Who said this card is outrageous?

As he spoke, a purple light shone beside him, and Ahri's figure emerged from the light.

She didn't say anything, just glanced at Zhang Che, then bent down and picked up Gatomon from the coffee table, leaving the living room to him.

"Sigh—" Zhang Che lay back on the sofa, staring blankly at the ceiling above him, and finally couldn't help but sigh, "I was thinking of going to Binhai University to register today..."

"What a turbulent time!"

Regardless of the situation on the city guard side, the appearance of the metal plaque is enough to prove that Binhai City has now become the target of infiltration by a certain force.

Now Zhang Che can only hope that those people haven't managed to infiltrate or bribe the city guard's higher-ups, otherwise things will be in trouble. If the people at the top run into trouble, no matter how much the people below struggle, it will all be in vain.

Of course, the worst-case scenario is that those metal signs are official products, and if that's the case, he'll have to consider moving.

However, the war with the fish-men is still ongoing, and who knows when it will end. Therefore, Zhang Che himself is relatively safe, at least until the war is truly over, those forces hidden beneath the surface dare not cause any trouble.

Thinking of this, Zhang Che slapped his forehead, having already made up his mind.

Ultimately, in a world where power resides within oneself, the only answer to all problems is to continuously become stronger.

If he were a high-level transcendent being, even at the lowest level of the seventh rank, he wouldn't need to worry about these trivial matters.

Of course, for Zhang Che now, the level of advanced transcendent is still too far away. The most important thing right now is to hone his spiritual power to the limit of the third rank as soon as possible, and then start to advance to the level of intermediate transcendent.

Thanks to his spying on that mysterious BOSS, his mental strength was directly upgraded from the initial stage of the second tier to the middle stage of the third tier, saving him a lot of effort.

Now, several months have passed, and although his mental strength has improved considerably, it is still some distance from the level required for advancement.

Even if he keeps making cards every day, it would still take at least two or three months to raise the numbers.

Even so, there is still a huge hurdle for him to overcome before he can truly advance to the intermediate level of extraordinary.

Binhai City has several thousand extraordinary individuals, with several hundred reaching the third rank. However, even including outsiders like the old man, there are only thirteen mid-level extraordinary individuals in total, which shows how ridiculously difficult it is for people to pass through this gate.

Zhang Che never thought he had any special talent, after all, he was the one who had spent more than ten years barely passing the first-tier card maker assessment.

The only difference now is that he has awakened his innate wisdom, gained decades of life experience, and acquired a fusion ability that can be considered a cheat code.

Moreover, the latter is more of an embellishment; to truly make a difference, one must have a solid foundation.

Fortunately, they had Ahri as a trump card, otherwise Zhang Che would have really had to take Uncle Wang to seek refuge with his daughter.

……

For Zhang Che, the best option to improve his strength right now is definitely to use his fusion ability to see if he can create a few more useful new cards.

The purple card is definitely the best, but he can only say that he has figured out the theoretical aspects now. When it comes to the practical aspects, there is still a long way to go.

Theory is theory, and practice is practice; the gap between the two can sometimes be enormous.

So over the next few days, Zhang Che began to try making purple cards by hand.

Of course, he would start from level one. Taking too big a step could easily lead to trouble, and he understood that principle.

He currently has two purple card recipes, one Tier 1 and one Tier 2. According to the old man, these are "benefits" given by the official team. Any card maker qualified to learn purple card making techniques can obtain them for free, just like the public version cards that were previously included with the card making manual.

However, the recipe for the Purple Card is strictly managed and absolutely cannot be taught to unqualified people. If discovered, the person will be severely punished.

When the old man gave Zhang Che these instructions, his expression was very serious. Obviously, the authorities or the Adventurers' Guild must have a corresponding and effective procedure in place, and Zhang Che certainly wouldn't dare to take the risk.

Purple cards are extremely difficult to craft, and the consequences of failure are not as simple as just destroying materials as with ordinary cards.

Mental backlash, material explosions, rune collapses... Zhang Che had read about every case in Mo Yuncheng's notes, and each one sent chills down his spine.

This can be considered the price to pay for gaining great power.

Therefore, during the production process, Zhang Che would take various protective measures in advance, just in case.

After failing seven or eight times, he finally succeeded in making his first finished purple card.

Card Name: Electrostatic Field (Thunder)

Type: Skill Card

Level: Tier 1

Grade: Purple

Effect: Upon activation, it generates an electrostatic field with a radius of five meters centered on itself.

Uniqueness: Chain Collapse

Since it's only a Tier 1 card, [Static Field] itself doesn't deal much damage; it's mainly used for support.

The continuous lightning damage disrupts the enemy, causing them to be briefly paralyzed, reducing their movement speed and attack frequency.

Its effects are particularly noticeable when used in narrow terrain or during chaotic battles.

As for the uniqueness of the name "Chain Collapse", its effect is somewhat dependent on luck: when an enemy target within the force field uses supernatural abilities, there is a low probability of triggering a static backlash, causing a stronger paralysis effect.

If the backlash is triggered three times in a short period of time, the fourth time will detonate the target directly, causing extremely high damage close to the level of a mid-level transcendent being.

According to the explanation accompanying the card recipe, the probability of triggering static backlash each time is approximately 20%.

This means that to trigger the final, extremely high damage, one needs to be "lucky" enough to encounter that 16 in 10,000 chance.

