Project Zero: Days 3-5 on My New F2P Series Account

How’s it going everyone! I recently kicked off a brand new series called Project Zero, where I’m taking a fresh account in 2026 to see just how far we can push it without spending any money. The account was created alongside the Echoes of Oz event, and naturally I thought… why not try and push for the Cowardly Lion Fusion?

I’ve now reached the start of Day 6 for the daily login rewards, picking up that much needed 500 Energy which has definitely given me a boost towards the Fire Knight Tournament. A lot has happened since the last update, so let’s break down how Project Zero has progressed over the past few days!

The first few days of a new account are always heavily focused on the Campaign grind, completing Missions and Challenges alongside progression to maximise rewards, while working towards that first Level 60 Champion.

Days 3-4 followed a similar path, but I was also grinding to finish the Gear Enhancement and Gear Hunters Events for the Cowardly Lion Fusion. At the same time, I was patiently waiting for regular Tournaments to finally start appearing after completing the Novice Tournament, with Champion Chase still being the big question mark.

Energy & Silver Spending

With Gear Hunters live and no active Tournaments available at this stage, I forced myself into grinding Dragon while the Speed boost was active. This gave me a great opportunity to pick up some valuable Speed gear for my Champions, alongside other pieces with stats I desperately needed at this stage of the account.

It also gave me some much better gear to actually spend Silver on during the Gear Enhancement Event, rather than wasting resources upgrading trash pieces just for the points!

The Forge Opens!

I eventually reached the level required to unlock the Forge, giving me access to potentially stronger gear, with my main focus being Perception. I managed to craft some really strong early pieces for the account, alongside the Perception gear earned through the Dorothy Pass on the lead up to claiming the Champion herself.

For such an early stage account, these pieces have already helped improve my builds and given me much better options for reaching the Speed and Accuracy needed across my Champions.

What Did I Get Up To?

Faction Wars has been going well, especially when Dark Elves opened up, where Kael and Mavara helped me push beyond Stage 9. This has started building up my crafting materials and progressing the Faction Wars rewards, and as I unlock more Champions, I can move gear around to help push stages across the other Factions.

Timing my Challenges alongside Missions has also been crucial. Backtracking can lead to a lot of wasted Energy on a new account, so I’ve been trying to line them up wherever possible and progress both at the same time. I’m now very close to completing the Dungeon and Artifact Challenges, while also making great progress through Part 2 of the Missions.

Completing that next section of Missions will give me access to another Sacred Shard, which could be extremely important with the Summon Rush still looming for the Cowardly Lion Fusion.

The looming question of whether Champion Chase would appear was finally answered at around 1PM on Sunday. Regular Tournaments started showing on the account, including Fire Knight, which had already begun on Saturday, alongside the active Arena Tournament.

Unfortunately, even though Champion Chase was technically still live for existing players, it never appeared for me. My guess is that there simply wasn’t enough time remaining to place the account into a Champion Chase bracket by the time regular Tournaments unlocked. Either way, those Fusion Fragments were officially off the table.

That leaves me with no choice… I now need to find enough Shards to completely max out the Fragments available from Summon Rush. On a brand new Free to Play account, that’s a pretty ridiculous task. Can we somehow pull off a miracle? Once again, time will tell.

Hunting for Shards –  Summon Rush Plan

I’m still hunting down every Shard I can find, whether that’s from daily Demon Lord Clan Boss chests, finishing Missions, or picking up milestone rewards wherever possible. Even Mystery Shards have become important, so I’m grinding those whenever I can in case my higher value Shards aren’t enough.

By the time Summon Rush arrives, I’m hoping to have around 4 Sacred Shards, 5-10 Void Shards, and close to 40 Ancient Shards. I’m also not using any referral links to gain extra Voids, so there’s no easy way of padding out my total… this is going to be tough!

At this point, I just have to hope the Summon Rush requirements for a new account are low enough for the resources I can gather. If they’re not, the Cowardly Lion Fusion could finally be over!

Fusion Progress

Every Event I’ve tackled so far has been pretty manageable, but the lower Dungeon stages I’m currently able to farm have definitely slowed things down, especially when it comes to Fire Knight. I can still get the points I need, it just takes a lot more Energy and time compared to farming the higher stages.

Gear Enhancement has probably been the toughest part so far. Silver is already limited on a new account, and I also don’t have a huge amount of gear that’s actually worth upgrading. I’m trying to avoid wasting millions of Silver ranking up pieces that I’ll probably replace shortly afterwards just for the sake of Event points.

Overall, I’m feeling pretty confident that the remaining Events and Tournaments are achievable. But once again, everything could come down to Summon Rush… if I can’t reach those Fragments, all of this grinding could be for nothing!

Dungeon Grinding

I’ve managed to reach Stage 13 across all of the core Dungeons outside of Fire Knight and Spider for now. Spider is mainly being held back by my lack of Turn Meter control, even though Pelops is doing a great job of melting the Spiderlings and boss with HP Burn.

Luckily, I’ve managed to pull an Armiger, which should help solve that problem once I get him built. His Turn Meter reduction should give me much more control over the boss and hopefully allow me to start pushing into higher stages.

For now, though, I’m not going to waste Energy pushing Dungeons for no reason. I’ll mainly be farming whichever ones my Missions lead me towards, or those tied into the Cowardly Lion Fusion Events and Tournaments.

Where I’m Focusing Now

The goal remains the same: do whatever it takes to complete every Fusion related Event and Tournament that comes my way. Alongside that, I’ve continued grinding Campaign to prepare my first six star Champion, which I’ve decided will be Pelops. I’m now very close to having all the food ready to finally get him there!

There’s also a Feast available through the Paths, which could be massive for speeding up the development of the account and getting another Champion straight to Rank 6. Outside of the Fusion grind, I’m continuing to stay on top of Quests, Challenges, and Missions wherever possible, picking up any extra Energy, Shards, and resources they can provide.

Keeping on top of Arena refreshes has also been important. I’m coming across plenty of teams that look very similar to the Champions I started with through the link code, except they’re often further developed with stronger gear. Finding the right matchups is helping me progress through the Arena Tournaments while also continuing the general climb into higher tiers.

Now it’s really just a waiting game mixed with a lot more grinding. The Fusion Events are getting done, Pelops is closing in on six stars, and I’m grabbing every resource I can… but the biggest question remains how many Shards I can scrape together before Summon Rush arrives at the weekend!