When that world-shaking aura surged through, Li Qingyan already had her answer.
After all, having fought a war for over a decade and clashed with him seven or eight times over the years, she naturally remembered the fluctuations of the Barbarian King's Source Qi.
After a brief silence, she said softly,
"This aura indeed belongs to that Barbarian Heterodox King."
Hearing her confirmation, Xu Yuan's expression grew rather peculiar.
Once the Kunwu Mirror shattered, anyone caught within the area bathed in white light would be teleported indiscriminately in a general direction. However, over such ultra-long-distance teleportations, the slightest discrepancy of a hair's breadth would lead to an error of thousands of li.
Under normal circumstances, their landing points should have differed by at least several hundred li. Yet the Barbarian King had ended up inside this crypt as well...
*Well, chances are that fellow also has fortune stats in the single digits—an absolute jinx.*
Of course,
it was also possible that Li Qingyan, an even bigger jinx, had such rock-bottom fortune that she had dragged her enemy along with her.
However, this wasn't entirely bad news for him and Li Qingyan.
Pitting a boss against another boss was Xu Yuan's absolute favorite cheese strategy in *Cangyuan*.
The remaining question, then, was whether that Barbarian King—whose forearms were thicker than Xu Yuan's thighs—could punch his way through this Silent Crypt.
In Xu Yuan's memory, that Barbarian Heterodox King was certainly powerful enough to clear it.
Although he had become the final boss in only one timeline, a final boss was still a final boss. With absurd stats and monstrous skills, physically carving a bloody path through a Level 90 dungeon would be a walk in the park for him...
Just as he was thinking this,
Li Qingyan's husky voice suddenly interrupted his train of thought:
"Prince Consort, the Barbarian King is almost certainly going all out. Could he have run into the one you mentioned, the one rivaling the Transcendent Realm...?"
Gathering his thoughts, Xu Yuan looked back at Li Qingyan's eager, itching-for-a-fight expression and let out a rueful smile.
"Probably not."
Li Qingyan was quick to react, her willow brows knitting. "There's more than one Transcendent aberrant ghost in this crypt?"
"Right."
Xu Yuan nodded, inwardly giving her a thumbs-up for her sharpness.
Aside from being far too headstrong, this princess was in every other metric an absolute god-tier teammate.
Patting down his slightly disheveled robes, Xu Yuan continued, "According to the internal intelligence reports of my Chancellor's Manor, there are four aberrant ghosts in this crypt that rival the First Rank. As for the Origin Realm... they're countless. Too many to number."
As a game, players obviously wouldn't go straight to the final boss the moment they entered a dungeon.
Besides, putting only a single boss in a dungeon—wouldn't that be a little disrespectful to the profession of "player"?
In a Level 90 open-world dungeon in *Cangyuan*, never mind regional mini-bosses and elite mobs, even the common trash mobs were Level 70 or 80.
Thinking of this,
Xu Yuan's gaze drifted toward the aberrant ghost Li Qingyan had casually incinerated moments ago.
That aberrant ghost hadn't been particularly strong; the speed it had displayed was roughly on par with an expert of the Flesh Integration Realm.
In the outside world, that was already formidable. If the presiding officials were negligent and failed to control it in time, that single aberrant ghost could bring down an entire county town.
Yet in *Cangyuan*'s Silent Crypt... there were no low-tier things like that.
How could a Level 90 dungeon feature trash mobs that were only Level 60?
Then again, it made sense in reality. Now that this Silent Crypt had materialized into the real world, its expanse likely spanned thousands of li. How could such a massive broodmother hive for aberrant ghosts contain only the "big monsters" from his memory?
While Xu Yuan pondered, Li Qingyan also fell silent.
After a while, she suddenly asked,
"Prince Consort, did the intelligence about this crypt really come from your Chancellor's Manor's Grade-A internal reports?"
"Hmm?"
Xu Yuan uttered an instinctive sound of surprise, then retorted without hesitation, "Why? Aside from the Manor's Grade-A reports, does Princess believe I have other means of obtaining intelligence?"
Looking at Xu Yuan, Li Qingyan suddenly asked,
"If what you say is true, an ordinary First-Rank expert who strayed into this place would almost certainly never return alive. Unless Chief Lou or the Sword Saint came in person to scout it out... but had they come personally, there would likely be no living soul left in this crypt."
Xu Yuan sighed faintly to himself.
*Why does this woman have so many scheming thoughts? She's an absolute pain to deal with.*
Yet after a split second, Xu Yuan already had a ready excuse, spinning a lie with an impassive face:
"My Chancellor's Manor doesn't rely solely on the Black Scale Guards for intelligence. Aberrant ghosts were a catastrophic calamity that struck the world ten thousand years ago, and many rare ancient tomes record them. Well... forget it. You'll find out sooner or later anyway, so I might as well tell you the truth. When our Manor wiped out Burial Village, we obtained a soul ring. Residing inside it is a ten-thousand-year-old remnant soul who knows everything about these aberrant ghosts. All the intelligence here was obtained through him."
