35: Chapter 35 The Suspicious Annihilation of Zhao Lei's Group and the Requiem Chant

After Blood Raven died, that layer of pale soul lightning plowed through the surroundings, and even the wind carried the burnt smell of bone fragments. Hu Jinsi looked up at the sky; the haze was still thick, as if someone were slowly closing a manhole cover.

"We still have some time," Lin Rui said, removing the severely deformed round shield from his arm and shaking his numb arm. "But it's not enough to explore the tomb again. We must prepare for tonight's camp."

Su Wan held her lyre, her gaze sweeping across the crooked tombstones and pits around them, before she pulled her neck back in, her voice tight: "We... we aren't going to stay in the graveyard for the night, are we?"

Hu Jinsi was taking the Hot Boot Spike out of his backpack to replace the mud-covered white-plate shoes on his feet. With the new boots on, the metal spikes on the soles changed his stance, making it look like he was stepping on two miniature daggers. He stood up, stomped his feet, turned to look at Su Wan, and then at Liu Betti, who was lowering her head to organize her quiver, and grinned: "Staying near a graveyard, or going out to blow in the northwest wind—which one do you choose?"

Su Wan shivered, her shoulders trembling from the cold. There was no sun in the Burial Grounds; that faint, eerie green glow looked strange, but at least it wasn't as cold. The wind poured in from the direction of the Cold Plains, like someone pouring ice chips into her collar. She shrank her neck, and the lyre's strings hummed slightly in the wind, forming no melody.

"...By that calculation," Su Wan sniffled, her voice muffled, "staying near the graveyard actually isn't the worst choice. But at least we should clear out the monsters around us, right?"

"That's the intention." Hu Jinsi hoisted his iron-clad long staff onto his shoulder, his boot spikes clicking crisply against the ground. "Before dark, a clearing mission. Send these wandering bone racks and slow-motion zombies in the Burial Grounds back to where they belong. As for those two tombs in the depths—"

He pointed his chin toward the deeper parts of the graveyard, where two patches of darkness, deeper and gloomier than the surroundings, were lurking at the edge of their vision like two mouths opened by the earth: "Leave them for tomorrow morning. Going into a tomb in the dark isn't a matter of luck; it's a bit of a challenge to our current courage limit."

"Agreed." Lin Rui rummaged through his backpack for a spare light crossbow and checked the mechanism. "Let's split up. Liu Betti, you take the left flank; Su Wan, follow behind me to finish them off; Jinsi, move on the right flank. Quick battle, quick decision; the sooner we finish, the sooner we rest."

For the next hour, the four-person team completed their routine sweep of the Burial Grounds. Without Blood Raven's summoning interference, those scattered skeletons and starving dead posed no threat at all. Their movement speed was agonizingly slow; in the words of a certain NBA legend from Hu Jinsi's past life, it was "passing you like passing a street in the morning."

Hu Jinsi even had the energy to test his new boots. He targeted a lone starving dead, pointed to the ground in front of it, and said, "I'm going to finish you here in a moment, remember that—right here." He then kicked out sideways, the Hot Boot Spike tracing a dark red trajectory, precisely piercing the zombie's cervical spine. [-7], the added fire damage ignited a small cluster of flames at the wound, making the rotten neck sizzle.

"Not bad," Hu Jinsi shook his leg, kicking the zombie into light particles. In short, he looked like a happy, fire-wielding youth.

Liu Betti saw this scene from afar and raised an eyebrow, but said nothing. She silently drew her bow, and the two arrows split from [Multishot] pierced the ribs of two skeletons, pinning them to a collapsed tombstone. The soul-siphoning effect of the Soul-Sucking Short Bow restored a bit of her mana, and a faint, imperceptible light flashed and faded on the bowstring.

Before the sky turned completely dark, the wandering undead on the periphery were cleared out. The four found a relatively sheltered ruin of a stone wall, backed against the broken wall, and lit campfires around them. The firelight appeared particularly weak against the eerie green background, like fishing lamps in the depths of the ocean that could go out at any moment.

Dinner was the leftover roast wild boar meat from their backpacks and hardtack. The meat was already cold, and the fat had congealed into a white film, but in a place like this, having a bite of hot carbohydrates was happiness. Su Wan used a knife to cut the meat into four portions, passed them around, and then sat by the campfire, hugging her knees, with the lyre within reach.

Liu Betti, now idle, suddenly looked up, as if remembering something. She put down the dried meat in her hand, pulled a regular arrow from her quiver, and nocked it on the Soul-Sucking Short Bow.

"Let me show you something," she said.

The bowstring was pulled back, and mana condensed on the arrow. Unlike the usual fire arrows, this time, a layer of fine white frost condensed on the surface of the arrow, and the temperature in the air dropped sharply. Liu Betti released the string, and the [Ice Arrow] left the bow, pinning itself to a withered tree more than ten meters away. The moment the arrow hit, a thin layer of ice spread rapidly from the impact point, wrapping the entire trunk in a crystalline ice shell.

"After killing Blood Raven, I not only unlocked the level cap but also obtained this," Liu Betti retracted her bow, her tone filled with irrepressible excitement, though she was still trying to maintain calm. "[Ice Arrow]. It enhances the arrow with ice magic, causing additional cold damage upon impact and significantly slowing the target's movement speed."

