Chapter 1167: A Day of Getting Beaten

Su Xiao looked at the King of Demon Hunters in his hand; the item was currently in its ring form.

The nature of the King of Demon Hunters was indeed very special. You could say it was three pieces of equipment, or you could say it was one, because the King of Demon Hunters could shift its form between a ring, a pendant, and a firearm. Activating different forms granted different additional attributes.

The ring reduced the duration of abnormal status effects, while the pendant delayed the onset of the near-death state—after all, entering a near-death state meant losing all ability to resist.

As for the firearm form, its attributes were similar to the previous 【Wild Hunt's Verdict】. However, 【Wild Hunt's Verdict】 required all five shots to hit and then be detonated to have a weakening effect, whereas now, each shot provided a layer of weakening, and stacking it to five layers completely outperformed 【Wild Hunt's Verdict】.

Compared to the detonation required after all five shots hit, Su Xiao preferred the one-shot-one-weakening approach; it had a higher margin for error. When fighting enemies of similar strength, the probability of landing all five shots was too low.

Three forms, three different effects. As for the most important set effect, it remained active regardless of which form the 【King of Demon Hunters】 was in.

The power of Set Effect 1 and Set Effect 2 was unquestionable; one increased real attributes, while the other significantly enhanced Su Xiao's melee and survival capabilities.

As for Set Effect 3, this ability was extremely powerful—no, it was even perversely strong. However, its weakness was also obvious: it required "charging" first, and the duration was only 100 seconds.

If Su Xiao activated the Demon Hunter Moment, then for the following 100 seconds, his mana would be effectively infinite, and his mastered abilities would have no cooldown. Of course, this did not include the abilities attached to equipment.

Interestingly, Su Xiao's "Dragon Shadow Flash" ability does not fall under the category of equipment-attached skills. The reason is that Checking Zhan Long Shan is a companion weapon. Su Xiao was clear about this point when he used the "Dragon Shadow Flash" ability; at that time, it was not Checking Zhan Long Shan that penetrated space, but he himself. Therefore, Dragon Shadow Flash is equivalent to an ability he has mastered himself.

If Su Xiao activated the Demon Hunter Moment, he would only need to use three abilities in the subsequent battle: Dragon Shadow Flash + Counter Shield + keeping Blue Steel Shadow active.

During these 100 seconds, Su Xiao could pierce through space to his heart's content and use Counter Shield without restriction. Once a Counter Shield was shattered, a new one would be generated immediately; if one layer couldn't block it, he would generate two layers simultaneously. Under these circumstances, only despair awaited the enemy.

Using Dragon Shadow Flash without restriction would make Su Xiao elusive, and using Counter Shield without restriction would allow him to ignore large-scale attacks.

Unquestionably, the Demon Hunter Moment ability was Su Xiao's ultimate move for the current period, a tool for turning the tide at critical moments.

Su Xiao took a deep breath. Upgrading the Demon Hunter set this time was definitely a huge gain. The Demon Hunter set was worthy of being a dream set for melee fighters. Unlike the Ascension set, it had no team bonuses, but it could be used for a long time, and its bonus to a single person completely outperformed the Ascension set.

Su Xiao only needed to sacrifice one ring or necklace equipment slot to enjoy the bonus effects of the three-piece set. Even when he reached a high tier, he wouldn't need to abandon the Demon Hunter set.

The attributes of the King of Demon Hunters were so powerful that Su Xiao naturally had to reinforce it, so he headed straight to the Equipment Reinforcement Hall.

Half an hour later, Su Xiao left the Equipment Reinforcement Hall. His expression wasn't very good. The reason for this was that the reinforcement cost for the King of Demon Hunters was simply too expensive.

Due to the set characteristics of the King of Demon Hunters, it was defaulted as three pieces of equipment being reinforced simultaneously. Reinforcing three gold-tier set items at once cost as much as 230,000 Paradise Coins per attempt.

Even if Su Xiao spent all the Paradise Coins in his hand, he couldn't reinforce the King of Demon Hunters to +5. Without reaching +5, the King of Demon Hunters wouldn't see a significant improvement.

Therefore, Su Xiao prepared to use the remaining 770,000 Paradise Coins for other things.

After returning to his exclusive room, Su Xiao began to think. Paradise Coins were, of course, meant to enhance his own strength. One portion had to be spent on inlaying gems into Checking Zhan Long Shan. As for the remaining Paradise Coins, he could choose to buy a piece of gold-tier equipment or develop a certain ability.

After hesitating for a moment, Su Xiao took out Checking Zhan Long Shan and decided to inlay the "Spirit Cat" gem into it before considering anything else.

