This Text Adventure Game is definitely poisonous
Chapter 650 - 348: The Disappeared Clockwork City_3

Chapter 650: Chapter 348: The Disappeared Clockwork City_3

[The underground of Sky City is composed of high-density gemstone rocks which are hard and immune to magic power, and are rich in energy. Mining these layers, there’s a chance of obtaining various types of renewable gemstones. Since the gemstone layer grows over time, if it is not mined periodically, it will continually constrict the space of the Underground City until it blocks all passages in the city.

Each level of the Underground City is like a large labyrinth, housing multiple nests of various underground creatures. (The monster nests have been unsealed with the birth of Sky City, and will continuously spawn monsters. It is imperative to dispatch personnel to clean them up regularly, to avoid overpopulation of demons in the Underground City.)]

Simply put, the Underground City is an experience gaining instance specially made for Fools. Not only can monsters be defeated here, you can also mine ores and gemstones along the way.

The gems and monsters within this instance regenerate automatically. If left untouched for a long time, they will overrun the place. Therefore, initially, players need to mine and battle their way downwards, clearing paths in the labyrinth, finding the entrance to the second level, then cleaning the second level and so on, repeating this process until reaching the bottom seventh level.

Such a colossal task cannot be accomplished by a single or just a few players — it requires the collective effort of all city residents to perforate through the Underground City as quickly as possible.

Besides the Underground City, the other two structures are the ’Blacksmith Shop’ and ’Pharmacy,’ both of which are ancillary buildings of the Underground City.

The Blacksmith Shop allows players to craft upgradeable standard equipment from various gemstones mined from the Underground City, while the Pharmacy is an automatic factory for creating healing medicine and antidotes, designed to aid players cope with the overflowing poisonous monsters in the Underground City.

After carefully reading the introductions of these three buildings, Mu You pondered for a moment before facing the residents of Dawn City and issued a City Lord announcement.

The announcement mainly referenced two things.

First, the opening of the Underground City, and also that through exploring the Underground City, players could combine standard piece sets at the Blacksmith Shop. For ordinary players, this is currently one of the most cost-effective ways to acquire equipment.

Secondly, it was a city-wide recruitment of exploration teams and strategy groups. The top ten teams with the most daily exploration progress will be given specific city positions and will be publicly announced city-wide.

A public announcement is essentially a leaderboard. People crave for recognition and the feeling of superiority, especially honors that are visible to others.

Once the leaderboard is out, even without any substantial rewards, it will definitely stimulate players’ desire to compete for the rankings, thereby indirectly speeding up the progress of conquering the Underground City.

The news of Dawn City upgrading to level three was released this morning, with a large number of people already eagerly awaiting the latest architectural reports on the forum. Now that the announcement is finally out, it’s being wildly shared and spread instantaneously on the forum.

The effects of the three new buildings were an eye-opener for numerous people.

An Underground City! An Instance where monsters can be defeated!

The emergence of an Instance is significant because movement in Sky City does not consume action power, meaning that once inside the Instance, players can balance the energy consumed with the lifespan gained from defeating monsters. Thus, the experience points and prizes gained are pure profit!

Meanwhile, the equipment that can be crafted in the Blacksmith Shop is also posted up quickly.

Sky Ensemble: A full set of standardized equipment that can be assembled over ten body parts, only available for the Fool. Starting from the second piece, each additional piece will activate a type of ensemble effect.

And these ensemble effects all correspond to the name ’Sky’. For example, combat power, defensive power, speed and life recovery rates are boosted when fighting in the high skies, etc.

If ten pieces are collected, the final effect will be activated: Sky Wings, granting the player the ability to fly!

The equipment that can be crafted in the Blacksmith Shop will be expanded as the level progresses. Currently, the level 3 Blacksmith Shop can only craft Black Iron and some Ordinary Grade Equipment, making it of little use to Advanced Players.

But that’s okay, this ensemble set can be constantly upgraded. There’s no need to worry about lower level equipment being phased out in the future. As long as you continue adventuring in Instances and collecting gemstones, everyone’s Sky Ensemble can be upgraded from Black Iron all the way to the final Epic Grade Ensemble!

Indeed, as mentioned in the announcement, this is currently the most economical way to acquire equipment for the majority of players.

After reading the information about the new buildings, the players of Dawn City couldn’t wait. There were various team recruitment posts on the forum, inviting each other to venture into the Underground City.

Players from other cities could only watch in envy, waiting for players from Dawn City to bring the latest information from inside the Underground City.

About ten minutes later, the first ’Suicide Squad’ hastily assembled in Dawn City and were the first to step into the Underground City to start their adventure.

However, before people could ask about their experiences within the Underground City, merely two minutes later, more than half of them were kicked out in a near-death state.

"Damn, poison, it’s super poisonous!" That was the exclamation of the first explorer to die in the forum.

"What poison?" someone asked in confusion.

"The Underground City is filled with poisonous gas!"

"What?"

"Yes, the text said it’s a poison gas that deducts 1% of your life per second. Forget about mining and killing monsters, you can’t even stand still. I died within two minutes!" the other members of the exploration team confirmed their statement.

"It’s that terrible?"

The rest of the outsiders were dumbfounded. If there is really such a powerful poisonous gas, then what’s the point of the existence of this Underground City?

Thankfully, as more and more information returned, the situation inside the Underground City gradually became clear.

"There is poisonous gas, but it only affects players below level 10. As long as you have evolved once, you can ignore the poison gas!" A level twelve player said.

’Only evolved players can ignore the poison gas’ means there’s a hard threshold for entering the Underground City. This single limitation has directly knocked out 80% of the city’s population...

Numerous people reacted with tears streaming down their faces. Is the Underground City prepared for the elites?

"Wait, how did you die then?" someone suddenly realized this.

"I... couldn’t defeat the monsters, I was poisoned to death by a monster..." the level twelve player responded.

"..."

People wanted to disdain this, but soon they found that such occurrences were not uncommon.

Players above level ten can be immune to gas, but most of them couldn’t last long either. Approximately fifteen minutes later, more players were gradually kicked out.

"Damn, the monsters on the first level are really difficult to deal with. I was bitten to death as soon as I mined a gem!"

"This is too hard, right? They can’t be defeated at all!"

...

The players that died were all complaining about the high difficulty level of the Underground City.

Onlookers were also shocked. Typically, isn’t the first level supposed to be easy? Why are the monsters on the first level so hard to defeat even here?