Picking Up Attributes From Today

Panda Novel

Ol’ Amos’ eyes almost fell out of their sockets as he stared at the drop of blood seeping so strangely into the golden leaf. “I’ll be damned… It really worked?”

In that instant, Ol’ Amos felt as if his entire world had been upturned. Only divine weapons could go through the process of dripping blood to claim ownership, and those that could go through this same process were divine weapons for sure!

But were divine weapons something that easy to come by?

“To think that I, Amos Kroc, have traversed the world unhindered throughout my life. I’d started from humble beginnings, improved by leaps and bounds the whole way, and broke through the Saint Domain realm’s shackles at 58 years old to become the top expert of my time!”

Indignation filled Ol’ Amos’ eyes as he went on. “After that, I even used only a short 1,000 years to attain the Saint Domain realm’s pinnacle and enter the ranks of ultimate top experts in the continent!

“Yet I’ve only ever encountered a single divine weapon in my illustrious lifetime, and that is the Gods-Slaying Spear that killed me. Even so, I’m proud to share in its glory!

“How fortunate am I to be killed by a divine weapon?

“But what about you?”

Ol’ Amos glared at Meng Lei and shouted furiously, “An immature little brat like you has actually encountered divine weapons one after another! Are the gods up there blind?!”

“Admit it, Ol’ President, this is fate!”

Meng Lei snickered and tossed his soft and silky long hair back in a showy manner. “Some people simply aren’t even as blessed as a sheet of paper. Even if they are born with a silver spoon in their mouths, they may still die a tragic death in the middle of the night without the luck to enjoy their good fortune. Whereas some people are just like cockroaches—even if they experience numerous difficulties and dangers, they have numerous chance encounters, and the longer they live, the more exciting their lives become.

“I’m clearly the latter!”

There was something else he didn’t mention—if Ol’ Amos knew that Meng Lei even had a software bug-like cheating device, wouldn’t he become so jealous that he’d kill himself by eating sh*t?

“To hell with your goddamn fate! I simply won’t accept it!”

Ol’ Amos was fuming mad. He grumbled indignantly, “Why do you get to have a divine weapon just by picking up any old parchment manuscript? Yet I’ve never even seen a hint of a divine weapon’s shadow after living for several thousand years?!”

“Look, look! Something’s happening to the leaf!”

At that moment, the golden leaf abruptly gave off an incredibly dazzling and brilliant golden light as if it was a miniature sun.

Right on the heels of it, an odd scene unfolded—everywhere the golden light reached, all the trees, grass, and vines started to grow at an alarming rate as if they’d been injected with highly concentrated growth hormones!

One meter, two meters, three meters, four meters, five meters…

In just a few short breaths, with the golden leaf as the center, all the plants within a radius of five meters had turned into “towering trees reaching the skies”!

Meng Lei was straight up… swallowed by the plants!

“What the heck? What exactly is going on?!”

Meng Lei stared at all this in stupefaction, totally dumbfounded, while Ol’ Amos looked absolutely flabbergasted as well.

At that moment, the cause of all these—in other words, the golden leaf—slowly flew into the air and spun a full round in mid-air before suddenly shooting right toward Meng Lei’s forehead.

“W-what are you doing?!”

Meng Lei received a huge shock. The forehead was a person’s vital weakness. Should the golden leaf impale him, wouldn’t he die?

As such, he instinctively blocked his forehead with his hand. However, in the instant that the golden leaf made contact with his hand, it passed right through bizarrely and continued shooting into Meng Lei’s forehead before vanishing without a trace.

“F*ck!”

Meng Lei hastily touched his forehead. When he realized that it wasn’t bleeding, nor was there any sign of injury, he couldn’t help but become a little relieved. However, the problem was that… The golden leaf had clearly wormed its way in!

There was no way he would be fine!

“Brat, are you alright?” Ol’ Amos asked anxiously.

“Seems like… I’m fine?”

As Meng Lei rubbed his forehead, he asked, “Ol’ President, the golden leaf has wormed its way into my head. Will I be alright?”

“Probably… yes?” Ol’ Amos wasn’t very sure, either. “My understanding of divine weapons is limited, so I can’t comment much. But since you’ve claimed ownership of it, I should think that it wouldn’t hurt you… probably?”

“Really?”

Meng Lei blinked in response.

“Pay close attention and try to sense where it has gone,” suggested Ol’ Amos.

“Okay!”

Meng Lei nodded repeatedly. Then, he shut his eyes and started to carefully sense its location. His spiritual power was very strong now, and he was entirely capable of scanning his own body and doing an inner view of his internal organs. There was no way any abnormality in the body could escape the eyes of a spiritual power scan.

