Reinforcement Success! New Form!

He was none other than the man in the baseball cap who had been in the crowd outside the Secret Realm, reporting Lin Xia's movements via his Bluetooth headset.

As the treatment progressed, the man gradually regained consciousness.

Seeing this, the bald woman with a scar on her face standing to the side immediately asked, "What happened? Who beat you up like this?"

"The person who attacked me was a student from Imperial University, wearing a samurai topknot, nearly two meters tall..."

The man coughed a few times and continued, "I followed your orders to track Lin Xia, but as soon as I reached the bottom of his dormitory building, the brat came out, dragged me into an alley, and beat me to a pulp. He said he'd known I was tailing him for a long time..."

"And what did you tell him?"

The bald woman's expression turned sour; she felt not a shred of pity for the man's injuries.

She shoved the healer aside, interrupted the treatment, and walked over to jab viciously at his unhealed wounds. "Did you betray me?!"

"N-no!" The man shrieked in pain, begging frantically, "I didn't say anything! I stuck to my story that I just happened to be passing by..."

"Is that so?"

The bald woman sneered, her face full of suspicion, and ordered the person beside her, "Burn him."

Hearing this, the burly man who received the order immediately hoisted the man up and headed toward the incinerator.

The man was terrified, sobbing as he begged for mercy.

But no one cared.

"Strange, we have already carried out the plan of the Lord of Slaughter..."

The bald woman frowned. "But why does the Lord of Slaughter, who was reborn by possessing Lin Xia, act as if he doesn't know us?"

"Have we been used... and then discarded?"

One person asked uneasily.

"No, that's impossible. We are so loyal..."

The bald woman only finished half her sentence before trailing off. Judging by the anxious expression on her face, she didn't seem to have much confidence either.

Early the next morning, while his roommates were still fast asleep, Lin Xia arrived at the city center.

In his original world, the center of a city was usually a place packed with commercial high-rises, entertainment venues, and dense crowds of people.

But in this world, cities were built around Reinforcement Pillars.

Because the Reinforcement Pillars emitted radiation lethal to mortals, the city center was not only sparsely populated but also extremely primitive in its environment.

Aside from a few tents around the Reinforcement Pillar, there were no man-made structures to be seen at all.

After all, except for Awakeners coming to reinforce their cards, no one would ever want to hang out here.

Furthermore, since Awakeners who chose to reinforce their cards were already a minority, including Lin Xia, there were only thirteen people present on the field, which was the size of two soccer pitches.

"Damn it, the success rate is so high today, I failed four times in a row trying to go from +2 to +3... I'm right back to where I started!"

A young man with short hair stood there in frustration, watching his card inside the Reinforcement Pillar turn gray and dissipate; he was on the verge of tears.

"Sigh, I'm done. I'm never touching the Reinforcement Pillar again!"

Another man, who seemed to be the youth's friend, patted him on the shoulder. "At least our main cards are just bottom-tier trash; otherwise, I'd really want to kill myself today. Can you believe it? 1 to 2, a 99% success rate, and it still blew up on me!?"

"To put it another way, the fact that you managed to hit that 1% failure rate—isn't that a kind of 'jackpot' in its own right?"

As soon as the short-haired youth heard that someone had even worse luck than him, his mood improved significantly.

But when his companion invited him to leave, he shook his head and refused. "I want to see how many times in a row it can fail. If someone actually succeeds, I'll be green with envy, but if everyone keeps failing... hehe, then I'll feel a lot better!"

Hearing this, his companion agreed. "Speaking of which, what's wrong with this Reinforcement Pillar today? Counting the main cards of the poor souls before us, that's 16 failures in a row... tsk tsk, if I didn't know better, I'd think they were just burning fodder cards!"

"..."

Lin Xia heard their conversation and frowned. He didn't believe that a 1 to 2 upgrade could fail...

But these two were complete strangers to him; they had no reason to lie.

Lin Xia looked up at the [?] floating above the Reinforcement Pillar.

He was debating whether to use his Eye of Insight.

One had to remember, his main card was an SSR-grade card with a value of 89.

If it were to be destroyed, it wouldn't be a minor setback like these people were experiencing; it would be a total collapse!

It's always better to be cautious. After all, my Eye of Insight charges have accumulated to 2/uses. If it really is a streak of failures... I must not lose the big picture for the sake of a small gain!

After thinking this through, Lin Xia looked at the Reinforcement Pillar with a determined gaze.

[Do you wish to use Eye of Insight to view the next success node for this Reinforcement Pillar?]

[Yes/No]

[Current charges: 2.]

"Yes."

As the thought crossed Lin Xia's mind, the golden question mark instantly burst apart and gradually condensed into the number [1].

This indicated that the next reinforcement would definitely succeed.

Although this meant that Lin Xia had indeed wasted one opportunity.

Yet he felt no regret; after all, caution is the parent of safety.

The next moment, Lin Xia arrived before the Reinforcement Pillar and took out the Buu card.

Upon seeing the SSR card, the short-haired youth and his companion instinctively gaped in shock.

"You really can't judge a book by its cover. To have such a high-grade card at such a young age... it would be amusing if it blew up."

"Indeed, I also hope it explodes!"

The two whispered to each other.

At the same time, five material cards began to orbit the main card.

Lin Xia initiated the reinforcement process.

The next second, the faint light within the patterns of the Reinforcement Pillar began to brighten gradually.

The five material cards, which had been relatively still, began to rotate rapidly around the main card.

Soon, the material cards dissolved into particles and surged into the main card.

At this moment, a blinding golden light enveloped the main card.

"BOOM--!"

The golden light burst outward.

The main card was revealed.

Not only that, but a streak of light swept across the face of the main card from bottom to top.

[Reinforcement Successful!]
[Card upgraded to +2!]
[OVR +2!]
[Current OVR: 91!]
[Form evolved into Thin Buu (Evil)!]

Lin Xia saw that the originally simple-minded Fat Buu had vanished from the card.

Replacing him was a gaunt, gray Buu draped in a blue cape.

Furthermore, the expression on Thin Buu seemed to be written with the word [Evil], making it clear to anyone at a glance just how dangerous this guy was.

However, each successful reinforcement only grants either a form evolution or a new skill.

Therefore, Lin Xia did not find any new abilities gained by Buu.

With that, he retrieved the card and intended to leave the area.

Since school was suspended today, Lin Xia planned to head to a Secret Realm in the wild to level up and, incidentally, test the strength of his +2 Thin Buu.

But just then, the sudden appearance of two people made Lin Xia stop in his tracks, his expression turning grave.