Formless Ascension: My Affinity Is Limitless

”I think you’d better check the global rankings first,” John Allen said. His eyes became unfocused, as he also seemed to have opened the global rankings to check the new changes.

The moment he did, his jaw went slack.

Of course he already knew what to expect from the rankings; however, people like Uhtred, Zara, and everyone else who participated in the trials had had their details frozen for the entire month they were gone. No one on the main continents could see their progress.

Which was why John Allen was utterly shocked the moment he saw the updated rankings — particularly the global power leaderboard.

But he wasn’t the only one surprised.

Uhtred opened the ranking panels to understand what John was talking about, and he was equally surprised by the new additions and changes he saw. However, his own surprise was directed toward the wealth leaderboard rather than the power rankings:

[World Ranking]

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 1

Name: Red

Level: 33

Territory Owned: 1 (???)

Dungeons Owned: 1

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 2

Name: Zara

Level: 32

Territory Owned: Nil

Dungeons Owned: Nil

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 3

Name: Perfection

Level: 27

Territory Owned: 1 (Land of the Flawless)

Dungeons Owned: Nil

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 4

Name: King Alexei

Level: 26

Territory Owned: 1 (Tsar’s Dominion)

Dungeons Owned: 1

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 5

Name: Black Sun

Level: 25

Territory Owned: 2 (The Black Isles)

Dungeons Owned: 1

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 6

Name: Diya

Level: 25

Territory Owned: Nil

Dungeons Owned: Nil

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 7

Name: Antoine Blanc

Level: 25

Territory Owned: 1 (United New Eden)

Dungeons Owned: 0

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 8

Name: White Raven

Level: 24

Territory Owned: 1 (???)

Dungeons Owned: 1

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 9

Name: Hassan Al-Malik

Level: 24

Territory Owned: 1 (???)

Dungeons Owned: Nil

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 10

Name: Quiet Daoist

Level: 24

Territory Owned: 1 (???)

Dungeons Owned: Nil

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 11

Name: Isolde Castiglione

Level: 24

Territory Owned: Nil

Dungeons Owned: Nil

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 12

Name: Stormcaller

Level: 23

Territory Owned: 1 (???)

Dungeons Owned: 3

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 13

Name: Daofarer

Level: 22

Territory Owned: 1 (???)

Dungeons Owned: 1

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 14

Name: Jolene Okafor

Level: 22

Territory Owned: 7 (Marina Archipelago)

Dungeons Owned: 11

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 15

Name: Iron Tyrant

Level: 22

Territory Owned: 1 (The Iron Sovereignty)

Dungeons Owned: 1

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 16

Name: Koffi Mensah

Level: 22

Territory Owned: 1 (Sankofa Peaks)

Dungeons Owned: 1

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 17

Name: Aiko Mizuku

Level: 22

Territory Owned: 1 (Shikoku Sovereignty)

Dungeons Owned: 2

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 18

Name: Lord of Flames

Level: 22

Territory Owned: 2 (Hellfire Country)

Dungeons Owned: 1

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 19

Name: Buttercup

Level: 22

Territory Owned: 1 (Wondrous Wonderland)

Dungeons Owned: 1

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 20

Name: Max Wagner

Level: 22

Territory Owned: 1 (???)

Dungeons Owned: 1

*

*

*

[Global Wealth Ranking]

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 1

Name: Jolene Okafor

Level: 22

Total Wealth Value: 293,230 Multiversal Tokens

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 2

Name: Don Luciano Vanezzi

Level: 20

Total Wealth Value: 82,150 Multiversal Tokens

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 3

Name: Golden Finger Chen

Level: 18

Total Wealth Value: 67,400 Multiversal Tokens

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 4

Name: Glorious Eagle Vance

Level: 18

Total Wealth Value: 54,900 Multiversal Tokens

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 5

Name: Red

Level: 33

Total Wealth Value: 47,803 Multiversal Tokens

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 6

Name: Shogun

Level: 19

Total Wealth Value: 39,800 Multiversal Tokens

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 7

Name: Stormcaller

Level: 23

Total Wealth Value: 38,094 Multiversal Tokens

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 8

Name: Warhound Thorne

Level: 20

Total Wealth Value: 21,500 Multiversal Tokens

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 9

Name: Iron Tyrant

Level: 22

Total Wealth Value: 14,771 Multiversal Tokens

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 10

Name: King Alexei

Level: 26

Total Wealth Value: 14,450 Multiversal Tokens

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 11

Name: Perfection

Level: 27

Total Wealth Value: 13,896 Multiversal Tokens

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 12

Name: Black Sun

Level: 25

Total Wealth Value: 13,508 Multiversal Tokens

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 13

Name: Aiko Mizuku

Level: 22

Total Wealth Value: 8,222 Multiversal Tokens

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 14

Name: Antoine Blanc

Level: 25

Total Wealth Value: 8,100 Multiversal Tokens

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 15

Name: Daofarer

Level: 22

Total Wealth Value: 7,453 Multiversal Tokens

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 16

Name: Zara

Level: 32

Total Wealth Value: 6,905 Multiversal Tokens

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 17

Name: White Raven

Level: 24

Total Wealth Value: 5,000 Multiversal Tokens

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 18

Name: Hassan Al-Malik

Level: 24

Total Wealth Value: 4,002 Multiversal Tokens

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 19

Name: Diya

Level: 25

Total Wealth Value: 3,450 Multiversal Tokens

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 20

Name: Quiet Daoist

Level: 24

Total Wealth Value: 2,066 Multiversal Tokens

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

*

*

”What the actual fuck?”

