65: Chapter 65 Moonlight Level

Roar—!!!

With the final, agonizing howl filled with resentment, Nidhogg's massive body, riddled with holes from the erosion of abyssal energy, finally reached its breaking point.

Under the unreserved barrage of firepower from [Cloud Top Fortress], the supposedly indestructible LV5 dragon body collapsed with a crash, like an obsidian mountain smashed by a heavy hammer.

Black dragon flames and purple abyssal ichor intertwined and exploded in mid-air, turning into a foul-smelling rain of blood that splattered down into the sea of magma below, stirring up towering toxic mists.

[Announcement: Dungeon Boss — World-Ending Black Flame Nidhogg Projection has been killed!]

[The danger level of the Encounter Space has dropped significantly; remaining time has returned to the normal settlement mechanism.]

"Dead... Damn it, we actually slaughtered a LV5 dragon!"

Zhou An collapsed onto the captain's chair, gasping for air, staring intently at the massive red dot on the radar that had completely extinguished.

As his chest heaved violently, before he could even catch his breath, several brilliant orbs of light suddenly erupted in mid-air, streaking toward the fortress's tractor bay like meteors.

[System: You have achieved an extreme cross-tier kill of a LV5 projection; you have obtained the ultimate loot!]

[Black Flame Dragon Core]: Contains extremely violent LV5 fire-elemental source energy.

[High-Order Dragon Flesh Remains 50 Units]: Warning: Highly contaminated by the abyss. Consumption will cause SAN value to instantly drop to zero and trigger irreversible mutation; can only be used as a high-order experimental material.

[Contaminated World-Ending Dragon Egg (Legendary)]: A LV5 offspring about to hatch, but its origin has been completely eroded by abyssal aura; the hatching result is unknown.

Just as Zhou An was eyes gleaming while counting this wave of heaven-defying loot.

[Ding! Extreme cross-tier kill of a LV5 creature! Prismatic Hextech 'War Treasure III' triggered!]

[Congratulations on obtaining: Diamond Supply Chest x1!]

A gorgeous chest slowly hovered above the main console.

"Boss... I really... don't have a drop left."

A weak voice came from the communicator. On the external observation deck, Luo Ning forced herself to disengage her exoskeleton armor, then collapsed onto the dark gold deck like a puddle of mud.

Continuously firing high-concentration pollution rounds at close range had caused her SAN value to plummet to a dangerously low single digit. If it weren't for her talent firmly locking onto the last shred of her sanity, she would probably have grown tentacles all over her back by now.

"Well done. Hurry back inside and lie down; leave the rest to me."

[Encounter Event: 'Cinder Fire Purgatory' has ended!]

[Space is warping; returning to the designated survival area...]

Vroom—!

The sea of fire and obsidian mountains before his eyes twisted instantly, like a shattered mirror.

When the sensation of weightlessness faded and the fortress hovered steadily once more, the scene outside the panoramic porthole had returned to that familiar, dead, gray-fogged dome.

The fortress's overwhelmed climate control system finally ceased its shrill screeching, emitting a long "hiss—" of pressure release.

"Finally... we made it through."

Zhou An released the sweat-soaked joystick.

Once his tightly coiled nerves relaxed, a tidal wave of weakness instantly engulfed his sanity.

His legs went soft, and he slid right off the captain's chair, lying sprawled on the cold metal floor without a shred of dignity.

Twelve hours of high-intensity combat and mental strain, coupled with the repeated torture of abyssal pollution, had completely drained his physical and mental energy.

Luo Ning, beside him, was even worse off; she didn't even have the strength to crawl back to her room on the second floor, so she just pulled a blanket over herself, wrapped herself up like a silkworm cocoon, and curled up in the corner of the co-pilot's seat, falling fast asleep.

Zhou An gritted his teeth, forcing himself to maintain the last shred of clarity, and activated the team communication channel.

"Muzi... the alert is canceled. Bring Old Zhang and the others down to land, and come to the second-floor control room to take over."

"Boss! Are you guys okay?!"

An anxious voice with a hint of tears came immediately from the other end of the communicator from Li Muzi.

"We're fine, survived in one piece."

Zhou An tiredly tugged at the corner of his mouth.

"Tell Old Zhang to go to the kitchen and make some easily digestible liquid food. Also... turn the fortress's defense system to full power and take turns on duty."

Ten minutes later, the cabin door opened. Li Muzi and the other two rushed to the cockpit. Seeing Zhou An sprawled on the messy floor and Luo Ning pale and unconscious in the corner, Muzi's eyes turned red with heartache.

"Boss, hurry to the medical bay and lie down; leave this to us."

Zhang Ming patted his chest firmly in assurance.

Zhou An nodded.

"The Encounter Week event won't end for another three or four days... In these next few days, new high-order coordinates will definitely refresh."

Zhou An was helped to his feet by Li Muzi; although his voice was weak, his eyes still held a wolf-like ferocity.

"Strike while the iron is hot; we can at least go in and farm one more round. When we wake up... we'll open the chests and split the loot."

With that said, Zhou An stumbled toward his captain's quarters.

The familiar [Nano Recovery Liquefaction Pod] slid open, the pale blue gel liquid emitting a comforting, faint medicinal scent.

Zhou An shed his armor and completely submerged his exhausted body into the cool medicinal liquid.

On the other side, Luo Ning was carefully picked up by Lin Qing and sent into the recovery pod in the next room.

As the silver-white cabin door slowly closed, high-concentration pure oxygen and nano-repair robots began working methodically, repairing the two's nearly broken bodies and minds.

