"Fungus... knows... no... divisions..."
The voice reverberating through every corner of the secret room answered Loulan, expressing its displeasure.
【Open the Nomad Shop.】
If he could not win, he would power up. Loulan felt that he had no way to draw out the boss's true body anytime soon, so naturally, he had to find a way to break the deadlock.
His body remained in place, vigilant, while his consciousness opened the Nomad Shop in his cheat, where purchases were made with gold coins.
With a fortune of 8,350, Loulan could not afford relics costing tens of thousands, but he could still purchase one suited to breaking the current deadlock.
The beginner Nomad Shop differed from the Star Crystal Shop. The latter stocked every relic, while the former randomly offered only some of them. Constructing and upgrading buildings from the Camp construction blueprints would increase the number randomly offered.
With a glance, Loulan saw that 12 relics had been listed in the shop and would refresh the next day. Two of them cost tens of thousands, beyond his means.
【It's not ideal, but I'll try this one. I hope it works.】
After briefly reading the descriptions of the other relics, Loulan purchased one that might break the deadlock.
【Tomb Raider's Hunting Shovel
Price: 5,000 gold coins
Quality: Rare-grade exclusive relic
Effect One: Grave Hunt—Twice a day, this relic can hunt for the most valuable grave within six kilometers that has not yet been robbed.
Effect Two: Tracking—Once a month, this relic will tell you the location of whatever you have in mind.
Bonus: Corruption +1】
Corruption: You will unconsciously take actions that remain within the limits of your moral bottom line. After the bonus exceeds a certain threshold, that bottom line will fall.
It was a double-edged supernatural relic. Although called a hunting shovel, it looked more like a shovel head inlaid with a compass. It had no shaft and could only be held by a grip on the back of the shovel head.
Loulan certainly wasn't going to become a grave robber. He still wanted to go to heaven after he died and couldn't commit such an immoral act. What caught his eye was this relic's heaven-defying Tracking effect.
Five thousand coins for one conceptual "wish granted" per month? An obscenely good deal!
"Tracking!"
Holding his blade in his right hand and the shovel-head compass in his left, Loulan activated Tracking while yearning inwardly to learn the location of this secret-room boss's true body.
Soon, the compass embedded in the shovel head began spinning wildly. Its needle finally pointed straight at the skeleton that had remained at the darkness's edge, locked in a standoff with Loulan until now.
"What the hell? It really is the true body!"
Loulan exclaimed in disbelief. He had never imagined that this skeleton was the boss's true body.
But how had it returned from the dead? What about the fungal stalks that dragged it into the darkness?
That made no sense. The records on neither Rot Fungus nor Blood Fungus monsters mentioned anything like this.
【I can't be unlucky enough to have encountered a new monster, can I?】
Loulan's morale fell somewhat. This was truly terrible luck.
"Fungus... doubt?"
The boss's confused voice echoed throughout the secret room. It seemed just as shocked by Loulan's discovery. It had exposed its essence so quickly.
All the groundwork it had laid before was now wasted.
The boss clearly could no longer remain patient under these circumstances. Within just two short seconds, the skeleton decided to attack.
It was done playing. Fighting was awesome!
"So we still have to fight in the end. Seriously..."
Loulan quickly unequipped the relic 【Tomb Raider's Hunting Shovel】 and stored it in his pouch, then held his blade in both hands and stood ready.
Before long, the huge skeleton closed in. It stretched out its left hand like a claw and grabbed at him.
"SWISH—"
Loulan reacted swiftly and slashed diagonally upward, but the expected sound of bones shattering never came.
Dozens of fungal threads as fine as silk squeezed out from within the bones. Countless dense cracks instantly appeared across the formerly intact white bones.
The slender fungal threads wrapped tightly around Loulan's blade like steel wire. There had not been the slightest warning, and they moved too quickly for even Loulan's body to react.
【It can do that?】
"Use... less..."
The taunt was immediately followed by the sound of air tearing on the other side: an attack from its other bony arm.
【Leper's Vertical Blade
Price: 1,500 gold coins
Quality: Normal-grade relic
Effect One: Leper's Blade, light and sharp】
"Buy!"
Gold coins -1,500
A short sword only about two feet long appeared from thin air on his right. Loulan released his blade's hilt with his left hand at the perfect moment and caught the brand-new secondary sword with nimble precision, slashing it toward the oncoming bony claw.
This time, Loulan's body had learned its lesson. His powerful combat instincts made him swing at the bony hand in almost the same way as before, but his left foot beneath him began gathering strength for a forceful kick.
Sure enough, identical fungal threads pried open the bone and sprang out, trying to lock down this blade that had appeared from nowhere.
【Now!】
Loulan's consciousness had observed the battle all along. As the brain, of course he knew what his body intended to do.
"THUD—"
His left foot stomped diagonally against the ground. The instant the fungal threads broke out, Loulan shifted position. His right foot traced a crescent-shaped mark through inertia, and his entire body leaned backward at an angle, retreating forty centimeters, roughly one step.
That single step made the incoming fungal threads miss entirely.
Before the enemy could react, Loulan promptly used the support created by the standoff on his right to twist his body. He pressed down with the hand holding his blade and dragged the skeleton's left hand downward, demonstrating the sheer force he possessed.
His left foot gathered strength. Their borrowed momentum and angled positions left the two figures forming a diagonal. At exactly the right moment, he kicked fiercely at the skeleton's chest as if to shatter it!
"Child... ish..."
The mocking voice sounded once more.
A yellowish-brown radiance blossomed within Loulan's glow, and the book that had remained inside the skeleton's chest quietly opened.
【The book is the true body!】
Loulan, who had been watching the situation closely, made an immediate judgment and relayed the information to his powerful body.
But it was too late.
As the book opened, the skeleton's frame exploded with a series of cracks as though its flesh were splitting open. Mushrooms bloomed like flowers all over its body, one after another.
The entire transformation took only an instant.
【My foot is stuck!】
The good news: Loulan's tremendously powerful, virtually perfect kick connected!
The bad news: it had no effect. The tremendous force seemed to be absorbed and diluted in that instant, while the eerie mushroom flowers transformed into vacuum cleaners and sucked Loulan's sole tight, immobilizing him.
"Laugh..."
The boss's taunt followed close behind. It seemed to enjoy seeing its prey rendered helpless.
Loulan lowered his head and looked into the chest cavity enclosed by the skeleton.
There, sitting atop the open book, was a cute, fairy-like girl. Her "clothes," woven from fungal threads, made even her minuscule body appear alluring and sexy.
But at that moment, Loulan did not find her alluring. He felt only... powerless!