Chapter 846 – Game of Courage

Nie Yan searched this side of the mountain for more than half-an-hour. The map wasn’t detailed enough, and the symbol too large. He could only discern the grave’s general location. How hard could it be to find? Harder than he expected, upturning even the pebbles in a desperate attempt to find it.

Looking over at the hillside to his left, Nie Yan noticed a green light flickering within the darkness.

Is it over there…?

Nie Yan had already searched that area before, but had only found a few mounds of dirt.

Let’s look again, Nie Yan thought before heading towards the green flames.

Several minutes later, Nie Yan arrived back at the mounds of dirt. A burial ground! He wondered how he could’ve missed this, though perhaps due to the lack of grave houses. The earth was muddy, with the stench of rotting corpses afoul in the air and crooked, broken gravestones scattered here and there. Specks of green flames floated up into the dark sky from a patch of weeds.

It was as if Nie Yan had been plopped into the set of a horror movie.

Is this it? The Lich King’s Tomb wouldn’t be this obvious, right?

Even though Nie Yan was doubtful, he still entered the burial ground. The moment he did, a powerful dark energy pervaded the area. Rotting hands erupted out from the earth as corpses crawled out of their graves and started stumbling towards him.

As a corpse stumbled within three meters of Nie Yan, he raised his leg and threw out a lightning fast fick. POP! Its head exploded.

It was only an ordinary Level 160 monster.

Losing its head, the corpse slumped back to the ground.

Nie Yan directly entered the heart of the burial ground and discovered a single intact gravestone. It was badly eroded by the wind and rain. Several words were written on it in Ancient Undead, a language he couldn’t read. On the corner of the stone face was the drawing of a blood red skeleton along with a thumb sized recess.

A secret mechanism?

Nie Yan dealt with the corpses crawling towards him while searching online for information related to Lich King Insar’s treasure. Failing to find anything new, he couldn’t help but get annoyed.

Looking back at the recess, Nie Yan suddenly recalled something. He still had Lich King Insar’s Finger Bone in his bag![1]

A light bulb lit up in Nie Yan’s head. He took out Insar’s Finger Bone from his back. Looking back at the recess, the two were a perfect fit!

Nie Yan inserted the finger bone into the recess. After which the gravestone lit up with a dazzling radiance.

A series of characters flashed in Nie Yan’s mind.

「You have opened Lich King Insar’s Tomb. Before the powerful Necromancer died, he placed down a terrible Nightmare Curse. Anyone that disturbs the sanctity of his final resting place would have their stats reduced by 80% for a month. He then cut off his 10 fingers, sending each to faraway places all over the world. Any single one of them can open the tomb. Brave, or perhaps foolish grave robber, do you dare to continue forward even after losing your great strength?」

A harsh cackle lingered in Nie Yan’s ears for a long time, ridiculing him.

Nie Yan could sense a gloomy energy invading his body and sapping away his strength. His body felt much weaker all of a sudden, almost foreign.

Looking at his status, he had received the Nightmare Curse.

All his stats were reduced by 80%, something no player could bear.

“Shit!” Nie Yan’s face was covered in dark clouds. This curse lasted for a month, and there was no way to remove it, meaning there was nothing he could do during this time. If he were to encounter players from the Evil Faction, he would be in even more trouble. With his current stats, even ordinary players could beat him.

As Nie Yan was mulling over what to do, the ground in front of him suddenly collapsed, revealing a flight of stairs leading down to an underground cave.

Nie Yan nearly lost his balance because of the violent shaking. After stabilizing himself, he looked down at the dark cave. He hesitated. Should he continue forward?

With his stats reduced by 80%, even against a Level 100 Elite, he might lose.

While Nie Yan was pacing back and forth outside the entrance, a zombie slowly closed in on him.

The zombies were still ordinary Level 160 monsters, the same as before. But now, Nie Yan had no choice but to raise his vigilance.

What little flesh still covered this zombie’s bones was rotting and gave off a foul stench. It was missing an eye and its face didn’t look quite alright.

Nie Yan brandished the Bloody Dagger and stabbed forward. PSHFT! He stabbed the zombie in the forehead, shaving away about 6,000 health from its pool of 160,000 health.

Nie Yan could normally down these zombies in one hit. Now, however, it would be a long and hard battle.

“GRAAGH!” The zombie swung down its arm.

