“As for Tang Yuanhuai... I feel like as long as he isn't completely brainless, he'll definitely come to this old residence at the mountaintop, unless he really wants to spend the night out in the wild with a specter,” Chang Sheng said as he crafted the parts.
“But I think Brother Liu is right. Whatever happens to Tang Yuanhuai doesn't really have much to do with us.”
“I think we should focus on how to clear the dungeon instead.”
“This time, there are still two main quests.”
“One is a survival quest, which goes without saying—we just need to make sure we stay alive. The other is the quest to find the path of survival.”
“How do you guys think we should go about finding the path of survival?”
“And then there's the novice benefit, 'Time'. Do you have any thoughts on those words?”
An Miao's expression grew somewhat solemn.
“How many main quests did the dungeons you experienced before have?”
Liu Da and Chang Sheng both replied, “Two.”
“Why do you ask?”
An Miao asked, “Have you ever encountered other players before this?”
Both of them shook their heads.
“No. Or rather, even if someone became a player, they certainly wouldn't go around telling everyone. What are you trying to say?”
An Miao sighed.
“I met a player once. He was an ordinary person who hadn't stepped onto the path of cultivation. I only found out he was a player by pure chance.”
“I paid him a little bit of money to learn about the dungeon he went through.”
“He said his dungeon had only one main quest.”
Liu Da and Chang Sheng exchanged a look, seeing the surprise and seriousness in each other's eyes.
“Is that true? What was the difficulty like?”
An Miao said with some emotion, “As for the difficulty, all I can say is that it was extremely simple. Any one of us could have easily cleared it.”
Liu Da rubbed his chin.
“In other words, there are differences in the difficulty of specter dungeons, and this difference is related to the number of main quests?”
He thought of a possibility.
“Could it be related to our strength as players?”
“Powerful players, or those with highly unique talents, get assigned harder dungeons, while players without abilities get assigned easier ones?”
Chang Sheng shook his head.
“Let's not think about that for now. The most important thing right now is to complete our main quests and survive to leave the dungeon first. We can worry about everything else later.”
Liu Da let out a long breath.
“True. Let's put that aside and analyze our main quests first.”
“I've never even heard of a path of survival quest before. Do you guys know how to find it?”
The other two shook their heads.
They hadn't experienced it either.
An Miao made a suggestion. “I know that the boundary of a specter dungeon is surrounded by a layer of dense white mist. Since we're being asked to find the path of survival, it must be somewhere within that white mist boundary.”
“I suggest that once daybreaks tomorrow, we first determine how large the boundaries of this dungeon are, and then search around. Perhaps the path of survival is hidden in some nook or cranny.”
“Agreed!”
Under Chang Sheng's nimble fingers, the piece of wood gradually transformed into individual parts.
“What about 'Time'?”
“How do you think we should interpret 'Time'?”
...
While the three of them were discussing the main quests, the novice benefit, and their subsequent plans, on the other side...
Tang Yuanhuai was panting heavily as he desperately fled ahead.
Zuo Lin'an followed leisurely behind him.
It was now about ten minutes before one o'clock.
During his pursuit earlier, he had closed in on Tang Yuanhuai more than once, wanting to provoke him into using his talent.
But unfortunately, even now, the man had not used it.
Zuo Lin'an found it quite strange.
Could it be that Tang Yuanhuai's talent couldn't repel specters? Or couldn't cause any hindrance to them?
“Is it an auxiliary talent? Like 【Spirit Vision】 or something similar?”
Zuo Lin'an didn't really believe that.
He planned to try one more time before one o'clock arrived.
If Tang Yuanhuai still didn't use his talent this time... then he didn't plan on wasting any more time.
He would just kill him directly.
Panting heavily, Tang Yuanhuai gradually slowed his pace.
It wasn't that he didn't want to run.
He simply had no strength left to run.
From the moment the specter appeared to hunt him down until now, it had been nearly half an hour.
This was a mountain with no roads or any markers.
He had been sprinting wildly on this mountain for a full half hour. The fact that he could still stand was already remarkable!
However, the specter would not grant him any time to rest.
Not long after Tang Yuanhuai stopped, he was horrified to feel a bone-chilling cold appear behind him, drawing closer and closer.
He instinctively looked back.
In his wake, he saw a dark shadow. What terrified him most were those crimson eyes and a sharp knife falling toward him.
“Ah!”
His legs buckled, and he collapsed directly onto the ground.
However, perhaps driven by his survival instinct, he managed to muster a sliver of strength before the knife descended. Relying on this burst of energy, he rolled away in a disheveled heap.
But as he tried to get up, he fumbled. Instead of standing, he tripped on something and tumbled all the way down the slope.
Zuo Lin'an stood in place, his raised knife not even having descended yet.
He just watched as Tang Yuanhuai rolled down the mountain like a barrel.
“Sigh...”
He should probably follow and check.
He didn't want him to just fall to his death.
But then again, was Tang Yuanhuai's talent truly useless, or had he somehow figured out that Zuo Lin'an couldn't actually kill him yet?
By the time Zuo Lin'an leisurely located him, Tang Yuanhuai was lying on the ground unconscious. One of his arms and one of his legs were twisted at unnatural angles, clearly broken.
In particular, there was a long gash on his forehead that was bleeding continuously, leaving his entire face covered in blood.
From the looks of it, even if Zuo Lin'an didn't make a move, this man probably wouldn't survive much longer.
Zuo Lin'an checked the time.
It was exactly one o'clock.
Though the man was quite pitiful, he still had to be killed.
He gave a casual kick, flipping the man over so he lay face down on the ground.
The cold, sharp tip of his knife rested against the back of Tang Yuanhuai's neck.
Perhaps sensing the mortal danger, the man was actually startled awake!
Zuo Lin'an did not waste any time because of this. The tip of the knife pierced the skin and pressed down.
But right at that moment...
【Dungeon Notification: Player Tang Yuanhuai has triggered the talent Sharing Weal and Weal. You have made physical contact with him and have been marked.】
【1. During the marking period, if either party finds a new specter item, the other party will obtain a one-time-use replica of that specter item.】
【2. During the marking period, if either party is attacked, the other party must bear the same pain, or even death.】
【Only one target can be marked at a time. The mark lasts for five hours, with a cooldown of three days.】
The moment Zuo Lin'an received the dungeon notification, he felt a strange sensation on the skin of his own back.
This feeling was very familiar.
Back in Sin Hunter City, during the final step of the birth of the Human-Specter Symbiont.
He had been subjected to his own specter body's rules.
Rate on N.U.
