Chapter 86. Trial of the Prodigies, Round Two...
Lin Xiaoxiao and Xiao Weizhi mingled with Li Youran's team, and for the next ten days or so, they watched them clear away monsters, solve puzzles, and search for treasure chests, as if on a picnic.
They also found Gu Qingqi, Liu Huihui, Huang Yuwei, Jiang Tao, and Pei Shuyan, who were trapped in the maze. The remaining seven people are still missing.
Just as everyone was working together to defeat an epic boss, a divine being lurking in the shadows, dressed in a gray-white business suit, wielded a longsword that gleamed with platinum light, and slashed towards Lin Xiaoxiao's location.
Sensing something was wrong, she dodged to the side, then braced herself with her cane, holding it horizontally between her hands, and tilted her head to block the slash.
The next second, the gold-grade cane was forcefully cleaved in two.
Lin Xiaoxiao was also wrapped around the waist by Xiao Weizhi with one hand, and her whole body was turned half a circle along his side, quickly moving from the left to behind him.
Immediately afterwards, Xiao Weizhi used his staff as a weapon to block the man's repeated attacks.
Clang, clang... The sound of metal clashing together rang out one after another, and the divine favored one sprinkled a handful of dust on everyone present.
[Forced Acquisition: Enhanced Bad Luck buff (7 days) (Countdown: 167:59:44)]
[Strengthened Bad Luck Buff (7 days): Those who receive this buff will experience the ultimate misfortune in the coming days, like getting stuck in a cold water bowl. If your luck was already average, you might even feel the deepest malice from this world.]
Lin Xiaoxiao seized the opportunity and kicked the God-favored one, along with a special experience coin worth 200,000, into the ten-meter-deep pit in front of her, which was filled with sharp spikes.
Along with the explosion, the following also occurred:
[Agent of the Goddess of Fortune: Lin Xiaoxiao, defeated the servant of the [God of Misfortune], and obtained: 1 Complete Divine Seed]
Level 3 Divine Possession, a favored one of the Gods of Misfortune?
Lin Xiaoxiao stared at the deep pit billowing thick smoke, a look of vigilance flashing in her eyes. She was not at all surprised that the God of Misfortune's followers had been turned against him, but she did not expect that these followers had been turned so early.
Everyone looked at each other, as if they hadn't expected that everyone present would be passively given a bad luck buff.
Gu Qingqi chuckled awkwardly: "Well, this bad luck buff, the annotation looks a bit... well."
Liu Huihui helplessly wiped a drop of blood from his index finger with his clothes. He hadn't noticed when he sheathed his sword and had cut himself on the blade. "You mean bad luck?"
When Huang Yuwei saw that Liu Huihui's hand was cut, she tried to go over to check on him. However, she accidentally stepped on a small pebble and fell forward. She accidentally stumbled into a soldier in Li Youran's team, creating a domino effect. Due to a series of coincidences, many people around her fell down.
Li Youran almost fell straight into the still-smoking pit, but Lin Xiaoxiao reacted quickly and pulled her back by the wrist.
Li Youran bowed in gratitude: "Thank you for saving me."
Xiao Weizhi stared coldly at Li Youran, his thin lips pressed into a straight line, and his brows furrowed slightly.
He witnessed Li Youran clearly being able to avoid the pit on her own, but upon seeing Lin Xiaoxiao reach out, she immediately stopped all attempts to save herself and fell straight into the pit.
Lin Xiaoxiao reached out and took Xiao Weizhi's hand, then turned and left, saying, "You're welcome."
Subsequently, this team, which was formed at the last minute, experienced all sorts of unbelievable things.
For example, when fighting monsters, even though you've clearly aimed at the BOSS's fatal damage location, your skills always seem to deviate for some inexplicable reason, almost causing a team wipe.
While searching for the treasure chest, you have already safely avoided all the traps, but due to a series of coincidences, you inexplicably go back and fall into a trap, and finally you have to save yourself in a chaotic mess.
Among all these people, this bad luck buff had the least impact on Lin Xiaoxiao, with almost no change whatsoever.
Perhaps because she is an agent of the goddess of fortune, she possesses a certain degree of luck, which offsets some of the bad luck.
Time passed day by day, and the seven-day bad luck buff was almost over in just over an hour.
