Could it be that Richard was planning to follow these three men in black robes to see what they were doing in the Scorched Earth Secret Realm, and at the same time, to confirm his own guess.
However, there are three people on the other side, who not only cooperate well with each other, but also are all very strong. If I rashly go up and follow them, I will easily be discovered by the other side.
Of course, the most important thing is that the strength of our side is too different from that of the other side! Otherwise, we would not be afraid of being discovered by the other side. If they were discovered, we could just take them down directly.
Gorkan? His strength was negligible. Even as a candidate for tracking, he was definitely 100% unqualified.
Blood bone puppet? Obviously, it won't work. First, it's too big. Second, it's a common problem for undead creatures. When they walk, they either make a "clacking" sound or a "thumping" sound, which makes them too loud! It's too easy to be discovered.
Just as Richard was still thinking about whether to follow and how to follow, Gorkan beside him suddenly screamed.
But he reacted immediately and covered his mouth.
It turned out that a small lava snake was hiding in the cracks of the rocks. Seeing Gorkan approaching, it bit his calf fiercely! In order to avoid the energy fluctuations of the witchcraft from attracting the attention of the black-robed man, Richard and Gorkan did not cast defensive witchcraft.
"Swish!" Richard immediately nailed the lava snake to death with one sword, and threw the two halves of the snake body into the lava pool in front.
Although the lava snakes in the lava pool didn't know why the "food" fell from the sky, they obviously took off and jumped into the air to start fighting for it.
Lava snakes generally do not actively attack their own kind, but when they see the corpses of their own kind, they don't mind using them to fill their stomachs.
In a short while, the body of the small lava snake was eaten up.
"Zlatko, there seemed to be some movement over there just now?" The black-robed man who was casting the Shadow Gun stopped and asked with a little confusion.
The other two black robes also stopped and after carefully sensing it, they said, "Mohetal, you are too sensitive. That is an internal fight among the lava snakes."
"Okay, I guess I was wrong."
The black-robed man named Mohetal shook his head and continued moving forward towards the designated target point.
This made Richard break out in a cold sweat.
I was almost discovered! Fortunately, I quickly killed the lava snake that attacked me, and threw its body into the lava pool, which caused a commotion among the lava snakes and covered up the incident.
It seems that the tracking is no longer possible because the opponent's perception is too sharp.
When Richard looked again, he found that the three people were no longer visible.
"Master, I'm so sorry! I..." Gorkan was ashamed. He almost got into big trouble just now.
Richard waved his hand, "It's okay. You have to be careful next time. The deeper you go, the more difficult the elemental creatures will be."
"If the situation is really critical, Gorkan, you should crush the teleportation stone yourself first."
"Master, what about you?"
"Don't worry, I also have a teleportation stone! Let's go and keep moving forward." - "Okay, we're here. This should be the place." The black-robed man in the middle suddenly stopped and said.
The other two men in black robes each took out a compass-like object and chanted a spell. A faint wave of witchcraft energy came out, as if they were trying to accurately locate something.
"Yes, Mohetal, this should be the place. Let's start now so as to avoid any more trouble."
"Um!"
The black-robed man in the middle took out a black box from his arms and opened the buckle with a "click".
A strong smell of blood spread out, and inside the black box, there was a purple-red, fist-sized round sphere.
"You two are responsible for guarding. I will prepare to perform the spell. It will take three minutes. Is that ok?"
"No problem! Mohetal, don't worry!"
As Mohetal's low incantation sounded, a blood essence ball was seen floating in the air at chest height, and began to emit tremendous blood energy in all directions.
Dozens of seconds later, suddenly, a blood-red light column as thick as a bowl burst out from the blood sperm ball and shot straight into the sky.
If it weren't for the low visibility in the Scorched Earth Secret Realm, I believe at this moment, Richard would be able to clearly see several blood-red light pillars shooting straight into the sky not far from him. ——Touge City Lord's Mansion.