Hu Jinsi, still chewing meat, paused. He stared at the frozen withered tree and then looked at Liu Betti, the envy in his eyes almost overflowing: "So now you can have attacks with two elements? Fire and ice... At this stage, whether in terms of attack power or elemental mastery, you've already surpassed mages of the same level, right?"

"You can't put it that way." Liu Betti waved her hand, but the corners of her mouth were indeed curled up. "After all, Rogues and mages have different roles. A Rogue is a ranged damage dealer from beginning to end, relying on attacks to make a living. While a mage is a variable class that relies on wisdom and arcane knowledge to lead the flow of encounters through prediction and strategy. It's just that when we were young, we saw those mages' battles as too cool, and thus always understood them as existence for damage dealing."

Su Wan bit into the dried meat and sighed indistinctly: "The only attack skill I use is still [Thunderwave]. Although I can master spells, I am restricted by spell slots, and it's not as refreshing as your class."

"Bards are jacks-of-all-trades," Hu Jinsi stuffed the last piece of meat into his mouth and patted her shoulder. "Wait until you get [Siren]'s voice at level 10; when you open your mouth, it'll be noise pollution. Just endure it for now and treat it as charging up."

After sharing the joy, the four confirmed tomorrow's itinerary. Liu Betti admitted that she had only been to the tomb on the west side of the Burial Grounds before, and the situation inside was roughly known. As for the larger one on the east side, because it was too close to Blood Raven's activity range, her former teammates had never dared to approach it. The specific terrain inside the tomb was randomly generated, like a dungeon, so she couldn't guarantee what specific monsters would be there, but the intensity shouldn't exceed Blood Raven.

"That's easy to handle," Hu Jinsi placed his long staff across his knees. "Tomorrow morning, two tombs. West first, then East, steady and solid."

Su Wan poked the campfire, sparks splashed up and quickly extinguished in the cold air. She hesitated for a moment, then suddenly looked at Liu Betti, her voice very soft: "Betti, do you think... it is possible for us to defeat [Bishibosh] now?"

This name was like a stone thrown into the campfire; what splashed up was not sparks, but a suffocating silence.

The smile on Liu Betti's face disappeared instantly. She stared at Su Wan, her eyes becoming unusually serious, even carrying a bit of sharpness: "Never think of [Bishibosh] as too difficult. Many teams can reach the strength to defeat [Bishibosh]. After all, before we even reached level six, Zhao Lei had already led us to kill [Bishibosh]. But you have to accept a reality: you being able to kill [Bishibosh] and you being able to leave alive are two different things. Just like today's lightning—standing too close, it's hard to survive."

Hu Jinsi had originally been using a branch to poke the charcoal in the campfire. Hearing this, the branch in his hand snapped with a "crack." He slowly raised his head, his gaze falling on Liu Betti's face, and he suddenly thought of something.

"Wait," he put down the broken branch, his voice pressed very low, but every word was articulated clearly. "You killed [Bishibosh]? I always thought you failed under the siege of [Bishibosh] and that pile of [Fallen Shaman]."

Liu Betti shook her head, the firelight dancing on her side profile, outlining a taut contour: "No. We did indeed forcefully kill [Bishibosh] back then. Zhao Lei's class is A-rank, and his abilities are indeed powerful. No matter how strong [Bishibosh] is, he is essentially just a strengthened type of [Fallen Shaman]. Facing a quick siege by several people, he actually has no evasion ability, and his defense isn't high. As long as it's fast enough, killing him is not a difficult task."

Hu Jinsi narrowed his eyes, his brain turning rapidly. He leaned forward, as if afraid of missing any word: "Then since [Bishibosh] died, why didn't your team receive a dungeon kill achievement announcement at that time? Blood Raven had one, why didn't [Bishibosh]? And today's announcement emphasized 'relying on one's own solid combat literacy,' which proves that in the previous battle against [Bishibosh], even if Zhao Lei's team killed [Bishibosh], certain people in the team must have used means they shouldn't have to achieve it."

He paused and added: "Similar to how Lin Rui used an RPG to hit Corpsefire before."

Lin Rui, who was wiping his short sword, stopped. He and Su Wan looked at Liu Betti simultaneously.

Liu Betti was stunned. She clearly had never thought about the problem from this angle. Her brows slowly knitted, and her lips pressed into a line: "Indeed... after today's battle ended, we received the boss kill announcement, and it said it was the first one completed. But when Zhao Lei led us to kill [Bishibosh] back then, we didn't hear any system prompts."

"Then since it was already killed," Hu Jinsi's voice became increasingly low, "how did you distribute the drops from [Bishibosh] in the end? Normally, the first kill reward shouldn't be bad. Did Zhao Lei split the loot with you? Or was it given to the families of the two fallen classmates?"

Liu Betti was silent for a long time. The campfire crackled, a piece of charcoal collapsed, sparking a few embers that landed on her boots and quickly extinguished.

