A Core Ship From The Start-Chapter 873 - 614 Taking the Task

Back at the Tribunal, Duanmu Huai could be said to have been slacking off for a few days, but soon, Maria came knocking on his door again.

"Great Judge, your request can be fulfilled, but I have a precondition," she said.

"Oh? What’s the condition?"

"Materials!"

At this point, Maria seemed quite smug.

"As long as you can find me a material that can resist any attack, then I can make the mecha you want."

"Where could anyone find such a thing? If there were such a thing, I would want it myself...wait, there actually might be something."

"Huh?"

Maria was surprised to hear Duanmu Huai’s response.

"Really?"

"Hmm...but not right now, let’s wait until after dealing with those cosmic monsters."

Honestly, when Maria made her request, Duanmu Huai’s initial thought was that there was no such thing; if there was, players would’ve gone crazy trying to get it. But the fact is, players had never gotten their hands on it—because there really was such a thing. It was as legendary as the Golden Pupil, except that the Golden Pupil had actually been physically seen by players, while the former had only appeared in a drop list.

It was the improved and enhanced version of Captain Tashiro’s warship, the Exelion.

According to information gathered by players, the hull of the Exelion’s enhanced version was made of a basic particle called "Arutelimu," an artificial particle. And the entire hull was composed solely of this basic particle. Therefore, theoretically, only an "anti-Arutelimu" particle could damage it. However, since "Arutelimu" particles were artificial, there was no such thing as an "anti-Arutelimu" particle, meaning any other form of attack couldn’t cause annihilation effect and was essentially invincible.

Unlike the Golden Pupil, this one was verifiable. During the great battle against the cosmic monsters at the center of the Milky Way, many warships including those of players were destroyed, but the Exelion didn’t have even a scratch on its hull and stayed stable as Mount Tai. In fact, it was after this that players on a forum began to ask, "Why didn’t the Exelion take any damage?" It was then that players who worked on the Exelion shared the truth.

Unfortunately, this technology didn’t appear in the exchange list nor did any player lay hands on it. Although players were annoyed, they could understand it. Some Divine Artifacts work wonders in the hands of bosses, crushing everything from heaven to air, but put them in players’ hands and they can’t even kill a chicken. It’s purely for game balance. If some player or guild got their hands on such a cheating device, everyone might as well quit playing.

Just because you can’t get it in the game, doesn’t mean you can’t get it in reality—Duanmu Huai had decided to bring Tutu along for the boss fight, hoping that with the rabbit’s luck, there might be a slight chance to acquire this technology...

"You promised, Sir Judge, you must get it!"

In the end, it was Maria who was exceedingly excited, and Duanmu Huai could only nod and see her out—whether he could get it or not wasn’t entirely up to him, it was all down to fate.

"But speaking of which, it’s been quite idle around here, I should do something."

After seeing Maria off, Duanmu Huai returned to his chair, sat down, and listlessly opened the system interface.

He now had three divine positions: God of Destruction, Pleasure God, and Old God’s Will.

The God of Destruction corresponded to Brutal Wrath.

The Pleasure God corresponded to Obsessive Sin.

The Old God’s Will corresponded to Cunning Deception.

That just left the Corrupted Foil...ugh.

The mere mention of that name made Duanmu Huai feel reflexively nauseous—it was truly disgusting...

But how was he to snatch the domain of Corrupted Foil?

God of Destruction goes head-to-head with Brutal Wrath.

Pleasure God is kind of a roundabout way to save the country against Obsessive Sin?

Old God’s Will is just indescribable...

So what about the last divine position?

Healing and saving lives?

That doesn’t seem to be my strong suit.

Biology...Duanmu Huai wasn’t a student of bio-chem-environmental-material science.

"Whatever the case, it’s necessary to figure out how to secure the last divine position as soon as possible."

While talking to himself, Duanmu Huai reached out and randomly flicked through the system information. Securing divine positions sooner made it easier to level up, not to mention it was entirely different from levelling up professions in a game. For instance, with Pleasure God, Duanmu Huai was currently being carried by the powerful Zhenjiling, and for Old God’s Will, he hadn’t even found the trigger condition for levelling up. It wouldn’t do to wait to level up until visiting the Subspace to fight the boss; who knows how long that would take.

Real life isn’t a game, and bosses don’t just foolishly wait for you to level up before facing off with you.

"Hmm?"

Just then, Duanmu Huai swiped his finger and opened a mission tab; he froze for a second, remembering that when he picked "Avatar of Calamity," he had previously chosen "King of War," which triggered the whole Milky Way mission mode. In simple terms, the system would detect what trouble was happening where and which required a player’s intervention, then teleport the player to that world to handle the situation. If it could be resolved successfully, all would end well.