"Hawkins, I've had a bad feeling these past two days, as if something is going to happen." An old gray dwarf, sitting on a large soft leather sofa and holding a dark brown solid wood pipe, spoke up.
His hair and beard were all white, and his clothes were simple yet luxurious. If you looked closely at his black wizard robe, you could see that it was made of some extremely rare silk material, which was expensive and smooth.
The cuffs and collar are decorated with multiple gold threads. The most eye-catching feature is a cross pattern of a hammer and an axe surrounded by a circular ear of wheat embroidered in gold thread on the left chest of the black wizard robe.
I think it should be the emblem of some wealthy nobles in the gray dwarf area.
Hawkins took a big sip of the bubbling beer and said, "Baghdadi, as an old friend, I advise you not to think too much sometimes. By the way, do you really want to try this newly brewed beer? It will definitely impress you and make you forget your troubles!"
"Haha, is the beer you brought this time really as good as you said?"
"Then I'll try it too! Although I don't like drinking beer very much, but since it's recommended by your old friend, I will definitely try it." Baghdadi put down the pipe in his hand and said with a smile.
Hawkins picked up a large wooden beer mug filled with the fragrant liquid and handed it to Baghdadi.
"Come, let's forget our troubles! Cheers!"
"Gudong, gudong!"
"Great! This is how you drink beer." Hawkins drank it all in one gulp!
Seeing Hawkins drinking so happily, Baghdadi also took a big sip. He frowned at first, but the next second, his slightly narrowed eyes suddenly brightened: "It tastes bitter first and sweet later. It has a very special aftertaste and freshness!!"
"Hawkins, where did you get this beer? It tastes really good!!"
"Gudong, gudong!"
Baghdadi poured a full glass of new rye beer directly into his throat.
"Hiccup! Hawkins, I realized it's not that I don't like beer, it's because I've never tasted this kind of beer!"
"By the way, is the production process of this beer very complicated? The output is very small?" Baghdadi, who hadn't drunk beer for a long time, burped without any noble manners after drinking a large glass of beer, and asked curiously.
"Baghdadi, don't worry. As long as you like this kind of beer, I will provide you with as much as you want!" Hawkins patted his strong chest and assured his old friend.
"My only request is that you, my old friend, help me promote this wine among the nobles in Tug City. After all, even good wine needs a deep cellar."
"Hey, Hawkins, could it be that you have already mastered the sales channels for this new type of beer?" Baghdadi, who was experienced and shrewd, immediately realized that Hawkins was likely to have mastered the sales channels for this new type of beer.
"No, Baghdadi, you guessed wrong. I not only own the channels, I am a shareholder of this new type of beer!" Hawkins said with a little pride.
"What! You didn't even ask me to join you in this matter? That's so mean!"
As the lord of a city, he had already thought about the benefits that could be generated by the new beer he had just tasted.
Hawkins looked at his old friend's face full of envy and disbelief and couldn't help but burst out laughing.
Suddenly, the entire Tug City shook slightly.
Immediately afterwards, a blood-red beam of light shot out from the monument in the center of the city, and then the vibration became more and more intense.
"Not good!" Baghdadi rushed out without even saying hello to Hawkins.
"Not good! There's something wrong with the seal of the secret realm." Hawkins immediately reacted. - All the residents in Tug City seemed to hear a sound similar to glass breaking in their minds, as if a corner of a complete glass window was broken by a naughty child with a stone.
"Selim! Did you break the window at home?" A gray dwarf woman holding a spatula in the kitchen shouted towards the living room.
"Mom, it's not me! Did you also hear the sound of glass breaking?" A young male voice sounded.
"Maybe a piece of glass in the store next door is broken. I'll go out and take a look."
After a while, the ground of the entire Tug City began to shake gradually, and it became stronger and stronger! "Crack!"
The ground in the northeast corner of Tug City suddenly began to collapse on a large scale, revealing a large hole with a diameter of tens of meters on the originally flat ground. Yellow-white high-temperature gases kept emerging from the ground, instantly filling the surroundings with smoke.
