Almost at the mont the village elder finished speaking, the players heard the system alert in their ears.
It inford them that the current mission objective had been updated, from [Finding a way to enter the Sacred Mountain] to [Killing the Magical Beast, completing the Guardian Clan elder's commission, and obtaining the key to the Sacred Mountain],
The mission ti limit was also changed to 18 hours.
This ant that the elder before them was indeed a key NPC in the script mission.
The players exchanged glances, Hoenhem lightly coughed, looked at the elder, and asked: "We just wanted to go to the Sacred Mountain for pilgrimage, didn't expect sothing like this to happen.
Hmm... Your Excellency, Elder, what kind of beast is it specifically? And how did it destroy the Holy Mountain Gate?"
"Well..."
The elder hesitated for a mont and then said slowly: "Actually, I'm not very clear, there are no related records in the village.
The villagers from my grandfather's generation were very secretive about that matter and never spoke of it to later generations..."
"Wait,"
David couldn't help but interject, "You just said that the Holy Mountain Gate was destroyed by an unfamiliar Magical Beast fifty years ago, right?
Weren't you present at that ti?"
The elder reasonably replied: "Of course, I wasn't even born then."
???
All the players looked at the elder, whose hair was entirely white, and his skin full of wrinkles, appearing to be at least over seventy years old, and were collectively at a loss for words.
David opened his mouth, hesitantly asked: "May I ask how old... you are this year, Elder?"
"Counting by the seasons outside, I should be twenty-four years old."
The elder sighed, stroked his white beard on his chin, and said leisurely: "Thanks to
always paying attention to health preservation, going to bed early and rising late, eating less but often, maintaining a balanced diet, and exercising regularly, I maintain my health so well."
Paying so much attention to health yet ending up looking like this... could you be the legendary God-level Coder?
Noticing the expressions on the players' faces, the elder sighed: "Most of the other people my age in our village have already passed away; I'm among the longevity of my age group.
Although, this isn't exactly sothing worth celebrating..."
David hesitated and asked: "What's going on exactly..."
The elder sighed again, gestured to a servant to refill the tea, and slowly began to explain.
This Guardian family has been guarding the Sacred Mountain for countless years, with a history calculated from their incomplete genealogy of at least a thousand years.
Their mission is to guard the Sacred Mountain, receive heroes from around the world, and issue initial trials to preemptively screen out the insufficiently strong or ill-willed pilgrims,
This is both to prevent too weak a hero from entering the Sacred Mountain and dying, casting a shadow over the Sacred Mountain,
And to prevent ill-intentioned people from mingling with the pilgrims and abusing the mountain's wishing blessings, causing harm to the outside world.
All the villagers do not step outside the Sacred Mountain's range, the trials they propose are generally conducted at the foot of the Sacred Mountain, in several dungeons that would freely shift in place.
Those dungeons reset every twenty-four hours, filled with all sorts of strange Demons, lethal or non-lethal traps. The outside heroes that enter them either complete the trial and exit,
or die inside, swallowed by the dungeon's reset effect, and the villagers of the Guardian Village definitely don't interfere proactively.
Throughout, pilgrims from the outside world ca in an endless stream, foreign travelers wanting to return ho, and heroes wanting to fulfill their wishes, embarking on pilgrimage again and again.
Their arrival infuses new vitality into the Guardian Village, bringing external goods, improving the villagers' lives, and brings tales of the outside world, letting the isolated village know of outside events.
But about a hundred years ago, the number of foreign travelers falling from the outer world gradually decreased, according to snippets left by the pilgrim teams,
It seed that several powerful duchies in the outside world broke out in a long-spanning war due to so religious reasons, the scale of the war grew, involving other countries initially trying to stay out of it.
Due to the completely different technology trees of the island kingdoms in the script world, the form of war turned extrely complicated. Assassination infiltration, sabotage behind enemy lines, large-scale airship bombing, spreading toxic gas in the atmosphere to create toxic acid rain...
