"Roar—"
With a furious roar, the Giant Sandworm suddenly plunged headfirst into the sand. The ground immediately began to bulge again and again at a terrifying speed. The very next second, the sand beneath my feet exploded.
"Whoosh!"
I instantly used Step Slash to dash five yards diagonally to the left. At once, I saw that gaping maw open wide, swallowing a mouthful of yellow sand!
At the same time, I unloaded an entire burst into the sandworm's mouth. The bullets struck its teeth and soft flesh with muffled pops, sending damage numbers flying.
Having missed its attack, the Giant Sandworm seemed utterly enraged. It twisted its massive body and charged at me, attempting to devour me again!
Without a second thought, I knew I couldn't keep holding back. Otherwise, the Giant Sandworm might swallow me whole and turn me into a pile of its crap. That would be way too miserable!
"Whoosh!"
As I rapidly sidestepped, I pulled out an Explosive Grenade I had been saving for a long time from the Dimensional Storage Space, yanked the pin, and threw it into the Giant Sandworm's mouth!
My body rolled across the sand. When I glanced back, I saw the Giant Sandworm's abdomen explode, countless chunks of flesh bursting outward. At the same time, a damage number rose above its head!
"1288!"
Sure enough, the damage from an Explosive Grenade detonating inside its body was terrifying!
Unfortunately, that attack had cost too much. That had been my last grenade. I had sold the others I'd stocked up on to Zhang Ruolin for money. If I wanted more in the future, I would probably have to spend a huge amount of Star Coins buying them on the black market.
[Congratulations, you have killed the Giant Sandworm (Green BOSS). Reward obtained: Ability Crystal ×1! You have also obtained the quest item: STC Fragment ×1!]
Two successive "plop" sounds rang out as the items dropped into my Dimensional Storage Space.
One was an unremarkable component—the STC Fragment needed to complete the instance. The other was an Ability Crystal, which was basically a treasure chest that could be opened for rewards!
So, I took out the fist-sized crystal from my storage space and opened it directly.
[Congratulations, you have opened the Ability Crystal. Item obtained: Explosive Charge (B-Rank Skill Tome)!]
Holy crap...
When I saw the notification, my heart suddenly began racing. I hadn't expected the Giant Sandworm to be so generous, dropping a class skill book that I needed most right now!
I spread open my palm, and a Skill Tome shimmered into existence above it.
[Explosive Charge] (B-Rank Skill Tome): First-tier Skill Tome. Locks onto a target within 40 yards and launches an Explosive Charge, dealing up to 150% damage to all hostile units along the path and stunning them for 1 second. Costs 3 Essence Points. Required Level: 10. Requires profession: Super Weapon Master.
For warrior-type players in the early stages of Star Abyss, Explosive Charge was unquestionably a god-tier skill. Not only could it rapidly close the distance, it could even stun enemies for one second. A skill like this could very well decide the outcome of a battle!
"Bang—"
Just as I was immersed in the joy of obtaining a new skill, a violent sound suddenly came from the distance. The instant I heard it, my head felt as though it had been struck by a hammer, and a huge damage number rose into the air!
"422!"
[Combat Notification: Deserter Sergeant (Green BOSS) used a sniper rifle to deal 422 damage to you!]
He was here—the other key figure needed to clear the instance!
I took advantage of the momentum to roll into the sand for cover and switched my main-hand weapon to Wind Whisperer. I quickly aimed and, sure enough, spotted a white man holding a sniper rifle amid the wreckage of a rusted helicopter, searching for me.
"Bang!"
The moment I aimed, I fired. I was faster than him. A bullet instantly streaked through the air and struck him in the throat with a wet pfft. Through my scope, I could clearly see blood spraying everywhere!
As he shouted, "What the fuck!" I kept firing. One large-caliber bullet after another either hit his head or his ass, giving me an absolute advantage in marksmanship.
"Damn it, you meddlesome bastard!"
The sergeant was completely enraged. He actually rode a sand bike out from behind the helicopter wreckage, kicking up clouds of dust as he sped toward the dune where I stood.
No rush. Keep firing in bursts!
With each shot from Wind Whisperer, not a single bullet was wasted. Though the sergeant lowered his body and tried to hide behind the sand, every one of my shots still struck his back, dealing massive damage!
"You bastard, I'll make you pay!"
The sand bike grew faster and faster, and the sergeant's expression became increasingly savage.
I frowned and aimed my next shot directly at the bike's fuel tank!
"Bang!"
The moment the gunshot rang out, the bike burst into flames and exploded!
"Aaaahhhhhh~~~"
The sergeant roared as he desperately rolled through the sand to extinguish the flames. When he got back to his feet, he had only around 1,000 health left, yet he still drew a military knife from his thigh and charged at me like a madman.
"Boom!"
A thread of essence energy exploded inside me, and my body instantly became an afterimage. I charged forty yards forward and stunned him where he stood. At the same time, I had already switched my main-hand weapon to Bee Sting, then turned and unleashed a three-hit combo on the low-health sergeant: basic attack + Dragon Blade + basic attack!
"254!"
"512!"