Chapter 95 The Fishman King Appears

Back then, no one knew which card maker had come up with this unique feature, or how pale one's face had to be to trigger it even once.

As expected, anything that allows someone to get something for free is definitely not a good thing.

What? So this was Master Lu Ming's early practice piece?

That's alright then...

Of course, the cost of successfully creating an electrostatic field is also enormous.

To obtain this purple card, Zhang Che had basically used up all the lightning-type materials he had. The remaining scraps were not enough to make more cards, so he had no choice but to change his approach.

As for that second-tier purple card, he definitely wouldn't dare to try it now. He'd already failed so many times with the first-tier [Static Field], the second-tier one would only be more of a disaster.

Instead of wasting your energy and materials here, you might as well try fusing blue cards to create purple cards.

Several more days passed, and Zhang Che prepared a sufficient number of blue cards to begin the fusion process.

The results were somewhat better than before; the probability of fusing purple cards was indeed much higher. However, the finished products were still all on the verge of being damaged, with fine cracks covering the card surface.

The only good news is that some of them seem to still be usable once or twice, unlike the other cards which crumbled into dust shortly after being fused.

But this is fine too; consider it as having a few extra disposable cards up your sleeve.

As long as he could see significant progress, Zhang Che felt it was worthwhile—the cards he made this time could only be used once or twice, but in the future he could make cards that could be used three or four times, or even complete versions of good cards.

You have to take things one step at a time; you can't expect to get fat in one bite.

……

After more than half a month of seclusion, Zhang Che felt like he was going to rot.

So, taking advantage of the break while he was out replenishing materials, he decided to stretch his muscles and bones.

He had walked the road to the Wangguo Fuka store countless times; he could walk it with his eyes closed and never get lost.

Although the battle with the murlocs was raging outside, the city was not greatly affected. The shops on both sides of the street remained open, and everything seemed to be the same as usual.

People still have to live their lives.

However, just as he turned a corner, a series of cell phone notification sounds suddenly rang out around him—this was an emergency alert indicating a serious situation, a standard feature that comes with cell phones.

Immediately afterwards, pedestrians on the street, including Zhang Che, took out their phones, looked down at their screens, and their expressions changed from calm to surprise, and from surprise to excitement.

Holy crap!

"We've found the King of the Merfolk!"

"The city guards have even fought against it!"

Exclamations of surprise came from all directions, one after another, like a pot of boiling water.

At this moment, Zhang Che was also staring intently at the overwhelming news feed on the screen:

[Major breakthrough achieved in the extermination operation; the whereabouts of the Fishman King revealed!]

He clicked on one of the messages and read it carefully.

It is said to be the result of the city guards. Under the leadership of a mid-level extraordinary captain, they went deep into the sea to carry out a reconnaissance mission and unexpectedly discovered the traces of the Fishman King, and even fought with it.

However, the ocean is their home ground, and even with specialized underwater breathing agents and auxiliary equipment, humans cannot unleash their full fighting power in the sea.

The vanguard squad fought and retreated, and several times they were almost overtaken by the Murloc King's forces. If the reinforcements hadn't arrived in time, they might have been defeated by the Murloc King.

Although the Murloc King was not killed in this encounter, it was not without its gains—the fact that even a mid-level transcendent team could not be defeated in a short time indicates that this generation's Murloc King has not yet advanced to the fifth tier.

According to records from eighty years ago, the rate at which the Fishman King ascends is strongly correlated with the size of the Fishman population, proving that the targeted cleanup operation against the Fishmen implemented by Binhai City was a very correct decision.

This slowed down the growth of the Fishman King, buying precious time for Binhai City.

Following this news was a declaration issued by the city hall: the commander of the city guard and the president of the adventurers' guild had begun to assemble an elite force to venture deep into the sea and completely annihilate the fishman king.

The fact that two fifth-tier transcendents attacked together is enough to demonstrate their determination to fight this time!

Many even speculated that if it weren't for the fear of their home being raided, the last fifth-tier superhuman in the city, the president of Binhai University, would probably have participated in this decapitation operation.

Of course, some people speculate that this might be the Fishman King deliberately showing himself to lure powerful human warriors deeper into the territory, and then wiping them out in one fell swoop.

But everyone knew that at this point, the decision-makers couldn't remain indifferent. The threat of the Fishman King was undeniable, and even if it was a den of dragons and tigers, they had to venture in.

This is no longer a question of "whether to fight or not," but a question of "must fight"!

Zhang Che leaned against the railing by the street, watching the news scrolling on his phone screen. He could already imagine the storm that was about to hit Binhai City.

If the decapitation is successful, everything will be fine, and then all he has to do is wait to sneak into the victory celebration banquet.

But what if the decapitation attempt fails...?

Zhang Che didn't think any further.

Since the King of the Fishmen dared to stage such a grand spectacle, it meant that he was confident he had some means to capture those two fifth-tier powerhouses, or at least one of them.

Regardless of which of the above outcomes occurs, it will have irreversible consequences for Binhai City!

Zhang Che quickly suppressed this thought for the time being—it was too early to think about these things now. The news had just come out, the operation had not yet begun, and no one knew what the outcome would be.

Moreover, even if it is the worst possible outcome, Binhai City is not without external support; the Federation is their strongest backing!

Instead of worrying unnecessarily, let's focus on doing our current tasks well and wait for confirmation before making any further decisions.