Chapter 182 – Florida Man Stormed into Gun Store, Threatened Store Owner, and Robbed a Pen
Leo was slightly confused. He had seen them in them in their giant forms, but at the moment, they were no bigger than a human's head. They looked like something from the Pokémon Series.
Most importantly, their speech reminded Leo of the giant cat ball statue back home. The statue also loved to meow "Munya" like these guys.
Discovering the kin of that statue, Leo was curious about them. He introduced himself and cupped his fist, mimicking cultivators.
"Yes, I'm Florida Man. Nice to meet you, fellas."
The three Cathulhus saluted like modern soldiers with their tentacle arms. Their innocent eyes and happy smile showed their friendliness and carefree attitude.
The floating cat "Miao Damao" waved his tentacles and showed Leo a ring made of catnip vine and leaves. He bragged, "Look, Florida Man. This is my engagement ring, munya! I bought it from the lifespan I got from your fight, munya!"
Leo was taken aback. He still remembered that this guy said something about earning ten million YOL. He wondered how much the ring cost as it seemed cheap.
"What did you pay for it?"
"Only a million years of lifespan, munya!"
"@#$!%"
Leo almost swore to the Cthulhu for giving birth to this stupid variant, who just got scammed for no reason.
"I hope that has hidden features or power. Otherwise…"
"I'm not stupid, munya!" Miao Damao laughed, "This works as a storage ring, an energy battery, and a life-saving tool, munya! As long as I charge this ring's battery to the fullest, it can block any attack from a sage once, munya!"
"A sage?" Leo was curious about the strength standard and tiers in this universe. He already learned what the mortal's strength was, but he was still clueless about the immortal stages and beyond.
"That's right, munya. You don't know anything about sages, munya?"
Leo shook his head, "Could you explain it to me like I'm a toddler?"
"Of course, munya!"
Miao Damao took his time to explain the cultivation base, strength, and power scales of the universe.
The lowest tier of the universe was the mortals. Their strength, cultivation methods, and standards were different, and it was impossible to compare them. Some mortals were capable of using the power of "Domain" when they were only a nascent soul cultivator while many were incapable of gathering Qi.
The next bottom tier was the immortals. Similar to the mortals, they had different scale and cultivation methods, such as constellation method, internal star method, or celestial body method. Xeno-based creatures also had their own ways of gaining strength, and their cultivation ranking names differed.
The next stronger tier was considered common in this Fate Stadium. People called them "Deities". Although their foundation was unique to their own race and cultivation method, they had one thing in common – Followers. These deities often built a country, a religion, or an organization to protect weaker immortals and mortals. These people obtained the power of faith through their good deeds, making them worthy of being called a god.
As for the sage, it was a realm higher than the deities.
Leo pondered as Acku mentioned something about him being a deity. He was still puzzled as he didn't remember creating a religion.
"Anyway, munya. Are you here to commission new weapons, too? You have good eyes, munya! This store makes the best immortal-killing treasures, munya!"
The dwarf coughed, "Correction, Constellation-Killing weapons. They're designed to cripple immortals with stars in their dantians."
He glanced at Leo and sized him up. A few seconds later, he frowned as he couldn't measure or appraise Leo's true strength due to his weird physique.
The dwarf introduced himself, "I'm Crimson Nineteen. You can call me Nine-Fingered-Red. Which planet are you from? Oheelu? Duffony? Or Snu Paradise?"
Leo had a bad feeling about the world called Snu Paradise. He hoped that it wouldn't involve something under the belly, and he didn't want to know about the local culture.
"None of those. It's Earth."
The cats froze while Nine-Fingered Red's face twitched due to the name – It was too similar to the N-Word that they didn't want to utter. The latter coughed and changed the subject as he didn't want to pry into the subject.
"Ahem. Say, what are you looking for, Florida Man? Maybe, I can custom-make a weapon of your need."
Leo rubbed his chin as the weapon racks and the products here all looked fancy and colorful. Instead of having only dull steel weapons, many swords, spears, lances, blades, and halberds had their glows.
