Xia Chengfeng scouted the area carefully. He controlled an ordinary [Skeleton Soldier Lv7] and got it to walk in front of him.
The skeleton soldier noticed nothing off, and nor did Xiaozi detect any ripples of elemental power.
Soon, Xia Chengfeng arrived at an abandoned stone hut that was covered in spider webs. There was a thick layer of dust on the surfaces of the floor and table.
Judging from the furnishing in the house, this place should have been a human village. However, all the items were ancient and of crude workmanship. It looked like the product of an agrarian age.
There were also humans in the Crypt World, but they might not have come from Earth!
Xia Chengfeng knew this. He had encountered human NPCs during the closed beta. Those NPCs had come from human caves in the Crypt World.
This cave should be one of the places those humans had lived in. But for some reason, this village was abandoned and everyone inside was nowhere to be found.
Xia Chengfeng entered a bedroom. It was simple, with only a broken-down bed that was covered in webs and stank to high heaven.
CREAK! Xia Chengfeng was about to leave when the bed suddenly creaked and a human figure sat up!
As the bed was beyond repair and looked like it would fall apart at any time. Expectedly, the figure's movements caused the wooden bed to collapse. But it did not make a sound, instead, it crawled up and faced Xia Chengfeng.
It had a rotten, contorted face, and the flesh on its body had turned black. Insects and rats had eaten most of its tissues away, and a withered eyeball dropped out of its socket.
[Rotten Zombie Lv9]: A corpse that an aura of death had infected and gradually turned into a zombie. It has an extremely strong offense.
"Rest in peace!" Xia Chengfeng raised his ax and physically exorcized the monster.
After Xia Chengfeng hewed the zombie down with his ax, a crystal the size of a soybean dropped on the floor. The walking corpse collapsed and instantly lost its support from the death aura. It then turned into a pile of ash.
[Death Aura Crystal Lv9]: A crystal of concentrated death aura. It can be used to craft magic equipment or create undead creatures.
"Roar!" Xia Chengfeng had just picked up the [Death Aura Crystal Lv9] when Xiaozi let out a cry of warning.
Through the skeleton soldier, Xia Chengfeng could see a few zombies wandering out from several houses. And soon, several skeletons and zombies began crawling out from their graves in the village's cemetery as well. The zombies sensed the aura of a living person and instinctively followed the trail and surrounded Xia Chengfeng.
An arm emerged from under the ground and grabbed hold of the Lv7 skeleton soldier puppet before tearing it to shreds!
"Xiaozi, time to work!" Xia Chengfeng tightened his grip on the battle-ax. There were roughly 30 undead monsters outside. They were mostly ordinary Lv9 monsters, and Xia Chengfeng thought it would be easy to deal with them.
Man and dragon charged out of the hut, and Xia Chengfeng killed an undead monster with every swing of his giant ax.
Xiaozi's lightning flames had a neutralizing effect on undead creatures. Her single bolt of lightning flame pierced through three [Vengeful Skeletons Lv9] and killed them instantly!
"The battle is over. It took us just 275 seconds!" he roared as he cleaved the last zombie in two. Xia Chengfeng and Xiaozi also finished the nearby undead creatures off. He received several more [Death Aura Crystals Lv9] and a few [Skeletal Frames Lv9] and he knew these could be used to create new skeleton puppets.
This area was just a small section of the cave. Xia Chengfeng looked forward to an area covered by thick fog. It looked sinister, and danger lurked—it would not be as easy as this area.
"I wonder where the other people are? Could the undead creatures have eaten them?" Xia Chengfeng mumbled to himself as he controlled a skeleton puppet to continue scouting the area.
The area covered in thick fog turned out to be an abandoned farm. Nothing was growing here because of the lingering death aura. The soil had turned a dark red. Xia Chengfeng came across a few bleached bones from time to time. They must have been broken off only recently.
"That's not right. There should be many more undead creatures here since the death aura is so rich. Where did they go?" Xia Chengfeng searched the area closely and found a few leads.
