CHAPTER 271: CHAPTER 271: "MIDNIGHT WALKER" CLEARED!

The Azure Dragon Crescent Blade was undoubtedly the final guest, so Ren Suo certainly didn’t hold back, directly serving up a "Desire Holy Wine." However, his luck was average, only triggering the effect ’Merit Points Consumption -1.’

The free Holy Water had naturally been drunk long ago, but the two extracted keywords were odd: Departure and Two Thousand Years. It was only through guessing and inferring that he could figure out what the beautiful young man really desired.

Although Ren Suo felt he could fight—and not that he couldn’t win—letting the Azure Dragon Crescent Blade leave joyously would truly embody the harmonious spirit of shared happiness and mutual well-being. Wouldn’t it also deepen the spirit of "Midnight Walker" by providing warmth to the lonely Demons and Ghosts? And wasn’t it... Well, after all, getting to this point had already taken Ren Suo five or six hours. If the female store owner was defeated, he would have to start over—another five or six hours—so naturally, he had to figure out how to clear the level in one go.

Ren Suo didn’t mind playing games, but he did mind repeating the same game. He belonged to that category of RPG players who wouldn’t deliberately grind monsters for leveling up, preferring to beat bosses at the lowest possible level if stuck on a level.

After drinking the "Desire Holy Wine," white smoke rose from the beautiful young man’s body, condensing into words:

’Comrade-in-arms’

’Loneliness’

’Bewilderment’

Ren Suo opened the seasoning list and, after pondering for a moment, began to season.

After almost a thousand seasonings—perhaps even more, as Ren Suo had to load his game several times—he had mastered the ’Desire Seasoning’ Skill, even though this Skill was only useful in this game.

Almost subconsciously, Ren Suo had a clear understanding of how to combine desires to restore hope to the customers.

The Azure Dragon Crescent Blade, unlike other customers, showed not a hint of murderous intent and was calm when sharing his life experiences, suggesting he might just be an ordinary strange creature.

But given the game’s traits, if Ren Suo couldn’t satisfy him, he definitely wasn’t going to leave peacefully. As for why he would draw his blade against someone, Ren Suo had all the reasons ready—according to his life experiences, he was, by nature, a strange creature who slashed people without reason! How could one expect a blade to understand the rationale that slashing people is wrong? It was born to slash!

Of course, since Guan Yu either didn’t slash at people or only slashed at Martial General Cultivators, it was very likely that the Azure Dragon Crescent Blade would only strike at the strong.

And the current female store owner was unquestionably strong.

"Comrade-in-arms... refers to Guan Yu, I suppose. Let’s add a bit of ’Friendship’... Ah, never mind, ’Love’ as well."

"Loneliness is easy to deal with. The Azure Dragon Crescent Blade doesn’t seem like it wants to find a girlfriend and have sons. Having cultivated for nearly two thousand years, it’s almost always been asleep, so it hasn’t had much time to get used to loneliness. A large dose of ’Loneliness,’ ’Enjoyment,’ and ’Joy’ will do."

"Bewilderment, I can understand. For him, the whole world has all but changed; he not only has to adapt to the new life but also doesn’t know a single person anymore. Therefore, the only solution is to serve up the chicken soup set meal of ’Determination,’ ’Effort,’ and ’Enthusiasm.’"

After seasoning the big red dates properly, the female store owner placed the dish in front of the beautiful young man. At this point, Red Armor finally polished his blade and stood up. However, he didn’t sheathe his blade but held it tightly, ready for battle at any moment.

Everyone was nervous, except for the beautiful young man who casually picked up a date and tossed it into his mouth.

He ate one after another without saying a word.

There was no discernible change in the beautiful young man’s expression. When he finished the last one, he let out a light breath, "Thanks for the hospitality."

A look of joy appeared on Ren Suo’s face as he watched the beautiful young man rise from his chair, reach into his bosom as if to bring out a gift to thank the female store owner!

Could it be a smooth clearance this time?

