World's Apocalypse Magician 23 Chapter 23: New Battle System?

No wonder the beasts here already had their cores. They were already in their 2nd and third evolution stages, I thought to myself. Although these beasts looked harmless, as well as non-aggressive, they had their own specialties that allowed them to become stronger. It seems ordinary animals developed to become wild beasts, but without losing their initial non-aggressiveness. Another possibility is that upon reaching a certain rank of strength, rationality appears once more to the organisms who had evolved.

Even the star rating merely indicated their evolution (1, 2, 3, 4, 5-star,...) and their strength when compared with others on the same star level (1.1, 1.2, 1.3,...), similar to Earth's beasts.

For these beasts to reach their current strength, it was paved with the blood of other beasts, or their own fortuitous encounters of resources that helped them become stronger.

After all, the evolution wasn't just the animals, but also the plants. Some plants began to exhibit increased vitality, some even became more voracious in nutrient requirement and devouring even other beasts.

When these plants started to appear, espers began to harvest them and even cultivate some for their personal use, especially those that helped them in their path of esper cultivation. These plants had the same star ranking as that of beasts, as well as elemental affinities.

This was because 1 month after the day of the apocalypse, the researches and espers discovered a vital fact: vitality and elemental energy in the world was increasing, and espers discovered meditation manuals as drops from beasts and destroyed mutated or evolved plants, allowing them to absorb the elements in the world.

Besides from the fact you could gain experience from continuously slaying beasts, one can gain experience through following the meditation manuals, albeit a slower rate. Upon arriving to this area, I noticed something peculiar: the density of vitality and elemental energy here were several times higher than that of earth. If someone trained using meditation manuals here, it would several tens of times faster here to achieve breakthroughs than that of Earth, currently.

For me, however, I wasn't affected by the increased density of vitality and elemental essences. After all, I didn't really care much about the manuals dropped since I could gain system points to level up as well as items that help me level. Probably the only thing that affected me was that my spells would probably cast faster than before since there's an abundance of elemental essences.

After killing those the bear and the rabbit, I gained their cores and stored them for now. Probably, I'll be able to get more on the way out of the forest. I also searched the dead bodies for loots as well as the leader after killing him. Weirdly, they don't seem to have any money with them. Did they stop using hard-cash as a method of payment? Probably digitalized their money, I muttered to myself.

I continued to explore the different changes in the battle system. Besides the changes in allowing me to view the health points of the targets, there was nothing else that changed. Everything else was the same.

I was confused so I decided to check the patch logs of the system.

Changelog:

Added support for Azur Realm (Oz's Realm). Allows the host to view and quantify the health points of targets around it. Reveals details such as background, bloodline and current star rank.>

.... Upon seeing this, my mood dampened down as it was just a hotfix to allow the battle system to work.

Oh well, let's head out then from this forest.

Conveniently, I was already close to the outskirts of the forest, around 15 kilometers from the edge, according to the last memory of the leader. Luckily I can warp ahead and reach the edges of the forest. According to the leader, there was a road there. If I follow it to the south I would reach Darren Town, indicating that I was close to Fahrenheit City.

Wait. Shouldn't I use this opportunity to pay off the debt by hunting the beasts and plants here, I thought to myself.

Instantly, I decided to walk instead towards the edge of the forest rather than use my [Blink] Skill, to avoid missing any potential preys.

-----------------

At the same time that Paolo killed the leader...

In a majestic hall, everyone was feeling nervous and worried with what has happened.

"Have you heard? the Whole 8th party disappeared. The Commander-in-Chief is furious."

"Idiot, weren't they only doing a reconnaissance mission near the Pointbreak Mountain located in Desolate forest? How could they die?"

"You're the idiot, the lifeshards for the whole team shattered one by one, with Captain Maul being the last one to die."

"f.u.c.k, aren't we screwed then? We're part of the initial investigatory team. Won't we be held liable for what happened?"

"I know, why do you think everyone is nervous? We couldn't even run away if we wanted to." The other man lamented. Everyone became silent as they digested the situation and the punishment most likely to happen to them.

After all, the superkingdom of Oz followed a strict hierarchical rule. Those that were part of the 8th party under the special squadron were the young elites of the generation, coming from rich and affluent families and clans.

Given that they had perished in an area that was designated by the information department to be minimal risk, this indicated that the survey of the land was not properly done, and they would be punished with their lives at risk.