Chapter 26 Part 1

Xia Xifeng awoke, shivering at the sight of the grimy stained-glass dome above him.

Where-where-where have I been thrown now?!

Xia Xifeng scrambled off the bench and looked around in alarm.

This was a dilapidated church. The statues of the gods were damaged beyond recognition, leaving only their ruined pedestals.

The bench he’d been lying on was positioned directly facing the broken pedestals, as if he were an offering laid before a god.

The fragments of the stained-glass dome were covered in dust and cobwebs, making it impossible to tell what scenes they once depicted.

The window glass was still intact, but every window was barred with iron, transforming the church into a gigantic cage.

Xia Xifeng rubbed his face, quickly opening his System map to check.

Thankfully, the map of the church, now cleared of fog, showed only one green dot—himself. No other NPCs or monsters.

Only then did Xia Xifeng see the quest notification, and he felt a wave of frustration.

Why did this quest teleport him directly into the dungeon without even giving him a choice button? The System said he wouldn’t get hurt, but while the body might not be injured, the spirit certainly could be.

He’d been terrified witless. How was mental trauma not considered harm?

Xia Xifeng opened the chat window, just thinking of what to type to avoid looking timid when Qin Lang’s avatar jumped with a message first.

Qin Lang: 【I’m here.】

Xia Xifeng blinked. His lips, pressed tightly together and slightly pale, regained some color, and his racing heart stopped slamming against his throat.

He let out a long breath and replied quickly: 【Where are you? I’m in some broken-down church. I was so freaked out when I woke up.】

Forget it, why try to act tough in front of Qin Lang? Qin Lang wouldn’t believe it anyway.

Qin Lang: 【In a residential house. Our stats are the same as in reality. Avoid the monsters as you move. If one blocks your path, use knockback. I tested it—the monsters are slow, damage is extremely low. All potions work. There’s no danger. You can explore, or wait for me where you are.】

Xia Xifeng saw his equipment had already been adjusted.

He had entered the dungeon first, yet Qin Lang had woken up before him.

Before he’d even awakened, Qin Lang had already explored the area around the house and adjusted Xia Xifeng’s gear suitable for this dungeon, dragging the potions and food he’d need onto his quick bar.

Xia Xifeng summoned his Spiked Club knockback staff. The weight of the hefty weapon steadied his heart.

Xia Xifeng: 【I’ll explore too. Might as well uncover the map quickly. The sooner we explore, the sooner we get back. Perila saw me vanish right in front of him; he must have been terrified.】

Qin Lang: 【Alright. I’ve encountered all these monsters in the game. If there’s a monster you’re not familiar with, screenshot it and send it to me. The System just unlocked a screenshot function when we entered the dungeon.】

Finding the new feature, Xia Xifeng was overjoyed.

Having screenshots was so much better; he’d wanted them for ages.

Xia Xifeng immediately sent Qin Lang a screenshot of the church.

Qin Lang also sent him screenshots of the area around the house.

Xia Xifeng recognized it instantly: 【I know this place. I did a mummy chain quest. You come here when entering the village mist. Wait, let me tell you about that quest.】

Qin Lang definitely wouldn’t be familiar with this place, as it was a pure story side-quest. There weren’t many monsters, and killing them didn’t even drop experience or materials.

He might have done this quest, but he would definitely have followed a guide straight to the objective, skipping all dialogue, his mind completely blank.

Qin Lang sat on the stone steps, reading the long paragraphs of dungeon introduction Xia Xifeng sent.

He indeed had little impression of this side quest, only vaguely recalling there was such a boring quest.

In the game, players received a letter-delivery request.

When arriving at the address on the letter, that small seaside village was already shrouded in thick mist.

Knights from several religious orders were stationed at the intersection, forbidding others from entering.

Players first had to gain the approval of one of the orders before being allowed to enter the village with that order’s knights.

Once inside the village, they would lose contact with the knights.

Next, players had to explore the map while searching for the missing knights.

While exploring, NPCs would call out to the player, asking for help. When the player helped, they would encounter one of the missing knights.

After meeting all the living and dead knights, the player would arrive at the Sanctuary on the cliff and fight the final boss. After winning, the quest ended. The thick mist dispersed, revealing that all the villagers had become dried corpses. The “villagers” the player had seen were merely spirits living in an illusory dream.

Xia Xifeng: 【The dungeon is related to the Outer God Blood Moon… Oh, whenever any game features an Outer God, there’s always a blood moon. Blood Moons really are the workhorses of the Outer Gods. The streets and the Sanctuary in the dungeon aren’t the real village, but a collective dream of the villagers. But the villagers’ collective dream shouldn’t contain these things, so I suspect it’s the BOSS’s dream. Although Outer Gods are all twisted, incomprehensible things in our eyes, perhaps some things from their memories can take on a semblance of their original form through people of this world.】

Xia Xifeng: 【This is probably also a specific manifestation of an Outer God’s descent distorting this world’s rules?】

Xia Xifeng: 【In the Dream World, the moon is one facet of the sun. The Sun holds authority over the moon. Could Blood Moon replacing Silver Moon also be a necessary condition for the Dream World’s Sun to fall?】

Qin Lang agreed with Xia Xifeng’s analysis.

This quest was a side quest of the main “Mystery of the Falling Sun” storyline, so it was naturally related to the Sun.

