Chapter 1983

"Fine by me. This is written in the language of this world. You won't have any trouble reading it."

A large bipedal deer...

Except for its head and body, he was no different from a human, and he was also able to write well. On the parchment paper he threw at Grid, the calligraphy he had just written showed off his elegant brush strokes.

[Breaking Soul Contract]

If either side violates the rules of this contract, their souls will be destroyed and they will die.

1. The two cultivators must compete using the same technique.

2. The choice of mystical art is left to the person who signs the contract, not the writer. However, if the signatory requests a mystical art that cannot be used, the writer has the right to refuse.

3. After the battle of mystical arts, the loser will need to complete three requests for the winner.

'There are three requests.'

The contract clearly stated this strange aspect.

'Did this deer intentionally approach me?'

What did he want? Grid was intrigued.

"There is no need for these three requests, is there?" Grid asked. "I just want to ask you a few questions."

"Yeah, if you win... I'm trying to reduce the number of questions you can ask to three. I don't wanna be kept here all day, you know?"

'Does he think I'm an idiot?'

The deer man's explanation was nothing more than a flimsy excuse. If Grid told him to answer all his questions as one of his three requests, the deer man's logic wouldn't work.

'Well, I just have to win and ask him things that way.'

Grid became more motivated and used his appraisal skill. He wanted to make sure there were no hidden effects in the contract.

The deer man sensed what Grid was doing.

"The Breaking Soul Contract is made by applying the Golden Soul Technique," the demon cultivator explained. "There is no need to doubt it since it is commonly used in various transactions in the cultivation world."

'Is this a type of Golden Soul Technique?'

As expected, the common skills were the most versatile and reliable, no matter the genre of the game.

Grid confirmed there were no problems with the contract and pointed to the signature line.

"Do I write my name here?"

"Yes."

'If I win the match, I have to tell him to hand over the latter part of the Golden Soul Technique as well.'

No, he had to ask the deer man to give him everything he had. Grid took out the fountain pen he had received as a gift from Elizabeth a few years ago and signed the contract.

[The Breaking Soul Contract is working.]

Along with this system message, the contract glowed red and floated in the air before it was torn in half. One half flew into Grid's heart, and the other into the heart of the deer man.

Grid felt a very powerful binding force. He opened his status window and checked. He found that the contract had been signed properly.

"What type of mystical art do you want to compete with?" the deer man asked.

It was clear that he didn't want to waste his time on useless things. Grid thought the same. He already had a plan.

"The Wave Arts."

The name was simple, but this was a top-notch mystical art. He'd got the gist of it from Noe. Once he learned the Wave Arts, he could easily learn other non-attribute skills and be successful in doing so.

This was how difficult the learning conditions were. It was necessary to know how to freely change the power of the spiritual root's attributes to the extent where it could be assimilated into the surrounding environment.

Of course, this wasn't a penalty for Grid, who had learned the Profound Martial Technique and made his spiritual root have no attributes.

"...You want to use Wave Arts?"

The deer man's expression subtly changed. He tilted his head, and so did his large, handsome deer antlers. He looked skeptical.

"Is there a problem?" Grid asked. He was about to tell Noe to take out the Wave Arts book.

"Unfortunately, I haven't learned the Wave Arts."

"Don't you want an easy victory? The Wave Arts is just a basic mystical art, right?"

"A basic one? Hmph. Even though the Wave Arts is a basic elemental art, you shouldn't undermine it. Who can easily learn the Wave Arts unless you are born with a natural physique, have attained the natural state by becoming an immortal, or learned the Profound Martial Technique like you?"

The deer man glared into Grid's ash-colored eyes. Based on the ashen energy around the man and the Wave Arts, he deduced the technique that Grid had learned.

"Dammit... Didn't you say that I have the right to choose the mystical arts?"

"I have the right to refuse. It is stated in the second clause, is it not?"

"You are acting so unfairly despite being the one who came up with this idea... Are you lying when you say you can't use Wave Arts? At this point, I don't think this is just you being prudent. Are all demon cultivators like you?"

"Your words and actions are despicable. The others who call themselves gods have some dignity, at least."

The deer man was mocking on the outside, but he was freaking out on the inside. Of course, he knew how to use the Wave Arts. Unless an immortal created it, there was no technique in the world that a cultivator in the late stage great ascension realm couldn't learn.

But there was a huge difference between knowing how to simply use it and how to use it properly.

Born as a lowly creature, he had survived for a thousand years by pure luck. He developed an ego, studied for thousands of years to become a cultivator, trained for tens of thousands of years to reach his current realm...

Like most demon cultivators, the deer man had continued to evolve thanks to his cautious nature. Had it not been for his personality, he would've been born as a deer and died as one.

"Why did you mention the gods...?" Grid asked. "Have you demon cultivators been to Asgard recently?"

The cultivators called the gods of this world 'beings who claim to be gods.' Grid suspected that the deer man had some type of connection to Asgard.

The deer man looked puzzled. "Asgard? I don't know what that is."

It seemed that he didn't know about the concept of heaven at all, nor did he seem to care about it.

Grid didn't believe him.

