Ghost-faced Monkey, Building 3

Jinling City, Satellite City No. 3.

Wilderness Ruins City.

This place once thrived with song and dance, prosperous and flourishing.

Now, only faded GG signs remain, along with crumbling walls draped in green moss.

Under a mold-colored overcast sky, the air seeps with damp cold.

Lu Xuan couldn't help his hairs standing on end. Breathing in the pungent, rotting stench, he gazed at the gray-white world, crushed a dried bone underfoot, and felt a pang of desolation:

The Wilderness... is lonelier than I imagined.

He hadn't taken two steps.

"Beep beep beep—!"

His earpiece crackled.

Lu Xuan answered. Xu Xin's voice came through: "I've marked a monster corpse. Logistics squad, follow up for retrieval."

"Copy that!"

The team immediately turned and headed for the coordinates.

A few minutes' walk.

Everyone saw—

A massive mutated chicken, pierced through by a long spear, lay in a pool of blood.

The chicken's head was the size of a basketball, its comb split in two, the blood at the tips the most precious.

Its claws were sharp as knives.

Palm-sized feathers, fresh and beautiful, could cut through iron like mud.

It was a low-level beast: a Precious Beauty Chicken.

Xu Xin divided the team on-site.

"Basic survey is done. The strongest monster within ten li is only Intermediate. Split up. Each melee logistics squad of three follows one student..."

She paused, then looked at Lu Xuan.

"You're with me."

"Alright!"

Lu Xuan didn't refuse.

He knew Xu Xin was helping him out.

She was an Intermediate Martial Artist. Following her on corpse retrieval meant a higher cut.

Besides, the Building 3 he needed to reach was in the inner city.

With the simple assignment done, Xu Xin led Lu Xuan straight into the depths of the Ruins City.

Along the way, they encountered no monsters.

They crossed a street, and a towering building appeared ahead.

Xu Xin stopped. "We've entered the third ring of the Ruins City. Let's search around here."

The Ruins City was full of monsters.

They built their nests in high-rise buildings.

Reason? Sturdy.

Likewise, monsters would bring seeds of heavenly treasures.

Once rooted and sprouted, they nourished the young.

Xu Xin and the others' mission, besides training, was to find these heavenly treasures, accumulate resource points for ranking, and finally determine the resource benefits after advancing to higher school.

The two entered several tall buildings one after another, all empty.

Just then—

Boom!

A distant building collapsed. Xu Xin shot toward it.

"Send your location to the team. Wait here for them. I'll go check it out!"

"Alright!"

Lu Xuan replied calmly.

This suited him perfectly. Separated from these martial student groups, he'd have more freedom to search for opportunities.

"Future Mail mentioned Building 3..."

Lu Xuan opened the Electronic Screen. "I looked into the Ruins City's original layout before—Building 3 should be on the Third Ring. Let me see where..."

He focused on the Satellite Map.

Suddenly—

The Psychic Power he'd spread outward caught a heartbeat.

"Not good!"

Lu Xuan stowed the Electronic Screen at lightning speed.

Almost the next instant.

Swish!

A sound of wind being sliced came from his side. Lu Xuan pushed off with his foot and retreated backward.

At the same time, a dark shadow appeared where he'd stood. Looking closely, it was a mottled-faced monkey, slightly smaller than him.

"Ghost-faced Monkey!?"

Lu Xuan recognized this monster at a glance.

Back in the Monster Warehouse, he'd handled Ghost-faced Monkeys—experts at ambushes and camouflage. If you saw someone walking toward you or waving in the fog, it was most likely one of them!

Lu Xuan breathed out, still shaken, and thought to himself in alarm: "The Wilderness really is full of traps. I just searched the area, and I still didn't find this monkey..."

Good thing he'd awakened Psychic Power after swallowing the Qi and Blood Golden Elixir.

With his Mental Power spread out, he could sense life signs.

If he were still the ordinary person he'd been before...

He'd be dead for sure!

"You think you can mess with me, you baboon?"

Lu Xuan raised his gun and fired.

"Eek!" The Ghost-faced Monkey was fast, dodging several bullets. With one failed kill, it slipped back into hiding, waiting for another chance to strike.

How could Lu Xuan let it escape?

"Trying to run?"

Bang bang bang—bullets flew out.