If the dungeon BOSS was a servant of Blood Moon, then Blood Moon devouring Silver Moon was definitely connected to the Sun’s fall.

Blood Moon’s authority lay in the mental realm, i.e., “dreams.”

Its methods were more insidious, and pre-Apocalypse documentation about it was extremely scarce. No one knew exactly how it had silently replaced Silver Moon.

Just that one night, when people looked up at the moon, it had already turned red.

The tranquil night became eerie and bloody, and people no longer dared to sleep peacefully.

Qin Lang: 【Blood Moon is a trash mob boss. Very annoying. Attack isn’t high, but HP bar is super thick. Skills all have crowd control, constantly interrupting damage output rhythm.】

Thinking about this dungeon being related to an Outer God, Xia Xifeng couldn’t help but feel nervous again.

Then he saw Qin Lang complaining that Blood Moon was a trash mob boss.

Xia Xifeng burst out laughing.

To the players, except for the Outer Gods’ chief deities during the final decisive battle, which Outer God hadn’t been slaughtered before?

As long as they dared to show their health bar, players dared to kill them.

The Outer Gods’ chief deities hadn’t been killed simply because they hadn’t shown their health bars yet.

Even though he himself was just a life-skills player, the Outer God materials he processed were numerous.

Post commission, post commission: Today I need XX amount of XX Outer God materials. Qin Lang, are you taking it? Don’t want to? I’ll just post it on the public board then!

Xia Xifeng: 【The demand for Blood Moon materials is huge. Thanks for your hard work.】

Qin Lang had farmed Blood Moon’s trash mobs until he wanted to vomit, all because Xia Xifeng wanted too many Blood Moon materials.

Cough, truly sorry, bro.

Xia Xifeng ate a calming snack and slowly began rummaging through every corner of the church, even checking the undersides of the pews.

A lore player had to click on every single corner of every story scene. Transformed into “full-dive,” Xia Xifeng could only rely on his own two feet.

Everything in the scene was destructible.

Destruction didn’t require combat skills. Xia Xifeng could use his “Mining” skill, swinging a large hammer wildly.

Xia Xifeng was firmly convinced that a location with symbolic meaning like a church was bound to have special story items.

Swinging his big hammer, he smashed pews, then cabinets, and finally smashed a large hole in the base of the ruined god statue, actually revealing the entrance to a basement.

Xia Xifeng smugly sent a screenshot of his success to Qin Lang.

Qin Lang sent him a screenshot of the streets littered with monster corpses.

Xia Xifeng: 【You’re so violent.】

Qin Lang: 【Not as much as you.】

Qin Lang continued killing every monster he saw. He was certain that if he killed enough, whatever was behind this would be forced to show itself.

Xia Xifeng continued exploring every inch, “gently” tapping every wall surface to see if there were any hidden compartments he’d missed.

The basement had torches.

Xia Xifeng’s life-support skills included “Hold Breath” and “Poison Immunity.” Although his skill levels weren’t high enough yet, he could also craft respirator masks.

After donning a respirator mask, Xia Xifeng lit the torches along both sides of the staircase and descended into the basement.

The basement resembled an illegal medical facility, complete with iron-barred cages, transparent vats filled with murky liquid, beds stained with dried blood, and instruments that looked utterly cruel.

Xia Xifeng spotted a “Medical Log” spread open on a table.

The System had loaded him with the full language pack, so even though the “Medical Log” wasn’t written in a common script, he could still read it.

The log stated that this place was a holy site of the 【Black Box】 Church, dedicated to the God of 【Black Box】.

The inhabitants of the holy site had originally lived peaceful, tranquil lives. One day, the residents suddenly went berserk, biting strangers.

At the time, they thought it was merely an illness and just locked up the crazed residents. Later, bones grew from the residents’ bodies, piercing their skin, turning them into monsters.

Residents bitten by the afflicted also developed symptoms of madness.

The disaster spread.

“Just like a zombie movie,” Xia Xifeng muttered to himself. “Extracting bones, carving away rotting flesh… Hey, your church’s practices are a bit twisted, aren’t they? You definitely didn’t use anesthesia during these surgeries. Tsk, looks like you didn’t consider your zombified brethren as brethren anymore.”

Xia Xifeng put away the first log and searched for more logs, diaries, and experiment records.

This church indeed had an evil vibe.

Some clergy believed the zombified people were suffering divine punishment; as long as they were all killed and burned to ashes, the god’s wrath would be appeased.

Another faction of clergy continuously experimented on the zombified individuals. Eventually, the test subjects shifted from already-zombified residents to newly infected ones, and even the blood relatives of the zombified.

Some deranged individuals even bought slaves to mate with the zombified, to see if they could produce “antibodies.”

The civilization level of this world was far below that of the Dream World. Was this the original world of the Outer God?

Or was this a “history” of the Dream World that the Outer God had once invaded?

An Outer God capable of triggering an Apocalypse clearly hadn’t just come to the Dream World recently. They might have infiltrated the Dream World’s history long ago.

“In short, killing all these clergy might be overkill, but skipping every other one would definitely leave some behind.” Xia Xifeng sent a photo of the last log to Qin Lang.

The System showed that the exploration progress of this map had reached 100%, rewarding Xia Xifeng with a cloak that could mask his presence.