Chapter 166: Skill [Teaching]

It seems skill books only come in white, green, blue, and gold tiers. This one, however, is iridescent! What tier could this possibly be?

Regardless, let’s check the attributes. Liang Jing was filled with anticipation.

"[Teach]: Consumes a large amount of skill experience to impart one’s own skills to others.
Description: Due to unknown energy possessing infinite creative potential, this has been mutated and generated by the system. The skill level of the recipient will always be lower than that of the teacher."

Huh!

Perhaps I really have struck gold!

Liang Jing was momentarily stunned, unable to collect his thoughts. How could such a skill exist? In the game he used to play, the highest level of skills were gold-tier, and there was certainly no such overpowered teaching skill. Think about it: if an incredibly rare gold-tier skill could be taught to someone else, how broken would that be? Gold-tier skills only had a chance to drop from super-difficulty quests or gold bosses. While gold bosses dropped many items, gold-tier items themselves never numbered more than three, and the drop rate for skills was nowhere near this high—in fact, it was only about a tenth of that. A skill book would only appear once in a blue moon; they were so rare that few people on an entire server would even possess a gold-tier skill. If this skill existed, wouldn't it be the equivalent of duplicating gear? The game company would be finished.

After all, in reality, the "system" requires massive amounts of energy to generate equipment. Where does that energy come from? The monsters themselves! It is far more convenient to directly absorb and mutate the skill runes from the monsters.

In short, this skill is incredibly broken, even if the description says it consumes a large amount of skill experience to teach others. However, it perfectly solves the problem currently worrying Liang Jing: the people around him are too weak, and he must find a way to quickly increase their strength. After all, the factions he will face after this incident are powerful; if his subordinates are too weak, they will not only be unable to help him but will likely become a burden.

It truly is a timely gift!

Previously, Liang Jing had tried giving skill books to others to see if they could learn them, but unfortunately, the others couldn't even see them, let alone learn them. From this, Liang Jing concluded that in this "system" game, he was the only player. Others were not players and could not learn or activate skill books; it was like a password-protected door requiring specific biometric verification—only one person’s fingerprint or iris could open it.

With this skill, how much could he boost the strength of others? How many times more powerful would it be compared to him using it alone? If he were to build a faction with this, how immense would the assistance be?

It was unimaginable. Being able to directly grant someone an ability or skill was simply too incredible; it was many times more difficult than "transmitting power."

As for the description about absorbing energy to mutate and generate, Liang Jing didn't pay it much heed. He simply assumed these skill books were all evolved through energy absorption and that this one was just a bit more special.

He didn't even stop to wonder why, in their building, everyone—whether it was himself, Jing Hui, or the Gold Baroque—was so unique...

He really wanted to try it out right now.

However, the immediate priority was to heal his wounds and fully utilize the abundant life essence of the awakened ones within his body to improve his own strength.

Liang Jing sat cross-legged, ordering the injured zombie "Brother Huang" to act as his final line of defense. At the same time, he gave his two underlings a simple command: alert him if they spotted any humans. Last time, he had been too focused and distracted, which led to him being surrounded and subsequently injured.

Silence returned to the dark cave. Liang Jing sat cross-legged, circulating his inner energy to absorb the life essence. To his internal energy, the life essence of an awakened one was a potent tonic.

Time passed. After about half an hour, the wound on Liang Jing's back finally healed completely. Life essence is least effective at healing bones—it is the slowest and most difficult process—followed by skin and flesh. Its best effect is on internal organs and meridians. If it hadn't been a comminuted fracture, he would have been healed long ago. Even though Liang Jing's physical constitution was many times that of an ordinary person, it just meant he consumed more life essence; it shouldn't have taken this long, nor should it have left him in such dangerous, passive situations several times.

After another half hour, Liang Jing opened his eyes. A flash of light streaked across them, making the entire dark cave seem to brighten for a moment.

*Sigh.*

He let out a breath. In truth, the life essence had been fully consumed or dissipated half an hour ago. He had wanted to use the remaining energy to push past a bottleneck in his inner energy to reach the next level, but this time, he had failed.