"There was no loot," she finally spoke, her voice so light it was like she was talking to herself. "At least from the news Zhao Lei gave me, he didn't pick up any drops. Zhao Lei told me that at the moment the shield was triggered, he was too scared and forcibly quit the dungeon, completely without checking if there were any drops, or what the drops were."

A heavy silence fell among the four. The wind crept in through the cracks in the stone wall, blowing the flames askew. In the distance, an unknown skeleton that hadn't died completely made a dry, rubbing sound, which quickly returned to deathly silence.

Lin Rui slowly sheathed his short sword, the sound of metal friction particularly harsh in the silence. He looked at Liu Betti, his gaze steady but carrying a penetrating force: "Do you believe it?"

Liu Betti raised her head and met his gaze. Her expression was composed, one could even say calm, a calm that carried a detachment after experiencing life and death: "Whether I believe it or not, what does it matter? After all, I am still alive. And the other two classmates have completely left; their families are the ones who should go to Zhao Lei to collect the debt."

These words were like solid ice, freezing the topic completely. Hu Jinsi opened his mouth, wanting to ask further: Why did Zhao Lei want to force an attack on [Bishibosh]? Why did he prepare kill items and life-saving items in advance? These questions hooked in his throat like fishhooks, but looking at Liu Betti's bottomless eyes, and then at Su Wan's pale face, he finally swallowed the words back.

"...Let's talk about something else," Su Wan forced a smile, her voice a bit dry. "For example... what to eat after going out? I want to find a sunny place and eat something warm."

"I want to eat hot pot," Hu Jinsi immediately picked up the thread, deliberately raising his tone. "Not spicy, the old-fashioned copper pot kind, only mutton, nothing else."

"Can you think of something realistic?" Su Wan rolled her eyes, but the tension on her face did loosen a bit.

Liu Betti also curled the corners of her mouth, although the smile didn't reach her eyes. The four turned to talk about clothes, food, and which teacher in school was the most annoying, using this trivial gossip to squeeze out the heavy air bit by bit. After the relaxation time, the night watch division remained the same: Lin Rui for the first half of the night, Su Wan for the middle, and Hu Jinsi for the second half.

The campfire gradually weakened, leaving only dark red charcoal glowing and fading in the ashes.

Hu Jinsi sat cross-legged on the meditation cushion, the prayer beads slowly turning on his wrist. He closed his eyes, appearing to be in Deep Meditation, but in reality, he sank his thoughts into the panel deep in his consciousness.

After the lesson from last week, he had developed a habit: every night he would check the panel, analyze exactly which different battles he had experienced, and see where the professional experience increase would be faster. Judging from the battles of the past two days, the experience gain from attacking those demon-type or undead-type monsters was at a normal level, or slightly higher than normal, but the increase wasn't particularly large. At least compared to those beasts in Goldshire, there was only a slight increase.

But when his enemy became a Dark Rogue, Hu Jinsi clearly felt a large amount of so-called "Monk's Balance Way" experience bonus. Especially at the moment Blood Raven died, he didn't know if others' professional experience moved, but for the first time, Hu Jinsi saw in his panel that he had received a four-digit reward experience all at once. So much so that now he could even draw a level 7 perk.

This was clearly not reward experience generated by the number of battles.

Regarding the story of Blood Raven, through Liu Betti's narration today, he also perceived the reason behind the rewards of the so-called Path of Balance.

At the very least, beings like Blood Raven, who originally possessed free will but were transformed into tools with nothing left but the instinct to kill, are rejected by the world consciousness.

The Monk's Path of Balance perhaps manifests in severing the chains of "distorted natural existence," restoring a local balance of life and death.

As for the stories of the other Dark Rogues, perhaps he could ask Liu Betti again tomorrow. She might have better answers.

Hu Jinsi slowly opened his eyes, gazing at the eerie green night sky of the Burial Grounds, exhaling a puff of white mist.

His Qi circulated through his meridians, and the warm, smooth touch of the prayer beads on his wrist felt like a silent reminder.

Today's plan was the tomb.

The morning of the third day in the Burial Grounds—a place that never saw sunlight—meant only that the yellow-green sky looked slightly brighter, like a lightbulb with insufficient voltage.

After a simple breakfast of leftover compressed biscuits and half a piece of roasted boar meat as hard as a rock, the four of them headed straight for the two tombs in the Burial Grounds.

The one on the west side was closer, hidden behind a patch of withered cypress trees, its entrance half-covered by vines and moss, looking like a healing scar.

According to Liu Betti, the western tomb only had one level and wasn't very large, its size somewhere between the first and second levels of the Underground Cave.

Inside, there would be an elite monster, a strengthened version of a skeleton with roughly three to four times the health of a normal one. At the end, there would be a chest similar to the one on the second level of the Underground Cave; don't get your hopes up too high.

"Exploring tombs is never very pleasant," Su Wan said, standing before the tomb entrance, looking up at the pitch-black stone steps extending downward like the esophagus of some giant beast. "I've been to forests, lakeside, mines, and even doomsday cities and sewers. But tombs certainly rank in the top three for worst experiences."

"The skeletons and zombies crawling out from everywhere really have a very limited impact on the squad," Hu Jinsi said, gripping his long staff, his Hot Boot Spike tapping crisply against the steps. "But the eerie atmosphere in the tomb, along with the traps everywhere, is truly not very pleasant."

