Chapter 16 : Chapter 16
Chapter 16: Entering the Contaminated Land! Experience Soars—Level 5!
Outside Linyuan City, it felt like an entirely different world.
An endless wilderness stretched into the distance beneath a faint haze, and even the air itself seemed oppressive.
Ye Ze crossed a patch of nameless ruins and moved farther and farther away from the gates of Linyuan City.
After more than ten minutes, he arrived at a concealed camp.
From the outside, it looked like nothing more than an ordinary training ground, but after passing through a stretch of sand and earth and going deeper inside, he saw a stern emblem: Demon Suppression Army!
This was the special military force China had established to resist the Abyss.
The Scout Camp Ye Ze intended to join was one part of it.
And the Contaminated Land lay not far beyond the military camp, held firmly in check by the Demon Suppression Army’s encampment.
“Stop!”
Two Demon Suppression Army guards halted Ye Ze. “Show your identification.”
It was similar to what had happened at the city gate, but the Demon Suppression Army’s identity verification process was far more detailed.
First came iris recognition, then voice verification...
And finally, there was even an ability test.
“Ye Ze, Summoner... Level 4? A high school student? A Special Investigation Specialist?”
After seeing Ye Ze’s identification, the two guards looked at each other in disbelief.
With every line they read aloud, their tone grew more incredulous.
“...Show us one of your class skills.”
Ye Ze nodded and summoned the squirrel.
After confirming that his Summoner skill checked out, the two guards completed the verification and directed Ye Ze into the Demon Suppression Army Scout Camp.
Afterward, the two of them could not help sighing.
“He’s only level 4, and he still dares enter the Contaminated Land...”
“Are young people these days all this brave?”
Once inside the Scout Camp, Ye Ze saw dozens of young people in different kinds of clothing gathered there, all with different classes.
“So they’re all like me...”
“Here to take part in the temporary scout mission.”
In recent years, contaminated lands had been appearing more and more rapidly.
Whenever the Demon Suppression Army lacked manpower, it would recruit Temporary Scouts from among all Class Users in society.
According to the Demon Suppression Army’s arrangements, those temporary scouts would carry out land-clearing and reconnaissance in the contaminated land.
Since danger and opportunity existed side by side there, plenty of people were always willing to take part.
Ye Ze looked around.
Half of them were first-year university students, while the other half were members of civilian guilds...
There was only one high school student among them, and that was Ye Ze.
The moment this level 4 Class User, who was daring beyond reason, walked in, he became the center of everyone’s attention.
“Listen up, everyone—”
Suddenly, an old soldier in the uniform of the Demon Suppression Army walked over.
“I am Xu Feng, commander of Scout Battalion One!”
“First of all, welcome to the land-clearing operation in No. 19 Contaminated Land!”
As soon as they heard that, the people who had been standing around in all sorts of postures immediately straightened up.
It was time to get down to business!
Soon, everyone received a package. Ye Ze opened his and found: one Distress Talisman, one briefing sheet on No. 19 Contaminated Land, and one Temporary Identity Badge.
Commander Xu Feng explained:
“Once you enter the Contaminated Land, if you discover a high-level Fiend, use the Distress Talisman immediately!”
“I or another third-tier or fourth-tier member will deal with the higher-level Fiends.”
“Your task is to eliminate all low-level Fiend Soldiers!”
“As for any harvests or spoils you obtain, you may either keep them yourselves or exchange them for Military Merit Points!”
At that, quite a few people’s eyes began to burn with excitement.
As for Ye Ze, he quickly finished reading the briefing on No. 19 Contaminated Land.
The Fiendish aura of the Abyss polluted Blue Star’s land and turned it into Contaminated Land.
The various Contaminated Lands in each region were numbered in order, based on when the contamination had appeared and how strong it was, starting from No. 1 onward.
No. 19 was the newest and weakest section of this Contaminated Land.
It was perfect for leveling up!
Ye Ze thought to himself.
Commander Xu Feng kept his speech brief and finally announced, “You may depart now.”
“You may travel either in teams or alone. Before you go, you may also pick up bounty missions. Those all count toward Military Merit as well.”
