NOVEL NEXT Chapter 201: Picture Book with Love
[Incomplete Tattooed Skin]
[A piece of back skin tattooed with half of a map]
(Two brave elite sentinels voluntarily split the map of the secret base in half and tattooed it on their backs, attempting to escape Azshara from the blockade of Blood-Burning Demons, each carrying a map and token separately. However, one tragically failed, the entire piece of skin was ripped off by the Blood-Burning Demon. Eventually, these items were recaptured by the Elf Resistance Army and have languished to this day.)
[Vitality Vine Wood Box (Purple)]
[Quality: Rare Level]
[Effect: Place seeds inside for 24 hours to imbue them with stronger vitality and more positive traits]
(A vine wood box woven from the Vine of Life, imbued with strong vitality power, can enhance any plant seeds, giving them traits like high yield and accelerated growth.)
Zong Shen looked through all four items, and it turned out that this vine wood box was indeed a treasure.
It can actually enhance seeds, causing positive changes.
The other items also have significant histories, but that human skin tattoo map is quite eerie.
Storing all these items properly, Zong Shen headed towards the nearby room marked by the golden phantom.
After clearing the spider webs and entering the room, a black iron treasure chest could be seen lying quietly in the room.
[Black Iron Treasure Chest]
[An unknown black iron treasure chest, no one knows what can be obtained from it]
(The chest is fine, feel free to open it.)
It's time for the delightful treasure chest opening segment. After monsters' drop rate significantly decreased, treasure chests have become truly coveted, theoretically capable of yielding anything matching its level.
For example, black iron treasure chests have the chance to yield refined level items, ancient bronze treasure chests can yield excellent level items, and silver treasure chests almost always yield something of rare level.
As for treasure chests above silver, Zong Shen hasn't seen them yet. He isn't sure whether they haven't been introduced yet or whether the ruins he's currently exploring aren't prestigious enough.
Zong Shen waved his hand to open the treasure chest.
[Black Iron Treasure Chest opened successfully]
[Crafted Gin ×6]
[Small Chili Seeds ×20]
[Basic Fertile Land Construction Map ×2]
[Refined Salt (Barrel) ×3]
[Protective Thick Hide Gloves (Green) ×1]
Five rewards emerged among which there were beverages, seeds, fertile lands, and barrel-packed refined salt. After collecting these, Zong Shen took out a barrel of refined salt.
It's a small keg-sized wooden barrel, each holding three kilograms of refined salt.
Recalling that when making bear meat soup previously, he purchased those salts from the [Market] all sold per gram, Zong Shen felt cheated!
Now a casual treasure chest opening yields eight to nine kilograms of refined salt, what a stark contrast.
Besides these items, there's a rare piece of equipment, which is gloves.
It's the first time Zong Shen has obtained such equipment.
[Protective Thick Hide Gloves (Green)]
[Quality: Refined Level]
[Hand Armor Value: 10]
[Passive Skill: Grip lv3 (Increases hand grip ability, reduces weapon drop probability by 10%)]
(Hand armor that increases hand protection and reduces the risk of severe disabling injuries to the hands during intense combat.)
Zong Shen immediately put them on. These gloves are sewn from thick hide, the stitching is a bit rough, but indeed sturdy, somewhat resembling reinforced work gloves used in construction.
He took out the Dragon-Slaying Heavy Sword, gripped it in his hand, the feel was indeed considerably improved.
Zong Shen stored the rewards, wore the new gloves, decomposed the treasure chest and exited the room.
Currently, there are still two rooms in the mining area dorms, marked with gold, left unexplored, situated at the head and tail respectively, and Zong Shen is positioned roughly at the midpoint.
He glanced in both directions, finally deciding to head towards the room closer to the mining passage he came from.
At this time, Zong Shen's warriors were engaging in dismantling the corpses of Spider Web Monsters. The entire mining hall housed some three to four hundred corpses of Spider Web Monsters needing to be dismantled, and in the office area, there were also two to three hundred corpses waiting for dismantling.
After the official period, they couldn't be decomposed in one go and had to be cut piece by piece for useful parts and individually processed.
So many corpses manually cut and decomposed indeed takes a lot of effort.
Thus, Zong Shen has ample time to explore the mining area dormitories and study those treasure chests and leftover items.
In this dormitory, there were no treasure chests; the entire room was covered in cobwebs, and all the tables, chairs, and beds originally placed there had vanished into the river of time.
In over ten thousand years, even black iron can decay into dust. In this room, Zong Shen discovered a tattered package.
