[Dragon Iron Block]
An alloy block formed within the stomach of an Ore Dragon over decades of acid corrosion from its diet of Iron Earthworms. Possessing extremely high hardness and adaptability, it is an exquisite forging material, but ordinary fire cannot melt it down.
Having recovered his mana, Zoe began to use his [Lesser Appraisal Eye] talent to inspect the items on his person.
“It really is good stuff.”
Looking at the appraisal results, Zoe was highly satisfied.
Next, he appraised another treasure in his possession, the crossguard that he had also obtained from that Ore Dragon.
[Furnace Crossguard (Fragment)]
B-grade. Infused with the power of furnace fire, it can comprehensively strengthen any blade fitted with this crossguard. If the blade itself contains magical effects, those magical effects will also be enhanced.
The appraisal result left Zoe quite surprised.
It appeared that the upper limit of the weapon this crossguard could strengthen was incredibly high, extending far beyond mere sharpness and hardness.
It could even amplify the inherent magical effects of the blade itself.
This effect was somewhat absurd.
What was more, this crossguard was only a fragment.
Zoe used a tentacle to lift the red crossguard, flipping it over to the other side, which was engraved with an exquisite acanthus pattern.
In the center of the pattern was a circular groove. It looked as though some gemstone had once been embedded there, but it had long since vanished.
“The origins of this crossguard might be even more extraordinary than I imagined.”
“How did it even end up embedded in an Ore Dragon in the first place?”
Unfortunately, his D-grade talent, [Lesser Appraisal Eye], could only identify the basic effects and could not provide a more detailed analysis.
After staring at the groove for a moment, Zoe had an idea and retrieved a pendant.
The pendant was crafted from gold and silver, embedded with a high-quality, grass-green gemstone.
This was the reward he had received from a guard captain in Hera City in his past life.
“Hmm, the sizes don't match. Well, it makes sense. How could there be such a convenient coincidence?”
Zoe decided to run an appraisal on the pendant as well.
[Emerald Pendant]
It seems to harbor a special secret.
“Huh?”
Zoe tried to look closely inside the emerald. With the visual enhancement from [Lesser Appraisal Eye], he could faintly discern a rune at the bottom of the pendant, refracted through the gemstone.
“Bathed in pure darkness...”
Zoe's enhanced vision could barely make out this part of the rune, but no matter how hard he tried, the finer, more obscure second half deeper within the emerald remained completely unreadable.
The literal meaning of the first half seemed to involve submerging it in pure, pitch-black water.
“Forget it, I'll hold onto it for now.”
Zoe did not dwell on it for long and placed the pendant back into his Reincarnation Space.
In any case, he possessed Infinite Reincarnation. He could leave it for his future self to figure out.
By the time his mana recovered, the gloomy environment of the dead forest had completely darkened.
Evidently, night had fallen.
Rather than taking a break, Zoe took control of his body and resumed hunting and fighting.
The night, after all, was the domain of the Dual Shadow.
However, in this Death Swamp, the dark was not Zoe's home field alone.
While the Death Swamp was quiet during the gloomy daylight, it grew lively at night.
As usual, Zoe split off a clone to act as bait ahead, while his main body hid in the darkness, waiting for the perfect moment to strike.
A pitiful Lv. 8 double-toothed crocodile took the bait and was easily lured out by Zoe, ending up as a new addition to the food reserves in his Shadow Pool.
Once his mana recovered, Zoe transformed his clone into a double-toothed crocodile and continued to lure enemies ahead.
He noticed that once he digested a monster, he gained a better understanding of its structure, which made his transformations look far more realistic.
Hunting with such high intensity through the night, whenever Zoe's mana dropped past half, he would hunker down with [Stealth]. Once his mana recovered, he would immediately resume the hunt.
By the time the night was over, his level had surged to Lv. 13.
His Shadow Pool was now packed to the brim with the corpses of various monsters.
“This leveling speed is insane!”
Though he had experienced rocket-like leveling speed from a night of high-intensity hunting, Zoe's mind was now thoroughly exhausted.
Using [Parallel Mind] to manage three threads of thought over a long period was indeed taking a heavy toll on his mind.
He needed to find a place to rest.
“...Do I actually need to rest right now?”
Zoe suddenly realized that he might be able to rest in a different way.
A day had twenty-four hours, which could be split into three eight-hour blocks.
Right now, he could barely split his consciousness into three threads to handle three tasks simultaneously.
Could he have these three minds take shifts on watch?
The Death Swamp was nothing like the Great Hera Forest; it was far more dangerous.
Furthermore, with no companions to keep watch, and since the monsters here didn't trust each other, to be honest, Zoe was a bit afraid to close his eyes.
What if he maintained [Parallel Mind] twenty-four hours a day, splitting his thoughts into three threads and rotating their rest?
In the first eight hours, Mind 1 would sleep, while Mind 2 and Mind 3 focused on hunting and training.
In the next eight hours, Mind 2 would rest, while the now-refreshed Mind 1 and Mind 3 hunted and trained.
In the final eight hours, Mind 3 would rest, while Mind 1 and the awakened Mind 2 continued hunting and training.
This way, Zoe could rotate his rest across his split consciousness, achieving twenty-four hours of non-stop hunting and training.
At dawn, Zoe's fatigue vanished instantly, replaced entirely by the sheer excitement of discovering a new application for his skill.
Without any hesitation, he began to experiment.
Activating his C-grade talent [Unearther], Zoe began to draw out the full potential of [Parallel Mind] to unlock its deeper applications.
Yet, even with the boost from [Unearther] to squeeze out every drop of his potential, the process remained incredibly difficult.
[Parallel Mind] allowed multi-threaded processing, but the moment one of his minds tried to sleep, that thread would simply vanish.
To maintain a mental thread while forcing it to sleep was like trying to fall asleep while keeping oneself absolutely awake; it seemed completely impossible.
Consequently, Zoe had to focus even more mental energy on the thread he wanted to put to sleep.
This immediately caused his main body to glitch out and start running around foolishly.
The digestion thread only required the physical act of eating, and since his shadow-composed body couldn't choke, it didn't run into any major issues.
“It's incredibly hard, but it should be possible.”
“How exactly do I get a single thread of my mind to sleep...”
Zoe decided to use other skills to assist him in experimenting with the ability to sleep.
He split off a clone and ordered it to sleep.
However, the clone's consciousness was linked directly with his main body. Though they could handle two tasks simultaneously, the clone could not sleep independently.
Due to this shared connection, the clone could only sleep when the main body slept.
Zoe had to rely solely on the enhancement of his [Unearther] talent to painstakingly force a single thread of his mind to sleep, little by little.
Time slowly slipped by as he adapted.
Although all three threads of his mind were thoroughly exhausted by his constant prodding, the proficiency of [Parallel Mind] was also rising rapidly.
Three days quickly passed while Zoe engaged in this battle with himself.
[Skill Parallel Mind Lv. 1 (D-grade) proficiency +1. Parallel Mind Lv. 1 (D-grade) proficiency is now maxed. Upgraded to Parallel Mind Lv. 2 (D-grade).]
[Skill Parallel Mind Lv. 2 (D-grade) has affected your body. Intelligence +1.]
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