Calamity Messenger-Chapter 57 - 44: End of the First Day in the Instance

Chapter 57: Chapter 44: End of the First Day in the Instance

Qian Gongyu knew about the Iron Blood Graveyard, a Secret Realm controlled by the Jie Family, and one of the most valuable Secret Realms in the entire Liang Kingdom.

The Iron Blood Graveyard is merely a Second-Turn level Secret Realm, yet it can produce Third-Turn Tokens—moreover, it’s the Three-Turn Defense Relic. It’s precisely due to this inherent advantage that the Jie Family has stood strong in Jiangnan for a thousand years, regardless of how dynasties change, they remain a top-tier family.

But... is the Blade Warrior outside the Demon King of the Iron Blood Graveyard?

Doesn’t that mean—

"Could the statues that can be built here all be from the Demon Kings of other Secret Realms?" guessed Shang Xinlei. "I was just thinking, if each wave of Demons becomes stronger than the last, then these creations like the Wooden Crossbow Catapult will soon become ineffective because there are humanoid demons with extremely fast speeds who can even cut through arrows, and even among beast demons, there are many with thick hides not afraid of the crossbow, with the Wild Bull Demon as a prime example."

"But if we can make other Demon Kings fight for us, it would be different—like the General of the Double Swords, whose attack power is extremely high but lacks defense. As long as we create opportunities for him to attack, even if he is just a Second-Turn Demon King, he can easily cut down a Wild Bull Demon!"

Shang Xinlei stared at Jiang Shi, hoping Jiang Shi would acknowledge her guess.

"The Blade Warrior has already lost thirty percent durability."

Jiang Shi suddenly said, and after a moment, she seemed to realize everyone might not understand, so she explained, "When durability hits zero, the Blade Warrior will revert to a statue."

"We must go out and help!" Jie Yuan Shao impatiently pushed open the door and went out, "The crossbow surely can’t kill the Wild Bull Demon, only the Double Swords... only the Blade Warrior can deal with it!"

"We’ve fought against demons many times, but it’s the first time we’re fighting alongside them." Shang Xinlei laughed.

Qian Gongyu wasn’t as excited as them. She took a few pieces of Spiritual Jade from her pants pocket and absorbed them, painfully walking outside.

...

...

"Finally, it’s over."

Yan Qing put down the game console, twisted his wrist, stood up to stretch his limbs, and felt his butt had gone numb from sitting.

The first wave of Mansu Forest Land only took fifteen minutes to finish, but the second wave of monster attacks actually took them a full hour—it’s something only MMORPGs could have with such a long battle flow, if it were in a mobile game, it’d probably crash instantly, planners would get a deluge of complaints.

However, Yan Qing had already anticipated this: the monster attack was set according to a normal four-player team, but apart from "Jiang Shi," the other three couldn’t really be considered players, they had to manually transport collected resources back to the cabin, whereas "Jiang Shi" could store them directly in the warehouse.

This meant that even after collecting resources twice, the resources at the Shelter were still far from enough, the defense was naturally unable to withstand the monster attack, and then they foolishly chose to build the Guardian Tree and the Guardian Stone, which was just asking for a challenge.

Yan Qing realized halfway that the Guardian Tree and Guardian Stone are resource reproduction buildings aimed at long-term development and are entirely planners’ traps; whoever builds them is a fool. More accurately, resource reproduction buildings are akin to ’exchanging current combat power for more resources,’ and the cost is that the missing combat power must be made up by the players themselves.

"Jiang Shi’s" team hadn’t collected enough resources, and instead of immediately exchanging them for combat power, they chose resource reproduction. No wonder it was such a hard fight. If Yan Qing guessed correctly, the team should have at least one player above Fourth-Turn to build resource reproduction buildings in the early stages, while this team’s average strength wasn’t even at Second-Turn, and it even included "Jiang Shi," who hadn’t changed professions.

Outside the yard, the walls had already collapsed, five crossbows were destroyed, and the Guardian Tree had also been knocked down, being the first to fall. Clearly, in the demons’ attack logic, ’obstructions’ > ’resource reproduction buildings’ > ’attack buildings’ > ’players.’ Demons will destroy the players’ hard-earned sources of wealth whenever possible, letting players know that resource reproduction is not something everyone is qualified to do.

Jie Yuan Shao and the others were too tired to care about their noble demeanor or lady-like conduct, worn out, lying on grass soaked with Wild Bull blood and flesh. The Blade Warrior reverted to a statue with only 5% durability left, but compared to before, the statue of the Blade Warrior was significantly more damaged.

