The next day.
Lu Heng and Su Muyu left the house, ready to retrieve the third Narnia Crystal.
The third crystal was located in a Beast Fighting Arena to the south of Mist City, and it was the most difficult one to obtain.
Upon arriving outside the arena, they saw the ancient building guarded by more than twenty Scary Claw Demons.
Some of the demons were patrolling, while others were wrestling in the arena.
Lu Heng and Su Muyu entered an invisible state and, from a high building outside the arena, observed the situation inside.
Seeing twenty to thirty Scary Claw Demons already seemed troublesome.
Just then, a Horned Demon Commander with a group of Scary Claw Demons appeared, climbed atop the arena's surrounding wall, and surveyed the area.
All the Scary Claw Demons bowed to the Horned Demon Commander, showing the strict hierarchy of the Abyss Demons.
The Horned Demon Commander was a High Rank Demon and held an absolute authority in front of these Low Rank Demons.
Lu Heng and Su Muyu watched from afar, waiting until the Horned Demon Commander finished the inspection and left the arena.
However, instead of taking the Scary Claw Demons with him, the commander left them behind to guard the arena.
This increased the number of Scary Claw Demons in the arena to over forty.
Now they had a problem.
While they were observing,
Su Muyu suddenly said, "Someone is following us."
"Hm?"
"That guy with yellow hair, hiding invisibly behind the wall back there, probably followed us all the way from Quenching Castle. I just noticed him," Su Muyu explained the situation.
"I didn't expect him to be so daring," Lu Heng thought that the blond didn't have the guts, but it seemed he had acquired an invisibility skill and suddenly grew bold.
"What do we do now?" Su Muyu asked, looking at the forty or so Horned Demons in the arena and noticing they also had a 'rat' hiding behind them.
Lu Heng pondered for a moment, a smile appeared on his lips, "Perfect, let the 'rat' behind us do the job of retrieving the crystal.
"I'll go out there and draw the Scary Claw Demons away. Our friend back there won't be able to sit still and will definitely try to steal the crystal.
"Once he steals the crystal, just keep an eye on him, then we'll meet up and take the crystal back."
Su Muyu nodded in agreement, "Okay."
With the plan settled, Lu Heng moved closer to the Beast Fighting Arena while remaining invisible. He got within five meters of the door, initiated Gale Step, charged forward in a dash, and drew the Aurora Blade, cutting horizontally with the Sword Draw Slash.
The sharp sword neatly sliced through the Scary Claw Demon's neck, decapitating it.
"[Killed a Scary Claw Demon, absorbed 50 points of Demon Energy.]"
Having slain the demon at the gate, Lu Heng immediately turned and ran south.
Roar!
The Scary Claw Demons inside the arena let out angry roars, rushing out of the doors and over the walls, chasing in the direction Lu Heng had fled.
Lu Heng kept his distance to give these low-level demons the illusion that they could catch him.
Meanwhile, Su Muyu used her invisible scout hawk to keep an eye on the blond.
As expected, when the blond saw most of the Scary Claw Demons being lured away, he started to approach the arena.
However, not all Scary Claw Demons were drawn away; about fifteen remained guarding the Narnia Crystal.
The blond hesitated outside the arena gates, too scared to enter.
Watching the blond's hesitance, Su Muyu felt a surge of impatience and urged in her mind, "Would you hurry up!"
Feeling nervous, the blond slowly snuck towards the arena fence, moving at a glacial pace, extremely cautious.
After three minutes of dawdling with no progress,
Su Muyu couldn't stand it anymore and controlled the scout hawk to scratch the wall, dislodging a brick.
Thud!
Ah!
Startled, the blond jumped, drawing the attention of the Horned Demon guard.
The guard shouted and charged toward him, throwing a handful of dust.
The blond's figure flickered in and out of view within the dust, too scared to attempt stealing the crystal and immediately turning to flee.
Half of the Demon guards roared and rushed out of the arena chasing the blond.
However, ten Demon guards remained watching over the crystal.
Su Muyu quickly decided to act, controlling the invisible scout hawk to fly into the arena and crash into the Narnia Crystal.
The hawk's energy transformed into an "Invisibility Veil", covering the Narnia Crystal.
This tactic was exactly the skill combination of "Scout Hawk" and "Invisibility Veil" that Lu Heng had explained to her yesterday—it came in handy now.
With the Narnia Crystal hidden under the cloak of invisibility, vanishing from the Demon guards' sight,
the ten remaining guards panicked once they realized the crystal was missing.
As Low Rank Demons, the Scary Claw Demons were somewhat intelligent, but not particularly smart.
Losing the Narnia Crystal meant they would be torn to shreds by the Horned Demon Commander.
Convinced that the intruder who had just snuck into the arena had stolen the Narnia Crystal, the ten guards immediately rushed out of the arena to join the pursuit of the blond.
Su Muyu walked into the empty arena as if strolling in a park, picked up the now-invisible Narnia Crystal, and calmly walked away to meet up with Lu Heng.
…
Meanwhile,
after chasing for two kilometers, the Scary Claw Demons began to return.
After meeting up, Lu Heng and Su Muyu killed three isolated Scary Claw Demons.
After hunting the Horned Demon yesterday, Lu Heng's level rose to Level 6, though he had no new major skills to allocate points to.
