Chapter Thirty-Two: The Devouring Flame-Venom Python!

Although trap-based elephant slaughter had greatly improved my leveling speed, I was far from satisfied. My journey through Fantasy Online was no longer merely about making a living or proving that I had made the right choice. From the day Xiao Lan’s father sent someone to warn me, the goal I was striving toward in life had already changed.

I would carve out a glorious path for myself. They knew perfectly well that Xiao Lan’s judgment was beyond compare. The thought of marrying Xiao Lan in grand style had taken root deep within my heart.

To achieve that goal, breaking into the Character Fame Rankings was utterly insignificant. What I needed to do was earn money through my own efforts and build up my wealth. I knew Xiao Lan did not care about such things at all, but how could a man’s dignity allow the woman he loved to suffer even the slightest grievance? Even if the pressure came from her father, I had to help her bear it and solve her troubles.

After the player-killing incident, Starbright Group transferred eight hundred thousand yuan into my bank account as promised. After converting my game currency and sending fifty thousand yuan to my parents, my savings had already reached nearly a million. If I chose to live like an ordinary person—working diligently and cautiously—then, so long as I did not encounter some sudden disaster, I could enjoy a life free from worries about food and clothing.

But an ordinary life was not what I wanted. Wealth and glory had to be sought amid danger.

After much persuasion, I sent Xiao Xue, A Wei, and the others back to continue their miserable elephant slaughtering. Then I brought along a supply of medicines and set out for the Forgotten Ruins.

My instincts told me that the overwhelming aura of the Undead General was definitely not something a low-level boss could possess. Ever since I had broken through the undead army two days earlier, I had been unable to stop thinking about him. This time, I had no worries holding me back. Even if I encountered Sky-Piercing Evil and his gang again, escaping unscathed with my current strength would be no difficult task.

The ruins were almost deserted. The only figures moving about were stiff-bodied undead creatures. Perhaps the players had been frightened by the terrifying undead army reported on the forums. No one dared challenge the Undead General, who commanded hundreds of underlings and whose own strength was impossible to gauge.

After cutting down several undead and sending them crashing to the ground, I was slightly out of breath. The familiar sensation coming from my Crocodile Bone Sword gave me a sense of security, but when faced with the countless undead creatures around me, a feeling of powerlessness gradually began to spread.

My loyal companion, from level twenty all the way to level thirty-two, you have followed me silently, never leaving me, never surrendering. During that time, who knows how much of my enemies’ blood you drank, or how much fame and wealth you helped me earn? You are the most steadfast and reliable of comrades. Are you tired today?

Or am I the one who has grown tired of you because of the fierce longing in my heart to reach a higher realm?

There is no banquet beneath heaven that never ends. As a level-twenty weapon, you have already done everything you could do, and you did it better than anyone could have asked. Set your heart at ease. You have shared life and death with me, and I will never allow you to suffer humiliation in another’s hands. Even when you honorably retire from my service, I will carry you within my heart and preserve you there forever.

I gradually cleared away the undead wandering along the road. Groups of three gave me an especially hard time, but fortunately I had prepared well. After exhausting one-third of my healing potions, I finally fought my way to the plaza.

The plaza was still paved with dark granite slabs, and the stone coffin remained in place. But its former guards—the imposing undead army, with its flourishing ranks and strict discipline—had vanished without a trace. Even the twelve grim guards that had once stood beside the coffin were gone. Only the brown marble coffin remained, standing forlornly beside the lonely pool in the wind.

The vast plaza was devoid of even a ghostly shadow. No corpses remained. The eerie silence brought with it a stifling gloom that left me agitated and oppressed.

Could the undead army really have abandoned its headquarters without a sound and moved elsewhere? Or had the Undead General devised some new tactical arrangement?

The stone slabs beneath my feet were unchanged. The coffin sat in silent stillness. There was no way to detect anything amiss.

I approached the coffin carefully and activated Sui Bian at once. With the unending circulation of the Vast Righteousness technique through my bonesword, a pale radiance shone from its edge, lending me an added measure of authority.