Having just finished fighting, Jiang Tao missed a step and stepped into a 1m x 1m hole, tumbling down into an underground tunnel. His scream echoed around him: "Ah—"
Liu Huihui stretched his hand out in mid-air but couldn't grab it. He turned his head and asked with a serious expression, "Boss, should we go down and save it?"
Xiao Weizhi reached up and rubbed his temples, sighed deeply, and said with a somewhat helpless expression, "Hmm."
The group slid through the tunnel for more than ten minutes and finally arrived at a huge cave, which was full of the lair of epic monster BOSS. They also met their teammates who had disappeared more than ten days ago.
However, their current situation doesn't seem too good:
Chen Feng, severely injured, held on to his last breath and stood in front of Cheng Cheng, whose face was ashen.
Lu Xumo stood in front of Shen Bi'an, who had lost a leg;
Li Junxuan stood with a tattered shield that was only a little over a meter long on his head. Behind him were Wang Hao, who was already pale and exhausted, slumped on the ground, and Chen Yijin, who had fallen into a coma.
Jiang Tao stood in front of his partners, gritting his teeth and holding on, pulling the output of more than a dozen BOSSes: "Boss, come quick, we can't hold on anymore."
Xiao Weizhi immediately raised his staff and cast seven or eight layers of thick shields made of ice elements on his lying companions behind him, blocking the fatal blows from the dozens of BOSSes in front of them.
Li Junxuan and Chen Feng breathed a sigh of relief upon seeing Xiao Weizhi and the others arrive. Then, they closed their eyes and lay down on the ground.
Seeing the miserable state of her companions, Lin Xiaoxiao suppressed her anger, kept a cold face, took out hundreds of experience coins from her space, each worth 100,000, and poured them into the weapons.
He unleashed a barrage of fire at the epic monster boss group before him.
Each experience coin explosion can instantly take down a monster boss.
[Congratulations to Lin Xiaoxiao from Dragon Kingdom for defeating the (Epic) Monster BOSS and earning 20 points]
Congratulations to the Dragon Kingdom...
Three minutes later, all the epic-level bosses in front of them fell to the ground, turning into a pile of treasure chests, experience points, and more than two thousand points.
Just as Jiang Tao was about to give a thumbs-up and praise, he caught a glimpse of several monster bosses crawling out from not far away. Without bothering to praise them again, he immediately raised his weapon, concealed his form, and continued to unleash his skills.
Xiao Weizhi stood in front of Lin Xiaoxiao, the tip of his staff emitting bursts of light.
A dozen or so magic circles floated in mid-air, piled up heavily, and countless fireballs, lightning strikes, ice spikes... fell like a torrential downpour, crashing down onto the monster BOSS group on the ground.
Li Youran and her teammates, armed, stood in a semi-circle protective formation around Lin Xiaoxiao and Xiao Weizhi.
The battle lasted from nightfall to dawn, and then back to nightfall.
After 34 hours of fighting, before everyone was exhausted, all the monsters were finally wiped out.
Meanwhile, Dragon Kingdom's points surged rapidly during this period, jumping from seventeenth place to ninth place on the leaderboard.
Lin Xiaoxiao closed her eyes tightly, and led Xiao Weizhi around the bodies of the monsters with precision, twisting and turning until they reached the very center, where she confirmed their location again and again using her perception technique.
Finally, pointing to a spot, he said to Xiao Weizhi beside him, "Weizhi, dig down two meters from here."
Xiao Weizhi took out an iron shovel from his spatial storage and dug down about a meter. With the last shovel, it seemed to hit some kind of barrier, and he could not dig any further.
His arm muscles tensed, and he repeatedly shoveled at the same spot dozens of times. Finally, with a sound like shattering glass, the protective barrier broke, revealing a hole of about ten square meters below.
A secret realm core, emitting a faint earthy yellow hue, floats in the cave.
However, the Infinite Treasure Vault skill fragments that Lin Xiaoxiao wanted were not placed inside this core.
When Xiao Weizhi carried the core of the secret realm out of the deep pit.
Standing on the edge, Lin Xiaoxiao's expression was extremely solemn. One hand was crossed over her chest, and the other was half-curled up to cover her mouth. She kept muttering to herself, "It looks so close, but it's actually so far away; so close, so far, so close, so far..."
