Chapter 369: Rescue Quest Activated—Trial

In the vicinity of the grayish underground region was an abandoned giant city. The city seemed to have been ravaged by war and was believed to be untouched in this boundless underworld for more than a few decades.

Dilapidated walls around the city were filled with holes, while the massive city gate was trampled and deformed. Broken swords, blade residues, burnt marks, and numerous dark red spots filled the streets and buildings of the entire city, portraying a lifeless and depressing atmosphere that shrouded the once gloriously rich and cultural capital…

None of the past wonders could be seen in the city now, as ruins and rubble were the only things left in this place.

***

Roar!!!

A loud dragon roar broke the silence of the wrecked city from above. More than ten grayish-white giant Skeleton Dragons flapped their intimidating bony wings and swung their ten-meter-long chain-like tail while gliding up in the sky above the giant city.

Immediately, the entire Buried City boiled over.

Rows of huge Skeleton Warriors marched out from the buildings in the Buried City with shields in hand. They marched on steadily and uniformly with their heads up. Sanguine monster eyes were eerily prominent inside the skeleton eye sockets.

All the streets were immediately filled by the great number of Skeleton Warriors. They were seen advancing toward the city wall.

Beneath the city wall, several monsters covered in dark robes raised their head and revealed the hideous skeleton faces under the cape. These monsters, with a wand in their hand, chanted loudly to summon clusters of dark clouds that ascended gradually toward the top of the city wall.

At the same time these Skeleton Sorcerers landed on top of the city wall, the army of Skeleton Warriors suddenly hastened their steps and dashed up the wall through the stairs. The repeated sound of string stretching was heard as soon the Skeleton Warriors were in position. Ghastly green fire dancing on the tip of the shot arrows quickly linked up across the entire city wall beyond where the eyes could see.

Suddenly…

Bam!

After the loud bang, the half hanging metal city gate was forcefully blasted away. It glided through the air with a roaring whiz and fell at a far end like a cannonball, sending earth and rocks flying.

A few seconds later, hordes of humongous hellhounds with extremely buff muscles squeezed through the city gate rapidly. They stampeded over the distorted city gate and rushed toward the weed-filled lane outside the city wall. A ruthless battle seemed to have taken place outside of the wall as well.

Wherever the hordes of hellhounds passed through, skeleton claws protruded out continuously from under the ground. Each one of them struggled to surface and withdrew one after another rusted sword, shield, ax, longbow, or sickle from the hole left behind them. Once they were armed, they released a series of unpleasant howls and then spontaneously chased behind the horde of hellhounds. From far away, the hellhounds and Skeleton Warriors looked like a powerful torrent with intertwined white and black rushing toward the 1000-meter-high mountain at a distance.

The army torrent rushed into the narrow, serpentine mountain path and gushed up without slowing down.

At the tip of the mountain peak, a man and a monster guarded the only path going up the mountain with great determination. Under the protection of the purple barrier, they courageously fended off those dead souls and hellhounds that came through the serpentine path.

Occasionally, Skeleton Dragons would fly near and breathe fire against them. But even the flame attack was effortlessly shielded by the purple barrier.

Behind the two of them, a well-decorated giant corridor at more than ten kilometers long extended out from the tip of the mountain peak without any visible supporting structure. At the other end of the corridor, another Buried City that retained some of the past prosperity was clearly within sight.

***

Qin Ruo regained consciousness once the vision ended. A vivid feeling returned to his body, and the sound of battle around him pierced his eardrums as it became clearer and closer.

Qin Ruo turned around and saw the human and monster he had just come across in the vision. He was the human being but his skin was green. His body was covered with wounds and every time he swung his swords, it was as if the motion drained all his remaining energy and further shortened his already depleted life force. But the human was indeed formidable. Qin Ruo realized that he was unable to view the monster information of these skeletons, hellhounds, and specters. These creatures were forced back onto the five-meter-wide mountain path like straws in a single swing.

Level 60 Terra Swordmaster, Darius!

The monster next to Darius was no less dominant. Though its movement had slowed down due to its heavily-wounded body, every time the giant wolf-like monster stomped the ground, a surge of magic power was immediately felt across the mountain path. Five meters away from the wolf monster, a powerful shockwave abruptly exploded!

A large group of poor souls was flipped over as a result.

