Cosmic Peak

Aren felt that those rings could be really helpful in various situations. They could become even more powerful after turning them into his Articule gears and upgrading them.

Anyway, he could continuously rain down many powerful attacks from the rings as long as he had spirit energy.

So he decided to save 10,550 gold coins instead of buying gold tier items to fill in his articule gear slots.

Before Aren left the shop, he took out the Mark of Yakum to the staff and asked, "I forgot to ask before but is this card usable here?"

Seeing the card, the staff member was stunned, "this...this is Mark of Yakum! Of course, this is usable here."

"Oh...then can I get 20% back from the chain whip and shield's purchase?" Aren asked with a wry smile before saying with a cough, "anyway, I am going to buy those rings after quickly gathering gold coins."

"Naturally, naturally! Come with me, please," the staff member said with a smile as he led Athan to one of the sales counters.

The staff member scanned Aren's card in some sort of stone plate before saying, "can you tell me your name?"

"Ruine," Aren replied.

"Mr. Ruine. From now you, you are a VIP member of all shops in the Underworld with this symbol on their name board," the staff member said as he showed a symbol to Athan on a plate.

The symbol looked like a dark tree with wavy black and purple branches going upward.

"Ohh," Aren nodded as he remembered seeing this symbol on this shop's board outside.

"You just need to show this mark of Yakum after entering the shops with this symbol," the staff member said with a smile before he initiated the trade with Aren to give him back the 20% discount gold coins.

"Here, you can take these 1538 gold coins back," the staff member said as he traded them back to Aren.

Aren nodded before he grinned, "then I guess the set of rings will also cost 24,000 gold coins to me instead of 30,000 gold coins."

"Indeed," the staff member nodded.

"Alright, then I will come back after gathering sufficient gold coins," Aren said before he left the shop.

"We will be expecting your arrival soon," the staff said with a small bow.

...

While walking towards the Guildhall, Aren thought, 'I now have 12,088 gold coins, so I merely need 12,000 gold coins. Nice, I guess it's time to get back to grinding and accept some quests.'

Soon, Aren arrived at the Guildhall, but after he looked at the quest board and the requirements, he smiled wryly and left.

The Guildhall's staff member clearly told him that he is not strong enough to take on any quests right now. His guild card indicated that he was at High warrior rank but the minimum requirement to take on the quest was Master-rank.

Generally, people at Supreme-3 to Supreme-5 lifeform can achieve Master-rank.

After thinking for a moment, Aren realized the reason. Right after he arrived at the Underworld, he encountered a legendary monster. Afterward, he only encountered level 40+ wild monsters, and after arriving at this city, a horde of epic monsters attacked.

This Underworld was truly dangerous.

'Hmmm...I guess it's time to invoke quests instead of taking them at the Guildhall,' Aren thought as he started roaming the city.

After roaming for ten minutes, he realized that not many residencies were in the city. Instead, there were many inns, hotels, and such things here but not houses.

Since he had no fruitful quest invokes even after talking with some people here, Aren decided to stay in an inn and finish his work of transforming his items into gears and then upgrading them.

He decided to go with a mid-tier inn where the price was 10 gold coins a day and started transforming his two newly bought items into gears.

...

[Crystal Hexa Shield]

-Rank: Platinum-tier (High-grade)

-Requirements: Armalist Drive+5

-Perks: +25 CONT, +20 STR. Fire, Water, Earth, and Wind resistance increased by 200.

-Defense: Phy. [1510], Energy [2600]

-Traits:

1) Aura of Resistance: Have a 50% certain chance to negate status conditions like stun, paralyze, burn, etc., from the user. Have a 2 minutes cooldown once this passive trait triggers.

2) Crystal Barrier: Infuse 1500 spirit energy and 100 Armalist Force into the shield to conjure a barrier with 4000 durability within a 5-meter radius around the shield. Barrier's defense values are half of the shield's value. [5 min cooldown].

-----

After Aren finished transforming Crystal Hexa Shield, the stats from the perk instantly applied, and he felt slight pain coursing through his body before feeling newfound strength and solidity in his body.

He was also somewhat surprised by how the traits evolved.

'My chances of survival really increased by a somewhat good margin,' Aren thought as he looked at the upgraded traits.

He then started transforming [Legumeta Chain Whip] weapon as well.

-----

[Legumeta Chain Whip]

-Rank: Platinum-tier (High-grade)

-Requirements: Armalist Drive+5

-Perks: +35 AGI, +15 STR

-Attack: Phy. [4,000~5,000]

-Trait:

1) Sound Slash: Breaking the sound barrier with the chain whip's attack will release a sound slash. The sound slash will consume 1200 spirit energy when the user manages to execute it.

Sound Slash Damage: 10,000~20,000 sound damage that will pass through the normal physical defense. Effective sound slash's range: 100 meters.

-----

Aren nodded as he looked at the upgrades, 'I wonder if using this whip in tandem with kinetic energy method will increase its soul slash damage?'

'Hmmm...the sound slash is supposed to be released when its tail breaks the sound barrier, but...,' Aren shook his head as he stopped thinking about it for now. He will just try it out when fighting outside.

*Thrrrrr.....DHOOOOM....*

Suddenly, the entire city started quacking again as an intense earthquake reverberated.

Aren hurriedly left the inn and was shocked as his eyes captured a massive floating ship in the sky.

"IT'S A GHOST DEMON SHIP! WHAT LUCK."

"Luck?" Aren was confused as he looked at the man in his late twenties looking in the sky with sparkling eyes.

He then looked at the floating gothic-looking ship that looked similar to a pirate ship but way scarier with the glowing skulls floating around it and muttered, "how is it lucky to find this shit on top of our heads?"

However, soon, Aren knew the answer.