Chapter 282: Chill of the Winter Sun

Annan didn’t know how long he had been in a coma, and when did he woke up.

When he regained consciousness, there was still a line of blood-red, scribbled characters floating in front of him.

[The curse has been severed —The Fated Feast of the Great Hunt.]

[You completed the Ritual: Swift Murder, so you’re granted the Basic Influence: One Step Ahead.]

[If you don’t remove it in time, you will fall into a random nightmare that has the keyword “Sharp Blade” on either April 4th or June 6th (difficulty: hard).]

[You have completed a ritual, Will Attribute +1]

[The Tragedy Writer is satisfied with your ritual. You have received 1 holy light engraving from the Tragedy Writer.]

[Current total engravings: 3 (Silver Sire) / 1 (Tragedy Writer)]

After a brief pause, the official notice of having cleared the dungeon finally appeared before Annan.

[Guarantee the survival of “Annan·Austere-Winter”, “Dmitri·Austere-Winter”, “Elizabeth·Noah”, “Kafni Noah”.]

[Find and interrupt the key ritual (Completed).]

[Do not reveal your identity (Completed).]

[Nightmare has been purified.]

[Purified the nightmare with the designated character. Evaluation ratings increased.]

[Perfectly stopped the ritual. Evaluation ratings increased significantly.]

[Stopped the explosion. Evaluation ratings increased.]

[Killed Philip Noah. Evaluation ratings increased significantly.]

[Received acknowledgment from the Tragedy Writer. Evaluation ratings increased significantly.]

[Completed the collection of memoirs. Evaluation ratings increased.]

[Comprehensive Evaluation — S]

[Received 3200 points of Shared Experience, Perception+1.]

[Reward for clearing dungeon: Increase any desired profession by 3 levels]

[Hidden plot you have decrypted: 100%]

[Reward for decrypting the dungeon: Element (Brilliance) awakening progress increased by 10%]

[Reward for attaining the highest evaluation rating: A Random Falteration Spell]

…It’s over.

“I have won.” He indeed didn’t let himself down.

Or rather, it was all within Annan’s expectations.

Like everyone else knew about Annan, he was just a “lucky madman”. He had a little bit of guts and a little bit of luck.

There was first a burst of ecstasy In Annan’s heart, followed by excitement.

But after such intense pleasure, Annan felt a little empty.

Annan took a deep breath and slowly exhaled in an effort to calm his rapidly beating heart.

He was not betting on whether the Goddess of Luck was on his side.

This gamble wasn’t about luck but his capability.

What he was betting on, what he believed was his ability to see and read people.

It wasn’t a sudden accident that led him with no choice but to trust Old Merlin. Instead, it was his decision to set up the plan, handing over the final victory button to Old Merlin, who knew nothing about his plan.

Undoubtedly, this confidence came from Annan’s understanding of Merlin Manning and his trust in his abilities and intuition.

Annan took a deep breath and slowly opened his eyes.

The sun outside had been up for a while.

…It’s already half-past seven. He glanced at the clock.

It seemed that a long time had passed since he passed out in the nightmare.

But that didn’t matter as long as he won.

Annan added all three free levels to his wizard profession and put all the remaining experience on Silver Knight.

As a result, Annan’s panel looked like this:

Attributes: Strength 11, Agility 10, Constitution 13, Perception 44, Will 15

Profession Overview:

Silver Knight LV13: [Austere-Winter Swordsmanship LV5], [Frost Sword LV9], [Parallel Comprehension LV1], [Silver Hand LV1]

Wizard (Energy Falteration School) LV20 (Advancement available): [Instant Spell LV4 (Chilling Touch, Slothful Eye, N/A, N/A)], [Guided Spell LV4 (Impeding Wall, Frost Arena, Notion Rain, Denial of Life)], [Chant spell LV3 (Frost Wheel, N/A, N/A)], [Ritual Spell LV1 (N/A)]

Annan noticed that starting from LV11, Silver Knight would increase 2 points in Constitution by default every time it went up a level and add another 1 point to either one of the three physical attributes: Strength, Constitution, and Agility.

In other words, this was a profession that could upgrade three attributes per level!

It was even more powerful than the wizard profession!

The wizard had only two attribute points bonuses per upgrade!

This is a premium profession indeed.

[TN: The idea of imbalance pay-to-win mechanics.]

Of course, on the other hand… Annan didn’t get any new divine art or abilities from upgrading the [Silver Knight] level. Although he had obtained skill points as per usual, he could only add points to his existing skills.

Its skills list… or rather the divine art list, seemed to require being purchased directly from Silver Sire using holy light engravings.

But the upgrading of Constitution attributes alone had brought a massive change to Annan.

Annan could feel that his body had gotten more vigorous now. For example… where Annan had to have at least three hours of sleep in a day to remain energized, he could now stay up all night!

But the more significant change was his Perception attribute.

The sudden increase of three wizard levels and the rewards for clearing the nightmare surged Annan’s Perception attribute by seven levels. He felt dizzy, as if he was seeing the world through a lens that was too clear.

But Annan could considerably dispel this discomfort after shaking his head.

It was all thanks to the poison Rotten Man had once used on Annan.

If Annan had not experienced the distortion of his perception of the world brought about by even higher levels of Perception, he would not have been able to adapt to this level of Perception attribute.

It might even increase his erosion rate. According to Salvatore, some wizards might even have their sanity eroded by a curse if their strength increased too quickly after completing a difficult nightmare.

This was also the case with professions like “Berserker” that would have a 2-point increase in Strength per level. The Berserker profession could be used in Silver Rank directly. As for the somewhat robust Silver Rank Berserkers, the muscles throughout their whole body might be highly activated after waking up from a nightmare, flowing around the body like a worm… It might even simply crawl away.

This phenomenon was called “sublimation”.

If one couldn’t handle these “muscle worms”, then without a doubt that their strength would drop quite a bit.

Basically, this phenomenon would appear in Silver Rank or somewhere close to Silver Rank.

According to Annan’s calculations, professions of this level had about 50 points on their main attributes.

Once the attributes exceed 40 points, it would be uncomfortable to increase their strength further because the curse absorbed would be close to the limit of what the human body could handle. In addition, there would be an unknown threshold that was different for everyone at the 50 points attribute. If one did not overcome it, they would drop directly back to 40 points.

This could be said to be a heavy hit.

Because one of the necessary conditions to advance into Gold was to “complete sublimation”. In other words, having over 50 points on main attributes was only the first requirement of the Gold Rank.

Once failed… other professions might not be able to recollect to 50 points even when they had upgraded to the peak of the Silver Rank. Aside from the professions with attributes similar to wizards that were easier to upgrade, they could only make two “advancement” attempts.

That was to obtain a secondary profession and progress smoothly.

According to Salvatore, this process seemed somewhat life-threatening, except that Annan wasn’t quite sure what the danger was after successfully advancing himself. But to be on the safe side, he temporarily locked the players’ ability on getting secondary professions.

Only after he had clarified what the risk actually was would he release the functions back to the players again, lest they ruin their own “gaming accounts”.

“Next, it’s time for the lucky draw… ” Annan’s expression turned serious.

He wiped the sweat from his palms onto the quilt and then reached out and clicked on the notification bar for [reward for attaining the highest evaluation rating].

As the notification gradually faded away, a new notification popped-up.

[Based on your profile and existing profession levels, you received Order Magic: Chill of the Winter Sun (Ritual).]

The system has gifted more goodies to Annan this time. What will the new power be? Find out what happens next by getting early access to chapters with Patreon! Please do check out the community goal in our Patreon as well! Thanks for the support! Click here to access our Patreon page.

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