Chapter 29:

Murphy led the little players through the woods behind them and soon arrived at the place where the Midnight Hunters had engaged with the transport team.

There were still traces of the Solar Spirit energy explosion here. The flowers and grasses on the ground were left with scorch marks, and the corpses of the transport team’s escort soldiers were strewn about haphazardly.

Dismembered remains, soldiers fallen by the carts, the terrible corrosion left by Dark Spirit energy on their armor, and the drained corpses on the ground allowed the players to feel the intensity of the main battlefield.

Compared to this, their ambush skirmish was child’s play. Speaking of which, there were still five or six cavalrymen with broken legs thrown into the trench of the ambush ring, weren’t there?

“Damn! This is simply a massacre!”

Meow King cursed heavily.

The two remaining giants beside him, “Electronic Succubus Old Tune” and “Led More Than Three to Five Pecks”, roughly counted the heads and said in astonishment:

“How could the sixty vampires under the Young Lady wipe out more than two hundred and forty soldiers and Witch Hunters and emerge unscathed? Their combat power is too exaggerated, isn’t it?”

“It’s not that bad. We can beat ordinary soldiers in close combat. Vampires are supernatural beings to begin with, and the ones led by the Young Lady are elites. Vampires have various enhancements at night. It’s not surprising that they turned out like this when they attacked in groups.

But they definitely couldn’t have come out unscathed!

Maybe the vampires took the bodies away?”

As Onboard Joy Stick was pondering while circling around on this grassy field ravaged like a storm had passed through, he saw Ah Yuen squatting down and picking up a handful of red ash from the ground.

The student looked at the others with a strange expression and said:

“Look at this ash! Doesn’t it look like the bone ash of that bastard vampire we drained earlier?”

This question made everyone shudder. They immediately spread out and began searching around in these woods.

“I found two piles here!”

“Over here too, a lot of it. I also found some half-charred vampire clothes.”

“There’s ash like this everywhere! Woah, you don’t think those vampires were all killed, do you? Not a single one managed to escape?”

As the information was gathered from various places, this battlefield, which had already fallen silent, suddenly seemed ominous.

The little players huddled together, looking around warily, fearing that a fire-breathing monster might charge out from the shadows at any moment.

The Young Lady on Precipitation Niuniu’s back had already fainted. With her arm cut off and undergoing self-healing, it was unlikely she could wake up anytime soon. Murphy also felt a chill down his back.

Ever since approaching this place, he had a feeling of being watched from the dark, which made him extremely uncomfortable.

He understood better than the little players the destructive power of these elite Midnight Hunters gathered together, and thus could better comprehend how terrifying the unknown force that had trapped and killed these Midnight Hunters in this patch of woods must be.

Perhaps there were entities in the Transia region that vampires could not contend with, but ones that prevented them from even escaping and only allowed for hopeless waiting for death clearly exceeded Murphy’s knowledge and imagination.

“We can’t stay here.”

Murphy decisively told his little players:

“Gather up anything that can still be used. Let’s leave! Search carefully through the Midnight Hunters’ remains and try to find their spirit pouches so we can carry more things.”

“Spirit pouches? What are those?”

The newbie Onboard Joy Stick bumped Meow King’s shoulder and asked. The latter explained in a low voice:

“It’s like a space backpack! Our NPC had one on his waist, and all our equipment came from that thing. I reckon these lost spirit pouches of the vampires are probably the quest rewards for our mission this time. They’ve got to give us some small bags as newbies, you know?”

“Makes sense.”

Onboard Joy Stick nodded and turned to rummage through the ash piles.

He indeed found a dirty blood-red pouch in there. Unfortunately, this thing was spirit-locked by its previous owner and needed to wait for the spirit imprint to dissipate before it could be opened.

Apart from nearly forty of these spirit pouches left behind by the vaporized vampires, the players also found dozens of usable rifles and several large ammunition boxes from the annihilated transport team soldiers.

The diligent little players not only found the spooked pack mules in the woods nearby but also wanted to take the intact armor off those soldiers, leaving nothing behind like a swarm of locusts.

