Chapter 1 Complex Caves

In the complex caves, Soren was leading the "Black Tower Alchemy Academy" trial group on a monster-hunting game.

But unbeknownst to them, on the street level above, a large tanker truck disguised as a water transport vehicle had pulled into a hidden alley.

Several men in black, holding some kind of instrument, were probing the sewer entrance, as if searching for something.

Soon, the instrument lit up with a red light, and the leader of the men in black spoke.

"Are you sure of their location?"

"Yes, the target is about two hundred meters below, exploring deep into the west."

"Release the Aberrant monster."

"Yes, sir."

As they spoke, they opened the valve of the tanker and inserted the pipe into the sewer entrance on the street. With a gurgling sound, a black, petroleum-like viscous liquid slowly poured into the sewer.

...

The students' shooting game continued.

Soren followed leisurely. Although he hadn't gone this deep last time, the surroundings were familiar.

Besides the ancient subway tunnels, this cave had many monster-dug burrows, crisscrossing and leading to who knew where.

Even the monsters in the sewers had their own territories. Soren knew they were approaching the lair of the crawling monsters, a huge space resembling a subway hub.

"Haha... Captain Jack shot down eight monsters again just now, all with headshots! Truly the number one sharpshooter in our academy."

"Our team has already collected seven cursed materials, exceeding the trial mission requirements!"

"Hey, Gallen, your goal is too low. Captain Jack doesn't want ordinary materials. We need higher-quality silver materials. Hopefully, we'll encounter more elite monsters, preferably 'Eerie' level, and maybe even get gold materials. Then our trial scores will definitely be on the academy's honor wall..."

"Miss Lena, I told you, our team will definitely get first place in this trial. The results of this trial will be our best coming-of-age gift..."

"..."

The four five-member teams advanced steadily, without much sense of crisis.

When idle, the young students would chat and joke with each other.

Soren, the guide, followed behind the team, seemingly doing nothing. He took the opportunity to carefully observe each student. Although they all wore gas masks and night vision goggles, he could roughly distinguish their personalities through their attire, skin color, and body shape.

Although he couldn't see the female students' faces clearly, he could guess that they were surrounded by attention and must be pretty.

Especially the one named "Lena," who always had boys hovering around her, showing their attentiveness.

Only glancing occasionally, Soren wasn't too interested in looking at the delicate female students. Compared to them, he was more interested in the monster corpses.

Although the probability of "Gray Mist" appearing on the corpses of Aberrant monsters was very low, it couldn't withstand the large number of monsters killed.

Along the way, the students swept through monsters, and Soren collected two clumps of Gray Mist.

Then, from the monsters' memories, he extracted more detailed cave maps and some "reverse joint movement techniques."

Although these movements didn't conform to normal human exertion habits, it was undeniable that some of these monsters' techniques were quite suitable for him, the high-agility "Eerie Puppeteer."

Like his previous life's "Five Animal Frolics," imitating animal postures could develop rarely used small muscle groups in the human body. These monsters' climbing techniques made Soren feel like he could climb on walls like a gecko, maximizing the use of his body's agility attribute.

With money to earn and fragments to harvest, Soren thought this mission was pretty good, at least for now.

...

Before long, everyone arrived at an open space, about six or seven soccer fields in size, with a very high ceiling.

From the layout of the buildings, it could be seen that this should have been a hub station for the old Lingdun underground rail transit.

Obviously, this was the monster nest in Soren's memory.

When the trial team arrived, the monsters were briefly startled and hid in various pits and buildings.

The students were very excited. They had been in cramped tunnels all the way, and the monsters had been killed by those with good marksmanship. Now that they had come to such an open space, everyone had the opportunity to fight in real combat. They rushed forward excitedly.

"Wow... this is indeed the monsters' lair. There are so many Aberrant monsters!"

"Haha, now it's our time to show off our skills!"

"Team three, follow me! We need to catch up on our trial scores..."

"..."

The four five-member teams chose a direction and began their clearing operations. Of course, except for Fatty Charlie's team, who deliberately lagged behind, everyone seemed very active.

The two teaching assistants also didn't follow up, but chose a high place to stand, recording the performance of each student in notebooks. From that position, they could overlook most of the space and provide timely rescue in case of emergencies.

