If Cheng Tian and the other rookies who had just entered Demon World Village had any advantage, it was undoubtedly this dungeon spawn point, which stood about five meters above the ground.
Because it was an isolated cemetery atop a small raised hill, there were only around a dozen tombstones up there. Zombies did crawl out from beneath those dozen or so graves, but afterward, they left behind empty pits in the soil. No additional zombies appeared out of thin air.
Clearly, zombie resurrection required reasonable conditions. Since one grave generally contained only one corpse, that became the sensible rule limiting the number of zombies that could spawn.
Demon World Village was indeed a high-difficulty dungeon intended for novices, but Chosen Space had a core rule that the newcomers did not yet know.
That was, the space would never design a dungeon or mission that guaranteed death for players. No matter how dangerous or difficult it appeared, there would always be some way for players to exploit and clear it.
Cheng Tian had already noticed that empty graves would not spawn monsters, so he immediately abandoned his original plan of breaking through while the other unlucky bastards were being eaten.
Clearly, the current situation was the dungeon's way of giving the players a warning. In more game-like terms, it was a "monster tide." Put simply, monsters would surge toward the players like a tidal wave and surround them.
Anyone who had played survival games, Vermintide, or Darktide should have understood the meaning more clearly.
But a tide had to rise and fall to be a tide. That meant that as long as they could endure this first ferocious monster tide, they would most likely have some time afterward to catch their breath.
Thus, the easily defended small hill was clearly the more advantageous choice under the current circumstances.
Among the Novice Players, only Cheng Tian and the awakened One-Ear had any Combat Power. The rest were either injured or dead.
Even those people who had fled blindly into the cemetery below had failed to fulfill even the role of bait. After their screams vanished amid the horde, the zombie tide they had Chain Triggered all turned around and began surging toward Cheng Tian and the others, who were thinking, "Kill one and I break even! Kill two and I profit!"
There was no helping it. The intense fighting had sent the vitality and blood energy of Cheng Tian and One-Ear surging into the air. To zombies steeped in dark magic, they were as conspicuous as torches, and the creatures came over as soon as they caught the scent.
At that moment, the terrain advantage of the hill's elevation became apparent.
The zombies of Demon World Village did have an advantage in straight-line pursuit, but their rigid, decayed joints inevitably caused them to slow down whenever they faced obstacles, slopes, or steep steps.
They clearly could not recreate the corpse mountains of World War Z. Even if they managed to climb the hill by stepping on corpses and poke their heads over the edge, all that awaited them was a whip from Cheng Tian, who maintained a safe distance.
One whip was all it took for a zombie to be killed and purified by holy power.
Although the Demon-Breaking Whip was a melee weapon, its attack range far exceeded that of ordinary blades, spears, swords, and axes. It could strike melee enemies while keeping a safe distance.
Then there was the hidden enhancement brought by the Simon Template, which made his whip practically unerring.
However, there was one highly counterintuitive key point: Cheng Tian could kill a zombie with every whip only because he had not equipped a proper weapon and was using only the whip that came with his Template Armament.
In a sense, the armament that came with the template was much like cosmetic gear in an online game. It provided additional attributes separate from normal equipment. The important part of Vampire Killer was its extra Holy Damage; its mere 1–1 weapon damage was barely worth mentioning.
If Cheng Tian equipped One-Ear's Hand Axe, Vampire Killer's "additional Holy Damage on every hit" would also stack onto the axe. But because the two weapon types differed so greatly, the original ten points of additional Holy Damage would likely be reduced to a pitiful one or two points. If the Hand Axe then rolled its minimum weapon damage, it might take two axe strikes—or even three—to kill one zombie.
On the other hand, because Cheng Tian used only the cosmetic whip, those ten points of Holy Damage suffered no reduction. It was just enough to kill a full-health zombie with slight damage overflow, eliminating the need for follow-up strikes. That greatly conserved stamina while also avoiding the danger of being counterattacked during consecutive attacks.
Zombies that struggled to climb the slope, efficient kills with low energy consumption, One-Ear occasionally filling in, and proper repositioning—the corpse tide that served as both a warning and a brutal screening mechanism was visibly shrinking in number, replaced by one empty grave after another.
However, this situation did not last until the corpse tide ended. An accident finally occurred.
Sweating all over, Cheng Tian lashed out with his whip again. The zombie's head burst apart without suspense, but then a metal chest with a faint glow on its surface and the color of black iron suddenly sprang out from the headless corpse and rolled down the slope.
A chest dropped!?
A game where people could die naturally also had rules for monsters dropping items. As the weakest and frailest monsters at the bottom of Demon World Village's hierarchy, the zombie horde had finally dropped its first treasure chest. This was one of the basic manifestations of Chosen Space's item-drop rules.
However, this lowest-tier Black Iron Treasure Chest had no rules such as drop pickup protection.
This was also one of Chosen Space's blatant methods of encouraging conflict between players.
The "Novice Trial" tag explicitly prohibited players from killing one another, but even if someone truly did kill another player, it merely reduced their rewards. It did not actually strip them of the right to kill.
And as their strength increased and evolution accelerated, when exactly players would start thinking, I don't eat beef... well, that truly depended on the individual.
Cheng Tian remained calm. He merely glanced at the rolling treasure chest before ignoring it. Safety was obviously the higher priority for him. Even if he wanted to open a treasure chest, he would only do so after clearing all the monsters.
Besides, Cheng Tian had recalled a certain setting from Demon World Village, and a thought of caution lingered in his mind.
One-Ear also saw that the treasure chest had rolled beyond the remaining zombie horde, to a place where it could be picked up with only a little effort. Yet he had no intention of taking it. His thought process was simple and straightforward. Having an accurate understanding of game Drop Items, he believed that Cheng Tian had earned that chest, so it rightfully belonged to Cheng Tian and had nothing to do with him.
Yet at that exact moment, someone actually slid down the dirt slope!
It was One-Ear's roommate, Phone Bro. Though he had no weapon, he had survived by making the correct choice and cowering beside Cheng Tian and One-Ear.
He was terrified of the zombies, unwilling to accept that he had been nothing but dead weight, and envious of Cheng Tian and One-Ear. On top of that, neither of them seemed interested in picking up the treasure chest, so after hesitating for around five seconds, the guy made his move.
Phone Bro wanted to slaughter enemies everywhere like Cheng Tian!
At the moment, most of the zombie horde's attention was still focused on Cheng Tian and the others, and the crows had temporarily been whipped out of existence. Thus, when Phone Bro landed, no zombies actually came after him. He successfully reached out and touched the Black Iron Treasure Chest, but then...
With a bang, the Black Iron Treasure Chest that Phone Bro had touched suddenly sprang open on its own, releasing a cloud of gray-black smoke.
When the smoke quickly dispersed, a humanoid creature emerged. It wore a blue tailcoat and a blue top hat, draped a crimson cape over its shoulders, held a Gentleman's Cane, and had a face resembling the stereotypical hooked-nose vampire. It scared Phone Bro so badly that he froze in place, shuddering from head to toe.
But the creature in the tailcoat did not hesitate at all. It spread open its cape and swung its cane, firing a magical projectile formed from a six-pointed star.
Phone Bro failed to make any evasive move and took the hit head-on.
In an instant, smoke covered Phone Bro from head to toe.
But when the smoke dispersed, Phone Bro was gone. In his place stood a white duck with an extremely human-like face.
"Quack!?"
Phone Duck's feathers stood on end.
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