"From the looks of it, even if I could acquire the God of Sun's Divine Position, its value may not be that great, after all, it's just a lone S-rank Skill that can't get past SS rank and undergo a qualitative change. The degree of amplification is limited."

For Zhang Yanhang, who has already evolved the E-rank Talent "Ant Power" into the XX-rank "Longbo's Power," a single non-upgradable S-rank really isn't all that useful.

"Moreover, compared to this so-called S-rank Talent, it's clear that the Purple Quality Divination Tarot Card - Pope is somewhat more important..."

Zhang Yanhang truly didn't expect Multiple Choice to surprise him in this way.

"No wonder it swallowed up all of my Energy Value right after I made the choice. So it wasn't just the energy consumption of a Divination Tarot Card but actually got me an extra card, and even a higher quality Purple Quality Tarot Card, at that. Pretty nice."

Zhang Yanhang knew that Multiple Choice would never let him down; he indeed misunderstood Multiple Choice earlier. It's impossible for Multiple Choice to consume his Energy Value and not deliver results.

After all, at the end of the day, as an Awakening Talent, Multiple Choice is naturally one with him, an Awakener. Who would shoot themselves in the foot? So, everything would definitely tend toward the best possible outcomes.

"This is my first time acquiring a Purple Quality Divination Tarot Card, so I'm not sure what's different from the Blue quality ones."

While he spoke, Zhang Yanhang began to examine the attribute list of the Divination Tarot Card - Pope.

[Divination Tarot Card - Pope[Inferior] (Gate of Truth)]

[Quality: Purple]

[Type: Equipment]

[Origin: Ashen World, Heavenly God Continent, Sizitak Empire, Akbar Village underground black workshop.]

[Durability: 42/42]

[Defensive Power: 29]

[Additional Attributes: Skill Cooldown Time -5%]

[Upgradable, Upgrade Conditions 1: Own 'Divination Tarot Card·Star[Inferior] (Gate of Truth)' (0/1), Own 'Divination Tarot Card·Moon[Inferior] (Gate of Truth)' (0/1), Own 'Divination Tarot Card·Sun[Inferior] (Gate of Truth)' (0/1).

Upgrade Conditions 2: Own 'Divination Tarot Card·Hermit[Inferior] (Gate of Truth)' (0/1), Own 'Divination Tarot Card·Death[Inferior] (Gate of Truth)' (0/1), Own 'Divination Tarot Card·Demon[Inferior] (Gate of Truth)' (0/1).]

[Usage Requirements: Possess Alchemy or other relevant Alchemy skills.]

[Score: 150 (Purple Items score from 71 to 150).]

[Set Effect One: Mother of All Things (Two-piece set unlock attribute)]

[Set Effect Two: Abyssal Purgatory (Three-piece set unlock attribute)]

[Synopsis: The Pope is one of 78 Tarot cards, ranking 5th among the 22 Major Arcana. It's a card that symbolizes the awakening of conscience and goodness, and also matters of religious faith and tradition.

In comparison to the Emperor, which represents material Domination, it leans more toward the spiritual realm, acting as a spiritual authority and interpreter of the unknown world.

Because the Pope can directly communicate with God, he attempts to save the souls of the people with compassion and insight and guide them on the right path through his teachings.

The Pope raises his hands high to spread his doctrine, while the faithful devoutly kneel and listen.

However, it should be noted that he is also a symbol of traditional knowledge and conservative morals, controlling people's thinking and limiting their vision.

Only by completely abandoning the old ways and exploring new solutions can one find hope.

But none of the above has anything to do with this poorly made, error-ridden counterfeit product from a small workshop.]

"What can I say, I know what 'Divine Right of Kings' means, but I can't help but wonder how many true believers the Pope has?"

Although Zhang Yanhang only read the synopsis, he could deduce from it and his inherent impression that the Pope's implications among the myriad Tarot cards are not too favourable, or even quite bad.

After all, the matters mentioned on the card sound good when phrased as following tradition, but can also be interpreted harshly as being inflexible and stubbornly clinging to old ways. Being completely dominated by religion is indeed a very terrible thing.

