“Could it be…
that I stepped in dog shit on my way out tonight and actually stumbled across a hidden wild Boss?”
Crouching behind the ruins of the Mill, Maluo stared at the approaching figure carrying a lantern.
Instead of being frightened, a greedy green light flashed in his narrowed eyes.
According to the logic of traditional online games, encountering a monster with such a cool design and exclusive sound effects in the wild definitely meant it was an elite monster or hidden Boss delivering itself straight to your doorstep!
And if a monster like this dropped loot, wouldn’t it be packed with top-tier equipment and materials?
“Take a gamble, and a bicycle turns into a motorcycle!”
“As long as it has a health bar, tonight it’ll become my stepping stone to leveling up!”
Maluo was completely blinded by the glory of securing the first kill.
He even ignored the health warning flashing with dazzling red light in the upper-right corner of his vision, gripping the sharpened wooden spear tightly in both hands.
Just as the Lantern Nightmare came within ten meters of him—
“Drop some gold coins for your grandpa!”
Maluo roared.
His entire body, like a coiled-up skinny monkey, suddenly shot out from the shadows of the Mill.
Using the fastest speed of his life, he executed a perfect tactical slide, instantly closing the distance as the wooden spear in his hands thrust straight toward the head of the black-robed monster hidden beneath its hood!
“Whoosh!”
The wooden spear struck its target with pinpoint accuracy.
However, the sensation of wood piercing flesh that Maluo had expected never came.
Instead, it felt as though he had stabbed into a lump of freezing, biting cotton.
The wooden spear passed straight through the monster’s head without the slightest resistance, piercing nothing but the air behind it!
No physical hitbox?
The fanaticism on Maluo’s face instantly froze.
“What the fuck…
Physical immunity?
A magic-type monster?!”
This game really didn’t play by the rules!
Before he could pull back his wooden spear, the Lantern Nightmare slowly lowered its head.
Beneath the ragged black hood, there were no facial features at all—only a constantly writhing mass of dense fog emitting an eerie, pale-green glow.
“Clatter!”
The iron chain in the monster’s hand suddenly lashed out.
There was no physical contact whatsoever, yet Maluo felt as though his soul had been smashed by a massive iron hammer.
His entire brain instantly went blank.
[Warning!
Sanity Value reduced to zero!]
[You have been subjected to a Mental Whip, falling into a state of extreme fear and paralysis!]
“Ahhhhh!”
Maluo’s vision was instantly flooded with scarlet.
The whispers around his ears transformed into countless enormous, torn mouths, frantically chewing at his nerves.
His entire body collapsed to the ground like a puddle of mud.
His eyes rolled back, and he couldn’t move even a single finger.
All he could do was helplessly watch as the Lantern Nightmare slowly raised a pale, bone-like claw.
At that moment, Lynn, sitting upright within the statue, watched everything through his divine perspective, and his heart skipped a beat.
“Damn, if Maluo dies now, it’ll cost ten Faith Points to re-condense his body.”
“This kid only killed two Tier 0 monsters just now.
He doesn’t have enough money to buy a Resurrection Coin at all.
Will this hurt his enthusiasm for grinding?”
As an edgy wild god who had a family to support and was extremely thrifty with his resources, Lynn felt that he absolutely had to find a way to save Maluo!
He hurriedly glanced at his system panel.
Although he couldn’t directly descend and engage the enemy in hand-to-hand combat, he was still the backend administrator with the highest authority!
“System!
Immediately use my authority to force a highest-level warning into Maluo’s field of vision!”
“Use the largest font size and the flashiest red light possible!
Wake this kid up for me!”
Ding!
In Maluo’s despairing vision, a wildly flashing blood-red pop-up window suddenly appeared:
[Warning!]
[Indescribable source of mental pollution detected!
(Tier 1 Aberration, Lantern Nightmare)]
[This creature is a Spirit-type creature.
Current physical attacks are completely ineffective!]
[Run!
The poison circle is closing in!
Return to the barrier immediately!!]
[Run!
Run!
Run!]
The sudden top-level red warning and dazzling flashing light, combined with the system’s forced vibration prompt, actually managed to tear a sliver of clarity through Maluo’s paralyzed nerves.
Especially the words “The poison circle is closing in.”
They instantly activated the survival instinct engraved into the DNA of the Fourth Calamity.
“Physical immunity…
Battle royale poison circle mechanics…”
Maluo used the last bit of strength left in his body to bite down hard on the tip of his tongue.
Thanks to the game’s weakened pain perception, he didn’t actually bite his tongue off, but the sudden stimulus was enough.
He abruptly broke free from his paralysis and scrambled to his feet.
Abandoning the wooden spear, he crawled and stumbled forward, sprinting desperately toward the faint blue glow of the church’s protective barrier several hundred meters behind him!
“Big Brother, I was wrong!
I’ll never be a Grind King again!
Don’t chase me!”
As Maluo ran, tears and snot streamed down his face.
The Lantern Nightmare clearly had no intention of letting go of this delicious soul.
It floated through the air, dragging its iron chain across the ground with a harsh metallic screech.
Its movements looked slow, but in reality, it was practically teleporting, staying right on Maluo’s heels.
Every time the eerie green light of its lantern flickered, Maluo felt a needle-like pain stabbing into the back of his head.
“Hurry!
Hurry!
Faster!”
Maluo poured every ounce of strength he had into his legs.
He swore that if this thing had chased him during his old 1,000-meter physical fitness test, he definitely could have broken the national college student record!
One hundred meters from the church barrier…
Fifty meters…
Thirty meters…
“Clatter!”
The Lantern Nightmare suddenly whipped the iron chain from its hand, wrapping it tightly around Maluo’s ankle.
“What the fuck!”
Maluo went flying, crashing face-first onto the ground.
His face scraped across the cold stone slabs for two meters.
An icy chill traveled up the chain, frantically draining his remaining vitality and sanity.
The featureless hood of the Lantern Nightmare slowly closed in behind him, seemingly preparing to feast.
“It’s over.
I’m really going to kick the bucket here today.”
Maluo closed his eyes in despair.
Then, at this critical moment—
“Boom!”
Less than twenty meters ahead, within the church, a brilliant deep-blue divine light suddenly erupted from the eyes of the dilapidated ancient statue, sharp as a divine sword!
It had finally entered the range where Lynn could take action.
This was Lynn using the divine power he had painstakingly recovered during this period to forcibly activate the church’s protective barrier!
The deep-blue divine light expanded like a tsunami, instantly enveloping Maluo and violently crashing into the Lantern Nightmare.
“Hiss!”
The monster released an ear-piercing shriek, as though it had been splashed with concentrated sulfuric acid.
The iron chain wrapped around Maluo’s ankle instantly shattered into black smoke.
The Lantern Nightmare’s eerie green lantern flickered violently several times, and its entire body recoiled as if electrocuted, retreating frantically until it finally vanished back into the endless dark wasteland.
The deity’s protective barrier was a remnant of the laws of the Old Days.
A low-tier aberration like this didn’t dare confront it head-on.
“Hoo…
Hoo…”
Inside the barrier, Maluo lay on the ground like a dying dog, his entire body drenched in cold sweat as he gasped desperately for air.
“Too…
too thrilling.”
Maluo rolled onto his back, lying flat against the cold ground as he stared up at the dilapidated roof of the church.
Then, slowly, the corner of his mouth curled into an extremely twisted grin.
“This game…
is fucking awesome!”
“The pressure from that magic-type monster, the heart-pounding rush of running from the poison circle…
it’s just so damn satisfying!”