Chapter 322: The Divine Ji Ming

People cannot betray themselves; as an old‑money aristocrat who, because of a talent that was too low, gave up competition early and single‑mindedly thought only of living a few more days and enjoying a couple more years, Ap Lan's understanding of war was actually quite backward even for that era.

So when he saw the allied forces no longer line up in opposing formations but break into small units to harass repeatedly; when he saw the various masters no longer restrained and proud but decisively went on to brutally crush the weak; when he saw the commanding nobles no longer enjoy immunity but have to be wiped out together with their troops, his entire worldview was overturned.

Accustomed to a straightforward approach, and being the absolute backbone of the allied forces, the Xi Er Wei Ya who, in the final battle, sliced off more than a hundred heads right before Ap Lan's eyes, thus became his deepest nightmare.

But what does this have to do with Ji Ming? He only thinks Xi Er Wei Ya was still a bit soft; since he would self‑destruct, when the final explosion comes he should pre‑use some monster‑pulling skills, or simply feign surrender, lure a few heavyweight figures, and set off a big firework.

As for why he never taught Xi Er Wei Ya how to reach a new height of explosion, to detonate at a high level… it's not that his evilness is that strong, why does he spend all day thinking only about how to trick subordinates into self‑destructing?

So, looking at the rag suspended in the air, Ji Ming chose to torture it directly.

"Ap Lan, I can understand that as the party being hit you would find this method terrifying, but that is not a normal war; it is about stopping the traitor who sold out an entire civilization, it is about killing the betrayer!"

"And according to your description, Xi Er Wei Ya's strike was very clean, right? I thought she would hang the enemies on spikes or chop them into fragments and pile them up, but she not only beheaded them directly, she also used a very low‑carbon, eco‑friendly cremation technique—doesn't that seem a bit too merciful?"

Having spent two months together anyway, Xi Er Wei Ya had already seen what kind of person Ji Ming was, so unsurprisingly she gave a slight bow.

"Thank you for your understanding!"

And Ap Lan turned terrified and began stammering.

"I, you, she, this…"

But just as fear peaked, he suddenly fell silent; the cloak's swing suddenly became regular and rhythmic, as if he had abruptly switched "person".

When he spoke again, the once magnetic voice had become hoarse and neutral.

"Your argument is very reasonable; the humble me fully agrees."

The previously wrinkled cloak suddenly unfurled, revealing a dirty surface scarred with cuts, punctures, and burns.

"Forgive my impertinence, Divine Lord; I am Ap Lan's elder sister, Second Princess Di Ya of the Dark Flame Empire."

Ji Ming said nothing, but shifted posture and quietly covered his mouth, which was about to slip.

Poison, a person in another world, three months after transmigration, just got praised by a rag with an extremely anthropomorphic male voice.

It is normal for Ap Lan to have such a situation; even if a single consciousness can only occupy a tiny fraction of the eater's whole, when that number is magnified dozens of times, only a "relatively large piece" can maintain the original state.

So nowadays, rather than saying he inherited the memories of dozens of siblings, he has become a super‑neurotic with dozens of personalities, and the Ap Lan who serves as the host, even if not the worst, is certainly ranked beyond the top ten, so a slight slip can be forcefully overridden by a dominant personality.

Therefore, in the following time, the interested Ji Ming chatted one‑by‑one with Ap Lan's younger brothers and sisters; unfortunately, as the weakest batch of the royal family, the vast majority were self‑destructive fools who, when seeing him, offered only hollow praise or fell silent in fear, and even brave souls capable of a normal conversation were exceedingly rare.

The standouts among them were, naturally, the first to show her face, Second Princess Di Ya, hoping to make a good impression, and the highly expressive Prince Sailusi, who displayed his strength to Ji Ming.

Probably feeling the timing was right, Ap Lan tentatively spoke.

"Divine Lord, as your defeated subordinate, we are already wholeheartedly devoted to you; could you raise your noble hand and grant freedom to your most loyal followers?"

