Played for a Fool!
At the edge of the upper area, Lin Jun discovered that pool of purple blood that had long since coagulated and was covered with a thin layer of frost.
A hidden path was exposed, winding toward the side of the ancient castle.
At the end of the path, a demon spawn's corpse lay on the cold stone ground outside a side door.
Having suffered from unfamiliarity with the terrain, Lin Jun had only had the puffshrooms seal off the front entrance.
The increasingly faint purple blood traces extended all the way out of the upper level, eventually disappearing into the vast icy plains.
But... how did it get out?
Crossing through the middle layer clearly still required a demon spawn's help, so surely there couldn't be another demon spawn waiting between the upper level and the outside to be consumed, right?
After some thought, the puffshrooms captured a young fatty beast and brought it along as they headed outside.
Before long, a puffshroom stood outside the dungeon, watching the fatty beast larva still struggling desperately in the midst of its tentacles. Lin Jun began to understand.
They then dragged the fatty beast all the way to the middle layer. This time, when it tried to pass through the tier boundary, it exploded into a puddle of meat paste...
This damn place's restriction mechanism was way too brutal!
In comparison, the Purple Crystal Dungeon's method of execution by lightning could be called elegant.
So from the current situation, the upper level's blockade had already failed. Apart from slight differences in magical concentration and temperature, it wouldn't be an exaggeration to say it had already separated from the dungeon's domain.
The middle layer's blockade was still there, though who knew how much effectiveness remained. As for the lower level, Lin Jun still hadn't found the entrance.
This broken-down dungeon had caused the duck at his lips to fly away!
The blood traces generally headed south. Two hunting puffshrooms enhanced through [Minion Control] were dispatched—essentially armed versions of reconnaissance puffshrooms.
In the frozen wasteland, these two puffshrooms only had enough magical power reserves to maintain operations for three days. Regardless of success or failure, this would be a pursuit mission with no return.
Honestly, Lin Jun was just trying his luck with the chase. With Qisi's intelligence, it definitely wouldn't stupidly flee in a straight line, and with such a vast area, the chances of coincidentally running into it felt far too slim.
Lin Jun just couldn't accept it. What if they actually caught up to it!
On another front, there was another troubling matter—Little Pig had disappeared.
She'd been out of mycelial network range for a full day now, with no word at all.
Had she defected?
This had to be defection, right!
The worst-case scenario was that she'd grabbed the Sun Stone fragment and fled the dungeon. A slightly better situation would be that she'd simply run off on her own, while the fragment might still be somewhere in the middle layer.
Traitor!
He had clearly treated her... treated her...
Hmm...
Thinking back, Little Pig's role here had been pretty much that of a miserable tool. Her occasional rewards were just good meals. If it were him, he'd probably run too.
Well, never mind then. But if he got the chance to catch her again, he'd definitely make her grow mushrooms!
Reviewing the situation at the time, he'd indeed been too hasty.
Thinking calmly about it, a single six-clawed creature shouldn't have been able to escape the middle layer's range and would eventually be found. He shouldn't have sent Little Pig to chase after it.
It was just that with such an important item right before his eyes, who could afford to think things through carefully?
How had this happened? He'd clearly won the battle, yet had this feeling of losing both the lady and the soldiers?
That damn Qisi really deserved to die!
Though it wasn't entirely without gains.
**[Level Up: LV58→LV59]**
**[Sin of Greed Triggered]**
**[Plundered Skill: Claw Strike LV9→LV10]**
**[Plundered Skill: Mana Perception LV7→LV8]**
**[Plundered Skill: Mana Shield LV3→LV4]**
**[Plundered Skill: Petrification Ray LV2→LV3]**
......
......
......
As his level increased, the difficulty of leveling up was clearly rising progressively. He didn't know if it was his imagination, but the experience he needed to level up seemed to be more than others required?
Regarding skills, this batch of Qisi had been fairly mediocre in both quantity and quality. After decomposing them, even [Cold Resistance] hadn't managed to level up again, though it felt like it was just short by a bit...
