Chapter 533 |
In the dark forest of the lower levels, an elf and a puji faced each other in silence.
The elf tried to step back two paces.
The puji followed forward four.
Mycelium writhed, and the rag-bag-like voice puji popped out as well.
“Syrian? Divine Tree old—uh, big shot?” Lin Jun asked tentatively.
Snap!
Syrian jolted, stamping one foot down on the voice puji, then immediately grabbing another puji at his side.
“Quiet!”
The Divine Tree’s voice echoed directly inside Lin Jun’s consciousness.
The confirmation made Lin Jun inwardly shaken.
This time, however, the Divine Tree’s voice was no longer light and drifting. Instead, there was a hint of embarrassment and irritation mixed in.
Syrian’s emerald-green eyes stared at the puji in his hand as he spoke through intent:
“Our deal is already finished. Whatever you do next is your business. We won’t interfere with each other. Just pretend we don’t know one another. Understood?”
He gently set the puji down and turned to leave.
But in the next instant, four soft mycelial tentacles wrapped tightly around his right ankle.
Syrian tried to shake them off, but more puji had already popped up with soft “bo” sounds from the surrounding fungal carpet. Their round bodies scrambled forward, hugging his calves and thighs, dragging at him with all their strength.
“You little—”
The forest came alive.
Several ancient trees that had been dormant suddenly shuddered. Roots burst from the soil like living vines, sweeping up puji one after another, lifting them into the air and flinging them far away.
Any new puji that tried to approach were immediately blocked by more whipping roots and branches that sprang out of nowhere.
Seeing Syrian about to calmly depart under the forest’s protection, Lin Jun had no choice but to throw out his ultimate move:
“Divine Tree big shot, you wouldn’t want that… that, uh… what’s-her-name… Veyra to find out your true identity, would you?”
Syrian’s footsteps halted abruptly.
He slowly turned around and walked back step by step. Under his gaze, the puji tangled in the roots were squeezed tighter and tighter.
“Threatening me?”
The Divine Tree’s intent turned icy.
“Do you think provoking me will bring you any benefit?”
“You’re the one who lied to me first!”
Lin Jun was indignant and emotionally charged.
“You said the world was beyond saving, that you were going to sleep until the end of the world. And then what? You secretly ran off to enjoy yourself! You dumped the miserable job of saving the world onto me, a poor, weak, helpless puji!”
“If it works, you reap the rewards. If it fails, everyone’s doomed together. You’ve been enjoying yourself all these years anyway, so you don’t lose anything, right?”
“Being the only one who gets to live out a happy tree life? I don’t agree to that!”
The puji struggled with difficulty, stretching out a trembling tentacle and stubbornly wrapping it once more around the tip of Syrian’s boot.
Syrian looked down expressionlessly at the puji at his feet, which looked as though it had suffered a grave injustice.
“Say it plainly. What do you want?”
The tentacle instantly loosened. The mycelial strands rubbed together nimbly, and the aggrieved tone vanished without a trace, replaced by crisp efficiency.
“Artifacts.”
“Impossible.”
The refusal was entirely expected.
Lin Jun didn’t get discouraged and immediately began bargaining, his shrewdness completely different from moments before.
“Then help me deal with a troublesome enemy… or give me a special skill with no level restriction… or at the very least, teach me how to control these ancient trees…”
He rattled off several demands in a row, all of which were rejected.
“This won’t work, that won’t work,” Lin Jun complained through intent. “Then I want to research abyss magic. You can at least help me think of a solution, right?”
For something as dangerous and taboo as researching abyss magic, Syrian showed neither surprise nor disdain. He merely asked calmly:
“What specific problem have you run into?”
“Risk control! I’m afraid I’ll mess with something I can’t clean up and blow up my own home. Do you have any good ideas, or maybe some kind of failsafe item? Like… a one-button purge or expulsion?”
“There’s no such thing…” Syrian thought for a moment. “Why not do it in a dungeon’s auxiliary space? Even if something goes wrong, it won’t affect the outside.”
The puji tilted its mushroom cap.
“That actually makes sense!”
The puji stretched out its mycelial tentacles and spread them in front of Syrian, the gesture filled with perfectly natural expectation.
Syrian looked down at the swaying tentacles.
“What does this mean?”
