The Watcher in the Dark

500 experience points wasn't a small amount, especially when it needed to be done more than once. Big Watermelon and Melee God of Magic quickly calculated that if they wanted to meet the next stage of favorability requirements, they would need to spend at least...

7500 experience points!

Each person!

In the past, they would have been scared off immediately, but now they were only hesitating.

Without a doubt, the more they interacted with the "Witch," the more they realized that Vivian's quests were indeed peculiar, completely unlike those of normal NPCs.

After all, what NPC would reclaim most of the quest rewards after giving them out?

This was a crossroads, so to speak.

Although they had complained about Vivian before, they had at least received her rewards for free. But now, if they wanted to gain more benefits, they clearly needed to pay a corresponding price.

Big Watermelon and Melee God of Magic had two choices at this moment. The first was to abandon the quest. At worst, they would die after the Witch got angry. The 5000 experience points they had already gained for free were enough to recoup their losses.

The second choice was to offer experience points to Vivian. Once they did so, it would be equivalent to truly investing their principal and getting on a pirate ship.

It was clear that when it came to actually spending money, the two players were still reluctant. Liao Zixuan chose to add fuel to the fire at this moment.

[Ding]

[Stage Two "Miss Witch Wants to Eat" has been completed]

[You have obtained 10,000 experience points]

[You have obtained one "Withered Wood Staff (Fine Grade)"]

[Detected that you have not yet met the special condition "Vivian's Favorability reaches 10 (Neutral)", subsequent quests cannot be unlocked]

It was like gambling.

They would only willingly continue playing after being given enough sweet rewards first.

"Damn it, let's do it!"

The arrival of 10,000 experience points from the quest rewards instantly gave the two players confidence and courage. They gritted their teeth and began to choose to spend experience points to purchase favorability.

[You have consumed 500 experience points]

[Vivian's Favorability +1]

[You have consumed 500 experience points]

[Vivian's Favorability +1]

[You have...]

Liao Zixuan let out a comfortable yelp as the wolf cub was fed by the young girl while she carefully groomed its fur.

The girl thought her petting skills had improved and was grinning foolishly, but in reality, what made Liao Zixuan feel even better was the arrival of the two batches of 7500, totaling a massive 15,000 experience points.

By channeling all this wool, shorn from the system by the players, into himself, Liao Zixuan leveled up.

Don't underestimate this one level.

For a normal native Dark Flame Wolf cub, advancing from level 15 to level 16 could take at least a month. After all, the higher the bloodline of a magical beast, the longer its growth cycle, often calculated in years.

Instantly, the fur on the wolf cub's body became even brighter and longer. Its previously short limbs had also grown slightly. Although still a wolf cub, it was noticeably plumper.

For Dark Flame Wolves, levels 0-20 were the juvenile stage. Liao Zixuan's current goal was to quickly pass through the juvenile stage. Only after entering the growth stage could he truly establish a foothold in the world of "Fall of the Gods" and gain the strength to contend with the powerhouses.

Yes, that's right.

Even a Dark Flame Wolf in its "growth stage" could sweep through the vast majority of human forces.

He was previously 5 levels away from the major milestone of level 20, and now he was only 4 levels away. Therefore, each level was extremely important to him.

If he continued at this pace, perhaps within three months, Liao Zixuan could successfully enter the "growth stage."

However...

Three months was still too long.

The storm stirred by his butterfly effect wouldn't wait for him to prepare slowly.

As expected...

New trouble had already quietly set its sights on them and was about to come knocking.

Sigh.

With a sigh, Liao Zixuan reluctantly got up from the young girl's lap. He stretched his front paws forward, limbering up his grown body.

Then, he raised his small wolf head and looked towards a spot above the forest where his group was resting.

A dark gleam flickered in his amber wolf eyes.

Immediately afterward, a "crack" sound, like shattering glass, echoed.

A crack suddenly appeared in the sky, then widened, fracturing like a spiderweb before finally disappearing completely, returning to its original state.

"Little Black, what was that just now..." Vivian was the first to notice Little Black's abnormality and naturally saw the entire process.

"Someone is using magic to monitor us."

Liao Zixuan thought for a moment, then yawned and added, "It should be around the time we first approached the depths of the forest?"

Meanwhile

In the central area of the Claw Forest, a forbidden zone for all forest monsters, within a massive underground lair.

A very peculiar scene unfolded here.

The enormous cave was filled with small crystalline grasses emitting a purple glow. They swayed gently without any wind, like the ebb and flow of tides.

Around these purple crystal grasses, over a dozen figures were busy at work.

Some were harvesting the mature purple grass and loading it into bags to be transported away, others were pushing carts filled with soil, and some held smaller cloth bags, continuously scattering something around.

If all of this were still within an acceptable range, the most discordant and inexplicable element here was the owner of this underground lair.

A Magic Tyrannosaurus named "Claw."

However, at this moment, this Tyrannosaurus, as massive as a small mountain, was curled up, lying in the center of the cave as if hibernating.

Its rough outer skin was adorned with strange, uncharacteristic patterns, eerie and evil. Although it was in a sleeping state, its breathing was unusually rapid, its heavy snores filling the entire lair.

If one were to zoom out and view this cave lair from an overhead perspective, they would be astonished to discover that it resembled a complex magic array, with the Magic Tyrannosaurus serving as the energy source for the entire formation.

The magic array was hypnotizing Claw, yet it was also stimulating the magic within its body to rapidly expand and grow, ultimately transforming into nutrients that dissipated into the air and were absorbed by the surrounding purple crystal grasses.

"Bishop, the magic vision has been breached."

Deepest within the lair, a woman wearing a ceremonial robe, though disheveled and intentionally or unintentionally exposing large patches of skin, sat languidly on a chair.

Below her, a person also wearing a robe, but of a much lower grade, likely a follower or deacon, was kneeling and reporting to the woman on the chair.

"Tsk, I didn't expect such a remote place to have powerful spellcasters," the woman, known as the "Bishop," chuckled lightly from her seat.

"Then... send someone to kill them."

After speaking, the woman paused for a moment. A few seconds later, she suddenly called out to the subordinate who was about to leave.

"The leading spellcaster... is female?"

"Yes, Bishop."

"I see..."

"Then, kill everyone else. Leave that female spellcaster for me. Bring her here, I want to meet her." As she spoke, this Bishop unconsciously licked her full, crimson lips.