221: Chapter 221 Mountain Giant

Several people stared at Sky Eye in stunned silence.

It wasn't until his emotions stabilized that Swift Shadow asked hesitantly:

"Brother Xiao Yan?"

"Ah? Oh, I'm fine."

Sky Eye wiped the tears from the corners of his eyes and held up the bottle in his hand.

"Who wants to try? The secret to possessing multiple S-rank Talents should be within this cloud of blood mist."

The group looked at each other.

"This..."

Sky Eye shook the bottle, sounding a bit impatient:

"Do you remember the savages from the first time we entered the Daytime Instance?"

"We remember." The others nodded.

"After those savages died—especially the savage leader—a cloud of blood mist rose into the sky. Did you notice?"

"Yeah."

Sky Eye's expression turned serious. "During the last Daytime Instance, after a large number of players died, blood mist also rose into the sky. The situation was urgent then, so I didn't think much of it."

"Looking at it now, that blood mist should be the source of their abilities. The reason players are forced to kill each other in the Daytime Instance's world is likely to refine their blood mist and make certain entities within the dungeon stronger."

"Hiss..."

Hearing this, everyone gasped.

Sky Eye shook his head. "Let's not talk about it anymore. Let's absorb this thing first. Who's going first?"

They looked at the eerie blood mist in the bottle, hesitating.

Finally, Frenzied Demon grit his teeth. "I'll do it. Damn it, you bunch of cowards."

He snatched the bottle away, leaned his head in, and took a deep breath.

The blood mist vanished instantly, sucked into his body.

Suddenly...

Frenzied Demon's body jerked violently, and his eyes grew hazy.

A moment later, his eyes widened:

"Hahahaha! I'm going to be invincible!!"

Seeing this, the hearts of the others began to pound wildly.

...

"I am Sky Eye, the new boss of District 3300. Our district will bear all the losses incurred by your seven districts during this operation."

"All districts must immediately stop slandering and insulting District 3300, or you will be excluded from the compensation plan."

As soon as these words were spoken...

The world channel went quiet for a moment before the tide of opinion shifted abruptly.

"I knew it! How could District 3300 default on their debts?"

"Aiya, we were just judging a noble man by our own petty standards. Boss Sky Eye, I sincerely apologize to you here."

"District 3300 might have overestimated themselves, but this is a real man's move—taking responsibility for their actions."

"Indeed. The losses of seven districts... tsk tsk, it's impressive they're willing to pay."

"District 3300 is quite something. They've really got something."

"..."

Chen Fan frowned as he scrolled through the chat logs, feeling somewhat puzzled.

What is this Sky Eye up to?

One district bearing the losses of seven others? Can you even afford it?

However...

Although he was dismissive on the surface, alarm bells were ringing in his mind.

The only purpose for District 3300 doing this was to spend resources to win people over.

As for why he wanted to win people over, the answer was obvious.

"It seems that the death of Setting Sun wasn't enough to scare you."

"But I'd really like to know, after seeing the upgraded annihilation ship and Mechanical Dragon, where do you get the confidence to still want to invade?"

Chen Fan shook his head and glanced down.

He had arrived at the City of Sin.

The Mechanical Dragon descended gradually, finally landing near the Crew Members.

Without wasting words, Chen Fan jumped off the dragon and gestured for the Crew Members to lead the way.

Several Crew Members led Chen Fan into a cave.

Chen Fan took out a long saber and casually cut through the vines and unknown creatures binding the Crew Members.

Staring into the darkness ahead, he immediately activated Exploration.

But he soon frowned.

Exploration could indeed penetrate the darkness ahead, but its original range of one thousand kilometers was compressed to a mere hundred meters.

Furthermore, it could only outline the shapes of many things within the darkness; he couldn't see them in detail.

Chen Fan took out a super energy nova.

Its bright light illuminated the area ahead.

After a moment's thought, he summoned hundreds more Crew Members and gave each of them a super energy nova.

The light emitted by hundreds of super energy novas lit up the darkness.

Chen Fan followed far behind the procession, keeping the password for the Spirit Realm ready at all times.

If things took a turn for the worse, he would flee immediately.

They moved forward gradually.

Chen Fan felt the slope becoming steeper as they descended deeper underground.

After walking for less than ten minutes, the darkness grew even denser. The light from the super energy novas could only reach about ten meters.

Chen Fan felt a chill creeping down his spine.

So he summoned several hundred more Crew Members to surround him from all sides, spreading the formation out for several hundred meters.

With a formation of over a thousand people, they delved deep into the darkness.

After an unknown amount of time, Chen Fan felt the ground beneath his feet gradually becoming soft and damp.

Before long, a small ten-square-meter hut appeared in his vision.

Inside the hut, there were patterns that looked like a magic circle.

In the center of the pattern sat a metal barrel covered in runes.

Chen Fan's brow furrowed slightly.

"What is this thing?"

After observing from a distance for a long time, Chen Fan commanded a Blade Soldier to go up and hack at the barrel.

However, even after dozens of strikes, the metal barrel showed no reaction.

After a moment of silence, Chen Fan took out a long saber and tossed it to a nearby Crew Member.

"Use this to hack it."

The mindless Crew Member stepped forward quickly, raised the saber with both hands, and slashed down fiercely.

Ding—

A sharp, ear-piercing metallic clang rang out, forcing Chen Fan to cover his ears.

The long saber, which usually cut through iron like butter, had actually failed this time!

The metal barrel remained intact!

Chen Fan frowned slightly and examined it closely for a moment.

A shallow dent had appeared on the body of the metal barrel.

"It's working! Keep hacking!"

With a wave of his hand, Chen Fan threw out ten more long sabers. Ten Crew Members rushed forward and hacked at it repeatedly.

After more than ten minutes...

Finally...

The metal barrel, unable to withstand the strain, shattered into pieces on the ground.

From within the rune-covered metal barrel rolled a pile of stones of various sizes.

The stones scattered across the floor.

Looking closely, thick branches and vines were coiled around the stones.

Just as Chen Fan was feeling puzzled, the stones scattered on the ground suddenly began to tremble.

A moment later, pulled by the branches and vines, the loose stones gradually gathered together.

Finally, they formed a half-meter-tall humanoid stone monster.

"What is this thing now?"

Chen Fan stepped back a few paces, his mouth already forming the command for the Spirit Realm.

A moment later...

"Gulu gulu—"

A hoarse voice came from the stone monster's mouth.

[So hungry... no energy... about to dissipate...]

"Oh?"

Chen Fan raised an eyebrow.

"You say you're hungry?"

"Well, now I'm interested. I have all kinds of food here."

"Plenty to go around!"

Chen Fan chuckled. "Hungry? I have food. Take a look and see what you want to eat."

With that, Chen Fan took out two bottles, containing the energy of a magic dragon crystal core and a holy radiance crystal, respectively.

The stone monster's head turned with a series of clicks. The moment it saw the bottles, its eyes lit up.

"Hungry! Want to eat!"

The corners of Chen Fan's mouth curled up. "You want to eat? Sure, but first tell me your name."

"Hmm, name... so long ago... can't remember..."

"Oh, I remember now."

"My name is..."

"Mountain Ridge Giant."