Light of the Righteous God

No matter whether the claims from novels and television dramas in his previous life were reliable, Zhang Chen decided that from now on, he would only dig at noon, when yang energy was at its strongest. Once noon had passed, he would go home and rest.

The treasures and Experience Points inside the Ancient Tomb were important, but his own life was even more important.

At certain moments, people would always subconsciously choose to believe in superstition, even if only a little.

In the house next door, the Fox Spirit watched Zhang Chen's receding back, the corners of her lips curving into a lovely arc. "I knew that blockhead had taken the bait. No one can resist the temptation of money."

Carrying his shovel, Zhang Chen followed the path he had taken earlier until he reached the cave entrance. After watching it carefully for a while, he said in surprise, "That pheasant came out of the cave."

If the pheasant could walk out of the cave, it meant the inside was still safe. Otherwise, the pheasant would probably have lost its life long ago.

Looking at the Experience Point numbers at the cave entrance, Zhang Chen's eyes lit up. Without another word, he started digging.

The Experience Points were only about a meter from the entrance. After digging for half a shichen, Zhang Chen found a large expanse of Experience Points right before his eyes.

"So many Experience Points!"

Zhang Chen looked at the Experience Points before him, surprise flashing in his eyes. Each red orb had a number floating above it: "+10," "+20," "+50," and "+100." Of course, there were also "+1," "+2," "+5," "+8," and "+9." It could be said that every number from one to one hundred was there.

"I'm going to strike it rich! Who knows how deep this cave goes? As far as the eye can see, the depths are filled with Experience Points. If I keep digging, my skills might soar into the heavens. Suppressing that Fox Spirit would be no more than a flick of the finger." Zhang Chen swallowed hard as he stared at the Experience Points.

Just then, Zhang Chen's Golden Finger detected the Experience Points, and the Golden Finger Interface popped up:

Experience Points discovered. Collect them?

"Collect," Zhang Chen silently said to himself.

Experience Points +10

Experience Points +30

Experience Points +50

Experience Points +9

Experience Points +8

Experience Points +35

...

As Zhang Chen continued digging, his Experience Points began to surge rapidly. It was not until noon had passed that he finally stopped his shovel. Sweat poured down his body as he panted heavily, having dug a huge pit where he stood. "Let's see how many Experience Points I have now."

Digging pits was exhausting, but the Experience Points made him happy.

Name: Zhang Chen

Skill (First Order): Evil-warding Golden Light (0/500)

Points: 350

"Only three hundred and fifty points?" Zhang Chen looked at the Experience Points on the interface, somewhat dissatisfied. He had labored under the blazing sun for an entire morning, yet he had only dug up three hundred and fifty points. That was far too little.

"I only need another hundred and fifty points to level up." Zhang Chen looked at the Golden Finger Interface and muttered to himself. If he dug for another two shichen at most, he should be able to level up, right?

The temptation of leveling up was beyond words for Zhang Chen.

"If there really were any strange things in this Ancient Tomb that harmed people, I wouldn't believe it. There's a village not far from here. If there really were something harmful in the Ancient Tomb, there would have been rumors in the village long ago. The entire village might even have suffered." Zhang Chen raised his head and looked at the sky. By the timekeeping of his later life, digging for another two shichen would only bring him to around four in the afternoon. The sun would still be strong then.

Looking at the Golden Finger Interface, which was only one hundred and fifty Experience Points short, Zhang Chen picked up his shovel again and got straight back to work.

Shovelful after shovelful of dirt was dug out, while the Experience Points on Zhang Chen's Golden Finger Interface accumulated rapidly.

Experience Points +1

Experience Points +9

Experience Points +5

Experience Points +20

Experience Points +7

Experience Points +35

...

Finally, at a certain moment, Zhang Chen stopped his shovel. His eyes were fixed tightly on his Golden Finger Interface, his gaze filled with excitement:

Name: Zhang Chen

Skill (First Order): Evil-warding Golden Light (0/500)

Points: 507

"Level up." Without a second thought, Zhang Chen spoke.

Name: Zhang Chen

Skill (Second Order): Light of the Righteous God (0/5000)

Points: 7

"What is this?" Zhang Chen's gaze landed on the skill. His Evil-warding Golden Light had advanced from the first order to the second order, upgrading from Evil-warding Golden Light to Light of the Righteous God.

Zhang Chen only felt his body grow hot as a warm current coursed through him. It was as though he had been immersed in warm water, and an indescribable sensation welled up in his heart.

