When the plot-skips players into the game world Chapter 1082: 418: If I Fail, I'll Have to Take Over the Fam

Chapter 1082: Chapter 418: If I Fail, I’ll Have to Take Over the Family Business

Because Path Power originates from when Lord Candle Master burned away the Sin Thorn, and the holy number of Candle Master is three… that’s why the ascension ritual always presents three options.

This ti, six Path traits have exploded all at once. And half of them are Devotion, the other half Transcendence—

“Is this a choice involving two Path traits this ti?”

Aiwass pondered.

He still had sufficient ti to deliberate… because this ti, the ascension ritual was short, the pace exceedingly swift, and there was still a long, long ti before dawn.

The first to be excluded were the two purple traits.

This was a crescent ascension ritual from four to five—already at the difficulty level where gold traits are guaranteed. To choose purple traits would equate to wasting a gold trait. With his Mana Points already sufficient and no intention to pursue further Elental Affinity, he didn’t need to even glance their way.

Among the remaining four Path traits, the first trait Aiwass excluded was [Elental Emperor].

The dual attributes of Light and Darkness were imnsely important to him and could not be forsaken.

This ascension ritual had already proven that the “Four-colored Wings,” representing the Endless Knot, was a kind of “wrong future.” He must achieve “Six-colored Wings” to have a chance to contend with the Serpent Celestial Marshal.

Choosing this trait would an that in the Heavenly Battle against the formidable Celestial Marshal, Aiwass could only use Four-color Elental Magic. For him, this would undoubtedly be a detrint.

Moreover, [Transcendent Snake] was a choice that, as a Transcender, Aiwass could not possibly skip.

—This trait was one not available as a selectable option within the ga.

Its nasake trait served as a catch-up chanism designed for newcors or players lagging in progress.

If the dungeon was not the current version’s difficult instance, but one from a previous version or the main quest of the current version, and if players experienced party-wide annihilation in it even once, all players would receive an 8% bonus to all attributes. Depending on the dungeon’s lagging progress, this bonus could stack three to eight tis.

For example, in an era when level 90 was the norm, if newcors repeatedly wiped out in level 60-era difficult dungeons… [Transcendent Snake] could stack up to a maximum of 64% bonus to all attributes. This straightforward strength was sufficient to enable novices and rookies to easily bypass so stages prone to party-wide annihilation.

In this world, Aiwass as a Transcender was almost certain to confront powerful enemies. Currently, based on his “Divinity” priority enhancents, he essentially only had the scales granted by the Silver-Crowned Dragon. Outside situations of “attacking oath violators,” he was quite prone to maxing out the 2 priority in Heavenly Battle scenarios.

With just one more unconditional priority source from elsewhere, Aiwass could intervene in the Heavenly Battle at the Fifth Power Level!

What truly made Aiwass indecisive, however, was actually the two traits from the Path of Devotion:

[Endless rcy (Gold): Your healing can resurrect the recently deceased.]

[Si Zhu’s Horn (Gold): You drink the blood at Candle Master’s neck and beco the Son of Candle.]

These two traits were also rare ones unavailable as player choices.

He had no way of knowing [Endless rcy]’s trigger conditions—the specific duration for “recently deceased,” nor did he know whether this effect ca with any drawbacks or internal cooldowns. Similarly, he was ignorant of what being the “Son of Candle” signified.

Without an informational advantage, he couldn’t guarantee he would pick the optimal trait…

Did it an he had to choose blindly?

However…

Only at this mont did Aiwass realize sothing entirely different.

Unlike every previous ascension ritual.

This ti, after offering him blood, Candle Master surprisingly did not leave!

He simply stood nearby, quietly observing as Aiwass made his decision.

“…Lord Candle Master.”

Aiwass didn’t hesitate but directly opened his mouth to seek help—after all, he was sothing akin to a Pope, and seeking his god’s guidance in tis of uncertainty was perfectly reasonable: “Could you explain [Endless rcy] and [Si Zhu’s Horn] to ?”

“Of course. After all, both traits co directly from .”

Candle Master seed long prepared, answering calmly and evenly: “Your understanding of the Candle Celestial Marshal already includes these two Path traits.”

He remained here, as if specifically to provide Aiwass the answers he sought.

And upon hearing this, Aiwass began to understand—

The Candle Celestial Marshal, the only Celestial Marshal to voluntarily descend into the Material Realm to be slain, featured dungeons whose nas were not “Campaign of Repulsion,” “Campaign of Extermination,” or “Campaign of Annihilation,” but rather “Trial Campaign,” “Examination Campaign,” and “Ultimate Examination Campaign.”