The two slept for over a dozen hours.

When the door of the [Nano Recovery Liquefaction Pod] slowly slid open, Zhou An sat up from the pale blue gel liquid.

With a deep breath, it felt as if endless power was surging within his body. The headache caused by mental pollution had completely vanished, and every cell in his body exuded a peak state of being well-fed and rested.

Just as he pushed open the door to the captain's quarters, he saw Luo Ning pacing back and forth in the corridor like an excited little hamster.

She had clearly recovered long ago, her big eyes flashing with undisguised greed for treasure.

"Boss! You're finally awake! I was about to get prostatitis from worrying out here!"

Luo Ning grabbed Zhou An's arm, incoherent with excitement, "Let's go, let's go! Third-floor warehouse! Open the chests! Split the loot!"

Zhou An was amused by her: "You're a woman, where would you get prostatitis? Let's go, let's see just how insanely rich we've become from this wave."

The two took the internal elevator straight down to the third-floor warehouse.

When the heavy alloy doors slid open to the sides, even Zhou An, who was mentally prepared, was thoroughly shocked by the scene before him.

The massive second floor now had almost no space to even step foot.

Treasure chests emitting various lights were piled into small mountains by EVA like worthless trash! The heaviness of bronze, the coldness of silver, the dazzling brilliance of gold, the luxury of platinum—all kinds of lights intertwined, enough to blind anyone.

Zhou An took a deep breath, summoned the system panel, and conducted a full inventory check:

[Current Warehouse Chest Total]: [black iron treasure chest]: 1322 [Silver Supply Chest]: 736 [Gold Supply Chest]: 91 [Platinum Supply Chest]: 6 [Diamond Supply Chest]: 3

"Over a thousand black iron, over seven hundred silver... Boss, when are we going to finish opening all these?"

Luo Ning swallowed hard.

"Who said we had to open them one by one?"

He slowly walked forward, stood before the mountain of chests, and slowly raised his right hand.

Zhou An's eyes narrowed. Vroom—!!!

A seven-colored divine light erupted from Zhou An's palm, instantly enveloping the entire third-floor warehouse.

"Fuse for me!!!"

Following Zhou An's command, the mountains of chests in the warehouse were instantly swept into a colorful storm.

Click, click, click, click—! 1322 black iron treasure chests collided and compressed violently in mid-air.

In the blink of an eye, except for 2 that fell to the side as remainders, the rest all melted and reorganized into 440 silver chests!

Immediately after, the original 736 silver chests merged with the newly synthesized silver chests, reaching a terrifying total of 1176!

"Continue fusing!"

1176 silver chests collapsed again within the seven-colored light. This time, not even a single remainder was left; it directly completed a perfect three-in-one, bursting out 392 gold chests!

At this moment, counting the original inventory, the number of gold chests floating in the warehouse reached an astonishing 483!

Luo Ning stood behind Zhou An, covering her mouth tightly, afraid she might scream out loud.

"Don't stop! Upgrade it to death!"

Zhou An was completely carried away.

483 gold chests collided in mid-air, producing crisp metallic sounds, turning into streaks of blinding golden light, and finally condensing into 161 platinum chests emitting a noble platinum luster!

Adding the original 6, the platinum total was: 167!

"Platinum to Diamond!"

Boom! 167 platinum chests were forcibly kneaded again by the power of laws. 165 chests vanished, and accompanied by an extremely dazzling, brilliant light, 55 crystal-clear diamond chests suddenly appeared in mid-air! The remaining 2 platinum chests fell as remainders.

Adding the 3 diamonds in inventory, a full 58 diamond chests floated quietly in mid-air.

These were chests that only dropped from killing BOSSes, yet now they were laid out before the two like common cabbages.

"Boss... is, is this Diamond Grade... I feel like my eyes are going to get pregnant."

"Diamond? You underestimate my talent too much."

58 diamond chests began to fuse violently in groups of three.

Every time a fusion succeeded, a beam of tangible moonlight would descend from the void. That cold, transcendent light, carrying a hint of divinity that spanned dimensions—that was the color of miracles!

When the light dissipated. In mid-air, apart from 1 lonely remaining diamond chest, there were 19 mysterious chests floating neatly, their surfaces flowing with star trajectories and emitting soft moonlight.

[Moon-Glitter Grade Supply Chest]

"It's not over yet! Keep fusing for me!" Zhou An looked at those 19 Moon-Glitter chests, greedily wanting to activate Hextech again.

However, this time, the system's cold red warning sounded directly in his mind, forcibly interrupting the seven-colored divine light:

[Warning! Rule conflict!] [Current vehicle core level insufficient! 'Moon-Glitter Grade' has reached the limit of Tier 4!] [Please upgrade the vehicle to LV5 before retrying!]

"Tsk, actually got throttled by the vehicle level."

Zhou An retracted his hand with some displeasure, and the light of Hextech dissipated accordingly.

However, when he looked back at the final inventory list before him, that trace of displeasure was instantly washed away by wild joy.

[Extremely Comfortable: Final Synthesis Settlement Panel] [Moon-Glitter Grade Chest]: 19 [Diamond Grade Chest]: 1 [Platinum Grade Chest]: 2 [black iron treasure chest]: 2

From over a thousand pieces of junk black iron, he had forcibly smelted nineteen Moon-Glitter Grade chests that only existed in legends! This wasn't just getting rich; this was practically robbing the game system's own father's treasure vault!

"Nineteen Moon-Glitter..." Luo Ning's eyes were filled with hazy stars, "Quick... quickly open the chests... I want to see miracles..."