Chapter 417: Fragmented Star Sea

Generally speaking, the General's plan was quite good; it was explained clearly and was easy to understand, so everyone present could grasp it, and there were not too many objections.

Therefore, the meeting ended smoothly and quickly. After the General finished explaining his plan, the group simply refined some details and prepared for potential emergencies that might be encountered.

Other than that, there really wasn't anything else.

"Wait a moment, Miss Yun."

After the meeting ended, Mage Luodanlun chased out from the camp and took the initiative to find Yun Mu.

"Is something the matter?" Hearing Mage Luodanlun's words, Yun Mu stopped her steps, turned around, and asked the other party.

Mage Luodanlun did not seem to have any intention of dawdling; he asked Yun Mu directly: "That, do you... no, do you believe the General's plan can succeed?"

Did this guy chase after her just to ask this question?

Yun Mu smiled helplessly: "How could I possibly know such a thing before it has even happened?"

"It's just..."

After a brief pause, Yun Mu continued: "If you want to know my thoughts, I think it is better to be optimistic."

"Tomorrow's plan will definitely succeed!"

This last sentence was Yun Mu's true thought. No matter how difficult the enemies in the game Dungeon were, she would always move toward the direction of victory in the end.

After all, just like the Dwarves here, once they failed, the price they would pay was also their lives.

"You are right..." Mage Luodanlun seemed to become much more relaxed, and he said with relief: "Regardless, we must achieve victory. If we deny this before it has even begun, it will be too late when it truly starts."

"Talking to you makes me feel much more at ease. Thank you." Mage Luodanlun took off the hat on his head and bowed sincerely to Yun Mu.

Soon, his figure disappeared before the group.

"Hmm, what is this? It's actually quite tasty."

In the evening, with one night left before the plan to seal the Portal began, Yun Mu and Lucy were sitting in the Dwarves' camp, enjoying the food prepared by that bald Dwarf uncle.

The other party's original words were that the final decisive battle would begin tomorrow, and it was hard to say how many people would be able to return by then.

So before that, they had to eat something good.

Thus, tonight's meal was exceptionally rich... although Yun Mu was not very clear about what the Dwarves' usual meals were like, looking at their happy expressions, it was clearly quite good.

They also sat down to taste the Dwarves' specialty food.

Honestly, it was different from the heavy-salt, heavy-oil, meat-eating, and wine-drinking diet she had imagined, but she couldn't specifically say where it was different; Yun Mu even felt it was unexpectedly quite healthy.

There were all kinds of vegetables, nuts, and meats. Besides the common pork, beef, and mutton, there were also various insect dishes.

Yun Mu asked Lucy out of curiosity, and the other party told her that the Dwarves' dietary habits were related to the environment they lived in.

It was clearly difficult to grow crops on the steep mountain walls, and even animal husbandry and farming were relatively difficult.

But the Dwarves found another way and instead studied another type of animal that was not well-accepted by humans.

That's right, it was insects.

These creatures ate little, gained weight quickly, and provided high calories, making them the perfect source of meat for the Dwarves who had to perform heavy physical labor all year round.

As for vegetables, most came from various edible plants in the Dixia Shijie; as long as it wasn't something that tasted terrible to a certain degree, the Dwarves put it on the dining table.

By the way, the vast majority of Dwarves liked to eat sweet and sour fruits, and the main reason for this had a lot to do with the wild berries that grew everywhere on the Reddis Mountain Range.

Therefore, sour grapes from the Human World sold very well among the Dwarves. Besides that, meat sausages made by humans and metal weapons forged by Dwarves were both popular trade items for both sides.

Hmm... when Lucy said this, she also told a story of her own.

She said that during the time she ruled the Scarlet Court, the Dwarves had tried to promote the insects they farmed to them, but the Scarlet Court, which valued etiquette very much at the time, had absolutely no market for it, so they eventually gave up.

"Strange, I don't see any insects anywhere?" After listening to Lucy's account, Yun Mu asked somewhat strangely.

"Hahaha, this young lady knows a lot about us Dwarves, but what you mentioned was the scene from several decades ago." The bald Dwarf chef appeared beside the three of them at some point and sat down between them with a laugh.

"Several decades ago?" Hearing his words, Yun Mu was suddenly curious: "What is different now compared to a few decades ago?"

"There are too many differences." The bald Dwarf uncle touched his smooth head with some emotion and said: "Ever since the last God War ended, we Dwarves have gained a lot of land outside the mountain ranges."

"Coupled with the rise of thermal weapons like gunpowder and muskets, we not only have land to farm and graze, but we also have a large amount of money to buy products from the Human World."

"Haha, in the past, when everyone ate insects, no one felt anything was wrong, but after humans came, everyone was in a rush to become so-called civilized people."

The bald Dwarf uncle sighed when he said this: "So many years have passed, and except for some older Dwarves, no one is willing to eat insects anymore."

"Do you mind if I smoke?"

"It doesn't matter." Yun Mu was very interested in what the bald Dwarf uncle was saying, and she asked: "Why do people want to become civilized people after humans come, and where is the relationship between civilized people and eating insects?"

