Chang Jiu’s footsteps suddenly came to a halt.
As if to make it easier for her to make a choice, the voice that had existed only in her mind moments ago suddenly transformed into several enormous lines of text, floating conspicuously before her eyes.
【Dear Summoner, would you like to select your initial summon now?】
The voice, the wording, and even the font of the options were all so familiar to Chang Jiu that it was almost unsettling.
Back when she had been testing that game, the class she had chosen happened to be Summoner.
And now, the thing that had suddenly appeared was none other than the game system’s initial prompt!
Wait…
Her game system had actually followed her here too?
Chang Jiu’s heartbeat began to quicken.
She discreetly glanced at the others, only to discover that not a single one of them was even looking in her direction.
They were completely unaware of the game system’s existence!
She hesitated for a moment.
After confirming that the system prompt had no time limit, she decided not to make a choice just yet.
What if she really summoned something, only to find that it couldn’t beat these people?
Wouldn’t she just be asking to die?
Just then, a miner behind her gave her a hard shove.
“What are you spacing out for? Keep moving!”
There was a trace of nervousness in his reprimanding voice. He didn’t sound like he was scolding her so much as reminding her.
“Midnight is almost here! That’s when the soul beasts are most active. If we don’t get back to the camp soon, we’re going to be in trouble!”
As if responding to his warning, gusts of cold wind swept through the thick darkness.
Every so often, strange rustling noises that were impossible to identify drifted through the night.
The burly miners were still able to withstand the sudden chill, but the group of elderly, weak, sick, and injured refugees, who were already moving slowly, instantly lost control of their bodies.
One after another, they collapsed to the ground!
By the light of the torches carried by the miners beside her, Chang Jiu saw several wisps of black energy beginning to spread around their bodies.
“It hurts! It hurts! It hurts so much!”
“Ahhh! Don’t eat me! Please, don’t!”
The people on the ground seemed to be suffering unimaginable torment from within their very souls. They clutched their heads and rolled around in agony, with some even passing out completely.
Chang Jiu had already collapsed to the ground along with the others by the time more than half of them had fallen.
She simply went with the flow, groaning along with everyone else as though she were in excruciating pain.
But inside, she was both uneasy and confused.
Aside from the agonizing hunger twisting her stomach, she had only one other sensation—
The wind really was unusually cold tonight.
Other than that, she didn’t feel the slightest bit uncomfortable.
Fortunately, Chang Jiu’s ability to play dead was exceptionally good.
No one noticed anything strange about her.
Seeing that the entire group had collapsed and was unable to move, Sang Biao’s voice finally came from the front.
“I’d like to see which soul beast has the guts to cause trouble for a second-grade Soul Refiner!”
First, he warily surveyed the surroundings.
When his gaze suddenly fixed on a certain spot, he looked down at a curled-up youth beside his feet and unexpectedly softened his expression.
“Not feeling well? Come here. Let me treat you.”
The boy’s face was pale.
Without thinking, he obediently crawled toward Sang Biao.
“Thank—”
Before he could finish speaking, Sang Biao’s hand had already curled into a claw.
Like an eagle snatching a chick, his fingers clamped mercilessly around the boy’s neck.
Blood sprayed violently into the air.
The boy’s unfinished words of thanks turned into a scream of agony.
Sang Biao casually tossed the blood-soaked corpse into the darkness.
Then his expression turned cold as he stared in that direction.
Chang Jiu’s entire body went cold, and she clenched her teeth tightly.
She could see something moving in the darkness.
It seemed to be hesitating.
But very quickly, whatever it was apparently could no longer resist the temptation of the flesh on the ground.
A mass of black energy rapidly gathered in the darkness, condensing into a shadow nearly half a person’s height.
In the blink of an eye, it lunged toward the blood-soaked figure!
As the black energy invaded the boy’s body, his pained groans quickly turned into a shrill, agonized scream that seemed to pierce straight through his skull. He was clearly suffering to the absolute limit.
Yet Sang Biao’s tense expression suddenly relaxed.
“Damn it. It’s only a first-grade soul beast that can’t even form a physical body. What a waste of my time!”