“You’ve got to give me a ‘key,’ right? Otherwise how am I supposed to get in?” Lin Jun said, even pointing with a puji toward the sapling in the distance that connected to the abyssal space beneath the Divine Tree Dungeon—now the Divine Wood Dungeon.
Syrian’s flawless elven face darkened instantly.
“When did I ever say I’d lend my place to you as a test site? Doesn’t Dungeon Thirteen have its own auxiliary space?”
“I need to keep my own space as a final escape route. I can’t just wreck it casually,” Lin Jun replied matter-of-factly.
Veins that hadn’t appeared even when he was being tangled by tentacles finally surfaced on the elf’s forehead. With a squeeze of the roots, that puji was crushed apart.
But in the very next second, another identical puji popped up from the nearby fungal carpet with a soft “bo.”
Completely unconcerned that one of them had just been killed, it simply spread its tentacles again, continuously projecting eager intent.
Syrian took a deep breath, steadying himself.
“My territory is not an option. However… there is one place without an owner. It might work.”
He picked up a piece of wood from the ground, closed his eyes briefly, then tossed it to the puji.
The instant the puji touched it, a stream of information flooded into its consciousness.
The sensation was very similar to touching information blocks in abyssal space. The difference was that this time the information was solidified within a physical wooden block, and once it was fully read, the block itself lost all special fluctuations and reverted to an ordinary piece of wood.
In Lin Jun’s mind appeared two extremely complex magic array layouts, along with a geographic coordinate.
“This is…?”
“Normally, the abyssal space beneath a dungeon collapses along with the destruction of its dungeon core,” Syrian’s voice returned to its original calm detachment. “But there… once existed a dungeon that was destroyed in an abnormal way. Its connected auxiliary space was accidentally preserved, becoming an independent fragment.”
“You go to that coordinate, set up Array One there, then place Array Two at the new anchor point you choose. That will move the space’s connection point within the world.”
“That’s it. If you’re still not satisfied, then do whatever you like. But in that case, don’t even think about developing anything in my dungeon again.”
With that, Syrian turned and left.
At this point, Lin Jun could only accept the win and stop pushing.
The structures of the two magic arrays were complex and profound, hard to fully comprehend at a glance, but the accompanying instructions were extremely detailed. Collecting the materials and setting them up step by step wouldn’t be difficult.
But that coordinate…
Isn’t this inside imperial territory?!
And it didn’t seem to be within Little Xi’s sphere of influence either. It leaned northward instead… this felt troublesome.
As Lin Jun was pondering this, Syrian suddenly returned.
“Since things have come this far, you might as well tell me where Veyra and the others are now. Save me the trouble of searching.”
Veyra?!
Lin Jun really didn’t know her location.
After all, to him, Veyra was just an adventurer with a bit of personality. There was no reason to spend effort tracking her specifically.
Of course, now that he knew the Divine Tree—whether this was its true body, avatar, or clone—was traveling with that team, he would definitely pay closer attention in the future.
Given that the big shot had just handed over benefits, helping him search was only fair.
His will swept over Mordu, Oathbound City, the fallen regions…
Huh?
Nothing.
He expanded the range and searched again. Still no trace of Veyra or any member of her team.
Could they already be dead?
“Where are they?” Syrian asked, his gaze falling on the puji.
“Didn’t find them,” Lin Jun could only answer honestly.
Syrian grabbed the puji by its mushroom cap and lifted it up, his face full of irritation.
“You didn’t even know where they were, and you still dared to use them to threaten me just now?”
“I’ll help you look! I’ll really look this time! I can roughly guess where they might be!” The puji’s short legs kicked helplessly in the air a few times before Syrian finally let go, dropping it back to the ground.
“They’re probably active near the western coast. A lot of adventurers have been heading there recently,” Lin Jun analyzed.
There were lots of slimes over there. It counted as one of Lin Jun’s blind spots.
“You move pretty fast,” Syrian snorted, the tone ambiguous—neither clearly praise nor something else.
That old Divine Tree clearly knew a lot but refused to share. That riddle-speaker behavior was duly noted.
The puji eagerly scooted closer, its mycelial tentacles waving ingratiatingly.
“Please be patient, big shot. Give me a day or two and I’ll definitely help you find them!”
Syrian could only sit down. He casually grabbed the puji, frowning slightly as he vindictively kneaded it.
Several scout puji rapidly spawned within the kingdom’s fallen regions.
Objective: locate the adventurer Veyra.
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