If I’m idle anyways, might as well check out what missions are there.

Duanmu Huai yawned, then skimmed through the missions rapidly.

One doesn’t know until they look, but upon looking...the Milky Way really does seem to be constantly on the brink of world-destroying crises.

The revival of an Evil God and the world on the verge of destruction? But it hasn’t been destroyed yet.

The Robot Army rebels, and humanity is retreating step by step? Isn’t that self-inflicted?

A mysterious cult plots to seize control of the nation, asking for the Hero’s assistance? Why don’t you handle this matter on your own...

Aliens invade the Human World, currently engaged in fierce battle... Just keep on fighting as long as you haven’t been wiped out.

Basically, eight or nine out of ten tasks on the list are related to the Evil God, influenced by them, or outright parts of their conspiracy.

Duanmu Huai was reluctant to fight with Cunning Deception; it was such a headache. Just thinking about all their tricks and schemes made his scalp itch as if his brain was about to grow.

Uncomfortable.

It would be okay to fight Brutal Wrath, but Duanmu Huai was worried that if he fought too extravagantly, he might get noticed by them, which would be troublesome. He felt that he wasn’t yet strong enough to arm-wrestle with Brutal Wrath. He would have to wait a little longer, wait for his strength to grow stronger—at least until he reached level 20, max level, as the God of Destruction. Otherwise, heading there would be like delivering himself on a platter.

Obsessive Sin... Forget it, that was the last thing Duanmu Huai wanted to encounter.

"Hmm?"

As Duanmu Huai scanned through the tasks, suddenly, one of them caught his eye.

[Tragedy of the Northern Land: In the city of The Far North, death is spreading. Disease torments the inhabitants there, who suffer and struggle pathetically until death claims them, yet everyone is helpless to do anything about it. For this is not a naturally occurring illness, but one derived from an unimaginable dark force... The Lord is summoning warriors, hoping they can save this city and even the souls of this Northern Land]

"A disease, huh..."

Without asking, Duanmu Huai could tell at a glance that this was certainly the doing of the Corrupted Foil.

Since it couldn’t be cured locally, that clearly meant it wasn’t a common illness. What exactly the situation was would likely only be known by going there.

That’s the one, then.

Duanmu Huai also wasn’t sure how to obtain the Divine Position corresponding to the Corrupted Foil. All in all, he figured he might as well face the Corrupted Foil first, and perhaps along the way, some hints would emerge. After all, he was truly clueless about this sort of thing; this was definitely not Duanmu Huai’s area of expertise. If you said it was Sherry’s forte, that would be more convincing.

So it was decided.

With that thought, Duanmu Huai promptly accepted the task.

[Player task accepted detected, do you wish to teleport?]

"No."

Of course, Duanmu Huai wouldn’t go alone, but this time he was dealing with the Corrupted Foil, so he didn’t plan to bring living people with him. After all, if the virus was indeed related to the Corrupted Foil, infection could be very troublesome. Therefore, he decided to take Ogis and Lani with him... Yes, both were Puppets, completely immune to the problem.

With that in mind, Duanmu Huai immediately looked up.

"Ogis."

"Yes, what is it, Master?"

"Would you like to join me for a stroll in another world?"

"Of course."

Ogis responded without a moment’s hesitation to Duanmu Huai’s invitation, which was to be expected.

Then there was the other one... As he thought this, Duanmu Huai opened his communicator and contacted Lani, who was currently sitting at a desk, flipping through a thick tome.

"Hey, got a moment?"

"What’s up, Sir Judge?"

Lani asked as she reached out to casually turn another page of the book.

"I’m going to another world to eliminate some trouble, want to come along?"

"Me?"

Hearing Duanmu Huai’s invitation, Lani turned her head in confusion to look at the screen.

"That’s unusual for you to ask me."

"Well, I can’t bring living people this time, that’s why I’m asking you. So, are you in or out?"

Upon hearing this, the corner of Lani’s eye twitched slightly, and she let out a cold snort.

"I am a living person too, no thanks."

"...Okay then."

Seeing Lani redirect her focus back to the book, with an air of indifference toward looking over, Duanmu Huai shrugged helplessly and closed the communication. He hadn’t expected that a wrong word from him would cause Lani to turn him down straight away... Well, strictly speaking, Lani and Ogis were indeed different; Ogis was a Puppet, while Lani had merely transferred her soul into one. Of course, to Duanmu Huai, they were more or less the same, and he couldn’t fathom why Lani was making such a fuss.

He then looked towards Ogis.

"Looks like it’s just the two of us this time."

"Yes."

As Duanmu Huai spoke, there was no change in Ogis’ expression, but at that moment, a small flicker of excitement and jubilation passed through the young girl’s eyes.