Ashen God-Chapter 671 - 670 Hope Goddess

"But even with achievements to fall back on, I am still quite far from completing the long-term goal of increasing the flight speed of the cannon bullets to nine mach," he lamented. "That will indeed need to wait until I reach the Third Tier."

Although Zhang Yanhang had previously stated that achieving the mini-goal of increasing the flight speed of the cannon bullets to six mach would require reaching Third Tier, that was clearly an overestimation. But this time, it was not at all exaggerated.

After all, it would be too much to ask of him to somehow manage to increase the flight speed of the cannon bullets by another 2.5 mach before achieving a promotion in rank; it wasn’t like this was just a matter of spending money on a sudden upgrade.

Having dealt with the issue of the +1 Demon Pig Bracelet, Zhang Yanhang quickly picked up a pair of Demon Pig Leg Rings and slipped them onto his thighs. He gave a shiver, but it was all for the sake of the added bonuses.

The Demon Pig Leg Rings looked quite similar to the Demon Pig Bracelets, essentially just a larger version of them, still sporting a silver motif with the Elf Clan’s trademark elaborate engravings. But all that was inconsequential to Zhang Yanhang, who was more interested in the additional effects of the Demon Pig Leg Rings.

"Now, with the extra 50% bonus to my Physical Recovery Speed from the Demon Pig Leg Rings, I should be able to make a significant improvement in my hunting efficiency.

Unfortunately, I’ve already cleared out the entire Demonized Swamp Zone, so for now, hunting efficiency isn’t as important to me. It will only become crucial again once I’m promoted to Third Tier and start clearing new areas."

Previously, without the Demon Pig Leg Rings, Zhang Yanhang could work continuously for fifteen hours and nine minutes then rest for ten hours. But now, with the added bonus from the leg rings, he could work for twenty hours and nine minutes and only needed to rest for ten hours to recover his stamina.

"With my current situation, not only have I easily accomplished the minor goal of having a work-to-rest ratio of 1.75 times of seven to four, but I’ve also inadvertently completed the two-to-one ratio, doubling my ratio goal."

He had once considered that achieving the goal regarding the work-to-rest ratio might be simple, but he never expected it to be this easy.

Merely obtaining a piece of light golden quality equipment, the Demon Pig Leg Ring, had instantly helped him achieve two mini-goals, both in full measure. He had only just set the goal of achieving a work-to-rest ratio of seven to four, with no progress made, and he had already inadvertently accomplished the goal of two to one.

"Alas, although I might have overestimated myself regarding the mini-goal for Life Value, I definitely underestimated myself when it came to the work-to-rest ratio. I effortlessly completed the 0.25 increment, and in doing so, accomplished two increments of 0.25, bringing my work-to-rest ratio from 1.5 to 2.0."

Zhang Yanhang believed that setting his next mini-goal as a nine-to-four work-to-rest ratio, which equals a 2.25 times ratio, would be undervaluing himself. He would at least stack an additional 0.5 on it, aiming for a ten-to-four or simplified to a five-to-two work-to-rest ratio.

"No, that won’t do; I’m getting ahead of myself. It would be more prudent to set the next mini-goal to a work-to-rest ratio of nine to four, which will also be easier to achieve."

If he were to set it to five to two, Zhang Yanhang estimated that there was a high probability that the mini-goal would simply transform into a long-term goal, which wouldn’t be ideal.

Although Zhang Yanhang did indeed slip on the leg rings, he quickly set them to hidden mode. He still didn’t particularly like these items but tolerated wearing them just to benefit from the added attributes.

After handling the Demon Pig Leg Rings and Bracelets, Zhang Yanhang picked up the final piece of equipment from his recent session of opening the treasure box — a blue-quality Divination Tarot Card·Star[Fake] (Gate of Truth).

But before using the card, Zhang Yanhang, as usual, checked the illustration on the front of the Divination Tarot Card·Star.