There was a tunnel somewhere within the farm. It was a tunnel that was connected to another space bubble.
"Looks like there are other people! Could these creatures have attacked them?" Xia Chengfeng asked himself.
He immediately brought the skeleton and Xiaozi into the tunnel to investigate the matter. They trudged along until they arrived at another space bubble a little while later.
The space bubble had an area of about 300 cubic meters. It was much smaller than Xia Chengfeng's space bubble.
Zombies had ravaged the space bubble. The few buildings in the space bubble had been destroyed, and there were even a few zombies and skeleton monsters roaming around the area.
Xia Chengfeng finished off the monsters decisively. He noticed that there was nothing else in the space bubble aside from a few resources and materials left behind.
The owner of the space bubble had just vanished, and there weren't even any traces of blood.
He must have escaped through the tunnel. There are no other tunnels here, so he must have entered the undead cave. Besides, his space bubble had been conquered, Xia Chengfeng guessed.
A space bubble was a player's territory. It was bound to the player's magic soul and was unique!
Under normal circumstances, no one would give up on their territory. It would him a wanderer, and it meant he could only survive in monster caves.
A player also would not be able to claim other monster caves after they lost their space bubble! Therefore, they had to keep exploring monster caves just to survive. His only alternative was to be affiliated with other survivors or to snatch over the space bubbles of other survivors.
Xia Chengfeng picked up a few resources and left the space bubble. He continued to explore deeper into the undead cave.
He reached the edge of the village after passing through the farm. Xia Chengfeng found signs of battle here.
He tracked the traces of the battle and arrived deep within the fog.
"Sob, sob, sob…" Sorrowful wails echoed from within the fog, like the sad cries of countless vengeful spirits.
Xia Chengfeng could also hear the sounds of battle when he listened closely.
"They are still fighting!" Xia Chengfeng walked carefully into the fog. He realized that this place was a mass grave. There were countless tombstones and plaques all around the area.
A sinister aura of misfortune lingered in the area, and it caused Xia Chengfeng's heart to thump rapidly. However, he did not spot any undead creatures here except for a few zero-star ones that he easily dealt with.
Xia Chengfeng saw a cemetery after walking a little further. A thick black fog obscured the graveyard, and Xia Chengfeng could not see what was happening in the area.
However, he saw a dozen undead creatures attacking two men at the entrance of the cemetery.
The two men looked extremely haggard. One of them was wielding a long sword, while the other was holding a staff made of withered wood. They were arduously resisting the attack.
There was a giant cross behind them, and it was releasing a weak pulse of light. The light weakened the abilities of the undead creatures, which allowed them to survive until now.
"Hiss!" A skeleton monster that was made of the bones of various creatures charged toward them. The monster was hit by both the light and also one of the men's spells, but took little damage. It could rapidly recover, even though a part of its skeleton was blasted off.
Xia Chengfeng looked at the monster and realized that it was an elite monster.
[Skeleton Amalgam Lv10 (Elite)]: Under the effects of the death aura and undead spirits, the bones of different creatures had fused to form a monster. It is the defender of the plague cemetery.
"It's over, it's over, we can't fend off the attacks anymore!" The swordsman let out a pitiful howl, "Why was I so unlucky to dig into this cave? I am only Lv7!"
"You have the cheek to say that? I was hiding so well. Would I have been discovered by the undead creatures if you hadn't come in?" The mage was visibly upset. He had become partners with the swordsman yesterday.
They had explored this undead cave together but realized that it was not a place they could challenge after scouting the area. Thus, they had turned back and retreated from the undead cave.
However, the swordsman had become greedy when he saw the cross and wanted to keep it for himself. By doing so, he attracted the horde of undead creatures and quickly found themselves trapped at the entrance of the cemetery. They were about to die at the hands of the undead creatures.
"To think that there are people I know here?" Xia Chengfeng saw how the two people looked and thought for a moment. He kept his [Tauren Shaman's Wizard Technique Mask] and got Xiaozi to hide. He then jumped out of the fog.
"The two of you, are you guys alright?" Xia Chengfeng shouted.