"Let's go," Lin Rui said, switching on his headlamp and stepping onto the stone stairs first. "The sooner we go down, the sooner we get back."

The interior of the western tomb was even more suffocating than Liu Betti had described.

It was less of a tomb and more of a warehouse filled with corpses. The air was extremely murky, permeated with a sweet, cloying scent of formaldehyde mixed with the stench of aged corpses; breathing it into one's lungs felt like swallowing a mouthful of warm swill.

Light could barely penetrate the thick dust; only the faint, eerie green foxfire occasionally flickering on the walls provided dim illumination. The foxfire was attached to unknown moss, swaying gently with the four's footsteps, casting twisted, dancing shadows on the walls.

It was abnormally quiet here; even their footsteps were absorbed by a thick carpet—if one could call the layer of accumulated dust and corpse wax covering the floor a carpet.

There was only a suffocating silence, and the faint sound occasionally coming from the depths, like someone scratching a stone slab with their fingernails.

The passage was extremely cramped, often only wide enough for one person to pass. Both sides were piled with open coffins and stacked skeletons. Some coffin lids leaned against the walls, with long-dried corpses curled up inside, their hollow eye sockets facing the center of the passage.

Many of the skeletons were not intact, as if something had roughly dismantled them and restacked them together. Leg bones were thrust between ribs, and a skull rolled to his feet. Hu Jinsi accidentally kicked it, producing a hollow rolling sound as it struck the wall and bounced back.

"This place..." Su Wan's voice was extremely low, her lyre clutched to her chest like a shield. "Reminds me of the school specimen room."

"At least the specimen room isn't poisonous," Hu Jinsi said, walking behind Lin Rui with his long staff held horizontally in front of him, ready to fend off anything pouncing from the shadows. "The same can't be said for here."

No sooner had he finished speaking than Lin Rui's foot sank.

"Pressure plate!" Lin Rui shouted, his body instinctively recoiling backward.

The stone bricks on both sides of the wall slid open suddenly, revealing dense rows of holes. Dozens of pitch-black poison arrows shot out from the holes, the sound of them piercing the air as sharp as fingernails scratching against glass.

Lin Rui raised his round shield, shrinking his whole body behind it. He heard only a dense series of clanging sounds, "clang, clang, clang, clang." The force of the poison arrows was astonishing; each one gouged deep dents into the shield's surface.

The impact force was transmitted through the shield to his arm, shaking him back two steps until his back slammed heavily into Hu Jinsi's chest.

"This force," Lin Rui gritted his teeth, his arm muscles trembling uncontrollably. "It's even fiercer than the quills of a Quill Rat."

Hu Jinsi steadied his shoulder and leaned over to glance at the arrows with their eerie blue sheen on the shield, gasping, "The arrowheads are coated with something. Don't get grazed."

The four of them hugged the wall, carefully bypassing the pressure plate area. Su Wan plucked a string, creating a slight vibration, attempting to use sound waves to detect the ground ahead, but the narrow space made the echoes chaotic, making it impossible to distinguish anything.

Reaching the middle of the passage, a coffin lying across the center of the path blocked their way. The coffin was already rotten, its lid half-open, revealing half a corpse wearing rusted chainmail inside. Lin Rui poked the coffin lid with his short sword, intending to push it aside.

"Wait!" Liu Betti suddenly spoke up. It was too late.

The instant the coffin lid was pushed, a crisp click of a mechanism came from inside the coffin. Several pitch-black flying spikes shot out from hidden slots in the inner walls of the coffin, moving so fast they left only afterimages.

Lin Rui reacted extremely quickly, holding his short sword horizontally to deflect two of them, but the third grazed his cheek, leaving a bloody scratch.

And Hu Jinsi, standing to the side and behind, was not so lucky; one flying spike accurately pierced the outer side of his left arm.

"Hiss—" Hu Jinsi gasped, feeling as if a red-hot branding iron had been thrust into his flesh. The skin around the wound instantly turned black, and a sense of numbness spread along his blood vessels toward his shoulder. [Health: 142/160], and a glaring icon appeared on his status bar: [Mild Poisoning].

"Don't move!" Su Wan lunged over, nearly dropping her lyre. A faint glow appeared at her fingertips, and the chant of [Healing Word] echoed in the narrow space.

Warm healing energy enveloped Hu Jinsi's wound; the black miasma dissipated slowly like snow meeting boiling water, and the numbness receded along with it. But the wound still burned painfully, as if ants were crawling inside his flesh.

"Toxic flying spikes," Su Wan panted, cold sweat covering her forehead. "Coffin trap. Don't go around pushing things blindly in the future."

"You should have said something before I pushed it," Hu Jinsi said, rubbing his arm and grimacing. "Hindsight is 20/20."

"I said 'wait'," Liu Betti said expressionlessly. "Don't touch things in a graveyard randomly; that's something taught many times in general knowledge classes."

Further ahead, the passage suddenly opened up a short distance, forming a stone chamber of no more than five or six square meters.

In the center of the stone chamber, a huge skeleton pieced together from multiple skeletons was kneeling with its back to them in front of a stone table.

