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Alongside soft thuds, the Spiky Skeletons around me slowly collapsed, leaving their incredibly odorous fingers that I needed to complete my quest.

I picked up the bones, tossing them into my bag. I counted them and just happened to have exactly 40!

I took a glance at my level, I noticed that I was already Level 20 with 45% experience. This grinding efficiency was pretty nice since I"d been online for 12 hours straight.

"Phew! Just the boss left..."

I looked at the Undead Lord Cyan Rain who was in the distance. It"s about time to go back to bring in reinforcements to kill this boss!

But before I moved out, I suddenly felt faint all of a sudden and nearly tumbled. At the same time, the sound of a bell rang past my ears—

Ding~!

System Notice: Your Satiety has fallen to 20. Please eat or there will be unbearable consequences!

Red light appeared on my interface, like when Ultraman"s power was low. I realized that I had forgotten one crucial thing—food!

Floating Ice City"s small merchants all sold food like bread, meat, and so on to replenish vigor, but Frost Mound Camp didn"t. The way Night Creatures ate was very simple, they consumed corpses!

Right, the undead race possesses an innate skill—Corpse Devouring! Corpse Devouring would not only replenish vigor by raising Satiety, it could also quickly recover HP. This was the Night Creatures" natural advantage.

My stats were reduced by 50%. My attack, defense, and HP had all already fallen. Rotting human corpses that looked like big steamed buns floated inside a blood pool not too far from me.

"Bleh…"

I almost threw up and frowned. f.u.c.k! I"ll never use Corpse Devouring even if you beat me to death!

Dragging my weak body with me, I walked out of the necropolis. There was a little human village not too far away. A few low-level NPCs were outside the village planting crops. As long as I killed and consumed any one of these NPCs, I wouldn"t go hungry for twenty-four hours.

"No!"

I gritted my teeth and continued onward. Chomping sounds echoed nearby. I saw a single black-armored Night Creature player chewing on a human corpse. It was none other than that d.a.m.ned Gui Guzi!

"How does it taste?" I asked as I moved closer.

Gui Guzi smiled sinisterly, his mouth dripping with blood. "Not bad, hasn"t been dead for more than twenty-four hours. Still pretty fresh and tender. Wanna eat together?"

"Scram, I"m not eating!"

I left with knitted brows. Gui Guzi laughed with relish. "Hmph, you won"t ever become a top expert. You"re too merciful, hahaha!"

I turned around in anger and glared at Gui Guzi. I infused each of my words with killing intent. "I don"t have some kind of bulls.h.i.+t mercy in my heart but a bottomline. My bottomline!"

"Hmph, whatever. Don"t starve to death or else I won"t even have a single rival!"

Gui Guzi snickered and then lowered his head to continue "feasting".

Wobbling as I walked, I used all my strength to move toward Frost Mound. The deadly Satiety meter suddenly declined even faster. In less than ten minutes, I only had 5 points of Satiety and didn"t even have the energy to walk!

Plop!

I tumbled onto the gra.s.s. It was pouring, and angry streaks of lightning illumed the roiling black clouds in the sky, like a divine oracle rendering judgement on the sinful Night Creatures.

I panted heavily, and looked at the gra.s.s beneath me in humiliation. I braced myself and took a fierce bite out of the tender gra.s.s on the floor!

It was intolerable. The bitter and astringent taste began to spread in my mouth—

Ding~!

System Notice: You have consumed Gra.s.s (Quality 1), recovered 0.1 points of Satiety!

f.u.c.k! Only 0.1, you"ve gotta be kidding me!

My inner cow was about to come out.

My mind was suddenly a sheet of white as I hovered between the brink of consciousness.

Right at this moment, I heard a voice. It was like a moonbeam s.h.i.+ning through the endless darkness—

"Big brother, what"s wrong?"

I slowly raised my head. I saw a round-faced little girl with big sapphire eyes clad in a long purple skirt staring at me from under a tree. She had a basket of mushrooms in her hands. Oh, it"s a loli-gathering mushroom. s.h.i.+t, no, it"s a mushroom-gathering loli.

"Uh…"

I tried to answer, but couldn"t voice any words. My Satiety was too low, but whatever. Starving to death and dropping a level was no big deal. I"d just use a few hours to grind it back.

"You…" The little loli looked at me and suddenly revealed an angelic smile. "Big brother, are you hungry?"

My head bobbed up and down.

The little loli hastily lifted her long skirt, revealing a pair of smooth, wet thighs. When my eyes were about to turn green, she took out a piece of bread and shoved it before me. She said with a smile, "Here, this is my mother"s baking, Oat Bread. It tastes really good, you can have it!"

I was ashamed of my previous thoughts and quickly s.n.a.t.c.hed the bread!

Oat Bread (Quality 100): Rank 1 Consumable. Immediately restores 75 points of Satiety.

This is some good stuff!