Since he was now just a piece of meat on the chopping board, Ji Ming wielded divine power to release "Apra", and after the suppression lifted, the magical cloak that had been the size of a handkerchief expanded to normal size, and the first words that "opened its mouth" were:

"Oh, great sovereign of living beings, your mercy can pierce the river of time spanning ten thousand years, warming my heart which I thought had long been chilled."

…One can only say that the Dark Flame King lives up to his name; in this brief ten‑plus‑minute dialogue, Ap Lan kept finding chances to praise Ji Ming as if weaving normal attacks between skills. If he hadn't already seen this kind of toady in modern society, he might truly have been duped.

However, this long‑winded monologue from Ap Lan was interrupted right at the start, and it was Di Ya and Sailusi together who did it.

"Divine Lord, we have discovered that we still seem to have a connection with the Earth Grudge Demon!"

To verify their words, they manipulated the black vapors inside a divine sphere to form a simple face, as easily as handling a tamed magical beast.

"Such a thing?"

This piqued Ji Ming's interest even more; he led the few to an ancient battlefield ruin, which had already reverted to normal land, where prisoners from the shadows were sweeping through, some in pristine empty spaces.

Of course, even for an experiment, he did not rush to release the entire Earth Grudge Demon; he first released a portion, wanting to see how far "Ap Lan" could go.

The first thing this cluster of resentment did after regaining freedom was to gather around the ragged cloak, then gradually disperse, coating it with a thin mist.

"Apra" pondered for a moment and cautiously requested:

"Lord, please try to attack this mist."

Ji Ming summoned a strand of holy light to test it, discovering the mist functioned like a shield—easily shattered by him, but for ordinary holy‑light cultivators it was as solid as gold.

Yet this seemed too outdated for the current version, so he shook his head.

"Are there other methods?"

"Yes! We were still discussing… Ah, right! Perhaps this way!"

As soon as the words fell, the mist changed its shape, solidified beneath the cloak, forming a vague humanoid that bowed to Ji Ming.

"Great Divine Lord, your most loyal follower greets you."

If it were only that, Ji Ming would have dispersed the sycophant on the spot, but his next move shocked everyone present.

Because this dummy made of resentment actually took a brooch from the cloak and, with smooth normalcy, presented it to Ji Ming.

…The Earth Grudge Demon has a physical form because it built its body from polluted soil; thus, even pure resentment can fabricate a body, which is quite remarkable!

So Ji Ming opened the Earth Grudge sphere again, releasing more black vapors, letting "Ap Lan" act like a potter, creating according to his prompts.

First came a resentment‑shaped fake beast, then a fake bird, then a fake fish, and multiple fake humans co‑existed simultaneously…

The Earth Grudge Demon is like an extension of "Ap Lan's" body; although it itself lacks consciousness, "Ap Lan" can, through control, grant it objective existence and command these resentful avatars to perform various tasks and fulfill requests.

Thus, soon, Ji Ming's task reached its final stage.

He lit a bolt of thunder on his fingertip, sliced the neck of one "person", then fixed his gaze on the lower‑right corner of his field of view.

Almost instantly.

【Kill Earth Grudge Demon, Experience 10327】

No, far more than that—new pop‑ups keep appearing… Oh my, too many!

【Kill Level 53 Fire Elemental Mage Tina, Experience 3245】

【Kill 32】

【Kill, Experience, Kill, Kill, Experience】

114514, Kill Kill Kill】

Bathed in the golden light of soaring levels, Ji Ming watched the garbled code filling his vision and slowly asked himself:

"Little boss, is this the system thinking everyone here has lived too long, or have I collapsed the world's laws?"

Hold on a sec, I'll go check.

……

My god, what on earth did you do? The world laws are starting to smoke; I'll rush to help fix them!

According to the Yangyue World settings, besides experience, professionals have one crucial restriction for leveling up—advancement.

Thus, for ordinary professionals, even if they manage to trigger this bug, they'll be stuck at the next whole-number level because they don't meet the advancement conditions.