She actually already had the answer to these two questions in her heart, but she wanted to know what the Dwarf uncle in front of her thought.

"It's a very simple principle." The bald Dwarf chef lit a cigarette and smoked casually: "Because apart from Dwarves, no other race eats insects."

"You can take cattle and sheep to sell outside, but only Dwarves themselves will buy insect meat, and once communication begins, it is very difficult to close it off again."

"If you were a Dwarf and were very enthusiastically hosting your human friend, would you invite him to eat insects knowing that humans don't eat them?" "What if you held the attitude of promoting something you like, but the other party wasn't interested at all and was even disgusted?"

"It's about like that, but I can't figure out the deeper reasons either."

The bald Dwarf uncle extinguished the cigarette butt, threw it aside, and got up to leave.

He had only heard Lucy and the others talking about insects, so he was just curious and came over to listen.

Since he had finished listening, there was naturally no need to stay here any longer.

"But I heard that the Dwarves still farm insects now." After the bald Dwarf uncle left, Brenna said in a low voice.

"Eh, why?" Yun Mu was briefly stunned when she heard this.

"Hmm, it's probably because of the border conflicts..." Brenna thought for a moment and replied.

"During the Cold War between the Frost Kingdom and the Dwarf Empire, all merchant caravans traveling between the two sides were banned... And the Dwarf Empire, which relied heavily on imported food, inevitably faced the problem of insufficient food production after trade was cut off."

"I think that was probably when they picked up the craft of farming insects again."

"So that's how it is..." Yun Mu suddenly realized, and then she muttered to herself with some emotion: "History really is a constant, repeating cycle."

【Congratulations, your understanding of the Civilization Path has increased, Path of Civilization points +15!】 【Current Path level: Civilization lv4 (80/300)】 This can also increase Path points!?

Yun Mu looked at the message prompt popping up on the Game Panel in a daze; she didn't expect that just by eating a meal, her Path points would actually increase.

Time passed in a hurry, and in the blink of an eye, it was the third day since Yun Mu and the others arrived at the Dwarf camp.

The time Yun Mu had spent inside the Dungeon after entering this time was exceptionally longer than before.

Perhaps it was because this was a Master-level Dungeon? Yun Mu did not really understand, but her intuition told her that today should be the final day.

As for why... "Mm, mmm."

Slowly opening her eyes, Yun Mu somewhat helplessly squeezed out from between Brenna and Lucy.

And after she got up, the two people lying beside her also woke up one after another.

Honestly, Yun Mu somewhat suspected that both of them were pretending to be asleep; after all, every time she got up, the two of them would follow suit.

And almost at the exact same time!

Of course, she was only thinking about it.

As Master-level Transcendental, Brenna and Lucy did not originally need to sleep and rest frequently.

Even if they rested, they did not need to rest for long; she did not intentionally hide anything when she got up, so it was reasonable for the two of them to get up together after sensing her.

Speaking of which, isn't this just pretending to be asleep? Yun Mu complained in her heart, then went outside the tent to wash up.

Today, the atmosphere within the Dwarf camp had clearly become much more serious, and almost everyone had a cold, rigid expression on their face.

Influenced by this atmosphere, Yun Mu and the others could not help but lower their profile, walking with expressionless faces the entire way to the gray-black tent used for meetings in the center of the camp.

Laidun and a group of Dwarf officers had already been waiting here for a long time; not long after, accompanied by a bell toll that resounded through the camp, all the Dwarves except for the guards responsible for patrolling arrived at the center of the camp to assemble.

"Everyone!"

The General was clad in gray-black full-body plate armor, standing with his back straight at the front of the military formation.

"Hah." He seemed to have originally intended to say something, but upon seeing the Dwarves below, each with their heads held high and chests out, wearing resolute expressions, he took his words back.

"It seems there is no need to boost morale."

He clenched his right hand into a fist and slammed it against his left chest, the gauntlet and breastplate colliding to produce a dull sound.

"This battle will be won!" He swung his clenched right fist and threw it violently to his side: "All troops, advance!"

"Ohhhhhhh!!"

Saying there was no need to boost morale, but was this sentence itself actually used to boost morale?

Yun Mu looked at the Dwarves around her, who had become incomparably excited after the Dwarf General spoke, and thought to herself.

Without a doubt, this was a good general, even if Yun Mu did not understand military formations at all, nor did she know what a so-called general was supposed to be like.

But judging from their contact over these short three days, she believed the other party was a qualified general.

However, just having an excellent general was far from enough; those monsters—Yun Mu felt the increasingly oppressive air around her, and that Ether mixed with the scent of Evil.

She could not help but feel worried about the future of their team.

"Roar!!"

Suddenly, a monster's roar came from the Darkness in the distance, and at the same time, a Portal with grotesque patterns carved into its frame, its interior constantly emitting the smell of sulfurous sparks, appeared at the end of everyone's line of sight.

At the same time, on Yun Mu's Game Panel.

【You have encountered an enemy—【Abyss Gate lv85 (Master)】】(End of chapter)