Chapter 448 — A Mountain of Stat Points

The Time Element was hailed as the rarest attribute of all.

Even if a skill's primary attribute was not Time, so long as its secondary attribute carried a Time nature, it could easily vault into the top tier of that attribute's skills.

Take Frost Cold Qi, which freezes Time itself...

It was thanks to that very skill that the Frost Dragon could live a leisurely two thousand years as an overlord-rank being, still as fresh as a maiden.

A mere Time-element skill was already this powerful; as for a pet beast whose own attribute was Time and which possessed a Time talent—such things were far harder to find, harder than climbing to heaven.

Take this World Tournament: across more than a hundred factions and all the contestants, apart from Ginseng Baby, not a single transcend lifeform had yet appeared whose innate attribute was Time.

So for Donghuang to suddenly produce a Ginseng Baby mastering a Time-element revival skill, along with a totem-rank Time-element lifeform—how could the totem nations not be shaken?

BOOM!!!

A vast aura burst forth from the Prophetic Owl, and beside it the Gem Cat bit her handkerchief and munched on a lemon as she watched.

Back then, when she had broken through to totem rank, she had scraped together decades of savings and still faced the threat of totems, managing the breakthrough only by the skin of her teeth.

And yet this layabout had inexplicably broken through to totem rank by riding on precognition. It really left the cat sorely aggrieved.

Still, no matter—once the Nine-Colored Divine Light was in her paws, she would be a cat of an entirely different order. Let the owl have its breakthrough.

"Holy shit."

What was happening over at Capital University also left Shenyuan City rather stunned, the Frost Dragon above all.

What on earth...

How was it that Shi Jin was fighting for his life over there while someone in the spectator stands had broken through?

By all logic, shouldn't it be Shi Jin and the others who broke through after farming monsters and raking in a mountain of experience? "Totem rank!!"

As the owl's aura surged violently, countless gazes turned toward it.

Moments later, the Prophetic Owl, its aura sweeping in all directions, opened its eyes, the majesty of a totem laid bare for all to see.

"Why does it feel weaker than the aura I had after my breakthrough?"

Beside it came the Gem Cat's surprised voice.

The Prophetic Owl: ???

"Grandma here is not a combat-type pet beast!" the Prophetic Owl screeched.

As for the Prophetic Owl's totem aura being unimpressive, the totem nations showed little reaction.

Yet inwardly, they were still startled.

And that was perfectly normal.

One could say that even when a Time-element being did rarely appear, because its powers were so utterly broken, its strength in other regards would be constrained.

Take the Time Sprite: the price of wielding a divine skill like temporal teleportation was that its own strength could not be too great, lest it disrupt the laws of time and space.

Take the Prophetic Owl: it possessed a Time-element skill like precognition, but beyond that it had no other potent attacking means.

It could only rely on foresight to fight in a predictive style; annihilating a city with one grand move was all but impossible.

In recent millennia, whether among the Seven Nations or the totem nations, only one figure was widely known to have pushed the Time Element to explosive combat prowess.

The first legendary emperor of Donghuang—the Time Emperor.

His alone were the Time-element pet beasts that truly unleashed the might of the attribute.

Pioneers always faced the hardest road. As the first legendary beastmaster to found a human nation, the Time Emperor confronted hardships far beyond those of the emperors who came after him—yet he still swept across the East. In that, the contribution of the Time Element was by no means small.

As for later ages, even a mighty legend blessed with Time-element talent like the first headmaster of Capital University left behind only a thing like the Prophetic Owl.

But all that was past now.

Though the Prophetic Owl's aura had subsided, countless gazes swallowed hard once more and turned toward the ravaged trial barrier.

Most people had never imagined that this pet beast "shaped like a Ginseng Baby" actually possessed the Time Element!!!

For now, people could only call it "Ginseng Baby-shaped."

Its species could not possibly be Ginseng Baby.

Whose Ginseng Baby had a ginseng flower like a sunflower that could ignite the flames of life across its whole body?

Whose Ginseng Baby had jade-green eyes in which a Time-element hexagram pattern could appear?

Clearly, this too was a freak wearing the skin of a support-species bloodline!!

Such a species mutating and evolving a Time Element was, frankly, acceptable to everyone—after all, what did it matter if a support species got the Time Element?

What set everyone's teeth on edge, however, was that this support-species freak's burst skills were absurdly, outrageously numerous!

And on top of that, it had mastered a self-destruct skill!

A pet beast starting out at Monarch rank, yet after self-destructing, its power rivaled the self-destruction of a totem-rank life form? How was that reasonable?

"Just how on earth was that pet beast cultivated?!"

Even Ji Li, the ancient senior who had witnessed Shi Jin blow a totem to death with his own eyes, could not help but fall into a stupor once again.

She could only feel that the force of this self-destruction was even greater than the last.

Inside the trial barrier, Shi Jin and the others were quite satisfied with the power of this self-destruction.

They simply felt that the skill points had not been wasted.

A Seed of Life at near-perfect proficiency, Plant Control at near-masterful proficiency... this was the fundamental reason the Ginseng Baby's self-destruction could rival that of a totem-rank life form!

In that instant, the Ginseng Baby had completely remodeled itself into the ultimate forbidden weapon.

Whooosh, whoosh, whoosh...

Beneath the tide of energy, Shi Jin's Ginseng Baby stood amid a heap of enormous corpses.

In the sky floated a vast expanse of life essence.

All of it had been condensed from the Starry Void Insects after the Eternal Divine Tree's modification.

"This is a problem."

And now, faced with so much nourishment, Shi Jin wore a troubled expression.

This sky-full of life essence—its energy could truly be called immense.

But absorbing it was a problem, and not absorbing it was a problem too.

If it absorbed all this, given the Ginseng Baby's current state, it would definitely break through to Overlord rank, just as it had when absorbing legendary resources.

Even Overlord rank might not be able to hold it.

There were, after all, five totem-rank Starry Void Insects' worth of life essence condensed here. Absorbing their life essence, the Ginseng Baby leaping straight into totem rank—one could say there was a very high probability of that too.

When that happened, Shi Jin would definitely explode.

If only he had known, he would have brought his senior schoolmate in as well.

That way, with her to share some of the burden, strengthening her Monarch-rank Imperial Concubine Flower to the level of an invincible Overlord should not be much of a problem.

"Wait—maybe I can pack it up and take it with me."

Shi Jin gazed at the sky-full of experience and fell into thought.

"Eternal Divine Tree, sir," Shi Jin said, looking through the broken barrier toward the Eternal Divine Tree. "May I ask—could I refrain from absorbing these for now, and pack them up to take with me?"

The Eternal Divine Tree was utterly silent.

It was rather like asking, at an all-you-can-eat buffet, whether one could take leftovers home.

Have some decency, would you.

The Boar God, Xuanming, the Demon King Dragon, and the others were all utterly silent.

Damn it, just what was the matter with this brat?