【To perform this inlay, you need to pay 20,000 Paradise Coins.】

The inlay fee was perfectly acceptable. Su Xiao chose to inlay it. The "Spirit Cat" gem in his hand floated up, its volume rapidly shrinking until it became the size of a grain of rice.

A white light wrapped around the hilt of Checking Zhan Long Shan. A tiny groove gradually appeared at the end of the hilt, and the significantly shrunken "Spirit Cat" gem was inlaid into the groove. The inlay was complete, and an inlay effect appeared on Checking Zhan Long Shan's attributes: ignore 16 points of the enemy's physical defense.

Su Xiao examined the Spirit Cat gem at the end of the hilt; it looked like Checking Zhan Long Shan could still accommodate 6 to 8 more gems.

Gems were things that could be encountered but not sought; very few people sold them. Su Xiao had opened many treasure chests and only obtained one gem, which showed how rare they were.

With the remaining Paradise Coins, Su Xiao had to choose between buying another piece of gold-tier equipment suitable for himself and upgrading a certain ability.

The ability he wanted to upgrade wasn't one he had already mastered, but a scroll he hadn't used yet.

【Melee Combat Mastery Lv. 25 (Scroll).】

This mastery-level scroll was gifted to Su Xiao after Maha died. Su Xiao had been hesitating whether to use it.

If he uses it, Su Xiao will only expend appropriate resources on this ability. If it requires Soul Crystal (Large) to upgrade, he will temporarily give up on upgrading it, as he has the Sword Master ability, which is very resource-intensive.

But if he didn't use this scroll, close-quarters combat was a weakness Su Xiao couldn't ignore. Because of the length of Checking Zhan Long Shan, once Su Xiao was engaged at close range by an enemy, he could only fight with the Slaughter Dagger.

It was fine in previous worlds, but as the enemies became stronger, holding the Slaughter Dagger started to become insufficient to solve problems.

In terms of close-quarters combat, Su Xiao had been beaten up many times. Die from the Blood Gate had beaten him up, Hughes had beaten him up, and Rose had also beaten him up.

Keeping a distance of 2 to 5 meters from an enemy, Su Xiao didn't fear anyone, but if it was less than 1 meter, he could only use the hilt of Checking Zhan Long Shan to bash or use side kicks. As for being completely engaged—once held by an enemy—he could only rely on his durability to tough it out, find an opportunity to create distance, or get beaten to death.

When Su Xiao was trading blows with Rose, to be honest, he was indeed beaten quite badly by that girl; those little fists of hers broke many of Su Xiao's ribs.

Thinking of the miserable state of being engaged in the past, and the current quantity of Soul Crystals (Medium), Su Xiao resolutely walked toward the Skill Upgrade Hall. Being pinned to the ground and beaten was too frustrating; he would strive to pin the enemy to the ground and beat them instead.

Five hours later, in the Skill Upgrade Hall, inside a skill reinforcement pod.

【Notification: You have mastered Melee Combat Mastery Lv. 25.】

Su Xiao's eyes suddenly opened, and he subconsciously blocked his front with his arms. Five hours ago, he had used the Melee Combat Mastery Lv. 25 scroll and then entered a dojo.

After entering that place, "misfortune" began. Melee experts were manifested one by one. Su Xiao couldn't use his sword, nor could he use other abilities; he could only fight with his bare hands.

Under the auxiliary training function of the Reincarnation Paradise, Su Xiao was beaten up for a full five hours. After "dying" 19 times during the process, he finally mastered Melee Combat Mastery Lv. 25.

【To upgrade Melee Combat Mastery Lv. 5 + 10,000 Paradise Coins.】

Seeing this notification, Su Xiao was stunned. Upgrading a Lv. 25 mastery ability actually only required Soul Crystals. He discovered one thing: upgrading Melee Combat Mastery consumed a relatively large amount of Paradise Coins.

"Upgrade 5 levels consecutively."

Soul Crystals and Paradise Coins were rapidly deducted. Light and shadow flickered before Su Xiao's eyes, and he arrived at that dojo again.

"Again."

Su Xiao looked around; in the quaint dojo, several figures were gradually manifesting...

Two hours later, Su Xiao, standing in the skill upgrade pod, shook his head.

【Melee Combat Mastery has been upgraded to Lv. 30.】

Su Xiao checked the attributes of Melee Combat Mastery Lv. 30, and his brow furrowed. This ability had already been upgraded to Lv. 30, yet no additional ability appeared. One had to know that his original Sword Art Mastery had gained an additional ability just by being upgraded to Lv. 10.

In fact, Su Xiao had always fallen into a misconception: his sword art ability wasn't obtained through a skill scroll, but was one of the core abilities attached to the Shadow of Law-Breaker profession.