76: Chapter 76 The Sword Saint's Surprise

After easily dealing with the gatekeeper monsters at the entrance, Lin Muyang did not linger. He led the four young ladies, maintaining the concealment effect of the "Divine Concealment Aura," and ventured deep into the ancient and bloody cave passage.

At the rear of the team, Elf Princess Lilia held her legendary-grade priest staff embedded with pure light-element gems. She whispered ancient elven incantations, and the tip of her staff continuously flickered with soft white, golden, or light green light.

"Holy Blessing" — Increases the entire team's physical and magical attack power by 15%.

"Natural Protection" — Increases the entire team's physical and magical defense by 20%.

"Whisper of the Wind" — Increases the entire team's movement and attack speed by 25%.

"Surge of Life" — Continuously restores the entire team's health.

The effects of these buff spells stacked perfectly with the God-Tier Aura activated by Lin Muyang, producing a boost far beyond the ordinary. Coupled with the random buffs brought by the "Angel's Delicacy" carefully prepared by Elena before entering the secret realm (Attack +12%, Defense +8%, Critical Hit Rate +5%, etc.), the buff icons in the status bars of Lin Muyang's party were almost lined up in two rows, and their attributes had reached a level that was inconceivable at their current level.

Soon, they encountered the second wave of monsters.

This was a slightly wider fork in the cave, where five "Blood-Stained Ancients" of different forms were gathered. Four were still the familiar crawler forms, but one had its body covered in dark red cuticles, obviously with higher defense; another had bone spurs protruding from its limb joints, moving swiftly; and another had chaotic red light flashing in its eyes, seemingly possessing special resistance.

And the most eye-catching one was the "Ancient" standing slightly behind! It was completely different from its crawling kin—it walked upright! It was draped in tattered, blood-stained rags, and its hands tightly gripped a twisted staff that seemed to be made of rotten tree roots and white bones. It was lean, but a circle of heart-stopping blood-colored energy field permeated its body; it was the "Ancient Priest."

Lin Muyang quickly perceived the key information:

"Blood-Stained Ancient · Rock Breaker (epic-grade)" : Defense increased, physical resistance additionally increased by 180%.

"Blood-Stained Ancient · Swift Bone (epic-grade)" : Movement and attack speed increased by 150%.

"Blood-Stained Ancient · Chaos (epic-grade)" : Immune to all Mind Control and slowing effects.

"Blood-Stained Ancient Priest · Blood Priest (epic-grade)" :

Skill: "Blood Suppression Aura" — Significantly suppresses the attack power of all hostile units within the Aura's range, with a suppression magnitude of 45%.

"Attack suppression 45%..." Lin Muyang's eyes narrowed slightly.

This combination was simply disastrous for a conventional team. First, being suppressed by 33% damage by the secret realm, then suppressed by 45% attack power by the priest, and finally having to face various small monsters with high defense, high speed, and immunity to control. Normal teams reaching this point would either get stuck and be unable to move, or they would have to split at least one person to use all means to contain or even banish that priest just to barely deal with the other monsters, a process that was time-consuming, laborious, and extremely risky.

But after just a moment of thought, Lin Muyang had a countermeasure.

His mind shifted, and he temporarily turned off the anti-healing Aura he had previously activated, replacing it with another God-Tier Aura — "Inviolable"!

Effect: The holder of the Aura and their designated friendly units are immune to all negative status effects of weakening, cursing, and control (excluding hard control)!

The "Blood Suppression Aura," with its despair-inducing 45% attack reduction, melted away instantly like snow meeting the blazing sun when it touched the "Inviolable" Aura effect on Lin Muyang and the young ladies! They maintained their full attack power.

"Ela, it's up to you." Lin Muyang looked at the Succubus Maiden beside him.

Elabess's mouth curved slightly, and a flash of excitement crossed her purple-black eyes. She elegantly raised her hand, and in front of her palm, the space suddenly twisted and collapsed. A deep, all-consuming "Black Hole Vortex" quickly formed, and a terrifying suction force erupted!

Those five Blood-Stained Ancients, including the priest holding the staff, were dragged toward the center of the black hole without any power to resist. Their movements became extremely difficult, and their attack motions were completely distorted.

Immediately after, Elabess opened the fingers of her other hand, and deep shadow energy darted out like a viper, precisely linking to each monster — "Shadow Erosion" (Origin) took effect, beginning to continuously devour their life and defense.

