Xu Fu himself wasn’t especially powerful.
It was purely the mechanic that made him miserable to fight.
With his preparations already in place, Roy cleared the Fusang dungeon without much trouble.
Xu Fu’s expression turned hollow with defeat:
“If this is what you’re after, then take the elixir.”
“In the end, this old man never did finish his final research.”
Xu Fu seemed to collapse, handing over a gourd.
[World-tier Item: Gourd of Immortal Longevity]
[A wondrous gourd brewed by Xu Fu.
It appears to draw in the natural energy of heaven and earth, automatically producing elixirs on its own.]
[Effect: Produces 10 elixirs of varying effects each day, ranging from HP restoration, MP restoration, temporary attack boosts, and cures for all manner of poison.]
The Gourd of Immortal Longevity was, in effect, a fully automatic alchemy furnace, no materials needed at all, churning out ten elixirs a day, any time.
The elixir system in Yggdrasil ranked at the very bottom of the pecking order.
Costly to make, and weak in effect.
As an example, an elixir that cost a million gold coins to brew still wouldn’t outperform a single buff cast by a spellcaster.
The only upside was that in top-tier fights, any extra stat boost helped, however small.
But given the cost, ordinary players almost never bothered with elixirs unless they were locked in some bitter personal PvP feud.
On top of that, elixirs came with a special compatibility quirk.
They existed to prop up and balance out weak classes like Immortal Sage, which was exactly why the class had an elixir effect twice as strong as any other class’s.
That was the only thing that brought the otherwise underwhelming Immortal Sage class up to a normal level of strength.
That was just how the company operated, giving even the weakest classes some kind of floor to stand on.
But factoring in the time and cost of brewing, the value proposition still wasn’t great.
But now that Roy had the Gourd of Immortal Longevity in hand, stockpiling elixirs over time and popping the right ones before a fight could get him a genuinely normal level of strength.
On top of that, the gourd occasionally produced top-grade elixirs too.
The Immortal Sage class’s real shining moment came from chugging a pile of top-grade elixirs and unleashing immortal magic.
The reason whales never bothered with this class was simply that the return on investment was too low.
If you were going to spend real money either way, classes like World Calamity offered a much better return.
The Gourd of Immortal Longevity closed that gap.
Sure, it was a fairly ordinary World-tier item on paper, but it could genuinely swing a fight.
But that wasn’t even the important part.
The moment the player picked up the gourd, the Fusang dungeon began to collapse.
Because the gourd itself had been the dungeon’s anchor point all along.
Now was the moment!
The instant he handed over the gourd, Xu Fu dissolved into an afterimage and lunged straight for the largest tree on the island: the Ancient Fusang Tree!
Because hidden inside the Ancient Fusang Tree was the single most important World-tier item in the entire world.
The World Tree Sapling.
Xu Fu had discovered the not-yet-grown leaf, and had been using the Ancient Fusang Tree as nourishment, cultivating the World Tree Sapling all along.
Only now, with the world on the verge of destruction, was the sapling finally beginning to sprout.
With no time left to spare, Xu Fu, having lost the fight, decided to fuse his own soul with the World Tree Sapling and escape into the new world.
“Let go of what’s mine!”
Taia Sword: Sweep the Six Directions!
Just as Xu Fu was about to merge with the Ancient Fusang Tree, a blade of pure sword energy came crashing down from the sky.
Qin Shi Huang had arrived.
“The First Emperor!!!”
Xu Fu let out a scream of despair, and just like that, Qin Shi Huang cut down his very last soul.
The same terrifying blade of energy sliced clean through the Ancient Fusang Tree in the same stroke.
The massive ancient tree split open, revealing a single sapling nestled at the very center of its trunk.
That’s right.
This was the World Tree Sapling.
It could only ever be born at the exact moment the whole world moved toward its own destruction.
Even on the test server, Roy had never gotten to experience this scene in full.
He’d only ever read through the design notes. Follow the newest chapters on g.com.
Because it was tied directly to the game’s shutdown.
Seeing the World Tree Sapling, Qin Shi Huang looked overjoyed:
“A life as long as heaven and earth themselves, a glory to rival the sun and moon.
This, at last, is true immortality.”
“You’ve achieved a feat beyond compare.
Serve under me, and I will take you all with me when I leave this world.”
But Roy was already standing right in front of the World Tree Sapling.
“Your Majesty, I’m afraid I can’t let you have this.”
Handing over the World Tree Sapling would genuinely have come with a huge reward.
The entire treasury of Qin, his for the taking.
But none of it came close to the World Tree Sapling’s own value.
“Oh?
So you want this treasure for yourself too.”
“A shame.”
“Whoever stands against me will be utterly destroyed.”
After the brutal fight against Xu Fu, if he couldn’t beat Qin Shi Huang too, none of it would have meant anything.
Roy answered, neither arrogant nor timid:
“Your Majesty, the World Tree Sapling is nothing but a game item.”
