Chapter 541

According to Apheta 00’s calculations, Prince Andre still has a seventy percent chance of winning? After glancing at the Cleaner’s head that Apheta 00 was using to speak, it was hard to judge whether this was true or just a bluff. Leon fell into contemplation for a moment, then squinted his eyes and said, “Let’s assume everything you’ve said is true. Since you’re not on the same page as Prince Andre and don’t want him to win, how do you plan to help us? Are you going to betray him once I charge into Research Zone 1?”

“That’s impossible~”

The sixth Cleaner’s head shook and said,

“During the soul encoding experiments, in order to gain Fein’s support, I had to add a top-priority instruction to the soul encoding base of all ‘Artifacts,’ which forbids any recipient of the soul encoding from disobeying the commands of the holder of the Time Sharing Scepter.”

“The Time Sharing Scepter?”

“The Time Sharing Scepter is one of a pair of anomalous items passed down through the Crocodile Kingdom, with the peculiar ability to confuse time perception.”

Apheta 00 explained: “The person chosen by the Time Scepter will experience an hour as brief as a minute, while the person chosen by the Share Scepter will feel a minute as long as an hour.”

“A time-based anomalous item?!”

“Not quite what you mean. Taking the Time Scepter held by each generation’s king as an example, it merely makes an hour ‘seem’ like a minute, not actually ‘turn’ an hour into a minute.

Simply put, the Time Sharing Scepter confuses time perception, increasing reaction speed sixtyfold, and then locks onto the opponent with sixty times the reaction speed, slowing their response rate to one-sixtieth of its original, without truly manipulating time.”

Even if it’s not a time-based anomalous item, isn’t that f***ing awesome?

Just imagining the consequences of your reaction speed being slowed sixtyfold while the opponent’s increases sixtyfold startled not only the three Level 2 Cleaners but even made Leon involuntarily suck in a breath of cold air.

Sixty times sixty equals a whopping three thousand six hundred times difference in reaction speed, and if speed could keep up with reaction, it would be enough to let an ordinary ant chase a high-speed train.

No wonder Apheta 00 said Andre still has a seventy percent chance of winning; with such a monstrous anomalous item in hand, our side having a thirty percent chance would already be a generous gift.

“Don’t worry, the Time Sharing Scepter isn’t that powerful.”

Seeing Leon silent, seemingly worried about losing confidence to fight against Andre, the seventh Cleaner’s head quickly reassured, “Only members of the Crocodile Royal Family can use these two scepters, and the consumption is also very high, roughly one point of Leon Value corresponds to one minute of effect.

For someone with one point of Leon Value, it can only make another person’s one minute become fifty-nine seconds, with an increase effect of only one-sixtieth. Even for someone with ten points of Leon Value, they can only improve their reaction speed by ten percent.”

After listening to Apheta 00’s words, Leon slightly pondered for a moment, then couldn’t help but narrowed his eyes.

Although the statement was correct, if this thing falls into the hands of someone with thirty points of Taint Value, it could quadruple the difference in enemy-reaction speed. And if it crosses the boundary between man and god, with a cleaner possessing sixty points of Taint Value, it could still create a three thousand six hundred times difference in enemy-reaction speed.

So no matter how you look at it, this is an incredibly terrifying “late-game artifact”! After recording the information about the [Time Sharing Scepter], Leon frowned and said:

“With such important intelligence, why would you tell us? Afraid of being shut down for betraying Andre?”

“It’s fine, this information isn’t important~”

Apheta 00 smiled and said: “Andre isn’t a Cleaner and doesn’t have your Cleaners’ unique Leon Value, so the Time Sharing Scepter in his hands has no effect, it’s just two tokens used to control me.

Moreover, because these two scepters have the highest authority over all ‘Artifacts’, he can’t possibly give them to anyone else either. Besides, this thing can only be used by recognized members of the royal family, and the royal family has already been wiped out by him, so even if he wanted to give them away, he couldn’t.”

I see.

After nodding slightly, Leon continued asking:

“So we’re back to the previous question, how exactly do you plan to help us deal with Andre?”

“I’ve already said this before, I’m not going to help you fight Andre.”

Apheta 00 blinked and said: “Right now, his chances of winning are still higher, so I’m just hedging my bets, selling you some goodwill just in case~”

Your fence-sitting is pretty blatant…

Shaking his head somewhat speechlessly, Leon followed up with a question:

“Is the location of your captured comrades enough?”

The eighth Cleaner raised his head and smiled, saying:

“The former Gemini Division Cleaner named Nicole didn’t die in the previous ambush, she was captured by Andre and is being held underground in Military Industrial Area Three.”

“Oh.”

Upon hearing this, Leon nodded.

“I see, anything else?”

“Isn’t this enough?”

Apheta, upon hearing this, slightly paused, somewhat confusedly pursued the question:

“Aren’t you and her companions? Aren’t you planning to rescue her immediately?”

“Why should I go save her?”

Leon shook his head, slightly sobering up from the alcohol, and asked in return:

“Will you kill her?”

“Eh… No…”

“So are you torturing her? Putting her under punishment?”

“This… Also no…”

“Then why am I in such a hurry? Let her stay with you!”

Glancing at Apheta 00, Leon calmly said: “And since you can’t betray Andre, not only can’t you help us, but you can’t even reveal Andre’s other cards, naturally, it’s impossible for you to specially help us increase our strength at this time. So if I’m not mistaken, Nicole is probably under control right now, or the anomalous item on her body has been sealed. Even if we rescue her, she won’t be able to do anything, right?”

“…”

“It seems I’m right.”

In Apheta 00’s silence, Leon concluded: “If I don’t rescue Nicole, not only will we avoid danger, but you’ll have to take good care of her, assign people to watch her. Apart from losing her freedom and the food being too bad, she won’t suffer much hardship; whereas if I rescue her, first, we’ll be in danger, second, she won’t be able to help us, and she’ll have to follow us around everywhere with her anomalous item sealed, even dragging us down, hindering our actions. It’s better to let her continue being detained by you.”

“…”

It seems… that’s indeed the case…

“So if you want to cooperate with us and avoid being settled after we defeat Andre, then you need to offer something more practical.”

While pulling fishing lines and bundling the cleaners who were cut into pieces together, Leon calmly said: “Since you can communicate with me through them, I’ll leave them conscious for now, and if you want to get anything from us, you’d better think about what you can offer us… I’ll be off, waiting for your good news.”

“…”

In Apheta 00’s wordless silence, Leon turned and entered the Crocodile Kingdom Royal Palace with the door blown open, then solemnly said:

“Seniors, we may need to prepare ourselves for Director Edward.”

(End of Chapter)