Updated: 2014-02-20

"As expected, killing monsters beyond our level is not very realistic. Should we retreat?" Lilith asked, her brows slightly furrowed.

"No need!" Lin Zheng said, "Liu Mang and I can still handle these monsters, it's just that the consumption will be higher. But that's not a problem, I brought a lot of white-cut chicken, and with your healing output, the problem won't be too big! Youxi, is the quest map far from here?"

"Not far, it's right ahead!" Youxi said, looking forward.

"That's good, it means the monsters on the quest map won't be too high-level!" Lin Zheng breathed a sigh of relief, "Then, let's continue forward!"

Under Youxi's guidance, the group slowly advanced towards the quest location, encountering many Weaver spiders along the way. Yang Qi also went up to try her hand, and immediately felt like she had returned to before liberation. Her damage to monsters was low, and the damage she took was high, it was truly frustrating! So, she secretly decided that once she underwent her second advancement, she would definitely torment these damned spiders thoroughly!

Just as Youxi said, the quest location was not far from them, and they soon arrived at the quest map. It was a huge valley, and at a glance, the valley was fiery red, like a burning land! When Lin Zheng stepped into the valley, a prompt sounded: "You have entered the map 'Crimson Valley'. The monsters in this map are of a higher level, please be careful!"

Crimson Valley, Lin Zheng opened the map and took a look. It was a winding valley, not too deep, and it wouldn't take much time to reach the end, of course, assuming they weren't killed by the monsters along the way! At the same time, Lin Zheng also looked at the map's introduction:

Crimson Valley, formerly known as Peach Blossom Valley a thousand years ago, was once captured by ruthless nobles. The valley master, Linglong, was killed while resisting. Before her death, Linglong cursed the entire valley at a great cost, plunging the entire valley into a sea of fire, killing all the enemies who invaded the valley. These slain invaders, affected by the curse, could never reincarnate and turned into undead monsters guarding the Crimson Valley!

Hmm? The monsters inside are undead? Seeing this, Lin Zheng's eyes lit up, this was good news! Because both he and Yang Qi had a title, "Ghost God Warrior," which increased their damage to undead monsters by 30%! This way, the damage suppression from the level difference would be almost offset! Moreover, by killing undead monsters, they would also receive an additional 30% experience bonus! Lin Zheng looked at Yang Qi, who seemed to also know the situation in the valley, a smile appearing on her face.

"Get ready to go in. Let's make it clear first, the main purpose this time is to complete the quest, not to level up, so we will only clear monsters blocking our path as we advance. Be careful not to attract unnecessary aggro, and quickly push towards the end of the valley! Everyone understands, right!?" After speaking, Lin Zheng scanned the group. Seeing that everyone nodded, he continued: "Then, let's go in. Liu Mang and I will be the vanguard, Youxi will be responsible for magic support, Lilith just needs to keep an eye on our HP, Xiao Meng, you need to protect Youxi and the others, you are forbidden from rushing to the front lines! As for Xiran, you can just happily leech experience!" After assigning positions, the team carefully walked into the Crimson Valley.

"That's strange, we've been walking for so long, why haven't we seen a single monster?" Lilith said with a frown. Just as she said, they had been in the valley for a while, but they hadn't seen a single monster! Lin Zheng also felt a bit strange. This valley wasn't too long, and no monsters had appeared yet. Could it be that all the monsters were gathered in the latter half of the valley?

"Clang—" Xiao Meng stomped her foot, creating a small pit, and immediately stumbled, almost tripping! Xiao Yatou was pouting and about to stand straight when the ground in front of her suddenly "Pffft—" split open, and a bloody, rotten claw reached out from the ground, almost grabbing Xiao Meng's face! Xiao Meng was startled at first, and then, a shriek of 120,000 decibels burst from her mouth!

"Ah—" Xiao Meng shrieked, drew her sword, and hacked down at the rotten claw, causing damage to float up. Before Xiao Meng could follow up with another sword strike, the rotten claw pressed against the ground, and then, a rotten corpse wearing tattered armor and emitting wisps of fire crawled out from the ground.

"Clang—", the rotten corpse drew the flaming sword from its waist, then opened its nearly fleshless mouth and let out a spine-chilling roar, swinging its sword to hack at Xiao Meng! "Cling—"! Lin Zheng, who had already noticed the situation, held up his disassembled shattered moon and blocked the rotten corpse's sword, while -179 damage floated above his head. This damage sent a chill down Lin Zheng's spine; parrying alone could take off 179 of his HP, how high must this monster's attack be!

With their weapons bounced off, Yang Qi immediately rushed up from beside Lin Zheng, delivering a furious slash, -3940, followed by two normal attacks, -1675, -1760! After two slashes, she horizontally blocked with her sword, "Cling—" successfully parrying again. Lin Zheng, with great tacit agreement, replaced Yang Qi's position and stepped forward, performing a low kick and Stomp, -3310, -3214. He swung his dual swords, delivering two more strikes, -1790, -1810, and finally kicked the rotten corpse flying, -1320!

"Thud—" The rotten corpse fell to the ground, no longer moving, and then dropped some items! However, before Lin Zheng and Yang Qi could relax, the surrounding ground began to crack, and one rotten corpse after another crawled out from the ground, surrounding their team in an instant!

“Hiss—” Lin Zheng gasped, looking at the dense array of rotten corpses around him! Meow! This time, things had gotten out of hand! He put on his black crow mask and checked the attributes of these abnormal guys.

