Volume 1, Chapter 58: You've Advanced to the King Rank?

"Huh? A source crystal dropped as well?"

Zhang Wei didn't pay too much attention to the pangolin's movements; as long as he knew the direction it was fleeing in, that was enough.

To Zhang Wei's surprise, after hacking Han Xiao into ten pieces, a source crystal actually floated out from her corpse.

Moreover, it was an epic-grade source crystal.

However, Zhang Wei didn't dwell on it; having a source crystal drop was a good thing.

He then put away the source crystal and began inspecting Han Xiao's remains.

Zhang Wei had already stated that he would definitely hack Han Xiao to death today, leaving her no chance of resurrection, and he naturally intended to keep his word.

"Her physical body is gone, completely integrated into the interior of this steel snake. What kind of principle is this?" Zhang Wei wondered inwardly.

Originally, Zhang Wei had assumed that Han Xiao's transformation was similar to humans piloting mechas.

It was just turning a mecha into the body of a mechanical creature.

But reality clearly wasn't what Zhang Wei had imagined; Han Xiao's physical body no longer existed.

"Still, I'm a bit uneasy," Zhang Wei muttered, and then he picked up the snake's head, which he had cleaved in half.

Take the head away, let's see how you manage to survive.

Afterwards, Zhang Wei looked around at the mechas standing frozen in place.

How should these fellows be dealt with?

Root out the evil completely; these guys had all followed behind Han Xiao and committed plenty of bad deeds. Leaving them alive meant they would continue to harm other people's lives.

However, the mechas these guys piloted were innocent.

"You lot, disengage combination," Zhang Wei commanded.

This order met with resistance from many. In this era, only mechas gave them a sense of security. Without the protection of a mecha, then...

"Disengage!"

There weren't so many trivial issues to consider; failing to disengage meant death, so they had no choice but to obey.

"Hand over your mecha cores," Zhang Wei continued.

Following that, a group of people reluctantly handed their mecha cores over to Zhang Wei.

Once he had collected the mecha cores, Zhang Wei's floating cannons opened fire.

He had never intended to let these fellows off in the first place. As for distinguishing whether there might be any good people among them—sorry, Zhang Wei didn't have the leisure for that. Since they had followed the wrong person, they had to bear the corresponding consequences.

After a dozen blasts, the ground was left littered with ice sculptures.

Over a hundred people, entirely devoid of life.

Then, Zhang Wei strode forward in a large step. There were still a few mechas hidden in the vicinity; these people were also Han Xiao's subordinates, just not gathered here earlier.

Zhang Wei would not let these people off either.

A dozen minutes later, not a single mecha remained in the entire town—aside from Zhang Wei, of course.

"Chased that far out?" Zhang Wei used a rough scan to check the situation on Lin Qianying's end.

At that moment, Lin Qianying had pursued and hunted Han Xu for five kilometers.

Zhang Wei found it a bit difficult to understand. With Lin Qianying's abilities, finishing off Han Xu should have been a breeze, not requiring such a long chase.

However, Zhang Wei didn't dig deeper; Lin Qianying wouldn't be in any danger anyway.

Subsequently, Zhang Wei took out the epic-grade source crystal provided by Han Xiao.

"Activate."

"Ding, obtained Purple Star!"

Purple Star: Can be used to upgrade equipment from tier 7 to 9, can elevate equipment quality, with a 100% chance to upgrade equipment to epic grade, and a small probability to upgrade epic-grade equipment to legendary grade.

"It's actually a Purple Star!" Zhang Wei felt it was a bit too hot to handle.

Why?

Because he now had the possibility of obtaining legendary-grade equipment.

If he used the Purple Star to enhance the quality of the thermal greatsword, there was a certain probability of obtaining a legendary-grade thermal greatsword.

Legendary grade and epic grade were simply two entirely different concepts.

However, that small probability forced Zhang Wei to calm down.

"No, not worth it. Even if it could be upgraded to legendary quality, it's not worth it."

The level of the thermal greatsword was too low. Even if it reached legendary quality, Zhang Wei would still phase it out once he acquired a better weapon.

Using epic-grade weapons in the early stages of the apocalypse was more than enough.

"Leaving it alone won't do either. Let's upgrade the engine's quality instead!" After pondering for a moment, Zhang Wei made his decision.

Good things only reflect their value when used; what use is there in hoarding them?

And the engine was the source of power; for a mecha, naturally, the stronger the power, the better.

Although the engine inside Zhang Wei's mecha was already considered quite good, Zhang Wei himself was a massive consumer of power.

Floating cannons, thermal greatswords, thrusters, skills—all of these required power consumption to operate.

Having made his decision, Zhang Wei immediately retrieved the engine from the lower compartment of the mecha.

Then, he pressed the Purple Star into the engine.

"Upgrade engine quality."

"Ding, engine quality upgraded to epic grade, combat power +100."

How much combat power increased didn't matter all that much to Zhang Wei; what he wanted to know was how much the engine's output had improved.

"About three times or so, pretty good!" Reintegrating the engine into the mecha, Zhang Wei immediately felt the surge in power.

"It'll be great after the third evolution; I'll be able to see intuitive data. I'll tidy up the fellow down below and then head back."

Zhang Wei muttered inwardly to himself.

Upon the third evolution of the mecha, all of the mecha's attributes would be presented in a digitized format, clearly spelling out the exact values of each capability.

Just as Zhang Wei was pondering to himself, Lin Qianying returned.

"Why did you chase them out so far?" Zhang Wei asked with a hint of confusion.

"I needed to retrieve something from him, so it took a bit of effort," Lin Qianying explained casually, not going into specific details.

Zhang Wei had no intention of pressing the matter further: "Han Xiao is already dead. Let's head back in a moment, there's still some other business."

Looking at the field of ice sculptures, Lin Qianying was puzzled: "What other business?"

Hadn't the people who deserved to be killed pretty much been taken care of?

"It should be good news."

With that, Zhang Wei grabbed the thermal greatsword and thrust it fiercely into the ground.

The thermal greatsword was over ten meters long, and combined with the length of Zhang Wei's arm, this strike nearly severed the pangolin's lifeline.

The pangolin had believed that hiding more than ten meters deep underground made it completely safe; it never expected to be discovered.

When the pangolin felt the intense heat, its instinctual reaction was to turn around and keep running.

If it was discovered at a depth of over ten meters, what about a dozen meters deeper?

Since it knew how to tunnel anyway, it refused to believe it couldn't get away.

"Run again, and you'll die a miserable death." Zhang Wei's cold voice reached the pangolin's ears.

Hearing Zhang Wei's voice, the pangolin immediately realized that Zhang Wei wasn't just messing around and nearly missing it by accident, but actually knew precisely where it was.

At that moment, whether to run or not—two competing thoughts echoed constantly in the pangolin's mind.

"Still not coming out?" Zhang Wei moved again, driving the thermal greatsword another three or four meters deeper.

This time, the pangolin saw the thermal greatsword with its own eyes, as the blade was practically touching its face.

"I'm coming out, big brother, don't hack!" the pangolin cried out loudly, and then burrowed upward with reckless abandon. Covering a distance of over ten meters, it surged up to the surface in a mere ten seconds or so.

Such tunneling speed genuinely astonished Zhang Wei.

"Are you about to evolve to the King tier?"