It was nearly three meters tall, its spine spliced together from three different spinal columns, and its ribs curled outward like a rotting flower.

It held a massive flail in its hands, the iron ball of the flail covered in rusted spikes, dragging on the ground and scraping out a teeth-gritting sound.

[Bonecrusher]

The monster slowly turned its head, and two points of crimson soul fire ignited in its hollow eye sockets.

As it stood up, its head nearly touched the dome of the stone chamber, and it raised the flail high, bringing with it a gust of foul-smelling wind.

"Elite monster!" Lin Rui shouted, bracing his round shield. "I'll tank the front! The passage is too narrow, you can't get around!"

Bonecrusher let out a silent roar. It was a soul shriek that vibrated directly in their minds, followed immediately by Bonecrusher swinging the flail down with a boom!

Lin Rui raised his shield to take it head-on. "BOOM!!!"

The force of that blow was beyond imagination. The iron ball of the flail struck the round shield, producing a loud bang like a blacksmith striking an anvil.

Lin Rui's feet instantly sank half an inch into the ground, his knees buckling, and he nearly fell to his knees.

Even with [Block] activated, reducing damage by 40%, the impact force still passed through the shield, shaking his internal organs out of place.

The web between his thumb and index finger split, and blood flowed down the handle of the shield. [Health: 198/270]; with one strike, it had directly shaved off over a quarter of his health.

"What kind of freakish strength is this!" Lin Rui squeezed the words through his teeth, his arm muscles trembling wildly.

Hu Jinsi was behind Lin Rui; the passage was so narrow that even turning sideways was difficult, and there was no way to get behind Bonecrusher. Thinking quickly, he pulled the [Licker's Ripping Knuckle Duster] from his waist and slipped it onto his right fist. Bone blades sprang out from between his fingers, gleaming with a ghastly, pale light.

"Lin Rui, crouch!"

Lin Rui crouched without hesitation. Hu Jinsi leaped over his head, using the momentum of his descent to slam his right fist hard into Bonecrusher's face. Bang! [Flurry of Blows] activated, consuming 1 point of Qi, and two independent unarmed strikes were unleashed in succession!

"Bang! Bang!"

The bone blades of the knuckle duster pierced into Bonecrusher's skull, producing a teeth-gritting cracking sound. [-11] [-11] [-9]. The armor-piercing effect of the bone blades ignored 5 points of armor, causing this seemingly indestructible elite skeleton to emit a painful soul tremor.

But Bonecrusher reacted extremely quickly; it pulled the flail back, and the iron ball swept horizontally toward Hu Jinsi's side.

Hu Jinsi had no leverage in mid-air and could only force his body to twist, activating [Roll]! His body, like a stone flicked away, rolled toward the side and back. The iron ball of the flail grazed his back and smashed into the wall of the stone chamber; gravel flew everywhere, and half the wall collapsed.

"Elemental damage is halved!" Su Wan shouted from behind. She had just tried using [Thunderwave], but the sonic wave slammed into Bonecrusher with a pitifully low damage number, [-8], almost just tickling it. "It resists elements! Don't waste spell slots!"

"Received!" Hu Jinsi scrambled up from the ground, his left shoulder burning with pain—likely from being struck by gravel earlier. He shook the bone shards off his knuckle duster. "Pure physical damage! Liu Betti, prepare to shoot!"

Liu Betti was at the end of the passage; the line of fire was indeed mostly blocked by the massive bodies of Lin Rui and Bonecrusher. She gritted her teeth and pulled [Biggin's Bonnet] from her backpack, putting it on. Although it looked ridiculous, the +30% hit chance might be too important in this chaotic environment. She crouched low, aimed through the gap between Bonecrusher's legs, and fired an arrow.

The arrow accurately nailed into the bone joint of Bonecrusher's knee, [-7]. Bonecrusher's movements visibly stalled.

Lin Rui seized this opportunity, activating [Charge]! He slammed his whole body into Bonecrusher's supporting leg, thrust his short sword into the bone joint, and twisted hard! [-13]. The effect of rixats elegy triggered, blue light surged, [-12.5% Current Health]! Bonecrusher's health bar instantly dropped by a large chunk.

Bonecrusher swung the flail in a rage, this time targeting Liu Betti. The flail smashed toward the end of the passage with a deathly whistle. Liu Betti's expression changed, and she dove to the side and back. The iron ball of the flail smashed into the spot where she had been crouching; the ground cracked, and gravel showered her.

"Faerie Fire!" Su Wan's spell finally found an opportunity. She gave up on attacking and instead switched to applying a debuff to Bonecrusher. Foxfire ignited on Bonecrusher, outlining its twisted silhouette and putting its attacks at a disadvantage; attack disadvantage meant its flail was more likely to miss.

Bonecrusher's next flail strike indeed missed; the iron ball smashed into the ground and got stuck in a crack in the gravel. Lin Rui and Hu Jinsi lunged forward simultaneously, their short sword and knuckle duster falling upon Bonecrusher like a rainstorm. Bone shards splattered, soul fire flickered, and finally, with a shrill soul-piercing wail, Bonecrusher's body collapsed with a boom, turning into bone dust and points of light dancing in the air.

