After the first round, the leaderboard was the focus of much discussion. Devil was first, followed by Dynasty, and third place to sixth place were all teams from group B, and the Group C teams were in the lower positions. The battles between strong teams in group C were very intense—most of them won by a small difference—so they did not score many points. However, there were strong ones even among the weaker teams, which was team Tulips that were placed at seventh place. Although their place seemed a little low, their opponent was Tomahawk. Sweden’s Esports had always been strong, and Tomahawk was a very strong team that had the chance to become the champion, yet Tulips could take so many points from them. It was rather terrifying.

Han Xiao recalled the first season league in his previous life, then it occurred to him. Right, the first season champion was French Tulips, these people’s strength is overwhelming. Their class combination, equipment selection, and ability collaboration are almost perfect, and their tactics are seamless. For China, only Dynasty was in top eight; the other two teams did not even qualify for the finals.

Looking down, the scores of eighth place to seventeenth place were the same.

This was just the first round so the ranking did not matter too much. Every team still had eleven more matches, so the final result was far from being decided.

The popularity of the Singles was high too, as one versus one has always been. Frenzied Sword barely won the first match, King Admiral won as well, but SnowFlower lost. SnowFlower was a feminine man, and his fans called him ‘Sister Snow’. Among all the contestants from China, he was the only one that lost, which was regretful.

After completing the matches, the Chinese players found Han Xiao to repair their mechanical suits. During the competition, these pro players did not hold back in spending all their Enas on enhancing their mechanical equipment. Han Xiao accepted the request with a smile—it was because of the player’s continuous hard work that he had accumulated close to 800,000 Enas. It was enough to even buy a spaceship.

Of course, he was definitely not going to buy a spaceship. Why would he buy one when he could take rides on others’ spaceships?

The competition carried on. The Chinese teams doing very well. Although they did meet strong teams and faced tough fights, they still won in the end. Han Xiao filtered the equipment that he sold to them. Although NCO Class armor was strong, it was not invincible. Players were all at max level 60 and had gathered the best equipment in their area, so their equipment was not bad either. They might even have something hidden up their sleeves that could turn the tables completely in important times.

Although China’s raw strength was at the top, the competitions were very unpredictable, and there were countless examples of the weaker ones winning through tactics.

Han Xiao was definitely not going to sell the core equipment ahead of schedule—he would not destroy his sales plan for the sake of helping China get better results. He had yet to even figure out what was happening to him in this world, so he did not have the time to control the players’ competition. Furthermore, the league was a business opportunity in his eyes. His main goal was to let the players showcase how good the equipment that he sold was so that he could expand his potential market. As long as the result was not too bad, it was enough for him.

After several battles, all the teams had a clearer understanding of the other teams and had designed specific tactics; China was no exception.

The strongest point of the Chinese teams came from those mechanical suits and weapons from Black Star. As long as they could deal with that, their threat would decrease tremendously!

Therefore, the next few opponents that China met with all changed their class combination, adding a Psychic.

In the earlier stages, the Psychic class was not one of but the biggest nemesis of the Mechanic class. Not only could they control objects, but their psychic attacks completely ignored physical armor. For the Mage class, their Psychological Resistance was high, so they could at least block it to a certain extent, the Pugilist class could reduce the duration of negative effects, and the Esper class was made up of extremely lucky people, so it could not be considered as an example. Hence, the Mechanic class was the only one left that was targeted by it.

Mechanics depended on machinery to battle, so they were usually weak. Psychics just happened to be able to deal direct damage to the user through physical armor. Plus, there were many methods of mind-controlling, such as illusion, confusion, fear, and many other debuffs. Furthermore, their attack range was very long, and the attacks ignored terrain. The minimal level of skills needed to play this class was just a little bit more than Pugilists.

When faced with such specific tactics, the specialness of the Chinese teams was shown. Although they were wearing armor, they were Pugilists and Espers. Despite the Psychics reducing the effects of the armor and dragging them down from the top place, the strength of the Chinese teams was still top tier. The opponent still had to face a group of top tier pro players.

Other than the Psychic class, the Mage class’ elemental, corrosive, and curse spells also reduced the effects of mechanical suits. Of course, while they could reduce the effects of mechanical suits, they were paper-like themselves.

The very existence of the armor forced these teams to spend more effort to deal with it; its strength was clearly shown. This thing could be used by all classes and provided comprehensive enhancements. It was like they wore a turtle shell with spikes that had an extra bar of health and were given the ability of ranged damage output. If the margin for error for normal teams was three, China’s was ten!

The enhancement was too tremendous!

Even with a certain level of damage adjustments and balancing, it was impossible to cancel out China’s equipment advantage.