This shop's weapon racks had a theme. Each section was full of weapons of the same color. For example, red blades, swords, and halberds were arranged close to each other while another section had similar items but with green.
Leo looked around for a moment before his eyes were attracted to a black stick in the deepest corner behind a red weapon rack. He pointed at it.
"Can I see that black stick?"
Nine-Fingered Red raised his eyebrows. He wiggled his finger, and the black stick floated toward them.
"I forgot that I put that broomstick there. It's a useless stick, though. Do you really want that thing?"
Leo gave it a closer look. As a cultured man, he was attracted to a smooth and straight stick. In addition, this stick was a meter long and suitable for holding and swinging. He reached out to grab the black stick.
As soon as Leo touched it, the stick shrank and transformed into a pen.
Leo liked this pen-stick, "How much for this?"
The dwarf deeply sighed. He waved his hand, "100 essence stones are enough. It was a broom that I made long ago. Aside from the shrinking and enlarging power, it has no other perk."
"What about its durability?"
"Depends on the user. Inject your blood into the ink tube of the pen and try to revert it back to the broomstick. You'll know."
Curious, Leo opened the pen's back lid. Then, he bit the tip of his index finger. He squeezed his transparent blood into the empty tube.
Miao Meolord and the dwarf widened their eyes when they noticed Leo's blood color. They broke a sweat and lowered their heads. As for Miao Damao and Kat Katerina, they didn't notice anything.
The pen absorbed Leo's blood. Originally, it was already black. But after taking in Leo's blood, it got even blacker. No light reflected from its surface.
Leo waved it around. A few seconds later, it transformed back into a straight stick. Unlike before, it didn't look like a wooden broom or a plastic broom.
The stick's surface was too smooth and sturdy to be called a broomstick. It might as well be called a metal short spear as one of its tips looked like a pen's head.
Leo tried smacking his arm and shoulder with the stick.
BONK
It sounded hollow on impact. However, the strike made Leo flinch as he could feel a numbing pain. He then checked the condition of the stick, wondering if something had broken.
Betraying Leo's expectation, it was intact. No sign of damage appeared on its surface.
"Nice! I'll take this, please."
The dwarf shrugged, "Well, that's to be expected. Weapons don't make a master. Only the master makes weapons work."
"Huh?"
"Nothing."
Leo paid the dwarf in full. He ejected 100 essence stones from his spatial ring.
The dwarf was an expert. He lightly snorted and forced all ejected essence stones to float toward him. But when he noticed the quality of the stones, he faintly grinned.
"Thank you for business, Your Holiness. Anything else particular you're looking for?"
"Nah, I'm happy with this."
Leo slightly jerked the short spear, reverting it into a pen. He then put the pen in his suit's inner pocket. He didn't notice that the dwarf changed Leo's pronoun.
Due to his tight schedule, Leo bid farewell to the dwarf and cats. He stopped exploring the third floor and went to the 4th floor.
.
.
After Leo had left, Miao Meolord and the dwarf looked at each other. They wiped away the sweat on their foreheads.
"That was scary, munya."
Nine-Fingered Red deeply sighed, "I think my lifespan is shortened by 10,000 years just now. Where did that MONSTER come from?! He's definitely not a human!"
"That's what I want to know, too, munya!"
While the two seniors complained about something, Damao and Katerina were puzzled. They had no idea why they were shivering in fear.
"What's the matter with you, munya?" Asked Damao.
Miao Meolord deeply inhaled. He smacked the head of his little brother and yelled, "You fool, munya! THAT MONSTER is not a human! He's…."
Meolord opened his mouth, but he couldn't utter the next word. His voice got stuck in his throat.
The dwarf also tried to say the word, but his voice didn't come out as well. They looked at each other as they realized something.
"Power of Redaction, munya!" Meolord was shocked.
The dwarf gulped. He pulled out a brown towel and wiped his pale face. He then stared at the three cathulhus.
"No one tell a word about today's encounter! No one!"
Damao and Katerina were still clueless. Meolord grabbed his brother and sister-in-law and whispered to them.