Despite the heavy atmosphere from just seconds ago, Uhtred couldn’t help but blurt out a curse in shock.

293,230 Multiversal Tokens... How the hell did she amass so much wealth?!

His eyes locked onto Jolene Okafor’s name; he didn’t even bother with the others. Seven territories and eleven dungeons owned, too... For fuck’s sake, it’s only been a month. What the hell happened to warrant such a massive wealth gain?

There were others on the list who had also gained immense wealth over the period of the trials, including many new names Uhtred did not recognize. However, the gap between Jolene Okafor and the rest was simply too domineering. Her wealth was more than triple that of the second-placed Don Luciano Vanezzi...

Uhtred frowned slightly, looking at the second-placed name more closely.

”What’s the name of the guy I just killed?” he asked John and Minh Quan. The two had their focus on their individual panels, their eyes wide as they took in the massive level increases of Uhtred and everyone who had returned from the trials.

Minh Quan was the first to snap out of his shocked stupor, realizing Uhtred was speaking to them.

”Ah—Vanezzi. His name was Vanezzi.”

Hmm... Uhtred refocused on the wealth rankings. So this must be the boss of the ”familia” the guy mentioned.

He snorted softly.

The Don was only a Level 20, still well within the Mortal Realm. The guy had mentioned the ”Familia” as if they were supposed to be big shots, but this was just pitiful. Uhtred did not spare the name any more attention. He moved on immediately, skimming past the other unfamiliar names.

Oh? I’m at number five. 47,803 Multiversal Tokens. I guess that’s taking into account the value of my gains from the trials.

He could see the same trend across others who had returned from the trials: King Alexei, Zara, Perfection... Their multiversal token counts hadn’t been as high before they left, but now there had been a significant increase. The main factor Uhtred could point to was the Nascent Realm beast cores they had all gotten, sitting in each of their spatial storage. That, along with several other interesting things he had gotten from the essence-dense environment of the Age of Abundance trial grounds, had surely boosted his wealth valuation.

Uhtred refocused his attention on the list. This was great and all. Very shocking, even. But he still couldn’t see how this was the massive change John Allen had made it out to be.

Yes, Jolene Okafor was extremely wealthy now, and several new players had surfaced, especially on the wealth ladder. But that was just wealth. At the end of the day, wealth could not compare to the massive level gains, the insights, and the eye-opening experiences gained by those who took part in the trials.

Uhtred looked unimpressed. He was just about to ask John Allen if this was all, and what any of this had to do with the intruders currently in his territory, when he caught a detail below the ranking panel.

Where the panel should have ended, there was a dropdown toggle at the bottom, as if another list had been collapsed.

He focused his attention on it immediately. And just as he suspected, a new panel unfolded below:

[Global Organizational Wealth Ranking]

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 1

Faction Name: United New Eden World Government

Combined Wealth Value: 238,500 Multiversal Tokens

Controlled Territories: 12

Controlled Dungeons: 19

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 2

Faction Name: La Familia Suprema

Combined Wealth Value: 212,000 Multiversal Tokens

Controlled Territories: 6

Controlled Dungeons: 14

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 3

Faction Name: Inagawa-kai

Combined Wealth Value: 189,400 Multiversal Tokens

Controlled Territories: 5

Controlled Dungeons: 11

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 4

Faction Name: The Free Ascenders’ Guild

Combined Wealth Value: 104,100 Multiversal Tokens

Controlled Territories: 3

Controlled Dungeons: 9

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Rank No: 5

Faction Name: Shadow Brokerage

Combined Wealth Value: 96,800 Multiversal Tokens

Controlled Territories: 5

Controlled Dungeons: 6

━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Huh? What’s this stuff... Another wealth ranking? I thought it was something good...

”John. What’s this ’organizational wealth ranking’ thing?” The name was self-explanatory, and from what Uhtred could see, he already understood what it was, but he still asked, knowing there had to be something deeper to it than the surface level.

John’s attention returned to the present, and his expression became solemn again.

”Those organizations... They’re the reason why the situation has changed so much,” he sighed. ”Just after the trial notice appeared and you, along with other high-levelers, began to head for the trial, these guys made their move.”

”The United New Eden World Government. The Free Ascenders’ Guild. And most especially, La Familia Suprema and Inagawa-kai. They all took advantage of the power vacuum to very quickly establish themselves.”

”Right now, these four have taken control of the entire continent. They have even procured long distance teleportation circles and extended their reach into the other continents across the sea. A new world order has been established. New laws...”

John Allen paused, looking at Uhtred hesitantly.

”...And by these laws. For ’tyrannically monopolizing a public regional dungeon,’The World Government has declared you a dangerous threat and a public enemy...”