Zhang Yanhang carefully examined the contents of the third prize pool and could only say that, although it was the last clean-up, it was still the same as before, with only forty Crimson Iron Worker Ants, twenty-five Crimson Iron Flying Ants, twenty-five Crimson Iron Soldier Ants, nine Crimson Iron Breeding Ants, and one Crimson Iron Ant King.

"So, I choose Option One, First Tier One-Star Ordinary Monster Crimson Iron Worker Ant." After discovering that the third prize pool from the Lucky Slot Machine at the small Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dala Gu was still unchanged, Zhang Yanhang quickly made his decision.

October 30, Friday, five days after the Double Ninth Festival, still counted as Zhang Yanhang's first day in Ashen World. At 5:34 am in Ashen World, at the Crimson Iron Ore Vein, in the small Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dala Gu, in the Outer Zone, at the C-shaped channel, at the Lucky Slot Machine.

[Successfully killed First Tier One Star Monster 'Crimson Iron Worker Ant (Ordinary)'×1, Soul points+3.]

[Successfully killed First Tier One Star Monster 'Crimson Iron Worker Ant (Ordinary)'×1, Soul points+3.]

[Successfully killed First Tier One Star Monster 'Crimson Iron Worker Ant (Ordinary)'×1, Soul points+3.]

...

After spending five minutes to extract the hundred monsters from the prize pool, Zhang Yanhang used a Death Wave to end their brief existence.

Then he began to stand still and quietly waited for the Drop treasure boxes to refresh. Several seconds later, four Drop treasure boxes scattered on the ground refreshed, two White quality Drop Treasure boxes, and two Green quality Drop Treasure boxes.

Zhang Yanhang immediately went up to pick them and checked, finding that the two white treasure boxes were both dropped by the Crimson Iron Worker Ants, while the green treasure boxes were each contributed by the Crimson Iron Soldier Ants and Crimson Iron Breeding Ants.

"I didn't expect that just forty Crimson Iron Worker Ants could drop two treasure boxes, tantamount to an average of one drop per twenty kills. Still, you can see from the fact that twenty-five Crimson Iron Soldier Ants dropped one treasure box, but Crimson Iron Flying Ants didn't drop any, that this method of calculation is definitely not reasonable."

Zhang Yanhang felt that the reason why those forty Crimson Iron Worker Ants could drop two treasure boxes must be due to previous accumulation, so only forty Crimson Iron Worker Ants were killed, and two treasure boxes were dropped.

And the same rationale applies to the Crimson Iron Breeding Ants. Indeed, he had not obtained a drop treasure box from the Crimson Iron Breeding Ants for a long time. Now, he estimated that he finally gathered around thirty or near forty, so they dropped a treasure box.

"Judging by this, just clearing the third prize pool from the Lucky Slot Machine doesn't really test whether the Luck attribute value has reduced the Rank Penalty.

I still need to kill more small Crimson Iron Ants to find out my actual Treasure box drop rate."

Fortunately, Zhang Yanhang was prepared. When he was drawing the lot, he scanned the situation of the small Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dala Gu in advance during the Time Pause.

By the way, given the forty-square kilometer area of the small Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dala Gu, although his Seeking Fortune and Avoiding Evil scanning efficiency would decrease in such a closed, solid environment, after all, he had just expanded the coverage range.

So, it would take at most only four or five scans to cover the entire small Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dala Gu completely. It's fair to say the scanning process was much easier than before.

According to his current scanning results, although less than fourteen hours had passed, still, a small batch of Crimson Iron Worker Ants and Crimson Iron Flying Ants had continuously refreshed in the small Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dala Gu.

All together, there were probably over two hundred or so, which was quite decent. Even if all were killed, it might still not test how much the Rank Penalty has reduced by now, but at least it would serve as a memorial for when he could no longer enter the small Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dala Gu in the future.

To put it simply, if he didn't kill them now, he would have no chance to do so later. Not killing them would indeed be a waste. Although Soul points were not worth much, at least they could make up a bit. Besides, since he had nothing else to do, he might as well kill some along the way.