"Never mention anything about that MONSTER to anyone if you don't want to die, munya."
"Eh? Why, munya?"
"To sum it short, he's a predator, munya!"
"Predator?" Damao and Katerina still couldn't understand.
"It means, he's the same as our master, munya!"
"!!!"
The duo finally realized something. They sweated bullets.
.
.
The fourth floor of this mall was a red-light district, which Leo disliked. He skipped it to the next floor.
The fifth floor was similar to what Leo had envisioned for his shopping mall. Tutoring centers and schools were the theme here. Thousands of children and teenagers of various races loitered in this place and gathered around food stalls and resting areas.
Leo walked around to admire the names of schools and training centers in this place.
"The Way of Berserker, Sentinel Rearing Center, Chess Guardians, Leveling by Snu-Snu…Hold up! Why is there a perverted school over here? There are children around! Dafuq?!"
Leo was tempted to visit every school to get a brochure of their curriculum, except the sexual ones.
After exploring the school area for an hour, Leo stumbled upon an arena. However, the surface was the arena was an 8x8 chess board. At the moment, 16 children stood on the stage as if they were chess pieces, facing off against the other team.
Everybody put on helmets of their pieces. The pawns stood in front of major pieces while rooks, bishops, knights, kings, and queens positioned behind the frontline pawns.
Strangely, one side was a group of human-like children, who had long monkey tails. As for the other team, they were all werewolf children.
"Oh? A human chess?"
The last time Leo played chess, his ELO was merely 1400-1500. He learned enough openings and middle-game, but his overall vision and pattern recognition still needed improvement.
At the side of the stage, their parents hovered, observing the game. They also sneaked glances at their kids, cheering for them.
Leo mixed in with the crowd, but he couldn't fly. He climbed a spectator stand and sat at the back.
"PAWN E4!"
"PAWN E5!"
The game began. Oddly enough, they were playing an international chess game.
The first move of each side was normal. However, the monkey-tailed humans utilized a bad opening.
"QUEEN H5!"
Leo almost snickered. He slightly shook his head as this game might either end prematurely.
"KNIGHT C6!"
"BISHOP F3!
"PAWN G6!"
"QUEEN F3!"
"KNIGHT F6!"
The game went on. Everything looked fine as both sides hadn't blundered any major pieces yet.
But as the game went on, they started trading pieces. But instead of removing the taken piece, a stunning and disturbing event shocked Leo.
The human child, who acted as a White Pawn, slashed an opponent's Black Pawn representative with a real sword. The werewolf child whimpered and opened his jaws to retaliate. However, he couldn't bite the human child.
The white pawn boy stomped on the werewolf boy and stabbed him in his chest. He gauged the heart of the wolf out and laughed.
The parents of the werewolf only frowned, but they didn't bother coming down to help their kids. Everybody silently observed the game without uttering a word.
Leo was disgusted by this game. He stood up and was about to jump on the stage to stop this nonsense. However, a guy next to him grabbed Leo's arm and pulled him with great force.
Leo flinched as he sensed the strong force from the guy. He looked back.
The person was a muscular green orc. He hushed Leo and shook his head.
"Don't interfere, human. This is a death chess for forsaken children. Don't ruin their ritual."
"Hey, a kid just died."
"They are all death-row criminals."
"Aren't they just children?!"
"For your standard, maybe. But for the Werewolves and Oheelians, those men are over 100 years old, and they disgraced their ancestors. This is where they give their descendants a second chance in life after the death sentence. The winning side will live on while the losers will be executed."
This was a custom of this place. Whenever the trainees or juniors committed great crimes and were sentenced to death, they put the prisoners on this stage. The only way to survive was to win the chess game.
However, there were flaws that Leo hated.
"What about the dead kid that got killed during the game? Can anybody revive them?"
"No. Nobody can do anything about it."
"…"
"Before the game even starts, the match has already begun. Everybody's roles and chess pieces are pre-chosen by the judges. The worse crimes they committed, the weaker piece they get. The one that controls the king piece acts as their leader. As for the other pieces, they have to move according to their king's order no matter what."
