Chapter 6: Skeleton Soldier
Humans were actually not as fragile as most people thought. In fact, human beings were a very adaptable creatures. In a harsh environment, it was easier for them to grow stronger. After the bloody battle and the thrilling escape, some of the present people were crying while others were trembling, yet their eyes and demeanor largely changed from the beginning.
Survival of the fittest, and the law of the jungle, applied here as well. It had not changed for thousands of years. Humans must go through an adaptation period. As long as they adapted to their environment, they could conquer anything with their wisdom.
Xiao Yu led the party into a one-meter-high tunnel. The passageway was slanted downwards; some sections were wide, others were narrow, and the walls were very rough without any trace of manual excavation. It was dark inside, very damp and cold.
The four of them moved down step by step, wielding wooden clubs, as the surroundings gradually darkened.
People’s dreadful imaginations were best stimulated by darkness. Han Kexin, Jin Shi, and especially the hot-headed Wang Chao were all tense. The latter’s legs shook violently. Hearing his own heartbeat accelerate, he had his nerves stiffening further, and he became as terrified as a bird.
“Take it easy; let’s move slowly!”
Xiao Yu walked in the front, bent forward, and slowly moved ahead.
Wang Chao’s fat face trembled, cold sweat streamed down his brow, and he opened his tiny eyes wide, cursing in a low voice: “fuck… fuck, it’s easy for you to say! Fatty… Fatty is a bit claustrophobic! Have you ever been here before? What’s going on down here? Can you tell me first? At least it’ll make us mentally prepared.”
Xiao Yu continued to advance without haste, “No need, we’ve arrived.”
The four of them finally walked out of the narrow tunnel. What appeared in front of them was a pitch-black underground cave. The area was not small at all; it was the size of several basketball courts put together. There were several naturally formed holes nearby that appeared to be tunnels; no one knew where these would lead. Sharp stalactites covered the top of the cave, and droplets of water were continually dripping down the ground. Several long and extremely tall stone pillars stood everywhere, the cave surface felt smooth and wet, and the odd moss was spread in every section, emitting a dim light, barely allowing people to discern the condition of the cave. A faint sound of flowing water could be heard as an underground river streamed by just on the right side of the cave.
Xiao Yu raised the wooden club in his hand and said to the others: “Don’t get close to that underground river; let’s keep moving!”
Jin Shi felt his throat about to burn at the sight of the drinkable water, but when he heard his friend’s words, he couldn’t help scratching his head and asked: “Why? Is the water poisonous?”
“Don’t worry; the water is not poisonous.” Xiao Yu paused and continued, “Remember, never approach a water source carelessly, there exist frequent dangers in the water, and it is often a place where other species are widely dispersed.”
Han Kexin seriously noted down Xiao Yu’s every word in her mind. At this moment, she was dirty all over, and the black stockings on her slender thighs were squeezed out and damaged, revealing her white skin, the strands of hair reaching her cheeks had clumped due to sweat, sticking lightly on her skin which gave her a different kind of temptation. Just then, she saw a few white objects under a huge stalactite in front of them, and when she focused her gaze, she immediately let out a scream.
“Ah, look there… over there, there are bones!”
Wang Chao glanced at the pile of bones and said disdainfully: “Tch, what’s so scary about dead human bones? Haven’t you seen enough dead people today? Fatty is fucking immune!”
Xiao Yu picked up a stone from under his feet without looking at them and gently threw it toward the pile of bones.
Bang!
The stone hit a stalactite above the pile of bones, and the crisp sound echoed out in the silent underground cave. Immediately afterward, a scalp-numbing cracking noise resounded. Then, the four to five skeletons lying on the ground actually moved, their hollow eye sockets lighting up with a dark green glow as they slowly stood up.
It was a terrifying scene to behold in this silent, dark underground space. Then, right afterward, a few withered human bones stood up, their eyes glowing with a weird green light, and the bones all over their body started moving.
“Oh my god, it’s a ghost!” Wang Chao yelled.
Han Kexin was so frightened that she immediately hid behind Xiao Yu’s back, acting just like a regular woman, not the “Bloody Queen” who would dominate the world in the future. Watching that scene, Jin Shi, standing beside them, also paled and took several steps back, almost failing to hold the wooden club in his hand.
Xiao Yu seemed to have expected this reaction and said lightly: “it’s just a skeleton of an undead. The skeleton is the weakest one among the undead tribe. Also, this kind of skeleton is the weakest in the skeleton family. It has less strength than a goblin slave. It’s only scary looking.”
After the five skeletons stood up, they quickly noticed the four people slowly walking towards them, and various crackling noises were heard as they moved.
Hearing Xiao Yu’s words, Wang Chao immediately let go of his fear and shouted, “That’s right, isn’t it just a dead human’s bones? While playing games, skeletons are always the most garbage of monsters. I kill them within seconds. Okay, let’s go!”
Xiao Yu nodded and said, “You still have to be careful, don’t get caught by their dry bones. Their attacks have a corrosive effect, and a large piece of flesh will rot away as soon as they touch you.” After he finished speaking, he followed Wang Chao as they both rushed toward the enemies.
