Worldwide Class Change: Minimal Effort, Maximum Reward!

The Greater Qilin stood at Lin Yi’s right shoulder, its evolved presence extending slightly outward as it sensed the cluster ahead. The multicolored light along its scales had a different quality in the early ambient glow of the Allheaven Expanse, richer somehow, as though the environment’s energy was feeding it continuously now that it had the capacity to absorb at the higher tier.

He drew the Celestial Lord Blade.

The runes ignited.

Not gradually. Immediately, fully, with a brightness that had not been present before the Set Attribute Core assimilation. Attack power 4,905 behind Strength 5,624 produced a weapon response that was categorically different from what it had been. The blade was the same object. What held it was not.

He stepped forward.

The first monster registered his approach from forty meters.

[Ashenveil Predator]

Threat Level: 142

HP: 74,600 / 74,600

Physical Attack: 1,820–2,100

Physical Defense: 1,640–1,900

Magic Resistance: 1,240–1,480

[A predator native to the higher atmospheric layers of the Allheaven Expanse. Generates a constant suppressive gravity field that compounds with proximity. Primary attack is a diving strike using mass and gravity to multiply impact force. Weak point: membrane between wing joints.]

Level 142. Previously a six to seven exchange engagement. He released Celestial Sword Qi in the concentrated single-target mode, the output behind the release carrying Strength 5,624 through the skill’s scaling formula. The arc reached the Ashenveil Predator before it completed its threat assessment.

One strike.

The predator dissolved.

[Ashenveil Predator Defeated]

[EXP Gained: +20,400]

[Reward Amplification Triggered — ×1000]

[New EXP Gained: +20,400,000]

[Item Drop — Amplification Applied]

Suppressive Wing Fragment ×2000

Allheaven Beast Core (Level 142) ×1000

High-Density Spirit Crystal ×1000

He was already moving to the second island before the drop notifications finished processing.

[Void Stalker]

Threat Level: 145

HP: 79,800 / 79,800 each | Count: 3

Physical Attack: 1,960–2,240

Physical Defense: 1,580–1,840

Magic Resistance: 1,340–1,560

[Ambush predators that phase briefly out of physical space between attacks. The phase transition has a 0.3-second visible shimmer preceding each emergence. Pack awareness allows simultaneous threat response.]

Three of them. The phase shimmer pattern was familiar. He released Celestial Sword Qi in the wide arc mode, the expanded radius covering all three positions simultaneously at the moment their shimmer appeared. The previous iteration of this technique had damaged but not finished the group in one exchange. The current iteration did not leave that question open.

[Void Stalker ×3 Defeated]

[EXP Gained: +23,100 × 3 = +69,300]

[Reward Amplification Triggered — ×1000]

[New EXP Gained: +69,300,000]

[Level Up! — Level 163 → Level 164]

[Level Up! — Level 164 → Level 165]

He didn’t pause. The level notifications appeared in his peripheral awareness the way background sounds do when you are focused on something else. Present, registered, filed.

The third island had a single resident.

[Gravestone Colossus]

Threat Level: 148 𝐟𝕣𝕖𝐞𝐰𝕖𝚋𝐧𝗼𝚟𝐞𝕝.𝗰𝐨𝐦

HP: 98,400 / 98,400

Physical Attack: 2,140–2,480

Physical Defense: 2,280–2,640

Magic Resistance: 1,640–1,920

[A construct-type monster composed of compressed gravitational stone. Standard strikes are less effective. Technique-based attacks that disrupt compression bonds are significantly more effective. Generates irregular pulse-aura shockwaves that increase in frequency as HP decreases.]

The Gravestone Colossus was the heaviest physical defense classification he had encountered in this cluster range. Previously it had required Celestial Sword Qi in the focused beam mode to disrupt the compression bonds effectively. He drew the Celestial Lord Blade directly this time and drove it into the Colossus’s central mass with Resonant Strike active.

The initial strike carried 4,905 attack power scaled through Strength 5,624. The resonance wave detonated from within the target 0.5 seconds later, bypassing surface armor entirely on the secondary burst.

The Colossus registered the combined damage, fractured along its central compression axis, and dissolved.

One exchange.

[Gravestone Colossus Defeated]

[EXP Gained: +28,600]

[Reward Amplification Triggered — ×1000]

[New EXP Gained: +28,600,000]

He crossed to the fourth island. The Greater Qilin followed without needing to be directed, its movement matching his pace the way things do when they have synchronized over enough time that the synchronization is no longer conscious on either end.