The moment he finished speaking, the crowd immediately began forming teams.
Most of them were around level 10, and clearing the land in groups was both more effective and safer.
But Ye Ze stood alone, and no one was willing to team up with him.
A level 4 Class User was the weakest person here.
Some people began whispering among themselves.
“Is that guy out of his mind? He’s only level 4, and he came to the Contaminated Land?”
“He has to be some rich kid who has no idea how high the sky is and just came out here to rebel for a bit!”
“Level 4... He didn’t get in through connections, did he?”
“Have you ever seen anyone use connections just to come to the Contaminated Land and die?”
“Uh...”
While everyone was whispering and speculating, Ye Ze walked over to the bounty board.
Team up?
He had never considered it, and he did not need it!
What truly interested him were the Scout Camp’s bounty missions:
【Scout Camp Bounty List —】
Collect the corpses of Faceless Fiends and Blood-Skeleton Fiends — 20 Military Merit per corpse (no limit)
Search for lost supplies in No. 19 Contaminated Land — 500 Military Merit (available)
Map No. 19 Contaminated Land — 300 Military Merit (the more complete the map, the higher the reward)
...
There were dozens of bounty missions in total, and Ye Ze read through almost all of them.
Whether he could complete them or not was another matter, but there was no harm in remembering them first.
“The only thing is, how exactly do you exchange Military Merit for rewards?”
Ye Ze searched around for quite a while and still could not find any explanation of how Military Merit was used.
Suddenly, a waft of fragrance drifted past from behind him.
A girl dressed in black walked over. She had a slender, tall figure and a light, steady gait, and she looked full of vitality.
But when she spoke, her tone carried the confident air of an older woman.
“Little brother~”
“You don’t even know how Military Merit works, and you still dared come here?”
Ye Ze turned his head and met a delicate, pretty face wearing a playful smile.
She looked only one or two years older than he was... probably a student from some university.
Ye Ze raised a brow. Why was she calling him little brother?
It was not as though she was that much older than him!
The girl in black continued, “With 1,000 Military Merit, you can go to the first floor of the Demon Suppression Army treasury and choose one treasure.”
“With 2,000, you can go to the second floor. With 4,000, the third... and so on.”
“Of course, you can also exchange Military Merit for money if you want.”
Ye Ze’s eyes lit up. He could pick treasures himself?
The Demon Suppression Army’s treasures were far more abundant than those in Linyuan City’s treasury!
That reward system was not bad at all!
After saying that, the girl smiled with her eyes curved into crescents. “Got it now? Little~ brother!”
Then, without giving Ye Ze any chance to retort, she accepted the bounty mission to search for the lost supplies and turned to leave.
Ye Ze was left baffled. The girl had teased him and walked off, and he had no idea what her background was...
What was more, he could not even see her level with his Inspection Panel!
“If the level gap is within twenty levels, I should be able to inspect it. Could she be wearing some kind of concealment item?”
Ye Ze murmured to himself, then decided not to think about it anymore.
He simply treated her as some passing college girl who had stopped to tease him for a moment.
After that, he entered No. 19 Contaminated Land alone!
Although this was the least contaminated area, at that moment, it was still a bleak and gloomy place. The sky seemed veiled by gray clouds, with only threads of light filtering through.
“I heard this used to be a scenic area...”
Ye Ze sighed. Now it had been completely polluted by the aura of the Abyss.
The moment he stepped into the Contaminated Land, he immediately summoned the Shadow Squirrel.
“Go scout the way ahead!”
After Ye Ze gave the order, the squirrel split into two Shadow Clones and began sweeping the area ahead.
If one was talking about scouting, then with the Shadow Squirrel’s abilities, it could at the very least have secured an official scout posting!
Its skills were simply too well suited for it!
And with the Contaminated Land so dim and shadow-filled, the Shadow Squirrel moved through it like a fish in water.
Not long after, the squirrel quickly sent back a report.
“Hm? There’s a Fiend up ahead to the left?”
Ye Ze fixed his gaze on the target location and spotted a decayed gray-green body with a twisted, hideous face:
【Corpse Fiend (lv.10)】
Type: Ordinary-grade Fiend Soldier
Attributes: Strength 50, Constitution 45, Agility 47, Spirit 1
Characteristic: Deathless Body — As long as any body part remains, it retains the ability to move and will continue attacking enemies.