After two days of relentless killing and obtaining life essence, his third-level inner energy had reached its peak. He only needed to break through the bottleneck to enter the fourth level. Unfortunately, perhaps because the energy had been accumulated too quickly—not through his own bit-by-bit cultivation—it was difficult to break through.

Liang Jing: Strength: 33 (+1), Agility: 30 (+1), Constitution: 30 (+1), Spirit: 28 (+1).

Although he hadn't broken through, the massive amount of life essence had still increased his physical stats by an amount equivalent to an ordinary person, raising all attributes by one point.

He shook his head. His promotion speed was already very fast, so he decided not to dwell on it. He looked at his body; his back had been pierced through, and both his metal armor and the [Steel Spine Beast Armor] bulletproof vest were shredded. But now that his body was healed, a cold glint flashed in his eyes. What next...

...

"Report! Sir, the target, Liang Jing, is severely wounded and dying. He has fled into the mountains. Commander Wu requests instructions on whether to continue the pursuit."

"Pursue! Find Liang Jing for me. I want to see a person if he's alive, and a corpse if he's dead!"

Political Commissar Gong lay on his bed, his face pale yet hideously distorted. Surprisingly, Commissar Gong was still alive and even seemed quite spirited!

"Commissar, there are many mutated monsters hiding in the mountains. If we continue like this, I fear we will suffer heavy losses."

"No! I need to see Liang Jing's miserable end to feel satisfied! I want everyone to know just how miserable the consequences of offending me are! Send another hundred men!"

"Yes!"

...

When Wu Yong received the order from Commissar Gong, his face was filled with helplessness. *He is not worth following, not worth following at all!* He shook his head inwardly, lamenting how the Commissar was disregarding the lives of his subordinates just for a personal vendetta.

The regiment only had about 500 of Commissar Gong's true subordinates. Including the hundred who had just entered the mountains, there were now over 300 people inside. Aside from the hundred or so around him, the Commissar had fewer than a hundred men left. It was worth noting that although the Regimental Commander had been severely wounded in battle due to the Commissar's schemes, most of the remaining men still refused to follow the Commissar's orders. Even Zhang Bao, who had the mutated military dogs, had been poached from the Commander's side.

...

In the dark cave, Liang Jing tidied his clothes. His expression was uncertain, shifting between pale and flushed...

He was going to start his revenge now!

However, just before acting, Liang Jing hesitated. He thought about what those people represented—the obedience ingrained in the bones of the Huaxia people for thousands of years, something that couldn't be erased in a moment. Perhaps that was why they were bold enough and arrogant enough to hunt him down relentlessly.

Did they really think no one dared to resist, no one dared to act against them or harm them?

Recalling his experiences before the apocalypse, being suppressed, oppressed, and even toyed with by the powerful Zhang family, a wave of anger and resentment surged within him. It was all these people—they were the ones who arrogantly oppressed him. Was he still unable, or afraid, to resist now?

The world had changed; was he still going to hide?

He had the strength to resist now; was he still going to endure it?

Could he only be a passive target, unable to strike back?

In an instant, Liang Jing's eyes turned red! A violent, murderous rage surged into his heart.

Kill! Kill! Kill!

They bullied him, oppressed him, and acted so ruthlessly. When he asked why, they didn't even offer an explanation! They just directly sentenced him to death!

The world is different now. He has the power. Bring it on! Whoever provokes him, he will kill! He doesn't care who they think they are, he doesn't care who they are!

Thinking of their endless attempts to take his life and threaten his family, and considering he had already attempted to kill Commissar Gong, he had no choice left—and he wouldn't allow himself any other choice!

No backing down!

Moreover, these people only represented themselves.

He was no weaker than anyone else now. If they had numbers, he would just recruit his own people and have a grand showdown. Suddenly, Liang Jing's heart felt expansive. *That's right! Let's see who dares to mess with me then.*

Liang Jing hadn't planned on building a massive faction to dominate the world before, just to avoid having to handle everything himself. But this time, it was different.