After reading for two or three minutes, Lin Xiaoxiao had a flash of inspiration and remembered the special features of the Wilderness Maze.
She turned around, took Xiao Weizhi's hand with her left hand, and grabbed the newly obtained secret realm core with her right hand, pouring a large amount of magic power into the secret realm core.
The light from the secret realm core in his hand grew brighter and brighter, until the earthy yellow light filled the entire cave.
When Lin Xiaoxiao and Xiao Weizhi, who were standing still, were teleported to a special place.
The two floated hand in hand thousands of meters in the air. The semi-transparent barrier above their heads emitted a faint, cold light under the moonlight. Beneath their feet was a yellowish-brown maze that had shrunk many times over and possessed spatial power.
Xiao Weizhi's brows furrowed slightly into a shallow "川" shape. He stared intently for a while, then asked uncertainly, "Is the maze below trembling?"
The maze appeared to be trembling slightly, but the trembling was subtle and required careful observation to detect.
Lin Xiaoxiao continued to channel her magic power into the core of the secret realm with her other hand, raising an eyebrow in admiration: "Yes, although it's called a secret realm, it's very special..."
The most unique aspect of the Wilderness Maze is that it is a symbiotic secret realm that lives on the back of a creature called the World Turtle Monster.
There were no class distinctions or racial restrictions; most of the land was used to build special combat training grounds or to create a unique territory.
As Lin Xiaoxiao continued to channel her magic, the two of them passed through the protective shield and continued to ascend for more than four thousand meters.
At an altitude of nearly 10,000 meters, Xiao Weizhi could barely make out part of the World Turtle's appearance.
This is a giant tortoise with a brownish-yellow body.
Its overall area looks larger than the capital city. On its back is not a tortoise shell, but a winding maze, and above the maze is a semi-transparent barrier connecting to the tortoise shell.
This world tortoise is slowly walking through a vast expanse of yellow sand. Wherever it passes, fertile land instantly turns into a large sandy area, as if all its nutrients have been sucked away.
[World Turtle (Pseudo-God Level): Gentle in nature, it feeds on earth elements found in the land through constant walking. It carries a secret realm imbued with spatial power on its back. It has no level, rating, or race for survival, and the secret realm on its back can be customized according to preference.]
Lin Xiaoxiao kept scanning back and forth, trying to find the skill fragment she wanted.
The two floated 10,000 meters above the world tortoise, braving the cold wind, and waited for more than two hours. Their clothes were covered with ice crystals, but they didn't see a single fragment.
Just as she was about to give up, the bright moon slowly rose to its highest point, and under the moonlight, a tiny point of light flickered twice.
It was those two flashes that allowed her to pinpoint the location of the skill fragment.
A hint of surprise flashed in Lin Xiaoxiao's eyes as she handed the secret realm core in her hand to Xiao Weizhi.
Then, a bright light emanated from her right hand, and she used the All Things Extraction Technique to retrieve the fragment that was hidden in another dimension and bound by chains formed from moonlight energy.
As the fragment approached, it transformed into a stream of light and swiftly merged into her body.
Congratulations on obtaining: Endless Treasure Vault Skill Fragment [2/3]
Without Lin Xiaoxiao's magical power to enhance it, the core of the secret realm began to lose its light, and the two of them slowly began to descend.
The moment Xiao Weizhi fell, he pulled Lin Xiaoxiao into his arms to protect her, just before they both fell back into the wilderness maze.
Dozens of kilometers away, a team of seventy professionals, dressed in black cloaks, stopped halfway up the mountain and watched the enormous world tortoise pass by.
The leading man seemed to sense something, his eyes fixed intently on the moving world tortoise.
The burly man next to the man asked in a hoarse voice, "Boss, why are you staring at that turtle?"
The man's voice was hoarse, but not harsh: "I have a feeling that there's something familiar about that turtle."
The burly man pulled a dry, hard flatbread from his pocket and stuffed it into his mouth: "Boss, do you want to eat turtle meat?"
The man didn't reply. Instead, he watched the world turtle disappear into the distance before calling to his teammates behind him, "Let's go!"
The group left silently, gradually disappearing into the dark wilderness.