At this time, many residents of Tug City, young and old, who lived near the collapsed area, walked out of their crooked bungalows, looking at the collapsed ground in front of them and the deep cave that suddenly appeared, with horror on their faces.
“Is this an earthquake?”
"It should be, but why did a big hole suddenly appear here?"
The residents began to whisper in groups of three or four.
The deep cave that suddenly appeared at the collapse site began to emit a light red glow, and the temperature around it began to rise slowly.
Among the residents of Tug City, there are many brave gray dwarf boys. At this time, holding weapons such as shields and sledgehammers, they bravely and slowly walk towards the collapsed area filled with smoke.
"Ahem. Selim! You little bastard, come back quickly and don't go!" A gray dwarf lady shouted anxiously.
The strong smell of sulfide made the gray dwarf cough continuously. She wanted to pull her child away, but found that the child had already run away.
"Mom, it's okay. I have a shield and a hammer. There may be treasures in the collapsed area. If I go too late, they will be gone."
A gray dwarf boy with a slightly childish but resolute face waved the gray iron shield and gray iron hammer in his hands towards his mother, and while answering, he quickly squeezed towards the collapsed area.
He was worrying about how to solve the tuition problem of attending the Gray Dwarf Warrior Academy, but he didn't expect to come across such an opportunity. For an ordinary Gray Dwarf civilian family, the high tuition of the Warrior Academy is almost an unbearable burden.
Emperor Dagran, please bless me to get the treasure. No, anything valuable will do! "Come back soon! Selim!!"
The gray dwarf mother looked at her child who was gradually disappearing in the crowd with a worried look on her face.
Apparently, there were many people who had the same idea as Selim and planned to go and see if there was any treasure that had been unearthed.
Many gray dwarf youths as young as Selim have already run towards the collapsed area.
In addition, some mercenaries of different races, such as gray dwarves, lizardmen, and murlocs, also ran out from the nearby taverns, holding various bottles or glasses of wine in their hands. After looking around, they began to walk towards the collapsed area.
At present, this group of people should be the most powerful ones.
In the crowd, you can occasionally see people from all walks of life holding spatulas in their hands or wearing white coats.
It seems that there is no shortage of adventurous people in every industry.
This may be because in the Underdark, the appearance of many treasures or secret realms will be accompanied by the current situation.
For example, the ground collapses, or some strange light appears.
The scene before me fits both of these requirements.
Suddenly, a gray dwarf boy who was rushing in the front stumbled and fell to the ground, uttering a scream.
I saw a small black snake, which seemed to rush out from the ground at the collapse site, and was biting the boy's ankle.
"Amusa, are you okay? Let me help you!" a sturdy gray dwarf boy shouted from behind.
It seems that it should be the companion of the bitten gray dwarf boy.
He was seen holding a one-handed hammer, raised high, and smashing it heavily on the slender body of the black snake.
“Bang!”
The little snake seemed to twist its body and bounced on the hammer. The next second, the hammer bounced back at an even faster speed.
“Boom!”
The iron hammer hit the forehead of the sturdy young man swinging the hammer! Suddenly, the gray dwarf's eyes turned white, and after staggering for a few seconds, he fell to the ground.
This immediately shocked everyone around.
"Hiss! It's a lava snake!"
A gray dwarf mercenary wearing black leather armor nearby also noticed the abnormality here.
When he looked closely, he discovered that this inconspicuous little black snake was actually a rare lava snake, an elemental creature that only appeared in extremely hot magma areas.
Although it is small in size, it has the strength of a second-level wizard apprentice.
Without the strength and agility of an intermediate knight or above, it would be difficult to inflict effective damage to it, and even defending against the attacks of lava snakes would be difficult.
Although the lava snake has only one means of attack, it is extremely fast.
"Scatter, you little kids! This is a lava snake, it's not so easy to deal with!"
The gray dwarf mercenary saw so many young men who wanted to try their luck but were not even knights rushing over, and he couldn't help but shout anxiously.
