Chapter 85: Lifespan Accumulated—2,198 Years

The reason he let them run for ten minutes first was that Tang Mubai didn’t want to scour the entire mountain in search of survivors who had slipped through the net. The commotion on the mountaintop just now must have alerted the Red Star Mercenary Group members stationed at the foot of the mountain—they would either be on guard, sneaking up the mountain, or hiding in the shadows. By sending Li Xingchang and his group down, he could draw these people out and then capture them all in one fell swoop!

He didn't have to wait long. Soon, Tang Mubai heard cries of alarm and curses coming from the foot of the mountain. At this, the corners of his mouth curled upward; he didn’t descend immediately but instead, after pausing the timer, walked around the scene, retrieving the arrows he had shot earlier.

Only after gathering all the arrows did he prepare to leave. But as he passed by Hu Zonghan’s corpse, something caught his eye. The expression on Hu Zonghan’s face had hardly changed—it was still as before: rosy, delicate, and glossy.

"Is he about to rise from the dead?" Tang Mubai raised his brows, knelt down, and carefully touched Hu Zonghan’s face. After a moment, a thought struck him. He grabbed Hu Zonghan’s facial skin and suddenly yanked it upward.

With a swift motion, an entire mask peeled off from Hu Zonghan’s face.

“A human skin mask?” Tang Mubai was astonished, feeling the softness in his hand, then shook his head. “No, this isn’t human skin.”

Human skin wouldn’t feel so good. This mask looked exactly like human skin, but its texture was entirely different. Even with Tang Mubai’s perception attribute of ten, he hadn’t noticed anything amiss when Hu Zonghan was wearing it.

A treasure! Only a treasure could explain it.

“Ah, I didn’t expect such an unexpected gain.” Tang Mubai grinned, played with the mask for a while, then put it away. Next, he searched Hu Zonghan’s body for other valuables.

Now, Hu Zonghan’s face had lost all its former dignity and resilience; he looked just like an ordinary person. Tang Mubai rummaged around and actually found a unique key hanging from his neck, as well as a box of “chocolate” hidden in his waist pocket.

The reason he judged it to be “chocolate” was because the black pellets inside the box looked so much like chocolate—round and exuding a sweet scent.

Tang Mubai, being able to control poison, wasn’t worried whether this “chocolate” was toxic. He picked one out of the ten, popped it into his mouth, chewed, and swallowed.

Less than three seconds after ingesting it, a surge of heat rose from his abdomen, generating energy that flooded his entire body.

“This is... a Vitality Pill?” Tang Mubai was speechless, quickly circulating the Golden Mist Technique to refine the energy, converting it into blood vitality, though it amounted to less than half a card.

Tang Mubai had seen Vitality Pills before. But it was the first time he’d encountered a Vitality Pill wrapped in syrup like candy.

Hu Zonghan clearly carried them for his own use. Yet, for a grown man to still eat “sweets” like this—there was simply no one else quite like him.

Theoretically, one Vitality Pill, when refined, could generate one card of blood vitality.

But in practice, the absorption loss was considerable, depending on the martial art used during refinement. With the basic Copper Gong, one could absorb at most thirty percent of the energy from a pill. With the Golden Mist Technique, forty percent could be absorbed.

The higher the grade of the martial art, the more energy could be absorbed.

But that didn’t mean the more Vitality Pills, the better. In fact, purely condensing blood vitality, Vitality Pills worked well only for amateurs and professional martial artists.

Once blood vitality exceeded one hundred cards, the effect of taking Vitality Pills dropped sharply. The human body developed resistance to pill energy.

For this reason, martial artists at the professional level and above seldom used Vitality Pills to boost their strength. Instead, they used them as healing pills, and for that, the effect was quite good.

In terms of price, a Vitality Pill cost fifty thousand Federation dollars. A healing pill, eighty thousand.

Healing pills were more expensive because they acted faster, while Vitality Pills were much slower. If speed wasn’t a concern, substituting Vitality Pills for healing pills was a decent choice—just as Hu Zonghan had done.

That guy’s earlier frenzy was clearly intentional. If Tang Mubai hadn’t possessed the Pressure Control ability, anyone else would have been beaten to death after Hu Zonghan used a Vitality Pill to restore his blood vitality!

Human skin mask, Vitality Pills, key—these were the three items Tang Mubai had retrieved from the corpse.

He carefully examined each, then stowed them away, used light-footed movement, and floated down the mountain.

At that moment, the sound of car engines starting echoed from below. Li Xingchang’s group had boarded vehicles and were fleeing at full speed.

Tang Mubai saw this and ran along the mountain, trailing behind the cars. Once the vehicles picked up speed—

Three arrows whistled through the air, each targeting a car’s tire, causing them to overturn.

Without pause—

Before Li Xingchang and his companions could get out, Tang Mubai nocked more arrows and aimed at the gas tanks.

This time, he used Explosive Arrow Technique!

So—

Three thunderous explosions erupted.

The gas tanks burst, releasing fierce flames that engulfed the vehicles.

At that moment, screams of agony echoed from within the carriages.

Tang Mubai emerged from the woods, approaching within two hundred meters of the cars.

[Life Force +79]
[Life Force +81]
[Life Force +90]
[Life Force +68]
...

A succession of recovery notifications flashed through his mind.

Yes, Tang Mubai realized that after the system upgrade, not only had the previous reminders disappeared, but the recovery range had doubled—from one hundred meters to two hundred.

As long as there was life force loss within two hundred meters of him, the system would automatically recover it!

At that moment, as the flames roared and screams persisted, the recovery notifications kept flashing.

When all the screams finally faded, Tang Mubai opened the system panel—

[Name]: Tang Mubai
[Constitution]: 20
[Strength]: 20
[Agility]: 20
[Perception]: 10 (+)
[Willpower]: 5 (+)
[Blood Vitality]: 100k (+)
[Martial Arts]: Golden Mist Technique (mastered), Tiger Roar Fist (mastered), Wave-breaking Blade (mastered), Nine Arrows Over the Mountain (mastered), Explosive Arrow Technique (mastered), Grass Steps (mastered), Wind-chasing Legs (mastered)
[Abilities]: Pressure Control (intermediate), Poison Control (beginner)
[Lifespan]: 2198 years
[Retainers]: 3
...

A lifespan accumulated to 2198 years!

Seeing this number, Tang Mubai was instantly overcome with joy.

And this didn’t even count the 250 years previously spent to enhance his perception.

One trip beyond the domain had yielded more than two thousand three hundred years of lifespan.

Remarkable!

Others ventured out for profit; Tang Mubai did so for both money and strength.

Accumulating 2198 years of lifespan, exchanged for blood vitality, meant more than a hundred cards!

...

(ps: This week is the Sanjiang promotion. The book’s collection is decent, but the recommendation votes are dismal. Dear readers, if you have a vote, please cast one, o(╥﹏╥)o)