Star Abyss Walker

Chapter 19 Giant Sandworm (Thanks to cklyt, the Alliance Leader!)
"Huffing and puffing~~~"

The three elite mutated camels simultaneously lit up their heads, indicating that they were being attracted to aggro. Then, they spurred themselves forward, shaking their heads and wagging their tails as they charged straight at them.

I immediately lowered my center of gravity, assumed a standard shooting stance, and unleashed a barrage of shots from my green Roarer. In an instant, damage numbers appeared above the heads of several mutated camels—

"59!"

"62!"

"69!"

"61!"

With the bursts of submachine gun fire, the health bars of several mutated camels steadily decreased, and I subconsciously spread the damage, reducing each camel's health bar to about a quarter. Just as I finished doing this, the camels were already close at hand, and I launched an attack!
Its forelegs rose, and it stomped down in fury!

With lightning speed, I drew the Vanguard Bee Sting sword and slashed it at the top of the camel's head on the left, dealing 248 points of damage. At the same time, I decisively activated the skill - Step Slash!

"Om~~"

Strands of sword intent flowed around his body, and he instantly shifted to the right side of the camel. At the same time, a faint layer of silver aura covered his body, which was the protective effect that automatically formed after the Step Slash was activated.

"Boom boom boom—"

The simultaneous stomp attack of the three mutated camels caused the energy generated by the stepping slash to gradually thin out, but it ultimately blocked the opponent's damage completely!

"Cool!"

I was overjoyed. The defensive layer generated by the level 10 Step Slash is definitely much thicker than that of the lower level, and it was able to withstand no damage. That makes things much easier!
The sword light burst down, and the second sword killed the camel on the left with its remaining blood. At the same time, the body twisted, and the blade went straight for the second camel. Streams of light flew across the blade and quickly formed a dragon-shaped aura, which slammed into the second camel's throat!
This strike is the universal skill of Starry Sky Super Weapon - Dragon Blade!
"538!"

The damage numbers skyrocketed, making me incredibly happy!

As expected of a level 10 Dragon Blade, the damage has reached the literal 200% limit. The monster-killing effect is exceptionally high!
"Hmph~~"

Seeing its two companions die one after another, the third mutated camel's eyes blazed with fury, and it lowered its head and charged forward.

I hurriedly retreated, and half a second later my body turned into a blur again. I activated the Step Slash and appeared behind the opponent. Relying on the protection of the newly generated Step Slash Qi, I killed him with two consecutive sword strikes!

In the blink of an eye, all three mutated camels turned into corpses, and the monsters were killed without any damage!
The reason for letting low-health monsters get close is simply to save some bullets. In addition, it can also train one's close combat skills. As a melee player, the ability to adapt to close combat is crucial. These are not things that can be changed by simply improving skills. They need to be summarized and honed by oneself.

In this way, you can quickly kill monsters and accumulate experience. As for the durability of the Vanguard Bee Sting, that's not a problem. In the setting of "Star Abyss", melee players have a huge advantage, which is that their weapons wear out very slowly. Every weapon can be described as the legendary three words - super wear-resistant!

Continuing on, armed with a submachine gun, I stepped deeper into the dungeon map. Ahead were still a large number of camels. According to the dungeon's rules, killing all the monsters inside would maximize the dungeon's rewards, so none of them could be let go.

"rustle……"

Stepping on the gravel, I attracted 3-4 mutated camels each time, which allowed me to suppress them with my firepower and melee damage; otherwise, it would be quite troublesome.

In this way, by continuously turning large numbers of mutated camels into experience points, a lot of time had passed in the blink of an eye. One batch of camels after another fell down, and while bullets were consumed in large quantities, a huge amount of experience points were accumulated.

Further on, enemies clad in combat suits and carrying firearms appeared in the ruins; their attributes floated up as they drew nearer.

[Plundering Grounds Rebels] (Elite)
Rating: 15
Attack: 20-55
Defense: 15
Qi and blood: 1800
Skills: [Basic Shooting Lv3] [Basic Melee Lv3]

In detail: The soldiers who followed the sergeant major in his defection had completely degenerated into desperados and had long since lost any semblance of honor.
……

I frowned. The other side had a gun and couldn't conserve bullets.

So, after creating a distance of about 150 meters, he flipped and jumped onto the roof of a vehicle that was nearly half covered by yellow sand. Then he switched his main weapon to the Wind Whisperer, aimed and pulled the bolt, and began to fire continuously at the rebels in the distance. With a series of loud bangs, damage numbers kept rising into the air above the heads of several rebels in the distance!

"424!"

"402!"

"609!"

"663!"

"411!"

The Wind Whisperer's strength lies in its damage output being several times higher than that of a submachine gun. In addition, it has a blessing skill that has a 25% chance to deal an additional 50% explosive damage, so it can easily deal more than 600 points of damage, which is terrifying for an NPC with only 1800 health!
In the blink of an eye, two rebels fell into pools of blood. The remaining three roared, their eyes filled with murderous intent: "It's a sniper! Charge out and kill that damned bastard!"

A burst of bullets exploded in mid-air, crackling and popping against the tank beneath them.