Skills: Putrid Poison, Embrace of the Dead
————
It was far stronger than the magical beasts in the dungeon!
It was not just a matter of higher level and attributes, but also the bizarre Characteristic unique to Fiends!
Fiend Characteristics were similar to human talents—powerful and varied in function.
Some Fiends even had Characteristics that were completely unknown.
Only when Class Users killed them and recorded those Characteristics would they appear on the data panel.
That was also one of the reasons why the Abyss and its Fiends were so difficult to deal with: There were simply too many unknown Fiends!
Still, for Ye Ze, this Corpse Fiend was not difficult to handle.
Summon Panda!
“Use Taiji Inner Force. Best if you can smash it apart with a single palm strike!”
If not even a single body part remained, then surely it would die!
Panda moved with nimble speed and thrust out a palm in an instant.
With the bonuses from Ye Ze’s two Spirit Pact equipment pieces, the summoned beasts’ movement speed had increased by 100%, and their attack speed by 50%!
That palm strike was as swift as the wind!
SLAP!
The Taiji Inner Force carried by that palm strike blasted the Corpse Fiend to pieces.
This Corpse Fiend, comparable to a level 10 Warrior-class Class User, was instantly annihilated...
No, not quite. Half a hand was still left.
Its entire body had been pulverized, but because of the way it had lifted its arm, half of one hand had survived.
That half-hand writhed wildly on the ground, desperately clawing its way toward Panda and Ye Ze!
“My stats still aren’t high enough. I actually couldn’t kill it with one palm.”
Ye Ze felt a little regretful.
But in the distance, a level 11 Archer glanced over and then rubbed his eyes in shock.
“Good Lord! Am I seeing things?”
“That level 4 Class User’s summoned beast just one-shot a level 10 Corpse Fiend?”
The others in his team did not have an Archer’s long-range vision. Though they had not seen it, they did not believe him in the slightest.
“One-shot a level 10 Corpse Fiend? Dream on. Who doesn’t know how hard Corpse Fiends are to kill?”
“The few of us are all level 10 Class Users. If he could one-shot a Corpse Fiend, wouldn’t that mean he could one-shot us too? What a joke!”
“My friend, a level 4 one-shotting a level 10 is a little too absurd...”
The Archer scratched his head.
Little by little, he began doubting his own eyesight...
On Ye Ze’s side, when the squirrel saw that half a hand still remained on the ground, it decisively went in for the finishing blow.
With two slashes of the Crimson Demon Blade, it chopped the severed hand into powder.
Only then did the experience finally come in...
【Killed Corpse Fiend (lv.10), EXP +90!】
“90 EXP! This trip really wasn’t for nothing!”
The experience here was several times higher than in the dungeon!
One could easily imagine how fast the leveling would be!
Ye Ze checked his experience bar: 【Level: 4 (895/1300)】
He only needed five more Corpse Fiends to level up.
An idea for greater efficiency suddenly struck him.
“Squirrel, use Shadow Clone to lure monsters over. Bring five Corpse Fiends together first.”
“Panda, once the Corpse Fiends have gathered, use Twin Peaks Pierce the Ears for an area attack and wipe them out!”
A single punch might not be enough to kill a Corpse Fiend, but one area attack would definitely be enough to kill a group of them!
The Shadow Squirrel obediently nodded. Luring monsters posed no problem for it at all.
Its only concern was whether there would be enough monsters nearby!
Half a minute later, five Corpse Fiends lured in from five different directions were drawn together by the Shadow Clones.
Panda rolled its shoulders and flexed its paws as a fierce gust of palm-wind swept out!
【Taiji — Twin Peaks Pierce the Ears】!
The Taiji Inner Force carried within the wide-area attack instantly pulverized all five Corpse Fiends, reducing them to fragments scattered across the ground.
【Killed Corpse Fiend *5, EXP +450!】
【Ding! Your level has increased to: Level 5!】
【Talent — You have gained one ‘Infinite Golden Traits’ draw!】