After the battle, the stone chamber was a mess. Half the wall had collapsed, the ground was full of pits and cracks, and the air was filled with a pungent smell of mixed bone dust and corpse wax.

Lin Rui slumped in the corner, his round shield severely deformed and covered in his blood at the handle. He panted heavily, his health remaining at less than one-third.

"This thing..." Hu Jinsi shook off the bone shards stuck to his knuckle duster, his left shoulder still aching faintly. "Its attack power is too high; it's only in this environment, which forces everyone to be unable to dodge, that its abilities are maximized. If it were outside, it would be a sitting duck."

Liu Betti scrambled up from the ground, brushing the dust off herself, her raven-feather hooded cloak skewed to one side. She walked to the spot where Bonecrusher had dissipated and picked up a flail from the points of light.

[Bonecrusher's Graveyard Flail] [Type: Military Weapon] [Required Strength: 16] [Required Level: 3] [Damage: 4-12] [Effect: +50% Damage to Undead, +10% Increased Attack Speed, +25 Attack Rating] [Item Description: The owner of this flail was once a graveyard keeper for the Sightless Eye Sisterhood; now, it can only be used to crush the bones of former companions.]

"The stats are actually decent," Lin Rui said, taking it to look, weighing it, and then shaking his head. "At least it's better than all the weapons in my hand, and it has a special attack against the undead. It's a pity I haven't trained with flails before, and I don't intend to train with so many weapons anymore."

He handed the flail back to Liu Betti. "See if we can sell it after we get out. Didn't you say you had a temporary teammate who uses a flail?"

Liu Betti nodded. "Hmm, I can help ask after we get out; maybe it can sell for a good price."

The chest at the end of the western tomb indeed yielded nothing good, only a few pieces of gold dust and a vial of potion that had long since dried up. The four of them exited the western tomb and stood at the entrance to catch their breath. Sunlight shone on their faces—if that yellow-green glimmer could be called sunlight—and there was an unexpected warmth of survival.

"The east side," Hu Jinsi said, looking up toward another mausoleum. The structure was even more magnificent, its entrance consisting of two large stone doors. Carved onto them was the blurred emblem of the Blind Sisters. "I hope it's not as crowded as that."

The large mausoleum on the east side was an entirely different world from the one on the west.

Pushing open those two heavy stone doors, a cold magical aura rushed toward them, as if someone had opened a freezer that had been sealed for a thousand years right in front of them. The chill wasn't just in the temperature; it was a cold that acted directly upon the soul, like someone had stuck their fingers into the back of your head and was gently plucking at a nerve.

It wasn't deathly silent here; instead, it was filled with eerie, whispering echoes. The sounds didn't come from any one direction but arose simultaneously from all around, as if countless wandering souls were trapped between the stone walls, endlessly pacing, whispering, and weeping. The content of the voices was indistinguishable, but the emotions of sorrow and anger seeped directly into their hearts, making their skin crawl involuntarily.

The layout was grand and expansive. It featured a towering dome and massive stone pillars, with corridors wide enough for phalanx combat. The floor was paved with broken marble tiles; although covered in cracks, it was relatively flat and clean, with no piled-up corpses. The walls were adorned with faded murals depicting the history of the Blind Sisters, and giant, broken statues stood in the corners. Most of the statues' heads had broken off, leaving only headless torsos holding longswords or staves, silently guarding this forgotten underground palace.

"This place..." Su Wan hugged her lyre tightly, the strings emitting an unconscious, slight tremor. "It's terrifyingly quiet. The western mausoleum was at least just stinky; here, I actually feel fear."

"Open terrain is to our advantage," Lin Rui said, swapping out his deformed round shield and taking out his spare tower shield. Although it was also a second-hand refurbished item, it was at least shaped properly. "We can coordinate and maneuver."

The four of them advanced deep along the main corridor. A faint, eerie green light seeped from the cracks in the floor tiles, illuminating the path ahead. When they reached a hall that resembled an altar, two distinct, dangerous auras surged from both the left and right sides simultaneously.

From the shadows on the left, a tall figure clad in rusted plate armor slowly emerged. Its armor was covered in green verdigris and dark red bloodstains, and the faceplate of its helmet was long deformed, revealing two burning soul fires behind it. It held a massive, rusted tower shield in its left hand and gripped a rusted greatsword nearly as tall as a person in its right. With every step it took, the joints of the plate armor emitted teeth-grinding friction sounds.

[Resurrected Guardian]

On the steps to the right, a half-kneeling figure slowly stood up. It wore broken Rogue leather armor; half of its face was already rotted, revealing the cheekbones and teeth beneath, while the other half eerily retained the delicate features it had in life. In its hands, it held a twisted, corrupted longbow made from some kind of black bone, with a bowstring made of dried human sinew. It lifted its head, its hollow eye sockets aimed at the four of them, and slowly drew the bowstring, an arrow radiating purple-black mist condensing out of thin air.

[Cursed Rogue]

"Two Elites!" Hu Jinsi's expression tightened. "Take out the ranged one first!"