Step by cautious step, I drew nearer. Nothing unusual happened. The hard, cold marble coffin before me looked solemn and magnificent. Not even the slightest crack could be found around it. Had I not witnessed where the Undead General had emerged from, I never would have guessed that the coffin was hollow.

I drew a deep breath. The cool air dispelled the heaviness in my chest. Raising my sword, I cautiously tapped the coffin.

There was still no response.

I transferred the sword to my left hand, then circulated the Vast Righteousness technique through my right arm and shoved hard against the lid. Once this stone slab was opened, every secret would be revealed. The faint fear in my heart silently retreated beneath the force of my curiosity.

“Rumble…”

The instant the coffin opened, I caught sight of the empty interior. On the side nearest the pool, however, there was a stone door. A volley of black-fletched arrows shot out with terrifying speed.

The attack came so suddenly that my mind had no time to react. Even with Sui Bian’s assistance, I feared I would have been unable to escape the range of those densely packed arrows.

At the critical moment, my instinct for survival—honed in the real world—took over. I sprang backward and performed a midair somersault. The sharp arrows, carrying a frigid chill, sliced past my chest. The circulation of the Vast Righteousness technique made my movements light and agile. Wave after wave of arrows pursued me relentlessly, piercing the floor where I had stood only moments before.

After several flips, I narrowly avoided the first volley. I did not dare linger. With Sui Bian’s help, I kicked backward and withdrew from the area around the coffin.

Four or five minutes later, the intermittent rain of arrows finally fell silent.

The area within fifteen meters of where I had originally stood was now densely covered with steel arrows. Their sharp tips had pierced two or three inches into the supposedly unyielding granite floor. Had I been struck by even one of those arrows, my frail body would have been run through with ease.

If I had not noticed the danger in time, I would already have become a porcupine on my way to report to the King of Hell. Fortunately, I had not brought A Wei and the others along. Given their speed, every one of them would certainly have died here.

What a vicious and terrifying mechanism. It activated the instant it was triggered. Even if one possessed an army of thousands, few could survive such a large-scale barrage while caught off guard.

The mechanism had been neutralized, but I felt no joy whatsoever. The floor was so thickly covered with arrows that there was nowhere to set foot. How was I supposed to cross those dozen-odd meters and enter the underground chamber?

With such an elaborate mechanism protecting it, I refused to believe there were no rare treasures inside. Perhaps the chamber contained the entire fortune of the castle’s master. If I could successfully unearth it, then—

Ha-ha…

Alas, all I could do now was stare at the treasure and sigh.

Bored, I pulled an arrow from the floor beneath my feet. It was made of a gray metal, nearly three feet long—light yet sturdy. Even when bent with great force, its shaft retained its straightness and rigidity. The fletching was flexible and resilient, remaining undamaged despite repeated tugging.

Judging from the material, the arrow shaft had been forged from an alloy containing tungsten steel. That was how it could remain light while withstanding tremendous impact. Three narrow grooves ran along the cylindrical shaft, each branching out from the triangular arrowhead. They were probably blood grooves. Once the arrow struck an enemy, the three channels would allow the victim to bleed continuously, deepening the injury.

The alloy arrowhead, made of the same material, bore two ancient seal-script characters, though they had grown blurry with age. I could faintly make out the words “Great Xia.”

These were military arrows!

Everyone knew that the nation in our Chinese region of Fantasy Online was the Kingdom of Huaxia, and many NPCs simply referred to it as Great Xia. What identity had the Undead General possessed while he was alive? A single mechanism had been built on such a grand scale!

I yearned to tear away the veil of his mystery.

I used Appraisal on the alloy arrow in my hand.

Armor-Piercing Arrow. Required level: 30. Agility requirement: 35. Attack: 32–48. Firing speed increased by 10 percent. Additional 10 percent damage against heavy armor.

Damn! This was absolutely a masterpiece specially forged for use against heavy cavalry in war.

What astonished me even more was that it had no listed weight. I could not understand it at all. The arrow was light, yes, but it still had a definite weight in my hand.

I stored it in my backpack, yet my encumbrance did not increase.