The fabric of this package was somewhat interesting, but unfortunately, without the power of magic runes, after such a long time, most of the package's fabric had decayed, leaving only a few tattered strands, and a layer of cobweb covered it.
Zong Shen used the sword blade to pick apart the cobwebs and decayed cloth, revealing the items inside, but was greatly disappointed.
There was only a large mass of black material, and Zong Shen could no longer distinguish the original appearance of this mass.
Apparently, these black, unidentified substances were produced from the items in the original package after they decayed.
However, since the previous strategy mentioned this package, it proved there must be some valuable items within.
Zong Shen slowly picked apart the black material with his sword, finding a palm-sized picture book.
Yes, it was a picture book, a hand-drawn album. The cover's illustration depicted an Elf father holding his child, flying across the sky on a Horned Eagle Beast. The child clutched a doll, and although the artwork was somewhat crude, it conveyed an inexplicable warmth.
Zong Shen bent down to pick up this small picture book, yet his doubts only increased.
Almost everything in the package had decayed. How could this picture book endure through millennia without decaying?
Could this be a magical item of mysterious intrigue?
Zong Shen thought of this and gently opened the album. The first page had a line of small text.
[There are six months left until the mine's rotation period. I will draw some pictures in this album each week]
[As a gift for my dear child Yulia, for his fifth birthday]
Seeing this line of small text, Zong Shen sensed something unusual.
He flipped through it to find ten or so pages filled with simple, crayon-colored illustrations depicting an Elf father taking his child on various adventures.
It was clear that the album's owner was a miner in the cave from years ago.
As Azshara's largest mine at that time, naturally, there were many Elf and Human Race miners within.
The Kobold and Orc slaves were regarded as inferior beings and were not even allowed into Azshara.
Zong Shen closed the picture book and focused his attention ahead.
Lines of prompts from the system began to appear.
[Picture Book with Love]
[A picture book from over ten thousand years ago, filled with deep paternal love]
(This picture book will have some impact on your exploration of the Burial Ground. A special Undead is waiting for this belated birthday gift, keep the Cursed Doll well, and in the future, you will obtain some clues about the Burial Ground)
Sure enough, the reason this picture book could endure millennia without decay indeed had its reasons.
This object was a bit eerie. The reason it has persisted to this day seems more like some kind of mysterious side power.
It's akin to an obsession or resentment. Zong Shen had previously encountered the ghost left by Demon Hunter Otelan Yu Feng, resulting in a rather rewarding quest.
Keeping the strategy's hints in mind, Zong Shen put away the picture book. The Burial Ground spanned over a hundred kilometers, with hundreds of thousands of creatures buried there. Zong Shen truly found it hard to believe there wouldn't be any relics.
Now, with clues in hand, it was time to schedule the exploration of the Burial Ground.
Zong Shen exited the room. Only one dormitory room marked in gold remained, leaving no room for further choices or indecision.
This dormitory was located at the opposite end of the Mining Hall and the end of this dormitory, requiring walking around most of the Mining Area dormitory.
Zong Shen walked quickly, passing through an area where heaps of headless corpses were placed. At that moment, the Wolf Cavalry were moving bodies one by one, piling them up in the center of a Blood Pool, forming a mound of corpses.
Even just passing by this area, Zong Shen could smell a sharp stench, almost making him vomit from the odor.
These bodies had been piled up for several days and were already rotting. Yellow-green pus remained on the ground, smelling so intense it was unbearable.
These corpses weren't all from the Spider Web Monster's hunts over the days; some were drained of blood and then injected with poison, consumed as food.
This was the most primitive and direct slaughter site. Such a Spider Web Monster race hunted a large number of creatures every day to meet development needs.
Zong Shen held his breath, quickening his pace to leave the area, heading towards that last dormitory room.
According to the strategy, this room contained a Silver Treasure Chest, which would be the last treasure chest in this Mining Area dormitory. So the right passage of the Mining Area had been fully strategized.
Once the warriors finished dissecting the Spider Web Monster's bodies, Zong Shen could immediately head to the left Mining Area, which had the warehouse and main passage leading to the Mining Hall's mining area.
The right Mining Area also had some narrower paths leading to the mining area.
Now with the Rune Key for the left area in hand, whether from a safety perspective or an exploration perspective, heading to the left Mining Area to unlock the warehouse and explore the mining area was the most suitable plan.
Zong Shen contemplated as he walked into the last dormitory room.
He once again used his longsword to pick apart the cobwebs, opening a path into the room.
When he uncovered the last large expanse of cobwebs in the room, he was immediately stunned.