Chapter 1127: Morning Star Manor

Chapter 1127: Chapter 906: Morning Star Manor

Morris looked like a reflection distilled from death itself; beneath the dull gray robe, that already gaunt body seemed pried open by something, his shoulder blades pushing out razor-sharp lines under the cloth.

His face was even paler now, pale like a sheet of paper just turned up from the ashes, eye sockets so deep they could barely hold those two pinpoints of green fire.

Those two green flames burned quietly in the depths of his pupils, like two extremely fine apertures leading down into an abyss.

A dense breath of death diffused from his body, entangling with the gray mist all around until one could no longer tell which part was mist and which part was him.

A veil of extremely thin black fog coiled around him; that fog crawled slowly along his arms and torso like a living thing, driving back all the gray-white vapors that tried to press close to his body.

Two Level 4 Undead Demons drifted out from a stone corridor to the side, gliding in his direction.

Duke almost rose to his feet, but in the next instant he stopped.

When those two demons approached Morris, they didn’t pounce on him like they did other living beings, but instead behaved as if they had smelled something, circling slowly around him twice.

Morris neither dodged nor moved.

He just stood there, the green fire in his eyes burning in quiet calm.

In the end, those two Undead Demons actually seemed to lose interest, drifting back into the depths of the gray fog without even looking back.

Duke and Vera exchanged a glance; they had been debating whether to intervene and pull Morris into the safe house, but now it was clear that was completely unnecessary.

Morris was like a fish that had swum into the gray mist, merged wholly with this land of death.

The Undead Demons in the fog took him for their own kind—more precisely, the Death Rules emanating from Morris were purer and more intense than theirs; it was as if those demons had encountered a being closer to the source of death itself and thus recognized him as one of their own.

Duke could even sense, from the black fog around Morris, an essence similar to that of the entire gray mist—only more condensed, like a blade forged out of the fog.

He suddenly understood: this gray mist was a deathtrap for others, but for Morris it was a colossal opportunity.

The Death Rules and these demons condensed from Death Energy shared the same origin and nature; it was as if he had returned to a hunting ground that belonged to him alone.

Duke said nothing, simply leaned back against the inner side of the stone wall and withdrew his palm from the icy surface.

By the time the gray mist dispersed, the sixteenth hour had already passed.

Duke stood before the safe house’s light membrane, his gaze sweeping over the ancient patterns that had lit up again outside.

The duration of the gray mist had doubled, jumping from eight hours to sixteen.

In the following half month, the two of them almost never moved separately.

The intervals between mists were growing shorter and the atmosphere in the maze grew heavier with each passing day.

They still lost their way, still spent more than half a day detouring around some dangerous region, and still kept testing the forks by trial and error.

That earth-yellow stone was later used by Duke several times to aid his cultivation; his Earth Attribute Rules Skill Proficiency, which had already been close to halfway, rose by another small increment.

Vera had not been idle either. With that Ancient Thorn Seed, her Thorn Domain had become even more effortless to wield.

In half a month, they opened three more Treasure Chests.

One yielded an extremely heavy Water Attribute Rule Crystal; another contained only a few bottles of rare Magic Potion, which he took without hesitation.

In the third Treasure Chest lay a small chunk of extremely black, extremely cold iron, its aura uncanny. Neither of them recognized it; Duke merely felt it was somewhat like remnants of some Divine Blood, and stowed it away for later.

Meanwhile, their points crept upward with each exploration. By the time he casually flipped open the rankings one day, they had already passed seventy-five million.

The increase wasn’t dramatic, more like a slow, steady flow.

Vera had at last crossed that qualification threshold, obtaining the right to proceed to the Level 4 floor; she remained here only to scrape up more resources.

But the gray mist did not grant them much time.

On the twenty-something day, a new wave of mist descended.

This time, the fog was thicker, heavier, its gray-white almost tinged with ink-black.

The two of them hid in the safe house again; this was the last key, with a duration of only twelve hours.

The time limit on the final key hit zero at the very thickest moment of the fog.

Duke could distinctly feel the change in the stone walls around him: that faint golden light membrane that had always wrapped them in steady protection began thinning at high speed, as if the gray mist outside were siphoning away every last trace of warmth.

He hadn’t yet had time to warn Vera when a compressive tremor rippled through the interior of the stone chamber.

In the next second, the two of them were pushed outward from within the safe house, tumbling back into the dim-gray maze passage.

The gray mist engulfed them at once like frigid tidewater, clinging to their skin and boring into their bones.

They had barely found their footing when the mist not far away began to stir.

One, two, three… extremely soft rasping sounds rose from all directions at once, as if something were converging here at tremendous speed.

It was the Undead Demons, roused as though by the scent of fresh life, forcing their way out of the depths of the fog.

Duke could even hear the sound of withered fingers scraping along stone walls, dense enough to make his scalp prickle.

Vera’s Thorn Flower had only just begun to bloom within the fog when the mounting deathly aura all around forced it to shrink back.

“Go!” Duke did not hesitate. He seized Vera’s wrist, raised his left hand, and triggered the Divine Revelation Mark.

He had long since obtained the qualification to enter the Level 4 floor, only he had never left.

Now, as that silver-blue teleportation radiance flared within the gray mist, it was like a sheet of fire exploding in ice-cold water.