The live stream was buzzing with excitement, and gifts from viewers were pouring in.

Brother Mang was full of energy.

He didn’t actually believe in any of this “white-eyed monster” nonsense; he was just riding the trend for attention.

After all, his streams usually involved him wandering around at night, and this time was no different.

As he engaged with his viewers, he ventured further into the night…

———

The day had passed quickly, but Xu Yuan’s progress was less than ideal.

Initially, Xu Yuan had hoped to achieve several first kills of the monsters in the main world within a single day.

Unfortunately, luck wasn’t on his side.

He had spent the whole day searching but couldn’t find a swamp or woodland mansion.

In the swamp, slimes and witches spawn, while in woodland mansions, evokers and other rare mobs appear.

But none of these terrains were anywhere nearby.

Seeing this, Xu Yuan had no choice but to let it go. Sometimes, the harder you search for something, the less likely you are to find it. So, Xu Yuan decided not to force it.

Nevertheless, he didn’t walk away completely empty-handed.

After a day of running around, he managed to acquire a new skill.

[Stealth Lv1: Allows the user to hide within stone.]

[Cost 5000 kill points to upgrade.]

This skill was dropped from a silverfish he had killed.

He had to admit, it was a pretty decent skill—a solid lifesaver in tricky situations.

After a long day of hunting, Xu Yuan opened his system panel to check his stats.

At this moment, his Intimidation value had climbed past 130,000.

His kill points had also reached over 13,000.

Xu Yuan did some quick mental calculations.

Unlocking the zombies, skeletons, and creepers would require 80,000 Intimidatpoints, and expanding his control range to 15×15 would need another 50,000.

It added up perfectly to 130,000 deterrence points.

“How convenient…”

With all the points spent, Xu Yuan then upgraded his Explosion and Teleportation skills.

[Explosion Lv2: Costs 89% of your health, deals damage in a 6×7 area, 40-second cooldown.]

[Upgrade cost: 10,000 kill points.]

[Teleportation Lv2: Allows teleportation within a 74x74x74 block radius, carrying up to 2 items or creatures, 40-second cooldown.]

[Upgrade cost: 10,000 kill points.]

Xu Yuan only had 13,000 kill points, so he could only upgrade two skills. Otherwise, he would have prioritized leveling up Explosion first.

With everything prepared, Xu Yuan stretched his neck.

“Time to go find some players to spar with~”

———

After unlocking his expanded control range and upgrading his skills, Xu Yuan’s strength hadn’t exactly transformed, but he was notably stronger.

With the Teleportation skill at hand, players were hardly a threat to him.

After all, he also had a passive ability that made him immune to all projectile damage.

So his only real concern was close-range combat.

But with Teleportation, even if a player did get too close, Xu Yuan could easily widen the gap.

And if things got desperate, he could always blow the player up.

The only drawback was that both of these skills still had relatively long cooldowns, so he needed to stay cautious.

With his strength improved, Xu Yuan immediately began searching for players on the map.

He wasn’t wandering aimlessly; he had already picked his first destination—the plains where he had first encountered Steve.

After all, that was the spot where Xu Yuan had first come across a player.

Though there was no guarantee that Steve or his friends would return to that place, there could always be other players in the area.

Xu Yuan was also hoping to stumble upon a swamp or woodland mansion while he searched for players, so he could secure the first kills of the monsters there.

Teleporting through the terrain, Xu Yuan traveled for about 40 minutes before he finally reached the area where he had first met Steve.

Just as he was about to press on, he noticed some movement up ahead.

Looking closer, he saw a player!

The player’s ID was Brother Mang. He was holding a torch, muttering to himself as if narrating his actions.

Seeing this, Xu Yuan quietly concealed himself within a nearby stone.

———

“Guys, we’ve been searching for ages, and still no sign of that so-called white-eyed monster!” Brother Mang grumbled.

“I’ll search for another half an hour, and then I’ll head back.”

