Chapter 75: Chapter 75

No way, that’s it?! He actually won?! For real?!

Jiang Ye hadn’t even processed it yet!

To be precise—he hadn’t expected...

That the fusion would actually work!!

So that opponent, the one who had transformed into his exact likeness—was really fused away just like that?!

What... what even was that?!

Did that mean the guy was dead?

Or was he just locked down for 3 minutes?

When the 3 minutes were up, would the guy realize he’d been fused?

Would the opponent share all of Jiang Ye’s memories during the fusion time?!

A flood of questions exploded in Jiang Ye’s mind.

He barely paid attention to the Ten-Win Streak reward floating in front of him.

Instead, he immediately pulled up his data panel.

And found—this bizarre fusion was recorded as nothing more than two Replica No. 2s fusing together.

Nothing unusual at all.

In other words, the opponent had copied not just his appearance,

But also his data panel!

No wonder that guy had been spouting off details like how Jiang Ye’s Combat Power was 78 during matchmaking, but surged to 400 during the fight!

That shadow ability was freakishly powerful!

If it weren’t for Jiang Ye’s absurdly broken 【Replica Fusion】,

He probably would’ve lost his ten-win streak!

Of course, to be fair, the truly broken thing wasn’t 【Replica Fusion】—

It was his X-tier ability, 【Infinite Replication】!

Only now did Jiang Ye realize—

He had severely underestimated the value of an X-tier ability!

It was 【Infinite Replication】 that had registered the shadow-clone version of himself as one of his Replicas…

That’s what let him use main-body skills meant for Replicas on it in the first place.

Right now, Jiang Ye’s main body had five Replica-related skills,

But in actual combat, the three that mattered were 【Replica Fusion】, 【Replica Swap】, and 【Replica Possession】.

And their skill levels weren’t even that high.

He started thinking...

If in the future, he could get a skill like 【Replica Self-Destruct】...

Then a fight like the one just now would make a lot more sense.

Even though he won with 【Replica Fusion】,

Once the three-minute duration ended, he had no idea whether that shadow guy was alive or dead,

And if he was alive, what he might think of the whole thing.

That guy had been such a smug a** earlier—

Shouting about how he’d trap Jiang Ye into a ten-match losing streak on the tenth win…

Told him to "enjoy his first loss" like some kind of movie villain...

And in the end... this was it?!

If that guy was still alive, would he even dare show up again to block Jiang Ye’s streak?

If he did, he’d have to intercept Jiang Ye’s eleventh win using a veteran’s duel machine.

Wonder if he’d feel awkward about it.

Jiang Ye definitely would, just watching him.

He waited the full three minutes for the fusion to end,

Then finally turned his attention to the Ten-Win Streak reward.

What he didn’t know was...

Far, far away from all the ruined Beginner Apartments,

Across a boundless sea of death,

There stood an enormous building wreathed in eerie symbols and towering into the misty sky—

The legendary Doomsday Apartment.

On the first floor, just like the lobby of a Beginner Apartment,

It gleamed with gold and marble, bustling with players.

From the 2nd to the 20th floor, things were nothing like a normal apartment.

There, the floors resembled a giant hive, filled with countless tiny rooms.

Each “room” was coffin-sized, about 2 square meters.

And each floor had a million of them.

This beehive structure continued all the way to the 19th floor.

The entire 20th floor served as the shared living and working area for those who lived in the “coffins”—

The bottom-tier ants of the Doomsday Apartment.

Starting from the 21st floor and up to the 99th,

Were rooms for players with standard permissions.

Those rooms varied in quality depending on the floor, with increasing luxury the higher you went.

And from the 100th floor onward,

Were entire zones dedicated to guilds, studios, and organizations.

On the 100th floor alone,

Over twenty small studios were crammed together, making the whole floor feel packed.

But the Duoe Organization?

They occupied two entire floors—118 and 119!

The 118th floor was massive, decorated like a professional esports arena—

Rows and rows of Duel Machines stretched on endlessly.

Some were in use, others were idle.

The entire atmosphere was silent, strict.

Like an exam hall, where no one made a sound.

Compared to that, the 119th floor was much livelier.

It had fewer Duel Machines, spaced further apart.

And nearly every machine had a few spectators gathered around.

These spectators weren’t Duoe members.

They were paying visitors—

People who had bought admission tickets, just like entering a theme park.

One ticket bought you a full day of access to watch every match on the floor.

For Beginner players, the fact that they were buying win streaks was a secret.

But in the Doomsday Apartment?

Veteran players had been watching and laughing about it the whole time.

Some even recorded footage of promising newcomers buying win streaks.

So that one day, when those players became powerful...

They’d have blackmail-worthy “dark history” on their hands.

Of course, for these "tourists,"

The real reason they paid to access the 119th floor wasn’t just to watch rookies cheat their way to victories.

That wasn’t entertaining.

What they came for—was to gamble.

Every time a rookie player appeared at a Duoe-controlled Duel Machine,

It was guaranteed to be at the third win.

Every third win for a rookie would trigger a betting match.

Tourists could place bets on—

whether the player would choose to buy their win streak or not.

And if they didn’t buy, whether they’d win or lose.

After a rookie’s first three-win “debut,” they would leave an impression on the spectators.

Later milestones like five wins or ten wins would trigger new rounds of betting.

Of course, these smaller streak bets were just casual fun.

The real high-stakes spectacle came with the Hundred-Win Streak bets.

The Duoe Organization would analyze each player through their previous duels,

gathering detailed data and developing countermeasures against their abilities.

Under those conditions, pulling off a hundred-win streak solo was nearly impossible.

