REVIEWS AND POWERSTONES PLSSS!!!!!Chapter 90: Weapon Chip: Rock Cannon and Genbu's Sacred Artifact
"...What just happened?"
Question marks were accumulating over Yusuke's head one after another. He genuinely could not follow what Ross and Kurama had done, or why Genbu had simply stopped.
"Instant kill."
Ross pulled the Gold Pickaxe out of the floor with a cheerful, unbothered tone.
"Ross used the pickaxe's specific mechanic to kill Genbu in one move."
Kurama, pressing his hand to his side, stood up and offered an explanation for the two baffled delinquents.
"Genbu's ability allows him to merge his body with rock. In that merged state, he can effectively be treated as a 'Wall' type unit.
"When he submerged into the rock he obviously entered an In state as well, making his presence undetectable. But his body always retained its particular smell, a combination of wild animal and mineral that was hard to miss.
"The Rose Whip was just a distraction. Spreading the rose scent through the entire room was the real goal. The moment the bad smell intensified in a specific spot, it meant Genbu was about to emerge there.
"Kurama has the same nose as when he was a demon fox. He genuinely found Genbu offensive to be around."
"And then Kurama deliberately backed himself toward the wall to redirect Genbu's attack path from the floor to the wall. The moment he gave the signal, I moved."
Ross followed up and raised the Gold Pickaxe.
"This thing can destroy any rock wall. Only walls, though. Floors, cliff faces, those are outside its range. Genbu died because he happened to be inside a wall this thing could affect, and his physical makeup happened to share the same properties as rock."
"...That's it?"
Kuwabara stared.
"Oh. Worth mentioning: Genbu actually had a special core inside his body, something functionally similar to a human heart. As long as the core wasn't destroyed, his body could theoretically recover from any damage, even being minced. It just happened to be erased along with the wall. Not that it matters at this point."
Ross had saved the most critical detail until after the fact. Not particularly relevant now.
He shook his hand. The Power Glove and the Gold Pickaxe both vanished, replaced by the Navigation Arrow appearing overhead.
The arrow began scanning along the clean-cut wall edges, looking for what remained of Genbu: his limbs and head, which had fully merged with the surrounding stone. Anyone with enough time and patience to chisel those wall sections open would have found the pieces inside.
Ross left the arrow to its methodical search and crouched down to pick up a small, flat chip from the floor.
Genbu had been his kill, and the Mega Buster had been loaded inside his body the whole time, satisfying the conditions for a BOSS kill chip drop.
[Weapon Chip: Rock Cannon. Mega Buster derivative attachment. Source: City of the Four Saint Beasts Primal Secret Realm BOSS, Genbu.
When equipped, the attack mode changes to "Rock." Fires a shotgun spread of rock projectiles toward the target area. Shot count varies randomly between 4 and 8. Very small probability of randomly including one of Genbu's body parts in the spread, including the Skull of Genbu, the Tail of Genbu, and others. Current Nen conversion rate: 1 unit = 1 rock projectile.]
After two months of training, Ross was not exactly short on group attack options. But from a Nen efficiency standpoint, the Rock Cannon did compare favorably, and the small chance of launching Genbu's own body parts as projectiles felt like it would be entertaining. Possibly very entertaining, depending on the circumstance.
The real focus, though, was on what the Navigation Arrow had drawn out.
Draw, return, release. Ross was genuinely curious about what Genbu would drop. He had guessed something rock-related, similar to the chip. What actually appeared was...
A cauldron?
A small one, about the size of a football, with a distinctive design and an overall bronze-green coloration.
"Is this correct?"
Ross looked at the small cauldron in his hand and let out a sound of mild dismay.
[Genbu's Sacred Artifact: Grade B Nen tool, Four Saint Beast Artifact, consumable. From Sanguo Zhanji 2: Battle for Supremacy. One of the Four Saint Beast Artifacts. Activating it enables unlimited combos for the player and all party members, while doubling combo score multipliers. Duration: 25 seconds.
Genbu's Sacred Artifact can be stacked with other Four Saint Beast Artifacts. Depending on usage context and method, certain hidden special effects may trigger. Cannot be used simultaneously with "Book" type consumables.]
Genbu's Sacred Artifact, from Sanguo Zhanji 2. Its primary effect was "unlimited combos": essentially, it broke the rules that normally capped combo strings, removed floor-bounce protection, and allowed a target to be hit indefinitely.
But in reality, what would unlimited combos actually accomplish? Real opponents didn't have floor-bounce protection to begin with.
On a separate note: Genbu had rock-type and tortoise-type characteristics, but the Navigation Arrow had specifically extracted only the "Genbu" characteristic when generating the artifact. Whether that was random or simply the most prominent trait on its radar was unclear.
As for the artifact's usefulness: it was admittedly somewhat questionable on its own. But if the other three Saint Beasts also dropped artifacts, those were genuinely appealing. The Byakko, Seiryu, and Suzaku artifacts from the same game had genuinely strong effects.
Ross tossed the Genbu artifact back into the Nekketsu inn room for storage and found himself holding a bottle of hydrogen peroxide and a roll of gauze. He waved Kurama over.
"Isn't that kind of wound fine with a bit of spit?"
Yusuke gave a dismissive look at what he thought was overreaction on Ross's part.
"You know, if you had put even a little effort into this area, maybe you wouldn't have completely failed to learn even the basics of Master's Healing Mastery."
Ross returned the shot without any softening. Ten days' seniority was still seniority, and calling Yusuke out on it was entirely fair.
Yusuke made a face, deeply unconvinced. But watching Ross clean the wound and then place both hands over it to deploy the Healing Mastery, he went sulky and crouched down to draw circles on the floor.
Ross's Healing Mastery was, honestly, barely past the entry level. It could increase cell activity, stop bleeding quickly, and slightly accelerate natural recovery, but it couldn't handle fractures yet. It was nowhere near Kurapika's Healing Chain from his future development. Still, it was genuinely a healing ability, not a workaround.
The abdominal wound wasn't severe on its own, but it would genuinely interfere with heavy movement. Even though Kurama insisted it wasn't necessary, Ross handled it anyway.
He finished the gauze and slapped his hand flat on Kurama's bandaged abdomen.
"Done. You should really work on your Ten, pretty boy."
"...Noted."
The long-haired young man gave a wry smile. He had no one to blame but himself for committing to a flashy performance.
"Then the next fight is mine!"
Kuwabara stepped onto the spiral staircase leading upward, full of confidence.
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