His dantian seemed to be breathing, as though it had come alive. With every breath he took, it seemed that a ray of light was being nurtured within his dantian in the unseen darkness.

That light was vast and mighty, like a god walking the world. An indescribably upright and majestic aura burst forth from it, as though the light could drive away all evil in the world, shelter all living beings, and dispel every shadow and stroke of bad luck.

Its Divine Might was as unfathomable as an endless abyss, yet also like the great sun hanging high above the nine heavens, looking down upon the myriad living beings and nourishing all things, making people dare not look directly at it.

"And then? That's it?" Zhang Chen woke from that vast majesty, bewilderment appearing in his eyes.

Shouldn't this give me some kind of cheat?

If not moving mountains and overturning seas, it should at least give him some Supernatural Power, right? How could it suddenly just end?

Zhang Chen's gaze fell upon the Experience Point requirement after "Light of the Righteous God," and his teeth began to ache. "It only took five hundred Experience Points to upgrade from the first order to the second, but now it takes five thousand to upgrade from the second order to the third?"

What did five thousand Experience Points even mean?

That was not as simple as digging a few more meters. It required a tenfold increase. Even if every Experience Point he picked up gave "+50," he would still need to pick up one hundred of them.

"Could leveling from the third order to the fourth require fifty thousand? Then it seems impossible to level from the third order to the fourth by relying solely on digging up the Ancient Tomb." Zhang Chen scratched his head. Still, if conditions permitted, leveling from the second order to the third seemed to offer some hope. After all, he had only been digging for half a day.

Thoughts flashed through Zhang Chen's mind. His waist and back ached, so he simply climbed out of the pit, hoisted his shovel, and left.

"At this rate, digging up the Ancient Tomb will wear me to death. The deeper I go, the harder it gets to dig, and transporting the dirt is also a huge problem." Carrying his shovel, Zhang Chen's thoughts churned. "If I could pick up a skill that increased my strength, or one that let me burrow through the ground, things would become much easier."

Of course, Zhang Chen knew that was merely wishful thinking. If skills were so easy to obtain, he would not have waited so long in vain.

"It seems my skill could be obtained from those Gold Leaf sheets covered in scriptures. I wonder where that Fox Spirit got that page of Gold Leaf. It would be wonderful if there were more scriptures like that." Zhang Chen muttered to himself. He felt that the Fox Spirit's benefits still had room to be developed.

"I wonder what kind of damage my Second Order Righteous God's Light will do to the Fox Spirit. But I can't get cocky yet. I'll hold back for now. Once I've collected all the Experience Points in the Ancient Tomb, if I still can't level up my skill, I'll give that Fox Spirit a huge surprise. I'll capture her and have her wash my clothes, fold my bedding, and warm my bed every day. I'll also make her carry food back for me every day." Zhang Chen had already thought of ten thousand ways to squeeze the Fox Spirit dry.

"That poor scholar next door is truly blessed with beauty." Zhang Chen shook his head. The sky was still bright, so he was in no hurry to return home. Instead, he continued hunting in the mountains.

"What a pity that my trap-making methods can't count as skills. Otherwise, I would have raised my skill level long ago and made traps capable of hunting great demons." Zhang Chen cut some branches in the mountains, weaving basket after basket and setting traps throughout the forest.

Of course, the main purpose of weaving the baskets was to transport the dirt dug from underground. He had already dug three meters deep. If he wanted to keep digging, he would have to deal with moving the soil, making the excavation even more laborious and troublesome.

"And a shovel isn't suitable for excavating an Ancient Tomb." Zhang Chen thought of the Luoyang Shovel from his previous life. Perhaps he could forge one for tomb raiding.

"But I have to be careful when forging the Luoyang Shovel. I absolutely can't let anyone learn its purpose. If people find out I'm a tomb raider, my head will roll." Zhang Chen silently reminded himself.

In this world, once a tomb raider was discovered, it was a capital crime!

After all, this was a world of dukes, nobles, and aristocratic clans. Everyone wanted a lavish burial after death, and they had zero tolerance for tomb raiders.

Zhang Chen's hands were rough yet nimble. Before long, the rough shape of a bamboo basket appeared in his hands.

Seeing the sky gradually darken and knowing the mountains were no longer safe, Zhang Chen finally carried the baskets back toward the village.

There was a blacksmith in the village, and Zhang Chen had a good relationship with him. In fact, the villagers all got along well with Zhang Chen, because he was a hunter who often brought game back from the mountains. If the farming households wanted to eat wild meat, they had to deal with Zhang Chen.