Naturally, Zhang Yanhang does not criticize this as an atheist. After all, he had just seen the God of Sun and even dispatched the God of Sun himself and is now thinking about defeating even more gods.

Therefore, as a firm theist, he merely criticizes from the perspective of an unbeliever and God slayer; after all, if his power is stronger than the gods', why would he worship such undefined deities?

If they really want Zhang Yanhang to provide faith, they would at least have to withstand one of his Triple Strike All Four Elements are Void and survive just to have a slight chance.

"By the way, if a priest, as 'father,' represents the traditional male authority that favours sons over daughters and likes little boys, does the Pope also like little boys? But it seems that most who can become Pope are generally quite old, so even if they liked little boys, they're probably too old to do anything about it..."

As a side note, Zhang Yanhang always found the translation of 'father' into 'priest' and mixing it with 'father' alone, and the direct translation of 'godfather' into the mafia 'Godfather' to be quite preposterous.

"However, irrespective of whether the Pope is any good, my version is a counterfeit after all, very different from the true Pope. The Blue quality Tarot Cards used to follow with a 'fake,' and now it's become 'inferior.' From pirated to low-quality, I'm not sure if that's progress or regress."

Of course, what's more important is the score. Zhang Yanhang discovered that the Equipment Score of this new Purple Quality Divination Tarot Card was a full score of Purple Quality at one hundred and fifty points, an increase of eighty points from the full Blue quality score of seventy, a quite significant increase.

But this is expected. Zhang Yanhang guessed that other Blue quality Tarot Cards upgraded to Purple Quality would also reach the full Purple Quality score eventually, as a twenty-two-piece set is indeed too fierce.

"What's most important is this additional attribute of the Divination Tarot Card - Pope this time, another additional attribute that I've never seen before, reducing Skill Cooldown Time by 5%? How to put it, it's useful but not that useful."

The main reason was that Zhang Yanhang only had one skill with a cooldown, which was the Four Great Emptiness Skill that came with the Four Great Emptiness Purifying World Fist, all his other skills had no cooldown and could be used anytime, anywhere.

Therefore, if Zhang Yanhang had more skills with cooldowns, this ability might be very useful, but for now, it was just okay.

"After decreasing the cooldown time of the Four Great Emptiness Skill, I will be able to use All Four Elements are Void sooner and increase the chance of triggering an extra attack and Double Strike. Actually, it's not bad, although the current 5% chance is quite low, it should be much better after an upgrade or activating a Set Effect."

Zhang Yanhang was actually quite optimistic about this cooldown reduction attribute because it wasn't an addition but a reduction, meaning, if it were reduced to '-100%', then he could completely ignore the cooldown and use All Four Elements are Void as a Normal attack.

By that time, not to mention triggering Double Strike, even Triple Strike might be possible. So, the prospects for development were indeed quite promising, well, provided that the upgrades continued, the current Purple Quality Divination Tarot Card - Pope was still a bit far from that goal.

[Item Five]

[Option One: Flame God's Fury, Golden quality, Weapon]

[Option Two: Flame God's Crown, Golden quality, Equipment]

[Option Three: Flame God's Blessing, Orange quality, Equipment]

"Hmm? Huh?? What??? Orange Quality Equipment?! Is Orange quality really above Dark Gold quality?!

That's not quite right. According to the style of the Ashen World from before, shouldn't it be a light orange or a pale orange? And then gradually transition to orange and dark orange or deep orange…

This Ashen World just doesn't follow the usual pattern and placed an orange right above dark gold...

Well, what can I say, it's worthy of being Fifth Tier equipment, just by the quality name it already seems so unique."

Although the first two options also included two Golden items, Flame God's Fury and Flame God's Crown, it was clear that neither of those items could attract Zhang Yanhang's attention, especially since he had already encountered Flame God's Crown in the loot from the Crimson Iron Prince Ant.

