"Tch, trash!"
Jiang Xiaofeng cursed as he stepped on the battered Ruin Hunter.
He had thought this thing would be a little more interesting, that it would last a little longer.
That was why he had not even activated Tornadic Aura when he charged in.
Who knew its reactions would be so pathetically slow? When he swung a fist at its arm, it did not even try to dodge. Instead, it was bent on extending the blade inside its arm.
Why the hell were you so hung up on that damn thing I could smash with one punch?!
What about your flight?
Your missiles?
Use them, you piece of shit!
Jiang Xiaofeng tossed aside the mask from a Hilichurl he had casually beaten to death and looked at the thing.
Wasn't it supposed to be one of Khaenri'ah's core creations, born for slaughter?
With such slow attacks, was it meant for slaughtering pigs?
Jiang Xiaofeng had sparred with the Ruin Hunter for ages, but the thing showed no intention of flying.
Gradually losing patience, Jiang Xiaofeng took the War Spear from his backpack and hurled it at its eye.
Then... the Ruin Hunter stopped moving.
Feeling insulted, Jiang Xiaofeng dismantled it.
But what angered Jiang Xiaofeng most was that this Ruin Hunter did not provide any cells!
Did the system actually classify Ruin Hunters as nonliving things and refuse to produce cells?
Damn it!
Jiang Xiaofeng activated Wings of the Crow and flew straight east.
Aside from the few hundred Mora in the chest he had kicked open and the handful of cells kindly provided by the Hilichurls, he had gained nothing from this fight.
Seventy-two cells. I should be close.
Jiang Xiaofeng thought to himself.
On the way to Liyue Harbor, I should be able to save up enough... a hundred cells, I think it was...
To travel efficiently, Jiang Xiaofeng mostly sought out level ground.
As a result, most of the monsters he encountered were low-level ones like Hilichurls and Slimes.
Jiang Xiaofeng had no intention of searching everywhere for monsters, either.
Even a mosquito was still meat, however small. His current destination was Liyue Harbor.
As for the Fatui, it was not as though Jiang Xiaofeng had never encountered them.
He simply did not want to kill them, so he only put up a token fight, robbed them of a few things, and left.
Yes, the Fatui advance troops' elemental shields were actually just a layer of elemental protection on the surface. Jiang Xiaofeng could break through them with one punch.
So...
Thanks to our generous Fatui sponsors for the big hammers and firearms. May you stop breathing, and may your corpses stay healthy.
As for Cicin Mages and Debt Agents... Jiang Xiaofeng really had not encountered any.
Otherwise, he definitely would have stolen their weapons to take a look.
Traveling in fits and starts, discussing the art of fighting with the Fatui or having some heart-to-heart exchanges with Hilichurls, Jiang Xiaofeng reached the vicinity of Mt. Tianheng.
Tsk, tsk, tsk. The surface really is livelier than underground.
There were far more monsters he could kill for cells than in the underground mines.
Jiang Xiaofeng stopped here not because some monster had stumped him, but because the system had announced that it had awakened.
"Cells collected. System awakening complete." "Searching for host requirements." "Distributing rewards." "Congratulations, host. System has reached level three. System upgraded." "Congratulations, host. Acquired: 'Spider Rune,' 'Ram Rune,' 'Homunculus Rune.'"
"Oh? Those three runes? Not bad, system."
"Congratulations, host. Acquired: 'Blood Sword,' 'Skill: Knife Dance,' 'Mutation: Open Wounds.'" "System entering dormancy. Please kill enough monsters and obtain cells to reactivate the system..."
"Pretty good rewards."
Jiang Xiaofeng took this batch of rewards out of the system.
"Hmm..."
The mutation automatically merged into his body as soon as he took it out. Jiang Xiaofeng roughly assessed how it felt, then paid it no further attention and turned to examine the other two things.
Blood Sword and Knife Dance, two big names in bleeding.
Was this system reward a bleeding gift pack?
Sigh, other people's systems at least had an AI to explain things. With mine, I could only collect cells step by step, just like in the game.
Of course, it was no big deal.
Jiang Xiaofeng did not particularly like systems that could talk to their hosts.
As things stood, he was happy to enjoy the peace and quiet.
Still, that was not the main issue right now.
Jiang Xiaofeng currently had three skills, but normally, the Beheaded could only carry two skills at a time.
Moreover, although he was no longer in the game and had no skill-slot or skill-cooldown restrictions, that also meant Jiang Xiaofeng could no longer activate skills by pressing a button. He had to unleash them through his own abilities.
Both Tornadic Aura and Wings of the Crow required considerable bodily control, but for some unknown reason, Jiang Xiaofeng could use both skills with ease.
Knife Dance, however, required actual technique from Jiang Xiaofeng to execute. It was not as simple as mechanically flinging a ring of throwing knives in every direction.
Yes, sacrificing convenient, rapid skill activation in exchange for no longer being restricted to two skill slots felt like a massive win to Jiang Xiaofeng.
And... despite being a skill, Knife Dance had the rare advantage of being usable as a ranged weapon.
What? You're asking about how I used Tornadic Aura at the beginning?
That was just an emergency measure. I still haven't retrieved the fragments I threw out to scare people...
The knives from Knife Dance, on the other hand, would fly back on their own a short while after being thrown.
Very convenient.
As for the Blood Sword... it simply made wounds difficult to heal, causing bleeding. Straightforward and easy to understand.
So what he ought to do now was practice using Knife Dance.
And so... quite a few animals also suffered on Jiang Xiaofeng's journey to Liyue...
In truth, practicing how to use the throwing knives was not particularly difficult for Jiang Xiaofeng.
The difficult part was actually unleashing Knife Dance unexpectedly in the middle of an attack for a surprise strike.
Fortunately, Jiang Xiaofeng remembered that most skills in Dead Cells could attack independently once deployed. Only a few required him to attack actively.
That naturally made things easier for Jiang Xiaofeng.
So, after successfully trying to launch all twelve knives of Knife Dance in one go, Jiang Xiaofeng put away his other weapons, leaving only Knife Dance.
Speaking of which... why weren't there any proper throwing knives among the rewards?
Then I could have a few more throwing knives.
Jiang Xiaofeng thought to himself.
Jiang Xiaofeng followed the trail onward and finally arrived two days later at the hilltop above the two stone statues west of Liyue Harbor.
The closer he got to Liyue Harbor, the fewer monsters there were. Animals, on the other hand, became considerably more numerous.
Jiang Xiaofeng flung a throwing knife, shooting down one of the pigeons ahead. A cell popped out at the same time.
"Even a mosquito is still meat, however small, but I shouldn't take it too far..."
Watching the cell automatically fly into his body, Jiang Xiaofeng suddenly had a question.
"Can I touch the cells?"