Abyssal Forest Conduit Tower, Floor 4.

While Lin Mo was busy analyzing the drop rates of raptor claws, Liu Xiaoyu was sitting cross-legged on the head of a colossal, stone-skinned ape, looking utterly bored.

The ape, or what was left of it, was slowly dissolving into particles of light beneath her. The surrounding forest was a disaster zone. Trees were snapped like twigs, craters scarred the earth, and the air still crackled with the residual scorched smell from the lightning storm.

[Floor 4 Cleared.]

[Time Elapsed: 3 Minutes 12 Seconds]

[Rating: SSS]

“Three minutes? Still too slow,” Liu Xiaoyu grumbled as she popped a [Spirit Replenishing Candy] into her mouth. “Father said he did it in four minutes back when he was here. I barely beat him.”

She hopped off the dissolving corpse, landing lightly on the ravaged ground. She glanced at the portal to Floor 5, then back at the timer on her Viewing Jade.

“Is Boss going to be there before me? Or maybe he got lost in the ferns? He must be taking his time without using his pew pew weapon.”

She giggled at the thought. Knowing Lin Mo, he was probably testing himself again, thinking he still lacked the qualification to represent the whole Eastern Abyssal Domain as its unifying figure.

She stretched her arms above her head, her joints popping. The tower was fun, sure. The monsters were strong, the environment was realistic, and the loot was shiny, though not as useful as the one she received from the other tower. But without someone to show off to, it felt a little… hollow.

“I guess I’ll wait in the waiting room. Someone posted about it. There should be one between Floor 4 and 5, to allow the challenger to link up with others or just take a breather before the real hell begins.”

She stepped through the portal and the swirling lights devoured her, bringing her to another place.

The sensation of spatial transfer was brief. When her vision cleared, the humid, wrecked jungle was gone, replaced by a large, circular chamber hewn from grey stone. The atmosphere here was cool and dry. Something so different from the oppressive humidity of the floors below.

In the center of the room, a large, glowing runestone sat while humming a gentle, restorative rhythm, accelerating the recovery of spiritual energy for anyone sitting near it.

And there were quite a few people already waiting there.

“Oh? It’s lively in here,” Liu Xiaoyu said in amusement, her voice echoing in the quiet chamber.

Around the huge stone, about a dozen cultivators were scattered in various states of disarray.

Most were meditating, their faces pale and slick with sweat. Some were nursing wounds, applying [Fruity Healing Tablets] with trembling hands.

Liu Xiaoyu recognized a few faces. There was Elder Yan Chen of the Azure Gale Sect, looking winded but dignified. There was a team of high-ranking mercenaries she had seen at the raid, their armor rent and scorched.

And sitting closest to the runestone, looking like a statue carved from red jade, was Sect Master Hong Ying. The Crimson Vale Sect Master, who was supposed to be forming and training the special group of vanguard, entered the Tower again.

She opened one eye as Liu Xiaoyu entered, a flicker of surprise crossing her fierce features.

“Little storm?” Hong Ying said, “You’re here already? I thought you were still playing around on the first floor.”

“Playing around? I was speedrunning!” Liu Xiaoyu corrected, bouncing over to them. She looked fresh, her uniform pristine, not a single hair out of place. “Floor 4 took me three minutes. How about you, Sect Master Auntie?”

Hong Ying winced at the ‘Auntie’ but didn’t retort. She sighed, gesturing to the bruise on her arm that was healing visibly. “It took me… considerably longer. The Stone Ape Guardian on Floor 4 is resistant to physical trauma. My Blood-Forged arts were… inefficient. I had to whittle it down.”

“Resistant? I just punched it really hard in the chin,” Liu Xiaoyu shrugged, pulling a bag of [Taihao Spicy Noodles – Seafood Flavor] from her spatial ring. “Anyone hungry? I’m starving. Boss says you gotta eat to keep the gains. Oh, but if you have Dimension Essence, do buy it from our Store Beacon! It’s cheap!”

The gathered cultivators stared at her. They were fighting for their lives, pushing their limits against ancient beasts, and she was treating it like a lunch break. Besides, it wasn’t cheap at all. It is marked up 50% compared to its price if they buy it from the store.