“It has actually gone all the way into my sea of consciousness?!” Meng Lei exclaimed loudly.

A person’s sea of consciousness, also known as their spiritual realm or soul realm, was the place that harbored their spirit and contained their soul.

Every single person, or rather, every single living thing, had their own sea of consciousness. The difference laid in the fact that some could “see” their own sea of consciousness, while others were unable to detect the presence of their spiritual realm.

Typically, once one attained the Seventh-Grade Magician level, they would be able to achieve inner viewing of their own spirit and return to their spiritual realm.

Of course, as it was common for Warriors’ spiritual power to be a tad weaker than Magicians’, and they needed to attain Ninth-Grade level before they could achieve this.

The sea of consciousness was like the universe, vast and boundless, limitless and infinite, yet incredibly wide and spacious. Within the endless void floated a single, lone silvery-white flame.

Chilly, wild and arrogant, and solitary! It strengthened and weakened unsteadily, as though a candle flame hanging in the Moon Palace1.

That was exactly what the soul flame was—a person’s very core and essence!

No matter how beautiful one’s outer appearance was, it would never overcome the passage of time’s corrosion, and an exquisite body might not necessarily be capable of holding a soul.

The “soul” referred to here was precisely the soul flame.

The soul flame hung suspended in the void, surrounded by gray, dusky fog. Chilly, deep, and remote, it was the one and only source of light in one’s boundless realm of consciousness.

That was what it was like in everyone’s sea of consciousness.

Yet Meng Lei’s sea of consciousness wasn’t the same because there was actually something else above his soul flame—the golden leaf!

Yes, that golden leaf from just now!

It floated above the soul flame, swaying lightly like light decorations above candle flames. It followed the soul flame’s unsteady fluctuations and spun slowly in a very rhythmic manner, emanating a vast and mysterious aura as it did so.

“What exactly is that?”

Meng Lei was anxious and doubtful. He found this particular “divine weapon” simply too odd. When he had claimed ownership of the Gods-Slaying Spear previously, a strong connection had been established between the Gods-Slaying Spear and him. Through this connection, he was able to easily mobilize the Gods-Slaying Spear, but this wasn’t the case for the golden leaf.

After he had dripped his blood onto it and claimed ownership of it, no connection of any sort had been established between the golden leaf and him at all. Despite it entering his sea of consciousness, Meng Lei still couldn’t sense any connection with it.

The golden leaf… was just like an inanimate object. It was as if he’d never claimed ownership of it.

He could clearly see it idling there, yet he couldn’t sense it, much less direct or command it. It felt extremely frustrating!

“Who can tell me just what the heck that thing is?!”

Meng Lei attempted to touch the gold leaf with his spiritual power, but the golden leaf stayed still and motionless.

He applied a bit more force… But it still stayed motionless.

He then struck at it forcefully, but it simply didn’t budge.

Even when he smashed madly at it, it stood its ground steadfastly and remained unmoving.

“Are you a goddamn inanimate object?!”

Meng Lei was going crazy. He finally knew a tiger’s pain when eating a hedgehog—wanting to eat it yet unable to, and wanting to discard it yet couldn’t bear to part with it. He could only stare at it helplessly, unable to do anything about it!

“Get lost, get lost! What a weirdo! You sh*tty divine weapon!”

Meng Lei was fairly incensed, and he withdrew from his sea of consciousness indignantly.

Ol’ Amos gazed at Meng Lei anxiously and asked with a face full of concern, “How is it? Did you find it?”

“I did, but…”

Meng Lei told him what had taken place inside his sea of consciousness with a shake of his head.

“What?! Really?”

Ol’ Amos frowned deeply. After musing for a long while, he finally said, “This situation is honestly surprising, but it’s nothing more than two possibilities.”

“What does that mean?”

Meng Lei perked up.

“The first possibility is that this divine weapon is damaged, or maybe it’s defective from the get-go and is a spare part of another divine weapon.”

Ol’ Amos twisted his beard as he mused with an intelligent gleam in his eyes. “Although a divine weapon’s ingenuity is indeterminable, in essence, it’s still a magic device. When a magic device cannot be used, there’s a high chance that it’s because it’s damaged.

“Reasons like damaged internal parts, depletion of energy inside its magic core, its magic circle breaking down, and so on. All these can cause a magic device to become unable to function properly.”

“What about the second possibility?”

“Now, the second possibility is a complicated one!” A sharp glint flashed across Ol’ Amos’ eyes. “The golden leaf itself is a divine weapon of extremely high quality, but you are too weak, so you’re not qualified to use it at all!”