Leifeng Dungeon (Seeking Recommendations and Favorites)

Leifeng Dungeon (Seeking Recommendations and Favorites)

As a grown man, staring at a woman's shortcomings was inherently rude. Knowing he was in the wrong, Ye Weiming naturally did not shoot her a look that said, "What are you looking at?" Instead, he obediently withdrew his gaze and stopped looking at her.

This was not cowardice. It was grace!

The woman apparently had no intention of pursuing Ye Weiming's rudeness any further. She rose from the ground and headed toward the woods not far from Leifeng Pagoda.

But before Ye Weiming could breathe a sigh of relief, he saw her circle around the edge of the woods before returning, now carrying a bundle of dry branches and grass.

Then, under Ye Weiming's watchful peripheral gaze, she returned to the entrance of Leifeng Pagoda and lit a bonfire on the ground. She took out an entire plucked chicken, skewered it on a stick, and prepared to roast it. From the look of things, she planned to have an open-air barbecue right here before leaving!

The woman's bizarre move left Ye Weiming thoroughly depressed.

After fussing about all night, Ye Weiming was just as hungry. He decided not to waste any more time with her.

If I can't provoke her, can't I at least avoid her?

Getting to his feet, Ye Weiming immediately used the Eight-Step Toad Leap movement technique and charged toward the shore of West Lake. He first splashed some lake water over his face, instantly feeling much more alert. Then he pulled out buns from his inventory, wolfed down three in one go, and chugged a bottle of Realgar Wine.

As for why he washed his hands before eating the buns?

Don't forget, he had been dealing with corpses all night. There might not be any bacteria or viruses in the game, but grabbing buns without washing his hands first was still disgusting.

After filling his stomach with the simplest of foods, Ye Weiming picked up his iron shovel and began digging a pit by the lake.

This was the greatest side effect of the Corpse Handling Method. There were only two ways to deal with collected corpses.

One was to hand them over to the Coroner's Office. However, they did not accept just any corpse; it had to be one that could serve as evidence or a clue before a case was solved.

Otherwise, he could only dig a hole and bury them.

Dumping corpses wherever he pleased would cost him Chivalry Points!

It took nearly an hour to bury all the corpses. Figuring that the woman had probably finished eating and left by then, Ye Weiming returned to Leifeng Pagoda. All he found was a pile of extinguished ashes.

That woman had indeed left.

To avoid unnecessary trouble, Ye Weiming circled Leifeng Pagoda once more. After confirming that no other players were around, he stepped inside the tower and twisted a semicircular dragon-patterned stone carving on the left wall, following Old Man Li's instructions.

With a soft click, two floor tiles at the center of the pagoda sprang up, revealing an iron chain ladder leading straight down.

Descending the ladder into the dungeon beneath the tower, Ye Weiming found its passages quite spacious, wide enough for two people to walk side by side. Piles of charcoal fires burned along the surrounding walls, brightly illuminating the underground world.

Ye Weiming twisted another identical dragon-patterned stone carving on his right, and the panel above closed once again.

He continued down the passage. After turning a corner, he found two corpses lying on the ground. They were the West Lake Bandits who had been wandering outside earlier.

West Lake Bandits were holed up inside the Leifeng Pagoda Dungeon too?

Old Man Li's note had not mentioned that.

Though puzzled, Ye Weiming unconsciously quickened his pace. Since the West Lake Bandits he found were dead and their corpses were still warm, one conclusion was obvious. He was not the first player to enter this place. Someone else had already reached the dungeon before him!

Could it be that Old Man Li had left more than one copy of the clue?

As he pondered, Ye Weiming passed two more intersections and found more and more bandit corpses on the ground. What worried him even more was that the person who had gotten here first seemed extremely familiar with the dungeon's layout. The route they had taken led directly toward the depths of the dungeon. Although West Lake Bandits also wandered the other paths, there were no signs of battle there.

Seeing that someone might have gotten to his treasure first, Ye Weiming grew anxious and unconsciously activated the Eight-Step Toad Leap. His speed surged severalfold. Only after passing two more intersections did he finally let out a breath of relief.

Ahead was a three-way junction. According to Old Man Li's map, the treasure was located on the right side of the dungeon, while all the bandits on the left path had become corpses.

In other words, from this intersection onward, the other person's direction had finally diverged from his target?

A divergence was good!

You do your thing, and I'll find my treasure. Neither of us bothers the other. How harmonious is that?

Drawing his longsword, Ye Weiming was about to clear a path toward his destination when he suddenly heard hurried, chaotic footsteps from the left passage. They were especially piercing in the enclosed tunnel. A woman in tight black clothing, with chin-length short hair, came into view as she fought while retreating. It was the Scarred Woman he had encountered outside the tower.

Ye Weiming had wondered why she had lingered around after the bandits outside disappeared instead of leaving. So her target had been this dungeon as well.

But the woman's complexion looked terrible now, faintly green. She had clearly been poisoned. Behind her, more than a dozen bandits wielding swords and sabers chased after her.

Normally, for a player who had learned a movement technique, shaking off these ordinary mobs would be easy. A player skilled in hidden weapons like the Scarred Woman could kite them at will. But perhaps because of the poison, her steps were unsteady, and her speed had dropped to roughly the same level as the bandits chasing her. She simply could not shake them off.

When she saw Ye Weiming appear before her, the Scarred Woman froze for a moment. But she had no mind to worry about that now. Without slowing down in the slightest, she brushed past Ye Weiming, while the bandits pursuing her charged straight up to him.

Seeing the bandits expose their openings right beside him, Ye Weiming instinctively thrust his longsword forward, piercing the throat of the one in front.

286!

A huge critical-hit number popped up above the bandit's head. Instant kill!

Ye Weiming's strike was like a stone cast into a lake, instantly stirring up great waves. The hatred of the bandits rushing after him was immediately drawn to him by that sword strike, and they all swung their weapons as they attacked.

Ye Weiming naturally did not care about these brutes with virtually no combat ability. Especially in this narrow tunnel, their numerical advantage could not be brought into play at all. Moreover, these pursuers had already been kited around by the Scarred Woman for quite some time, and their HP was not full. Under Ye Weiming's fierce attacks, they all turned into his experience points in short order.

As Ye Weiming casually picked up the bandits' drops one by one, he discovered that the bandits in this dungeon gave considerably more experience and had a much higher Drop Rate than those outside. It was not a bad place to grind levels.

Turning back, Ye Weiming found that the Scarred Woman had not gone far. She had sat down not far behind him. After tossing a pill into her mouth, she crossed her legs on the ground and began regulating her breathing, as openly as could be.

"Say..." Ye Weiming said half-jokingly, "This dungeon is extremely well hidden. Aren't you afraid that I might take advantage of your illness and take your life so I can keep all the benefits for myself?"

The Scarred Woman calmly glanced at Ye Weiming and softly uttered two words. "Go ahead."

With that, she closed her eyes and stopped looking at him, wearing the valiant expression of someone resigned to his mercy.