Endless Extraction in a Game-Like World-Chapter 12: Earning the Rookie Emperor Title! Returning to Reality

Chapter 12: Earning the Rookie Emperor Title! Returning to Reality

Three hours later.

Swish!

Caelus stood atop a mountain of corpses.

He slowly stowed his weapon into his inventory and wiped the blood from his face.

Endless killing. That was what had happened here for the past three hours.

[Combat Score: 9.55]

"My combat score managed to reach 9." Caelus smiled, seeing this.

While he had been continuously hunting down monsters for three hours straight, the amount of essence he received had decreased significantly. In these plains, there were only snakes and boars. He had been hunting down many Level 3 Ruby Serpents and Level 3 boars, along with Level 2 beasts simultaneously. It had to be noted that the essence extraction did not trigger every time.

Hence, the process of accumulation had become extremely slow.

He was easily strong enough to crush every beast here, but there was not a single Level 5 beast in the Newbie Plains. Lower-level monster essence yielded diminishing returns on a physique with a higher combat score like his.

He had to wait a day until the other side of the map unlocked. By now, all major functions of the system had also awakened.

As he was right now, he was still a bit far away from reaching level 3 as the beasts stopped giving him exp, but he made sure to take use of the essence extraction.

Caelus painfully cracked his back.

"The EXP I am getting has also decreased a lot."

Most people who had a higher combat score from prior training also usually stopped at Level 2 on the first day as well. Hence, Level 2 was his current practical limit.

"Oh well." Caelus sighed. "Not much I can do now."

"The six hours are already up. It is time to return to reality."

By now, Ren had already reached Level 2 safely, and Lara had followed right after him.

He didn’t know what talent she had awakened, but it had to be pretty strong. Strong enough to reach Level 2 on the very first day.

He would likely find out what level of talent she possessed after returning to reality.

The allowed time to stay in the Domain was eight hours per day. There were no shortcuts around this strict rule. The Network synchronized it so that the new servers opened at midnight. While players were inside the Domain getting stronger, their physical bodies were dreaming and resting, allowing them to wake up fresh in the morning.

Soon, the system announcement rang out.

[System: You have been ejected from the Domain.]

[Statistic: You managed to reach Rank 1 across all leaderboards on the first day in your server.]

[System: You have received +3 Reputation Points.]

[System: You have obtained the title: ’Rookie Emperor’.]

[Title: Rookie Emperor (Passive Skill): The NPCs of The Origin Ascension Domain will have a favorable impression of the player.]

[Current Reputation: 7]

"There was such a thing?" Caelus was pleasantly surprised.

In a single day, his reputation points had already reached 7.

It was incredibly impressive.

He remembered seeing many posts on the forums where people flaunted getting just 2 Reputation Points on their first day.

But he, someone with a crippled E-Rank Mana affinity, had actually managed to surpass that easily.

"The Extraction Talent. Its existence must not be made public."

With that thought, Caelus left the space.

Whoosh!

His consciousness slowly condensed back into reality. He was right back at the place he had left.

The grand stadium of Fortis-01 High in Fortis City.

As soon as he returned, the sound of loud chattering and heated discussions filled the stadium.

"Phew, I came out safely," one of the students next to Caelus spoke up.

"It was intense. Although I didn’t reach Level 2, I managed to befriend a top player in my server. He was handsome."

"I know his name. I might be able to meet up with him in real life."

"Man, that pain reception was no joke! I got bitten by a rabbit, and it felt like my leg was on fire. I am never leaving my party to hunt alone again."

"Anyone here from Server 513?"

"I was in 513."

"Did you see the announcements? Who the hell is Player 555? He took all the First Blood achievements and absolutely dominated the Wealth Leaderboard."

"I have no idea. If I knew, I would have already requested to join his party."

"I awakened an F-Rank talent... Cooking. I am doomed. I am going to be a chef while you guys fight dragons."

"Stop complaining. At least you didn’t die immediately. My party got wiped out in ten minutes by a pack of wolves. We didn’t even see what killed us, and now we are stuck in a cooldown."

"Hey, did you spawn in Server 102? I think I saw you in the town before heading out with my party."

"Yeah, I am in 102."

By now, everyone had returned to their physical bodies.

Among the crowd, Riya and her party was trying to find Caelus.

Albert also made his way over to Caelus.

"How was it, Caelus?" Albert asked with a soft chuckle. It seemed he was in a genuinely good mood.

"What else?" Caelus shrugged. "I didn’t awaken any talents."

"I got no talent and have an E-Rank affinity. What can I say?" Caelus heaved an exaggerated sigh.

Albert immediately became awkward upon hearing this.

He himself had awakened a talent. Since his good friend had supposedly failed, he didn’t want to ruin the mood by showing off his own success.

Caelus naturally noticed this.

Good guy. Caelus shook his head inwardly. 𝘧𝑟𝑒𝑒𝘸𝘦𝘣𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝓁.𝘤𝘰𝓂

He was too kind, and Caelus didn’t strictly deserve such kindness given his heavy deception.

But Albert was a true friend in the end.

"It looks like you awakened a talent. What is it?" Caelus laughed slightly and patted Albert’s shoulder.

Albert’s expression shifted. For a split second, he felt his shoulder grow incredibly heavy under Caelus’s firm grip, but he didn’t think too much about it and spoke.

"Well..." Albert hesitated.

"Spill it."

"I got a Lower B-Rank Talent. Lightning Domain."

"A B-Rank?" Caelus was genuinely surprised and then laughed brightly.

"That is great. Since my good friend has awakened a B-Rank talent, no one will dare bully me again," Caelus said with a wide smile.

Starting from the B-Rank, talents were further classified into Lower, Middle, and Upper tiers. This was because there was a huge disparity in power between each sub-class, and the gap became even more prominent at the A-Rank and S-Rank levels.

With his friend awakening a B-Rank skill, and an offensive elemental one at that, Albert would rise swiftly without any problems.

"What is your combat score right now?" Caelus asked with raised eyebrows.

"I managed to reach Level 2, so I currently have a combat score of 6. But with the party I formed, it can reach 8 with my Lightning Domain and the party buff. I will introduce them to you one day, Caelus."

"Hm." Caelus simply nodded.

Albert was from a wealthy family. The reason he was overweight was not because he ate too much junk food, but because his father was a professional chef who constantly cooked meat infused with rich mana.

With the constant nourishment received from it, he became heavier. However, this weight was actually ’mana fat,’ not normal adipose tissue. He could effectively cut it down now that he had entered the Ascension Domain by directly converting the stored physical energy into his own usable mana.

While he might seem chubby and round on the outside, his internal potential was already incredibly high.

It was a magical yet strange biological phenomenon.

But in a reality merged with a game-like world, anything was possible.

Then, abruptly, the sharp sound of someone tapping on a microphone echoed across the stadium. Principal Harris was preparing to speak again.