Galbis’ Glare!
Originally, Qin Ruo intended to just test try out this skill by wearing the Eye of Galbis and attempted to absorb the MP from the Underworld creatures in nearby buildings.
After three seconds, Eye of Galbis’ glare suddenly turned intense and, slowly, a minute amount of MP started to flow into the necklace…
However, Qin Ruo did not seem to notice the effects. He was instead spooked by Majestic Hero and Black God who were staring at him.
After seeing them staring straight at the Eye of Galbis in front of his chest, then he realized the eerie changes of the necklace.
“What’s wrong?”
“Huh?”
Before they were able to ask him why did he switch his necklace and what’s going with this weird necklace… They heard loud concentrated galloping noises from afar heading toward them.
Both of them frowned and focused on the noise, ignoring Qin Ruo’s necklace immediately and completely. They then quickly turned to Qin Ruo. “Damn, they’re fast! To arms! It’s the Skeleton Knights!”
“Remember. Take out the leader of the patrol team.”
“Roger.”
Confirming his order, Qin Ruo set his eyes on the area a distance away from the streets but did not condense his magic yet. There were houses right and left, with the Underworld creatures’ roars and growls started to recede…
Having his attention diverted, Galbis’ Gaze was halted automatically. The red lights within the Mirror Cloak also disappeared. The Eye of Galbis finally returned to its “resting eye” mode.
Even though they knew there was a patrol team heading toward their way, they still did not stop moving. They instead maintained onward toward the coordinates that they were following. While they were pressing forward, the noise of the footsteps of the patrol team and the gallops of the horses were getting clearer by the minute.
Then, the Skeleton Knight patrols appeared from the next turn of the street. Riding dark gray skeleton horses, they rode out like actual knights and locked onto the three eye-catching human players in the streets. They roared loudly and then thunderously galloped toward them.
The ground shook as though there was an earthquake—the morale of the knights was sky high!
Even though these were merely a group of Level 58 Underworld creatures, the Skeleton Knights rode fast on their horses, displaying truculent vigor—as though it could crush anything by their sheer presence. The horse and knights, as though they were fused into one entity, rushed toward their enemies with imposing spirits that rivaled that of Tier 6 monsters. Even Qin Ruo, who had just gone through the battle of Galbis’ Lair, felt that these knights were almost as threatening as a team of Cyclops Archers.
If Qin Ruo were not someone who often operated solo, or had seen waves of monsters that were much more frightening, or had faced off depressingly powerful Mega Bosses and Tier 6 Bosses and even slew a Tier 5 Ultimate Boss… He might have got entirely stunned by the indomitable wills of the Underworld knights.
In an instant, Qin Ruo pulled himself together, raised his Water Dragon’s Staff, and pointed at the Skeleton Knight patrols that were speeding toward them. Three water elemental balls started to condense. Two seconds later they turned into three ferocious wolf skulls!
By then, Majestic Hero and Black God already had experience fighting the Skeleton Knights. Thus, they were not affected by their imposing vigor. Three of them stood together, covering each other’s back, and started to channel their mana…
***
“Rooaaar!”
The Skeleton Knights did not slow down even after detecting a strong influx of mana ahead. They still headed straight into the three humans, like an arrow released from a bow.
“Lightning Converge!”
After Majestic Hero bellowed loudly, suddenly a clap of thunder roared through the sky of Buried City. Three huge thick violet lightning bolts plunged down and converged into one, shaped like a trident! The timing and accuracy of the lightning bolts were also rather superb—shooting directly at the leading Skeleton Knight, who was almost thirty meters away from Majestic Hero. It had a symbol that looked like an eerie looking eye on its chest.
Electricity rushed through the body of the Skeleton Knights. Even the skeleton horse beneath it neighed in agony and stood up lifting hooves, throwing the knight off its back…
The rest of Skeleton Knights did not appear to be affected by the fact their leader had now fallen off its horse. With expert riding techniques, they split up and rode towards Majestic Hero, Black God, and Qin Ruo.
Even though now they were now threatening close to him, Qin Ruo did not allow this to affect him one bit. Following Majestic Hero’s attack, he shot another three strikes of Lycan Barrage at the Skeleton Knight leader, who was paralyzed and kicked off his horse.
As for the rest of the Skeleton Knights, it was the concern of another person—Black God.
Although this seemed to be a heavy task, he squatted down and leered at the speeding Skeleton Knights. He let out a laugh and said, “Get down from your horses!”
Booom!
As he finished his words, several dozen black tentacles emerged near the skeleton horses’ hooves. As Black God unleashed a spell, they quickly entangled the horses’ legs.
Qin Ruo was also observing Black God’s techniques against the Skeleton patrols, using his Elemental Perception, while commanding the wolf skulls. W he saw how the tentacles got their prey, he could not help but feel pity for them, even though they were Skeleton Knights.
As the horses neighed in agony, the knights’ tragedy had only just begun.
When these knights were now away from their horses, they had become merely normal Level 58 Underworld creatures to Qin Ruo, Majestic Hero, and Black God…
Defeating these Level 58 Monsters was too easy.
Boom!
Dark Vajra had shown up after heeding Black God’s summoning.
It immediately stood in front of the trio and blocked the attacks that were shot out panickly by the Skeleton Knights. Then, a golden ray rushed out from Dark Vajra’s enormous back.
Bop! Bop!
The instant Poochie butted two Skeleton Knights into the air, several light balls infused with Holy magic rushed into their bodies. As Pets could not utilize Potions, it was vital for them to preserve their MP.
While all of these were happening, Majestic Hero and Black God also resumed their attacks. Qin Ruo joined in the battle after finishing off the Skeleton Knight leader.
“Multiple Frostbursts!”
“Thunderburst!”
With the help of three Pets, the three of them were able to quickly end their first battle in the Buried City.
***
After the battle was over, Qin Ruo quickly collected a few loot before catching up to their moving party.
“I’m curious… You even picked up Violet equipment. Why? You have too much inventory space?” Black God spoke in amusement.
“This is what I call ‘prudence’.”
This reply amused Black God even further.
“Looting Violet quality is being prudent? Ha! I’ll just see how long would it take for you to throw them away!”
“…”
Qin Ruo shrugged indifferently and followed the team. While he was picking up pace, he activated Galbis’ Glare again and absorbed 50 MP from the Skeleton Warriors that were in the buildings.
The Eye of Galbis was now fully open and glaring at its prey again!
***
“Bloody hell!”
Several minutes passed and Black God could not help but swear.
It was merely ten minutes since they first came out from the entrance, and they had already encountered five groups of Underworld Knights and Death Knight patrols. This constant encounter rate was fairly unusual.
“We did not experience this many encounters last night—there were only two to three groups of patrols. What’s going on today? Qin Ruo, are you wearing some kind of cologne? They all seemed to have drawn out when you appear.”
“…”
Qin Ruo was starting to get used to Black God’s rants so he only looked at the sky while listening to his tantrums.
Majestic Hero who was walking in front of them speculated, “There really is no surprise. This Buried City has always been a mysterious place. This time we had an addition of two teams of players, so the level of difficulty could have been increased due to the number of players in the party.”
“But we are not currently doing any quest, how should it raise the difficulty?”
Black God disagreed. “And I was here alone earlier too, but the difficulty did not get any easier?”
“Alone?”
Majestic Hero threw him a glance.
“Yeah.” Black God continued, “I came in here once right after I’ve established my clan…”
“… now that’s curious.” Majestic Hero frowned.
Before they could figure out what was wrong, the familiar sound of galloping could be heard from afar again…
‘F*ck!
‘Not again?!’
Even Qin Ruo too found this unusually high encounter rate a tad bit annoying. And from the heavy gallops of noise, they could determine that they were the heavily dark armored Death Knights again!
This was the sixth group of patrols they had encountered. At this rate, even if three of them fled five kilometers away, it would reach the time Eye of Hades started its patrol routine again.
There would not be enough time for them to help the Tier 5 player from Hall of Heroes to complete the Golden Key mission!
And Angelic Wings were not allowed too!
This annoying feeling of limitation, coupled with these countless persistent sticky-candy-like patrols, really was getting on his nerves.
As they were positioning themselves, for battle, against the direction from where the sounds of galloping came from, suddenly they heard another wave of horse gallops from their back… From beyond the junction they just passed by…
They were so shocked!
Two groups?!
“Something’s off!” Majestic Hero stopped his steps and quickly glanced at the Death Knights that were already showing up far ahead of them. He looked behind then spoke to Qin Ruo and Black God, “Something must have gone wrong.”
“…” Qin Ruo and Black God both nodded.
Something indeed must have gone wrong! These patrols did not seem to be averagely spread across the streets in Buried City—it was almost like they were actively chasing after and surrounding them.
However, currently they had no other options but to fight off the incoming enemies. They could not afford to be distracted yet. If they were going to figure out what was next, they would need to fend off these two groups of patrols that were surrounding them first.
“You two handle the front; leave the ones in the back to me!”
Qin Ruo said with firm resolve and immediately turned invisible in front of his two teammates…
For the first time, Majestic Hero and Black God witnessed his unique morphing ability. Qin Ruo climbed onto the roofs of the two houses by the street like a gibbon.
As he was ready to completely one-shot the Death Knight patrols that were sprinting toward them from the rooftop, he was shaken by the sight that he saw from the high ground!
Geez!
On the convoluted and imposing streets of the Buried City, there were at least a dozen teams of Underworld Knight patrols racing toward their direction…
Their target destination was obviously exactly where the three of them were standing!
Qin Ruo felt nothing but shivers run down his spine!