Escaping the Infinite Reload

Before I knew it, through endless reloads and the training-experience copy bug, I had finally clawed my way to level 299.

And the Training Ground? It wasn't some one-in-fourteen-million long shot. I'd cleared nearly two hundred maps just grinding up to 299, and I still hadn't found the damn thing.

Naturally, I hadn't even attempted a Limit Breakthrough. My stats, which I'd confidently assumed capped at a thousand, had already blown past eleven hundred without so much as a hiccup — which meant I was probably looking at twelve hundred before the wall finally showed up.

Half out of my mind, I looped the eight maps around my base like a circuit, skimming each one in turn, and every time the Training Ground failed to ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠appear I just hit reload and started over.

I mean, the odds of the Training Ground spawning were way higher than landing a classic combo! A full half a percent!

So why the hell hadn't it shown up yet?!

Not knowing whether I simply couldn't spawn it or whether it had appeared and I'd walked right past without noticing made my blood boil even harder. I felt like I was going to collapse from sheer frustration.

I pulled up the sticky-note memo I'd pinned to the corner of my vision with Memo Mode.

1. Hit level 299.

2. Max out every stat to its limit.

3. Craft consumables for Limit Breakthrough.

4. Prepare to block the Heavenly Tribulation event.

5. Obtain an exclusive weapon.

6. Manage the base.

I scratched off number one. Sure, some eok-kka might drop my level later, or I might burn slaughter energy in a panic and slip back down — but once you'd hit 299, recovering it was easy enough. Moving on.

"...Except I need the Training Ground to raise my stats."

More precisely, I needed a massive haul of slaughter energy. Instant dungeons that vanished after a single clear, or dungeons that slapped you with penalties for overstaying, weren't going to deliver that kind of volume. And field farming? Not even close.

And more than anything, the newly appeared third memo was the real problem.

"Limit Breakthrough."

I could just do it fine up through Core Formation, couldn't I? Why do I suddenly need materials? Is this some kind of class-change quest? But wasn't the Heavenly Tribulation event already the class-change quest?!

Help!!!!!

"Hm? Well, of course — Golden Core needs external force, doesn't it? If pure training alone kept raising your realm forever, what would be the point of a sect? You need resources for cultivation, pills and tonics to advance your realm, and the alchemists and Dharma Treasures to make them. That's how it works."

"But my sect is just me!"

"Then go get them with your own two hands, Hee-ah. The type and effect of pills a cultivator needs varies wildly from person to person, so don't look at me."

"What about you, Cheon Nan-cho?"

"Me? I already told you. I'm holding the Golden Core fragment left behind by an immortal who fell from the upper realms, climbed to Golden Core, then failed to outlast their lifespan and got snuffed by Heavenly Tribulation. Up through Golden Core, I don't need pills."

What a convenient backstory!

"But do I really need to go get them myself? Do I?"

I stared Cheon Nan-cho down. She tried to bolt into the inventory; I caught her mid-flee.

"Wait, Hee-ah! Just listen to me for a sec...!"

"Have a nice trip~ Prisoner Exploration."

Wrapped in slaughter energy, Cheon Nan-cho went whooshing off to a random map. Until she came back, I figured I might as well keep hunting for the Training Ground — so I started wandering the maps at random.

By the time Prisoner Exploration ended and Cheon Nan-cho returned, I still hadn't found the Training Ground. And after years of exploration, she hadn't brought back any materials either. I didn't hesitate.

"Reload."

And so began the endless, grinding, utterly hopeless cycle of infinite reloads — hunting the Training Ground while simultaneously farming materials for Limit Breakthrough consumables through Prisoner Exploration.

At first, the skill grinding and the training experience piling up made it bearable. No matter how many times I looped the same stretch of time, watching skill levels climb still gave me a sense of progress.

In the middle stretch, I soothed the boredom by wandering the randomly generated maps, still searching for the Training Ground.

And later on, I reached the point where I was actively ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠enjoying the random events that popped up.

After all, a reload would erase everything like it never happened!

My save point was locked to the moment I'd first joined the sect and entered the base map, so decorating or managing the base was completely pointless. The routine was ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠simple: immediately send Cheon ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Nan-cho on Prisoner Exploration, then loop the maps hunting for the Training Ground. Over and over.

"But why the fuck does it genuinely never show up?!"

Honestly, in all my time playing, I'd only seen the Training Ground twice.

Were those even real odds?! No.

Was it probability manipulation, then? No.

In this piece-of-shit garbage game, cases like this always boiled down to one single problem.

"Where the hell is the mod conflict..."

After confirming it through countless limited regressions via reload, that was the only airtight conclusion I could reach: a mod conflict had dropped the Training Ground spawn rate well below the advertised 0.5%.

Nothing else could explain it failing to appear this hard!

And then.

.

.

.

"Hee-ah! I brought you pills to eat!"

"You're the best, Help! — I mean, Cheon Nan-cho!"

After that long, grinding, soul-crushing stretch of pure busywork... just when I was thoroughly sick of it, a way out of this infinite regression finally appeared! The Training Ground? Who cares — pile up enough slaughter energy, keep converting residual stats, and I'd hit the stat cap eventually!

Grateful just to escape the infinite-reload treadmill, I immediately took the pills from Cheon Nan-cho.

Hitting View Details just spat out that useless message, but I didn't care. Like the legendary-grade consumable Petal of the Heavenly Dao that had dropped from an earlier event, this was an item that would let me perform a Limit Breakthrough just by using it!

"Time to stop reloading for a while and actually clear some maps..."

I couldn't level up, but most of my skill grinding was already done through infinite reloads anyway. Now it was time to strip the maps bare and stockpile equipment, consumables, and materials at the base.

Until now I'd been operating on a pure "whatever, I'm just gonna reload anyway" mindset!

Either way, I was finally free of the reload loop. I could casually clear maps, dump materials and consumables and gear into the base, and even throw up a few modest buildings.

And when I finally built a warehouse at the base, the event I'd been waiting for triggered.

A monster raid scaled to the value of whatever was sitting in the warehouse — the so-called Base Invasion event!

Of course, given that the junk currently stacked in the warehouse wasn't worth much, the monsters that spawned barely ranked above the decorative plants Cheon Nan-cho had been diligently growing and multiplying.

"Hmm... if I toss a Peak-grade Spirit Stone in there, the invasion difficulty would skyrocket, right?"

I slipped one in for a peek. The value shot past a hundred million. Unique items hovered around a thousand, so this was the sheer power of a level-450 drop hauled in via the Abyss bug.

Not wanting anything weird to happen, I finished checking quickly, stuffed the Peak-grade Spirit Stone back into the prisoner bag — Cheon Nan-cho's bag — and checked the base status.

"Alright. First I need to make more spirit land and set up proper kill zones."

The decorative plants Cheon Nan-cho cultivated on spirit land contaminated with slaughter energy were perfect for building kill-zone traps. Beyond the cost of creating the spirit land itself, they barely ate any extra resources — and best of all, when those plants killed monsters from an invasion event, they accumulated slaughter energy and grew on their own.

Which meant that rather than stuffing the warehouse with high-value goods and farming slaughter energy off invasion events, I needed to carefully tune the warehouse's total value so the decorative plants could keep eating experience and growing.

"A whole new content loop!"

Base decorative-plant cultivation — talk about a random, out-of-nowhere mashup feature. Classic piece-of-shit garbage game!