[Voidclaw Ravager]

Level: 151

HP: 108,200 / 108,200

Physical Attack: 2,380–2,720

Physical Defense: 1,960–2,260

Magic Resistance: 1,740–2,040

[A predator with four independently articulated limb-claws operating on separate attack trajectories. Covers standard dodge angles simultaneously. Speed is its primary threat. Endurance is lower than its attack profile suggests.]

The four-claw coverage pattern that previously required Phantom Void Step to bypass cleanly now presented a different calculation. With Strength 5,624 and Iron Body Fortification passive active, the threshold at which incoming physical attacks reduced to zero damage had moved significantly upward. He walked into the engagement without repositioning and let one claw strike land while his blade reached the structural gap between the lateral and forward joints.

The claw strike registered against Iron Body Fortification’s threshold and did not penetrate it. His blade finished the exchange in the time the Ravager would have taken to reposition for a second strike.

[Voidclaw Ravager Defeated]

[EXP Gained: +32,400]

[Reward Amplification Triggered — ×1000]

[New EXP Gained: +32,400,000]

[Level Up! — Level 165 → Level 166]

The fifth and sixth islands came in quick succession, a cluster of three Astral Serpents on the fifth and a pair of Nebula Titans on the sixth, both classifications he had catalogued in previous days but was now clearing at a fundamentally different pace.

[Astral Serpent ×3 Defeated]

[EXP Gained: +27,900 × 3 = +83,700]

[Reward Amplification Triggered — ×1000]

[New EXP Gained: +83,700,000]

[Level Up! — Level 166 → Level 167]

[Level Up! — Level 167 → Level 168]

[Nebula Titan ×2 Defeated]

[EXP Gained: +34,800 × 2 = +69,600]

[Reward Amplification Triggered — ×1000]

[New EXP Gained: +69,600,000]

[Level Up! — Level 168 → Level 169]

He moved through the cluster’s interior formation at a pace that the terrain imposed rather than anything he imposed on himself. The island bridges varied in width and stability, some requiring precise footfall, others wide enough to cross at a run. He adjusted without thinking about it, the Predatory Instinct passive providing continuous environmental awareness that extended his effective perception range far enough that he was reading the next island’s monster positioning before he had finished the current engagement.

[Celestial Dreadhorn]

Threat Level: 153

HP: 168,400 / 168,400

Physical Attack: 3,040–3,560 | Physical Defense: 2,860–3,320

Magic Resistance: 2,280–2,640

[A rare elite-class monster evolved beyond standard elite classification through prolonged exposure to the Allheaven Expanse’s concentrated energy currents. Horn channels compressed celestial energy for directed burst attacks. Physical defense is extraordinary. Weak point is the horn base where the energy channel meets the skull structure.]

The Dreadhorn classification that had previously required seventeen exchanges and careful pattern management. He read the HP total, cross-referenced it against his current output, and made the adjustment. Resonant Strike carried to the horn base, the secondary burst detonating from within the skull structure at the weak point rather than at the surface, bypassing the extraordinary physical defense where it was thinnest.

Two exchanges.

The first disrupted the burst charge cycle and dropped the HP by more than half. The second finished it.

[Celestial Dreadhorn Defeated]

[EXP Gained: +54,800 — Rare Elite Bonus Applied]

[Reward Amplification Triggered — ×1000]

[New EXP Gained: +54,800,000]

[Level Up! — Level 169 → Level 170]

[Level Up! — Level 170 → Level 171]

He stopped at level 171 and let the panel update register. The EXP bar showed the current progress against the 171 to 172 threshold, which was substantially larger than the 163 to 164 threshold had been eight levels ago. The exponential cost curve was real and present. Each level was consuming more than the one before it, the multiplier applied to the requirement growing steeper as the level count moved toward and beyond the brackets where even the restricted dungeon circuit had started losing relevance.

He opened the full panel briefly.

Level 171. Strength 5,624. Agility 5,096. Constitution 5,242. Spirit 4,818. The numbers existed on a scale that the hunter classification system had no terminology for. The gap between his current values and the highest recorded values for active hunters worldwide, which the Bureau’s public registry listed somewhere in the 600 to 700 range for the most advanced practitioners, was not a gap that could be described as competitive. It was categorical.

He closed the panel.

The cluster’s interior had more islands ahead. He could see them through the ambient haze of the expanse, the irregular silhouettes of stone formations at varying heights, the faint energy signatures of the monsters that occupied them registering against Predatory Instinct’s passive range.

He kept moving.