Level 5 Resources and Wraith Remains

Black snow covered the ground beneath an ink-dark sky, shrouding heaven and earth alike in gloom.

On the vast, desolate land of Great Xia, more than ten figures stood gazing up at the black cloud ahead, which spread across an unknown number of kilometers. Every face was solemn.

Inside the black cloud, dark rain fell from the sky. Though it was no raging storm, it still gave the impression of another, terrifying world.

"Divine Granny's prophecy came true."

Zhang Xuanxuan, one of only three female Transcendent Sequence holders in all of Liangmin County, opened her mouth and looked at the others with a grave expression. "What do we do next?"

"Let's check how much ground the black cloud covers and see if we can go around it?"

"The black cloud is moving to cover our migrating group. If we can't get around it, we'll just have to deal with whatever comes."

"We're traveling along what used to be an expressway. I wouldn't recommend going too far out of our way. The longer it takes, the more danger we'll face."

People voiced their thoughts. Some were worried, some were grave, and some... didn't care.

They were Transcendents; famine and chaos wouldn't touch them.

Even if powerful evil entities appeared, all they had to do was run faster than ordinary people.

An unknown disaster was gradually approaching the migrating group from Liangmin County.

The residents of Liangmin County, however, knew nothing about it.

"Dad, I'm going to the Lost Land."

"If anyone from the Worldweaver clothing store comes, call me."

Inside the Cao family's shelter, Cao Fengqi waited an hour without any word from the Worldweaver clothing store. After telling his father, he went straight into the Lost Land.

He had quite a few things to do today.

Splash! Splash!

The sound of rain reached him as soon as he appeared in the deserted town.

"Rain?"

Cao Fengqi looked at the chilly raindrops falling on him and frowned slightly.

"Good thing it isn't too heavy, or it'd make it even harder to see."

He muttered to himself as he climbed out of the hole.

"Huh, what's this?" The next second, Cao Fengqi spotted a stone slab on the ground, and a glint flashed in his eyes.

The rain had washed the mud off a stone slab on the ground ahead, revealing several large characters.

He wiped it with his hand and gradually made out the words.

[The Hero's Tavern]

"The Hero's Tavern. So this is the tavern marked on the deserted town's map."

Cao Fengqi looked at it and thought of the information on the map, making a quick calculation in his head.

It was roughly 1,300 meters from the underground shelter. If the scale on the map was correct...

"Then I'm only about two kilometers from the nearest [Klein the Apothecary's Shop]."

Two kilometers wasn't especially long, but it certainly wasn't short, either.

That was two kilometers, a full four li.

"There was a whole jar of level 4 wine buried in a tavern. There's an eighty percent chance [Klein the Apothecary's Shop] has something good."

With that thought, Cao Fengqi looked ahead and slowly walked on.

[Scan complete within a one-kilometer radius. Newly detected: three level 1 resources, one level 2 resource, one level 4 resource, and three level 5 resources.]

He had walked less than two hundred meters when a notification from his cheat suddenly appeared.

Cao Fengqi froze when he saw the message, his pupils widening.

"Holy shit, level 5 resources? Three of them?"

He looked ahead, his face full of delight, but a moment later, surprise replaced it.

"Wait, why are those three level 5 resources in my field of vision moving?"

They were even coming toward him. Though they weren't moving directly toward him, they were definitely getting closer.

"Shit!"

The next second, a piece of information flashed through his mind, and a chill shot from the soles of his feet to the top of his head.

Without the slightest hesitation, Cao Fengqi turned and fled.

He didn't stop until he reached the underground shelter. Seeing that the level 5 resources were no longer within a kilometer of him, he let out a heavy sigh of relief.

"Damn it, Wraith Remains. That's right, it's definitely Wraith Remains."

Cao Fengqi's heart was still pounding.

Wraith Remains were evil spirits that fused with the bones of the dead and metal materials or equipment.

These evil spirits were extremely terrifying and hard to kill, and they armed themselves.

An Arcane Musket was practically useless against this kind of evil spirit.

In particular, these Wraith Remains had fused with level 5 equipment or metal. If they set their sights on him, he would be utterly defenseless.

"This is bad. I haven't even caught a glimpse of [Klein the Apothecary's Shop], and I've already run into Wraith Remains I can't beat."

Cao Fengqi's expression darkened.

Against Wraith Remains of this level, probably only the dozen or so Transcendents in all of Liangmin County could do anything.

The good news was that, thanks to his cheat, he could detect these Wraith Remains in advance.

But... he couldn't be sure whether there were any powerful evil beasts inside as well.

If an evil beast didn't attack him, he couldn't sense it.

"Against something of that level, even if I trade for that blue-patterned robe, I'm still no match for it."

Cao Fengqi's expression shifted. He shook his head helplessly and entered the underground shelter.

"Bad luck. I won't look for resources today. I'll get some level 3 metal materials to expand the shelter back home and make myself a separate room."

With that thought, he returned to the shelter and fetched the saw he had bought from the spirit-forging smith's shop.

Scrape, scrape, scrape!

He took the saw and got to work.

The Gathering Technique was useless on such enormous pieces of metal, so he had to cut them up bit by bit.

The level 3 saw was made of adamantine sharp metal.

Adamantine sharp metal ranked among the hardest level 3 materials, so cutting with it wasn't much of a problem, apart from being a little slow.

Clang! Clang! Clang!

"This really is hard labor. It took two hours to cut off 2,500 jin of level 3 metal."

Cao Fengqi cut off piece after piece of metal, working up a sweat.

Fortunately, his constitution had increased by five points, or it would have been even harder.

"2,500 jin of level 3 metal is enough to expand our shelter to 100 square meters."

Cao Fengqi rubbed his hands together, looking very pleased. "I finally won't have to squeeze into the same room as Dad anymore. Hmm, I'll make myself a separate bathroom too."

He smiled at the thought of finally being able to stop using the cramped bathroom and toilet, where it was hard even to turn around.

A 100-square-meter level 3 shelter counted as a luxury home even in Liangmin County as a whole.

"Dad, come give me a hand."

Cao Fengqi carried all the metal materials into the shelter's second bedroom, then opened the door and called outside.

"Hmm? Fengqi, what do you need us to do?"

At the sound of his voice, his parents and sister-in-law immediately looked over.

"I got some level 3 metal materials. I'm going to make a room of my own."

Cao Fengqi smiled at them. "Finally, I won't have to squeeze into the same room as Dad anymore."

"You brat, just how badly do you want to stop sharing a room with me?"

Cao Jiancheng glared at him in displeasure.

"Not for another day."

Cao Fengqi gave his father no face at all and urged him on. "Get to work, get to work!"

"Hiss, this is what you call getting a little level 3 metal?"

Cao Jiancheng entered the room in a huff, but when he saw the pile of metal materials, he cried out, "This is a little?"

Liu Chunying and Liu Xiuxiu were also dumbstruck when they saw it.

They understood now: when Cao Fengqi said "a little," he meant "a billion."