Thus, adhering to the principle of "might as well do it if idle," Zhang Yanhang immediately started clearing the small Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dala Gu again.

...

October 30, Friday, the fifth day after Double Ninth Festival, still only counted as Zhang Yanhang's first day in Ashen World. At 5:40 am in Ashen World, at the Crimson Iron Ore Vein, in the small Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dalagu, Inner Zone.

Compared to the last time he cleared the small Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dala Gu, with a significant increase in Strength, Zhang Yanhang relied on his own Movement Speed and defense strength, rampaging through the small Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dala Gu. He couldn't be bothered with things like side roads and simply bulldozed through layers of Crimson Iron Ore Walls, forcibly killing the Worker Ants behind them.

Of course, in most cases, as long as Zhang Yanhang charged through, merely the fragments of the shattered Crimson Iron Ore Wall would crush the Worker Ants behind it to death. And even if some were lucky enough not to be crushed, they would still turn into mush if he just rammed straight through them.

With his current Peak Third Tier strength, clearing these Worker Ants was truly their fortune in three lifetimes.

After all, even the Lord Monster of the small Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dala Gu was only Second Tier Four Stars, so Zhang Yanhang would be the strongest life form they had ever seen. With his current strength, personally killing them would not be overkill but akin to using a nuclear bomb on a mosquito, with just a slight leakage of power between his fingers being enough to wipe them all out.

Realistically, Zhang Yanhang felt that even his power after entering the Dharma Body State with the Heavenly Earth Skill was comparable to a nuclear bomb—not to the level of a strategic nuclear bomb, perhaps, but certainly more than enough compared to a tactical nuclear bomb.

After all, tactical nuclear bombs typically have a radius of only a few hundred to a few thousand meters, but he had just created a few-hundred-meter crater in the ground made of Crimson Iron, which was at least ten times stronger than ordinary steel. If it were an ordinary dirt ground in the Main World, one blow would definitely cover a kilometer or more, easily destroying a small town.

"I feel like, if this trend continues, by the time I get promoted to Fourth Tier, my normal attacks will rival nuclear bombs. Awakeners are indeed dangerous, but only this level of power can quickly eradicate Provincial-level units."

Zhang Yanhang now felt that the combat power comparison targets for Awakeners really had a distinctive Ashen World feature, after all, to become stronger, Awakeners would need to continuously clear various regions. It's quite possible that some high-level regions might have the same size as provincial units.

For example, the Land of the Buddha, which he cared about a lot, was comparable to a whole country. It certainly couldn't be too small in size. Even if it wasn't as large as a provincial unit, it would at least be as large as a city-level unit like Qin Island City with tens of thousands of square kilometers.

While thinking, Zhang Yanhang kept moving forward and soon killed the last five Crimson Iron Worker Ants hiding on the edge.

[Successfully killed First Tier One Star Monster 'Crimson Iron Worker Ant (Ordinary)' × 1, Soul points +3.]

[Successfully killed First Tier One Star Monster 'Crimson Iron Worker Ant (Ordinary)' × 1, Soul points +3.]

[Successfully killed First Tier One Star Monster 'Crimson Iron Worker Ant (Ordinary)' × 1, Soul points +3.]

…

Looking at the blurred corpses of Crimson Iron Worker Ants on the ground and walls, Zhang Yanhang was unresponsive, just silently waiting for the refresh of the treasure box drop; unfortunately, these five Crimson Iron Worker Ants did not refresh a new dropped treasure box after several seconds.

"I remember the last time I cleared the small Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dalagu, it took me ten minutes, but this time, thanks to the increase in my speed and the decrease in the number of monsters, it only took about six minutes to clear the entire small Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dalagu."

Zhang Yanhang felt that the most time-consuming part of the clearing process wasn't moving, but waiting for the treasure box drops to refresh. Luckily, there were only slightly more than two hundred small Crimson Iron Ants, so it was still cleared with ease.

After clearing the more than two hundred Crimson Iron Worker Ants and Crimson Iron Flying Ants in the small Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dalagu, Zhang Yanhang obtained nine dropped treasure boxes in total. Although the number was small, he did vaguely feel that as his Luck attribute value increased, the rank penalty indeed decreased a bit.