But Murphy felt they shouldn’t linger in this place.

So after simply loading a carriage with their findings, he quickly led them away from there with the unconscious Young Lady.

It was only after they had all left that a grey falcon the size of a plump pigeon silently took off from a branch at the edge of the woods at night, nimbly turned and disappeared.

At the entrance to the Foul Swamp, the white knight Finoch Lawson placed the sole two surviving spirit channelers from the battle into one of the carts left by the vampires. One of them, still conscious, was emitting smoke from his high body temperature.

“However, although I have your help, I am still just a weak vampire summoner for now. I must first return to Kadman City to prepare for my Trial of Strength. I understand your eagerness to make achievements and serve the grand plan, but you must learn patience.”

“Got it, more test slots will open in the next phase, right?”

Ah Yuen snapped his fingers.

He got the information he wanted, while Murphy answered impassively like a true NPC:

“I do not understand what you are saying. The slang from other worlds is truly profound.

Alright, my warriors. I know you all feel joyous about this news, and so do I. But for now, I must send you back to your worlds first.

Once I have adjusted the summoning ritual, we can embark on the journey back to Kadman City together.”

“Lord Murphy, you seem so happy when mentioning Kadman City. Is there a lady waiting for you there?”

Meow King dared to crack a joke, only to be glared at by Murphy, who flicked his wrist lightly. The grinning Meow King instantly dispersed into particles of light before everyone’s eyes.

“Damn, he really can force-kick us offline! Is this GM mode?”

The Spicy Gugu Chicken standing next to Meow King let out a startled cry.

Although everyone knew this was just the “game’s portrayal” of “logging out”, this game’s NPCs were too intelligent, giving the sense they were “real people” after interacting for so long.

“We shall meet again tomorrow, warriors.”

Murphy nodded gracefully to the little players in a vampiric manner. In the next instant, ten beams of light dissipated into the night, instantly quieting the previously lively temporary camp.

He looked around, suddenly feeling a bit lonely, like being the only one left to clean up after a happy event.

But he quickly remembered he was about to set off on his return journey. At most three days of travel, and he would see Tris again, filling his heart’s solitude with anticipation.

If Tris saw him like this now, she would definitely be greatly surprised, wouldn’t she?

“Lord Murphy!”

Maxim’s call snapped Murphy out of his imagination. He turned to see his loyal servant hurrying over and saying to him:

“I helped Miriam pry open the transport team’s cargo boxes. She recognized those goods and insisted I must request you to come over immediately! She said those things are extremely, extremely important, and you must decide right away how to dispose of them!”

From Maxim’s grave tone, Murphy sensed an issue and asked:

“What exactly are those things?”

“I don’t recognize those intricate mechanisms,”

The blood servant relayed:

“But Miriam stressed that those things could bring us utter calamity!”

Hearing this, Murphy was greatly alarmed and immediately followed Maxim over.

That large cargo cart was still overturned, but one of the spilled crates had been opened. Miriam sat there with a worried frown. Seeing Murphy approach, she handed him something from her hands.

The vampire felt its substantial weight as he took it.

This thing was only pendant-sized but exquisitely made.

A pyramidal silver-grey metal base with a square gemstone set on top, like an eccentric pendant. But the overall design was strikingly minimalist, with almost no extraneous decorations or scratches visible.

The Patriarch’s intelligence clearly stated this transport team was carrying military supplies. So this “jewelry” in Murphy’s hand was definitely not as simple as it appeared on the surface.

“This is...?”

He eyed Miriam while holding it.

She sighed and said softly:

“The third-generation Spirit Computation Bead developed by the Halflings, the pinnacle of steam engineering, strictly military-controlled goods in the port of Shaldor.

After the Ten Years’ War began, their export has not been permitted. Attempting to take even one across the border is grounds for immediate execution without question.

But here we have at least 3,000 complete sets of these gemstones. If assembled into a computation matrix, it would be enough to arm an entire army.

Murphy...

Whether you believe it or not, we’ve really stumbled into a huge affair this time.”