Lin Xiaoxiao and Xiao Weizhi had just returned to the wilderness maze when they heard a notification sound:
[Trial of the Prodigies, Round Two: The core of the Wilderness Maze has been found; the trial is over]
[Rankings: First Place... Ninth Place: Dragon Kingdom...]
The countries ranked at the bottom ten are: Tara, Ross... Professionals from these countries will not be eligible for the third trial.
As the voice announced this, soon after, beams of light, like the aurora borealis, slowly appeared and enveloped the surviving professionals in the maze, drawing out some of the filth from their bodies every ten seconds.
This is the reward for completing the second trial: Holy Light.
The longer these light screens remain, the more impurities accumulated in the body will be removed, and one's talents will be further enhanced through the cleansing process of these light screens.
Six hours later, the light barrier faded, and the surviving professionals all received further enhancements to their talents.
This time, the stay is for one day, and before the next event even begins, everyone has already received advance notice:
[Do you wish to withdraw from the Trial of the Prodigies?]
[Quit now and you can leave with the rewards you earned from the first two rounds.]
It is now confirmed that Chen Yijin, Chen Feng, Li Junxuan, Wang Hao, Shen Bi'an, and Lu Xumo are all unable to continue participating in the third trial.
Whether Liu Huihui, Huang Yuwei, Gu Qingqi, Jiang Tao, Pei Shuyan, and Li Youran's team should continue to participate in the third trial has become an important issue that needs to be discussed.
A group of people sat in a circle, discussing whether or not to participate in the third trial.
Of those present, only the members of the Dragon Fang Squad remained completely abstaining from the discussion, neither indicating whether they would participate nor not.
Gu Qingqi downed the water in his cup in one gulp, slamming the cup down on the table with a thud. He said in a muffled voice, "It's rare for a professional from our Dragon Kingdom to make it to the third round of the Trial of the Prodigies. We definitely have to participate."
Pei Shuyan nodded in agreement: "Yes, it's said that the reward for the third round is a treasure that everyone wants."
Treasures? In a sense, they can be considered treasures!
The ultimate reward for the third round is: a spot favored by the gods, and a seed of divinity; plus rewards for the top few, and various items that can be redeemed with points.
In her previous life, she also believed the rumors and entered the third trial with great enthusiasm.
After fighting tooth and nail to get third place, I was utterly disappointed when I found out that the ultimate reward was a spot favored by the gods.
It was after this trial ended that they went to the City of Divine Favor to receive their reward.
This exposed her past life to the people of the City of Gods, foreshadowing the tragic fate that would haunt her for years to come.
Lin Xiaoxiao rested her head on Xiao Weizhi's shoulder, yawned boredly, and looked uninterested, showing no intention of joining their discussion.
As if sensing that Lin Xiaoxiao wasn't very interested in the third round, Li Youran tentatively asked, "Miss Lin, do you think it's better to participate in the third trial or not?"
Lin Xiaoxiao freed herself from the large hand around her waist, sat up straight, looked at Li Youran sitting not far away with a serious expression, and chuckled: "You can participate if you want, or you can stay if you don't want to."
What is a mere "divine favor" slot to her is an extremely rare treasure in the eyes of professionals, not to mention those items that can only be exchanged after safely passing the third round.
Ultimately, all members of the Dragon Fang team except Lin Xiaoxiao and Xiao Weizhi withdrew from the third trial and returned to reality, all because of Lin Xiaoxiao's words: 'The third trial is a hunting competition among monsters for professionals from various countries. Even sixth-level professionals who go in may not necessarily come out alive.'
There are quite a few favored individuals mixed in with the third round. With such tempting rewards this time, it's estimated that there will be even more favored followers, attendants, and wish-granting officials appearing.
After seeing all the members of Longya leave the secret realm, Li Youran, after careful consideration, chose to leave the trial as well.
Seeing that everyone had withdrawn from the trial, Gu Qingqi and Pei Shuyan discussed it for a while, and then pulled Xiao Weizhi aside to whisper and chat for a long time. After much deliberation, they gritted their teeth and withdrew from the third trial.
Lin Xiaoxiao watched them leave, then sighed softly, "I miss Redtail and Treasure Hunt."
Xiao Weizhi put his arm around her waist and gently comforted her, "You can go home after you finish the third trial."
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