Then, the beautiful young man pulled out a pair of white rubber gloves from his bosom, the kind used by surgeons.

"Having had my fill, let’s get started," the beautiful young man relaxed his hands. "Let me see your capacity."

The scene shattered, and combat began!

Ren Suo wanted to curse. After being fed, he still wanted to fight; it was truly a case of flipping a pig’s stomach to find its shit—utter ingratitude!

’Flame Overlord’!

’Serious Slash’!

Though the female store owner’s ’Flame Overlord’ Skill sounded formidable, its effects were actually quite similar to Red Armor’s ’Serious Slash’—her right fist ignited with flames, and she charged forward to smash into the beautiful young man!

Simply put, it was a right straight punch.

However, when the female store owner’s fist connected, the entire scene blossomed with fiery flames, and a pillar of fire erupted like a volcano, causing the ground to crack open again!

Ah, crack open again, because during previous fights, the female store owner had already shattered the ground several times.

’Flame Overlord’ was so powerful mainly because of the bonuses brought on by the female store owner’s high Attack Power. If I wanted to create such special effects at this stage, I could probably only achieve it through the ’Good Dream Technique.’

Yet, the beautiful young man simply crossed his hands and stably caught the female store owner’s strike, with only a red mark left on his pristine hands.

After the female store owner attacked, Red Armor followed close behind! He wielded his long blade, slashing out dozens of blade shadows in midair, then converging at one point—the beautiful young man’s neck!

CLANG! CLANG! CLANG! CLANG! CLANG—

The clang of steel echoed non-stop, and the screen displayed the word ’BLOCK’ in black letters over a white background: Red Armor’s attacks were all blocked!

One round had passed, and the beautiful young man had lost only a few Health Points, not even one-tenth.

In the second round, the female store owner used ’Wax and Wane’—’Flame Overlord’ didn’t trigger other attack effects due to its intrinsic burning trait.

This time, the beautiful young man’s Health Points finally showed significant change. Effects like ’Golden Ring of Revenge (each hit inflicting 5% of the enemy’s current Health Points as damage)’ and ’Butcher’s Cleaver: Enemy Armor slightly reduced,’ sliced off a tenth of the beautiful young man’s Health Points. Unfortunately, the ’Ice-cold Engagement Ring’ effect that could have frozen him didn’t trigger.

After the round ended, it was finally the beautiful young man’s turn to attack. He raised his hands, clad in White Gloves, and fiercely tore downwards!

The air was directly torn open, leaving ten traces, and the azure Gang Shadow struck through the gaps, enveloping both the female store owner and Red Armor!

Total attack!

Red Armor’s Health Points were cut by half, and the store owner’s Health Points were cut by a quarter!

The Azure Dragon Crescent Blade’s Attack is too high!

Another two rounds passed, and Red Armor fell to the ground, dead, while the store owner was left with only a quarter of her Health Points. At this point, Ren Suo decided to use props, choosing seven or eight Healing Items, and taking them all at once, filling her Health Points completely!

She now had over 9,000 Health Points. Among the Healing Items, most restored Health Points while also moderately increasing an attribute, so none restored a large amount of Health Points at once. An exception was an item like "Chalk Wrapped in Candy Paper," which could either strengthen Health Points or attributes—one or the other—and was extremely effective.

But props could be consumed as much as desired in one round, which allowed the possibility of a war of attrition. Otherwise, if one couldn’t replenish Health Points as fast as the opponent was depleting them, that wouldn’t be called a battle; it would be getting beaten up.

So, healing and attacking, seven or eight rounds later, the store owner was running low on supplies.

Although Ren Suo had served nearly a thousand customers, only a small portion had provided items that boosted combat effects. Some items enhanced culinary skills, and most boosted attributes. As for Healing Items, even though Ren Suo had tried to be temperate, he’d used about half of them in the battles of the past few days.

Just as the beautiful young man had half of his Health Points chopped away, and Ren Suo was nearly at his wit’s end, the game suddenly exited the battle screen.

