The Era of Gods

Just as Lin Xiao’s school only handed out a few cards at the end of every academic year, which were far from enough to go around, only the most outstanding few students had the chance to snatch them up.

Although the descendants of True Gods didn’t necessarily lack Divinity, possessing Divinity didn’t mean it could be integrated randomly.

It’s known that Divinity not condensed through one’s own Power of Faith is impure. Moreover, Divinity doesn’t appear out of nowhere; it accumulates through the condensation of the Power of Faith provided by the followers of other Demigods or True Gods. Naturally, it contains a plethora of the spirits of different believers, as well as the condenser’s own spiritual Branding.

To fully integrate it into oneself, one had to spend time completely refining the spiritual Branding within. Otherwise, influenced by the different spirits within the Divinity, at best it could affect one’s personality, at worst it could limit one’s potential.

Lin Xiao had previously integrated the Divinity of a Snake People Demigod because he used the Creation Magic Cube to directly extract pure Divinity, thus bypassing this step.

Other True God descendants who acquired additional Divinity could only refine it slowly; there was no quickening this process.

Anyone aspiring to go further wouldn’t integrate a large amount of Divinity at once, as it could affect themselves.

Upon leaving the Divine Realm, Lin Xiao immediately received a brief message from his mentor:

The challenge is over, you may move freely, but do not leave the fortress. Must be assembled by the morning of the third day.”

This hardly imposed any restrictions, but he had nowhere else to go. He simply sent a message to Lin Xu, and without waiting for a response, he ordered a meal and applied to receive his reward.

He must be one of the earliest students to finish the elimination task for his team. Having completed the mission, he was naturally entitled to claim his reward.

After a little while, the meal he ordered arrived, and he browsed the trading platform while eating.

Speaking of which, Lin Xiao found that even Ancient Grade Cards were available on the trading platform, but Divinity Cards and Divine Realm Cards were rarely seen. If they ever appeared, they were snapped up instantly. Such cards were in extremely high demand and short supply.

The reward of five Mythical Quality Five Star Cards for completing the task allowed him to choose any species, but this did not include Divinity Cards or Divine Realm Cards.

Just as he thought of this, he received a message. He opened the holographic screen which popped up showing exactly the reward he had applied for, prompting him to choose the type of card for the reward.

He put down his chopsticks and pondered for a moment before selecting a Goblin Species Card as the first.

A Goblin Card of Mythical Quality represented three thousand Goblins, split evenly between males and females.

The primary reason for choosing this race, which wasn’t even considered fit for cannon fodder, was to prepare for the third race in the Divine Realm.

At present, both the Fishmen and the Supreme Naga in the Divine Realm were considered combat races, but a well-rounded Divine Realm could not only consist of combat races. It had to have one or two Advanced Races. The Goblins were the Advanced Race he had chosen.

Strictly speaking, Lin Xiao was already eligible to pick an Intermediate race at this time, but he chose the Goblins for two reasons.

The first reason was that Advanced Races didn’t need to be too powerful; it was sufficient if they were prolific breeders. Goblins met this standard well. They could eat anything, including grass roots, tree leaves, and even rotten flesh, making them remarkably easy to maintain.

The second reason was that he possessed a talent called the Afterglow of the Goblins, which was an incredibly powerful trait. He wanted to try and see if he could use this talent to restore the glory of the Ancient Goblin Empire.

Well, that likelihood was not great.

The splendor of the Ancient Goblins was due to their creation of artificial deities, which is something no True God would permit, even Lin Xiao himself.

If they were capable of creating deities, could you expect them to keep their faith and worship you?

Chances are, the first thing they would do would be to overthrow him as a false deity.

It’s like the Humans of the Main World who can extensively Open the Divine Realm and create deities—the common people of the Main World don’t worship deities, hence Divine Territory Players can only Plunder from Different Domains, converting Other Races into Divine Domain species to provide faith.

Unless Lin Xiao became the legendary Supreme God, the King of All Gods, the God Above Gods—only then might he be able to control these artificial deities.

But that would be too troublesome, and once he truly became a Supreme God or a God Above Gods, he wouldn’t care about these matters anymore.

Therefore, it was essential to limit their growth ceiling from the very beginning.

Or to put it another way, not to lift the curse of the gods within the Goblin Bloodline. As long as the curse remained, no matter how much the Goblins developed, they could never return to their ancient glory.

After all, he only needed an Advanced Race specialized in forging weapons and engineering machinery for the main combat species of the Divine Realm. That was sufficient—he didn’t need them to aspire to anything else.

For the reward of five Mythical Quality Five Star Cards from the task of resisting the Blood Legion, besides the Goblin Card, he chose two very suitable Talent Cards and two Specialty Cards.

The two Talent Cards—Higher Level of Enlightenment and High-level Enlightenment.

The two Specialty Cards—Spiritual Power Genius and Clever Heart and Skillful Hands.

Enlightenment and High-level Enlightenment were used to develop intelligence; the enhanced Mythical Quality versions were particularly significant. The current Goblins were very ignorant, and without Enlightenment and High-level Enlightenment, they were basically useless. These were two essential cards.

The Spiritual Power Genius was for tapping into their spiritual power, a talent necessary for creating Magical Equipment. Without spiritual power, it would be impossible to fashion Magic Items.

Clever Heart and Skillful Hands, as the name implies, suggests a more active mind and more dexterous hands and feet.

With those two talents and two specialties, a new species brimming with potential took form in Lin Xiao’s imagination.