“It can’t possibly carry Your Majesty into another world.”
Even the fight to claim the World Tree Sapling was, at the end of the day, just scripted content the designers had cooked up.
Qin Shi Huang laughed loudly:
“I don’t need you to remind me of that.”
“I know full well this is all scripted.
I know the World Tree Sapling is nothing more than a sapling, and might not even survive the end of everything.”
“But I refuse to give up.
I will have it, one way or another.”
“A king deserves a king’s farewell.”
“If you still intend to stand in my way, the iron cavalry of Qin will grind you to nothing!”
“And you’ll lose everything you’ve gained besides.”
“Give up now.
Only a true king could ever stand against me.”
Qin Shi Huang’s presence deepened into something immense, and Roy, along with the NPCs he’d brought, was pulled into a special, ancient battlefield.
Refuse to back down, and he’d have to stake every World-tier item he had.
Lose, and he’d walk away with nothing at all.
Roy called out, loud and clear:
“My apologies for trying to talk Your Majesty down with mere words a moment ago.”
“I am the World King, and I too intend to claim the World Tree Sapling.”
“If Your Majesty wins, I will hand over my crown without complaint.”
Roy understood: this was it, the final dungeon of the Eastern realm.
And that meant carrying himself with the bearing of a true king.
Without staking World-tier items of his own, there was no way to beat Qin Shi Huang at all.
“Good!”
“Very good.
Now this is a battle worthy of a king’s farewell.”
“Come, then.
Let us fight.”
Just entering this fight required staking at least one World-tier item.
But staking only one item made beating this final boss all but impossible.
Because Qin Shi Huang had an absurdly broken mechanic: Domain of the First Emperor.
For as long as even a single soldier of the Qin iron cavalry remained standing, Qin Shi Huang himself could never be brought down.
Every last mob had to be cleared first.
Stake too few World-tier items, and his summon rate would outpace what even a hundred World Champions combined could ever clear.
Even with Kingdom-Toppling Silver Bullet, Roy couldn’t necessarily wipe them all out.
Roy staked every single World-tier item he owned, which genuinely surprised Qin Shi Huang:
“A king’s bearing, indeed.
I acknowledge you.”
No, not really.
He’d just known the quest inside and out thanks to the backend.
Genuinely embarrassing, if he thought about it too hard.
Roy knew perfectly well he was nowhere near an actual king.
He just had enough greed, paired with enough restraint.
He’d only ever taken this fight because he already knew, for a fact, that he’d win.
Come, Valkyries!
World-tier items could still be used even while staked.
Even with ninety-nine NPCs at his side, this fight would’ve genuinely strained Roy.
The key was clearing the mobs fast, or Qin Shi Huang’s special mechanic would grind him down completely.
Because Qin Shi Huang had yet another special mechanic.
The King’s Pressure.
In this fight, no player had access to revival at all.
The instant someone died, a matching soldier would be spawned and added straight into the Qin army.
Which meant if you lost the opening wave, everything after it only got harder.
So Roy opened with his biggest move right from the start.
Valkyrie’s Bloom!
All thirteen Valkyries unlocked their boss-tier power, joining Roy’s Kingdom-Toppling Silver Bullet to annihilate the Qin iron cavalry.
Qin Shi Huang was a pure mechanic-gated boss.
Any player who didn’t already understand the mechanic would almost certainly get wrecked on their very first attempt.
Unfortunately for him, his opponent wasn’t playing by the rules at all.
He was the only person alive who already knew the entire quest’s story.
Kingdom-Toppling Silver Bullet poured across the battlefield without pause, and thanks to executing every step exactly right, even Qin Shi Huang couldn’t hold out to the end.
A thunderous boom!
Qin Shi Huang never actually fell.
His body simply turned translucent.
“Your strength, I acknowledge it.”
“The World King, is it?”
“Let’s settle this again, in the new world.”
“The most important treasure of Qin, I leave to you.”
Stake enough World-tier items, and earn Qin Shi Huang’s recognition, and defeating him would net you yet another World-tier item.
[World-tier Item: Heirloom Seal of the Realm]
[Effect 1: On any battlefield the King stands upon, as long as a single soldier remains, the King cannot fall.
Soldiers absorb damage meant for the King.]
[Effect 2: Anyone loyal to the King can instantly reach the King’s side at any time.]
[Effect 3: The larger the territory the King rules, the higher the cap on how many loyal subjects the Seal can support.]
Roy’s heart leapt.
What an absurdly powerful World-tier item.
In group combat, this was basically unbeatable.
As long as a single ally stood, he couldn’t die.
Pair that effect with Roy’s tens of thousands of NPCs, and his effective survivability shot clean through the roof.
World-tier items really were the official, sanctioned cheat codes.
Now, all that was left was the single most precious item among all two hundred World-tier items in the game.
The World Tree Sapling.