Chapter 45 - 10X EXP

The golden pillar of light faded, leaving Leon standing in the devastated crater of the Weeping Hollows. The silence of the forest was absolute, save for the crackle of residual lightning and the slow dissolution of the Willow Goddess’s remains.

But inside Leon’s mind, a countdown had just begun.

Twelve hours.

Seven hundred and twenty minutes.

Forty-three thousand, two hundred seconds.

For the duration of that timer, every single point of experience he gained would be multiplied by ten. In Eternal Heaven, experience was the absolute currency of survival. It was the difference between being a predator and being prey. The system had just handed him a blank check, and Leon Wes had absolutely no intention of letting a single second of it go to waste.

"Twelve hours," Leon whispered into the quiet forest, his breath pluming slightly in the cool air. The sheer density of his newly acquired Adept-tier stats hummed beneath his skin. His base attributes had all jumped by a flat +20. His mana pool felt like a bottomless ocean. His physical body felt as though it had been forged from tempered steel.

He gripped the Stormcaller’s Conduit in his left hand and the Bloodfang Edge in his right.

"Let’s see how far this goes."

He didn’t walk out of the crater. He didn’t jog.

"Gale Weaver!"

Leon compressed a pocket of high-density air beneath his boots and detonated it. The ground cracked beneath the force, and he was launched into the dark canopy like a fired cannonball. His 60 Agility—bolstered by the Adept promotion—made the world blur around him. The weeping willow vines whipped past his face, parting harmlessly against the invisible barrier of his wind manipulation.

He pushed deeper into the open dungeon, leaving the Level 30-35 zone behind. He needed higher density. He needed higher levels.

Ten minutes of continuous, high-speed aerial traversal brought him to the edge of the Weeping Hollows. The terrain sharply dropped off into a massive, plunging ravine known to the system as the Ashen Canyons. The air here was thick, smelling of sulfur, brimstone, and dried blood.

He didn’t hesitate. He dropped out of the sky, letting gravity pull him into the canyon. As he fell, his Origin Eyes flared with brilliant golden light, piercing through the gloom below.

Faint, pulsing red auras immediately lit up his vision.

[Monster Detected: Venom-Spitter Arachnid (x12)]

[Level: 35]

[Type: Mutated Insectoid]

[Innate Talent: Corrosive Webbing]

A dozen massive spiders, each the size of a small carriage, clung to the sheer rock walls of the canyon. They sensed his descent instantly. Dozens of glowing red eyes snapped upward, and their mandibles clicked in a chaotic, terrifying chorus.

They reared back and fired.

Thick, glowing green nets of webbing shot up into the air, crisscrossing to form an inescapable canopy of acid meant to melt Leon before he even hit the ground.

Leon didn’t flinch.

"Arcane Requiem!"

He pointed the Gold-Rank staff downward and unleashed a continuous beam of swirling green poison, black decay, and arcing blue lightning. The raw output of his 95 Intelligence ripped through the corrosive webbing like wet paper. The decay latched onto the falling webs, rotting them into harmless ash before they could touch him.

He plummeted through the gap he had just blasted.

"Wraith-Step!"

A fraction of a second before he hit the canyon floor, Leon folded into the shadow plane. He bypassed the physical impact entirely, materializing directly behind the largest of the Arachnids clinging to the wall.

"Verlimon’s Judgment!"

He brought the Bloodfang Edge down in a brutal, two-handed arc. The Platinum-tier crescent of wind sheared cleanly through the spider’s hardened carapace.

Ding!

[Bloodfang Edge: Severance Effect triggered!]

The pitch-black true-damage shockwave exploded inside the creature’s abdomen, completely bypassing its physical defense. The spider detonated in a shower of corrosive ichor and severed limbs.

As the ichor splashed over Leon, his skin hissed. The acid was incredibly potent, immediately trying to eat through his clothes and flesh.

Ding!

[Absolute Adaptation has activated!]

[Your body is rapidly adapting to high-tier corrosive acids.]

[Resistance to acid-based damage increased significantly.]

The burning sensation dulled instantly. But the minor damage that had been done didn’t linger. Perfect Body, his passive SSS-Rank talent, immediately isolated the damaged cells and reconstructed them to absolute peak vitality. By the time he turned to face the remaining eleven spiders, his skin was flawless.

"Domain of the Dead!"

The freezing, necrotic aura blasted outward, instantly suppressing the remaining Arachnids. Their movements became sluggish, their attributes forcibly reduced by 15%.

Leon moved like a ghost. He was a blur of silver steel, green wind, and black decay. He Wraith-Stepped from shadow to shadow, severing legs, decapitating heads, and firing point-blank blasts of Arcane Requiem that blew massive holes through the canyon walls.

The Leeching effect of his magic kept his HP completely topped off, turning the slaughter into a perpetual motion machine of violence.

Within sixty seconds, all twelve Level 35 Arachnids were dead.

Ding!

[You have killed "Venom-Spitter Arachnid (Level 35)" and gained 45,000 experience points. (10X Multiplier Applied)]

[You have killed "Venom-Spitter Arachnid (Level 35)" and gained 45,000 experience points. (10X Multiplier Applied)]

...

The notifications flooded his vision, a blinding wall of golden text. Four hundred and fifty thousand experience points for a single mob of Level 35 creatures. The 10X multiplier was absolutely game-breaking.

Ding!

[Congratulations, you have leveled up to Level 31!]

[You have gained 5 Stat Points and 2 Evolution Points.]

Ding!

[Congratulations, you have leveled up to Level 32!]

[You have gained 5 Stat Points and 2 Evolution Points.]

Ding!

[Congratulations, you have leveled up to Level 33!]

[You have gained 5 Stat Points and 2 Evolution Points.]

Three levels in one minute.

Leon laughed out loud, the sound echoing off the canyon walls.

"More," he demanded, sprinting down the length of the ravine. "I have to get stronger. I have to keep getting stronger, until death can never take me from this world the way it did before!"