Nie Yan leaped back. However, he was still a beat too slow. The arm struck him in the shoulder.

THWACK! Nie Yan stumbled backwards.

−3,356

A little dizzy, Nie Yan saw the zombie coming at him again. He sidestepped and plunged his dagger into its back with a Reverse Grip Backstab.

Brushing the attack off, the zombie’s arm came swinging over. THWACK!

−2,991

Nie Yan couldn’t dodge in time. With his movement speed greatly reduced, his body was having a hard time syncing up with his mind.

God dammit! Nie Yan inwardly cursed. How was he supposed to fight like this!? He couldn’t even match up to a trash zombie mob!

After exchanging several blows with the zombie, Nie Yan finally got used to his restricted speed. It felt like a jump back in time when he was merely Level 90.

A few minutes later, Nie Yan finally downed the zombie.

More and more zombies came stumbling over from all around. Nie Yan hurriedly retreated. Bringing out his cavalry crossbow, he fired at them while kiting back.

With his stats suppressed by 80%, Nie Yan was questioning if he should enter Lich King Insar’s Tomb.

After deliberating for a long time, Nie Yan decided to enter anyway. Since he had come all the way here and even fell victim to a curse for no reason, if he were to turn back now, he would be losing too much.

Nie Yan descended the stairs. Looking up, the zombies were huddled together outside the entrance, seemingly afraid to come down after him.

Taking a deep breath, Nie Yan calmed his mind. His gaze fell on the cave which was faintly illuminated by torchfire. The cold and gloomy air coming out of it caused his body to lightly tremble. The stairs led down to an underground passageway three meters high and two meters wide. He saw skeletons of the fallen leaning against the walls. Covered in broken armour, they were likely adventurers in life.

“Welcome to Lich King Insar’s Tomb. Are you ready to take on his game of courage?” a disembodied voice cackled in Nie Yan’s ear. It was brimming with undisguised ridicule and mockery.

A game of courage, huh? Nie Yan’s heart turned cold, glancing at the corpses on the floor. You think this is enough to scare me off!?

Nie Yan was on full alert, ready for anything. As he took a step forward, he heard a rumbling noise. Looking up, he saw several dozen round wooden pillars.

Nie Yan quickly lunged six meters forward. BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! Glancing over his shoulder, the ground was smashed into rubble.

Close call!

There was no time. As his feet touched the ground, several hundred arrows came flying towards him.

Nie Yan stared at a solid wall of arrows roughly 10 meters thick. There was only a single crack, too big to fit a human.

Pygmy Transformation!

After shrinking down to a third of his size, Nie Yan activated Animorph and shrunk down even further into a small lynx, increasing his movement speed by 300%.

Put put put! Put put put! Arrows struck the ground behind Nie Yan as he nimbly found his way through the crack.

If Nie Yan hadn’t acted so quickly, he’d be swiss cheese by now!

After running for 60 meters, Nie Yan suddenly felt a quaking beneath his feet. Following the origin to a slope up ahead, he saw a giant boulder rolling towards him. It was quickly picking up speed and practically covered the entire passage.

No wonder this place was filled with so many slopes!

Seeing this boulder coming at him like a malevolent beast, Nie Yan turned tail and fled as fast as his legs would carry him. However, it wasn’t fast enough. In the next moment, he was going to be squashed into a meat patty.

Nie Yan leaped over to the corner of the wall and curled himself up as much as possible. The boulder was round while the passageway was square. So, he should be safe here.

The sound of the boulder whizzing past caused Nie Yan to break out in a cold sweat. Shrinking down in size had saved his life yet again. No human could pass through this space.

The traps here were some of the most dangerous ones Nie Yan had encountered in his life!

After traveling through the passageway for 30 minutes, Nie Yan finally experienced what was called a true trap. He feared even nine lives wouldn’t be enough to get out of this place alive.

Nie Yan finally reached the end of the passageway. A game of courage it truly was. He estimated the traps here were powerful enough to kill 99.99% of the experts that reached this tomb. Likely, only those who were fated could get through.

This was only the beginning!

Pygmy Transformation and Animorph wore off, and Nie Yan returned to his original size. Even after ranking up, the cooldowns of these two skills were still six hours long. Not knowing what lay ahead, he hesitated for a moment. He decided to sit down and wait for all his skills to come off cooldown first before proceeding.

1. Nie Yan obtains the finger bone from the secret shop in Okoron in Chapter 733.

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