'If the gods of the surface, not the ones in heaven, encountered a guy like him, there is no way I wouldn't have known about it.'

The 'gods of the surface' and the 'Overgeared World's gods' were now virtually synonymous with each other. Except for a few, such as Hanul, all the gods on the surface served Grid. If something happened to them, Grid would naturally know.

'He doesn't trust me,' the deer man thought.

He told Grid, "Don't waste any more time and get down to business. Decide on how you want to duel."

The deer man obsessively avoided wild cards. He was confident he could fight his opponent a hundred times and win every time, but he tried not to provide an environment that would prove advantageous to his enemy. This was why he refused the Wave Arts that Grid was most confident in.

The man forced Grid to choose the next best option, not giving him enough time to think too thoroughly. Grid, seemingly relaxed, stared at the man.

"If you didn't learn Wave Arts, that means you haven't mastered the other elemental arts, right?" he asked.

"That's not it. Most common arts have no attributes. I just haven't learned any offensive non-attribute arts, like Wave Arts."

"Is that so?"

Grid scoffed. This guy wasn't a deer. He was a fox in disguise. Grid found it so funny that he couldn't take advantage of the Profound Martial Technique.

He wasn't particularly upset. He didn't place his hopes on Profound Martial Technique. No matter how good it was, it had only two stars, and it wouldn't give him too much of an advantage against a great ascension cultivator.

"Let's compete using the Earth Escape Arts."

"That isn't something I am confident in, but... As you wish."

The Earth Escape Arts was a technique that made the earth shift. It was a basic technique, and it was capable of changing the shape of the land or permeating the land, but it could be utilized in many ways. Thus, all cultivators made it their main technique.

However, the deer said he wasn't confident enough to use it. This guy was truly insidious. Grid snorted.

Noe rummaged through his pockets, and he was about to pull out a book on earth arts. At this time, the only mystical arts that Grid had learned were the Golden Soul Technique and Memory Searching Technique, so he had to learn other mystical arts from scratch.

This was why Noe was frowning. As far as he was concerned, his master was insane. How could he deal with a cultivator who was an Absolute using a skill he hadn't learned yet?

His master wasn't just confident. He was insane. This wasn't arrogance, but madness.

Grid held back Noe, whose eyes were filled with worry and dissatisfaction. "Stay back."

He was rejecting the Earth Escape Arts book.

Noe couldn't stand this anymore and asked, "Did you eat something bad...?"

The ground on which Grid stood swelled rapidly. This was the activation of the Earth God skill. The power to move the earth at will... The potential of this technique was endless as it was controlled with intent.

This was clearly superior to the Earth Escape Arts, which was confined to the framework of the skill and had rules.

"......!"

The ground transformed until it resembled a dragon. Surprised, the deer man decided to hurriedly settle things. He was astonished by Grid's skill in launching the large-scale Earth Escape Arts without giving any warning whatsoever.

'I did say I shouldn't underestimate him.'

Though the human cultivators were fearless, the demon cultivators studied this world carefully. They knew about Grid and the strongest beings in this world. They never underestimated them.

However, when he met Grid, he realized Grid was only in the qi refining realm. This had made the cultivator lower his guard somewhat. Thus, he was even more shocked. Who knew that Grid could make a dragon this size with such a small amount of spiritual energy?

The deer man used the Earth Escape Arts to create three earth dragons. Each one was larger than Grid's single earth dragon. Grid's dragon was about to be eaten.

Kurarararara!

Grid's earth dragon opened its mouth as it was bitten by three earth dragons. A stone pillar bigger than itself popped out, and it looked like a dragon shooting a Breath.

The deer man was surprised by this transformation attack and raised an earth wall, which was much larger than the stone pillars. They collided against the wall.

The deer man's spiritual energy was overwhelmingly superior both quality and quantity wise. Of course Grid's stone pillars would do nothing. They were like raindrops falling into a pond.

At least, that's what the cultivator was expecting...

"What?!"

The deer man's fur stood up. The moment the stone pillar touched the earth wall, thousands of stone spikes stretched out from the other side of the earth wall and reached for the deer man.

This meant that Grid had now complete control of his Earth Escape Arts.

"What trick did you use...?"

The deer man's dismay was cut short halfway through. A blue shield surrounded him. Thousands of stone spikes shattered as they collided with the shield.

Grid's smile could be seen through the cracks in the falling stone fragments.

"If you give up on responding with the Earth Escape Arts and use a shield, that means you have admitted defeat, right?"

The deer man couldn't deny that.

[The 'Breaking Soul Contract' has proven that the signatory is the victor.]

The system also indicated that Grid had won.

Grid didn't start acting arrogant. Instead, he invoked his authority as the winner.

"From now on, you must answer all my questions honestly."

This was the first requirement.

"You must not refuse no matter what I ask of you."

This was the second requirement.

"You can never be hostile to me."

This was the third requirement.

He was clearly putting his foot down. The deer man had completely fallen into Grid's grasp. The cultivator had planned for the opposite to happen. He gritted his teeth.

Grid laughed.

"You shouldn't have been so greedy."