Super Gene

While Queen was looking away, Han Sen summoned the Deadeye Peacock beast soul.

A peacock-like bird appeared in front of Han Sen, flapping its wings. It was roughly two feet long.

Looking closer, he realized that it wasn’t a living creature, but a blue-colored metal crossbow. It was shaped to resemble a peacock, with its wings composing the bow of the weapon. With the body as its stock, the mouth of the peacock was where the tips of the bolts were lodged, and the top of the head itself was the sightline with which its user would aim. It was a beautiful piece of equipment.

The elastic string of the crossbow was unusual, however. It was like a beam of translucent hardlight, fixed between the ends of the wings. Han Sen could command for bolts to be nocked and drawn with his mind, and he only had to pull on the lock to loose them.

Han Sen looked inside its accompanying quiver and saw that there was enough space for eight bolts to be stored. This was a fine amount, particularly for a weapon that could be used as efficiently as a pistol.

If he used beast soul bolts, he’d have an infinite supply of ammo, too – provided the bolts weren’t broken.

Han Sen examined the peacock crossbow with an open jaw. It was a remarkable weapon to have in his possession, but without the appropriate bolts, it was little more than a sturdy stick to beat stuff over the head with.

”This is great, but you could at least provide me with some bolts. You didn’t even give me a single one. Now I have to go find some myself?” Han Sen didn’t know whether he should be happy or sad right now.

The peacock crossbow looked incredibly powerful, but his visual perception was all that he could use to get to know it. He had no way of giving it a proper test run.

”I suppose it doesn’t matter. I’ll formulate a few steel bolts for it and think about getting beast soul bolts further down the line.” Han Sen tucked the crossbow away, realizing that its usage wouldn’t be as simple as he had hoped. However, even without the high-end bolts that would be best to use, it should still be pretty powerful.

A crossbow was vastly different to a traditional bow. The strength of the latter weapon stems from the human that makes use of it. Crossbows were automatic, and the power and efficiency derived from the weapons came from the bolts that were used and the craftsmanship of the weapons themselves.

They continued to sail for another ten days before Han Sen caught sight of land. It wasn’t just any parcel of land, either. It was a human shelter, one that operated on the coast.

Han Sen, upon arriving, made sure to teleport back to the Alliance. He had been gone for some time, following his misadventure with the White Tiger. He was afraid Ji Yanran had become gravely concerned over his welfare and whereabouts, so he made sure to check-in on her. He wanted to comfort her and make some bolts for his new crossbow.

Ji Yanran really did worry over him. When she saw him return, she was delightfully surprised and she did her best to shelve how upset she was.

Han Sen comforted her for a while and her mood genuinely brightened.

Ji Yanran had been upset not because he had been gone for so long, but because she did not know whether or not he was okay.

As Han Sen lay on his bed that night, he decided to log into the virtual community. He visited the army to take a look at the weaponry on offer there, and finally decided to purchase Z-class bolts.

All sorts of weaponry and equipment could be purchased in the army, for the right amount of money. Only weaponry that dealt raw, physical damage could be bought, however. Weapons that inflicted elemental damage were not available.

Han Sen browsed around for a while before he stumbled across the Z-class bolts he had resolved to buy. Different crossbows could only employ certain types and sizes of bolts, and these were the ones Han Sen thought he would need.

But the peacock crossbow was a beast soul crossbow, and that meant it had fantastic compatibility. Provided the bolts weren’t too long, he could make use of them. So Han Sen selected a few different types of bolts and bought them.

After buying the bolts, Han Sen went off to browse the news and see if anything important had occurred in the Alliance during his absence. Many things had transpired, such as a half-god killing a bunch of creatures, a victory for the Alliance in a war that was taking place in another system, and how the Shura people managed to reclaim a planet that was taken from them.

Still, despite all of the things that had been going on, none of these events were of personal concern to Han Sen. After a while of browsing there, he went onto the Skynet platform to research as much information about crossbows and their bolts as he could.

After a good while of searching for bolts exclusively, he noticed there was an extreme shortage of the bolts available in the Second God’s Sanctuary, which led him to believe the crossbow was an unpopular weapon type.

More popular swords and knives had billions of beast soul variants to purchase, but the total number of bolts available for purchase was in the low tens of millions.

He enabled the filters to browse for sacred-blood beast soul bolts and was surprised to see only a mere dozen for sale.

Han Sen looked at the locations where these bolts were on sale and saw the names of shelters that he had never heard of before or were in remote, inaccessible places. It seemed that it might be impossible for him to trade for the bolts he sought.

”If I cannot buy the bolts I need, I’ll just have to hunt down the creatures myself.” Han Sen scoured the Icefield, Golden Beach, and Whitestone Beach for information, hoping to find out where sacred-blood beast soul bolts could drop.

After a good while of searching, he came across a creature that was known to drop sacred-blood beast soul bolts near Whitestone Beach.

It was a creature known as Sky Falcon. They were mostly ordinary, but there were mutants amongst them. The Sky Falcon king was the sacred-blood variant.

Many people had hunted the ordinary Sky Falcons for traditional bolts that were quite powerful.

After learning what he could about the Sky Falcons, he knew he’d like them. And if a sacred-blood falcon became a berserk sacred-blood class beast soul, it’d be a fearsome thing to behold. With his new crossbow in hand, perhaps he could use such a bolt to shred or pierce the shells, scales, or skin of super creatures that were extra thick and previously impervious.

But the Sky Falcons lived on the peaks of the Sky Pillar mountain. There were many other creatures there, which would make it a difficult trek to the top.

The person who provided him this information had only learnt what he knew from a Sky Falcon that had fallen down the mountainside. He hadn’t climbed up the mountain himself, so it was sketchy information at best.

”With the silver fox here, I shouldn’t have much difficulty reaching the peak – provided there are no super creatures up there,” Han Sen mused to himself.

Han Sen really wanted these Sky Falcons now, and even if they did not drop a sacred-blood beast soul, with their small bodies, Han Sen could increase his sacred geno point tally by a good deal in a short amount of time.

Han Sen conducted more research about Sky Pillar mountain, so he could be as prepared as possible.

After looking for a while, Han Sen furrowed his eyebrows. People had recently reported sighting a freakish monster there, riding a red cloud around the Sky Pillar mountain.

Judging from the reports, all signs pointed to it being another super creature.

Ring! Ring! As he was finishing up his browser session, his communicator rang.

It was Zhu Ting calling. He had asked for his number a while back, but this was the first time he had called him. Han Sen wondered what he wanted at this time.

”Boss, this is not good!” Zhu Ting said, hastily.

”What’s not good?” Han Sen frowned.

”Mystery Island. There is a Mystery Island on the Icefield. Where are you? Come back! If you don’t, others will seek to claim the benefits!” Zhu Ting’s face looked panicky.

Han Sen was frozen for a bit, knowing why Zhu Ting was in such a rush.

The Mystery Island here was different than the one in the First God’s Sanctuary. The Mystery Island must have had a royal-class spirit shelter situated on it. If it did, the likelihood of something good being there was extremely high.