canglan World next time, without having to suppress their power and entering an unknown location like last time.
During this time, the War Zone had been preparing to strike at the Tidal Crystal Wall System.
After communicating with the Insect Race forces from the Tidal Crystal Wall System, both sides parted on bad terms.
They coveted that treasure, and the Insect Race coveted it, too; naturally, they could not come to an agreement.
However, full-scale war was not possible, so Commander Xie called upon the support of the Radiance and two Divine Powers from the War Throne. They had already reached an agreement with the Dominators of the Insect Tribe Divine Realm civilization to keep the war within certain limits.
The third Expeditionary Army of the warzone had already transferred several regiments, and his Huge God Regiment was ready to be moved at any moment, and they were currently mobilizing.
He pressed a button on his desk and murmured a few words. After a little while, a screen popped up before him, someone having sent over the latest situation of the Tidal Crystal Wall System.
According to the information displayed, the warzone had already dispatched two Void Fortresses there, and they were engaging in a standoff in the void outside the Tidal Crystal Wall System with the Insect Tribe Divine Realm civilization. At present, both parties were still largely restraining themselves, though small-scale skirmishes were continuous, yet full-scale war had not broken out.