Chapter 156: The Impossible Mission

"Captain, why are elf ears pointy?"
"Captain, why was that woman so fierce just now?"
"Captain, why did she call you 'skinny dipping'? Where we come from, that kind of behavior gets you a year in prison!"
"Captain..."
"Shut up."
"Oh..."
Leaving the elven settlement behind, Luo Yong was lost in thought while Fiona chattered endlessly, having apparently activated some bizarre skill.
"Captain, where are we going?"
After enduring in silence for a while as she followed Luo Yong wandering aimlessly across the wilderness, Fiona finally gave in and asked softly, "Are we not going to farm monsters in the secret realms anymore?"
"..."
Luo Yong paused, stopped in his tracks, turned his head to look at his little tagalong, and then pulled out a glowing golden orb, along with a pair of precious secret elixirs—one red, one blue—and placed them all into her hands.
"Fiona, I am now formally notifying you—"
"I get to be an official team member? Really? Yay!" Before Luo Yong could finish, Fiona jumped up with joy, cradling the items in her hands, and said, "Captain, what I really wanted to know is where you found all this stuff, hehe!"
"No, what I want to notify you is that the team is officially disbanded. I have very important things to do and can no longer take you with me," Luo Yong said.
"I know, it's just going to save the world, right!" Fiona muttered unhappily, pouting. "You're only a few levels higher than me, Captain. If you can go, why can't I? I want to save the world too..."
"This is my own business, it has nothing to do with you. Besides, I can't look after you, and you wouldn't be of any help. You'd better go home early, or go find your aunts."
As he spoke, Luo Yong opened a portal and stepped straight through it.
When Fiona tried to follow him inside, she was blocked. Strange runes flickered across the surface of the portal, which quickly initiated a self-destruct sequence.
"Captain!"
Fiona cried out, feeling somewhat aggrieved and irritated, but Luo Yong could no longer hear her shouts.
Wiping away a few tears by herself, she summoned her wings of light, shot up into the air, and flew away.
*"[Energy Cornerstone], commonly found in various ruins and secret domains... a few scattered across the world..."*
*"Pitch black in color, ordinary in appearance, highly resembling ordinary black stone, rarely recognized by anyone..."*
Walking alone after stepping out of the portal, Luo Yong flipped through the pages of the book as he walked.
Though he had only read it once, he had memorized it entirely. To say he could recite it backward would not be an exaggeration; he knew every single word.
Still, just to be safe, he read through it several times more, and only after confirming everything did he put the book away.
"Ruins..."
There were plenty of various ruins in the vicinity of this camp, but all of them had been explored countless times.
Almost everyone who had newly become a hero would spend some time exploring ruins, hoping to pick up scraps left behind by the countless people before them.
This behavior had continued for so long that it was practically becoming a special ritual.
If a registered hero claimed they had never explored a few abandoned ruins, they wouldn't even be able to make good friends!
The nearest ruin to this place was the ancient city not far ahead. However, at this stage, the ancient city had been completely destroyed, leaving only the dungeon beneath the ruins.
Moreover, because massive energy fluctuations had emanated from the dungeon a short while ago, it had suddenly become the hottest spot, drawing more and more people to explore.
Naturally, an increasing number of people were entering the dungeon and never coming back out.
"Hey, buddy, looking for a party? Let's explore the dungeon together! We've got a partial map of the safe zones explored by our predecessors!"
"Not interested."
"Brother! We've already gathered fifteen people, just need one more to form two squads, and we can set off together!"
"No time."
Luo Yong pushed through the crowd, rejecting all invitations, and entered the dungeon alone.
Though the dungeon was sturdily built—resistant to any explosions Luo Yong's magitech puppets could dish out—its age was simply too vast, and a glance revealed the devastation of time.
Luo Yong unhooked his long spear from his back and began relentlessly poking at the stone walls, tapping repeatedly, listening to the echoes to identify their material.
"Surely nobody would use [Energy Cornerstones] to build walls, right?"
Though he thought this to himself, adhering to the principle of leaving no stone unturned just in case, Luo Yong walked along, poking every single piece of masonry without sparing a single one.
As a result, his progress became extremely slow.
This bizarre habit of poking walls was naturally witnessed by the people who entered after him. Aside from being astonished, they simply wrote him off as a lunatic and paid him no further mind.
"Bro, are you really not joining?"
Halfway through, another team came over to inquire, hoping to add another member to their strength.
"..."
Luo Yong sighed helplessly, activated a teleportation scroll on the spot, and left.
He had originally intended to start from the entrance and leave not a single stone unchecked, but people kept bothering him, giving him the impulse to skewer them all with his spear.
Therefore, he simply teleported to a place he had visited before—the familiar grand hall.