"Lava snake? What is that?" A gray dwarf boy holding a wooden hammer looked at his friend beside him in confusion.
"I don't know. I've never heard of it."
"You said it's just such a small snake, what's so great about it!"
"I guess that idiot just smashed the hammer on the ground, so it bounced back and hit himself."
"Hey, do you think those mercenaries wanted to take it all for themselves, so they tricked us into leaving?"
"Probably! Look, they are coming." A young man holding a blacksmith's hammer pointed at the mercenaries rushing over and shouted.
"Let's go, hurry up, if we're late there won't be any for us!"
The group of young men simply ignored the black-armored mercenaries' dissuasion. When they saw the mercenaries coming up, they quickly ran towards the pit.
“Swish, swish, swish!!”
Several more black lines emerged from the cracks in the collapsed area.
“Ahhhh!!”
Suddenly, screams rang out one after another!
Seven or eight of the young men who had been rushing in the front fell to the ground in an instant. The two or three remaining standing turned pale in an instant, their teeth chattered, and they were so scared that they couldn't even speak.
Only then did the young men believe what the black-armored mercenary said.
Because they didn't see clearly how the lava snake attacked, but their companions around them had already fallen to the ground, wailing. Obviously, this kind of creature was not something that these civilian teenagers could deal with.
Fortunately, there were several taverns near the collapsed area. At this time, many mercenaries with the strength of intermediate knights also rushed up and fought with these black lava snakes, and rescued the seven or eight gray dwarf boys.
However, the wounds of these gray dwarf boys who were bitten had begun to turn black, and the skin near the wounds began to show large areas of blisters similar to those after burns, and they were getting more and more. "This is fire poison!" said a tall mercenary holding a two-handed hammer after taking a look.
"Yes. This is troublesome."
"We need to find a pharmacist to treat it."
"I'm afraid ordinary pharmacists are of little use. We need at least an intermediate-level pharmacist!" An elder mercenary looked at it and shook his head.
The mercenaries started discussing at once. The group of lava snakes that had just appeared made them, who had been living on the edge of a knife for years, dare not move forward casually.
However, there are always people who are not afraid of death. Seeing that the black snake no longer appeared, some people bravely began to slowly continue exploring forward.
"Look at them, they are really not afraid of death!" A mercenary shook his head when he saw several chefs holding spatulas and daring to continue exploring forward.
"Never mind them!"
“Hiss~~”
These gray dwarf chefs holding spatulas heard a strange sound coming from a deep cave more than ten meters ahead.
"Oh no! That's the sound of a snake spitting out its tongue." a chef nearby shouted.
"Retreat quickly!"
But just as they turned around and ran a few steps, they heard a sound of breaking air coming from behind!
“Swish, swish, swish!”
Dozens of red lines appeared.
The red line is much longer than the black line, and much thicker! "Ahhh!!"
However, the screams were less frequent than before.
Because these red lava snakes are three to five meters long, they can often bite the neck of a gray dwarf who is only 1.4 meters tall.
Therefore, at this moment, the gray dwarves who were hit have fallen to the ground, and most of them have been killed in one blow without even a scream.
"Oh no! It's a red lava snake!!" Seeing the red lava snake appear, several gray dwarf mercenaries also had the intention of retreating.
It seems that what is hidden in this collapsed area is probably not some treasure.
Even if there is, it is not something they can covet.
These red lava snakes alone were not something they could resist! "Get out of the way! Get out of the way!" At this time, a loud voice came.
“Bang, bang, bang!”
The sound of neat plate armor and steel boots stepping on the ground was heard!
The mercenaries looked delighted.
This is the sound of the arrival of the organized Gray Dwarf City Guard.
As the official defense force of Tug City, although their individual strength is not strong, once the number exceeds ten, their overall combat effectiveness is not comparable to that of their scattered soldiers.
"All of you retreat!" A captain dressed as a gray dwarf, wearing thick plate armor and with a silver hammer painted on his breastplate, gave the order.