The game popped up a new message, and Yan Qing glanced at it, then copied the message into the chat box. After AI’s automated evolution, it was said by "Jiang Shi":

"There are two bad news."

Sitting on the ground with her legs apart, not caring about exposure, Shang Xinlei panted and laughed, "Let’s hear the less bad one first."

"The less bad news is that the statue can only recover one-tenth of durability every two quarters. There’s three quarters until the next wave of attacks, so the statue can only recover to two-tenths durability before the next attack starts."

"And the worse news?"

"The worse news is if we leave now, then when we come back tomorrow, we’ll have three quarters of resource collection time, and then the monster attacks will start."

Initially, this sounded odd, leaving early and having more preparation time tomorrow should be good news, right? But everyone here was sharp, and Jie Yuan Shao quickly caught the subtext of these two messages: "If we can hold through the third and even fourth wave, the score ought to be much higher? But if we leave, we can only start from wave one tomorrow?"

"Yes."

Everyone exchanged looks, and Jie Yuan Shao said, "I haven’t given my all yet, have you?"

"Neither have I." Shang Xinlei stood up and patted her backside, "But Xiaoyu can’t hold on anymore, right?"

Qian Gongyu was startled and stammered, "I, I can barely..."

"Let’s pull out."

"Jiang Shi" said, "You all don’t even have the energy to collect resources; the third wave will definitely be tougher than the second, and without sufficiently strong buildings, we can’t win."

With that, "Jiang Shi" headed straight into the thick fog behind the stone house, and Qian Gongyu relaxed and quickly followed. At this moment, Jie Yuan Shao suddenly recalled something and chased after, shouting, "Jiang Shi, Qian Gongyu, wait, I have something to say to you!"

"Let’s talk outside; the longer we stay here, the less collection time we’ll have tomorrow."

The four of them stepped into the fog, unlike when they came in, the fog didn’t separate them. After a moment’s trek through the mist, they saw a bright light at the end.

As they stepped out of the fog, the blinding sunlight made the game console’s screen go completely white, almost like being hit by a flashbang. The dazzling sunlight of noon fell on the open space at the entrance, accompanied by the chirping and chattering of birds echoing through the forest land.

"We’re out!"

"They’re out!"

As they appeared, the crowd scattered across the open ground at the entrance immediately grew excited. Many noble offspring even rushed out from tents and carriages, as if they would miss out if they were even a second late, soon gathering a large group of people around. Their eyes were filled with curiosity, envy, and even jealousy when gazing upon the four, much like a group of starved chickens eager to rush forward to peck them to death.

But they all obediently stood at the periphery, watching, because there was a man standing in the middle of the open ground, and no one dared to stand in front of him. Not just because of the purple silk he wore on his wrist, but because he was the strongest one in this forest land.

"Third Uncle?"

Jie Yuan Shao walked ahead of the others, asking in surprise, "Why are you here?"

"Passing nearby, so I thought I’d see you, planning to go back with you." The man smiled.

But Jie Yuan Shao was not at all lenient, "Third Uncle must’ve caused some trouble and doesn’t dare to go back by himself, right?"

"Well—not really trouble. But I am a filial son, and I don’t want to make your grandma upset, so I thought of taking you, the good granddaughter, to see her—this way, she won’t be able to get angry."

"Honestly, I’m so filial; otherwise, I might have missed such an interesting event."

He stepped forward and glanced at Shang Xinlei, Qian Gongyu, and "Jiang Shi," finally settling his gaze on "Jiang Shi," smiling, "Nice to meet you. I am Jie Yuan Shao’s Third Uncle, Spear Instructor of North River Military Town, Jie Zilong."

A Third-Turn Messenger?

Although it was anticipated, being surrounded by so many people the moment they came out, and even targeted by someone above level thirty, still made Yan Qing a bit nervous. Nonetheless, as long as "Jiang Shi" completed the instance, raising a ruckus was no issue to Yan Qing; he could always sacrifice a small account.

However, at that moment, a trembling figure stood in front of "Jiang Shi."

"She...she’s my house guard. If you have something, please, please talk to me." Qian Gongyu, in the most timid voice, said the boldest words.

She turned her head towards "Jiang Shi," lowering her voice, revealing her local accent, "Don’t be scared, the Jie Family... shouldn’t snatch civilian girls...right?"