Having secured the items, Lin Xiao didn’t use them immediately but stored them away for now.

He remembered his mentor mentioning that any student who remained after the team elimination rounds would receive two Mythical Quality Five Star Cards. Although he was almost certain to stay, the other students hadn’t finished their trials yet, and he couldn’t claim those two cards at this time.

Moreover, he didn’t have extra Card slots available, so…

He had to wait.

The organizers of the summer camp are indeed rolling in wealth—mythical quality cards are really counted by numbers, and this time the trial has already earned me a total of seven five-star mythical quality cards, which is unimaginable at Dongning No. 5 Middle School.

Of course, this isn’t to say that such cards are so common they’re worthless; they’re still quite valuable.

It’s just that the summer camp sponsors come from over a hundred high-level colleges in the HuaXia District, and with military support, these resources are available.

Even the rarest resources aren’t considered rare at a higher level.

When I return to Dongning No. 5 Middle School, when the sophomore year begins, I guess there won’t be any chance to come across something as good as this, and it will be back to the stage where even a card of epic grade is a great thing, and mythical grade cards are only seen during mid-terms or final exams.

With different levels come different experiences. I suspect after the summer camp ends, I won’t be too impressed with the rewards offered by the school.

Therefore, I should take advantage of this phase of the summer camp and do my utmost to earn more resources to close the gap between myself and those top elite families from the first phase.

Two days flew by in the blink of an eye. This morning, after washing up, Lin

Xiao received a message from his mentor—

The three-day period is up, immediately head to the playground for assembly!”

He went out at once, took out a flying skateboard, set the route, and arrived at the plaza where he was first introduced. From a distance, he saw many people already gathering there, chatting in groups of threes and twos. He noticed that everyone’s expressions didn’t look very good.

Did everyone perform badly?

At this moment, he spotted a slim figure standing apart from the other students on the other side—it was Aunt Shen.

Not far away were several acquaintances, but they stood on another side and didn’t interact with Shen Yuexin.

He thought about it and decided not to go over to greet them.

In this second phase of the summer camp, everyone was pretty much on their own, and most of those who had come together from Yunmengxing Province had already been eliminated. The remaining few were distributed into four teams. Now, within the Fury Flame Team, apart from Shen Yuexin, there were a few others who he wasn’t very familiar with.

Being unable to help others be eliminated from within the team, plus not being very familiar with them, naturally there was no need for contact.

As for Aunt Shen, he did reach out to her once during this time, but she was undergoing a trial and didn’t respond.

The flying skateboard stopped next to Shen Yuexin, and these people were the few that the mentor had particularly favored before. At the very least, they were silver contestants, and Lin Xiao was the weakest among them.

Of course, that was before, and now he certainly wouldn’t be considered the weakest.

Lin Xiao self-assessed that his current strength could definitely reach the level of a silver contestant, and even among the strongest of that batch, he was now eligible to compete for those three golden thrones.

The reason he said he was eligible and not that he could definitely snag one was because of his clan equipment.

The weapon issue had been resolved, but not the armor. The Fishman’s body shape was different from Humans, so the armor looted couldn’t be worn.

There were armors specifically designed for different races on the market, but his created Fishman and Naga species had different body shapes from the standard Fishman and Naga, so there were no suitable armors available. He’d have to find someone to custom-make one or…

Or nothing. The market didn’t have Fishman armor for sale at all. No one would bother to tailor-make a set of armor for Fishmen, who were considered cannon fodder. Nonexistent.

This was also the reason he was preparing to create a third advanced race—so that he could be self-sufficient.

Without armor, it would be a disadvantage when facing an equally matched opponent—one clad in thick armor, the other relying on his flesh to withstand blows. The outcome would naturally be quite grim.

Shen Yuexin greeted him generously, and he smiled and waved back, while others just nodded slightly in acknowledgment. Some responded, while others acted as if they hadn’t seen.

Clearly, these people neither saw nor recognized his abilities. Had there been a chance, it is likely some would have wanted to challenge him.

Lin Xiao ignored them. Recognition didn’t matter; results would be shown through action. Should they really challenge him, he’d be sure to give them a surprise.

Not paying any more attention to them, he stood with Shen Yuexin and spoke softly.

After talking a few times, he found that although he had to call her “Auntie” in terms of seniority, she wasn’t much different from other girls. Strictly speaking, she was indeed a young girl, not much older in age, just higher in seniority. They were the same age and got along quite well.

When talking to her, he always couldn’t help but quietly look up, staring openly at her charming face.

Yes, charming!

He felt that words like “pretty” or “beautiful” hardly did justice to her appearance and temperament. With the changes brought by Divinity, female deities are rarely ever unattractive, and each could be considered a goddess. But with her exceptional looks, figure, and temperament, Lin Xiao thought that “charming” was the only way to describe her.

Talking with her always felt very comfortable, very pleasing to the eyes.

So he always couldn’t help stealing glances at her, and moreover, he did it openly.

Of course, his gaze was limited to her charming face and did not stray to other places. Not that he didn’t want to, but the review process wouldn’t allow it.

However openly he stared, it would still make the girl shy, and during one such unabashedly open stare, Shen Yuexin said somewhat bashfully and angrily:

Do you talk like this with all girls?

No, because they aren’t as pretty as you!”

Are you always so smooth-talking when speaking to girls?

No, I’m telling the truth. If you don’t believe me, feel free to check.

He stood with his hands on his hips and chest puffed out, while Shen Yuexin tilted her head and looked at him with disdain: