◎They haven't even scratched the surface!◎

Since the blood mist disappeared, the originally hidden stairs leading to the second floor gradually became apparent.

The group reorganized their backpacks, waited for the cooldown of all their skills to end, and then went upstairs one by one.

There is a long corridor on the second floor with carpet on the floor. The corridor extends all the way out with no end in sight. The atmosphere is particularly weird.

There were six doors on each side of the corridor. They tried one door after another and found that the handle of only one door could be turned.

"Looks like this is the place," Bai Guo held the ball handle with one hand and lowered his voice to remind the team behind.

Everyone held their breath and nodded.

The door opened quietly, a light flashed quickly inside, and then everyone entered the room.

This is a study room, it is very large, at least a hundred square meters.

The first thing they did upon entering the new map was to look for monsters. Baiguo, Poxiao and Luo Pan did not hesitate and walked around the study room with their weapons, but they did not find any traces of monsters.

"Do I need to complete some task to trigger it?" Dawn scratched his head and searched the room again.

Suddenly, his eyes fell on the floor clock in the study. It was exactly the same clock as the one on the first floor, and it appeared in his field of vision twice in a row. It was impossible for him to ignore it.

"Dawn?" Bai Guo asked when he saw him walking straight towards the grandfather clock.

"I want to give it a try..." Poxiao stood in front of the grandfather clock, looked at the time on the dial, stretched out his hand, and prepared to adjust the position of the hour hand.

Baili Xi and others discovered his behavior, but did not stop him. Instead, they quietly stood beside him to prevent any monster from suddenly appearing.

Xia Li was a little surprised, but also a little relieved. It seemed like everyone would be able to find the clue quickly without her. She watched Poxiao tiptoe, flip open the clock face, and then slowly move the hour hand from 12 to 11, 10, and finally to 6.

Ding! Ding! Ding! …

Six regular and shocking bell sounds came from behind the floor clock. Everyone's heart tightened, and they instinctively felt that something was about to happen.

Something really happened. Xia Li turned around calmly, staring at the door of the room that they had closed.

Soon, the whole room seemed to be caught in a reversed flow of time. The books that fell on the ground were automatically put back on the bookshelf, and the coffee on the rectangular table began to steam. Then, everyone saw a monster with an extremely terrifying appearance walking back backwards from outside the study, and finally stopped in front of the desk, stroking the cane in his hand while staring at an open book on the table.

“Oh my god!”

Even though they knew this was a copy and everything was fictional, when they saw a monster walking backwards back to its original position, Qingzhengyu and the others were still scared and cursed inwardly.

The time was turned back to 6 hours ago by dawn. After a brief pause, the picture suddenly froze and the monster's scarlet eyes stared straight at them.

"They've discovered us, start fighting." Baili Xi reacted quickly and started giving orders.

Baiguo cast an identification spell and warned the team, "It's an ogre. Everyone, be careful."

The ogre doesn't have any particularly awesome skills. The only thing you need to note is that he has a sacrificial staff in his hand, which looks similar to the priest staff in the player's hand.

When his health drops by 10%, he will use the sacrificial staff to randomly name a player. The person named must leave the room, otherwise he will explode in the study and blow up the health bars of all teammates.

In order to test this skill, Dawn was targeted once and Qingzhengyu was targeted twice. If Qingzhengyu was not a priest and could heal himself, he would have been killed by the ogre's skills after being targeted twice in a row.

After figuring this out, Xia Li was pleased to find that Baiguo and the others' progress in fighting the ogres had accelerated a lot.

Whoever is called out should prepare the red medicine and run out of the room. After the small light ball above his head explodes, he should immediately take the medicine and then run back to the room to continue fighting.

After grinding for nearly an hour, the ogre finally fell to the ground and a bunch of things exploded from his body.

It has to be said that the output of the private copy is much better than that of the public copy. While everyone was picking up things frantically, they were secretly glad that Xia Li had taken the scroll back from Dark Storm. Otherwise, they might be the ones who spent a lot of money to buy the scroll today.

Xia Li casually picked up a dagger at her feet and said, "Ogre Dagger, a precious blue item with the [Shadow Strike] special effect. Dawn, your weapon."

Aren't thieves the most fond of sneaking around? This special effect is very suitable for thieves. A passive skill that has a 50% chance to damage enemy targets within a 2-meter range when in sprint mode.

Under the original sprint setting, the thief can only sprint for 1-5 seconds (depending on the skill level), during which time he cannot release attack skills, which is a bit restrictive. However, with the Shadow Strike bonus, the player can cause certain damage to the enemy even while escaping, giving the opponent a taste of his own medicine.

Poxiao was naturally very happy. He hugged the dagger and kissed and touched it.

Not only the thief equipment, but also the archers Yuese, Zero and the warrior Baiguo, who did not pick up any equipment in the first round, all picked up equipment suitable for them in this round, and everyone's face was filled with happy smiles.

In addition, a number of light ball bombs exploded in the study. Like the potions, they came in three sizes: large, medium, and small, for a total of nine. Based on her DPS contribution, Xia Li received the most, receiving three: one large, one medium, and one small.

The ogre is dealt with, and the whole team is ready to move on to the third level.

Before leaving.

"Wow, the hour hand has moved back another notch!" Steamed Fish pointed at the clock face of the grandfather clock and exclaimed.

Everyone then looked at the clock face. The hour hand, originally set to 6 o'clock by Dawn, had unknowingly moved back another notch. It seemed that time was the hidden thread that connected the entire instance, but they couldn't yet fully connect the story behind the timeline.

The third level was in the basement. The iron door leading to the basement opened automatically, and a group of people pushed each other and squeezed in.

There was still a grandfather clock in the dim basement, and the hour hand still pointed to 12 o'clock. Now everyone understood what to do to trigger the monster, so Steamed Fish was the first to rush up and fiddle with the pointer, turning the hour hand to 5 o'clock.

As expected, after five heavy chimes, nine monsters emerged from the darkness. The largest one in the center formed the core, with the remaining eight surrounding it, ready to strike at any moment.

Xia Li looked ahead and gritted her teeth secretly. The most difficult place was finally here. If she could defeat them, she could return with a full prize. If she couldn't... then she would have to fight again next time.

I just don't know when the next one will be. After all, human energy is limited, and high-intensity dungeon runs can't be scheduled too closely together, otherwise it will backfire, wasting mana and potions while also being a physical and mental torture for the team members.

And tomorrow is the day when the Scarlet Monastery will be invalidated, and they don't have much time to fail.

Before she could think any more, she heard Baili Xi give the order: "Let's fight."

Everyone rushed forward immediately, using all sorts of skills to dart around in the basement, accompanied by all sorts of cool weapon sound effects. The entire basement was filled with the smell of gunpowder.

However, with the confidence built up from their previous two victories, everyone fought with exceptional confidence this time. It was only nine monsters, and they'd faced levels with this number before. As long as they followed their previous plan, with warriors charging, paladins pulling, mages and marksmen positioning themselves for damage, and priests healing, and with a powerful alchemist like Li Shen around, clearing the level was a matter of time.

However, 50 minutes later...

Everyone felt unprecedented pressure.

After nearly an hour, they had only managed to eliminate 3 of the 8 monsters? And they hadn't even gotten a sliver of the third monster in the center!

They all fought with all their might, and each of them had changed into precious equipment dropped from the first two rounds of dungeons. Their output was not low at all, but why didn't they have any advantage in the confrontation?

If they continue to fight at this pace, assuming they have enough mana and health, it will take at least another 2 hours to pass this level.

That was more than 5 hours, and everyone was gritting their teeth and holding on while secretly calculating in their hearts.

In fact, sometimes all you need to win a dungeon is a breath and a hope. As long as there is hope, you don’t have to worry about losing.

But the problem is that they have no idea at all. The 5-hour clearance plan they had previously planned was based on the assumption that they had enough resources. However, their blue medicine is gradually running out, and no one knows whether they can still hold on.

Among them, the mages Windmill and Wisteria, who consumed the fastest mana, were the first to report to the team.

"President, there is only one bottle of blue medicine left!" Dafengche looked at Baili Xi anxiously, hoping to get some feedback from him.

"Me too. I only have two bottles of blue medicine left." Zi Teng said and drank one bottle directly. Her blue bar only went up a little bit. As she made a move, the blue bar that had just gone up fell down again in almost the blink of an eye.

Now no one in the team has the skill to restore mana instantly, and Zi Teng can only watch her mana bar decrease, and finally it directly became 2%. She wanted to run to the corner and hide, wait for the potion cooling time to pass, and then give herself the last bottle of mana.

Unexpectedly, a small monster spotted her, chased her all the way, and hacked at her!

In the blink of an eye, Zi Teng fell down, and the others felt a pang of fear in their hearts. With one less output, they were under even greater pressure.

"Why do I feel that the output of these monsters is getting higher and higher?" Baiguo withdrew his gaze from Zi Teng's ID and asked with a frown.

"I think so too. The first time the monster hit me, it only dealt 400 damage. The second time it became 500. And just now it was the third time, it directly reached 700! It's outrageous!" Dafengche said it was difficult. He was a fragile mage. If he was hit again, he would be dead on the spot.

As the saying goes, when a person is unlucky, even drinking cold water will get stuck in his teeth. As soon as the windmill's crow's mouth closed, the fourth attack fell on his head in the blink of an eye.

Just heard a plop!

ID: Big windmill, gray.

"President, are you going to leave the battle?"

On this side, Xia Li was also sweating profusely from running. If she had not been fast enough to dodge several attacks, her fate would probably have been the same as Zi Teng and the windmill.

With the help of the blood-red gloves, she threw a poison gas critical strike at the fourth monster. The original skill plus the critical strike triggered the fourth monster's health bar to zero, and it fell to the ground with a bang.

"There are three small ones and one big one left. President, do you want to leave the battle?" Xia Li ran to Baili Xi and asked again.

-over-