Chapter 16: ３ Enhancement Directions

The suited man, Zhong Hao, swallowed hard as he hid in the shadows. Just moments ago, when he was about to step out to reap the rewards, his passive skill activated. His talent, 【Future Perception】, triggered, allowing him to witness the events that would unfold within the next five seconds.

The outcome was annihilation—all six players died within five seconds, and he was the first to fall.

He didn’t understand why, even after his own death, he could continue observing the deaths of others from a third-person perspective.

If it were Kamiyu or any other player well-versed in gaming and familiar with anime, they would have known immediately.

This was “fate”—a “closed loop of destiny.”

Certain skills and talents, once activated, would persist regardless of the user’s condition or whether they were alive or dead, continuing until the effects of the talent or skill ended.

If replaced by even more terrifying talents or skills, once activated, they could trigger a butterfly effect, producing unpredictable consequences in the future.

If Kamiyu knew the true effect of the 【Future Perception】 skill, she would immediately recall a classic, long-running anime series centered on clashes of supernatural abilities.

In the third installment, the enemy “foretold” the protagonist’s death, which did not come to pass at that time.

It would only be realized in the sixth installment.

If Kamiyu encountered such a situation, she would not hesitate to prioritize eliminating players whose talent or skill effects were destined to come true.

In fact, in the original worldline, even without knowing the true effect of 【Future Perception】, she had relied on her intuition to prioritize killing Zhong Hao with her Signature Sniper.

However, Zhong Hao’s combination of the 【Future Perception】 talent and the 【Vigilance】 passive skill was simply too overpowering, forcibly reversing the future and shifting to the second worldline.

The Kamiyu of the first worldline was too terrifying, killing six players in five seconds. This led Zhong Hao in the second worldline—the present one—to decide that no matter what, he must rally everyone’s strength and treat Kamiyu as the Dungeon Boss of this Black Sphere Game.

Frowning deeply, he thought back to a few hours ago in the Black Sphere Room, where she had revealed very little information. All he knew was that she specialized in firearms.

Zhong Hao deeply regretted why everyone had underestimated her back then.

This thin, short girl turned out to be the most ruthless among the twelve players.

“Let’s go, we need to retreat first,” Zhong Hao said.

“Huh, Brother Zhonghao, aren’t we going to take out that official woman? Her ability is quite dangerous for us,” Brother Dong asked.

“Take her out? Why don’t you try taking a single step out from here?” Zhong Hao retorted disdainfully.

He certainly didn’t dare to do so. His 【Future Perception】 was now in a prolonged cooldown, and he needed to wait for the talent’s cooldown time to pass. Then, he would seek out the other four players to see if they could form an alliance to deal with Kamiyu.

Brother Dong was instantly silenced by the rebuke.

The three of them, looking rather disheveled, took advantage of the cover of night to slip away through the back alley.

Back at the hotel.

Kamiyu had struck it rich in one wave, reaping a bountiful harvest—almost returning fully loaded.

Within five seconds, she had killed three players, earning three precious Enhancement Points.

Each Enhancement Point could significantly strengthen her, and these points were her trump cards for reversing the situation and staging a comeback.

Moreover, she had eliminated a major thorn in her side—Mohawk.

This was largely thanks to that player from the official side, who had reverted Mohawk back to a normal human.

Just now, through her scope, she saw the letter girl frantically stabbing Mohawk with a knife, which confirmed that Mohawk had turned into an ordinary human. Only then did she dare to take the shot and instantly kill Mohawk.

She opened her profession panel.

【Profession: Gunsmith (Mage Class)】

【Level: 3/60】

She even leveled up? That was somewhat unexpected.

She noticed that after leveling up, all her attributes increased by 10. It seemed that for every level gained, the four core attributes—Strength, Intelligence, Agility, and Willpower—each increased by 5 points.

This meant her skill damage, critical hit rate, and storage capacity would all increase, while cooldown times would decrease.

Kamiyu placed great importance on skill cooldown times. As a shooter, every second could determine the course of the game.

She desperately wanted her cooldown times to be reduced.

In the attribute descriptions, for every point of Willpower increased, skill cooldown time would decrease by 0.01%.

Time for some math.

Now that she had gained 10 points, the cooldown times for both her skills were permanently reduced by 0.1%.

The cooldown time for 【Headshot Strike】 was 10 minutes. Ten minutes is 600 seconds. 600 * 0.1% = 0.6 seconds.

Only a reduction of 0.6 seconds? Not even a full second. What a joke.

Kamiyu’s eyebrows shot up in frustration.

What was this? It felt good, but the good feeling was meaningless. Leveling up felt like not leveling up at all.

Is the system working against me?

What Kamiyu didn’t know was that the Black Sphere Game was extremely “fair” to all players. Everyone received the same attribute point rewards upon leveling up.

Kamiyu sighed heavily.

She was utterly speechless.

Just as she was about to casually use her skill points to upgrade her Signature Sniper Rifle…

A sudden flash of insight struck her.

She carefully “opened” her character panel to read the description about her talent.

【Talent: Enhancement (Can enhance equipment, personal attributes, etc. Enhancement Points are difficult to obtain. Please use them cautiously.)】

Kamiyu noticed the word “etc.”

The panel didn’t specify whether Enhancement could affect skills, whether it could even enhance skills.

Kamiyu couldn’t imagine if this was even possible.

After all, the description of the Enhancement Talent was quite vague. It didn’t explain what would happen after enhancement.

Back in the Black Sphere Room, she had enhanced a vase fragment. Unexpectedly, it transformed the ceramic shard into a Legendary Tier Ceramic Blade.

This raised the equipment level of the Ceramic Blade to match that of her own signature equipment, the Sniper Rifle.

It gave her an extra weapon right from the start and allowed her to instantly eliminate her biggest rival, Huang Kun.

It wasn’t surprising that the level increased, but even the appearance changed.

Now, if she enhanced a skill, she had no idea what the consequences might be.

Kamiyu thought to herself, it was just like opening a blind box.

It was very similar to “Tempering” in a classic loot game she had played, Diablo 4.

Enhancing attributes was different. If she enhanced the right attribute, like reducing cooldown time, Kamiyu would be soaring.

If she enhanced the duration of Headshot Strike, that wouldn’t be a loss either.

But if she enhanced Attack Power, changing it from a 3x multiplier to a 3+n multiplier, that would be a huge loss.

Because now, the biggest enemy, Mohawk with his “immortal” attribute, had been dealt with. For this round of the game, strengthening Attack Power wasn’t really necessary.

3 Enhancement Points, 3 enhancement options: reduce Skill Cooldown Time, increase Skill effect duration, increase Skill stacking Damage.

That’s a 33.3% probability.

Kamiyu thought to herself, no matter what, she had to take the gamble.

She took a deep breath and recited, “Use 1 Enhancement Point on the Skill 【Headshot Strike】.”