Rod spoke gloomily, tilting his head back and finishing the cold wine in one gulp.
"This Mushroom Wine tastes really damn weird, don’t heat it up next time."
Molly looked up from her mountain of work, her eyes complex as she watched the young man.
She had already learned from the White Tower’s message about the danger of the attacking monster. Yet before she could act, a huge explosion occurred outside Star Town, followed by the news that the monster had been eliminated and Rod had once again achieved a complete victory, with no casualties.
She could hardly recall how many times she had been surprised; this man seemed to always create miracles, and common sense simply did not apply to him.
Yet he himself seemed to feel nothing, even appearing somewhat dissatisfied.
Watching his figure, Molly’s gaze gradually softened, and a blush crept across her pale, delicate cheeks as she thought of something.
But the next moment, his figure wobbled, as if he were drunk.
"What’s going on? My head is so dizzy, my stomach hurts so much... the wine, it was the wine just now... Ah! Molly, you really are poisoning me!"
Before he could finish, he fell to the ground.
Molly covered her face, unable to speak.
It turned out to be true; Mushroom Wine should not be heated as it causes the wine to spoil and activates the inherent toxicity of the mushrooms, causing vomiting, diarrhea, and dizziness.
But Rod’s assured words had made her overlook this fact.
How could I have believed him.
Molly was very self-reproachful; she had thought Rod had some special method to avoid poisoning, which is why she had specifically instructed to heat the wine.
It turned out the guy simply lacked common knowledge of life.
Molly had known this for a long time. Apart from being well-versed in bedroom knowledge, his other life knowledge was extremely shallow; he simply didn’t seem like someone who lived in Trolian.
I should have asked him first.
Molly sighed, got up, and helped Rod to the bed.
Just as she was about to feed him some water, the Spiritual Energy Communication Crystal in his arms lit up.
Molly tapped it, and Horus’s voice, fraught with urgency, emanated from it.
"Rod, don’t get excited, just listen to me first, the monster outside Star Town is a Withering Lord, whose threat is very..."
The news that Rod had annihilated a Withering Lord alone quickly spread through the upper echelons of Royal City.
People who knew or did not know the details were equally astonished.
The threat level of the Withering Lord was well-known among the upper echelons of Royal City, and the monster manual regarding it was the thickest, with over two hundred methods cataloged for dealing with it.
But there was a basic consensus that even at the early stages, only High Rank Combatants at least had a chance to kill it.
Attack attempts by combatants below High Rank would only stimulate its reproduction by dividing.
Yet, from the battle report of Star Town, Rod had alone blown up a Withering Lord that had already divided twice.
Although he used some kind of peculiar soul creation, this creation was unique to him.
According to Trolian combat rules, a creation unique to oneself can be considered as one’s own combat strength.
Based solely on performance, he could genuinely be considered a High Rank Combatant now.
However, for high-level combat ratings, traditional combat evaluation methods were no longer applicable as they were too costly and difficult to control damage.
The combat rating of High Rank Combatants is assessed through past achievements and strict standards sideways to estimate their combat strength.
According to Rod’s achievement in killing the Withering Lord alone, he fully met the standards of a Third Level Combatant.
Consequently, there was a voice within Royal City suggesting that Rod be allowed to join the Fire Hall as a preparatory member.
However, some opposed, as Rod had not surpassed the strict standards, his Spiritual Power Level had not broken through the Ninth Level, and his spirit-meat coordination had not reached the perfect state.
Allowing him into Fire Hall at this time, they argued, would be an utterly irresponsible and dangerous act.
In the meantime, with the war ongoing, Trolian had concentrated most of its forces on the west, making the pressure on Fire Hall immense and High Rank Combatants were in severe short supply.
Despite employing countless Silence Runes, the disturbance from large-scale battles still affected the Dark World, causing ancient beings to awaken one after another, with crises continuing unabated. If not for Arlan once again taking up the mantle, the Fire Hall’s combat sequence would have collapsed under the overwhelming pressure long ago.
But Arlan could not keep fighting forever.
And High Rank Combatants cannot be replaced by regular combat forces; the King’s measures against the Black Tide could not be employed at this time, leaving everyone greatly troubled, desperately hoping new High Rank Combatants would join.
That is why someone proposed letting Rod join the Fire Hall ahead of time.
But in the eyes of others, this was nothing short of killing the goose that laid the golden eggs.
The two parties argued vehemently over this.
However, the Fire Hall remained silent, expressing no opinion.
Rod had never expected, immune to all poisons as he was, to be felled by spoiled Mushroom Wine.
Humanity can only counter the corruption and erosion of the soul but does not make one immune to biological poisons.
Although Rod had only passed out for a few dozen seconds and finished the latter half of the conversation with Horus, shocking the old stump-like fellow immensely,
he kept having diarrhea over the following days.
He had to run to the bathroom over a dozen times a day, which greatly annoyed him.
Luckily, Molly, feeling guilty, took tender care of him, mitigating his discomfort.