This was not enough. Elabess tapped her staff lightly and spat out obscure demonic language. Suddenly, shadow energy gathered crazily at the top of the cave, turning into "Dark Starfalls" burning with black flames, bombarding the group of monsters firmly held by the black hole like meteorites one after another!

-52341! -60123! -48990 (Critical!) -56712! ...

Supported by "Infinite Firepower," "Dark Starfall" required almost no cooldown, forming a continuous stream of shadow meteor showers! Coupled with the monster grouping and control of the "Black Hole Vortex" and the continuous damage and defense-breaking of "Shadow Erosion," the health points of the five epic-grade small monsters plummeted at a speed visible to the naked eye.

Although the "Chaos" monster was immune to some control effects of the "Black Hole Vortex," it could not be immune to pure damage. It waved its claws in vain, but could not find any attack targets (Lin Muyang and his party were still invisible), and could only fall unwillingly under the bombardment of the dark meteor rain.

The whole process lasted about twelve seconds.

When the last Dark Starfall smashed down and the last Ancient Priest's health bar was completely emptied, the rotten wood staff in its hand snapped with a "crack," and its lean body turned into fly ash.

The second wave of monsters: team wiped out.

Lin Muyang compared it; the time Elabess took to clean up this wave of five small monsters was indeed slightly longer than the time Ao Qingyan took to clean up two. But this was not because Elabess's output was insufficient, but because of the characteristics of the "Peerless Sword Formation" — the total number of sword qi generated per second by the sword formation was fixed (200), and the more enemies in the range, the less sword qi each enemy shared, and the burst damage was dispersed. Elabess's "Dark Starfall" was a standard area-of-effect continuous damage skill; the more enemies, the higher the total damage, making her efficiency in clearing miscellaneous mobs even better.

"Each has its own merits." Lin Muyang evaluated in his heart. Ao Qingyan was good at extreme execution of a small number of elites or BOSSes, while Elabess was good at dealing with multiple enemies.

The battle ended, and as usual, it was time to "loot the corpses."

Elena looked at the disgusting remains that were gradually dissipating, frowning slightly, and did not step forward. Lilia shook her head like a rattle: "I don't want to touch these dirty things!"

Lin Muyang smiled and activated the "Mind Control" Aura again. An invisible force swept across the battlefield, and two items flashing with dark golden legendary light flew into his hands from the air.

"Oh? Dropped something." Lin Muyang's eyes lit up. The probability of small monsters in an epic-level secret realm dropping legendary-grade items was extremely low; he didn't expect two to drop in the second wave.

He checked the attributes:

【Blood Curse Priest's Resentment Pendant (legendary-grade)】

Type: Necklace

Class Restriction: Mages, Warlocks, Priests, and other magic-based classes

Attributes: Spell Attack Power +1250, Spirit +1300, Cooldown Reduction +55%

Legendary Effect 【Blood Curse】: Any of your damaging spells has a 12% chance to apply "Blood Curse" to the target, reducing its attack power by 130% for 15 seconds. This effect's trigger probability is halved against BOSS units.

Required Level: 45

【Desolate Sisters' Blood-Devouring Light Armor (legendary-grade)】

Type: Chest Armor (Leather Armor)

Class Restriction: Assassins, Rangers, some Agility-based Warriors

Attributes: Physical Defense +600, Spell Defense +580, All Attributes +920

Legendary Effect 【Blood Devour】: When taking damage, absorb 40% of the damage value and convert it into self-health recovery. This effect is not affected by any healing reduction.

Required Level: 45

"Such strong attributes!" Even the well-informed Lin Muyang couldn't help but exclaim.

The necklace came with a high 55% cooldown reduction, almost equal to half an "Infinite Firepower" Aura, which was a huge boost for magic-based classes. And the 【Blood Curse】 effect was a "physical class killer"; once triggered, it was equivalent to making the opponent's attack power drop directly to zero or even become negative (if there was a base attack power boost, it would be greatly reduced), and the duration was also very long.

The chest armor's effect 【Blood Devour】 provided amazing survivability. 40% damage absorption and conversion to healing was equivalent to a disguised reduction of a large amount of damage taken, and it could also restore health. For fragile agility classes, survivability would see a qualitative leap.

"As expected of legendary-grade equipment, the attributes completely crush the previous Emperor Level and King Level ones." Lin Muyang put away the two pieces of equipment with satisfaction. This level of items could not be circulated on the market at all; they were treasures that only core members of top forces had the opportunity to touch.