Blazing Corpse: Level 52 (Elite) Physical Attack 1850-2414, Physical Defense 780, Magic Defense 750, HP 18750 Skills—Blazing Slash Lv1. An elite swordsman cursed and killed a thousand years ago, his soul trapped in his corpse, unable to reincarnate, becoming an undead. He hates all living beings and is immune to all fire magic.

“Damn it! Attack upper limit 2414, and it even has a Level 1 Blazing Slash!” Lin Zheng exclaimed, his face changing drastically! At his shout, the others’ expressions also changed. A Level 1 Blazing Slash is a powerful skill that generates 350% of the maximum physical attack. This is a swordsman’s signature skill, their bread and butter! With the attack of these monsters, under the tier suppression, no one here could withstand a single blow!

“Quick! Charge out, run towards the mountain! Find a place for cover!” Yang Qi shouted loudly. If they were slow, they would be torn apart by these disgusting rotten corpses! After shouting, Yang Qi let out a delicate cry: “Ghost God!”

“Roar—” A huge Ghost God phantom appeared behind Yang Qi. After a roar, it attached itself to Yang Qi. Instantly, Yang Qi was covered in black energy, forming a faintly visible, fierce battle armor, and her eyes emitted a blood-red light! This made the beautiful woman appear even more enchantingly beautiful, like a dark goddess. This image was too amazing! It drew gasps of admiration from the others!

Ghost God Level 1: Summons a Ghost God to possess the user, lasting 5 minutes. In Ghost God State, attack is increased by 100%, damage reduction by 80%, HP recovery +100%, and it has a deterrent effect on undead monsters, reducing all their attributes by 50%. Cooldown 30 minutes.

Lin Zheng quickly checked the Ghost God’s skill information and was immediately shocked by its powerful effects! This skill was too formidable! In the same-level state, anyone who activated Ghost God could basically sweep through all players! Lin Zheng was itching to try this skill himself, but he was clear-headed about the current situation. Now was not the time to use it; he had to wait until Yang Qi’s Ghost God disappeared before it was the right moment to use it! Otherwise, he would waste 5 minutes of the deterrent effect!

“Death Advance!” Yang Qi, now in Ghost God State, shouted loudly. The huge Ghost God attached to her reappeared, and as Yang Qi charged forward, the Ghost God’s massive body instantly knocked away all the rotten corpses blocking their path! In an instant, a path leading to the mountain was cleared! Lin Zheng’s eyes lit up, and he immediately rushed towards the mountain with the others!

“There’s a crack over there!” The sharp-eyed Lan Xiran pointed to a spot on the mountain and shouted. Lin Zheng looked over, and indeed, there was a sizable crack there, large enough to accommodate all of them! Yang Qi also saw it and immediately roared, charging towards the crack. The huge Ghost God knocked away one rotten corpse after another. Lin Zheng and the others followed closely, finally breaking through the encirclement of rotten corpses and rushing into the crack! Yang Qi was the last to run into the crack. As the huge Ghost God disappeared, Yang Qi turned around and unleashed a Golden Crow Slash. Accompanied by a clear bird cry, a massive three-legged Golden Crow swooped towards the dense swarm of rotten corpses. “Boom—” The sun’s fire covered a large area of rotten corpses. Amidst their agonizing ghostly wails, all the covered rotten corpses turned to dust. In an instant, everyone leveled up!

“Holy crap! I’ve seen it a few times, and I still think your Golden Crow Slash is too abnormal! It’s a super weapon, a super weapon!” Lin Zheng exclaimed, looking at the scorched earth left by the Golden Crow Slash. Unexpectedly, Yang Qi didn’t boast proudly. Instead, she yelled at Lilith: “Lilith! Heal! Heal! I’m almost out of HP!” Sweat! Only then did Lin Zheng realize that Yang Qi had less than a quarter of her HP left!

It turned out that the “Death Advance” skill came with a considerable cost. This skill could only be activated in Ghost God State. After activation, it drained 5% of maximum HP per second, but the user was invincible during the advance, capable of knocking back obstacles and dealing 400% of maximum physical damage! It was extremely powerful for breaking through or assaulting!

Hiding in the crack, only two rotten corpses could attack Lin Zheng and the others. After Lilith healed Yang Qi, she and Lin Zheng quickly blocked the attacking rotten corpses! Although there were fewer rotten corpses that could attack them, they also had no space to dodge and could only tank the rotten corpses’ attacks. Fortunately, the rotten corpses’ normal attacks couldn’t break their defense due to the Ghost God’s effect. Only the Blazing Slash hurt a bit, dealing over 5000 damage to Lin Zheng with one hit. If it weren’t for the Ghost God’s effect, it would have instantly killed Lin Zheng! However, Yang Qi’s Ghost God effect was fleeting; 5 minutes would be up in an instant! At this moment, Lin Zheng also roared, activating Ghost God. With his attack skyrocketing, Lin Zheng charged out, unleashing an Explosion among the rotten corpses and then following up with a Stomp. At Level 2, Explosion’s attack range had reached an 11-meter diameter. With one blow, all the rotten corpses within an 11-meter radius screamed and fell. One Golden Crow Slash and one Explosion had wiped out ninety-nine percent of the rotten corpses. For the remaining few rotten corpses, everyone except for the slacking Lan Xiran charged out and fiercely attacked these second-tier monsters with greatly reduced attributes, wiping them out completely within a few minutes!