Soren also chose a distance that was neither too far nor too close, observing everything here.

Although the mission was easy, he never let his guard down. The students had their safety guaranteed, but he didn't think that if he really encountered danger, the instructors would definitely save him, a gangster from the bottom of society.

He was indeed familiar with this space, and Soren also knew that it was the lair of those "Zombie-type" Aberrant monsters. But he didn't know how many monsters there were here, or what kinds of mutated monsters...

He looked at the buildings, then at the countless dark holes overhead, his gaze slightly solemn.

His intuition told him that something in the darkness seemed to be staring at them.

The two teaching assistants were chatting while observing the team's progress.

"The protective performance of the new generation of 'Night 3 Combat Suits' is indeed very strong. But over-reliance on equipment will also cause the students to lose a large part of their necessary crisis response capabilities. The effect of the trial may not reach expectations..."

"Yes, when we did the trial back then, we were still using the first generation, and the defense was far worse. Tsk tsk, it's time for these little guys to suffer a bit. Anyway, doesn't the academy have instructions to increase the difficulty of the trial?"

"Let's find an opportunity to test their adaptability later."

"Well, the opportunity will probably come soon..."

The two were chatting without avoiding Soren. From what he heard, it seemed that the two teaching assistants might take some action to increase the difficulty of the trial.

But thinking about it, with bodyguards following them at all times, the students wouldn't have any vigilance.

And just as the two teaching assistants were chatting, an unexpected situation suddenly occurred!

...

The students, in groups of five, were harvesting the lives of those Aberrant monsters.

But just then, an Aberrant monster suddenly jumped out from somewhere, its body exceeding three meters. It charged wildly like a gorilla, directly knocking away a team.

Immediately, someone shouted, "Everyone be careful, it's a 'Zombie-type Eerie'!"

Hearing this, Soren's pupils shrank, and he focused his gaze.

"Eerie" was defined as a cursed creature stronger than its peers, with a certain level of intelligence, and usually capable of leading other Aberrant monsters.

In simpler terms, it was a Boss monster.

And "Eerie" were classified according to their strength: Common, Silver, Gold, Lord-level...

The usual "Eerie" mainly came in three categories: Zombie-type (humanoid), Phantom-type (spiritual), and Beast-type (monster).

In finer divisions, there were some extremely rare special categories, such as "Mythical-type," "Elven-type," "Phantasmal Beast-type," "Abyssal-type"...

And Aberrant monsters that reached the "Eerie" level almost always produced cursed materials, and the quality far exceeded that of ordinary silver and gold materials.

This was a monster that Wasteland Hunters were unwilling to face, yet eager to hunt.

...

"This Zombie-type Eerie is so strong... But those combat suits have exaggerated defensive power."

Looking at the sudden situation before him, Soren was slightly surprised, but didn't show much change in expression.

It would be strange if a large population of Aberrant monsters like this didn't have one or two Bosses.

The two teaching assistants had obviously foreseen this, but didn't remind them in advance, letting the rash students suffer a loss.

However, compared to the ferocity of the monster, what surprised Soren even more was the "liquid combat suit" on the students.

Just now, the "Zombie-type Eerie" had directly crashed into several students, knocking them away. Judging from the impact and the speed at which their bodies flew back, Soren determined that the monster's impact force was extremely high, not inferior to a heavy truck ramming them.

If it were an ordinary person, this blow would probably kill them on the spot.

But despite being knocked away, the several students who were hit got up unscathed.

Soren's eyesight allowed him to clearly see what had happened just now, and he quickly analyzed some of the combat suit's attributes: "The blue light marks on the clothes should be the energy supply system. The alchemical runes on it are at least second-level 'Fortification Runes' and 'Resilience Runes'... What a strange material, it's actually like a non-Newtonian fluid, using fluctuations to absorb most of the impact energy."

At this time, Soren saw that the runic blue light on the student who had been hit the hardest had dimmed. Then, like changing batteries, he replaced a few new energy crystals and sighed in his heart: "Sigh... 'Cursed Crystals' worth ten thousand each as energy, no wonder the defense is so strong. Another money-burning black technology..."

Not to mention whether this kind of armor could be bought outside, even if ordinary Wasteland Hunters had it, they couldn't afford such extravagant consumption.