The long-lasting war destroyed the original social order, and the number of capable pilgrims decreased as well,
It seed that influenced by this, the dungeons at the foot of the Sacred Mountain also gradually fell into decay.
Since then, the village started behaving oddly, many villagers suffering from premature aging, becoming decrepit before forty, appearing like eighty.
By the ti of the elder's grandfather's generation, even the longest-lived in the village had difficulty living past thirty.
"Through the generations, we also hoped to figure out the cause of this aging illness and solve it once and for all,"
The elder sighed and said: "But as guardians of the Sacred Mountain, we are not allowed to step out of the mountain range, nor can we enter the mountain as pilgrims, accept trials, and make wishes...
Cough cough, to get back to the point, fifty years ago, my father had just been born, he also later heard from my grandfather that a powerful, unfamiliar Magical Beast destroyed our confidential Holy Mountain Gate under the cover of night.
You all probably noticed the optical cloaking device placed inside our village just now, right?"
The players nodded, on the way to the elder's ho, they saw a large optical camouflage device resembling a refrigerator in the middle of a square, which sharply contrasted with the surrounding dieval village.
"Including that optical cloaking device, our village preserved quite a lot of equipnt and items gifted or abandoned by heroes of various generations, though most are discarded now, there were plenty usable fifty years ago."
The elder continued, "Moreover, fifty years ago, our village's aging condition was slightly less severe than now, and the guards defending the Holy Mountain gate had power approximating the heroes' average level."
David and Hoenhem exchanged glances, it was natural that the Guardian Clan tasked with defending the Sacred Mountain couldn't lack self-defense capabilities,
Although they are incredibly weakened now, needing to carry Hay Fork Longswords cautiously when eting outsiders,
Yet, in their bloodline lies a thin trace of Transcendent Power.
"However, that Magical Beast easily breached our defenses around the Holy Mountain Gate, brutally killed the guards, and violently destroyed and stole a rock from the gate,"
The elder slowly said: "Since that rock was stolen, the Holy Mountain Gate has not responded to keys.
The several dungeons affected by the Sacred Mountain also ceased to function, with no reset effect.
We also don't know if our village's aging effect is related to that rock.
Of course, if the heroic travelers could retrieve the rock, it would indeed be splendid."
The players looked at each other, the mission objective clearly stated to kill the Magical Beast and complete the commission, naturally, it wasn't sothing they would leave undone.
Hoenhem nodded and asked, "So where is that magical beast now?"
"In the northwest direction, inside a cave five kiloters away."
The village chief added, "It should be there."
Hoenhem slightly frowned, "Should?"
"I'm not sure about the specifics,"
The village chief smiled bitterly, "Previously, our village could still organize patrols to inspect the various underground cities.
But now... you have also seen, it really is beyond our capability.
The reset effects of those underground cities have long disappeared, and they have beco nests where demons gather, far too dangerous for us.
The only thing I know is the words left by my grandfather — that 'massive magical beast covered in shadows' fled towards the northwest direction cave after stealing the rock."
Li Ang squinted his eyes, his fingers lightly tapping on the wooden teacup filled with warm tea.
Several players seed silent, pondering, but in reality, they were already discussing within the spiritual link of the [Group Sympathy] technique.
Hoenhem: [The lie detection spell on
shows that he is not lying]
David: [But he must be hiding sothing. For instance, when talking about the reason for aging, his gaze flickered a little.]
Li Ang: [That should be normal. After all, from the aura monitoring, this Guardian Tribe seems to be so kind of Dark Clan, whether they are long-lived or short-lived involves their clan's core secrets, and of course, they can't casually tell outsiders. But this script world is really malicious, letting a Dark Clan serve as the Guardians of the Sacred Mountain...]
Amber: [Uh... so what should we do now? The defense strength of this village is rather weak, although three guards squatting outside think they are well hidden, we could easily sweep this guard force aside. Perhaps now, we use so Truth Serum or mind interference type spell to force the village chief to speak more?]
Hoenhem: [I personally hold a conservative opinion. These people are Guardians of the Sacred Mountain, acting against them might trigger so chanism, such as directly invoking thunderbolts from the sky. Besides, based on past strategy assessnts, we are unlikely to adopt the "deceive and conceal" thod to muddle through.]