"First team, raise your shields and attack!"
"Second team, infiltrate and defend!"
The red lava snakes seemed to sense the danger as well. They gave up the "food" in their mouths and began to focus their attention on the "tin cans".
Suddenly, the red lines started fighting with the tin cans.
As the battle was raging, suddenly, dozens of pieces of rubble were ejected from the collapsed area, and a rumbling sound of rolling stones was heard from the deep cave.
As the noise grew louder, the civilians and mercenaries watching turned their attention.
I saw a rock monster over two meters tall with a human upper body shape emerging from an underground cave with a rumble.
The civilians had never seen such a monster before and were so frightened that they screamed, cried and fled in all directions. Many old people and children were trampled to the ground.
"Not good!" The gray dwarf captain of the city guard army, whose face suddenly changed during the battle.
"This is a large rolling stone element. Ordinary first-level wizards are no match for it!"
"Casper! Go inform Commander Bram immediately, quickly!"
"Yes! Captain!" A gray dwarf city guard quickly turned around and ran towards the center of Tug City.
One. Two After a while, five large rolling stone elements rushed into the surface from the collapsed area and wreaked havoc in the vicinity.
The dozens of gray dwarf city guards who were able to suppress the red lava snakes were now defeated by the impact of the large rolling stone element.
Casualties also began to occur.
The city guards, equipped with thick armor, are not afraid of elemental creatures like lava snakes that mainly bite, but when faced with stones thrown by large rolling stone elements, the protective effect of plate armor is much smaller.
The basin-sized stones coming at you at high speed seemed to be thrown from a large catapult. With just one hit, no matter which part of the body was hit, it would break bones and tendons, causing serious injuries.
If you are unlucky and get hit on the head by the stone, your skull will definitely be smashed to pieces, and even the white brain matter will splatter everywhere.
"Swoosh!" A shadow arrow hit the large rolling stone element, splashing a pile of gravel! "Don't use fire magic, the large rolling stone element has a high resistance to fire, use shadow magic!" shouted an old lizardman holding a black wooden staff.
"Swoosh!" Several shadow arrows came one after another.
A group of lizardman wizards in black robes arrived at the scene at this time, stood behind the old lizardman holding a black wooden staff at the beginning, and launched an attack on the large rolling stone element.
From the emblem on the chest of the black robe, the captain of the gray dwarf city guard knew that they were all from the nearest medium-sized wizard organization - Shadow Flame Tongue, which was mainly composed of prophets or wandering wizards from various lizardman tribes.
The strength is quite strong!
This immediately made the captain of the gray dwarf city guard heave a long sigh of relief, feeling a lot more relieved.
As long as the wizards can destroy these big stones, there won't be too many casualties. After all, creatures like lava snakes are relatively easy to deal with.
"This place will soon belong to Rocour."
All residents in the northeast corner of Tug City, whether they were civilians, gray dwarf city guards, or even wizards, received this low, majestic, and ancient mental fluctuation in their minds.
"boom!!!"
Hundreds of rocks burst out of the tunnels in the collapsed area, and a giant stone creature that was almost identical to the large rolling stone element, but magnified several times, was rumbling out of the cave.
Behind it were dozens of large rolling stone elements and thousands of small rolling stone elements following in an orderly manner. The closer to the front, the larger their size. The four in the front were much larger than the average large rolling stone elements.
Instantly, the sound of rocks rolling was deafening! If Richard were here, he would definitely think that this scene was very similar to the scene of a heavy army tank cluster moving in the past life.
"Lord of Stone Elementals!!" the old lizardman holding a black wooden staff said in horror, sticking out his long tongue.
"It's over! Tug City is finished! This is a third-level Stone Elemental Lord!!"
"However, how could a stone elemental lord suddenly appear? Could it be that there is something wrong with the ancient seal of the Scorched Earth Secret Realm?" The old lizard man muttered to himself, his eyes blank for a moment! (End of this chapter)