Chapter 28: Entering the Secret Realm: Vast Sands

At ten o’clock in the morning, Fang Shi had fully restored his energy, ready to depart and open the secret realm.

Xiao Xi and Zhai Yan had dark circles under their eyes, gazing listlessly out the window at the firewing birds patrolling endlessly.

Since midnight, they hadn’t slept a single good night.

The house shook intermittently, furniture and furnishings tossed onto the floor.

Especially the sight of buildings drifting away outside filled them with terror.

Even the overwhelming crimson light that followed couldn’t compare to this upheaval.

They were already used to more monsters—it was just a matter of dying sooner or later.

But the separation between buildings? That was a force that reshaped heaven and earth.

Moreover, under the firelight, they could clearly see that the gaps between buildings were newly formed stretches of land.

On that land grew ancient trees, some taller than the buildings, their dense canopies blotting out the sun and sky.

It was as if Blue Star had plunged back into primordial times.

No matter what, Xiao Xi and Zhai Yan couldn’t sleep; finally, exhausted beyond endurance, they collapsed into a drowsy doze.

Not long after, Fang Shi woke them again to work, making them wish they were dead.

“Alright, we part ways here. As long as you stay inside, eat well, and train, you’ll be fine.”

After saying this, Fang Shi didn’t wait for a reply—he walked out the door immediately.

He left behind two people unsure whether to feel relief or despair.

Fang Shi wasn’t Xiao Xi and Zhai Yan’s babysitter. With firewing bird meat and energy cores already provided, if they still couldn’t carve out survival in the apocalypse, it was simply their fate.

Soon, Fang Shi arrived at the location where the secret realm had opened, downstairs.

Just before the firewing birds surrounded him, he activated the key in his attribute panel.

“Do you wish to use the random secret realm key?”

“Yes.”

The black key emitted a silvery glow and slowly rose from Fang Shi’s hand.

After a flash of light, the spot was empty—no one remained.

The diving firewing birds circled, searched left and right, found no trace of Fang Shi, and dispersed.

…

Sand. Endless sand. Sand like a downpour.

When Fang Shi regained consciousness, he felt gravel pelting his face, his nasal passages and throat dry and aching.

“What is this?”

Squinting, Fang Shi saw sandstorms stretching from horizon to horizon—and froze.

Though the key opened a random secret realm, this was beyond unreasonable.

It was one of the worst possible openings.

Had his luck been entirely spent since his rebirth?

Secret realms were jokingly called dungeons, but they differed significantly from actual dungeons.

They had no dungeon-style stages or boss mechanics—just an uncharted, explorable map.

Rewards for completing a secret realm were based on exploration progress.

Reaching 60% exploration progress counted as completion.

Whether monsters appeared or other gains were found depended entirely on the player’s own skill.

Moreover, a Black Iron Secret Realm allowed only twelve hours inside; exceeding that time would automatically return the player to their original location on Blue Star.

Thus, Fang Shi faced a terrible opening.

In this desert environment, where could he find monsters to kill? Add this monstrous sandstorm, and it was pure survival terrain.

If he didn’t avoid the sandstorm, he’d be buried alive in the desert.

“Exploration progress: 1%.”

Fang Shi glanced at the data on his attribute panel and decided to push forward—he wouldn’t give up so easily.

He scanned his surroundings and suddenly sensed a faint shadow amid the swirling sand.

Fang Shi focused his spirit sense instantly—he realized this shadow was the key to this secret realm.

A secret realm contained no meaningless objects.

Every anomaly was tied to exploration progress.

So Fang Shi began walking toward the shadow.

Soon, a ruined temple appeared before him.

The temple was built of stone, reduced to only one hall, itself decayed beyond recognition by centuries of erosion.

Even the murals on its stone walls had been smoothed into featureless slabs.

One side of the entrance had collapsed, revealing a dark, deep interior.

“Exploration progress: 6%.”

Fang Shi studied the entrance, sensed no immediate danger, and slowly stepped inside.

As soon as he entered, exploration progress increased by another 5%.

He adjusted to the darkness, glanced around, and found the hall nearly empty.

Only shattered stone altars remained.

“This…”

Fang Shi was speechless—he’d expected hidden treasure, yet the place was utterly barren.

What kind of bandit would strip even worthless junk?

No—that couldn’t be right.

Simply entering this temple increased exploration progress by 5%—it couldn’t be that simple.

And the hall wasn’t truly empty—weren’t there still stone floor tiles?

Could these tiles hold some secret?

Fang Shi observed closely, exerting all his perception, and finally spotted something unusual on one floor tile.

In this desert environment, even a half-day without disturbance would leave a fine layer of sand.

But this one tile, though covered in sand, had far less than the surrounding tiles.

This wasteland was far less likely to be touched by humans than any remote wilderness—who had touched this stone?