Xiao Yu dashed to a stiff and sluggish skeleton and crushed it to pieces with his club. The fragile skull was directly shattered, and a ray of light the size of a thumb shot into his forehead. Immediately afterward, he delivered a smash to another skeleton beside him, as it also broke down.
Wang Chao also waved his wooden weapon as he broke a skeleton in half. He yelled loudly: “Killing like this is much more enjoyable than fighting those little dwarves. These dead bones move too slowly!” he felt ecstatic, but he had yet to notice that he didn’t absorb any energy. Although broken in half from its spine, the skeleton with only half of its upper body still had a green glow in its eyes as it reached out to grab his legs.
“Be careful!” Xiao Yu spun around and swung his club furiously, striking the skeleton’s upper half on the ground, utterly breaking its skull. “Fatty, you almost died just now. These monsters are undead; as long as the fire of their soul is not extinguished, they will not die. So remember to aim for the head when dealing with them!”
Wang Chao was drenched in cold sweat, but after seeing the skeleton’s energy absorbed by Xiao Yu, he immediately cursed: “Damn, I’ve been robbed out of my experience!”
Han Kexin and Jin Shi discovered that the skeletons were not as frightening as they had imagined, and they all exhaled a sigh of relief. Han Kexin saw the rows of moving free essence and didn’t want to miss out, so she rushed into the battle with her own wooden club in hand. Jin Shi was surprised for a moment before following suit.
The underground cave tunnel contained around fourteen to fifteen bone skeletons. They were pitifully frail and slow to respond. They rose up slowly after being alarmed and were frequently shattered in the process. Xiao Yu only killed four of them and let the others kill the rest as much as they could because after killing more than twenty goblin slaves in a row, the effect became somewhat negligible. The weak skeletons’ soul energy was only half that of the goblin slaves; for him, it wasn’t much, but for others, it still gave out sufficient power.
“There are still many dry skeletons in the other passages.” Xiao Yu pointed at the five to six tunnels around him and continued: “But we have become much stronger, and the energy of the dry skeletons is no longer useful to us. They will not wake up on their own initiative if they are not disturbed, so let’s save these piles for later.”
Wang Chao pointed to another pile in front of him and said, “what about this one? Let me deal with it!”
“Fatty, stop right there, don’t go over there; this one is different from the others!” Xiao Yu grabbed his collar from behind and said quietly, “Don’t you have a brain? All the time, we avoided this one on purpose and cleared up the other skeletons; even fools would realize that this skeleton is different from the others.”
“Really?”
Wang Chao scratched his head and examined the specific skeleton with suspicion, only to discover that the bones of this one were whiter than those of the weak, dry skeletons and were much more complete. It clutched a bone shield in one hand and a blade in the other; its bone blade was filled with gaps.
Xiao Yu said lightly: “This is a skeleton soldier, a low-level undead creature. Its strength is similar to that of a goblin warrior, and it is far stronger than ordinary skeletons. So get ready to attack together!”
The four of them adjusted their posture and rushed toward the enemy at the same time. When they arrived within ten meters of it, the skeleton soldier awakened as usual. A green light glowed in its empty eye sockets; the intensity of the light was much brighter than those of the dry skeletons’, and it didn’t stand up slowly like the normal ones either. Instead, as if there were springs underneath its feet, it jumped up violently, leaping three meters high. The bones all over its body were rattling, and it swung the bone blade slashing at everyone.
Wang Chao looked at the skeleton soldier in the air who was slashing at them with its blade and shouted in fright: “What the hell, did we make a mistake! This is insane!”
Xiao Yu’s physical strength had far surpassed the other three, and his reaction time was equally the highest. With a flash of his silhouette, he stepped in front of them, blocking the skeleton soldier’s bone blade with his club. The power of this slash was terrifying. Even though Xiao Yu nullified the majority of the force with a subtle angle, he still felt his hands trembling as the skin of his palm split open, while a large gap developed on the relatively solid wooden club due to corrosion.
A green light flashed in the skeleton soldier’s eyes, and its right hand that held the blade suddenly increased in strength. Xiao Yu felt a mountain pressing on him, and the huge force pushed him down on one knee as cracks appeared on the ground beneath his feet. Seeing the strong Xiao Yu like this, the other three people’s faces changed drastically. Realizing this monster’s power, they hurriedly seized the opportunity to attack.
“Eat this!”
Jin Shi strode forward, roared, and swung his club, only to be blocked by the bone shield and forced a few steps back.
Wang Chao and Han Kexin hit the skeleton soldier simultaneously. Wang Chao felt as if he had struck a piece of iron instead, and his hands ached, yet only few tiny cracks emerged on the skeleton soldier’s body. Han Kexin was significantly stronger than him, but she concentrated her attack on its tough skull, resulting in few cracks as well.
Wang Chao couldn’t believe it: “Damn it, this can’t be true!”
Elementary-level monsters were really powerful!
Skeleton soldiers had no senses, felt no pain, and as low-level undead creatures, they had no emotions. So, naturally, they did not feel anger. It just blankly raised its bone knife and struck Jin shi next to it. The latter managed to block the monster with his wooden club. But, unfortunately, he got thrown three meters away by that huge force and fell to the ground. Then it turned around and bashed Wang Chao’s chest with its bone shield, and Wang Chao likewise was flung out as he coughed out blood in midair.