If his memory served him correctly, the original depiction on the Divination Tarot Card·Star was quite simple, featuring a goddess continuously pouring water with a circle of stars around her head.

To describe it in more detail, it would be an unclothed Nordic-looking blond from Northern Europe, clearly a Hope Goddess, holding a jug in one hand and pouring water onto both the lake and the earth, or rather, ’sowing hope.’

The sky above the Nordic blonde goddess’s head was dominated by a large golden Sirius around which a circle of ordinary stars revolved. He thought that the circle of stars was likely to represent the endless hope and fortune mentioned in the description, guiding to a bright future.

However, the illustration on Zhang Yanhang’s Divination Tarot Card·Star, clearly a counterfeit product from a black workshop, could not be described as identical to the original, but it was at least unrelated.

Or rather, the only connection between the two versions now was the similarity in name and the overall composition. The all-important Hope Goddess on the current Divination Tarot Card·Star remained, but it could be said that even her ethnicity had changed.

She had become a Hope Goddess with equally fair skin but distinctly Asian facial features, and on top of that, this version of the Hope Goddess was dressed. Her lower body was barely covered by a blue miniskirt that just about reached her thighs, but her upper body was tightly clothed, and just like the skirt, was predominantly colored in blue.

Compared to the original unclothed Nordic goddess, the black workshop’s version of the Hope Goddess seemed somewhat more modest, even though this Hope Goddess’s style was decidedly more striking than the original Nordic version.

Beyond the clothes and ethnicity, another aspect that struck Zhang Yanhang as preposterous was the color of the Hope Goddess’s hair had also changed from golden to blue, and the jug had vanished, replaced with the blue-haired Hope Goddess puffing her cheeks and spewing water into the lake, the stream shimmering with a golden divine light.

In essence, the black workshop version of the Hope Goddess and the original Nordic goddess shared little in common besides their gender.

Moreover, Zhang Yanhang also noticed that beside the golden divine power water column spewed out by the blue-haired Hope Goddess puffing her cheeks, there was a circle of arc-shaped rainbows, which had taken the place of the ring of stars that originally appeared on the tarot card.

That circle of stars was clearly the symbolic pattern representing the Star of Hope, "Sirius," and the very name of the tarot card "Star," but now the stars were gone, replaced by a rainbow. Zhang Yanhang hadn’t seen such a preposterous version for a long time, after all, even the other three tarot cards no matter how absurd still had some connection to their names.

Moreover, the most bizarre part was that Zhang Yanhang found that this blue-haired Hope Goddess was actually being held in someone’s arms, a completely new character had been added out of nowhere.

Besides, that new character seemed to be a man, a strange man wearing a military uniform. What’s even more peculiar is that, compared to the blue-haired Hope Goddess, this military man’s overall style seemed rather out of place, giving a great sense of disharmony as if he didn’t belong there.

Regrettably, due to the limited scope of the standee illustration, Zhang Yanhang couldn’t see anything above the strange man’s neck, so he couldn’t further analyze the military man’s identity based on his features. But even so, Zhang Yanhang’s keen intuition told him that this guy should be extremely handsome, almost heavenly in appearance.

Besides, Zhang Yanhang’s sharp intuition also told him that the expression of the blue-haired Hope Goddess puffing her cheeks and spraying water into the lake wasn’t simple—it was as if she had suffered some great injustice, giving off an impression of deep resentment but seemingly too timid to resist, and there was even a hint of fear and regret in the goddess’s eyes.

Although it was just a simple divination image or character illustration on the face of the Divination Tarot Card·Star, Zhang Yanhang could still determine the seemingly complex but actually straightforward character relationships at a glance. He felt that the blue-haired Hope Goddess was probably being forced to spray water by the man in the military uniform.

Zhang Yanhang didn’t know what the truth was, but his extremely keen intuition told him again that the military man was most likely doing the right thing, while the blue-haired Hope Goddess was more like atoning for committing some unforgivable wrongdoing through this act of spraying water.