Despite his words, Sang Biao’s movements remained swift and decisive.
A hazy, earthy-yellow light began gathering beside his hand. It grew brighter and brighter, gradually spreading outward until, in the end, it actually solidified into a massive earthy-yellow hammer!
Chang Jiu didn’t blink as she stared fixedly at the strange hammer that had appeared out of thin air in his hand.
Was this the key to how Soul Refiners fought soul beasts?
But how exactly had he created it?
The miners nearby had already begun showering Sang Biao with praise.
“Brother Sang Biao summoned his natal soul weapon!”
“Brother Biao has gotten even stronger! The Earth Spirit Hammer looks much more powerful than last time!”
“As expected of Brother Sang Biao! What soul beast could possibly stand against him? It’s nothing but a paper tiger!”
After Sang Biao summoned his natal soul weapon, the aura belonging to a second-grade Soul Refiner quickly spread outward.
The mass of black energy devouring the boy’s soul seemed to sense that something was wrong and instinctively tried to flee.
But Sang Biao swung the giant hammer down with tremendous force—
The earthy-yellow light suddenly burst outward.
The terrifying black energy that had seemed so sinister and eerie moments ago instantly began melting away like snow beneath the blazing sun the moment it touched the light of the Earth Spirit Hammer.
Chang Jiu noticed that the bone-chilling wind had also disappeared without a sound.
The people affected by the soul beast gradually began recovering as well.
Sang Biao put away the Earth Spirit Hammer and frowned as he kicked at the unconscious refugees nearby.
“All right. These people are still alive, so they’re still useful. Give them some Soul-Calming Wine to keep them alive, then hurry up and take them back!”
One of the miners hesitated.
“My lord, we don’t have that much Soul-Calming Wine…”
“Can’t you dilute it with water? As long as they don’t die, that’s enough. I don’t give a damn if they end up as idiots!”
Chang Jiu received a mouthful as well.
The diluted Soul-Calming Wine was so watered down that she couldn’t even taste the alcohol anymore. All she felt was a warm current flowing through her body, restoring a little of her strength.
The other unconscious refugees gradually regained consciousness, but Chang Jiu could still see how weak they were.
So she continued pretending to be groggy and followed the others forward in a daze.
There were eleven people in total in this group of unwanted refugees, including Chang Jiu.
Aside from one person who seemed to have barely a breath left and had to be carried, everyone else was herded along like cattle or sheep.
Anyone who walked too slowly was rewarded with two lashes of the whip.
After hurrying along for what felt like half the night, they finally arrived at the base of Mine No. 7.
It was already deep into the night.
With powerful soul beasts appearing in the area recently, enormous bonfires had been lit every ten yards or so.
The mining district was eerily quiet. The only sounds were the footsteps of patrolling guards and the sharp crackle of burning wood and red-hot charcoal exploding in the fire pits.
The brilliant firelight illuminated row upon row of densely packed, low-roofed huts.
They looked almost like countless coffins lined up side by side.
And tonight, Chang Jiu and the others would be locked inside those little huts.
“Lord Sang Biao, there aren’t enough empty rooms.”
Sang Biao frowned.
“Didn’t a lot of people just die?”
“They’re all being used to store the corpses. You said to keep them there for a few days in case their families came to claim them. We’re supposed to collect the corpse-storage fees before disposing of them.”
Sang Biao glanced over the group of elderly, weak, sick, and injured refugees.
Finally, he waved his hand.
“The ones who still look like they can survive can squeeze into one of the larger rooms. Put those two half-dead ones in a separate room. Give them a couple extra bites of food to keep them alive.”
He paused, then added coldly,
“Don’t let them die before they even make it into the mine.”
Chang Jiu glanced at the trembling old men and women behind her. She was just about to obediently follow the group when someone suddenly grabbed her by the back of the neck and tossed her in the opposite direction.
“You’re going the wrong way.”
She was thrown straight into one of the little huts.
The unfortunate fellow who had been carried all the way to Mine No. 7 was thrown in with her.
Oh.
She got it now.
Apparently, she was one of the ones who looked like she was about to die.
“Click.”
The coffin-like hut was locked from the outside.