The tactic was determined in an instant. With a low shout, Lin Rui activated [Charge], slamming straight into the Resurrected Guardian. His body became a blur as his tower shield struck the Guardian's rusted plate armor with a dull, thunderous boom. But the Guardian only swayed slightly before hacking down with its sword in a backhand strike!

Lin Rui raised his shield to [Block]. The greatsword struck the tower shield, sparks flying, and the impact force sent him stumbling back three steps, his feet plowing two white marks into the floor tiles. [HP: 231 / 270]. The power of this strike was not much less than that of the Bone Crusher.

"Heavy armor! High defense!" Lin Rui shouted. "Slashing and piercing effects are reduced! Switch to blunt weapons!"

Hu Jinsi had originally followed Lin Rui toward the Guardian, but upon hearing this, he abruptly turned. He glanced at the brass knuckles and staff in his hands, then at the Cursed Rogue in the distance, and made an instant decision: "Liu Betti, you handle the Guardian! Use [Ice Arrow] to slow it down! Lin Rui, hold it off! Su Wan and I will take care of that archer!"

Liu Betti immediately drew her bow, firing an [Ice Arrow]. The frost-laden arrow precisely pinned into the Resurrected Guardian's knee joint. Ice crystals spread across the rusted plate armor, and the Guardian's movements noticeably slowed for an instant. Lin Rui seized the opportunity, fished the [Rusted One-Handed Hammer] from his backpack, and smashed it hard against the Guardian's helmet!

"Bang!" [-14], the blunt attack effect was outstanding! The Guardian's head was knocked to the side, its soul fire flickering.

On the other side, the Cursed Rogue had already locked onto Su Wan. It released the bowstring, and the purple-black arrow tore through the air, moving so fast it left only a blur. Su Wan tried to dodge, but the arrow traced an eerie arc in the air, piercing precisely into her thigh.

"Ah!" Su Wan screamed, feeling the wound instantly go numb as a cold, stiff sensation spread up her leg.

"Su Wan!" Hu Jinsi activated [Parkour], consuming 1 point of Qi, doubling his movement speed. He shot toward the Cursed Rogue like a bolt of grey lightning. Mid-way, he activated [Roll] again, his body springing forward to the side. A corrupted arrow followed closely, grazing his back and embedding into the ground, kicking up a cloud of purple-black poisonous mist.

He was in close range! Hu Jinsi rose from his Roll, the bone blades on his brass knuckles smashing fiercely toward the Cursed Rogue's face. The Rogue tried to Block with its bow, but Hu Jinsi was too fast. He activated [Flurry of Blows], consuming 1 point of Qi, and unleashed two consecutive unarmed strikes!

"Bang! Bang! Bang!" The bone blades of the brass knuckles pierced into the Rogue's rotted shoulder and chest. [-12], [-10]. The Cursed Rogue let out a sharp wail and tried to retreat to create distance, but Hu Jinsi clearly wasn't going to give it the chance.

Su Wan gritted her teeth, enduring the numbness in her leg, and plucked her lyre urgently—[Thunderwave]! A loud note exploded, the sound waves spreading in a ring. The Cursed Rogue, positioned right in front of Hu Jinsi, was hit head-on by the [Thunderwave]. [-16], its body was knocked staggering back, crashing directly into a massive stone pillar. Hu Jinsi followed like a shadow, his brass knuckles smashing down in a flurry; the armor-piercing effect of the bone blades made the Rogue's decayed leather armor useless.

"Die!" Hu Jinsi punched the Rogue in the throat, the bone blade severing its decayed windpipe. The Cursed Rogue went limp, its corrupted longbow slipping from its hand and dissipating into motes of light.

On the other side, the Resurrected Guardian let out a dull roar and activated [Shield Bash]! The rusted tower shield slammed into Lin Rui's tower shield, the immense force knocking Lin Rui back five meters. His feet scraped two blinding sparks against the floor tiles, and the webbing between his thumb and index finger split open, blood staining the shield's handle.

Liu Betti fired an [Ice Arrow], continuously slowing the Resurrected Guardian's movements. Su Wan, enduring her leg injury, applied [Faerie Fire] to the Guardian, the magical flames burning on the rusted plate armor and putting its attacks at a disadvantage.

Lin Rui spat out a mouthful of blood and swung his one-handed hammer again. But the Guardian raised its greatsword to [Block], the hammer head striking the blade and numbing half of Lin Rui's body. Having dealt with the Cursed Rogue, Hu Jinsi immediately returned to assist, his staff sweeping from the flank toward the Guardian's knee joint.

"Bang!" The staff struck the rusted plate armor with a dull thud. [-9], although the blunt effect wasn't as direct as the brass knuckles, it successfully shifted the Guardian's center of gravity. Lin Rui seized the opportunity, used [Tactical Roll] to flank the Guardian, and smashed his one-handed hammer fiercely against the junction of its helmet and shoulder armor!

"Crack!" The hinges of the plate armor broke, and soul fire gushed out from the gap. The Resurrected Guardian let out one final, unwilling roar before its massive body crashed to the ground. The rusted armor slammed onto the marble tiles with a deafening thud, shattering into a pile of scrap metal and motes of light.

The battle was over.