"Huh? Where does this portal lead? The other side looks like a dungeon too?"
"Should we follow them through and take a look?"
"Don't go poking around blindly. This is a portal opened by someone else, who knows..."
Boom!
A flash of light erupted on the opposite side.
Powerful energy surged out from the portal, instantly shattering the gateway, severing space and time, and cutting off the vision of the onlookers.
On the other side, Luo Yong resumed poking stones.
However, to prevent being disturbed again, he summoned ten Fiora blade-maidens, dressed them all in identical cloaks to make them look like a squad, and had them join him in poking stones.
Clang, clang, clang...
Ting, ting, ting...
Such a bizarre spectacle had never been witnessed since the dungeon's inception.
A moment later, human heroes' voices drifted over from not far away, accompanied by the roars of monsters.
Luo Yong cast a soulless glance in that direction, then turned around and walked the other way.
"Ah!"
Suddenly, Susie's scream pierced the passage ahead.
It baffled the mind: why had she lingered in this place for so long, and what exactly was her purpose?
Could she also be searching for something special?
He hadn't thought much of it before, but at this moment, the thought naturally occurred to Luo Yong.
"Susie Robert, you'd better not be searching for the same thing I am!" Luo Yong muttered to himself, just as he saw her sprinting from the distance, whizzing past his side.
The moment their eyes met, a flicker of astonishment flashed in her eyes.
Then, instead of running away, she simply fell in step behind Luo Yong.
She was clutching something to her chest—whatever it was, it was undoubtedly related to the monsters she had lured over!
Luo Yong couldn't be bothered to care or guess, continuing his soulless march.
"Mister, where's your little tagalong? Gone? Dead?" Susie asked with her usual unearned familiarity. Knowing that the man didn't seem to like talking, she didn't mind.
She glanced at the Fiora blade-maidens trailing Luo Yong, clicked her tongue twice, and said, "Mister, that bit of combat power won't cut it. There are tons of monsters around here; you should summon more magitech puppets!"
"..."
Luo Yong came to a halt, sighed helplessly, and before the monsters charged over, he said indifferently, "You should leave."
Then, he strode forward, walking straight toward the approaching horde of monsters.
"Huh?! What do you mean?"
Susie felt a sudden sense of wrongness. This mercenary uncle seemed somewhat different from before—he looked like he had a death wish.
"Could the little tagalong really be dead? No way..."
She had witnessed Luo Yong's army-clearing combat prowess; far from being troubled by dungeon monsters, he didn't even flinch when facing a beast tide!
Yet—
The moment the confusion struck her, she watched Luo Yong swing his long spear, casually shattering the few monsters blocking his path, his figure instantly swallowed up by the horde!
He didn't clear out the monsters as he had done previously, nor did he get swamped by them; instead, he rapidly weaved through the crowd.
Only when monsters crowded too densely in front of him, blocking his path, would he strike out to clear a certain amount of space just to pass through...
As for the Fiora blade-maidens, they had been dismissed and were no longer marching with him.
"Ah!"
After a momentary lapse in brain function, Susie was horrified to realize that if she didn't run now, it would be too late.
The monster closest to her was almost face-to-face with her!
"Why isn't he being attacked?!"
Susie yelled as she ran, though a realization hit her soon after, and she angrily shut her mouth.
"Qi-concealing equipment! Hmph! Having something like that makes things much more convenient!"
Although she possessed an invisibility cloak of her own, its effects were limited and could not completely conceal her presence.
Even if human heroes couldn't detect her, those monsters always had a way of sensing her existence.
Moreover, she was carrying treasures she had found within this underground palace.
"Aside from the Energy Cornerstone, there's the Goddess's Tear, the Deep Sea Heart... Sunflower, Moon Grass, Star Tree fruit..."
The latter few items were things Luo Yong had heard about from Vielle, who had mentioned they were used for enhancing beauty and strength.
However, according to the elf elder's book, these items had an even greater purpose.
"Seven-Colored Flower, Nine-Colored Divine Feather..."
"What on earth are these things?"
Luo Yong recalled the contents of the book, mechanically poking the wall beside him.
A single Energy Cornerstone took an unknown amount of time to find, let alone all the other items.
Some of those items didn't even exist on the Blood Moon Continent and had to be sought out elsewhere.
Others had only ever appeared in legends!
"This is an utterly impossible mission!"
Luo Yong thrust his spear forward, parrying a sword-thrust aimed at him by a figure that suddenly lunged from the opposite side.
"Not bad. You can already block a casual sword-thrust from me." Pang Ding's figure flickered into view as he sheathed his slender sword.
"However, I only used thirty percent of my power just now. Also, what was that you said about an impossible mission?"