Chapter 154: Take a Break and Have a Sweet Dream
Yuliya was on her way to other mid-sized exploration points, occasionally bumping into other players along the way.
Being the humble and unassuming type, Yuliya generally preferred to sneak past people like a ninja on a stealth mission.
Sometimes, if something interesting caught her eye, she would choose to hide at a distance and watch the show unfold.
Thanks to her Golden Eyes, her vision was many times better than the average player’s, making it nearly impossible for others to spot her when she was watching from afar.
Then she discovered that other players would sabotage the array patterns by first locating the energy supply nodes and cutting them off to completely shut down the formation.
Once the mist dissipated enough, they would then step in to clear the array patterns that threatened the formation’s structure.
But finding those nodes was a hassle! It took forever to cut them off, and then you had to wait… total time-waster.
Why not just yank the whole ground where the array was etched? That’s much simpler and more efficient!
Forget about nodes and patterns; I’m going straight for the roots and flipping over the entire floor—who needs a formation that doesn’t even exist?!
After giving it a couple of uninterested glances, Yuliya quietly walked away.
Time passed slowly as the commentary and viewers changed from one batch to another, with Yuliya facing off against the mid-sized exploration point BOSS time and time again.
Welcome to Red Maple City, her third city of challenge.
The three cities were all pretty different in terms of their environments.
Black Raven City had corrosive black mist, Wisteria City was crawling with bl**d-sucking plants, while Red Maple City was shrouded in fiery red clouds that resembled sunset hues and maple leaves.
These clouds might not have temperature, but contact with them could easily cause some serious fiery damage.
This place was a match made in heaven for Yuliya.
No explosive fireballs or burning temperatures to worry about.
But clearly, explosions were much more artistic and dramatically split the clouds apart.
Plus, the BOSSes in Wisteria City and Red Maple City were kind of dull.
They were so far gone in their monster transformations that they had no lucid awareness and skipped right to the third stage.
When you look at it that way, Sogriede was actually quite special even among these city lords.
Her battle with Sogriede lasted just over an hour, but those two clowns hadn’t even taken a full hour combined.
Most of the time was consumed in exploring the terrain and hunting for points.
Sigh, having no guide is such a bother!
Every city initially shared some similarities; they all had been transformed by some kind of power into the forms they took now.
Black Raven City was a junction of varying sized formations, Wisteria City was a plant mother body buried underground.
And Red Maple City? Well, after nearly two or three hours of exploration, Yuliya found out it was conveniently floating in the sky, looking like a bunch of balloons.
Yuliya strictly adhered to the classical approach: destroy the terrain before dealing with the BOSS.
After lighting up the Red Maple City, a whopping twelve hours had already slipped by.
The distance between cities was vast, and since she had to avoid the large exploration point smack in the middle, even with her speed, getting from one city to the next would still take her about an hour.
She glanced again at the leaderboard.
Her score? Securely sitting at number one.
In second place was an overseas player with 5329 points.
And in third place was her old friend, Fiery Conflict Across the Sky, with 4726 points.
Looking further down, all the scores in the top ten were above three thousand, and even the top twenty were above two thousand.
As players cleared one small exploration point after another, their equipment and skills would gradually improve, making their future quests smoother and their points skyrocket.
The crème de la crème of players had already set their sights on mid-sized exploration points.
In Red Maple City, Yuliya ran into an unfamiliar overseas player team that successfully delved deep into the BOSS area.
And then… nothing.
After dealing with the misty maple leaves and reaching the BOSS area, all she found were some signs of combat and charred corpses.
Confirming the general state of the players, Yuliya sought out a hidden spot in the BOSS area of Red Maple City.
It was time for a short breather.
After twelve continuous hours of intense combat, her mind needed to unwind a little.
She quickly cast a simple spatial magic barrier as a warning for anyone getting too close, then curled up in a corner, hugging her knees and leaning against the wall for a quick nap.
Uncertain about how the other players were faring, Yuliya had the ability to sleep in the game.
And yes, it worked the same way in this instance.
All she intended to do was close her eyes for a quick breather, but before she knew it, she had drifted off into dreamland.
This little act left the current batch of commentators and viewers utterly baffled.
“Is the Wind God asleep?”
“I think he actually looks like he’s really asleep!”
“No way, I think he might be faking it to fish for attention!”
“Come on, buddy, the BOSS is already dead; what’s he fishing for now?”
“The Wind God has a history of fishing; who knows what he’s up to? Maybe we just didn’t catch on!”
“I want to know, can you really sleep in the game? I tried once and got booted out instantly!”
“Someone’s actually sleeping in the game? That’s a bold move!”
After a heated debate in the chat, they noticed he was still and hadn’t been forcibly logged out, so they concluded:
The Wind God was plotting his next big move.
Whatever strategy he was laying down, it was one of those “you wouldn’t understand” deals.
Those who got it, got it. For those who didn’t—don’t ask. Even if you did, you wouldn’t get it.
In reality, Yuliya had truly fallen asleep.
Not only that, she had a dream.
In her dream, she witnessed an earth-shattering battle.
This wasn’t a war between humans, or more accurately, neither side had a single human to speak of.
One side featured flocks of creatures flying, creeping insects, and swarming fish—all countless and widespread.
On the other side stood dragons, elves, angels, and demons, a variety of beings straight out of one’s wildest fantasies. Although not many, each one was extraordinarily powerful.
And at the top of this battlefield, two vague, towering figures stood face to face, glaring at each other.
The battle seemed to stretch on for thousands of years, yet also felt like just a fleeting moment.
The world shattered, the lofty figures vanished, and the various clans in the fight all perished.
Who was the victor, if there even was one? That remained a mystery.
After what felt like an eternity, the fragmented world began to develop anew, bursting with life again.
And between the fragments, many blurred silhouettes darted back and forth.
They weren’t as grand as the two figures from the outset, but were still brimming with dignity and mystery.
Yuliya observed everything from a third-party perspective.
She was merely a spectator, formless and insubstantial.
But in the next moment, a vague figure opened its eyes, and a pair of golden slit pupils fixed intensely on her direction from afar.
Yuliya’s gaze locked with theirs, and she was sure she had been seen.
Their gazes drew closer, only to repel each other fiercely.
Like the sun and moon, like water and fire.
The very next instant, the dream imploded like shattering glass, and Yuliya jolted awake.