The four of them slumped onto the floor tiles of the altar hall, gasping for air. Su Wan's thigh was still aching; although the slowing effect of the corrupted arrow had faded, the skin around the wound showed an unnatural bluish-purple color. Lin Rui's hands were shaking so much he could barely hold his hammer, and the blood from his split skin dripped onto the floor, splashing into dark red flowers. Hu Jinsi's Qi pool was nearly empty, with only 1 point of Qi remaining, and his brass knuckles were covered in rotten flesh and bone fragments, emitting a nauseating stench.

"Two of them..." Liu Betti leaned against a stone pillar, her Soul-Sucking Shortbow hanging by her side, her voice hoarse. "This dungeon is too insidious. If we had tried to sneak in earlier, we probably would have wiped."

"We only won against Blood Raven because we used tactics to ambush her," Hu Jinsi said, panting as he removed the brass knuckles from his hands, his knuckles white from overexertion. "These two were a direct confrontation—no traps, no terrain advantage, just head-on combat. This is what normal difficulty is."

The four of them rested for a while before barely managing to stand up. At the end of the altar hall was a half-open stone door, behind which lay a smaller stone chamber. As they walked in, a wave of heat rushed toward them—completely different from the overall coldness of the mausoleum.

In the center of the stone chamber was a huge stone platform. Lying on the platform was the burning corpse of a Rogue.

The flames were still crackling, and the smell of charred flesh was thick enough to be suffocating. The corpse was wearing partially rusted leather armor; her frame was slender, and even though consumed by flames, one could tell that she had been a female warrior in life. Her hands were crossed over her chest, and it seemed she had once held something in them, but it had already been burned to ashes. The fire was not ordinary fire, but a pale, spectral flame imbued with magical fluctuations that burned endlessly, even underground without oxygen.

The four of them stood at the entrance of the stone chamber, silent for a long time.

"...One of the Blind Sisters?" Su Wan's voice was very soft, as if she were afraid of disturbing something.

Liu Betti did not answer. She just watched the burning corpse quietly, her knuckles white as she gripped her Soul-Sucking Shortbow.

Hu Jinsi looked away and toward the corner of the stone chamber. There was a dilapidated stone treasure chest, its lid cracked from the heat of the flames. He walked over and used his staff to pry open the lid.

At the bottom of the chest lay a yellowed piece of parchment. Its edges were charred black and stained with long-dried wax and blood. The musical notes on it were twisted and heavy, as if carrying the sorrow of all the departed in the Burial Grounds over the past thousand years.

[Elegy of Grief: Requiem Chant]

[Type: Sheet Music]

[Effect: After spending a short time studying this sheet music, your Bard performance list will permanently gain a special track: Requiem Chant]

[Item Description: The edges of this yellowed parchment are charred black and stained with long-dried wax and blood. The musical notes on it are twisted and heavy, as if carrying the sorrow of all the departed in the Burial Grounds over the past thousand years. It is rumored that this was the ultimate requiem composed by a genius Bard of the Blind Sisters, who poured her life into it after witnessing her comrades fall one by one. It can turn the song of the living into the scythe of death.]

"Su Wan," Hu Jinsi said, picking up the sheet music and turning to hand it to her. "It's yours."

Su Wan took the sheet music. The moment her fingers touched the parchment, she felt a cold sorrow surge into her heart from her fingertips, like someone sighing softly in her mind. She took a deep breath, sat cross-legged, spread the sheet music over her knees, and began to study.

Time ticked by second by second. Lin Rui and Hu Jinsi stood guard at the entrance of the stone chamber, watching the darkness of the corridor vigilantly. Liu Betti stood beside the burning Rogue corpse, whispering something as if offering a silent farewell.

A dozen minutes later, Su Wan opened her eyes. A brand-new chanting skill had been added to her skill list—

[Chanting - Requiem Chant: Once every 6 seconds, all Undead within a 5-meter radius of yourself must make a Charisma saving throw. On a failure, the target takes 3-18 points of Radiant/Sonic mixed damage; on a success, the target takes half damage.]

"I've learned it," Su Wan said, standing up. Her voice carried a strange solemnity, as if the sorrow from the sheet music had temporarily borrowed her throat. "Let me try."

She picked up her lyre and lightly rested her fingertips on the strings. This time, she didn't play the usual passionate or playful melodies; instead, she plucked a low, slow sequence of notes that seemed to well up from the depths of the earth.

[Chanting - Requiem Chant] activated.

With Su Wan at the center, a circle of golden sound waves slowly expanded outward. The light wasn't as glaring as [Faerie Fire], but carried a soft, almost compassionate warmth, like the last ray of sunlight in winter. The sound waves passed through the walls of the stone chamber and through the darkness of the corridor, spreading toward the entire mausoleum.

Unfortunately, the surrounding undead had already been dealt with by the group in the previous battle. The golden sound waves spread out, illuminating only the empty stone walls and broken statues, hitting no targets. Su Wan couldn't test the actual damage effect here.

But even so, the song still echoed throughout the entire underground space. The golden light reflected on the faces of the four, on the burning Rogue corpse, and in Liu Betti's bottomless eyes.

The flames crackled, as if in some kind of response.