141: Military merit, bottleneck

Chu Yuan naturally did not know that the moment he uploaded the Spirit Gathering Array, it was noticed by many big shots.

Seeing it downloaded over a dozen times in quick succession, he just assumed Vermilion Dragon had recommended it to his friends... and subsequently, a pile of military merit was credited to his account.

When setting the price, he hesitated a bit. Logically speaking, he could be considered at most a Sixth Realm Martial Artist right now.

If the price were set according to Sixth Realm standards, it would range from one hundred to one thousand military merit.

However, the Spirit Gathering Array was effective even for Eighth Realm Martial Artists, and according to the exchange standards for Eighth Realm Martial Skills... it would be in the range of five thousand to ten thousand military merit.

The gap between them was simply too large, and there was no reference...

After thinking for a long time, he still priced it at three thousand military merit.

For Martial Artists below the Eighth Realm, spending three thousand military merit to exchange for a Formation of unknown specific efficacy would naturally be a huge loss, and they would not dare to take the risk.

But for the Eighth Realm, three thousand military merit seemed cheap...

In the Legion's military merit System, if one excludes the military merit rewarded by the missions themselves, and excludes specific items like assassination lists or bounty lists... calculating purely by headcount, the head of a Second Realm alien was worth one military merit, which was the base unit;

Third Realm was ten military merit, Fourth Realm was one hundred, Fifth Realm was one thousand, and Sixth Realm was five thousand;

Seventh Realm was ten thousand, Eighth Realm was one hundred thousand!

Ninth Realm... if you could kill a Ninth Realm alien, you would naturally no longer be within the military merit System.

It sounded easy to obtain. For example, Pang Long scammed one million military merit from his Old Ancestor, which only required killing ten Eighth Realm aliens... but even among the Eighth Realm, who was stronger and who was weaker was not necessarily set in stone!

Want to be a military merit plunderer?

Be careful that you don't become someone else's military merit first!

As for killing lower-Rank ones to make up the numbers... that was not allowed!

In military merit calculation, killing an alien one Rank lower than oneself would result in halved rewards.

For those two or more Ranks lower, there was absolutely no military merit!

Such a System was not to protect those low-Rank aliens, but to protect one's own low-Rank Martial Artists!

Still taking that Eighth Realm Martial Artist from the Pang Family as an example, admittedly, he could kill a bunch of Fifth Realm or Sixth Realm aliens to quickly gather military merit.

But how would the slaughtered side let it rest? They would definitely take equivalent revenge!

If you can do it, but others cannot, there is no such good thing under the sun...

Therefore, high-Rank Martial Artists generally would not easily slaughter; this was the restraint of the various races on the Outer Heaven Battlefield.

Of course, there were special cases, such as when the balance of power was lost or the situation completely collapsed!

For example, if Great Qin were to suffer a total defeat on the Outer Heaven Battlefield, and even the Earth Star homeland were invaded... naturally, they would kill anyone they saw!

However, in that situation, the military merit System would naturally be of no use...

In short, not long after uploading, Chu Yuan had over forty thousand military merit credited to his account!

And then, gradually, no one else exchanged for it...

His expression was somewhat strange; he had a strong illusion that his military merit was endless.

Since joining the Bell Tower Squad, they had completed two consecutive missions, and one team member had even nearly fallen...

With a five-fold military merit bonus, how much military merit did each person receive on average? Less than thirty thousand... The five-fold bonus only applied to the missions; killing aliens did not receive the bonus.

Sure enough, knowledge is priceless...

...

Over the next few days, the Bell Tower Squad did not accept any other missions and remained in rest.

It was not that they didn't want to, but rather they couldn't find suitable ones.

Either the danger level was too high, or it required going into alien territory;

Or it was too simple, with little reward... or the mission duration was too long.

Yuan Yang was open-minded about it; the gains from the two missions were already very high, to the point where they couldn't digest them for a while.

There was also no need to work Chu Yuan, this 'experience baby', to death...

Chu Yuan had no objections and cultivated with peace of mind.

