Bai Chen carefully felt the power boost brought by Aura Hardening.
Inside the arena, he wreaked havoc for roughly five minutes.
Then, the black aura covering his body gradually faded away, and an overwhelming wave of exhaustion surged up from deep within.
It was a kind of weakness that could not be resisted at all.
"So this really is a gamble that stakes all of my stamina."
Under normal Aura Transformation, Bai Chen's overall attributes increased by twenty percent, allowing him to fight at high intensity for over an hour.
Limit Aura Transformation pushed that further—unlocking more aura, raising all attributes by forty percent, but cutting sustained combat time down to half an hour.
Aura Hardening, however, was far more violent and far more dangerous than either of the previous two.
By forcing aura directly into his body, it granted a full one-hundred-percent increase to all attributes.
If that was stacked with Ultimate Aura Field's 1.7× boost, Bulk Up's 1.7× increase to strength and defense, and High-Speed Movement's 1.7× speed amplification—
At full output, Bai Chen could briefly achieve nearly 3.4× overall attribute enhancement, and almost 5.7× amplification to strength, defense, and speed.
This far exceeded the limits of all his previous techniques.
At the same time, Bai Chen clearly felt the shackles.
With his current physical strength, sixfold enhancement across all aspects was already the absolute limit.
No matter how powerful the buffing techniques were, they still relied on his flesh as the foundation.
He could not violate the limits of his own body and wield power he was fundamentally unable to bear.
Bai Chen murmured,
"In Aura Hardening, I can only maintain peak output for five to six minutes at most. Once it ends, my combat power will drop by at least ninety-nine percent. This technique can only be used as a final, all-or-nothing move."
│ "You're even more shocking than your Nergigante."
The Commander walked over slowly, holding a bottle of potion. He tossed it to Bai Chen.
│ "You look exhausted. Drink a recovery potion and catch your breath."
"Thank you, Commander."
Bai Chen took it without ceremony, popped the cork, and gulped it down in one go.
After the potion settled, the crushing weakness finally eased a little.
The Commander glanced around.
On a nearby lookout platform, he spotted Nergigante and Little Cosmog basking in the sunlight.
Little Nebula leaned against Nergigante, greedily absorbing the light energy from the sky.
Two beings from entirely different worlds—yet they looked strangely harmonious together.
Then the Commander looked toward the center of the arena.
There stood Basarios, whose body seemed to have expanded by another two sizes.
The Commander muttered inwardly,
The companions are already this monstrous… and even the master himself is absurdly strong.
│ "Commander, do you have some urgent task for me?"
Bai Chen asked.
The Commander should have been directing operations in the Great Ravine. The fact that he had come back personally meant this was definitely not just a casual visit.
│ "Yes. There is indeed an important task I need to entrust to you."
The Commander withdrew his gaze from Basarios and asked first,
│ "Your companion Cosmog can teleport between the Coral Highlands and Astera, correct?"
"That distance is within range."
The Commander's eyes lit up.
│ "Then can it teleport a Starship back as well?"
"That won't work. Teleporting a single monster is already Cosmog's current limit. A Starship is far too massive."
│ "That's unfortunate."
The Commander muttered softly. Bai Chen had already guessed his intentions.
"You want to bring back the Third Fleet scholars?"
│ "Correct. We urgently need their twenty years of accumulated research data. In addition, the study of Zorah Magdaros requires their participation."
"I see. While Cosmog can't teleport their Starship, bringing dozens of people back along with some documents is still possible."
│ "That will do. Could you make a trip to the Third Fleet's research base and bring them all to the Great Ravine?"
"Not a problem. However, it will have to be three days from now. Please have them prepare in advance. I'll arrive at the research base in three days."
Bai Chen planned to deal with Kirin first before heading there.
│ "Do you have another mission to handle?"
The Commander asked instinctively.
"There is something urgent I need to take care of."
For now, Bai Chen had not told the Commander about establishing relations with the Ancient Wyverians.
He planned to wait until they successfully cultivated Fruits, then inform the Commander and bring the results back directly.
Seeing that Bai Chen did not intend to elaborate, the Commander wisely chose not to press further.
│ "Stay safe. If you encounter trouble you can't handle, fire a signal flare. Any nearby hunters will come to your aid."
"Understood."
Bai Chen called Cosmog over and had it teleport the Commander back to the Great Ravine.
He then returned to the center of the arena and checked on Basarios's condition.
After a night of transformation and growth, fiery red, high-temperature cracks had appeared across the rock plates on its back.
"It looks like once this awakening ends, Basarios will truly evolve into Gravios."
Seeing that Basarios would not awaken anytime soon, Bai Chen recalled Nergigante into its ball.
He took Cosmog to the dining area, ate a hearty meal, then packed food and headed straight for the forge.
Before even entering, he heard the rhythmic clang of a hammer striking metal.
Inside the workshop, he saw Tinkatuff leading the remaining smiths through the final stages of work.
After waiting more than half an hour, the upgrades and Flame-Soul Bomb forging were finally completed.
"Thank you all for your hard work. This is lunch I prepared for everyone."
Bai Chen had brought meals not only for Tinkatuff but for all the smiths as well.
He let Tinkatuff distribute the food while he donned the Lagiacrus armor set.
During the fight with Nergigante, the armor had been crushed into a deep dent and was basically scrap.
Now, with Tinkatuff's help, it had finally been restored.
After reinforcement with Armor Spheres, its defensive performance had also improved slightly.
From its previous stats—
Lightning Resistance (40), Defense (200),
to—
Lightning Resistance (50), Defense (230).
The improvement was modest, barely pushing it into high-rank territory.
Bai Chen sighed inwardly,
"Is there really no armor that can scale with my strength? Can the system reward me with one someday?"
His growth rate was simply too fast.
So fast that armor he had considered excellent just a month ago was already becoming obsolete.
With Aura Hardening active, his own defensive power already exceeded that of this Lagiacrus set.
If not for its strong lightning resistance, he would hardly bother wearing it anymore.
After equipping the armor, Bai Chen checked his three blades.
All three had received solid upgrades after being reinforced with Ore Spheres by Tinkatuff.
Like the armor, they had reached the threshold of high-rank weapons.
He strapped the blades to his back, then picked up the eight Fire-Soul Bombs crafted by Tinkatuff.
He had originally wanted ten, but due to time constraints and material loss during forging, only eight were completed.
He stowed the bombs into his backpack.
│ "Ya-ma."
After distributing the meals, Tinkatuff came over and asked about the fit and performance of his equipment.
"There are no issues at all. It fits perfectly."
Products made by Tinkatuff were always top-tier.
"I'm heading out to challenge Kirin. I'll leave Basarios in your care for now."
│ "Ya-ma."
Tinkatuff nodded.
In the next instant, Bai Chen had Cosmog teleport them straight to Coral Village.
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