I hurriedly stuffed the bread in my mouth. Even though it was moist, it still carried the scent of a young girl. They said that there was a kind of tea leaves that was immediately placed on a young girl"s chest to dry after it was harvested. Widely spread in Anhui, the tea leaves were called... x.x.x (f.u.c.k! I forgot their name). But this Oat Bread was pretty much the same, its flavor immensely delightful.

A large part of my vigor was instantly restored. This bread was a low-level commodity, but since my level wasn"t all that high either, it replenished a substantial amount of my vigor!

Full of energy, I turned around and smiled at the little loli. "What"s your name, little girl?"

"I"m Xinran!" she said in a sweet voice.

To be honest, I didn"t need to ask because I could already see the words floating above her head: Young Girl Xinran LV-15. This had to be a pure and harmless little girl if she helped a Night Creature like me, who would normally be put to death by humans.

"Xinran, why are you here? Night Creatures often roam this place. What if something bad happened?"

Xinran blinked. "Mother can"t see anymore and shamans in the village said that freshly-springed mushrooms born from the rain can cure her eyes, so I…"

"Oh I see. Will you come here every day from now on?"

"Mn!"

I exposed a smile and slightly moved away from Xinran, afraid that she would be frightened by my face. "Xinran, I can come here everyday for you. Can you give me a piece of bread every time we meet?"

Xingran nodded, "Okay, big brother. Do you like mother"s bread?"

"Mn, mn!"

"Hehe, I got it!"

I was a bit speechless. This silly girl, she didn"t want anything in return?

When I thought about that, I took out a silver coin from my bag. With a flick of my hand, the silver drew a graceful arc and landed in Xinran"s basket.

"Take this back to buy some flour. I can"t eat for free."

"Mn, okay. Then I"ll be heading back now. Mother will worry."

"Okay!"

Like a beautiful b.u.t.terfly, Xinran skipped across the gra.s.s while carrying her basket and soon disappeared from my sight. Sigh, a pure girl like her is truly rare!

After my Satiety was restored, I strode into Frost Mound Camp. I arrived before Undead Swordsman Suren and selected the "Learn Skill" option. Two Level 20 skills that I could learn immediately jumped out at me—

Summon Undead: Summons an undead creature no stronger than the user as a monster servant.

Earth Escape: Escape underground. Movement speed is reduced by 90%, easy to discover.

Each skill cost 20 silver. Fortunately, I was a rich man with 92 silver, so I swiped up both skills.

Summon Undead was naturally a strong skill. It could summon a combat a.s.sistant. Regardless of whether it would be an attacker or just a meats.h.i.+eld, this skill was extremely useful. As for Earth Escape, it should be a life-saving skill. Of course, if one didn"t mind how slow it is, it could also be used for a sneak attack.

I activated Earth Escape and my body immediately transformed into several blood-colored vines that dove into the ground. I could see everything that happened above ground but my movement speed was infuriatingly slow. If I tried going to Floating Ice City at this speed, my hair would"ve already turned gray by the time I got there.

Something like being able to see what"s above ground while being hidden underground was extremely powerful. An image of multiple thighs immediately took form in my mind. Using Earth Escape to hide beneath Floating Ice City"s gates would allow me to see the cute female elves, succubi, and humans pa.s.s by. Their fluttering short skirts and the impressive view would be a kind of cosmic pleasure!

Subconsciously, my mind already cla.s.sified Earth Escape as a precious trump card.

At this time, my trainer, Undead Swordsman Suren, looked at my underground self with disdain. He said with a voice full of contempt, "What"re you doing, ya smelly brat? You dare use such a basic Earth Escape here?"

I quickly canceled Earth Escape. Blood-colored vines shot out from the ground, condensing into a human figure. I then took out 40 Spiky Skeleton Fingers. "Master, I got these from our enemies. Undead Lord Cyan Rain is inside the necropolis!"

Suren took the skeleton fingers and snorted. "Cyan Rain doesn"t know the meaning of death, to dare enter my territory. I"m going to show him the power of the Night Creatures" master swordsman! Little skeleton, follow me. I"ll give you a lesson and teach you what the law of the jungle means!"

I was filled with reverence. "Master, over here!"

I came to the deepest part of the necropolis again, this time with Suren. All the resp.a.w.ned skeletons along the way were pretty much instantly killed by Suren. Wielding a two-handed broadsword, a light wave of his sword immediately beheaded a Level 22 Iron Skeleton. Awesome!

We quickly saw the edges of the graveyard Undead Lord Cyan Rain was guarding. He stood at its center, holding a longsword with a frosty expression.

Broadsword in hand, my master—Undead Swordmaster Suren—walked toward the outer fringes of the graveyard. Facing the Undead Lord, hands on his hips, he shouted in a display of arrogance, "Cyan Rain, you aristocratic sc.u.m! Come out and prepare to die!"