With such gains from just two waves of small monsters, he was full of anticipation for the final reward of the entire secret realm.

The team continued to move forward. In the journey that followed, they encountered various epic-grade monsters with tricky attributes: those with high damage reflection Auras, those capable of summoning reinforcements, those that could release large-scale curses, and even those that could temporarily steal buff states...

However, in front of Lin Muyang's nine God-Tier Auras, which could be called a "universal toolbox," these headache-inducing mechanisms were resolved one by one.

During the whole advancement process, although Lin Muyang needed to flexibly switch the ninth Aura slot according to different monster combinations, the overall rhythm was still a crushing victory. Even the few elite monsters of small boss level encountered on the way could not stop them for more than a minute.

Experience points were rising rapidly, and legendary-grade materials, equipment, and skill book in the storage space were also increasing slowly but steadily.

At this speed, Lin Muyang estimated that completely clearing this 13-person scale epic-level secret realm would not take the days and nights he had anticipated, and it wouldn't even take half a day!

...

Meanwhile, in Jingjun, the capital of the Xia Kingdom.

On the top of an ancient and solemn white tower, two old men were looking into the distance, the sunset stretching their shadows long. One of them was the Nation-Guarding Level Expert, the Sword Saint known as "Northland Sword Saint." There was a hint of unresolvable worry between his brows.

The other was a white-browed old man with white hair and beard, but full of vigor, his Aura deep as the sea. He was one of the guardians of Jingjun, the "Astrology Sage" Zhou Wenyuan, who was also a Nation-Guarding Level Expert.

"Just received an encrypted message from Huangque City," the Sword Saint said in a low voice, "She... has already gone in."

Zhou Wenyuan's white brows moved: "So fast? Is she sure?"

"Hard to say." The Sword Saint sighed, "epic-level secret realm, too many variables. Especially since this is the first time it has appeared at such a low level, there is insufficient data. I can only hope her ability is enough to cope with all accidents."

"Yes," Zhou Wenyuan looked to the southwest, as if he could penetrate space to see that secret realm shrouded in blood, "The level at which epic-level secret realms appear is constantly dropping, which is a dangerous signal. The challenges faced by young people in the future will become increasingly severe. How much longer can we old guys hold on?"

"Let's take it one step at a time. If necessary, perhaps we can only seek international cooperation to jointly cultivate top seeds." The Sword Saint's tone was heavy.

The two were silent for a long time, and the sunset gradually sank into the distant mountains.

Zhou Wenyuan turned to leave: "Once she enters, it will take at least three to five days to have a result. If she comes out early... I'm afraid it will be ominous. I'll go back first; notify me immediately if there is any news."

"Okay." The Sword Saint nodded.

However, less than half an hour after Zhou Wenyuan left.

A hurried stream of light shot from the horizon and landed on the top of the tower; it was Zhou Wenyuan, who had returned! His face was full of unbelievable shock and urgency, and he held a slightly hot communication jade talisman in his hand.

"Old Sword Saint! Something big happened!" Zhou Wenyuan's voice was a little distorted, "Urgent report from Huangque City! That epic-level secret realm... has been cleared! The blood light has dissipated, the entrance is stable, and energy feedback shows it has been completely purified!"

"What?!" The Sword Saint turned around suddenly, his pupils shrinking, "How long has it been? Half an hour? How is that possible?!"

Zhou Wenyuan handed over the jade talisman, and the information on it was short and shocking: " 'Scarlet Altar' secret realm was cleared solo a quarter of an hour ago, with a total time of about thirty-seven minutes. The identity of the clearer is unknown, not exposed. The secret realm has entered a stable dormant period and can be safely explored."

The Sword Saint held the jade talisman, unable to speak for a long time. He had anticipated many possibilities and was even prepared for the worst, but he had never thought... it would be this result.

Thirty-seven minutes to solo clear a level 45 epic-level team secret realm that caused five S-class and SS-class geniuses to collapse instantly and required at least ten peers of the same level to carefully cooperate to have a chance to challenge?

This had completely subverted his cognitive limit of the word "genius"!

"This... what kind of monster is this?" The Sword Saint muttered to himself, his eyes looking to the southwest full of unprecedented horror and exploration.

And at this moment, the center of this storm — Lin Muyang, had already taken his rich harvest and the experience of another level-up, and before everyone could react, just like when he appeared, he disappeared silently into the vast wilderness outside Huangque City.