Actually, in Version 2.0 or 3.0, basically, everyone had a mechanical suit. Since everyone had one, the difference was in the performance of the mechanical suits, and that difference would not be as huge as it was now. Sadly, characters that sold armor in the first version were extremely rare, and even if they did, they were selling rough, semi-finished ones. Han Xiao was the one and only place that provided high-quality armor and related services.

However, these specific tactics did have an effect. The Chinese teams’ damage taken increased clearly. Everyone was a strong team from their area, so they could not defeat all of them in an overwhelming fashion. The matches after were all back and forth; it was exciting and intense.

The rankings on the leaderboard fluctuated every day. Dynasty and Devil faced each other once, and Dynasty won with a slight advantage, placing them at the top of the leaderboard and attracting a lot of attention.

Such results made Chinese spectators feel very proud. Every time a Chinese team or player was having a match, they would definitely be waiting on the forums for it to start. Not only the Chinese fans, but quite a number of foreign viewers became fans of Dynasty because of their performance. The popularity of the matches involving China was at the top three.

Comparing to the tragedy in the previous life, this was a complete change.

On the other hand, Long Sky and Temple of God, who were in group C, were not doing very well. They were drifting between the eighth and twelfth place, at the edge of being unable to qualify. The competition was very intense.

…

In an unused alloy room in Black Star’s stronghold that was modified into a prison cell, Rezar was still imprisoned. His hands were fixed tightly on the metal bed, and a few needles were inserted into his body and kept that way, injecting nutrients and sedatives. His eyes were filled with emptiness, and his face was completely stiff.

He was being used as material for the extractor. He had no freedom and was tortured till he was nearly not a person anymore. His magic would be extracted as soon as he recovered any, not giving him even the slightest hope.

The door opened. Han Xiao walked in, glanced and him, and refilled the nutrients without stopping, even humming while he worked. He completely ignored Rezar’s tragic state, like a doctor that was used to life and death. He then took out the extractor and extracted Rezar’s blood as usual.

Red and slightly illuminated blood flew through the pipe and into the tube, turning into a new Ability Potion. Han Xiao had already made eight potions.

Rezar turned his head, looked at Han Xiao, and opened his mouth to speak. His voice was so hoarse that it was almost silent. “Are you planning to imprison me forever?”

“Of course, not forever.” Han Xiao raised his eyebrows and said, “Do you think you can live that long?”

“Can we make a deal? You let me free, and I can give you everything that I have and work for you. I just wanted to come to the higher world and satisfy my desire for knowledge. I don’t oppose working for anyone,” Rezar said in a pleading tone.

Han Xiao picked up the new Ability Potion and shook it. He turned around to look at Rezar, smiled, and said, “I already have your everything.”

“You! Are! So! Evil!” Rezar clenched his teeth tightly, his eyes filled with bottomless hatred and despair.

“I won’t do this to the innocent. If you were a normal person, maybe I would pity you, but you’re an evil person that almost killed millions of lives. Hehe, do you think I should pity you? That would be an insult to the millions of lives you almost took.

Han Xiao’s heart was never shaken. He had been through the dark times of being imprisoned by the Germinal Organization and being a test subject, so he knew very well how it felt. He was very happy to let people like Rezar experience it too.

He knew that he was not a forgiving and kind person.

“Look forward to the day of you dying. That is your last hope of feeling relieved,” Han Xiao said coldly and closed the door, leaving Rezar screaming in agony and despair.

After returning to his room, Han Xiao sterilized the extractor and laid out all the Ability Potions. They all had tags on them. With the popularity of the league, he was planning to sell these potions to the players.

Looking at these potions, the Great Mechanic Han suddenly had an idea.

The extractor can only generate potions when used on an NPC. If I extract my own genes… will it work?

Han Xiao was interested. He washed the extractor again and pressed it down on his arm. He changed the output of it to the lowest level.

_____________

You are using [Super-Gene Extractor – Test Version] on yourself.

_____________

A sense of weakness appeared and penetrated his body instantly. Han Xiao raised his eyebrow and did not stop until the entire tube was filled.

_____________

You have received [Ability Potion] x 1.

_____________

It worked! Han Xiao’s eyes sparkled. He then looked at his character interface. He had received a [Weakened] debuff for twelve hours, reducing all his attributes by thirty percent. He was feeling a little bit powerless and sluggish.

He did not mind it. He was resting in Juberly Hub, so there would not be any fighting for this period. Thus, being weak for a short period was not a problem.

What effect will my Ability Potion have?

Han Xiao was extremely curious.

It’s too much of a waste if I drink it myself. I have ready-made customers.