Chapter 188: Out

When Xiao Ming disappeared once again, the Button vanished along with him.

Jiang Ke’er almost jumped up and cheered.

If the Button didn’t leave with the target when they teleported, the Button would have to remain in the original room, making it impossible to farm rooms infinitely—because you’d have to walk all the way back along the original route just to pick it up again.

But since holding the Button lets you take it away with you, the essential requirement for farming rooms infinitely was fulfilled.

Xiao Ming hurried back, Button in hand, and looked at Jiang Ke’er with anticipation, nervously asking, “Junior Sister Qing Yi, do you have any ideas?”

“There’s one approach, but only about a twenty percent chance to reach the top,” Jiang Ke’er said.

“……”

This percentage was much lower than everyone had hoped.

“Let’s go, to the next floor.”

The next three rooms were all ordinary Battle Rooms, so there wasn’t much to choose from.

Jiang Ke’er just picked one at random and slipped inside.

Just like the Elite Monster Room, the ordinary Battle Room had a red line in front of the entrance after you crossed the threshold.

Xuanyang was in front and stepped across the red line first.

This time, the scene around them did not change.

Clack clack clack—

Jiang Ke’er noticed that there were many coffins placed throughout the room.

As Xuanyang crossed the red line, the lids of the coffins slid off on their own, and the sound of bones grinding echoed in the room.

Huff huff—

From inside the coffins, skeleton corpses suddenly sat upright.

Their movements were swift, each one dragging afterimages as they shot out of the coffins, lunging at the Taiming Sect Members!

“Bang bang bang—”

This was where Xuanyang’s headshot technique really shined.

These Skeleton Monsters were controlled by Necromancy, and the core of control was usually hidden inside the skull, wrapped by bone. Xuanyang punched each one in turn, smashing both skull and core in a single blow.

The others’ weapons and fighting styles were a bit inferior to Xuanyang’s, so in this battle, Xuanyang’s performance was especially outstanding.

“Senior Brother Xuanyang really is incredibly strong,” Xiao Ming exclaimed.

“He’s the kind of person we could never catch up to, even if we trained for a lifetime. Thankfully, he’s here with us for this run.”

This ordinary Battle Room wasn’t particularly difficult, and the group soon cleared it.

However, the options on the seventh floor were all three kinds of Elite Monster Room.

“Press the Button!” Jiang Ke’er decided instantly.

“Didn’t you say all the good rooms had already been picked? Even if we choose again, what’s the point?” Xuanyang asked.

“All the good rooms might be gone, but there are still Public Rooms, and possibly Bizarre Rooms that people have purposely avoided,” Jiang Ke’er explained quickly. “Just press it!”

With no other choice, everyone followed Jiang Ke’er’s command. Xuanyang frowned but didn’t object.

The group hurried back up to the previous floor and chose another ordinary Battle Room.

This time, it wasn’t Skeleton Monsters, but a giant centipede.

Luckily, it wasn’t too difficult. After about five minutes, they had chopped the centipede into countless pieces.

New room options appeared—a Public Room that looked like a spirit stone, and a private Bizarre Room.

Jiang Ke’er chose the spirit stone-like Public Room first.

But this time, there were no Tokens on the pedestal.

Instead, a golden dwarf Shopkeeper was sitting there, with a sparse selection of magical artifacts laid out in front of him.

“Welcome to the Magical Artifact Shop. Here, you can perform operations such as healing, removing curses, discarding artifacts, buying artifacts, and so on… Of course, these require a certain price from you.”

Jiang Ke’er looked first at the artifact stall.

There were no other teams here, clearly showing that the Taiming Sect squad had fallen far behind.

It was also obvious from the artifacts left—anything of real quality had long since been picked over, leaving only scraps and rejects.

But even scraps and rejects could help the Taiming Sect Members, given their dire circumstances.

Jiang Ke’er surveyed the stall. There were five magical artifacts left.

Three of them were Five-Grade Magical Artifacts usable inside the Tower.

The other two were both Strong One’s Eggs—the very items they’d found before, capable of summoning powerful monsters.

By the logic of the other four from Taiming Sect, they should really buy some artifacts to strengthen themselves right now.

But Jiang Ke’er decisively tossed out two Tokens and immediately grabbed the two Strong One’s Eggs.

The other four were dumbfounded.

“Junior Sister, did your brain get scrambled?” Xiao Ming wailed. “Shopkeeper, Shopkeeper! Can we return these?”

“All items are final sale, no returns~” the golden little old man said with a beaming smile.

“Could you at least explain…” Xuanyang’s voice shook with anger.

After finally having a hope to improve their strength and catch up, Jiang Ke’er had just thrown that hope straight down the drain without hesitation!

Now they had three Strong One’s Eggs in hand.

What use was that? Without power-up artifacts, they couldn’t win the fights at all, and even if by some miracle they did, everyone else would have already finished the challenge!

“Press the Button.” Jiang Ke’er had no desire to explain. Before pressing the Button, she only said, “Now the odds are up to thirty percent.”

All three paths out of the Shop were battle routes.

Jiang Ke’er memorized this in her mind, then pressed the Button.

Everyone returned to the very first room on the first floor.

Without pausing, Jiang Ke’er led them straight toward the sixth floor.

Then they went to the Bizarre Room they hadn’t visited before.

As she expected, because of the uncertainty of the Bizarre Room, most teams would choose ordinary Battle Rooms and avoid the Bizarre Room if possible.

That gave her an opening.

Twice in the Bizarre Room.

Facing the Strange Elder, Jiang Ke’er’s palms were slick with sweat.

The Strange Elder glanced at the Red Skull floating beside Jiang Ke’er and said, “Unlucky child. But the good news is I’m in a decent mood right now.”

A mocking smile tugged at the elder’s lips. “Let me show you all just how pathetic you’ve become.”

The elder waved his hand, and the Compass in Jiang Ke’er’s arms flew out of its own accord.

The Compass enlarged, turning into a semi-transparent Tower.

The phantom images of the other teams appeared inside the Tower.

Everyone was filled with despair as they discovered that the fastest Fireblade Squad had already reached the twelfth floor, with the second-place Heaven’s Gate Team just arriving as well, surging forward with a chance to overtake.

Even the third and fourth place Dan Sect Alliance elite team and Demon Revival Society squad were about to reach the twelfth floor.

The rest of the teams were basically above the tenth floor.

Only the pitiful Taiming Sect was still lingering on the seventh floor.

“Pretty miserable, isn’t it? But it could get worse… Your soul is mine!”

The elder’s face shifted, and suddenly a pitch-black rift tore open behind him.

From the rift, countless absurdly long arms shot out, seizing Xiao Ming in an instant.

“Why am I always the one who gets hurt?”

Xiao Ming wore a woeful expression and struggled hard, but it was useless.

Everyone rushed to attack the arms, and Jiang Ke’er attacked the elder, but all their attacks were effortlessly blocked by a terrifyingly strong force.

The Taiming Sect Members could only watch helplessly as Xiao Ming was dragged into the rift.

The rift snapped shut, and all was silent.

“Don’t worry, he’s not dead—just eliminated from the game.”

“And besides, for you all, what difference does it make?”