Ghost was still happily scratching at the window.
[Weird. Why isn't the streamer using his Spirit Pearls to level up? Why is he using them to replenish the room's magic instead?]
[What a waste of Spirit Pearls.]
[You still think the streamer's on the first level? He's in the stratosphere!]
[If you understood what he was doing, you'd be a top-tier player too.]
[But I still have no idea what he's up to.]
He encountered another lesser monster, a small Primordial Snailfish.
Bound by the Shadow Ribbon, the Primordial Snailfish gradually broke down.
[Spirit Pearls +10]
Xiao Hao still kept only ninety Spirit Pearls in reserve, using the ten new drops to replenish the room's magic.
Ten pearls could replenish 1,000 liters of magic.
He picked up his phone. There was still an hour until nightfall, so Xiao Hao continued searching for isolated wild monsters.
This time, Xiao Hao found three new lesser monsters.
They were three palm-sized insects. Without the chat pointing them out, Xiao Hao would never have noticed them.
[Weird. Why are there three Golden Copepods here?]
[These lesser monsters shouldn't appear in the beginner village.]
[Golden Copepods live in groups. Since there are only three here, they probably got separated from the main swarm somehow and drifted here.]
[If that's what happened, the streamer is seriously unlucky!]
[Ummm, if they could drift here, he'll probably run into them once he leaves the beginner village.]
[I've watched other streams, and the wild monsters those players encounter are all pretty ordinary. But with streamer 869, it always feels like the game's gotten a lot harder.]
[Golden Copepods make pretty good troop units too. Too bad each player can only bind one troop type.]
[They're still a little worse than Shadow Seahorses, right? Wild monsters like Shadow Seahorses shouldn't appear in the beginner village either. If an egg drifted into his beginner village, that means there are plenty of terrifying wild monsters outside it.]
One problem followed another.
Ghost inside the beginner village was already giving Xiao Hao a headache, and there were even more ridiculously powerful wild monsters outside.
Since the chat had warned him, he would hunt these three copepods first.
The Golden Copepods were golden all over. One look at their armored shells told him their defense was formidable.
As darkness enveloped them, the copepods immediately noticed.
The Shadow Seahorse was already level eight. Ordinary lesser monsters couldn't detect its domain skill at all.
Combined with the dark seabed, the Darkness Domain was difficult to detect in such a dark environment.
Yet these lesser monsters from outside the beginner village had sensed it.
All three copepods raised their heads together. Though they were only palm-sized, each had a grotesque face on its head.
Those faces were tiny, their flesh crammed together. An insect mouth occupied half of each face, while the fuzzy antennae and jointed limbs gave Xiao Hao goosebumps.
The faces were deeply unsettling. Their left and right halves were completely asymmetrical, and their tiny eyes darted around, positioned as haphazardly as a child's scribbles.
Each had two slender tails that looked somewhat like cockroach antennae, while its actual antennae resembled fuzzy fingers. Those fingers even branched, as though each hand had six digits.
The grotesque faces all turned toward Xiao Hao, their six randomly positioned eyes staring fixedly at him.
Suddenly, all three copepods sprang at Xiao Hao together, moving so unbelievably fast that he couldn't even react!
Fortunately, Xiao Hao had already released the Mantis Shrimp.
One slash. Three insects.
The copepods were blasted into the ground even faster than they had lunged, kicking up a cloud of dark red sand.
But no wild monster death notifications appeared on Xiao Hao's game panel.
The three copepods crawled out of the crater, their mouths splitting open to reveal tightly packed golden needle-like teeth.
This time, the Mantis Shrimp had firmly drawn their aggro, and they attacked it from different directions.
The Mantis Shrimp had more than one Jade Scythe. Its enormous Mantis Scythes swung, knocking two copepods back, while a scythe tip pierced the last one's grotesque face and pinned it dead to the ground.
[Spirit Pearls +150]
A level-five lesser monster.
It was the first Xiao Hao had ever seen.