The beautiful young man took off his White Gloves and said indifferently, "I didn’t expect that besides being an excellent cook, your combat power is on par with mine."

"Initially, even though I enjoyed the dates you gave me, I still wanted to chop you because I, who desire nothing, was suddenly attracted to you. I think you are someone worth my blade."

"However, I rarely owe others because they die before I can repay them." The beautiful young man pointed to the store owner’s wrist, "The Ren Family is the only debt I have now because I once injured that little girl wearing the Jade Pendant. If I meet a Ren Family member again, I will protect them once."

"Now that you’ve demonstrated the ability to carry this Jade Pendant, I acknowledge that you indeed received a gift from the Ren Family."

"But since you are not a Ren Family member... I will not protect you."

The beautiful young man reached into his bosom again, but this time he pulled out a dirty Crimson Tassel, "Consider this my apology for testing you."

The store owner took the Crimson Tassel, and the dirt on it fell off, revealing its blood-red beauty:

"Yanyue’s Crimson Tassel: A crimson tassel once tied to the Azure Dragon Crescent Blade, it has endured many battles and is saturated with fresh blood. Each Attack now comes with an additional Azure Dragon Crescent Gang, inflicting extra damage."

Azure Dragon Crescent Gang? Could it be the ten azure streaks that the beautiful young man had just ripped through the air with?

Since it’s a final boss’s gift, it must be powerful... but it’s already the tenth day.

Ren Suo sighed. He hadn’t expected that the strategy to defeat the final boss would rely on the "Goddess Jade Pendant" token and the influence of a subplot from "Over My Dead Body" where Ren Family Cultivators had once encountered the Azure Dragon Crescent Blade.

Back then, I felt it was a side quest that could increase the score, but I never expected the Azure Dragon Crescent Blade to still exist in modern times.

If Earth Spirits could be hammered into pillars, I wouldn’t be surprised if past deities and other Earth Spirits had disappeared or their personalities had changed.

With the matter resolved, the beautiful young man turned and left, stepping into the dim park.

The fallen Red Armor stood up and came over to the store owner, saying, "My lord, shall we leave now?"

The store owner replied, "No, our contract is over, and you are free to go."

When the contract was made, it was agreed that Red Armor would only assist the store owner for three days, so there was no surprise from him, and he nodded, "Until we meet again!"

At that moment, the store owner first scooped a bowl of white rice from the rice cooker, then from the drawer of the Ghost Stall, she took out a Gold Cup.

This Gold Cup was larger than the Pure White Mini Holy Grail. It was filled to the brim with bright red blood that seemed ready to overflow at any moment. The surface tension was almost at its limit; it felt as if the slightest breeze could make the blood spill from the cup.

"Desire Collection Amount: 12,800"

This was the vessel for storing Desire, the Holy Grail of Desire.

An object that had only appeared on the world map interface had finally appeared in the game.

The store owner slowly raised the Holy Grail, pouring the blood into the rice.

The blood acted like a sauce, a seasoning quickly absorbed by the rice. As the last drop of Desire fell from the Holy Grail, the rice turned an appetizing color, resembling a dish of tomato and egg fried rice.

The store owner then sat down at the dining table like a customer, picked up her chopsticks, and seriously, methodically, ate up the bowl of rice.

When she put down the bowl, it was as clean as if it had been washed.

"The Trial Participant has consumed 12,800 servings of Desire."

"The Trial Participant has gained the recognition of the World’s Composite of Desires and ascended to a Collector."

"The Collector will continue to harvest the Rampaging Desires of strong Living Beings within the area, reducing the likelihood of corruption."

"The current collection range of the Collector is: within a radius of 1.28 kilometers."

"You can set the coordinates for the Collector to collect Desires. The Desires collected can be exchanged for Merit Points (this function will be unlocked after the upload is complete)."

At that moment, the screen of the Ghost Stall, the female store owner, froze completely, and a game prompt appeared:

"Desire collection complete, Ten Days of Midnight Walker complete."

"Mission accomplished!"