Su Muyu also reached Level 4, growing quickly.
Then, they returned the Narnia Crystal to Quenching Castle.
Gulu, holding the third piece of Narnia Crystal, was very pleased, "This is wonderful, thank you, my friend. As a token of my gratitude, have this Aurora Blade."
Subsequently, a data prompt popped up.
[Quest Completed: Collect Narnia Crystals]
[Reward Acquired: Aurora Blade]
A new item appeared on the character data panel.
[Item: Aurora Blade]
Su Muyu was also in the same situation, officially receiving the [Energy Crystal Bracelet] as a reward.
By evening,
Hu Biao and his group finally mined enough Flame Assistance Ore to complete their collection quest.
When they delivered the last cart of Flame Assistance Ore to Gulu, he was very pleased and told everyone:
"Now that we have enough materials, Quenching Castle needs to leave this damn place fast. Once I deactivate Quenching Castle's disguise, that damn Horned Demon Commander will surely discover us. You all must stop it from entering the castle."
Subsequently, everyone received a notification of a new advancement in a series of hidden quests.
[Hidden Quest Series "Crisis of Quenching Castle" entering the second phase.]
[Quest: Stop the Horned Demon Commander]
[Objective: Quenching Castle has gathered enough materials to leave the Abyss, but activating the space device will make the castle's disguise fail and face an attack by the Horned Demon Commander. Gulu asks you to stop the Horned Demon Commander until Quenching Castle escapes the Abyss.]
[Reward: The friendship of Quenching Master Gulu]
After the new quest appeared, Gulu added, "One more thing, after Quenching Castle leaves the Abyss, it will be discovered by a terrifying entity within the Abyss. The intensity of the Spiritual Pollution will increase by tens of times, so you must leave the Abyss quickly."
Since the Main Quest of the Abyss Battlefield was to survive for 3 days, it was now the evening of the third day.
According to the timeline, just enduring until midnight would complete the Main Quest and return to Blue Star.
Gulu also needed to adjust the space device parameters, which was estimated to be activated at midnight as well.
…
As twilight deepened, the final stage of the Abyss Battlefield was drawing near.
At that time,
A person returned to Quenching Castle, it was Blondie.
Blondie looked very disheveled; after arriving at Quenching Castle, he hung his head low as he passed through the main hall on the first floor, not daring to meet the eyes of Lu Heng and the others.
Seeing Blondie appear, Lu Heng was a bit surprised.
Earlier, Su Muyu had mentioned that Blondie sneaked into the Beast Fighting Arena, got discovered by a Horned Demon guard, and then his whereabouts were unknown after he fled the arena.
It had been over three hours since he escaped from the arena.
Hu Biao was also displeased to see Blondie, as he had vanished since noon, forcing him to complete double the mining tasks.
"Where have you been?" Hu Biao asked coldly.
Blondie rolled up his sleeves, revealing bandages on his arms, and said, "Boss Hu, are you interrogating me? While you guys were mining, I saw a Demon approaching the mine, and I lured it away, which is how I got injured."
"Oh, I see." The members of Hu Biao's team, hearing this, showed expressions of guilt.
Lu Heng watched him with interest and suddenly asked, "You met the Horned Demon Commander, right?"
"What?"
Blondie's eyes widened, feigning shock, "That thing is so terrifying, how could I possibly come back if I had seen it."
Others might have believed him,
especially since escaping the Horned Demon Commander was one of the objectives in the Main Quest of the Abyss Battlefield.
So logically, encountering the Horned Demon Commander meant near certain death.
But Lu Heng was different, aware of some secrets of the Abyss Battlefield.
The quests in the Abyss World weren't static; they changed with the situation.
And the Horned Demon Commander wasn't a stupid beast but a high-ranking intelligent Demon.
Intelligent beings share one characteristic: they can communicate.
What comes out of that communication depends on how it's conducted.
Thus, Lu Heng directly questioned, "What quest did you trigger from the Horned Demon Commander?"
"What... quest?" Blondie's forehead started to sweat.
"That's okay, I'll guess then. You must have provided information valuable enough to let you live. In this city, the only thing of such value could be none other than Quenching Castle."
It wasn't a hard guess; a high-ranking Demon wouldn't let go of food like Blondie for any lesser offerings.
Thus, it had to be Quenching Castle.
Seeing large beads of sweat form on Blondie's forehead, Lu Heng continued to guess, "Your triggered quest must be to prevent Quenching Castle from leaving the Abyss. The sub-quest would likely include deliberately exposing Quenching Castle's location and leading the Horned Demon Commander here to attack."
Blondie sweated even more now as Lu Heng's guess was almost exactly like the quest he had triggered.
He had been proud inside, having triggered such an exhilarating hidden quest.
By completing it, he could lead the Horned Demon Commander to wipe out everyone in Quenching Castle.
Yet before he could even start, Lu Heng had seen through it.
Moreover, such a hidden quest he triggered had another name: "Traitor Task."
Naturally, Blondie couldn't admit it and retorted loudly, "I didn't! You're slandering me! Why are you so malicious towards me?"
"Whether it's true or not doesn't matter; killing you will solve the problem regardless if you triggered the Traitor Task or not," Lu Heng said with a dangerous curve to his lips.