However, what made Zhang Yanhang feel a bit strange was that he inexplicably felt the blue-haired Hope Goddess looked somewhat familiar, but after thinking hard, he couldn’t recall anything. Perhaps this was what they called "déjà vu"?

Moreover, he didn’t know if it was this so-called "déjà vu" playing tricks on him, but when he saw this bullied blue-haired Hope Goddess, a strange sense of pleasure emerged in his heart.

But since he had never seen this blue-haired Hope Goddess before, Zhang Yanhang felt that this sense of pleasure was actually more like a subtle illusion to a certain extent.

"Speaking of which, I wonder if I will have the chance to encounter some goddess-like monster that I can hack away at in the future. A divine rank sounds like a super high-end piece of equipment with multiple functions. It must have a lot of attribute bonuses."

If Zhang Yanhang said something like this in the Main World, he would definitely be labeled as "this is why straight men are so boring," but after all, this is the Ashen World. There are no living people here, so no one would criticize his thoughts.

After inspecting the face of the Divination Tarot Card·Star, Zhang Yanhang quickly put it into his Waist Bag. As a kind of amulet or protective Equipment, it would serve its purpose just as well there.

"Originally, my Critical Strike Rate was 18%, but it’s a pity that later it was reduced to 14.5% because the Green Ten-Piece Set replaced it. I need to attack about seven times to trigger a critical hit.

But now, with the 5% Critical Strike Rate from the Divination Tarot Card·Star, my Critical Strike Rate has risen and increased to 19.5%, which is 1.5% higher than the original 18%, not bad at all.

This means now I can reduce the need to attack seven times for a critical hit down to only needing five attacks to trigger one."

For an Awakener like Zhang Yanhang, who excels in concentrated attacks, Critical Strike Rate is indeed very practical, although triggering a critical hit once every five attacks doesn’t seem frequent during normal attacks.

But it’s different when he uses the Six Roots Pure Soul Spear to shoot Cannon bullets; he can fire 218 bullets per second, and at the rate of triggering a critical hit once every five attacks, that means he can trigger 44 critical hits per second, which is objectively a significant increase in attack power and overall damage output.

And in normal times he could also rely on improving his punching speed to try to trigger a lot of critical hits, but most enemies couldn’t even take one punch from him before they would instantly die.

"Before, I was just thinking that it would be good to raise the Critical Strike Rate back to the original level, but it turned out that when the old equipment was gone, the new equipment came, and it was even higher than before.

Unfortunately, it’s only a 1.5% higher Critical Strike Rate than before, and once I’m promoted to Third Tier, the additional attributes of the White Ten-piece Set will become invalid, causing my Critical Strike Rate to drop again by 2.5%, going from the current 19.5% down to 17%, which is still 1% lower than the original 18%. It feels a bit uncomfortable."

So, from the current situation, Zhang Yanhang still felt it was very necessary to improve the Critical Strike Rate bonus, that is, to obtain more equipment or other items with a Critical Strike Rate bonus.

However, the likelihood of items that increase Critical Strike Rate appearing wasn’t very high. Zhang Yanhang was already Second Tier, and he had cleared four zones, only seeing a Critical Strike Rate bonus on the White Ten-piece Set, the Green Ten-piece Set, Four Great Emptiness Purifying World Fist, and Divination Tarot Card·Star.

Or rather, there were actually only three since the Green Ten-piece Set was an upgrade from the White Ten-piece Set. Therefore, on average it was less than one item per zone, which was extremely rare, but rarity couldn’t stop Zhang Yanhang’s determination to increase his Critical Strike Rate.

Due to the difficulty of raising the Critical Strike Rate, Zhang Yanhang decided to be more pragmatic and set his next small goal for Critical Strike Rate at just over 20%.

But 20% is quite high. It looks like only a 0.5% difference now, but after being promoted to Third Tier, that becomes a 3% gap. It won’t be easy to raise it directly, or rather, there’s no normal way to do so, and he’ll have to rely as much as possible on new equipment and various items.