And the Candle Celestial Marshal’s most potent trait was that nearly unrestricted resurrection ability.

In the Candle Celestial Marshal’s first stage, he brought along two Papal Guards and continually applied various group-wide buffs onto them. If they weren’t killed, the buffs stacked continuously; if killed, the Candle Celestial Marshal ceased applying buffs and instead resurrected them three seconds later. In the second stage, after resurrecting them, he sang a chanism capable of party-wide annihilation that lasted six seconds.

In the highest-difficulty “Ultimate Examination Campaign,” Candle Celestial Marshal started directly with six Papal Guards—three sets of Guards and one set of Guards presented entirely different levels of pressure. That seemingly endless resurrection capability left players utterly unnerved.

Thus, defeating the Candle Celestial Marshal hinged on controlling the Guards’ health, ensuring they died sequentially and that their deaths all occurred within nine seconds.

The key lay in using the Guards’ deaths to interrupt Candle Master’s long cast tis for high-risk special actions, creating opportunities to strike his main body.

By utilizing this approach, players could negate all buffs, delay Candle Master’s special actions, and ensure the newly revived batch of Guards lacked any frightening buffs. Furthermore, Candle Master would be forced to resurrect the Guards continuously, leaving him defenseless for an extended “damage window.”

If defeated by Candle Master, players couldn’t respawn at revival points, nor could they receive the unique battle resurrection from player Priests. Instead, they were directly revived by Candle Master and isolated outside the battlefield—because they had already been revived, they couldn’t be revived again.

Thus, the Candle Master Trial Campaign was a uniquely “non-death” battle mode.

—This battle was genuinely a “Trial Campaign.”

This fight itself wasn’t excessively difficult—making one or two mistakes wouldn’t spell doom unless compounded. It conveyed one core lesson to players—so bosses’ minions needed their health controlled but not killed.

This was a very classic MMORPG-style boss fight chanism and marked the first ti such a health-control, non-kill chanic appeared in the ga “Ring of Ouroboros.”

If players were reckless, prematurely killing one or two Guards, they would likely struggle during subsequent health control sequences to kill revitalized Guards returning to full health. They would then helplessly watch as buffed Guards rampaged unchecked. If unable to resist and mass-targeted those Guards again, chaos would ensue. If Candle Master twice consecutively sang the party-wide annihilation chanism, players inevitably fell en masse.

“The ability provided by [Endless rcy] is literal resurrection. So long as the recipient’s death occurred within three seconds and their physical injuries could be repaired sufficiently to “allow them to survive” through your healing, they would revive imdiately. Without any restrictions, without any costs… once possessing this trait, for you, there would no longer be ‘those who could have been saved if only you’d arrived a mont sooner,’ or ‘those killed unexpectedly due to an oversight.’

“Its flaw, however, lies in the inability to use this resurrection thod on yourself. Because rcy is not sothing one can grant oneself.”

Candle Master spoke softly: “As for [Si Zhu’s Horn]… that is a power to summon miracles.

“Have you heard of [symbolism] or [totems]? Certain esoteric texts may also refer to them as [mythic stances]. This draws directly upon the symbolic strength deep within the Source River.

“This Path trait allows brief access to the essence of civilization within the Source River, granting you godlike privileges. The side effect, however, is… the more you use this ability, the more you will gradually grow antlers and acquire the form of a deer.

“This power enables you to aid anyone you wish to save—whether due to tree petrification, amberfication, stone petrification… reviving a corpse whose soul still lingers inside, or transcendent beings suffering spiritual aberrations or Path deviations. The [Fla of Civilization] can burn away all darkness—as long as you’re willing to pay enough of a price, it can even revive a soul already returned to the Source River. As long as the soul hasn’t been shattered and recollected, anything is still possible.

“The cost, however, is that the more you use this power, the more you’ll resemble . You will grow antlers, and your soul will be purified, while ‘impurities’ from other Paths will be progressively filtered away by the power of the Source River.

“When your soul wholly synchronizes with the Third Source River, you will beco like ‘Ann,’ that child—taking the humanoid form with a deer body. To continue using the power thereafter would result in full transformation, resembling entirely.”

Ann Eternal—that was the na of the first Pope of Eternity.

And also the real na of the Candle Celestial Marshal.

“If I end up like that… what will happen to ?”

Aiwass couldn’t help but ask.

“—When that ti cos, take my place.”

Candle Master simply smiled: “That would be the price of succumbing to the temptation of Devotion.”