At the sight, the remaining copepods sprang away, only to be bound by the Dark Ligament.
There are still two left. Don't let them escape.
Their golden sheen slowly faded and dulled. Xiao Hao took the 450 Spirit Pearls without any joy.
These were only lesser monsters from outside the beginner village.
And insects, at that!
Everyone knew insects came in despair-inducing numbers!
And these were only lesser monsters!
Another known lesser monster outside the beginner village was the Shadow Seahorse that had accompanied Xiao Hao all this time.
Xiao Hao knew firsthand just how broken the seahorse was!
He forced himself to calm down and tried not to think about the future. Only then did his anxiety ease.
For now, dealing with Ghost was what mattered!
Night was approaching. Ghost would probably notice something was wrong soon...
Outside the floor-to-ceiling window, the red-hot scythe fingers trembled slightly, constantly releasing scalding bubbles.
It had been scratching the window all day.
Judging by the sporadic replenishment of Spirit Pearls, this player was almost at his limit!
Throughout the day, its mood had swung wildly several times, from excitement as it watched the Coral Shell Room deteriorate to fury when Spirit Pearls restored it.
Finally, just as it was reaching its own limit, the Coral Shell Room's magic was about to run out!
Ghost conjured a massive purple-black claw, intending to smash the Coral Shell Room with a single blow!
But before the huge claw could descend, it vanished again.
That damned card again!
Before Ghost could vent its fury, it suddenly discovered that the Coral Shell Room before it looked brand-new.
Its opponent hadn't even upgraded it. He had merely replenished it with a huge number of Spirit Pearls.
He seemed to be telling Ghost that he had plenty of Spirit Pearls and simply enjoyed leading it around like a dog.
Ghost realized it couldn't keep this up any longer.
Just then, the appointed hour arrived.
The buff from the dark energy sent it into a furious frenzy.
It had been played again!
The only reason its opponent had replenished the magic little by little was to make it think he was nearly at his limit. That would keep it scratching the window, steadily wearing down its condition.
It had foolishly scratched away all day, suffering the Coral Shell Room's reflected damage the entire time! He had done this to stop it from coming to scratch at night, when it could benefit from the dark energy!
Ghost let out a furious roar, its piercing, ragged soprano echoing across the entire stretch of sea.
It was ready to burst with rage!
Whatever it did, it seemed to fall into his traps!
His combat strength was nothing to fear, but he was only a newcomer! A clueless rookie who had just entered the game!
Yet with his intelligence alone, he could run rings around it!
Even the skull around its empty eye sockets seemed to have cracked. Ghost looked at its charred arms, its scalding scythe fingers worn blunt, the flesh burned by the Coral Shell Lighting, and the bones torn apart by the giant energy claw.
Its battered body throbbed with fierce pain that relentlessly tormented it.
It would never let him get away with this. Never!
It would bite the flesh from his body, piece by piece, while he was fully conscious, then turn the skeleton left over from its meal into a specimen!
Ghost departed in fury. Behind the Coral Shell Room, a mass of shadow wriggled out and slipped straight through the gap in the door.
The corners of Xiao Hao's mouth lifted slightly. The first phase of his counterkill plan had gone smoothly.
Chat messages kept appearing on the game panel.
[God! No wonder the streamer deliberately refused to upgrade the Coral Shell Room!]
[How many times has he toyed with Ghost now?]
[Too many. Ever since he first hid in that cave, Ghost has had to watch him escape again and again.]
[It's pretty tragic for the beginner village's big boss to end up like this.]
[Can someone give me a recap? I'm new here, so I don't know how he tricked Ghost.]
[Uh... first he played hide-and-seek with it, then he lured it away, then... forget it, I've lost count. A single plan of his tricked it several times. It's been so long, who could keep track?]
[I stumbled across this stream before. Now I regret not following him...]
The chat was buzzing, but Xiao Hao didn't see any useful information, so he decided to take a shower and get a good night's rest.
He would settle things with Ghost over the next few days. Xiao Hao needed to be fully rested.
Before you continue