And Flame God's Fury, it wasn't even equipment, just an even more useless Golden quality weapon. Despite its appealing name, it really wasn't worth paying attention to.

"Although I'm not sure which part of the equipment this Flame God's Blessing is for, just the Orange quality alone means I've definitely chosen it."

Since this was his first encounter with Orange equipment, Zhang Yanhang couldn't wait to start looking through the attribute list of Flame God's Blessing.

[Flame God's Blessing]

[Quality: Orange]

[Type: Equipment]

[Origin: Ashen World, Crimson Iron Ore Vein, Large Crimson Iron Ant Nest Talano, Nameless Blacksmith.]

[Durability: 70/70]

[Defensive power: 55]

[Additional Attributes: Movement Speed +60%.]

[Usage requirements: Agility 75 points.]

[Score: 680 (Orange quality item scores range from 531 to 680.)]

[Introduction: Damn Hero! Damn Hero!! Damn Hero!!!

The King summoned me to discuss the matter of forging a weapon for the Hero, but to my surprise, that so-called strongest hero of the kingdom turned out to be the same damn Hero who obtained 'the best sword in the village' from me in exchange for licking a crimson iron ball!

I thought that the Hero, having been adventuring outside at that time, wouldn't have known about that incident and may not recognize me after so long, so I tried to converse calmly. But to my dismay, he recognized me at a glance and immediately pointed out my past misdeeds to the King. I just liked watching people lick crimson iron balls, what's the crime in that?!

At the first opportunity, I thought about fleeing with my workshop, but the Hero, having grown much stronger, quickly subdued me and threw me into the dungeon. Thankfully, the Witch Demon Mage came to my rescue just in time and saved me during the night.

The Witch Demon Mage told me that when she blew up the maze earlier, she actually blasted out a treasure by accident at the bottom, a Black Magic Book that can summon the Hell Demon God, the legendary item lost by the previous Demon King after his death.

Hmph, you've been unkind to me, so don't blame me for being unjust to you. A kingdom and a king who can't tell friend from foe deserve to be destroyed completely! And then, after its destruction, I, Lord Makarov, will rebuild and rule over it! Hahaha!

— From a Nameless Blacksmith who prefers to remain anonymous and has once again retreated into the deep mountains]

"How should I put it, after using third-person narrative before, suddenly switching back to first-person makes it quite jarring for me, and the development of the plot is really happening too fast. The previous introduction was all about practicing corruption, but then suddenly in the next, the Hero exposes the blacksmith.

Although the previous introduction also hinted at the subplot of the strongest hero forging weapons, this punchline was unveiled too quickly, and the Nameless Blacksmith has returned to the mountains once again. No wonder the origin has consistently been the Large Crimson Iron Ant Nest Talano inside the Crimson Iron Ore Vein; the end was apparently already set."

Of course, more than the Nameless Blacksmith's return to the mountains, Zhang Yanhang was more concerned about that Black Magic Book that could summon the Hell Demon God.

"I've always wondered why the God of Sun, Crotena, kept calling out Makarov's name. Now it seems that she is probably the Hell Demon God summoned by the Black Magic Book. Moreover, judging by her behaviour, she clearly had a severe conflict with Makarov and got frustrated with him."

Zhang Yanhang seriously suspected that after Makarov used the Black Magic Book to summon the God of Sun, Crotena, he might have gained some kind of control over her and then manipulated her into doing things she was unwilling to do. That is the only reason he could think of for the conflict between the two. After all, if the God of Sun, Crotena was not subjected to anyone's control and was free to move, she would have killed Makarov long ago based on her attitude.

But clearly, she had not managed to kill Makarov—at least, the God of the Scorching Sun, Crotena, who had just been summoned and was probably from a different timeline, did not succeed in killing Makarov.

"Speaking of which, since from the present narrative it appears that Makarov has not died, but has secluded himself in the mountains again, I wonder whether there is any possibility of encountering any new equipment forged by Makarov in the future."

To be honest, Zhang Yanhang was actually quite looking forward to the next part of the story; he just had no idea when it would come.

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.