And his first maxed skill was actually [Claw Strike], which he'd barely ever used!
Lin Jun was speechless.
Having a puffshroom test it out, the max-level sharpness had indeed increased, but it was within expected parameters and didn't have any particularly significant meaning.
However... combined with [Steel Bone] and similar skills, could he mass-produce decent blades?
The length that puffshrooms could grow would at most be suitable for daggers.
Moreover, [Steel Bone] lacked a stable supply source and was only at level four.
Compared to this basic attack skill that he'd never had high expectations for anyway, Lin Jun actually held great hopes for the [Division LV1] he'd obtained earlier.
This was the divine skill that had allowed that bastard Qisi to pull off a golden cicada escape right under his nose!
Trying to install it on a puffshroom, an unexpected situation occurred—the skill disappeared from his main body!
???
An unprecedented situation!
What did this mean? Could this skill be recalled?
It wouldn't just be wasted, would it!?
**[Species: Mushroom-Puffshroom]**
**[Skills: Mana Storage LV7, Division LV1]**
Staring at this puffshroom, Lin Jun hesitated for a moment before finally having it use the skill.
The magical power on the puffshroom consumed a large portion, even more than the accelerated production of a single puffshroom.
**[Species: Mushroom-Puffshroom (Division Body)]**
**[Skills: Division LV1]**
Something miraculous happened—[Division] disappeared from the original puffshroom!
Trying to activate it again, the two puffshrooms' attribute panels instantly swapped, perfectly recreating the scene from Qisi's escape.
However, attempting to swap again proved impossible.
So... this thing was a consumable life-saving skill?
Use once and it's gone?
And he'd just used it on a puffshroom...
Lin Jun wanted to curse!
Recalling the situation, the [Division] skill on Qisi's main body had been LV3, but the one left for Lin Jun was only LV1.
Did this thing lose a level each time it was used?
After long deliberation, Lin Jun decided to try eating the skill back.
Using greedy decomposition to improve proficiency by breaking down skills from his own puffshrooms was something Lin Jun had tried back when he was low-level.
The result had naturally been unsuccessful.
This kind of left-foot-stepping-on-right-foot-to-ascend-to-heaven bug logically didn't exist.
But this [Division] skill was clearly somewhat different, and Lin Jun couldn't think of any other way to recover it. It was a case of treating a dead horse as if it were alive.
Mycelial threads wrapped around the puffshroom division body, and it quickly dissolved into the fungal carpet.
Lin Jun opened his own panel and went directly to the bottom layer of the skill section to search.
**[Skills: ...Division LV1...]**
It really was recovered!
Honestly, if this skill had also been wasted, Lin Jun might have broken down and cried on the spot!
This time, instead of going through a puffshroom, he used it directly with his main body.
He'd thought that gestating the main body would be relatively difficult and time-consuming, but the situation was completely different from that.
Almost the instant the thought flashed through his mind, consuming negligible magical power, another nearly identical blue mushroom grew beside the original blue mushroom.
The magical power consumed was even less than puffshroom division...
What did this mean?
Was it implying that the main body's "value" wasn't even as much as a single puffshroom?
**[Species: Mushroom-Fungal Lord (Division Body)]**
**[Skills: Division LV1]**
Currently, this division unit gave Lin Jun a feeling very similar to individuals under [Minion Control].
Let's test the effect.
Transfer... decompose... divide again...
Emmmm...
Had he managed to exploit a bug?
Originally, [Division] as a consumable skill was probably positioned as equivalent to a precious revival coin, but for him it could be used repeatedly?
Since it could be recovered, did that mean that in the future when encountering enemies, if the division body was killed, as long as he could find a way to recover it, he could continue using this skill?
He didn't even need enemies to kill it. Being more shameless about it, when he saw enemies coming, he could decisively transfer and then have the division body dissolve on the spot?
Following this logic, as long as he wasn't instantly killed or forced into a situation where he didn't even have the chance to activate division... wouldn't he be nearly invincible?
Simply put... I'm invincible now?!
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