Ding Zhensi: [Muddle through?]
Hoenhem: [That's deliberately avoiding the strategy route designed by the system, and completing objectives with the bare minimum described in the mission. For example, our current mission is to "kill the magical beast, complete the commission from the village chief of the Guardian Clan, and obtain the key to the Sacred Mountain". We could go to the underground city casually kill a low-strength magical beast, deceive or violently threaten the village chief to indicate the commission is finished, and get the key. On a textual level, we have completed the mission requirents, but in actual operation... so sneaky tricks might instead increase the task difficulty.]
Word gas are an important part of gas in the killing fields, if you don't like it, don't play.
Not only can the system set word ga traps to harm players, players can also exploit loopholes on the word level, sneak and cheat (sotis sneaky and cheating actions are also part of the strategy),
but now everyone is engaged in a high-difficulty script task for the top-tier players, there is no reason to take risks going afar.
Players quickly discussed a decision in the spiritual link, with Hoenhem standing up first, addressing the village chief, "Alright.
As pilgrims, we have no reason to refuse the trial.
But before that, we want to know the appearance of that Sacred Mountain Gate rock."
The village chief was stunned, "Huh?"
"What we need to do is retrieve the rock that repairs the gate, right?"
Hoenhem calmly said, "Assuming we finally find that 'massive beast covered in shadows', and successfully kill it, but it inhabits a debris-filled ruin, how do we proceed?
If we know specific identifiable features of that Sacred Mountain rock, it would be much easier."
"Oh oh, that's right."
The village chief stood up, walked into the adjacent room, and soon returned with an old yellow-brown scroll that must be decades old, depicting a rock.
The rock appears overall as a long strip, pure white, with a complex cloud-like pattern in the middle.
The village chief explained, "The rock of the Sacred Mountain Gate is indestructible, emitting a faint glow in dark environnts. If not abandoned in so corner, it can definitely be found."
Hoenhem earnestly observed, taking the scroll from the village chief's hand, "There is no ti to delay, we are setting off now."
The village chief hesitated with his rubbing hands, "So soon?"
"The sooner we complete the trial, the sooner we can go for the pilgrimage."
Hoenhem smiled slightly, without explaining that this phase of the task is limited to 18 hours,
there's a possibility that the underground city area is very broad, or the beast is not in the northwest underground city but in so other area,
players need to travel further to track and lock onto its location.
"Oh oh, uh, then bless the mighty heroes a safe journey."
The village chief's words were filled with pauses, his eyes flickering, hesitant to say more.
"What's wrong?"
Li Ang asked, "Anything we can help with, feel free to say, we are very helpful."
"No, nothing."
The village chief eventually swallowed his words, saying nothing, standing at the door watching the players walk towards the village entrance.
Once the players left the village, the entire village was once again covered by optical camouflage, assimilating into the ordinary foot-of-the-mountain rocky scenery.
"Let's go. The system gave an eighteen-hour ti limit this ti, if we can't find the magical beast or the rock in the northwest underground city, we will have to do a large-scale search again."
Hoenhem withdrew his gaze from the village, speaking plainly.
This ti, with a clear direction and purpose, everyone's pace accelerated sharply,
Ding Zhensi driving the Kui Ox cha, activating wheel mode, towing those seated on the sled car, leading at the forefront.
Along the way, the gale roared, others continued discussing the previous topic in the spiritual link, and outside the Group Sympathy technique, Li Ang released another spiritual link connecting to Liu Wu Dai.
Li Ang: [It's . I've opened a private channel, the others can't hear our discussion. Just now I noticed there was a wave in your psychic link after the village chief took out the drawing of the Sacred Mountain Gate rock...]
Liu Wu Dai interrupted: [That cloud-like pattern in the middle of the rock, I have seen it.]
Li Ang: [You have seen it? Where?]
Liu Wu Dai: [Special Affairs Bureau, Heterodox Academy.]
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