The blacksmith's surname was Cui. His was a father-and-son shop, and the house in the village whose flames shot into the sky day and night was theirs.

Instead of going home, Zhang Chen headed straight for the blacksmith shop.

Though it was called a blacksmith shop, it was really just three old, rundown mud houses. At that moment, red light flickered from the westernmost room, and clanging sounds poured out along with waves of heat.

"Uncle Cui!"

Zhang Chen called out from outside.

He needed animal traps, wire, and iron nails for his hunts in the mountains, so he often dealt with the Cui father and son.

"Oh, the Zhang Family boy is here. What are you having made this time?" A burly man around thirty, his face blackened with soot, emerged from the room. His eyes were full of anticipation as he looked at Zhang Chen.

He was a blacksmith, and smithing required strength. It was a high-consumption job, so he needed meat to replenish himself and finish his daily workload.

When Zhang Chen went hunting in the mountains, most of the game he could not finish ended up in the old blacksmith's stomach, sold to the Cui father and son.

"What I want made this time is different from before. I'll tell you the dimensions and draw the design." Zhang Chen directly sketched on the ground, explaining the dimensions of the Luoyang Shovel to Blacksmith Cui.

The Luoyang Shovel was not an entrenching shovel, so it was not difficult to forge. It was somewhat similar to an ordinary shovel, except that it had wings for holding soil.

"What kind of thing is this? A shovel? But isn't this shovel too strange?" Blacksmith Cui had never seen a Luoyang Shovel. Seeing the strange shovel Zhang Chen had drawn, he frowned and pondered, unable to figure out its purpose.

"It's only for making it easier to set traps when I hunt in the mountains." Zhang Chen explained with a smile. That excuse could pass muster.

"Come pick it up from me tomorrow." After one look, Blacksmith Cui firmly memorized the design and spoke to Zhang Chen.

"Then I'll trouble you, Uncle Cui. How much will this shovel cost?" Zhang Chen asked.

"Just bring me two pheasants later on." Blacksmith Cui smiled.

Zhang Chen nodded at that. In all fairness, two pheasants were not expensive. In the ancient era of backward production, iron ore was a precious metal.

Seeing that Zhang Chen was about to leave, Blacksmith Cui hurriedly grabbed him. "Don't go, don't go yet! I've got some interesting stuff here. Aren't you going to take a look?"

Zhang Chen paused and turned to Blacksmith Cui. "What interesting stuff?"

Blacksmith Cui did not answer. He directly bolted the door, then dragged Zhang Chen inside. Pulling a battered chest from beneath the bed, he opened it and said to Zhang Chen, "Do you want it, kid? If you do, I'll give you a cheaper price."

Zhang Chen looked into the chest, and his eyes widened. His pupils contracted. "Uncle Cui, are you tired of living? This can get your head chopped off!"

"Of course I know it can get my head chopped off, but no one knows, do they? Besides, I recently took a huge order. They provide the iron ore, and I secretly forge the goods. I thought that you often hunt in the mountains, and it would be a pity if you lost your life to some fierce beast. That's why I secretly withheld some iron ore bit by bit and forged these things for you to protect yourself."

Zhang Chen stared into the chest and sharply inhaled. Inside lay a dull gray long blade with an edge.

The long blade was ugly. Its surface was crooked and pitted, not beautiful in the slightest. Yet the sharpness of its edge concealed its ugliness, making it impossible to ignore its crude appearance.

The long blade was thick and looked very durable.

Beside the long blade were more than ten arrowheads gleaming with cold light. Once mounted on arrows and paired with a strong bow, Zhang Chen would believe it if someone told him they could hunt roe deer and Sika Deer.

"I intercepted all this iron ore from that big customer, skimming it off little by little in secret. Take a look. Do you want it? If not, I'll sell it to someone else." Blacksmith Cui looked at Zhang Chen with a smile. "Don't say your uncle didn't look after you. Whenever there's something good, you're the first person I think of."

"Yes! Of course I want it!" Zhang Chen quickly replied, but then a troubled look appeared on his face. "But you know my financial situation. I'm afraid I can't afford the price."

"We live in the same village. Silver can be discussed later—we can take it slow, like a long stream of water. Just keep bringing me some game often." Blacksmith Cui smiled.

P.S. Do any of you esteemed gentlemen have recommendation tickets? During the new book period, I humbly beg everyone to keep reading every day. Thank you, esteemed gentlemen.