Dense Spikeweed soon followed suit. The spikes appeared together with molten lava beneath the dead souls army. The powerful impact flipped over more creatures this time to buy the human adventurer some time.

Gasp!

Qin Ruo breathed in a puff of cold air. He was astonished.

Suddenly, the system delivered a notification to him.

The rescue quest is activated.

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Take over the defensive task on the mountain path. Buy three minutes of rest time for Darius.

Within this period, no specter can step into the Eternal Barrier. If the quest is successful, the quest will continue. If you fail, you will be warped out from the Buried City immediately.

The substitution will take place after ten seconds.

The countdown starts now.

The system did not plan to negotiate with Qin Ruo and immediately started the cruel countdown once again.

Now only did Qin Ruo realize that he was all alone at this peak of a huge mountain.

‘Gosh!’

He rolled his eyes in annoyance. Before he could contact the others, he had to follow the system’s instructions first and quickly approached Darius. He examined how Darius dealt with the torrent of dead souls outside the Barrier while rapidly condensing elements. He had no other choice but to oblige and withstand it for three minutes. He would look for an opportunity to contact the others and checked them out later on.

Thankfully, although he was isolated, he still had the Amethyst Orc and Poochie by his side. With them, he would not feel insecure no matter how difficult or dangerous the circumstances became.

Instead, he was worried about Xiaoxiao and the others…

If everyone was isolated like he was, then it would be disastrous.

In the midst of his thought, the Frostbarrier and Darkfrost Shield were activated successively by him within five seconds. Qin Ruo did not halt there and continue to prepare the third spell—condensation of Million Arrow Sleet.

The specters on the mountain path appeared to be affected by the so-called purple Eternal Barrier. None of their offensive spells or skills were able to penetrate the barrier. As a result, they could only barge in repeatedly to use melee attacks and threaten Darius and his monster from a close range.

Some specters did breach the barrier and successfully damaged the giant wolf monster and Darius, but it did not deal significant damage to them and was immediately swept away from the mountain path.

‘Even the Demigod-tier player is in danger—I cannot be careless even for a second.’

“Million Arrow Sleet.”

One second before the countdown stopped, Qin Ruo cast the AoE spell and it immediately covered the mountain path beyond the Eternal Barrier. The sleet devastated a ten-meter-area radius and many Skeletons and Undead on the mountain path were drastically slowed down.

After Darius took care of most of the spectral armies at the frontline, the immediate threat remained were only a pitiful number of hellhounds.

The appearance of the hellhounds resembled the one Qin Ruo encountered at the Graveyard of the Gods, but the only difference was that one had three heads but the ones here only had a single head.

Since there was only one head hanging on its neck, the difference in power was conceivable. Even though the Million Arrow Sleet did not affect the hellhounds much, as soon as a hellhound stepped out of the sleet zone, it would immediately be greeted by the Amethyst Orc’s powerful slash and be thrown off the mountain.

The assaulted hellhound first struggled and twisted in midair, then dropped vertically to the bottom of the mountain releasing a horrendous shriek. Without looking, Qin Ruo knew that that was the end of the poor monster.

When he was performing the Tier 4 Advancement Quest, the Snowpeak at Frostsnow Island has only half the height of this giant mountain. A Tier 4 monster would easily die after falling a few tens of meters, let alone this giant peak that was a thousand meters high.

Aside from the Amethyst Orc, there was also the competitive Poochie. After the Amethyst Orc beat Poochie to the escaping hellhounds several times, the Shadowfox simply entered the Million Arrow Sleet zone and forced the hellhounds out of the path before they skipped past the AoE spell.

Despite its Attacks being weaker than the Amethyst Orc’s, when it came to bumping and crashing into enemies, this playful creature had been repeating the same move over and over again since its younger days.

Darius by his side did stop attacking once the countdown ended and retreated to rest at the rear.

The majestic wolf monster had also lost its purpose since not a single dead soul and hellhound was able to break through the Million Arrow Sleet, not to mention getting near to the barrier.

The quest was easier than Qin Ruo initially thought.

Qin Ruo felt relieved. He maintained the output of elements to sustain the Million Arrow Sleet and passed on the defensive duty to the Amethyst Orc and Poochie, while sending a voice message through the party channel.

“Where is everyone?”

“…” No one responded until a few seconds later.

“Sob sob, Brother Qin, I am dead. There were too many specters. I was unable to fend off the attacks.”

“…”