So that was how it worked—it did not count toward carrying weight.

Although these were armor-piercing arrows, they could be taken as spoils of war. But with only a hundred slots in my backpack, how many could I possibly carry? Even if I had brought quivers, there was nothing I could do about the tens of thousands of arrows scattered across the ground.

Arrows of such superb quality would fetch a fortune in gold. Throwing them away was painful, but there was nowhere to put them. The dilemma gave me a terrible headache.

If I left now and another player discovered this place, tens of thousands of arrows would be handed over to them on a silver platter.

I stared helplessly at the armor-piercing arrow in my hand. If I called A Wei and asked him to bring quivers, he would have to return to town and come back. It might take him an hour at best. By the time he arrived, the treasure would already be gone.

Forget it. I would take as many as I could and hide the rest somewhere concealed.

Huh?

After I placed several armor-piercing arrows into my backpack, they unexpectedly stacked together with the arrows already inside, occupying only a single slot. My encumbrance had not increased either.

This unexpected discovery sent me into a frenzy of delight. I began pulling arrows from the ground and throwing them into my backpack at lightning speed. The nimbleness of my hands and feet set a personal record.

In less than an hour, every arrow on the ground had been collected into my backpack. Five hundred arrows occupied one slot, with each slot weighing ten units. More than eight thousand armor-piercing arrows had been swallowed by fewer than twenty slots.

At that moment, I was nothing less than a mobile miniature arsenal.

With the obstacle of the arrows removed, I cautiously stepped into the grim, pitch-black underground tomb chamber. To protect the secrets of this place, I lit a torch purchased from the system and pushed the coffin lid back into place. The tomb chamber was well ventilated and did not feel stuffy.

Entering through the open stone door, I discovered the mechanism at once. The devices that had fired the armor-piercing arrows were the sixteen arrow launchers arranged in two rows before me. Their appearance was strikingly similar to the crude cannons used to breach fortifications during the Second World War, except that their barrels were thicker and longer. Their honeycomb-like openings could fire more than a hundred arrows at once.

The launchers’ loading mechanism was relatively complicated. A four-meter-diameter iron wheel was connected to a thick steel axle. Beneath the axle was a row of waterwheels, their broad blades as large as palm-leaf fans. Flowing water drove the waterwheels, which in turn powered the rotation of the axle. Once the arrows were placed into the wheel, they would be loaded automatically.

It was a simple device, yet by making use of the underground river, its creators had fashioned such a perfect mechanism. Their imagination and inventiveness were truly astonishing.

The trigger for the entire system had been installed above the stone door of the tomb chamber. When the lid of the coffin pulled the stone door open, the section buried beneath the earth slowly retracted as well. The waterway that had originally been blocked immediately became unobstructed. As the water rushed through, the waterwheels began to turn, activating the whole mechanism.

Beyond the mechanism-filled chamber stretched a long passageway. It was deep and winding, and its end could not be seen. Ancient stone walls were covered with spreading cobwebs, their desolation and melancholy echoing the shattered ruins above.

Every ten meters, solemn bronze statues had been cast along the quiet passage. The first figures I saw were warriors standing in rows on either side. They held long halberds, their armor gleaming, their bodies powerfully built, their expressions resolute. They inspired instinctive awe.

Bronze statues of court ladies alternated with those of the warriors. The ladies wore palace robes, their beautiful features lifelike, their ribbons fluttering as though caught in the wind.

Oil lamps had been set into the stone walls between each pair of statues. When my burning torch drew near, the lamps—extinguished for countless years—suddenly flickered to life, releasing once more the radiance they had concealed beneath the earth.

The bronze statues gleamed beneath the yellow, murky lamplight. In the haze, they seemed almost to come alive.

I was just preparing to continue forward when the unexpected happened.

Two powerful gusts of wind struck me. The cold killing intent nearly froze my heartbeat in an instant. At the same moment, the two palace maids before me, who had been smiling sweetly, revealed savage expressions. Their fluttering ribbons shot out and wrapped around my feet in the blink of an eye.

I screamed inwardly:

My life is over!

Fantasy Online Game