“Now, should I keep going straight into the forest or turn left into that cave? Your choice, guys!”

Brother Mang checked the stream’s chat and, seeing the viewers’ suggestions, turned towards the cave on his left.

The cave wasn’t too dark, mainly because it had another opening on the opposite side.

In truth, it was more like a tunnel cutting through the mountain than a proper cave.

It wasn’t particularly long, either—about 20 blocks or so in length.

The tunnel had a chilling, eerie vibe, and the occasional gust of wind sent shivers down one’s spine.

Holding his torch up, Brother Mang took a deep breath and stepped inside.

The torchlight quickly illuminated the tunnel, revealing a few scattered zombies and a skeleton archer standing further down.

Seeing the monsters, Brother Mang instantly recoiled.

“Damn! Guys, there’s a skeleton archer in there! Those things are such a pain!”

Even though Brother Mang frequently wandered at night, he usually stuck to open areas where he could see monsters from a distance and avoid them.

He hadn’t ventured into many narrow spaces like this tunnel before.

In confined areas, it was much harder to survive if too many monsters showed up.

And with a skeleton archer, things got even trickier.

The stream chat blew up as the viewers teased Brother Mang for his fear.

“Brother Mang, weren’t you supposed to be fearless? What’s wrong, scared to go in?”

“Just one skeleton archer and you’re already freaking out? What’ll you do if you run into the white-eyed monster?”

“Brother Mang, what’s that behind you?!”

“Quick, check behind you!”

…

Whenever the chat started spamming, it was usually hard to stop, especially when it came to telling Brother Mang to check behind him.

Since Brother Mang streamed his night adventures so often, his viewers loved to prank him by scaring him about things behind his back.

Whenever he showed signs of fear, the chat would explode with calls to check behind him.

Seeing the spamming chat, Brother Mang couldn’t help but laugh.

Turning around, he lifted his torch to light up the area behind him.

Not far away, a few zombies and a creeper were resting under a tree.

“Look, guys. Here’s what’s behind me.”

“See? Three zombies and a creeper, all quietly resting under that tree.”

“You can’t scare me anymore, alright? This joke’s getting old.”

“Seriously, who else in this plains biome has the guts to hunt monsters at night like me?”

Brother Mang was well aware of his stream’s usual antics.

However, at that moment, some of the more attentive viewers began to feel something was off.

“Why do those monsters look… off? I can’t quite put my finger on it, but something’s strange…”

“Same here! Something feels wrong, but I don’t know what it is!”

“I’ve had that feeling ever since he stepped into the tunnel…”

…

A good number of viewers had been feeling uneasy since Brother Mang had entered the tunnel and spotted the monsters, but none of them could pinpoint exactly what was wrong.

Meanwhile, Steve was also watching Brother Mang’s stream.

Steve was naturally curious about the white-eyed monster but wasn’t reckless enough to wander around looking for it like Brother Mang.

Since he didn’t have much to do that night, he figured watching the stream would be entertaining enough.

If Brother Mang did encounter the white-eyed monster, it would confirm that Steve wasn’t imagining things.

After watching the stream for a while, Steve, like many of the viewers, began to notice something strange.

Carefully observing the screen and replaying everything that had happened since Brother Mang entered the tunnel, a sudden realization hit him.

He shot up from his seat, feeling chills run down his spine.

“It’s the monsters! There’s something wrong with the monsters!”

“He’s already within their aggro range, but they haven’t attacked him!!!”

It finally clicked for Steve.

From the moment Brother Mang had entered the tunnel, none of the monsters had made a move to attack him.

And now that Steve thought about it, the stream’s frame rate had dropped slightly as soon as Brother Mang entered the tunnel.

It was subtle, but Steve had noticed it, and so had a few other viewers, as noted in the chat.

This frame rate drop had never occurred before.

All these strange details pointed to one terrifying conclusion—the white-eyed monster might be closer than anyone thought.

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Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep