"Is this researcher a simp? No, rather than a simp, he's more like a pervert, since being a simp requires actual 'simping'."

Among all the protagonists Zhang Yan has seen in these profiles, this guy might be the only protagonist interested in women.

After all, other protagonists, like the Red Dragon, are only interested in money and nothing else.

Then there's the blacksmith, who also doesn't like women. He only enjoys torturing others, eventually going down the path of a villain with no return.

And elves or whatever, they are just typical nerds who know many female friends but remain only friends due to their nerdy nature. Besides, as a 'retired old man,' he has no interest in some 'twilight romance'.

Therefore, encountering this researcher in the profile, who is strangely interested in women, is indeed rare, and Zhang Yan was naturally very surprised.

But at the same time, Zhang Yan wanted to advise this guy not to waste time on women and instead to invest his limited energy and time more in infinite scientific research, developing stronger Tyrants and equipment. Women will only be a stumbling block on his path to success.

But unfortunately, all these stories have already happened. Zhang Yan is just an observer; he cannot persuade this researcher nor change the course of the story. He can only continue to watch silently and await further development.

"Although I don't know if this Neck Potential Activation Device was developed by this researcher, the profile featuring this researcher's story suggests that it's definitely related to him."

From this perspective, Zhang Yan believes the Neck Potential Activation Device is most likely a special device developed by this researcher during his studies to enhance the Tyrant's power.

"Even though this researcher is a pervert, I must admit, the Neck Potential Activation Device is quite impressive. Even unenhanced, it provides a 32% power boost, almost on par with the Flame God's Crown I obtained earlier."

Well, there might be some difference, as the Flame God's Crown initially had a 35% power boost and a full score of 440 points with Golden quality. It advanced from Golden to Dark Gold and then to Orange quality after just three simple fusions back then.

However, this Neck Potential Activation Device is somewhat lacking, with only 400 points, merely a medium score in Golden quality. From past experience with fusing the Life Ring, it's unlikely to advance to Orange quality with just three fusions.

So, although both were obtained from treasure boxes of Third Tier Three-star Monsters, a significant gap remains between them.

After all, the Crimson Iron Prince Ant is a Third Tier Three-star, but it's also an Elite Monster, practically a Third Tier Four-star Monster. Thus, it's normal for the items obtained from it to be stronger than those from a Third Tier Three-star ordinary monster like the T-0400TP Death God Tyrant.

"As for the 85-point power requirement, it can be easily met; even when I first advanced in rank, it was no issue, let alone now."

After checking the attribute list of the Neck Potential Activation Device, Zhang Yan felt it, despite its slightly low score, is overall pretty good.

"But I wonder which part of the body this Neck Potential Activation Device is supposed to be equipped on…"

Regarding this, Zhang Yan planned to explore it further after opening the treasure box. If it can be obtained, it must be equipable, so there's no need to worry about that.

After checking the last item slot, Zhang Yan quickly made his choice, "So, I choose '10000 Soul points', '10000 Soul points', 'Muscle Regeneration', '10000 Soul points', 'Neck Potential Activation Device (Magnetic Energy Embedded)'."

After Zhang Yan made his final decision, the time pause quickly disappeared, and he immediately picked up another treasure box. This time he had seven to eight hundred treasure boxes to open, which would take at least more than half an hour.

......

November 1st, Sunday, Halloween, and also the first day Zhang Yan entered the Ashen World, at 7:16 PM, at the Umbrella Biochemical Test Field in Terra City, Lucky Slot Machine.

After opening all seven hundred or so treasure boxes, Zhang Yan glanced at his watch and found nearly forty minutes had passed.

"Ten minutes for fighting monsters, ten minutes for recovery, forty minutes for opening boxes. Just clearing Terra City took an entire hour, so really, opening treasure boxes is such a waste of time."

Zhang Yan now desperately wanted a bulk one-click opening function. Unfortunately, Ashen World is not a pay-to-win online game; such conveniences don't exist here, so he can only open them manually one by one.

Zhang Yan believed that other Awakeners probably don't worry about such issues, as their hunting efficiency is low, and the treasure box drop rate is even lower. Only he, with an extremely high treasure box drop rate, would worry about not being able to open all the boxes, and indeed, he's quite troubled by this.

"Forget it, I won't think about these things for now; after all, they can't be solved at the moment. I can only put up with it for now and check what I've gained from the treasure boxes."

While speaking, Zhang Yan began to tally up the gains from the boxes. Although curious about the new equipment, Zhang Yan first tallied the most important Talent earnings as usual.

After tallying up, Zhang Yan found he had obtained a total of 768 B-level talents of [Muscle Regeneration] this time, and he still had 119 Muscle Regeneration left in his waist bag. So, in total, Zhang Yan now had 887 Muscle Regeneration talents in hand.

"If my SSS-level talent, Immortality, needs to be promoted to X level, it requires 6561 E-level Slow Corrosion talents, which translates to only 243 B-level Muscle Regenerations. With my current talent quantity, it's easily met, even exceeding by more than twice."

After tallying the number of Muscle Regeneration talents, Zhang Yan quickly picked out 243 Muscle Regenerations and smashed all these grey small light balls at once.

At the same time, that familiar Talent prompt sound immediately echoed in Zhang Yan's ears.

"Detected subordinate talents of the SSS-level talent 'Immortality' in your Talent list. Would you like to merge the talents?"

"Yes, merge."

Currently, Zhang Yanhang's upgrade direction for the SSS-level talent Immortality is still similar to his previous idea, which is to add a new effect that can increase the recovery speed of physical strength upon upgrading to the X-level.

Moreover, Zhang Yanhang thinks that this new effect should be able to increase physical recovery speed based on the Constitution attribute, just like the Longevity effect in Ability Three.

This way, the Constitution attribute can become a conversion factor and, with the growth of the Constitution attribute, continue to increase physical recovery speed, making it a semi-growth type ability.

Allowing it to 'automatically grow' even when the talent level cannot be upgraded, unlike other abilities that are tightly bound to the talent and cannot upgrade if the talent cannot upgrade.

Looking at the previous situation when Longbo's power was upgraded to X-level, Zhang Yanhang feels that this idea is far from being unrealistic. On the contrary, the success rate is quite high, as Longevity is such a template. Adding a similar template thereafter is logical.

[Merge completed.]

[You have obtained the X-level talent 'Heavenly Protection Nine Lives.']

"Heavenly Protection Nine Lives? What is this?" Zhang Yanhang felt that the name of this X-level talent seemed to touch on an area of his knowledge he was unfamiliar with.

After thinking about it for a while, Zhang Yanhang finally recalled a description of Heavenly Protection Nine Lives from his memory of life-related materials. Simply put, it means becoming nature's favored child, with endless fortune and endless lifespan.

In a more specific description, Heavenly Protection Nine Lives is an abbreviation from the Book of Songs, from the 'Heavenly Protection' chapter of the 'Lesser Odes' section.

The original text is 'Heavenly protection sets you well, everything flourishes. Like mountains, like rivers, like hills, like marshes, like an ever-arriving river, nothing stops the increase. Like the eternal moon, like the rising sun, like the everlasting Southern Mountain, neither falling nor collapsing, like the flourishing pine and cypress, everything upholds you'.

And because this chapter of the Book of Songs uses 'like' nine times, it is abbreviated as 'Heavenly Protection Nine Lives'.

The nine 'likes' basically mean that nature's favor is as vast as mountains, continuous as hills, like an ever-flowing tide, ensuring your fortune only increases without decreasing.

And your life process will be as complete as the full moon on the 15th day of the first lunar month, advancing like the rising east sun, unstoppable in its brilliance and heat.

Your lifespan will be as endless as Zhongnan Mountain, and whatever you wish to do will not fail midway. Your descendants will flourish perpetually like the expanding branches of pine and cypress.

In terms of the meaning of Heavenly Protection Nine Lives, it is essentially equivalent to combining all the previous experiences he had, such as 'Life Extension, Longevity, Longevity Mountain and Fortune Sea, Longevity, and Immortality' and directly doubling it exponentially.

And in ancient times, Heavenly Protection Nine Lives was considered the topmost blessing, usually used to describe emperors. It covered the most important aspects of ancient life: fortune, career, longevity, and descendants.

"Looking at it this way, this Heavenly Protection Nine Lives is quite impressive as an X-level talent. However, compared to the talent name, the most important thing is the actual talent effect."

Therefore, Zhang Yanhang quickly opened the talent effects of the X-level Heavenly Protection Nine Lives to see if he had acquired the new ability to increase physical recovery speed.

[Heavenly Protection Nine Lives]

[Quality: X (0/19683)]

[Ability One: Unwearied — Constitution +12 (+3).]

[Ability Two: Energetic — Physical Strength +400% (+120%).]

[Ability Three: Longevity — Life Span +260 years (+80 years) +8 years (+4 years)×100[Constitution]=1060 years (+480 years).]

[Ability Four: Longevity — When remaining life span is greater than 1000 years (current is 2040 years), increase 2040 years (Life Span)×0.05%=102% Attack Power, increase 2040 years (Life Span)×0.05%=102% defensive power.]

"This time, upon promotion to X-level, the number of talents needed for upgrading indeed tripled again, from the previous need for 6561 Slow Corrosion to 19683 Slow Corrosion.

One must admit, requiring 19683 Slow Corrosion is truly a massive upgrade need."

If Zhang Yanhang continues to use Slow Corrosion to upgrade the X-level talent [Heavenly Protection Nine Lives], considering his current upgrade needs and the treasure box drop rate of needing to kill thirty-eight First Tier Monsters for one Drop treasure box, he would need to kill approximately seventy-five million Zombies to gather this massive amount for the upgrade.

But the total number of Zombies in the quota of Raccoon City is just six thousand, so if he wants to gather the 19683 Slow Corrosion needed for the next upgrade, he would need to clear out 125 areas similar to Raccoon City, or clear Raccoon City 125 times continuously.

Just thinking about this number is despair-inducing. If cleared once a month, it would need Zhang Yanhang to continuously clear Raccoon City for ten years to gather the required amount of Slow Corrosion.

"But fortunately, I am using B-level Muscle Regeneration Talent to upgrade 'Heavenly Protection Nine Lives' now. So, when divided by 27, this massive demand of 19683 Slow Corrosion actually only needs 729 B-level Muscle Regeneration.

I previously had 887 B-level Muscle Regeneration in hand, but due to upgrading Heavenly Protection Nine Lives to X-level, 243 B-level Muscle Regeneration were consumed, resulting in only 644 Muscle Regeneration talent remaining."

Currently, Zhang Yanhang still needs 85 Muscle Regeneration to once again upgrade the talent level.

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