"Waaah, Mommy... Mommy..."

Id knelt on the ground, his eyes filled with tears, his fists clenched tightly, pounding the ground again and again.

Joso ignored Id and his attention was immediately drawn to a splash of crimson in the corner.

As he squinted to examine the source of the red light, he was overjoyed: "Baron! Look at that, isn't that blood crystal?"

The two rushed forward and picked up the blood crystal to examine it closely.

"My God! Thank you, Holy Emperor, this blood crystal is bigger than your head!" Baron was so excited he almost jumped up.

"Put it down!" Id's voice was distorted, and his eyes were so fierce they could kill.

"You brat, we'll let you off the hook because you're pitiful. But if you cause trouble again, we'll send you to see your mother."

Joso didn't take Id seriously at all. Although the boy was exceptionally talented, it seemed that he was at best a gold-level player.

Id exhausted the last bit of magic in his body and unleashed several lightning strikes, all of which were blocked by Baron's shield.

"He's asking for it, kill him, Baron," Joso said, holding the Blood Crystal.

Baron raised his heavy shield, his arm muscles bulging to an exaggerated size, and with a mighty throw, the thousand-pound shield flew towards Id.

Id used magic to break off a boulder and slammed it down on the shield, naively thinking he could knock it away.

As a result, the shield did not slow down at all after smashing the boulder, and immediately smashed Id, who had not yet reacted, into pieces, embedding him into the rock wall.

By this time, Norn had recovered and shakily got up, only to be kicked back to the ground by Josso, who stepped on his chest.

"Now let's talk about you, young Norn. What brings you here?"

"Of course, it's for what you have in your hands," Norn said, looking at the blood crystal in Josso's arms.

"That's not negotiable, this blood crystal is ours." After saying that, Joso's wand began to gather light.

"Stop, stop, stop! I didn't say I wanted the blood crystal you have. There are plenty of those here!"

"You're not kidding us, are you?" Joso put away his wand, but his foot was still on it.

Norn then told the two of them about Sarah and the others, and Joso finally let go of Norn's leg and pulled him up.

Baron pulled the heavy shield out of the rock wall, rubbed it on the ground, and then looked into the pit.

The flames on Sarah's body had been extinguished, and only a few pieces of rotten flesh remained burning on the ground.

"You know what, these monsters inside really do look like that fat pig monster."

Baron leaped up and landed heavily in the pit. He ran among the monsters while swinging his heavy shield, the sound of flesh tearing echoing everywhere. In no time, all the monsters in the pit were killed.

Baron pulled out the knife from his waist and dissected the corpses one by one. The blood crystals inside ranged in size from the size of a fist to the size of a little finger, but most of the bodies did not contain blood crystals.

He stuffed three fist-sized blood crystals into his pocket, then turned to Joso and shouted, "There aren't many! They're nowhere near as good as the one you have!"

"Don't worry, they've been here for so many years, they must have accumulated quite a lot of blood crystals."

Norn put the equipment that Sarah and the others had stripped off back on, then went to Id's half-dead corpse and tied the thief's cloak, which was covered in sticky flesh and blood, back on.

The three walked out of the cave. The deformed children in the village were still doing their work in an orderly manner, some sweeping the floor, others turning over the soil.

"Good heavens, look at these little monsters! Even the mud figurines I made with urine are prettier than them!"

Baron laughed heartily at his own analogy, but Joso had no interest in these freaks; his mind was filled with those blood crystals.

The three of them split up and searched different parts of the village.

Joso attempted to find the hiding place of the Blood Crystal by questioning the deformed children, but the children were either unable to speak or did not know.

Norn headed straight for the largest "villa" in the village, which was clearly the house where Sarah and Id lived.

As soon as Norn entered, he discovered something that could be described as extremely luxurious in the village—a bathtub.

It was a large rock hollowed out in the middle, suspended in the air by several thick straw ropes, with a fire pit surrounded by stones below, filled with thick ashes.

There were also several wooden bowls next to the bathtub, containing some dried grass leaves and powder, which should be the bath spices.

"No wonder Sarah smelled so good back then." Norn picked up the wooden bowl, smelled it, and then put it back on the ground.

Besides the bathtub, there are two wooden beds and a simple wooden frame in the room.

A straw rope ran across the room, with various clothes hanging on it, including the straw cloak that Sarah used to lure Norn.

On the wooden shelf, Norn finally found something useful: a book.

The book cover was made of leather and had a leather belt clasp on it, clearly something that the village's production capacity could not produce.

Norn opened the book, and the first page contained a passage written in extremely neat handwriting:

"Guided by our Lord Bacchaglia, we believers gather here, willing to give our lives and even our descendants for our Lord's second coming to earth, so that future believers may inherit our aspirations."

The following pages record the experiences of successive village chiefs.

Because there was no ink or pen, the handwriting was very messy and difficult to decipher, mostly consisting of trivial matters.

Norn closed the book, having roughly learned the origins of the village.

A group of dark mages came to the eighth floor to collect blood crystals in hopes of resurrecting or summoning the evil god of this dungeon, hoping that other dark mages would come and take them away to fulfill their last wishes.

Moreover, judging from the four different handwriting styles in the book, this village has had at least three generations of village chiefs.

The Rotten River Underground City opened more than 50 years ago, so those dark mages arrived here at least 40 years ago, even before Byrne!

"Found it! Found it!"

Baron's loud voice suddenly rang out, and he discovered the blood crystal near Sarah and the others' house.

Beneath the gray-white rock wall, several clumps of shrubs abruptly appeared, and hidden beneath the shrubs was a cave filled with blood crystals of all sizes.

Joso and Baron stuffed pieces of blood crystal into their backpacks until they were full, but there were still many left in the cave.

"Little Norn, didn't you want the Blood Crystal? Pick one of the rest yourself!"

Joso, clutching his bulging backpack, grinned from ear to ear, and his attitude toward Norn improved considerably.

Norn took a few pieces and put them in his bag. In the dazzling red light, Norn could already see Tintin waving at him.

"Finally, finally..." Norn was so excited that he was trembling all over and almost cried.

"Let's go, I don't want to stay in this godforsaken place for another second." Baron slung his backpack over his shoulder and prepared to leave with Joso.

"Brother Norn, if you're comfortable with this, we'll follow you," Joso said, turning around.

As Norn recovered from his joy, a deformed child with a sunken head poked its head out of the grass and stared blankly at him.

Oh dear—what should we do with these children?

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