Mark stayed in the laboratory for three full days and nights.
Had it not been for Mark undergoing a complete bodily rebirth, cultivating the Blood God Path techniques, and drawing support from Umbrella’s massive blood bank, he might not have endured such an intense process of refining magical artifacts.
At the first layer of Qi Refining, his cultivation was still a bit too low.
Fortunately, this three-day artifact refining marathon yielded extremely bountiful returns.
Artificial blood worth tens of millions was spent freely at his command.
By the time he finished, his cultivation naturally stepped into the second layer of Qi Refining.
The difference between the first and second layers…
well, it wasn’t huge.
Still, an increase in cultivation was worth celebrating nonetheless.
What truly surprised and excited Mark were his gains in magical artifacts and Dao Soldiers.
The Blood God Banner had been successfully refined.
Moreover, because it was crafted as a single, unified whole from a single source material, its quality post-refinement far exceeded Mark’s expectations.
Not only was the banner forged into a mid-tier artifact, but the moon-wolf Dao nature had been perfectly integrated.
Upon the silver banner cloth with crimson patterns, there were not only numerous runic restrictions for drawing, absorbing, controlling, and nourishing blood, but also a condensed crimson crescent moon.
This crimson crescent moon was a remnant Dao-nature spatial dimension.
With this Dao nature, the Blood God Banner gained not only the ability to absorb cosmic starlight and lunar essence, but also an inherent storage space.
This was essentially the ideal Blood God Banner for Mark’s personal Dao path.
Mark’s foundation was the Path of the World.
A Blood God Banner with built-in spatial properties could be used to set up the Blood River Grand Array; once completed, it could condense a Blood River Grotto-Heaven.
Such a Blood River Grotto-Heaven could then be integrated directly into Mark’s own Dao Fruit.
This banner already possessed the potential to become Mark’s natal magic treasure and tool of enlightenment.
Even if Mark chose not to make it his natal magic treasure, possessing a spatial storage artifact in modern society was immensely useful.
Beyond that, the banner’s pole was far from ordinary.
Refined purely from the essence of werewolf bones, the pole had naturally condensed into the shape of a spear.
The spearhead resembled a wolf’s fang, possessing inherent armor-piercing and frenzy traits.
When necessary, wrapping the banner cloth around the shaft transformed it into a formidable melee weapon.
Not to mention, the Blood God Banner was an auxiliary magic treasure capable of bestowing its traits onto others.
Looking at the dense, intricate, and aesthetically captivating runic restrictions upon the banner, Mark smiled warmly.
With a gentle wave, the Blood God Banner rolled its cloth tightly and shrank rapidly, ultimately turning into a ruby cufflink that settled casually against his sleeve. Visit novelping dot com for the full chapter.
Putting away the Blood God Banner, Mark finally turned his attention to the Dao Soldiers produced by his automated combination artifact.
By now, more than half of the dozens of bio-weapons delivered by the company had crumbled, reduced to clusters of lingering fiend-aura floating in midair.
Seeing this, Mark frowned slightly.
The hastily constructed automated combination artifact lab was simply too crude.
Over two-thirds of the prospective Dao Soldiers had been destroyed.
Only twelve Dao Soldiers had successfully taken shape.
Among these twelve were eight Tyrants, two Lickers, and two Zombie Dogs.
Evidently, among Umbrella’s bio-weapons, the humanoid Tyrants were still the most suitable for refining into Dao Soldiers.
Of course, calling these twelve units zombies was no longer accurate.
Over the three days of refinement, all twelve specimens had undergone profound transformations.
The Tyrants grew even taller, surging from two meters to around two point two or two point three meters.
Their pale skin had vanished completely, replaced by full-coverage, red-and-white bone armor.
Overall, the Dao Soldiers looked less like undead monsters and more like sci-fi mecha.
On these soldiers were not only Asura bone blades, but even bone rotary Gatling guns.
When Mark saw them, even he froze in dumbfounded disbelief for a second.
*Wait, when I was refining them, did I forget to strip the modern heavy weaponry off the Tyrants?
Seems I didn’t…
I just shoved the whole package straight into the refining furnace.*
*Bah, what do you mean “forgot”?
This was my intentional master plan all along!*
*Yeah, exactly.
That’s what I intended from the start.*
Wasn’t a Dao Soldier like this ten thousand times cooler than a regular Tyrant zombie?
Looking at that red-and-white mecha armor, even Mark half-wished he could jump into the furnace and refine himself for three days and three nights.
The more he looked, the cooler they seemed.
After circling the mecha Dao Soldiers three full times, Mark finally cast a spell gesture, linking the eight mecha Dao Soldiers to the Blood God Banner.
While this move might forfeit their chance to develop independent sentience and evolve into Asura Generals, it allowed them to be stored within the Blood God Banner’s spatial dimension.
The Blood God Banner wasn’t the signature weapon of the Blood God Path for nothing—its versatility was staggering.
Once Mark refined Blood God Corpuscles and embedded them inside, those corpuscles could function like an AI, operating all of the banner’s features automatically. Find the original chapter at novelping(.)com.
The more corpuscles stationed inside, the higher its intelligence.
At a high enough level, the corpuscles could collaborate to upgrade and temper the banner on their own, to say nothing of mundane tasks like managing Dao Soldiers.
Storing away the mecha Dao Soldiers, the Blood God Banner, bonded to Mark’s mind, automatically relayed the stats and combat capabilities of the mecha Dao Soldiers.
Just as he had anticipated, each Dao Soldier possessed the power of a pseudo Foundation Establishment cultivator.
Against a legitimate cultivator of the same tier, they would be fragile showpieces, easily crushed in a single move.
However, in modern human society, a single mecha Dao Soldier could easily wipe out a mechanized military squad.
Their bone armor resembled a titanium-magnesium alloy; their speed rivaled top supercars; their strength matched a city bus; their bone blades could slice through tanks effortlessly; and their rotary bone guns delivered power comparable to heavy anti-materiel rifles.
For short-term protection on his path, such Dao Soldiers were more than sufficient.
Besides, these mecha Dao Soldiers were newly created; once their numbers grew, he could have them devour one another to condense power.
Their strength could continually increase.
The mecha Dao Soldiers met Mark’s expectations completely.
In comparison, the remaining two types of Dao Soldiers fell somewhat short.
The ones crafted from Lickers…
Well, the refining furnace was a crude makeshift fusion of magic and technology, so a few unexpected defects during the process were perfectly normal.
Defective Dao Soldiers could simply be erased.
With a casual flick of True Qi, Mark blasted the two refined Lickers into clouds of fiend-aura and blood mist.
Next, Mark looked at the last two canine Dao Soldiers.
Having undergone the furnace’s alchemy, the Zombie Dogs no longer looked hideous, bloodthirsty, or rabid.
Instead, in their new form, they looked like divine hellhounds.
Their coats were sleek and smooth, lined beneath with intricate scales etched with Dao patterns.
When those Dao patterns activated, crimson light swirled around them, giving them an imposing, majestic air.
Most importantly, their eyes no longer held mindless fury, but a composed, terrifying zeal for battle.
Clearly, these canine Dao Soldiers were much more likely to awaken sentience and become Asura Generals.
Well…
Asura General didn’t sound right for dogs.
Let me call them Asura Hounds.