Chapter 23: The End of the Novice Phase and Changes in the Catacombs

Fang Tang discovered a new way to eat bread.

Placed on the grill, it turned into toast.

He arranged six slices of bread neatly, sliced some ham, and paired it with sausages.

He enjoyed a delicious breakfast.

At present, he had no tool to measure time.

The pickaxe didn’t display any countdown either.

So Fang Tang had to devise another method, using the water collector to estimate time.

Just after finishing his meal, the water collector was already full, which told him he had slept for more than seven hours.

Adding the three liters he had poured out before sleeping, he deduced that nearly twelve hours had passed.

Fang Tang walked over to the corpse of the night owl and studied it carefully.

After defeating it yesterday, he hadn’t immediately taken it apart.

He wanted to observe this denizen of the underground.

As one of the two strongest creatures he had yet encountered in the depths, the night owl was worth a closer look.

His main reason was that, after dying, the night owl hadn’t released any strange scent—not even the smell of blood—which piqued Fang Tang’s curiosity.

Twelve hours had passed, yet the night owl’s corpse looked unchanged; even the blood on its wounds hadn’t clotted.

Intrigued, Fang Tang poked at it with his hunting knife.

The skin was incredibly tough—the sharp blade couldn’t pierce it.

Upon closer inspection, he noticed a transparent layer on the skin.

It was akin to viewing human skin under a microscope.

It had a gelatinous quality.

However, this was much thicker than human skin.

On the transparent epidermis, if one looked closely, there were hexagonal patterns, interlocked and covering the whole body.

A thought crossed Fang Tang’s mind: “Perhaps this is the reason the night owl can become optically invisible?”

After his examination, Fang Tang took out the decomposition hammer.

A gentle tap, and the night owl transformed into a pair of enormous wings and a blood-red pearl.

The pearl was as richly colored as the one from the desert python.

This corroborated what the Eye had said.

Stowing away his spoils, Fang Tang began preparing for further exploration.

He poured all the water from the collector into the wooden barrel.

The tent was packed away into his backpack.

The grill, pot, and other items were all wrapped up in the newspaper.

Once everything was in order, Fang Tang picked up his pickaxe, ready to head for his next destination.

Suddenly, the underground world was rocked by an earthquake.

The ground and walls all trembled violently.

Fang Tang’s heart clenched and he blinked rapidly.

“What’s going on?”

[Read the newspaper.]

“Hm?”

Fang Tang took out the newspaper. At the top of the front page, a red notification bar appeared.

‘Notice!!! Three days have passed. The underground will now fully open.’

“What does this mean?” Fang Tang asked in a low voice.

Such a notice was clearly not good news.

[Rules, rules, and more rules. It’s complicated to explain. In short, you can think of it as the end of your three-day novice period. Now, the true nature of this world will be revealed.]

“The true nature?”

Fang Tang was shocked.

So what he’d seen so far was only a beginner’s village of sorts?

The creatures he’d encountered were just the small fry of the starting area?

Now he would be facing the real underground world?

The tremors intensified, making it impossible for Fang Tang to stand. He could only sit on the ground, quietly waiting for the transformation to finish.

The newspaper was spread out on the floor, messages jumping rapidly across it.

“What’s happening? Why is there an earthquake down here?”

“Look at the notification. What does ‘fully open’ mean? Have we only seen the tip of the iceberg?”

“This place is terrifying. I want to go home!”

“If this dangerous period was just the novice stage, wouldn’t the real underground be even deadlier?”

“What’s the use of panicking? At worst, it’s just death. If I die, so be it. If not, I’ll keep on living. What’s there to be afraid of?”

“We’re already here and have tried every method. There’s no way back, so we have to press forward. Who knows—maybe one day we’ll find the way home?”

“Isn’t it just digging? Dig long enough and we’ll eventually break through. Then we’ll find a way out.”

…

…

Fang Tang read the messages in silence.

Break through the underground?

Perhaps, but with such mysterious rules in place, that possibility shrank to almost nothing.

Trying to fight the rules with human effort alone was pure fantasy.

The only thing to do was to use the rules to grow stronger.

Stronger—strong enough to challenge the rules themselves.

Then, perhaps, he could find his way home.

The underground continued to change.

Two whole hours passed before the tremors finally stopped.

Fang Tang looked around, his pupils contracting.

Inside the underground…

There was light!

The space was tightly sealed by walls on all sides, so where was the light coming from?

Though curious, this was undoubtedly good news.

Now, even without firestones, he could move freely.

Moreover, the underground had grown much larger.

The ceiling soared over ten meters high.

The length and width extended more than twenty meters.

The space had more than doubled.

This meant Fang Tang’s combat abilities had been diminished.

Not a good sign.

More space meant more room for movement.

Creatures that relied on speed, like night owls and bats, now had plenty of space to maneuver.

This severely affected Fang Tang’s fighting strategies.

At the very least, his predictive shots with the explosive bow would need to change.

And his methods for luring enemies wouldn’t be as effective.

This was a collective nerf to the players.

[Wow, the underground is getting more interesting. Guess what I’ve discovered?]

The Eye popped out at this moment, clearly in a good mood.

“What is it?” Fang Tang asked curiously.

[Ha! The place you’ve always dreamed of—you’ve forgotten already?]

After thinking for a moment, Fang Tang’s face lit up with excitement.

“The underground shop?”

[Exactly! As the most unique place in this world, its location is randomly shuffled. Who would’ve thought that, now that the world has fully opened, a shop would appear right next to us? Even if it’s only a level-one shop, there are plenty of good things inside, and we have enough valuables. You should hurry over—there’s no guarantee it’ll stay open for long.]

“Yes, yes!”

The sudden good fortune shattered Fang Tang’s gloom.

With the shop’s appearance, perhaps he could finally buy the blueprints for the three materials needed for the mechanical claw arm. This was wonderful news.

If he could build the claw arm soon, who in this world could stand in his way?

He grabbed the pickaxe eagerly and scanned the surrounding walls.

“Where is it?”

[On the left.]

Fang Tang dashed over, swung his pickaxe, and struck the wall.

Despite the transformation, the relationship between his pickaxe and the walls hadn’t changed.

The blade sank into the wall as easily as poking foam.

Thud, thud, thud!

Ten strikes, and he’d opened several round holes over two meters high.

The openings were larger now.

Just as Fang Tang was about to step into the black mist, the Eye appeared again.

[Once inside, immediately drink the green juice on the counter—it will benefit you. Don’t waste time talking to it. You only have five minutes. If you finish your transactions early, you might be able to get some useful information from its mouth.]