Two of the bullets even hit me, and it felt like being bitten by a mosquito, a slight pain, and damage numbers flew up above my head.

"51!"

"52!"

However, the damage was quite ordinary. For someone like me with 4100 health points, it was nothing. There was no way around it; the SS-level Yuanli Furnace was just that powerful. The level 8 furnace added 24 health points, and the health growth of a super warrior was quite impressive. 1 health point was equivalent to 100 health points, so the Yuanli Furnace alone provided a maximum health of 2400 points!
In addition, Randall's Shield also increases my health by 500 points, so my current health is much higher than that of an average player!
His body rolled rapidly, and after rolling off the chariot, he quickly switched to the Howler. With a "thud," he slammed the Randall's Shield heavily into the yellow sand with his left hand, and suddenly veered to the right, firing a burst of bullets that took down one of the rebels!
"This bastard!"

The other two rebels fired wildly, but the damage to Randall's Shield was negligible. With my health regeneration rate, I could quickly recover to full health!

"Who taught you how to shoot? All you can do is aim?" I suddenly shifted my body to the left of the shield and fired another burst, leaving the two rebels with almost no health.

Finally, the two rebels became frightened, a "fear" icon appeared above their heads, and they picked up their submachine guns and tried to leave, but I shot them down with my Howler.

"Shuashuashua~~"

The bodies of the rebels, like the camels before them, quickly respawned and disappeared after being killed in the instance space. They could not loot loot boxes or collect any equipment or supplies.

This is quite different from the previous Deadmines instance. This is probably because the Deadmines is an objectively existing faction and map, which was just classified as an instance by the system. As for this, it is a map that is activated by instance crystals, so there is a world of difference between the two.

Of course, this is reasonable. Otherwise, if you could loot a huge amount of guns and bullets just by running a dungeon, wouldn't the economic balance of the entire game be broken very quickly?

"Quick, charge over there and take out the intruders!"

At this moment, several more rebels rushed over.

At the same time, a "crackling" sound suddenly came from deep underground, as if something was burrowing underground.

In the lower right corner of the battle interface, a series of azure blue words kept appearing.

[Attention! The Giant Sandworm is about to enter the battlefield!]

[Please be aware that a sandstorm is approaching. Please find shelter immediately!]

[Tip: Scattered abandoned vehicles nearby can be used as hiding places!]

……

"Wow~~~"

Without any warning, a sandstorm struck, instantly blinding everyone.

I hurriedly stepped back and struggled to open the door of an abandoned war chariot. After getting in, I quickly locked the door. Instantly, a sandstorm swept across my vision. This was probably an unexpected situation in the instance. At this moment, more than ten rebel soldiers in front of me were blown by the sandstorm and could only lie on the ground, powerless to resist. They were about to be buried by the sandstorm in the blink of an eye.

"..."

I frowned, squinted at everything around me, and began to understand a principle.

You must read the prompts in the "Star Abyss" dungeon carefully, as they can sometimes be lifesavers. If I hadn't gotten on board in time, it could have been quite troublesome.

The sandstorm is about to end! The countdown to the giant sandworm attack has begun!

A countdown screen appeared before my eyes.

The sandstorm dissipated in an instant, and as the sand and gravel fell to the ground, the sky returned to its cloudless state. The dozen or so rebel soldiers lay prostrate on the ground, struggling to rise from the sand.

"Bang~~~"

With a loud bang, a colossal creature emerged from the ground, its head adorned with a BOSS ring!
[Giant Sandworm] (Green BOSS)

Rating: 15
Attack: 125-150
Defense: 50
Qi and blood: 5000
Skills: [Drilling Lv4], [Bite Lv4], [Devour Lv4]

Details: Giant sandworms lurking underground feed on humans and camels; they are malevolent creatures.
……

"It's that damned sandworm!"

The group of rebels were terrified.

At the same time, the copy notification appeared again.

In past battles, the Giant Sandworm stole STC fragments from the rebels. Defeating the Giant Sandworm will allow you to reclaim these important STC fragments!

Outside, the giant sandworm twisted its body and charged forward, its blood-red maw, filled with swirling teeth, opened wide and swallowed one of the rebels in one gulp!

I rushed out of the chariot and set up the Wind Whisperer on top of it again, shouting, "Hurry up, let's take down this giant sandworm together, or none of us will leave here alive! Hurry!"

As he spoke, he fired a series of shots, and the damage numbers kept jumping up above the sandworm's head!

"He's right, let's take down the sandworms together, and we need to be quick!"

A group of rebels scattered and began firing.

Unfortunately, the giant sandworm has a thick carapace, which blocked a lot of bullet damage. Even my Wind Whisperer could only deal 200+ damage per shot, as too much of the damage was negated.

However, as the giant sandworm's health bar kept dropping and it rapidly pounced on the rebels, my goal was achieved. Why not let these rebels draw the BOSS's firepower?
In the blink of an eye, the entire rebel army was wiped out, and the giant sandworm's health bar dropped to about 20%, leaving it with approximately 1000 health points!
It turned around, and its large, dark compound eyes stared intently at me.

This feels a little creepy...

(End of this chapter)