It probably decreased by about 0.5 to 1, meaning that if originally he needed to kill thirty Crimson Iron Worker Ants to obtain just one dropped treasure box, now he only needed to kill approximately twenty-nine Crimson Iron Worker Ants to achieve that. Overall, there was indeed a change, though not significant.

"While it's not very noticeable now, once I continue to increase my Luck Value bonus, it should become quite evident," Zhang Yanhang thought.

He believed that as his Luck Value increased, he could definitely reduce the current drop rate of one treasure box per thirty killed monsters back to one per twenty kills, as it originally was.

"It's just that I'm not sure whether this Luck Value bonus applies to killing normally only one rank lower monsters, but logically, it definitely should work. However, the specifics are yet to be known until after some real tests."

Zhang Yanhang's demands weren't high; if he could lower the treasure box drop rate of killing ordinary low-level monsters from one box per twenty kills to about one per fifteen kills, that would suffice.

"Although I really want to test it right away, there are currently no extra monsters for me to kill. So, since the small Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dalagu has been cleared, I should quickly check the lucky slot machine third prize pool of the large Crimson Iron Ant Nest Talano."

As he looked around at the small Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dalagu, which felt so familiar that he could commit the entire map to memory, Zhang Yanhang sighed silently. After leaving this time, he wouldn't be able to enter again. Although further access wouldn't be of much benefit to him, the inability to enter at all was a different matter.

"I wonder if I can obtain some ability to ignore these kind of rank restrictions in the future, although the chances are slim."

The blockade of low-level areas was a restriction from the Ashen World; not to mention Zhang Yanhang as a Third Tier Awakened, even if he was promoted to the Fourth Tier, he would still be unable to resist such might from the Ashen World.

He reckoned that the ability to ignore rank restrictions might be possible to obtain when his rank became exceptionally high in the future, but right now, it was certainly not possible, since such powers would indeed be too game-breaking (BUG).

After taking one last look at the landscape of the small Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dalagu, Zhang Yanhang quietly activated the teleportation.

......

October 30th, Friday, the fifth day after the Double Ninth Festival, still counted as Zhang Yanhang's first day in the Ashen World, 5:41 a.m., the Ashen World, Crimson Iron Ore Vein, large Crimson Iron Ant Nest Talano, Outer Zone, Lucky Slot Machine.

Zhang Yanhang, who had precisely teleported in front of the Lucky Slot Machine, immediately started checking the current jackpot refresh situation of the machine, but regretfully, the third prize jackpot of the Lucky Slot Machine hadn't been refreshed yet and was still in the state of being emptied by him, unable to be drawn.

Of course, if Zhang Yanhang really wanted to force a draw, he could do so, but he would inevitably draw the Fourth Prize 'Thank you for your patronage' at the cost of one hundred sixty soul points, which equates to directly discarding that portion of soul points. Although not a lot, it seemed wasteful to lose one hundred sixty soul points for nothing.

"If that's the case, then based on my previous estimation, it should definitely only refresh around one hour before the opening of the transmission channel, which is at around six in the morning, and right now, it's about nineteen minutes away…"

Zhang Yanhang thought he could wait for a bit as there wasn't much else he could do, especially since he planned to open the Ashen Treasure Box along with the boxes obtained from the third prize jackpot later on.

"Ever since entering the large Crimson Iron Ant Nest Talano, I've been continuously busy hunting monsters and never felt so leisurely."

For Zhang Yanhang, whose sole purpose for entering the Ashen World was to hunt monsters and improve his strength, even if the large Crimson Iron Ant Nest Talano wasn't considered, it was rare for him to have such downtime in other regions.

Most of the time, his schedule or plan was always packed, and the only time he didn't have to do anything was when he slept.

However, this time he definitely wouldn't need to sleep, mainly due to the lack of time, as there was only a little over an hour left. He preferred to sleep after returning to the Main World or perhaps after advancing to the Fourth Tier, assuming he could still sleep by then.

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