Chapter 90: [91]: The Vanguard’s Loot, The Platinum Wall
He had 15 new free stat points to allocate.
Levi looked at his raw attributes. They were incredibly skewed. He had the Strength of an endgame Berserker and the Agility of a max-level Rogue, but he was wearing the character model of a mid-game player.
His Max HP and Mana were starting to fall behind his damage scaling. He needed to pad his defensive pools before hitting the final stretch of the continent.
He assigned 10 points to Vitality and 5 points to Intelligence.
His permanent Strength hit 1,135.
His Total Attack shot up to exactly 2,892.
His Vitality bumped from 319 to 329. That pushed his Max HP to 6,680 and his base Defense to 379.
His Intelligence bumped from 201 to 206, pushing his Max Mana to exactly 2,110.
Levi closed his menu and looked down at his hands. He was Level 47. His Total Attack was nearly 3,000. His Speed was 831.
"I am a complete anomaly," Levi said to himself.
He turned around. Isolde was standing quietly by the canyon wall, her blank eyes tracking a piece of digital ash falling through the air.
"Good shooting," Levi told her, resting his scythe on his shoulder. "Let’s clean up this mess and figure out what to do with the loot."
—
The canyon floor was an absolute disaster zone.
Levi spent the next hour walking back and forth across the polished black glass, physically sifting through the dissolving pixel-corpses of over thirty Level 60 Elites. Looting was usually a chore in Starfall, but because of the massive level gap between Levi and the mobs, the drop rates for high-tier items were artificially inflated to an absurd degree.
He didn’t even bother looking at Bronze or Silver gear anymore. He just kicked it aside.
He vacuumed up mountains of Platinum coins, which automatically converted into raw Gold in his digital wallet, pushing his domain balance back up to a highly respectable 52,000 Gold Coins.
He grabbed stacks of rare, glowing bone-crafting materials and stuffed them into his spatial inventory.
But he was looking for something very specific.
He walked over to the remains of the five Obsidian Dreadknights he had just executed. He dug through the heavy piles of rusted iron and shattered greatswords. Sitting at the bottom of the loot pile were dozens of small, glowing silver orbs.
[Silver-Tier Core of the Aegis]
[Rarity: Silver]
[Material Effect: A highly condensed essence of defense. Used primarily in high-tier armor and shielding fusions.]
Levi picked them up, counting them carefully. The drop rate was perfect. He had gathered exactly twenty-seven of the Silver-Tier Cores.
"Twenty-seven is the magic number," Levi muttered, dumping the glowing orbs into his bag.
He stopped looting and pulled up his status screen. He needed to evaluate his build. The game was essentially a giant math problem, and right now, his equations had a fatal flaw.
His Total Attack was sitting at a monstrous 2,892. His Speed was 831. He was an absolute terror on the battlefield.
But his Max HP was only 6,680, and his base Defense was a pathetic 379.
"This is the glass cannon reality," Levi sighed, staring at the numbers.
He was fighting Level 60 Elites that swung for 4,000 damage on a basic attack. His Diamond-tier [Heart of the Chained] necklace granted a permanent 50% Damage Reduction, which cut that 4,000 damage down to 2,000. But even with 50% DR, taking 2,000 damage a hit meant he could only survive three clean strikes before his 6,680 HP pool was completely erased.
A single mistake, a single missed dodge or badly timed teleport, and he was instantly dead.
Worse, his primary defensive skill was severely outdated.
He pulled up the tooltip for his Gold-tier [Hollow’s Ward].
The dark-matter shield scaled off 500% of his Intelligence stat, plus a flat 500 Base HP.
His Intelligence was 206.
His Gold-tier shield only provided a 1,530 HP buffer.
"A fifteen hundred health shield is basically paper," Levi grumbled, swiping the menu away. "If a Dreadknight hits my shield, it shatters instantly, and the bleed-through damage still chunks my actual health for almost five hundred points. Against whatever boss is waiting in the Midnight Spire, that shield is entirely useless."
He needed a real defense. He needed a skill capable of absorbing apocalyptic levels of damage.
Levi turned around and looked for Isolde. She was standing near a large pile of purple silk dropped by the Shadow-Weavers. She wasn’t looting; she was just staring blankly at the canyon wall.
"Isolde, come here," Levi called out.
She glided over the black glass, stopping exactly two feet in front of him. "I am ready to receive target parameters."
"No targets right now. We need to do some crafting," Levi said.
He scanned the immediate area and spotted a small, dark cave carved naturally into the side of the obsidian canyon wall. It was entirely out of sight from the main patrol paths.
"Follow me," Levi instructed.
He ducked into the quiet cave. The ambient lighting dropped, casting long, dark shadows against the smooth rock. It was the perfect spot. He didn’t want any roaming Elites interrupting him while his inventory was wide open.
He checked his Domain tax wallet one last time.
Exactly 52,000 Gold Coins.
Fusing items up to Platinum rarity required massive, absurd amounts of raw currency as a catalyst fee. He was about to empty his bank account again, but he knew you couldn’t put a price tag on not dying.
"Alright," Levi said, taking a deep breath. "Time to build a real wall."
He opened his UI and forcefully summoned the [Boundless Fusion] interface. The three glowing golden slots materialized in the dark cave, casting a warm, humming light over the obsidian floor.
He pulled the twenty-seven [Silver-Tier Cores of the Aegis] out of his inventory. The glowing orbs clattered softly in his hands. He was ready for the ultimate defensive fusion.