Sofony and Chris had their intelligence stat raised as their highest. But as for him, it was only around 50 points, barely past the minimum for a Level 5 host. Actually, many level 4s had a higher IQ than him. Of course, there was a reason for it.

With a limited number of points, it would be impossible to dream of distributing his points to all the stats or skills. Balance was impossible. Or even if it was achievable, it just meant that it would be easier for the opponent from any specialization to suppress him.

It was not always good to be a jack of all trades. After all, it was synonymous with being a master of none, something not glorious at all.

Which ones to improve then? Which should be sacrificed so the others could be increased? An indispensable part of people's lives was to make choices. Not everything could be grasped in one's hand and so one should decide what to hold on and what to let go. The principle was also applicable in this case.

Of course, the option to not invest in stats also exists. But unless an immoral host's IQ was not in the negatives, he wouldn't choose to let himself stagnate while the rest were getting stronger each pa.s.sing day. However, when compared to his co-hosts, while it would not be a problem to make a full-fledged scientist who was in the field for ten or so years cry, if it was against the system hosts, he would not win a single battle of wits against them.

In any case, Ver Drilon's merit did not lie on his brain, but something else.

"The intruder is here!!! Reinforcements! We need reinforcements ASAP!!!"

"Haah...Useless!"

The coldness from the Level 5 host's voice was contrasted by the redness from the blood that littered the ground of that hallway shortly. The voice came from the front, yet before the four-armed mercenaries of differing statures and appearances could react; the person they wanted to turn into a beehive through their bullets already reappeared behind them. Their heads were then separating from their heads and making loud spraying sounds. This all happened within a split-second.

"You're all so slow... and you expect me to wait for you all to attack me? I'd be killed by boredom before then." Ver sneered, flinging the blood off of his long daggers to the side.

Behind him were so many dead bodies sprawled on the ground. Further behind, from the entrance, more corpses were left strewn all over there, collapsed in all sorts of conditions and positions. The smell of death wafted from these cooling bodies heavily together with that fishy iron-like odor. 

All those people, when they were still alive didn't even manage to react to his attacks! Precisely put, they didn't even see him move. He had killed him so swiftly, not allowing room for any reactions or counterattacks!

Right. The pretty-faced young man who was always playfully called a dog by Wendy was an advocator of speed! Even if his brain was slow, he wouldn't care as long as his reaction speed and movements were fast!

In his own words, 'Screw brain tests and all the scheming b*tches and b.a.s.t.a.r.ds in the world! All they know is to run their brains! Countering this shameless bunch is not by being intelligent too, but by being faster than them! While they are still hatching ways to kill me in their minds, I must already run towards them to kill them or run away to not be killed by them!'

This same love for speed was what allowed him to survive two years ago under the siege of so many mercenaries and fellow system users when he defected from the organization. Several days ago too, were it not for this, that pervert Gu Yimu would have killed him already when he ambushed him together with more than a hundred armed mercenaries and hitmen.

Trained as an elite mercenary, he paid attention to his strength, but he made sure to pay more attention to his dexterity and speed which was now more than 20 points higher than his intelligence. Perhaps in the whole eastern part of the globe, he was already the fastest man under level 7!

 'I have already explored half of this base... How are the others?' he asked the system.

His face crumpled in annoyance. Worry was almost clouding his head. That time, he badly wished he had bought the Hypnosis skill so he could self-hypnotize himself to not lose his cool and focus on doing his part. His thinking was simple, if he could finish fast, he could then go a.s.sist the two others so that the d.a.m.ned girl's mission would be completed.

'This is all for Wendy...'

Ver exhaled. He felt a bit at a loss since he was sure the last guy managed to alert the whole base of his current location. But after some time he felt quite thrilled. "I badly want to end this. They should come at me at once together with the base keeper!"

'Once this is over, she will wake up. Dung, I want this to end already!'

"I didn't know the ever so righteous traitor had learned to become arrogant and c.o.c.ky."

At the system's reminder, Ver turned his head to that direction, seeing a familiar person.

It was a man in his early forties. His hair was partly grey and a lush mustache decorated his upper lips. The middle-aged man was wearing a grey suit, looking like a normal salaryman. However, since Ver was a host, there was no way he would believe this was the other's real looks.

Looks could always be deceiving. It couldn't be any truer if the other party was a system user.

"h.e.l.lo, Uncle Sam. Long time no see."

"We're of the same age bracket, pretty-faced," calmly answered by the one he called uncle.

Ver was alertly looking at the approaching enemy.

"I know it's you I will meet up..." He said with a complicated expression on his face.

