Chapter 30: Rule of Skill (1/2)

Marni’s death was not actually too serious, but did alert the other players who were intending to enter the Valley of the Tragic Dead that even with the Miasma-Clearing Torch, the thick purple fog was not as harmless as it looks.

Even at the edge, there were monsters that could kill Players like them in seconds.

In fact, it was not just the Players who were taken surprise—Xi Wei, watching the show live from his Divine Kingdom was taken aback as well.

He immediately spent some divine energy to activate his Divine Eye to see where Marni had just died.

As a former battlefield of the gods, the Valley of the Tragic Dead was full of barriers or wild streams of divine power that even abilities like Divine Eye could not see through.

That was also the main reason why Xi Wei would send the Players to explore it instead of having himself descend.

Luckily, the edge where the Players were now at did not have those things, allowing Xi Wei’s Divine Eye to easily see through the fog and observe the monster hidden in the deadly miasma.

It was a magical beast known as the Skull King Spider. It resembled a massive spider made out of bones, but was actually not too different from another magical beast, the Jungle Spider. However, the Skull King Spider would always look for the bones of other creatures and stick them on itself with its webs, eventually sticking the skulls of giants or other massive magical beasts to protect its abdomen, which was its weakest point.

They also had surprisingly immense strength, and could move very rapidly although they were carrying bones several times above their own weight. In comparison, they were also heavy feeders that devoured two-thirds their own mass each day, not to mention that they were highly territorial and ferocious, often attacking invaders larger than themselves. Apart from their sharp claws, even the stingers on their mandibles contained powerful venom.

Marni had previously been caught defenseless and pierced by its mandibles, reduced to a blob right after he died!

In fact, the field guide that the Continental Adventurers Association published classified the beast as Highly Dangerous, recommending that only veteran adventurers tried to fight them, and in groups of thirty people or above.

“So, it’s not just revenants inside the Valley of the Tragic Dead…” Xi Wei touched his chin with his tentacle, realizing that he had made a mistake in terms of experience.

Still, it was not too major a mistake for Xi Wei—aside from Marni being killed, his body irrecoverable and dropping in level again.

Under such circumstances, if the players would want to continue their initial plan of taking turns in entering the fog, their split strength meant that they would only be killed one by one.

It would be an easy task to help them, however, and Xi Wei did not actually need to make a move at all: he just had to add information about the Skull King Spider as reference and send it to the Players. He was confident that they could come up with a strategy.

But he had no intention of helping.

In the end, it was the Players’ first mission into a new frontier. On many occasions, experiencing things for the first time was the most important start in developing certain instincts.

It was true that Xi Wei could help them once or twice, but there are many things in the mortal realm that even could not interfere with. Furthermore, if the Players became used to his help and turned reliant, they would definitely become helpless if they could not gain information from their god every single time, and might even lose faith in him.

Either way, since Players would never really die, it was acceptable to let them train for a bit.

“Do your best, don’t let me down…” Having decided to not help, Xi Wei continued watching the livestream from his Divine Kingdom.

***

Fortunately, Edward and the others were no fools. They realized immediately that there must be a monster hidden inside the miasma.

In response, they simply stayed outside the part of the miasma where Marni was insta-killed, calling out to the other Players for a simultaneous barrage of long-range skills.