Fang Shi studied it slowly and finally noticed two indentations on one side, shaped to grip and lift.

He strained to lift it—damn, it weighed four or five hundred jin.

But lifting it fully revealed what lay beneath.

“Exploration progress: 16%.”

A tunnel descended before Fang Shi, drawing a cold wind from below, creating a current with the air above.

Fang Shi tore off a cloth, lit it with a lighter, and dropped it down—nothing unusual happened.

He knew the tunnel below wasn’t simple—there was likely danger.

But Fang Shi was an adventurous man; his main reason for opening the secret realm was to farm experience and earn rewards upon completion.

Not merely to escape the first wave of chaos.

If there were no dangers, he might even be disappointed—it meant the rewards here were poor.

So he picked up a scavenged smokeless lamp and cautiously stepped into the tunnel.

The tunnel was high—three meters—and long, extending fifty meters downward without reaching an end.

The engineering stunned Fang Shi—building underground thirty or forty meters was hard enough, but surviving intact for centuries in this desert?

No sand had seeped in; the passage was clean, as if someone had swept it.

Someone had swept it?

Fang Shi’s pupils contracted—a strange object lay hidden in the darkness above, just one meter ahead.

He raised the smokeless lamp, examined closely—and saw a mechanical trap resting on the tunnel ceiling.

Wasn’t this the Kobold’s Dragonfire Trap?

With years of apocalypse survival experience, Fang Shi was no stranger to these creatures—more common than weeds.

He’d lost count of how many he’d killed.

Fang Shi strongly suspected they hadn’t gone extinct simply because of their breeding ability.

Kobolds were short, cowardly, cunning humanoid creatures with two pale horns on dog-like heads and gleaming eyes.

They preferred deep underground lairs and excelled at mining and setting traps.

Finding them underground wasn’t surprising.

Had this temple been abandoned and then seized by a group of foreign kobolds?

As for kobolds conquering the temple itself, Fang Shi dismissed the thought immediately.

Kobolds, as the lowest rung among races, sat at the bottom of the food chain—even with a trace of dragon blood, they were trash.

Even at the same level, their combat power was unremarkable.

Fortune—true fortune. No wonder it was a secret realm key.

If he could farm a group of kobolds, this trip was already worth it—far easier than battling monsters head-on.

Of course, only Fang Shi would dare say that.

Kobolds valued cunning over bravery; ranged attacks and ambushes from shadows were their specialties.

Especially in this dark tunnel, it granted them the advantages of home terrain.

But Fang Shi felt no fear; before his rebirth, he had hunted dog-men so often while mining that he’d grown sick of them, and knew every trick they had.

As long as they didn’t come in numbers of hundreds or thousands, he had ways to deal with them.

……

Dog-men were undoubtedly masters of traps; along the way, Fang Shi had disarmed countless traps before reaching the tunnel’s end.

At the tunnel’s end stood a towering underground palace, ten meters high.

Fluorescent stones were embedded in the palace walls, filling the subterranean world with a faint blue glow.

As soon as Fang Shi entered, he sensed the presence of dog-men.

Especially under his spiritual sense, the stench clinging to them was unmistakable.

“Why are there no dog-men guarding the entrance to this palace? Have they grown so complacent from living here that they’ve become lazy even without enemies?”

As Fang Shi pondered, a seventy-centimeter-tall dog-man staggered out, clad in tattered armor, idly twirling a slender sword.

His trembling right hand made Fang Shi fear the dog-man might accidentally stab the blade into his own throat.

Seeing the dog-man appear, Fang Shi no longer hesitated—he lunged forward and drove his sword straight at it.

This was a Level 3 Dog-Man Swordsman, with 18 Agility and the Lightning Reflexes talent.

Combined with the advantage of being a small-sized creature, it should have easily dodged Fang Shi’s attack.

Unfortunately, the effects of alcohol were too strong—the dog-man was pierced cleanly through the skull without resistance.

“Piercing Attack triggered.”

“Target received fatal damage.”

“You dealt 25.5 damage to the target.”

“Slashing Attack triggered.”

“You dealt 25.5 damage to the target.”

“Target received fatal damage.”

“Target died.”

“Soul energy extracted from target. You gained 60 experience points and 6 Survival Points.”

This was the advantage of high health.

A Level 3 Dog-Man Swordsman had 30 health points.

Even after piercing its brain, the dog-man retained some biological vitality and had not fully died.

But this state was no different from being comatose—Fang Shi merely twisted the hilt slightly to inflict a second fatal wound.

Yet it was clear that when a monster’s health reached a certain threshold, so-called vital strikes would no longer be truly vital.

Cases of surviving heart-piercing or still living after decapitation would inevitably occur.

Wait—this dog-man was strange; its gray scales were something he had never seen before.