A dark shadow suddenly shot out from the bushes behind Fang Zhou, lunging straight at his back.

Fang Zhou quickly turned around, and a long black shadow flashed into his view, fast as lightning.

The shadow was already very close, just an arm's length away, and he could see the gaping bloody maw.

The next moment, an invisible attack descended from above, striking the open mouth.

Boom!

A dull thud, and debris scattered everywhere.

Fang Zhou stepped back to a distance, finally seeing that the ambush came from a pitch-black giant python.

This python was thicker than a barrel, its whole body covered in pitch-black scale armor, with tendril-like whiskers growing from the gaps between the scales, making it look like a long-haired snake. Its head was adorned with a chaotic set of sharp horns.

The python's entire head was now trapped underground, its massive body writhing back and forth, unable to break free.

Bi An stood on the python's head, suppressing its movements.

Upon regaining consciousness, Fang Zhou immediately summoned Bi An to prevent such a sudden sneak attack.

He summoned a storm of golden sword shadows, which rained down on the giant python, quickly turning it into a snake-shaped pincushion.

After being shot dead, the python's corpse rapidly shriveled as if an invisible force drained all the moisture and blood and flesh from it.

A small point of light flew out from the python's corpse, swiftly merging into Fang Zhou's body.

Is this the special reward for killing an enemy?

Fang Zhou could clearly see a line of words appearing on his retina.

[Killed Abyss Poison Python, experience +1, goal completed 1/1000]

This game-like prompt left Fang Zhou quite amazed, understanding that to complete the goal, he would need to kill at least a thousand abyssal monsters to leave.

But what is this experience +1? What kind of experience is being added?

Could it be butchering skills?

Fang Zhou pondered for a while, suddenly opening his system panel.

In the sections for realm, techniques, skills, and attributes, there was a plus sign next to each, even behind reputation and male charisma.

But his male charisma was only 8 points, not enough to upgrade even the lowest-level skill, so why were there so many upgradeable plus signs?

Fang Zhou focused on the plus sign after Innate Realm, clicked it, and nothing happened, but a prompt appeared immediately.

[Experience required for upgrade: 35,000, current experience: 1]

Fang Zhou trembled, instantly understanding what this experience meant.

This experience was similar to male charisma, able to enhance and upgrade all his abilities.

This delighted Fang Zhou, as male charisma was so hard to come by. After laboriously completing a difficult task, he was only rewarded with 8 points of male charisma.

Although the most important task reward was the cards, it was a fact that male charisma was scarce.

Now, gaining experience from killing monsters could replace male charisma, meaning that killing enough monsters could level him up completely?

Fang Zhou loved this mindless grinding method.

However, his enthusiasm was quickly dampened when he realized that investing this one point of experience into an attribute required 10 experience points to equal 1 point of male charisma.

Upgrading the Nuclear Fireball Skill required 8,000 experience points, upgrading the Sword Control Technique required 150,000 experience points, and upgrading the current lowest level Invisible Sword Energy also required 300 experience points.

After seeing this, Fang Zhou couldn't help but click his tongue, finding the experience requirements excessively high, especially for Sword Control Technique—where would he find 150,000 abyssal monsters to kill? Even 150,000 pigs wouldn't be easily wiped out at once.

It's only logical that there's no free lunch.

If experience were easy to acquire, why bother with tasks? Just farm monsters here until max level and leave as the Ten-mile Slope Sword God, unstoppable by any deity or Buddha, right?

That's obviously impossible.

Fang Zhou cast his gaze on Wise Time.

Upgrading the Wise Time skill required 2,000 experience points, much more cost-effective than directly upgrading his realm. He decided to save up the 2,000 experience points to upgrade this skill first.

Adjusting his mindset, Fang Zhou soared into the sky, beginning his search for monsters.

...

Inside the gourd space, Aya and Ming Aoshuang weren't surprised by Fang Zhou's sudden disappearance, thinking he'd gone outside the gourd.

Aya wanted to comfort the withdrawn Ming Aoshuang but didn't know how to start, so she sat beside her.

"A... Aya!"

Ming Aoshuang called Aya's name somewhat awkwardly, looking at the ground: "If you had little time left to live and didn't know when you'd die, what would you do?"

Aya didn't placate her with empty words. She thought seriously before saying, "I would strive to live each remaining day well."

Ming Aoshuang slowly lifted her head to look at her: "Aren't you angry? Why did such a thing happen to you...?"

Aya smiled slightly: "Anger is useless. In the face of an unfair fate, you can accept it or resist it. The key is to follow your true inner desires and then make a choice."

Ming Aoshuang fell into deep thought, pondering Aya's words.

"Splash!"

Suddenly, Fang Zhou appeared out of thin air, crashing to the ground, his body covered in blood.

Aya's face changed dramatically, rushing to Fang Zhou's side and helping him up in concern: "What happened to you outside?"

Ming Aoshuang also ran over with a look of panic. Though she was upset with Fang Zhou, he was their only hope for leaving this place.

If something happened to Fang Zhou, Ming Aoshuang couldn't imagine how to escape on her own.

"Don't worry, I'm fine... Just flesh wounds..."

Fang Zhou said while spitting blood, his face pale, chest bearing several bone-deep wounds, his organs visibly pulsing.

Some semi-transparent tendrils grew from the wounds, wriggling like maggots.

An unsettling aura was emanating from the wounds, like an invisible ghostly claw reaching toward Aya and Ming Aoshuang.

Aya stared at the semi-transparent tendrils, an aura emanating from her body that was so intimidating it startled Ming Aoshuang beside her.

The substantial aura completely tore and obliterated the eerie breath.

Fang Zhou nearly fainted from Aya's aura, quickly using his barely conscious mind to summon all the Sword Lake Water from the gourd space, enveloping himself to use it for healing.

Aya stepped aside, watching Fang Zhou, who had fallen unconscious in the water, her expression turning grim.

Why did Abyssal energy appear on Fang Zhou?

She had seen those semi-transparent tendrils growing from wounds many times in the Black Soul World; they were traces left by Abyssal contamination.

Once the contamination affected rationality, one would completely turn into an abyssal creature, like many monsters in Black Soul Mountain.

Ming Aoshuang cautiously asked, "Are you okay?"

Aya shook her head expressionlessly, her gaze still fixed on the water-immersed Fang Zhou.

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