He pulled out a calendar and calculated when the volcano would erupt this month.
“Four days from now, huh...”
“With four days, I can do some light exploring on Floor 31.”
Having calculated the timing, Li Xiuman did not hesitate. He spread his Bone Wings and flew toward the massive volcano.
He then folded his Bone Wings over the volcanic crater and plunged headfirst inside in a glide.
Inside the crater, there was no boiling lava as one might expect, but rather a layer of pitch-black volcanic rock.
Along the edges of this volcanic rock, clinging to the walls of the crater, were numerous passages that led into the Floor 31 labyrinth.
Once the volcano erupted, however, molten lava would surge through these very passages that adventurers walked on and shoot straight out of the crater.
Your death would be beyond your wildest imagination.
For the sake of his precious safety and life...
Li Xiuman didn't quite trust the math skills he had honed over more than a decade.
He recalculated it all over again. After confirming that the eruption was indeed still four days away, Li Xiuman finally headed down the passage and entered Floor 31.
The narrow corridors branched out in all directions, making it easy to lose one's sense of bearing.
In the intense heat, the surrounding stone walls appeared slightly warped.
“What a complex labyrinth.”
“If it were before, I might have been a bit worried about getting lost.”
“But now...”
“Tada! The Omen Crystal!”
Li Xiuman displayed the crystal on his wrist and channeled mana into it. He tested the passages one by one until the crystal glowed orange.
He then walked down that passage.
Before long, he encountered another fork in the path. Li Xiuman once again brought out the Omen Crystal.
After finding the orange path, he continued forward.
Going back and forth like this, happily fussing with it for quite a long time, Li Xiuman finally realized something.
He...
Hadn't encountered a single monster.
“Holy crap, what kind of path are you choosing for me? You literally avoided every single monster!”
“You're way too safe!”
Li Xiuman grabbed the Omen Crystal and shook it violently.
“Dammit, you're so unreliable.”
If he kept following the Omen Crystal, he would very likely reach Floor 32 without encountering a single monster.
Therefore, Li Xiuman decided to boldly trust his own instincts.
Sure enough, before long, Li Xiuman spotted a lone monster.
Its appearance was extremely similar to a red lizardman.
Except that fire burned at its elbow and knee joints, and a ball of flame sat on the tip of its tail.
A layer of exoskeleton grew over its chest, shoulders, and head.
It looked like a set of bone armor worn over its body.
[Name] Molten Lizardman
[Level] LV28
[Class] Monster
[Status] Healthy
[Skills] Fire Magic LV3, Defense Boost LV3, Elemental Resistance LV2, Swiftness LV2, Self-Healing LV2, Fire Enchantment LV1
[Description] A special lizardman living below Floor 30 of the White Bear City Dungeon. It possesses the power to manipulate fire and lava, and has a defense-boosting bone armor growing on the outside of its body. Please handle with caution.
Li Xiuman activated [Quiet Steps] and cautiously approached.
He slowly drew the Crystal Orchid.
“Freezing Slash!”
A wave of sword qi slashed out in an instant, giving the lizardman absolutely no time to react. Half of the lizardman's body, along with the ground beneath it, was frozen into a block of solid ice.
“Next, the eyes.”
Li Xiuman dashed forward, his wand unfurling a dual-colored magic circle of green and yellow.
Two Spiral Spikes accurately struck the lizardman's eyes.
Following right behind them, the diving Li Xiuman tilted his body slightly to dodge a claw swipe from the blinded lizardman.
Then, the Crystal Orchid swept upward, slipping into a gap in the lizardman's bone armor like a phantom, slicing cleanly across its neck.
He slightly rotated the blade, flicked off the non-existent blood, and slowly sheathed it.
“Click.”
“Clatter.”
As the sword clicked into its sheath, the lizardman's head severed from its neck and crashed to the ground.
[Ding! Killed Molten Lizardman LV28, Exp +3,900]
“That must have looked incredibly cool just now, right?”
A slightly smug Li Xiuman trotted over to the lizardman's corpse and dug out its magic stone.
How did he pull off that cool move just now?
This was a special technique Li Xiuman had developed based on the properties of the Crystal Orchid.
When slashing the neck, he used the frost power of the Crystal Orchid to freeze the wound.
Then, upon sheathing the sword, he would release the freeze.
This allowed him to achieve the visual effect of the head falling off the moment the sword clicked shut.
It was just a bit of a pity.
If he had used the Rib Sword just now, he would have gained an extra 390 experience points.
It was fine. Experience was temporary, but looking cool was forever.
Still, when there was no one around in the future, he should try his best to use the Rib Sword to stab, stab, stab.
Even mosquito legs were meat, no matter how small.
Besides, if there was no one around, wasn't he just showing off to ghosts?
Stashing the magic stone into his storage space, Li Xiuman continued to explore the labyrinth.
Since he wasn't following the guidance of the Omen Crystal, Li Xiuman very quickly encountered...
A giant... surprise.
Li Xiuman didn't notice that the moment his gaze left the Omen Crystal, it had turned red.
Such a coincidence could probably no longer be explained by mere bad luck.
The solid rock beneath his feet suddenly shattered, and he was violently struck by something, causing him to plunge down to Floor 32.
“What the hell?!”
Li Xiuman rubbed his smooth skull and stood up.
The instant he stood up, he wanted to climb back up through the hole to Floor 31.
But just as he jumped to reach for the hole, a massive torrent of lava poured down through it, which he only managed to deftly dodge by reacting just in time.
He ended up stepping right onto a round rock at the edge of the stone.
Although Li Xiuman really wanted to ask whether the presence of such a round stone here was a bit of an anomaly...
His sprained ankle and leaning, off-balance body did not support him conducting geological research on volcanic rocks at this moment.
With a thud, Li Xiuman braced his hand against a nearby wall, stabilizing himself.
“Crack?”
What was that sound?
As if refusing to give Li Xiuman any time to think, the next instant, the stone wall supporting him collapsed with a crash.
Li Xiuman struggled to stabilize himself, barely standing on the edge of the drop, preventing himself from falling to the next floor along with the shattered stone wall.
Yet before he could even heave a sigh of relief, he felt an impact on his back. No longer able to maintain his balance, he fell.
As he plummeted, Li Xiuman desperately looked back, wanting to see who exactly had set him up.
Only then did he realize that a stray rock, kicked up as a byproduct of two Molten Lizardmen fighting, had struck him.
Having fallen to Floor 33, Li Xiuman still thought he had a chance.
He spread his Bone Wings, intending to fly back up to Floor 32 through the gap he fell from.
To his surprise, at this critical juncture, the gap above continuously collapsed, tightly blocking the way with rubble.
If he tried to blast it open with magic, it would inevitably cause an even larger cave-in.
“What is... happening to me?”
“Look! We finally found someone.”
“Adventurer ahead, don't be afraid or on guard! We are good guys!”
Li Xiuman looked at the glowing red Omen Crystal, then looked at the group of adventurers walking toward him.
He felt...
Something was definitely wrong, ever since a moment ago.
As if realizing something, he pulled the Cursed Gold Coin out of his pocket.
Right now...
The gold coin was coated in a faint crimson sheen.
Every gift of fate comes with a price tag, secretly attached long ago.
[Cursed Gold Coin] Special effect “Curse” has been triggered.
Trash coin, get the hell away from me!
But since he was in front of people after all, Li Xiuman maintained his composure and didn't hurl the coin into the abyss.
Rate on N.U.