When he was in the Lianshan Secret Realm, he was already close to breaking through to the Golden Core Middle Stage, and now, over ten days later... he was still close to breaking through to the Golden Core Middle Stage.

On the Golden Core inside his body, although the third pattern was tending towards Formation, it had not fully formed yet!

At this point, what was lacking was not the accumulation of spiritual power, but the understanding of the Cultivation Technique!

He previously cultivated the Geng Metal Primal Dao Art, and Zhang Chen said that he had the aura of the Law of Metal on him, implying he had already touched upon the Law.

After switching to the Golden Core Great Dao Song... it was actually also related to the Law!

But he could not clearly perceive exactly what Law it was.

He only knew how to Cultivate step by step, but did not know the underlying reasons.

It seemed to contain everything, combined in some mysterious way.

It seemed like a 'World', yet also like 'Chaos'!

It was 'Existence', yet also seemed like 'Emptiness'!

Chu Yuan felt somewhat helpless; he was only at the Golden Core Stage now... Golden Core Stage!

Why on earth did he have to comprehend this kind of thing!?

If he had known, he would have continued cultivating the Geng Metal Primal Dao Art. At the very least, the Geng Metal Primal Dao Art would not make things difficult for him... He could just honestly comprehend the Law of Metal...

Jokes aside, how could cultivation ever be smooth sailing?

Chu Yuan quickly adjusted his mindset and exchanged for a large number of Seventh Realm Cultivation Techniques to compare and verify them with each other.

However, Cultivation Techniques that had not been converted by the System did not have much effect for verification. It wasn't that he was limited by the System's conversion count, but rather that it was difficult to master a new Cultivation Technique in a single day.

...

"Chu Yuan, it's time for a mission."

"What mission?"

In the training room, Yuan Yang stood tall with a sharp gaze and a solemn expression as he spoke: "This time, it is a rescue-type mission!"

"Mission location: The intersection of the Ninth Legion, the First Legion, and the Nightmare Insect Clan, the Soldier Soul Profound Realm!"

"Enemy: Uncertain, upper limit Seventh Realm, lower limit Fifth Realm..."

"Rewards: Three rescue targets, ten thousand military merit each! A guaranteed base of ten thousand military merit! In addition, there is a fifty thousand military merit private bounty!"

"This is a joint rescue, with a total of four squads;"

"Two from the Ninth Legion, two from the First Legion..."

"Who is worth so much?" Li Qi asked, frowning. Those who needed them to rescue them must be weaker than them; otherwise, they would have been able to fight their way out on their own!

Since they were weaker than them... why did the higher-ups make such a big fuss?

Not only did they offer super-standard mission rewards, but it was also a joint operation between two legions?

Adding in that inexplicably huge private bounty... he subconsciously concluded that among the people who needed to be rescued, someone must be the offspring of a big shot.

He hated those 'Martial Second Generation' types the most...

"Do not guess wildly." Yuan Yang glanced at him and said in a deep voice: "They are Martial Artists from the Dark Blade Camp. During the execution of their mission, they obtained important intelligence and performed meritorious service! That is also why they fell into a desperate situation..."

"That is why there is a rescue of this scale!"

Li Qi was stunned for a moment, then fell silent. There was no such organizational unit as a 'Camp' in the legions;

In an already very loose System, redundant organizational units were completely unnecessary... except for the Dark Blade Camp.

In the Dark Blade Camp, the lowest-ranked Martial Artist was at the Third Realm, and there were not even many of those;

They were generally Fourth Realm or Fifth Realm, and there were even a large number of Sixth Realm or even Seventh Realm Martial Artists!

But in reality, it was not some gathering of elites; the Dark Blade Camp had another name, called... Cannon Fodder Camp...

"These are the files of the rescue targets; everyone, take a look;"

"In addition, although the potential gains for this mission are very high, the uncertainty is also very large!"

"Consider for yourselves whether you want to go; we will decide by vote..."

"I'm going... I'm going!" Chu Yuan looked at the terminal, feeling a bit like 'covering his forehead with a bitter smile'...

"Hmm?"