"Of course you, do. And that's why you chose this base to attack. Well, I've been here since then. And this is also your real base. I have long foreseen you appearing before me setting this place on fire." The mustached man, oddly, could still smile upon mentioning what Ver was currently doing.

The young man took a deep breath. The fellow before him was a good guy, one of the still good ones among the rotten 'patriotic' bunch. That was how he remembered him from two years ago. However, he couldn't be sure that the other was still the same. After all, if even he changed, how could he guarantee the others didn't?

"I'm sorry." Ver quietly said when the system alerted him of a notification.

The mustached man promptly turned his head to the right, silent at first before saying, "I see. Another part of the place has been attacked by poison gas. I was suddenly notified of more than forty people under me dying. It's your doing, I supposed?" 

Ver did not say anything, just silently watching out for what the other would do. In his head continuous notifications rang, reminding of his progress.

The one called Uncle Sam returned his gaze to the handsome young man. However, this person did not make a move even though Ver was long readying his stance. Instead, he laughed. "I started antic.i.p.ating this day since the organization did something to provoke those people from that country. Everything started from Gloria's whim to kidnap a girl not in the target list."

A viciously dark expression showed on the other's face, very angry at being reminded of what happened to Wendy. "I've long wanted to destroy this h.e.l.lish place. But I held back due to my lack of strength. However, with or without the aid of those locals from the nearby country, I would have still raided the organization even in exchange for my life."

The man watched him say his piece silently. After a while, he sighed, "Do whatever you want. The leader is probably preoccupied with visitors from other countries. Anyway, I'm weaker than you. So I've released all the slaves."

Ver was surprised to hear that. But after this, he realized this friend of his had turned traitor like him. It seemed he had remained sober even after being exposed to so much sh*ttiness of the organization.

"... Thanks."

The mustached man walked through the pathway filled with corpses of those the intruder killed. Before completely disappearing from Ver's view, he said, "Sorry, I won't help you kill my own people. We're similarly deceived. But I've had enough of the killings, plus I'm never that heartless. Good luck and bye."

"..."

After that short talk, Ver resolutely continued his ma.s.sacre. When he finally reached the dungeons, it was really empty. And no, it was not that simple. While the area above had long been suffused with the aura and smell of blood, the lower floors were surprisingly clean, actually cleaner than his room at J Country.

"That Sam had released everybody here a long time ago?" He knitted his brows, musing to himself. "...He's obviously so soft-hearted that he should just go run an orphanage or become a monk. Why did he stay so long?"

He grumbled for a while. Then after making sure that everything had been taken care of, he left the place. 

'... The clone should be at Gavin's territory, huh?' He trembled in rage, not forgetting that it was that ugly masked b.a.s.t.a.r.d who really did the kidnapping. When he teleported from there with that place as his destination, there was a fire in his eyes that craved for more blood to spill. 

'No matter what happens, I must kill that b.a.s.t.a.r.d!'

...

Meanwhile, unlike the foreigner man whose raid turned out so smooth it was like a joke, Sofia, Sofony's secondary host, was not as fortunate, seemingly smiled upon the d.a.m.nable G.o.ddess of unluckiness.

Without an insider's surprise cooperation like Ver nor an army's help like Sofony, she faced an entirely different dilemma, internally crying to herself, '...My dearest Original, why the heck am I feeling like I was deceived and even unknowingly entered a Last Boss' den!?'

...

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Not at webnovel.com?

Link: https:///book/12734433505930905/The-Sinners'-Queen

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AUTHOR'S NOTE:  P-L-E-S-E  R-E-D

(don't worry, the following wall of text is excluded from the word count the system converted into ss amount, cross my heart, I added the note after I made sure the 1.8k words above will stay 9ss or 4ss if the country is having discounts)

Hi, everyone. And my deepest apologies for the hiatus. I know though a simple apology won't suffice so to clear the misunderstanding, allow me to clarify why I took so long to update again.

First of all, I don't plan to abandon TSQ. It's the first novel I invested so much time and energy. It's very hard for me to truly leave it since it's like my first child. So I truly have neither the plans nor the heart to abandon it.

Before anything else though, let me clarify too that it's not that my other novel took away my time. You all know that when Sinners' is still active, that novel too is active. I have all the time in the world to update it, and even if life happens, churning out a chapter a week should not be that hard. So what truly happened...? 

Well, I have the option to lie and truly use the 'life happens' excuse, but I want to be honest. I know that TSQ started out extremely mature, and even now the story is still as dark as its initial chapters. I know that it will not be accepted by the majority due to the scenes it has. And I know I should have prepared myself for all the types of criticisms it will receive. 