And the Hundred-Win bets?

Those were serious business.

Additionally, once more than ten rookie players had triggered the Hundred-Win Streak milestone,

Duoe would start ranking and evaluating them.

Tourists could then place bets on one major question—

Among all the hundred-win rookies, who would become this season’s “Rookie King”?

Only one Rookie King would be chosen from all the Beginner Apartments across all districts.

So it was a huge event.

Even more, the first player to correctly bet on the Rookie King would win Duoe’s exclusive prize—

the “Eye That Sees Heroes” Award.

This prestigious prize attracted countless spectators.

After all, if you wanted to win it, you had to spend time studying the rookies with real potential.

Just like sports betting—you had to know your teams.

Naturally, Jiang Ye’s three-win debut had already drawn quite a bit of attention here.

At the time, many tourists noticed—

this guy seemed to be performing far above his listed Combat Power!

Even among Doomsday Apartment veterans, it was rare to see a power-breaker type player—

someone who performed beyond the system’s limits.

As a result, many spectators started watching Jiang Ye.

Debates broke out about whether he was truly a "limit-breaking" rookie.

Some players argued that Jiang Ye was a martial arts prodigy, the kind you only see once in a hundred years—

a true overachiever among rookies!

Others thought he wasn’t actually breaking limits—

he just had a special ability that made him look stronger than he really was.

In any case, he was the talk of the town.

Which meant he had popularity.

And just like that—despite only having a three-win debut,

Jiang Ye became a hot topic within the Duoe Organization.

Someone actually went for it—

and placed a Rookie King bet on Jiang Ye!

That caused an uproar, no less shocking than someone tipping a web novel a million bucks!

Because, according to Duoe’s rules—

Each player could only bet on one Rookie King.

No hedging or multi-bets allowed. Follow current novels on novel⚑fire.net

And the cost of that bet?

A whopping 10,000 Survival Points.

With that much SP, you could buy a serious upgrade.

Even for filthy-rich whales, that wasn’t pocket change.

Normally, even though the "Eye That Sees Heroes" award only went to the first player to make the correct bet,

most players would wait until there were at least ten Hundred-Win rookies before carefully placing their bet.

But someone had bet on Jiang Ye—

a guy who’d only hit his first three-win streak!

This was completely unheard of!

It was absurd beyond words!

So, because of that insane bet, Jiang Ye—just a low-level rookie—

gained even more attention.

And of course... more targeting.

His fifth win was already hotly anticipated.

On the 119th floor, it triggered a sizable betting round.

Duoe clearly put their money on their own player, trying to block his streak.

So for those who bet on Jiang Ye to win, the odds were sky-high.

The crowd that bet on Jiang Ye’s fifth win raked in a fortune!

His sixth to ninth wins weren’t shown to spectators,

but within Duoe, his matches were tracked and controlled through targeted matchmaking.

Then came the public tenth win.

Once again, quite a few spectators took a gamble,

betting Jiang Ye would hit ten wins on his own strength.

But some cautious viewers analyzed the situation and said—

the fact that Duoe was still offering high odds meant they were sure he wouldn’t succeed.

"This bizarre, polarizing rookie," they thought,

"will probably fail right here at ten wins."

And it did seem like that...

At the start of the duel—

Though Jiang Ye immediately one-shotted his opponent,

once the audience saw who he was fighting, they exploded:

“F**k! It’s just the tenth win and they’re already using a Glyphmarked member with suppressed Combat Power?!”

“Using glyph abilities on a newbie! That’s just straight-up dimensional suppression!”

“Duoe’s got no shame! Absolutely disgusting!”

Spectators who had bet big on Jiang Ye were furious—

they felt completely scammed.

Especially when Jiang Ye’s shadow started talking trash mid-fight,

announcing that he’d be blocked over and over again and forced into ten consecutive losses...

Those who bet on him were livid—

as if they were the ones being ganged up on and losing the match!

“This is bullsh*t! Duoe’s shameless, absolutely shameless!”

the more analytical viewers, who had predicted Jiang Ye would lose due to Duoe’s suppression,

wore smug "told you so" expressions and stepped up to defend the organization:

“Who said you can’t use glyph abilities at ten wins? Duoe’s done that before.”

But the pro-Jiang Ye bettors fired back instantly:

“Yeah right! Every time they’ve used glyph abilities at ten wins,

it was against rookies who already had glyph powers themselves!”

“This player—number 666—is clearly a total beginner with no glyphs!”

“What Duoe’s doing here is just plain suppression. It’s blatant targeting!”

And the anti-Jiang Ye bettors? They didn’t hold back either:

“Dimensional suppression? Targeting? So what! He’s weak, he deserves to lose!”

“You think they’d offer odds that high just to hand out free money?”

“‘Take a risk, ride a bike and get a motorcycle’? Pfft! Making money isn’t that easy, pal!”

Just as the players who bet on Jiang Ye to lose stood smugly by Duoe’s side,

hurling mockery and taunts—

The duel result popped up on the screen.

At first, their arrogant grins only widened.

But the moment they really saw the result...

Even the viewers who bet on Jiang Ye to win sat there stunned for a long moment before bursting out:

“Holy sht?! What just happened?!”

“Holy sht! I was too busy arguing—I missed it! Someone tell me, what the hell happened?! Why does it say... the winner is that rookie, number 666?!”

“Holy sht! I saw it happen, but I still can’t explain it! The Duoe glyph guy was just about to attack, then suddenly poof—he vanished! And then the result screen just popped up…”

“Dmn it! It looked like... he just surrendered or something!! Like he voluntarily forfeited!!”