He drove his Psychic Power, steering the bullets straight after the Ghost-faced Monkey.

Thwip—one bullet hit the monkey's thigh. It screeched and fled into the ruins.

"Tch. Still can't focus my Mental Power on a single point."

Lu Xuan clicked his tongue.

If he'd had more time to train, he could've killed that baboon instantly just now.

He activated his Mechanical Exoskeleton and gave chase, spreading his Psychic Power over a ten-meter radius. He could still sense the Ghost-faced Monkey—it hadn't gone far.

"Huh? Something's off!"

Lu Xuan stopped short.

Right ahead of him was a deep pit, a hundred meters across, its bottom invisible.

The Ghost-faced Monkey was down there.

Go?

Or not?

Lu Xuan hesitated. A Ghost-faced Monkey was a Low-level Monster, but it was worth 100,000 Federal Coins.

If he killed it alone, the corpse was all his.

He'd come here to make money and find opportunities.

"Anyway, finding Building 3 will take time. Might as well hunt while I search."

Lu Xuan took a breath, steadied himself, loaded his gun, activated his Mechanical Exoskeleton, and jumped into the pit.

The pit was dim, almost pitch-black.

Even the Ghost-faced Monkey, which lived here year-round, couldn't move quickly.

Lu Xuan turned on the Searchlight mounted on his shoulder and descended slowly.

His Psychic Power swept the surroundings like radar.

Soon.

He caught the Ghost-faced Monkey's trail.

It was still heading deeper, moving faster, as if searching for something.

"A monkey troop?"

"Wrong. Ghost-faced Monkeys are selfish and don't live in groups like other monkeys. It must be looking for something to heal its injury... Could there be a Heaven and Earth Spiritual Item?"

Lu Xuan thought as he descended.

Considering that possibility, he pushed the Mechanical Exoskeleton to its limit, charging toward the Ghost-faced Monkey.

Within two minutes, Lu Xuan caught up.

"Squeak squeak squeak!"

The Ghost-faced Monkey shrieked in terror. The wound on its leg made it hard to crawl steadily, and when it saw Lu Xuan closing in, it lost its balance and fell straight from the height.

"Suicide? Dream on!"

Lu Xuan raised his gun and fired.

Bang bang bang! Bullets flashed in the darkness. He couldn't tell if he'd hit the Ghost-faced Monkey, but the latter had gone silent.

Lu Xuan landed.

At the bottom of the pit stood several massive buildings, dragged a hundred meters underground by some unknown force.

His light swept toward the Ghost-faced Monkey, but only a pool of blood remained. Lu Xuan spread his Mental Power and suddenly sensed a heartbeat behind him.

He spun and pulled the trigger.

Squeak--!

The Ghost-faced Monkey lunged at him at the same time. This time, it seemed prepared—its figure vanished into the darkness, then burst out, blinking in front of Lu Xuan and swiping a claw at him.

Lu Xuan instinctively raised his gun to block.

Bang!

The sharp claws, like blades, shredded the gun and smashed through the Mechanical Exoskeleton.

Lu Xuan was sent flying.

"Damn... My head hurts!"

He rubbed his skull. It seemed he'd overused his Mental Power, causing a momentary daze that gave the Ghost-faced Monkey an opening.

"Squeak squeak squeak!"

Seeing its opponent down, the Ghost-faced Monkey didn't hesitate—it pressed the attack.

Lu Xuan drew his blade to defend.

Fortunately, the knife's quality was completely different from the gun's, and it managed to block some of the strikes. Though barely surviving, Lu Xuan wouldn't waste the opening. He immediately mobilized his Psychic Power, controlling the shattered gun fragments to stab the Ghost-faced Monkey from behind.

"Oww!"

The Ghost-faced Monkey's head was pierced, blood spraying across Lu Xuan's face.

Dead.

"Phew, phew, phew~"

Lu Xuan slid down, leaning his back against the wall, gasping for air. "That was too close. I didn't expect Psychic Power to have side effects..."

He'd truly witnessed the danger of the Wilderness.

A single low-level Ghost-faced Monkey had left him this battered.

What about Intermediate Monsters or High-level Monsters?

"Phew... I still need to train."

Lu Xuan tilted his head back, the light on his shoulder shifting upward.

In a daze, the light illuminated a few weathered, large characters.

Building 3!