"268!"
In an instant, the sergeant's throat was slit. A torrent of blood sprayed out as he stared at me in disbelief, slowly sank to his knees, and gave me a massive amount of Experience Points!
At the same time, ding-dong sounds rang continuously in my ears.
[Congratulations, you have completed the rare instance Red Sand Plunder (Elite ★★). Reward obtained: Character Experience +100,000. Additional rewards obtained: Sleepless Chestplate (Quality: Green), Ground Spike Slash (A-Rank Skill Tome)!]
"Holy crap..."
Staring at the rewards, I was dumbfounded. Could it be... that I was actually the legendary chosen one? These rewards were far too generous. Could other players be getting the same thing?
Thinking it over carefully, that didn't seem to be the case. The more likely explanation was that most players currently had no access to "Instance Crystals," so very few instances had been cleared. The reward bonus was therefore high—like being the first person to taste crab, with the finest possible enjoyment.
Anyway, this felt amazing...
I quickly opened the Dimensional Storage Space and took out the Sleepless Chestplate. Equipment like this in Star Abyss was quite different from the gear in World of Warcraft or DNF. The armor seemed to be forged from some kind of alloy and was extremely light. It was barely heavier than combat clothing, but the defense power it provided was far beyond what those trash gray combat uniforms could compare to!
[Sleepless Chestplate] (Quality: Green) Tier: First Tier Defense: 22 Strength: +9 Requires strength: 35
The attributes were simple: 22 Defense and 9 Strength.
Still, I was already more than satisfied. Something was better than nothing. After all, when I switched into Combat Form, I only had a vest with no defense power. Forget a green chestplate—even a gray one was better than running around naked!
With a light sweep of my hand, the second Skill Tome from this instance appeared in my palm:
[Ground Spike Slash] (A-Rank Skill Tome): First-tier Skill Tome. Launches a fierce attack against targets within a 5×5 area. Essence energy transforms into ground spikes, dealing up to 250% damage to targets within the area and immobilizing them for 2 seconds. Required Level: 10. Requires profession: Super Weapon Master.
Ground Spike Slash was an area damage skill that could somewhat make up for my lack of AOE. More importantly, its instant 250% damage was already quite impressive!
However, I didn't have enough skill points to learn it yet, so I decided to level up.
The instance had given an enormous amount of experience, so I shot all the way up to level 16. Same old rule: all freely allocated points went into Strength. I had to maintain my advantage in attack power.
In addition, I used one skill point to learn Ground Spike Slash, then poured the Skill Experience I had gained over the past few days by constantly assembling and disassembling computers at the internet cafe into Explosive Charge and Ground Spike Slash, raising both skills to level 10!
As a result, Strength and Agility each gained an additional 6 points!
Then I checked the Essence Furnace. After consuming a massive amount of experience, it had risen to level 12 as well. Every attribute had increased, and when I opened my personal panel, even I felt that the results were ridiculous!
[Shadow Chaser] (Starry Sky Super Weapon · Sword Specialization · First Tier) Level: 16 Attack: 80–182 Defense: 76 Health: 5700 Critical Strike: 0 Charm: 0 Essence: 100/100 Overall Combat Level: 325 Potential Point Allocation: Strength 150/Agility 75/Spirit 34.8/Stamina 36 Achievements: 3
My attack power had now reached a staggering 182. With most players currently having only 20 to 40 Defense, this kind of attack power could easily break through their defenses. Combined with the damage boosts from my skills, instantly dealing one or two thousand damage would be easy. And thanks to the Essence Furnace's advantages, my stamina had surged, bringing my health to 5,700. With another 76 Defense, I was practically built like a tank.
In short, I wouldn't die so easily anymore. My sense of security was temporarily maxed out!
"Whew..."
Time to leave.
I quickly confirmed my choice and exited the instance.
"Whoosh!"
My body was enveloped in a streak of light. Then a gust of wind blew from behind me, pushing me forward through the instance Teleportation Gate. But the moment I stepped out of it, I froze slightly.
It was already dark outside!
And I wasn't in the Old City District. On the contrary, after leaving the instance, the light behind me vanished, and I found myself standing in an old open-air public toilet. It smelled pretty awful, too.
"Holy crap..."
I opened the map and discovered that I was in the western outskirts of Creek City, roughly ten kilometers away from Forward Street.
This instance's random teleportation function really didn't care at all about players' taxi expenses, huh?
So I had no intention of taking a taxi back. Instead, I took Bus No. 8, transferred to No. 15, and arrived at Feiyang Internet Cafe before ten at night. Looking at the spicy hotpot stall outside in the cold wind, I thought, Forget it. Save some money. Then I went into the internet cafe, planning to soak a bowl of instant noodles while waiting to change shifts.
"Where's Lu Xiaobei?"
"What, do you miss her?" Sakura laughed. "If you miss her, go upstairs and find her. She just went up to sleep. She was asking earlier why you still hadn't come back. She said that if you dared skip work without a reason, she'd dock you double wages and treat the rest of us to hotpot."
"..."
Speechless, I started soaking my noodles.
Before you continue