“What? Do you think it’s expensive?” Xiaoyu blinked, licking spicy residue from her thumb. “Think about it. You’re in a danger zone. You’re tired. Your qi is low. A 50% markup is the price of convenience. It’s the ‘I-don’t-want-to-die-today’ tax. Boss calls it ‘Supply and Demand dynamics’.”

Elder Yan Chen let out a weary chuckle as he shook his head. “The Shopkeeper has taught you well, Miss Liu. He has turned a peerless prodigy into a ruthless merchant.”

He stood up, groaning slightly as his joints popped, and accessed the Store Beacon. Its window panel immediately popped up in front of him.

“However, she is right,” Yan Chen muttered as he tapped into it. “I am out of talismans. And my stomach thinks my throat has been cut. I’ll take this box of noodles and a replenishment bundle.”

A soft chime echoed, and the goods materialized from the warped space that opened up in front of him. The sight of the Azure Gale Elder succumbing to the markup broke the dam.

The mercenaries, realizing that hoarding Dimension Essence was useless if they died on the next floor, scrambled up to resupply.

Liu Xiaoyu watched with satisfaction. “See? Business is booming. Boss will be pleased.”

“He usually is,” Sect Master Hong Ying said, her gaze fixed on the portal they had come from. “Speaking of the Shopkeeper… is he also climbing right now?”

“Yes! We’ll go together starting from Floor 5. He said this is part of our training for our next reconnaissance deep in that Anchor to find the long-eared Dreilling.”

Hong Ying’s eyes narrowed slightly as a thoughtful expression replaced her weariness. “Didn’t you two scout inside recently? Now, you’re planning to go deep into the heart of the enemy’s mental domination… The Shopkeeper is bold.”

“Hehe, Boss said he needed to do that rather than risk our strongest experts becoming puppets. Don’t worry. If someone’s afraid of dying the most, it’s Boss. He’s determined to live out his life quietly and safely while enjoying the fruits of his labor at the store.”

Suddenly, she recalled something, “Oh right, our Viewing Jades can be used in this waiting room. Wait a bit, Sect Master, I’m gonna check in on Sister Meiyu at the store.”

—

Meanwhile, on Floor 2.

Lin Mo stood amidst a swamp of bubbling, acidic sludge. The environment seemed to be thick with a poisonous miasma that would have instantly melted the lungs of a mortal.

[Floor 2: The Venom-Mire Maze]

[Objective: Navigate the maze and defeat the Mire King.]

“Mire King? Venom Master Xun would be thrilled to find another creature to experiment with.” Lin Mo shook his head and then let his [Stellar Domain] flare outwards. The silver light pushed back the green miasma, creating a sterile bubble around him.

Massive, slug-like creatures erupted from the sludge to his left, their maws gaping to swallow him whole.

Sensing them, Lin Mo extended his left hand.

“[Qi Solidification]: Wall.”

A transparent barrier of starlight materialized instantly. The slugs slammed into it with a wet smack, stunning themselves.

Lin Mo pivoted, his spear lashing out.

“[Dragon Crescent Sweep].”

The spear swept through the creatures’ gelatinous hides, the spiraling qi shredding their internal organs.

Despite their strength becoming a notch higher than the initial strength of the raptors from the floor below, their slow nature allowed him to deal with them with ease.

With that, they quickly dissolved into motes of light as he collected more Dimension Essence from them.

He moved on with an unhurried pace, treating the maze as a challenge and a place to hone himself further. He used his refined soul perception to sense the flow of the miasma, deducing that it flowed towards the Mire King.

Eventually, after facing more slugs and other toxic creatures, he reached the end of the maze and came face-to-face with the supposed Floor Boss.

The Mire King was a grotesque monstrosity, a coalescing hill of bubbling, toxic sludge that rose from the swamp like a sentient landslide. It had no distinct face, only a gaping maw that dripped with concentrated acid capable of dissolving spirit-grade artifacts in seconds.

[Floor Boss: Mire King]

[Threat Level: Mid Foundation Establishment]

[Ability: Acidic Spew, Sludge Regeneration, Toxic Domain]

“A mud slime, huh?” Lin Mo noted as his eyes scanned the shifting mass. “Inconvenient. Physical attacks will just pass through or get stuck. Fire will likely just bake the outer layer into a hard shell while the inside remains liquid. I need to disrupt its core structure.”

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep