Legendary Victory

For starters, I was clearly screwed. The fact that he was flying on spiritual energy alone made it painfully clear he was on a completely different level from a mid-stage Qi Condensation cultivator like me.

"This fucking game."

"Even after going mad and slaughtering every last mortal, your eyes remain as clear as they were when you were a newborn."

"Fucking shit game."

"I know you. Born with a spiritual root, I gave you a name and intended to let you grow among mortals for a time before bringing you into the sect."

"How the hell am I supposed to deal with this kind of event? Just dumping it on me like this."

"This too is my mistake. Your slaughter karma is so thick I can feel it this clearly. I cannot even begin to guess how many innocent lives you've devoured."

"There's no skip button and I have to sit through all of this? That doesn't make any fucking sense."

"Late as it may be, I will correct my mistake. I shall end your slaughter karma here."

"Hostile NPC appearance events have a ridiculously low probability, so I must just be unlucky, right? This isn't related to the mods either, is it? Either way, both options are equally fucking terrible."

I glanced at the cultivator's gray dot on the minimap as it bled over into red, wondering whether dying outside a dungeon meant actually dying for real — and in the end, I had no choice but to use the one and only method available to me.

"Auto-Battle."

My consciousness dimmed, fading into black. Thinking that if I lost this Auto-Battle I might die and my consciousness would vanish completely, I simply closed my eyes.

The little girl who had been muttering incomprehensible sentences like a madwoman closed her eyes for a brief moment — and the instant she opened them again, an explosive surge of killing intent erupted forth and blanketed the sky. The cultivator watched in horror.

When had he last seen this child? It had not even been ten years since he had laid eyes on her as a ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠newborn. Just how many lives had she cut short in the time between?

Slaughter karma that could only be accumulated by taking lives pressed down on him with crushing force, blotting out the heavens.

This was pure slaughter karma — the kind that could never be achieved by killing a mere thousand or even ten thousand. The child's realm was clearly nothing more than mid-stage Qi Condensation, which made the situation all the more incomprehensibly terrifying.

"What a thoroughly deranged child. Good. I'll subdue her, take her back to the sect, and refine her whole into a fine Dharma treasure."

No slaughter karma of this magnitude had occurred within the sect's territory in recent memory, so she must have obtained it through some special means. A mid-stage Qi Condensation child being swept along by it should have been easy enough to suppress — or so the cultivator thought, until he came to his senses the moment he saw the child already at his throat, swinging a killing blow.

"What—?!"

The wall of spiritual energy he hastily raised collided with the vast slaughter karma bursting from the child's hand, and in that instant the crimson karma invaded his energy like a drug dissolving in water. The wall of spiritual energy collapsed in the blink of an eye.

What the cultivator felt in that moment was a wall.

A wall named Time — one built over a span far longer than the years he himself had spent in cultivation.

"...Slaughter karma accumulated over hundreds of years?!"

He could not begin to understand how a mere mid-stage Qi Condensation cultivator could carry something like that in her body and still keep such clear eyes — but that did not mean he was going to die here.

He drew out a Dharma treasure obtained through his cultivation at the sect. It was far too precious to waste on a cultivator of such clearly inferior realm, but dealing with this mad child — who had clearly picked up something unspeakable from somewhere — demanded it.

"Rage forth!"

A typhoon of spiritual energy sealed within a small sphere drank in power and unleashed its full force. The tiny whirlwind that began in the cultivator's hand swelled in an instant, surging toward the child still wreathed in slaughter karma like a crimson cloud.

That violent current swept away not only the vast slaughter karma that had blanketed the sky, but the clouds themselves — and in the same moment:

"...Ah."

Only then did the cultivator understand why the child's slaughter karma had covered the heavens.

A small star had risen in the sky above her.

A star as vividly red as blood.

In the brief, involuntary moment his gaze was drawn to that ominous starlight, the child broke through the whirlwind summoned by the Dharma treasure with her bare body and closed the distance to his face in an instant.

Her body was crumpled and shredded by the gale, bleeding and scattering flesh in every direction — wounds that would have been fatal even for a cultivator, let alone an ordinary mortal. And yet she charged like a reanimated corpse, red blood-light streaming from her eyes in rivulets.

Two remaining stubby little fingers, wreathed in crimson slaughter karma, twisted and punched clean through his body. Even through the searing agony, the cultivator swallowed his groan and drew up his spiritual energy to cast a technique.

He condensed a blade of wind in his hand and swung it to take the child's head clean off. He felt the heavy, solid impact of the blow — and then:

The child's small mouth bit down on his fist as if tearing it free, deflecting even the wind blade. That was the last thing the cultivator registered before the horrific pain of his spiritual root being gouged out and ripped away by the child's fingers, and then he died.

"Ghhk…"

The moment my consciousness returned, the pain hit me so hard I couldn't even twitch. My entire body was genuinely wrecked.

My body was already healing under the influence of spiritual energy, but the pain was so intense I wanted to pass out all over again.

In the end, desperate to divert my attention from the agony, I awakened the innate ability inside me.

Apparently the hard cap of nineteen levels per kill still held, no matter how high-level the monster. I'd killed a cultivator with at least double my level and still stopped at sixty-one.

I could feel the unabsorbed experience mixed into the slaughter karma, knitting my body back together — but the second I paid attention to it, the pain made my eyes water, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠so I forced myself to think about something else.

The rewards for a hostile NPC appearance event were random, but Free Stat Points ranked among the better ones.

If I deliberately triggered certain events and stacked seven or more Free Stat ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Points each time, I could gather over a hundred before hitting level 100 — which would let me trigger guaranteed events.

It was an event you absolutely had to pull off if you wanted a high-ceiling character, but I had no idea whether it still worked after the reality patch.

Worth trying if it works, no big deal if it doesn't. With that thought, I gritted my teeth against the pain — which by now, after quite some time, I was getting used to — and slowly forced my body upright.

I'd only gone through one map and one dungeon, and already far too much had happened. The reality patch stretching out travel time didn't help either.

Originally, this shit game only needed about two hundred years of in-game time per run to dig through all the content. Then you'd raise the difficulty next run, try to hit certain endgame events faster, grind out ten-year speedruns, and once you got bored of all that, install mods and go again.

Why the hell did I even play that shit game? It was on a sale list, so I bought it without thinking. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Couldn't even play without mods, so I installed those. Still no Korean language support, so I slogged through it anyway, then spent years of pure hell trying to make a Korean patch just for my own convenience.

And then, right at the end, I downloaded a Chinese mod, installed it, and my computer exploded and died.

"Fucking shit game."

Thinking about it again still made me feel robbed.

I wrapped myself in spiritual energy to cover a body that was half-naked at this point, and rummaged through my inventory to check the newly acquired loot. One Rare-grade consumable and a pile of Magic-grade consumables.

Not a single piece of gear dropped, huh.

Not that I wanted to wear equipment made from bug corpses even if I could hold it, so it looked like I'd have to grind for gear the hard way.

Once I got out of the Wasteland, I'd find a village or a dungeon, spam object creation and destruction, and something was bound to drop eventually.

Another event popping up without so much as a breather. I steadied my lurching heart, let out a long sigh, and started walking — one step at a time — toward the edge of the Wasteland.