But who is Ji Ming? On his panel, not only are "excellent" and "perfect" present, even miracle‑grade elixirs are there, so advancing is a green light all the way.

However, after he slayed a ten‑thousand‑year‑old Earth‑grudge demon and dozens of mages who, objectively, aren't exactly weak, and was about to settle at over seventy levels, this abnormal feeling finally vanished; the erroneous experience and chaotic pop‑ups were both cleared, turning into a simple line.

Kill High‑Grade Grudge‑type Pseudo‑Human, Experience +20

The Little Boss logged in again, and even through text you could sense lingering dread.

You scared me to death; the world laws almost collapsed because of you. If this experience‑farming method were approved, Yangyue World would surely be erased for violating universal principles!

Rules aren't a soft, pliable thing anyone can knead and flatten; they're a strict management system, layered like law, each link nesting into the next.

Otherwise, if some world's will were to defy the heavens and turn the world laws into its own hard‑working slave, wouldn't that cause a civilizational explosion, with god‑kings everywhere, immortal emperors worse than dogs, transforming into the true Fourth Heavenly Catastrophe, spinning the game console like a DJ and ravaging the entire universe?

So after the Little Boss performed an emergency patch, guiding the world laws to close the loophole, it gave Ji Ming a compromise solution.

—Trying to deceive the world will by killing pseudo‑humans by slaying that many masters is obviously impossible, but you can trick the world will by killing a fairly strong oddity.

Thus, as long as "Apra" teams up with the Earth‑grudge demon, they can conjure a new monster‑spawning point out of thin air; although a solo's total experience won't match before, it's stable and counts as a fairly powerful bug.

So our only problem now is, can we only create one kind of oddity as an experience package?

Ji Ming, eyeing a quick grab, turned to "Aplan" to continue the test, only to find the once‑boastful tattered black gas man had been reduced to a piece of rag, looking as if it had been wetted then chilled by a cold wind, maintaining a perfect floating pose as it lay inverted on the ground.

And it wasn't just him; everyone who came to partake or watch the experiment—no matter who, including Sylvia and Grayson—were all turned into life‑size figurines, frozen in various stiff, scattered poses.

Ji Ming silently surveyed his surroundings, first glancing at the life indicator on his map.

They're all alive; what's happened to them?

The one who just malfunctioned was me, so only I could turn them into this.

So Ji Ming immediately opened his panel, intending to check what he'd missed on himself, and at a glance saw…

Divine Entity: Love and Beauty (Sealed)

What the heck?

Ji Ming opened the details and found the deity's effect wildly perverse; aside from everything else, just the ability to "freely tweak mortals' appearances and affection lines" is a peerless, ultimate trick for a fun‑seeker.

Um, Savior, roughly what level did you just jump to?

Didn't notice; probably just over seventy levels.

…so you rose to over seventy levels as a "Potion Master"?

Ji Ming was about to say "yes" when he spotted the issue: as the 135th Generation Savior, the special profession forcibly split from "Alchemist"—the "Potion Master" is the only one that gains a charisma bonus upon leveling.

Thus, being the highest‑level Potion Master in history, after reaching over seventy levels, the total charisma summed up to essentially the strongest ever, supreme in all directions. Luckily there was no mirror in front of me; otherwise this book could have ended today with the classic anticlimax of the protagonist waking up to see his own reflection so handsome he'd die from his own good looks…

According to the original Savior An Yi Cheng's rule‑setting, whoever tops any historical stat can unconditionally obtain a hidden divine entity, and the stat of charisma corresponds to "Love and Beauty".

Even though, thanks to the Little Boss's emergency patch, his over‑seventy‑level state only lasted a moment, once it happened it happened; even if the level is now reverted and the deity sealed, he truly was the Love and Beauty god for that instant.

Thus everyone around Ji Ming just earned the "Facing the Beauty God" achievement; regardless of race, gender, preference, or level, they were all knocked out by sheer handsomeness.

What a sin!