Chapter 355: Reaching Dark Sky

Meanwhile, as they exited the tunnel of the Deep Wall Stratum, the frontliners reached the Dark Sky, the third stratum of the Elven Synchronized Intellect Nation (SIN).

“It is clearly below, so why is this place called ‘Dark Sky’?”

Gou Dan asked, perplexed as he looked at the stone wall barrier over himself.

The exit from the tunnel which they just left protruded downwards, resembling a stalactite hollowed out at its center.

Twinkling radiances were spread across the walls too, and a closer look would reveal that those were luminous ferns.

Aside from the one from which they exited, they could also see that there were other stalactites in other areas, meaning that there might be more tunnel entrances into the Dark Sky Stratum from the Deep Wall Stratum.

But that was all their vision could see.

The luminous plants growing on the stone walls notwithstanding, the Dark Sky Stratum was filled with darkness. While there were faint starry sparkles inside, those only extended for a certain length to pierce through the darkness and weren’t actually too bright, to the point that you almost can’t see your own fingers within the Dark Sky Stratum.

“No one knows what the high elves were thinking,” Edward muttered. “Anyway, by logic, the so-called Steel Earth should be below, right?”

Although the party was still going downwards after entering the Dark Sky, their descent had become remarkably slow that they felt a curious buoyancy. That was why Edward simply turned his Blackfire Dragon into a fireball that enveloped everyone as the first line of defense.

“Edward, can’t you use your peerless fire magic to come up with something and brighten the area around us?” Joe mumbled. He was stretching his eyes as wide as he could but he couldn’t see a thing, and became even more flustered after summoning his spirit familiar, only for it to turn out that having four eyes didn’t help matters either.

That said, he wasn’t really afraid of the dark

-after learning to use fire and its light to dispel the darkness, the discomfort in dark became inscribed into their instincts.

“Let me try something. Multi-cast, Flame Convert,” Edward murmured softly, conjuring a white fire out of thin air. “Flare Strike!”

With Flame Convert, Edward attached the Flare Strike that should have been shot out to his helm, keeping the white flames blazing on it.

Since the helm was imbued with a Zoffy rune as well as Edward splitting his attention to control the flames and increased the fuel (mana) to maximum output, it slowed down the decrease of durability of his own helm.

The reason Edward would use Flare Strike was also because a white flame-like ‘flare’ was the brightest fire spell he had at the moment.

And that was very much the truth: while normal flames illuminated a circle of around a meter radius, the flare illuminated a circle with a radius of five meters, increasing the visibility considerably.

But the Players didn’t realize what would happen to them for doing something like that in a pitch-black environment.

“Hold on, Edward, snuff out the fire right now—”

Gou Dan appeared to sense something then and shouted urgently, but was promptly dragged out of the protective circle formed by the Blackfire by his navel and disappeared in the darkness outside.

(Player Doug Ag has been killed by Limulus, Sky High, Sky High, Sky High, Sky High, Sky High, Sky High, Sky High, Sky High, and Sky High)

“?!”

For a moment, Edward assumed that the System notification was lagging, but soon realized that it was not the case.

The System notifications were not wrong.

Aside from the monster called Limulus, there were nine more Sky Highs that had sized and killed Gou Dan!

After all, Edward had fought several other Sky Highs to know that they were extremely quick and devastating in attack. While a single specimen could not instakill a Player, nine attacking at once would be another matter!

Clang! Mufasa rattled his sword just then, deflecting a silver threat that the naked eye would have difficulty seeing.

“Careful. Something is trying to grab and kill us one by one!” He yelled.

Be that as it may, the fish fins that kept flapping on the hilarious pink flatfish was an utter mismatch with his solemn tone, leaving Joe a little deflated even though he had almost turned serious.

And in that split second where Joe relaxed, the silver thread slip through the protective flames again, catching him unawares to coil tightly around him, grabbing him before he could even react.

“Joe!” Edwards was utterly enraged.

(Joe Paul has been killed by Limulus, Split-tooth Crawler, Loving Poison Mother, Yekel Insect, Sky High, Sky High, Sky High, and Sky High) “Put out the fire! Hurry! Those bastards are pinpointing our location with your fire!”

Mufasa roared, swinging his sword again to deflect another oncoming silver threat.

There were even more different species of monsters that killed Joe this time, making it obvious that more enemies were being drawn towards them.

“It’s too late! Those damn things are already flocking here!”

The quick succession of his friends’ deaths left Edward a little flustered. “It’s just us two now—there’s no way “Tch. So, we have to die once, huh…” Mufasa pursed his lips unhappily. “Well, you’re going to have to foot the bill for one wasted Resurrection Ankh!”

“You are the champion of the Twin City Cup, can’t you fork out that little bit of money?” Edward couldn’t help protesting against Mufasa’s stinginess.

“I’m not alone, you know, I have three rascals to feed…” Mufasa retorted casually. “They did well this time, but they were also catching so much attention and might get involved in some trouble. I have to prepare beforehand.”“Fine, just this once! Flame Convert, Red Eyes Dark Dragoon Blast, and Flare Strike!” Edward exclaimed, raising Happy Flames from which a gigantic fire dragon surged out. In no time at all, white spots were shining upon the black flames that burned over the Blackfire Dragon’s body, rapidly expanding and consuming it to create a white dragon of luminous flames.

“Blue Eyes Whitefire Dragon!”

The colossal dragon body naturally brightened the previous light radius by several times.

Nonetheless, both men who were feeling high-spirited just then were left stunned in the instant they saw the situation around them.

Thousands of abnormally shaped monsters were keeping a tight circle around them, and there were definitely over five thousand of them even if one didn’t bother to count! Some were so massive that they were far larger than the Dead Red Dragon the Players had to fight so hard to defeat!

With such ranks, they were only going to be monster feed even if every other player was here, let alone a handful of first-rate Players.

After a moment of silence, Edward uttered a single word drily.

“Tch.”