However, maybe due to being new to this, and not totally having experience in handling negative stuff being thrown at me, I didn't manage to monitor myself and check my ability to take on the insults and criticisms. Whenever I received bad reviews or comments I just said to myself, okay, move on, accept, and stay strong. All my fellow authors experienced the same so I should not make a big deal out of it. Yeah, stop whining, FallenBlue. 

But then I saw that every single day (I think even now, from my earliest chaps), I'm still receiving those kinds of stuff. Compared to others, my novel is not on the top so it's impossible/next to impossible for it to attract the trolls. I could only accept that the comments and reviews are real. Well, the majority has a point so I can't really complain. Who asked me to write many heavy materials in my novel. I have no one to blame actually. Lols. I could only accept. And I could not reply or refute. 

However, I just feel like I need to say this. Without me noticing, those things just piled up, every other day, if not every single day, I saw people commenting/pointing out on how much of a PIECE OF GARBAGE I have written. (I doubt if these people even read past the first volume or even the first ten chapters yet they immediately jumped into a conclusion. But I hate myself more for being affected.)

At first, I'm okay, I can easily move on, coz I have readers waiting for updates. I think, or I hope even now, there are still some. However, just like I said above, maybe I was just not truly prepared that time. So when it all acc.u.mulated within- the misgivings, self-doubt, insecurities, hate, everything, I crumbled down and couldn't bring myself to pick TSQ up.

It was just hard. One time, I was even cursed to have a bad life, saying I'm mental and a psycho. Well, maybe I am truly becoming one. Though I hope not. *laugh_cry* The main point though is that it's always in my mind and it's one of those which truly crushed my heart. I always wish everyone could be mindful of what they say coz even if the words are said through the internet, the one on the receiving end can't really be protected by his/her monitor/screen from being hurt. 

But alright. Let's say it's my fault coz I was not mentally and emotionally strong enough yet I dared to write such heavy novel. I was not strong enough to accept that the d.a.m.n novel I wrote for 8 months or so (minus the hiatus), and poured so much time, effort, brain cells, heart, everything into writing is demeaned like that. Lols, not even demeaned. Or maybe it is, just that I'm included in it.

I don't know anymore. I only know the result... Hiatus. And to be honest, I hated myself for doing that, because I always want to write it, but couldn't. Nothing's coming to mind, or maybe I'm afraid to continue it since the words are still ringing in my head. I was so pa.s.sionate about TSQ so I never imagined I would come to that point. I always feel heartbroken every time I go to inkstone and try to type something only to end up with a blank doc.u.ment.

Then there's how I always felt so bad because people are still voting for it. Every time I see votes (especially from those loyal ones who kept voting despite the two months of hiatus), I would cheer to myself, 'Hey, write, aren't you ashamed of yourself? You have readers voting and readers who still haven't removed your story in their library. Write. Write. Write. Why can't you bring yourself to write! Stooopid. Pick yourself up!'

Who knows how many times I scolded myself already. *laugh_cry*

I consulted a few friends and cried to them my dilemma, and every time I hear their encouragement, to be honest, I only feel more like crying. And even now, while typing this, it's past 3 am here, and I'm crying. 

I feel guilty. And annoyed at my self. If I were in the shoes of the readers, and see an author doing what I'm currently doing, I'll probably just say, lols, TLDR, or what a weak-hearted person. But now I couldn't do that coz I am the one experiencing it. I have to say, it's not easy and even now, it's hard to face this story. Today's update is written for a whole week. It's a chapter I could have written with ease in two-three hours before. But what happened? Well, I already explained above. It's ironic how it's easier for me to type what I have always wanted to say to everyone than to write a chapter. 

I'm sorry for the wall of text, it's just that I feel like without pouring my heart out I won't be able to pick myself up. It's just annoying and heartbreaking bottling things to myself. In the end, actually, all I want to say is that I'm weak, that I hate myself for taking a hiatus, but couldn't do anything since I'm just human. I'm sorry too for everyone who is still here despite what happened. Sorry again. So now, I plan to get back to regular releases and continue writing TSQ to make up for everyone. Thanks for reading. 

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PS: Privilege will go offline next month. I already deactivated it last week or so, but I just found out the effect is not immediate and will only take place the following month. Thank you for all the support and sorry for the inconvenience brought. FallenBlue loves you all (except the d.a.m.n haters who only know how to make people doubt even their existence's purposes, go away burn somewhere! Or be a monk! Or terrorize other novels! Grrrrrrr!)