A faint, thick stench of blood drifted from outside the mine.
Today, when Cloud Pattern Spirit Ore was discovered in the mine, the Mine Cultivators immediately rioted. Then Xue Nu arrived to put them down, killed the overseer and two squad leaders, and left with Chen Wu. He then ordered the new overseer to kill the remaining squad leader and slaughter all the injured Mine Cultivators.
After killing so many people and keeping busy all day, night was finally falling.
There was no point in mining any longer today. Having established his authority, the new overseer announced with satisfaction that they would rest for the night and resume work tomorrow.
Gu Qingshan kept his presence concealed, still tucked away in the depths of the dark mine.
He did nothing, only waited in silence.
—Waiting for time to move forward.
At last.
Night fell.
Gu Qingshan took the pocket watch from his coat and looked at it.
The hand had jumped one notch forward from the Angel's Wings icon, pointing to the Dark Tunnel.
"Ding dong!"
The pocket watch gave a clear chime.
A line of tiny, firefly-like words immediately appeared in the void:
Notice: At the current time, the Non-Fusion World Linker can be activated to travel to the Dark Tunnel. By expending ten thousand points of Soul Power, you can travel directly to the Dark Tunnel. Please note: Once you travel to the Dark Tunnel, you will be temporarily unable to return to the Evil Ghost World until time passes and the hand points to the Evil Ghost World again. Would you like to pay?
"Pay."
An invisible wind curled around Gu Qingshan's hand and flowed gently into the pocket watch.
"Ding ding ding ding ding!"
The pocket watch rang out