Since it was virtually impossible for Old Man Luo to ever converse with Li Qingyan, dumping the blame onto that old fossil was as fitting as could be.
"Is that so..." After a moment's reflection, Li Qingyan gave a slight nod, seemingly accepting Xu Yuan's answer. She then asked with a light laugh, "Alright, what should we—"
"Li Qingyan," Xu Yuan interrupted suddenly.
"Hmm?"
"This is the last time."
"..."
Li Qingyan narrowed her phoenix eyes, a glint rising in her crimson pupils.
Xu Yuan stepped firmly forward, raised his hand, and jabbed an index finger hard against her chest.
"Li Qingyan, I know a woman like you makes her own decisions about everything, and I know you aren't used to taking orders from anyone else. But you should know that a soldier's sacred duty is to obey orders. Before we get out of here, I suggest you stop throwing your little tantrums in front of me, Xu Changtian."
"..."
Li Qingyan didn't say a word. She first lowered her gaze to glance at the finger Xu Yuan was jabbing into her chest, then raised her eyes to meet his.
Xu Yuan exerted a little more pressure, the softness instantly depressing under his fingertip. Staring into her eyes, he said word by word:
"From now on, whatever I tell you to do, don't ask me for any explanations. I don't have time to explain things to you. If you can't do that, you're more than welcome to leave right now. After all, this political marriage hasn't been consummated anyway, so we might as well leave each other to our own fates."
A team could only have one commander.
Even though Li Qingyan had agreed in words earlier, less than the time it took to drink a cup of tea later, she had reverted to acting according to her own rules.
Being exceptionally capable and fiercely independent made for a god-tier teammate at times, but under specific circumstances, it could instead become a liability.
Without Li Qingyan, his chances of survival were slim, but if Li Qingyan refused to listen to him, their chances wouldn't be any better.
He had to ensure right now that Li Qingyan would obey him one hundred percent—at least until they got out of this crypt.
The passageway was dark and quiet, illuminated only by the faint gleam of the embers lingering on the ground.
After a long pause,
with a soft laugh, Li Qingyan lowered her pretty eyes slightly and looked at his finger.
"Prince Consort, your finger is poking this palace rather uncomfortably. Could you remove your hand from my breast first?"
"..."
After a moment of silence,
Xu Yuan glanced down, withdrew his hand without a change in expression, and asked again, enunciating each word:
"Li Qingyan: I speak, you act. Can you do it?"
"A soldier's sacred duty is to obey orders."
Li Qingyan smoothed the wrinkles on the chest of her red robe, setting off a rolling undulation. Looking up at Xu Yuan, she said clearly, "From this moment on, Prince Consort, you are this palace's commander-in-chief."
As their eyes met, the fierce wind from the depths of the passageway died down.
Amusement danced in Li Qingyan's eyes as she asked,
"So, Lord Commander, what should this palace do now?"
Xu Yuan looked her up and down, stroked his chin, grinned, and said,
"Take off your clothes..."
*Rustle—*
Before he even finished speaking,
the red robe rustled and slipped off. Slender branches bearing heavy fruit, skin white as snow, and on her sharply defined abdomen, that long scar from the previous battlefield remained visible.
Everything was clear to the point of unreality.
*Hiss... this woman really goes all out?*
Still, Li Qingyan's action confirmed something Xu Yuan had been rather curious about moments earlier.
After her clothes had been shredded by the spatial turbulence, the princess had indeed been completely bare underneath, wrapped only in that loose red robe.
"They're off. What next?"
Facing him in complete nakedness, Li Qingyan stood ramrod straight, staring at Xu Yuan with a bright smile. She chuckled softly, "Prince Consort, you wouldn't just want to look at my body, would you?"
"..."
Meeting her gaze,
an inexplicable fire flared up, and Xu Yuan promptly stood at attention. Hurriedly circulating his cultivation technique to suppress his physical salute, he cast two calm glances over her before shifting his eyes away, pointing at the inner wall of the tunnel:
"Naturally not. The commotion caused by the Barbarian King just now has most likely awakened that thing in the deepest part of the crypt. This creep helps it sense intruders from a great distance. Go tear some down. Get a lot—I need some too."
Pausing for a beat, Xu Yuan added an instruction:
"Oh, and remember not to use fire. Flames will destroy its vitality."
She didn't ask why, nor did she ask what it was for.
Li Qingyan glanced aside and raised a hand. With a subtle tremor of her bountiful curves, a large patch of the brownish-red creep clinging to the tunnel wall was torn away as if flayed, pulled through the air by her power and piled onto the open ground before them.
Looking at the brownish-red creep pulsating rhythmically on the ground like a living thing, Li Qingyan asked softly,
"What next?"
"..."
Without replying, Xu Yuan stored the Blood Jade Glazed Robe he was wearing into his Sumeru ring.
Li Qingyan cast an intrigued glance downward, her phoenix eyes arching slightly and her plump, rosy lips forming an 'O' before letting out a soft chuckle.
Xu Yuan's eyelid twitched. Glaring back at this brazen woman who seemed to have forgotten the danger they were in, he pressed his hand directly onto the pulsating brownish-red creep and channeled his Source Qi into it.
In the next instant,
the brownish-red creep, as if acknowledging a master, crawled up along Xu Yuan's hand and began spreading across his entire body.
Li Qingyan stood to the side, arms folded across her chest, watching quietly.
Feeling the rustling sensations enveloping his body, Xu Yuan explained softly,
"This creep is actually a kind of natural rattan armor. As long as you infuse enough Source Qi, it will cling to your body, shielding us from high-tier aberrant ghosts tracking us through the creep."
Li Qingyan leaned down slightly, narrowing her phoenix eyes as she inspected the creep creeping over Xu Yuan.
After watching for a few breaths, she suddenly remarked,
"Although its defensive capabilities are weak, it seems capable of continually condensing. If one were to fuse all the creep in this passageway into a single set of armor..."
Halfway through hearing her words, Xu Yuan was seized by a wave of astonishment.
*She could tell just from a single glance?*
He instinctively looked up.
And then,
he saw Li Qingyan's half-stooped posture with her arms cradling her chest.
His heart skipped a beat. Forcibly suppressing his bodily salute with his cultivation technique, he met the cool, glamorous princess's gaze and chuckled softly.
"Forget it. Taking a small amount of creep is like plucking a single hair from a monkey—it won't draw the attention of that thing deep in the crypt. If we take too much, its primary target will become us."
"..."
Saying no more, Li Qingyan reached out a jade hand as well, her slender index finger lightly touching the creep. Fiery red Source Qi flared as the brownish-red creep instantly coiled up her fair, jade-like arm. She asked with a smile,
"Meaning, this palace's guess was right?"
Xu Yuan was silent for a moment before nodding.
"Yeah. You can."
In *Cangyuan*, these creeps had health bars.
Clearing a patch would guarantee a drop of a crafting material called "Black Death Creep."
When clicking on the material in one's inventory, a special option called "Infuse Source Qi" would appear, turning the Black Death Creep into a common white-tier piece of equipment: "Black Death Armor."
To players who had already reached the endgame, this armor's stats couldn't just be called low—they were practically nonexistent. Moreover, the damn thing constantly drained mana (Source Qi).
Yet despite being loaded with debuffs, the Black Death Armor's stealth property against mobs was actually quite handy.
Mini-bosses in the Silent Crypt roamed all over the map; as long as one ended up within the nine-grid radius around a player, it would charge right over to hunt them down.
However, none of this mattered to the Fourth Calamity known as players. What mattered was that this Black Death Armor could be synthesized and upgraded continuously.
From white common, to green uncommon, to blue rare, to purple epic, to golden legendary, and ultimately all the way to a blood-red artifact.
This catered perfectly to a player's collection addiction through positive reinforcement.
Of course, getting that blood-red artifact was no easy feat.
Once the Black Death Armor was upgraded to green, the regional bosses and all the trash mobs would collectively hunt the player down.
After reaching blue, it became even more perverse: the final boss would wake up immediately and join the hunting party.
Under such conditions, the typical routine for players wanting to synthesize the gear was to clear the mobs first, and then grind the creep bit by bit once the area was clean.
Unfortunately, that strategy didn't work in the Silent Crypt.
Because unless the creep was completely eradicated, mobs in the Silent Crypt could respawn indefinitely—including some elite monsters and even regional mini-bosses.
Dozens of monsters swarming to hunt you down on a single map, and getting hit by one of the higher-level bosses carried a chance of inflicting an incurable poison status.
Constantly losing health until death.
With such hellish difficulty, unless one joined the glorious FLiNG Trainer sect, players had no choice but to farm while running for their lives.
Back then, those monsters had simply been named "???". Who would have guessed they were actually aberrant ghosts?
Thinking of this, Xu Yuan let out a deep sigh.
While he was lost in thought, the creep stripped onto the ground had already vanished completely. Li Qingyan's faint voice drifted over gently from the side:
"This thing looks quite like what women in brothels might wear."
"..."
Xu Yuan looked back, his eyebrows arching slightly.
Li Qingyan was looking down at her raised jade hand. Her straight, slender legs, perky fullness, and the curves of her waist and hips were highlighted to perfection by the form-fitting Black Death Armor. The eerie brownish-red markings lent a touch of bewitching allure to the heroic demeanor of her features.
Seemingly noticing Xu Yuan's captivated gaze, Li Qingyan thrust her chest forward a bit, looked back with a chuckle, and asked in a soft voice:
"Stop staring, my Lord Commander. What should we do now?"
Chapter 274