Chapter 128: The Corpse King Palace with No Entrance

Lin Jia took another look at the screen, where a massive horde of Corpse Kings was roaring incessantly. His eyes nearly sparked with greed; so many Corpse Kings! Imagine the incredible equipment they must be dropping! He hurried back to the town to respawn. As soon as he arrived, he saw the group of newbies he had been leading earlier pestering some veteran players to carry them. Feeling too ashamed to face them, he sneaked away to buy potions. It was his first time leading newbies, and it had resulted in a total party wipe, including himself—it was simply too embarrassing.

The three brothers brushed off the newbies who kept sending them private messages and stealthily made their way back toward the Mine Area. Because Lin Jia was such a terrible navigator, they couldn't use Random Teleport Scrolls to shorten the journey and had to run the whole way.

Oldest brother dared to swear on the only moon in the entire world that if Lin Jia used a single Random Teleport Scroll, he would absolutely get lost and wander from the Mine Area all the way to the third floor of the Woma Temple.

Fortunately, they had Fourth brother, who was like an old horse that knew the way. After twists and turns through the labyrinthine mine, just as Lin Jia felt certain they would never find the entrance on foot, they finally reached the Eastern Abandoned Mine once again.

"Alright! We're at the abandoned mine, it's your turn to lead," Fourth brother said, turning to Lin Jia.

"Uh... I think it's this way, or maybe that way..." Lin Jia hesitated, running back and forth.

"Damn it! Going up or down here leads to the same place!" Fourth brother shouted, losing his patience. He dragged Lin Jia around the map of the Eastern Abandoned Mine several times until even a lost soul like Lin Jia had a rough mental map of the terrain.

"Oh! I remember now! There's a Y-shaped junction up ahead, and it's in a side path just slightly below that junction!" Lin Jia exclaimed with a sudden realization.

Fourth brother muttered, "It's about time you remembered!" and followed Lin Jia into a narrow mine tunnel. Near coordinates 137:108, in a winding corner, Lin Jia finally found the spot.

"Right here! This is exactly where I was standing when I fell in!" Lin Jia pointed confidently at the corner of the mine pit on the screen.

"Here? There's nothing here!" Fourth brother ran back and forth over the spot several times, but the hidden Corpse King Hall map Lin Jia described failed to appear.

"Could there be a secret passage in the wall?" Oldest brother wasn't giving up, rubbing against the wall and running back and forth, but it didn't trigger like the secret passage in the Sabac City.

"Uh... back then, a Zombie Monk crawled out of the ground. I stepped into the hole it dug and fell through!" Lin Jia struggled to recall the scene.

"A hole? Damn it! Did that zombie dig through the earth?" Fourth brother stared in disbelief. They had stepped into thousands of holes dug by Zombie Monks in the Zombie Cave and the Fragrant Stone Tomb, and never once had they fallen into a secret area.

The three brothers searched the area for a long time without finding any sign of the suspected secret passage. Even when they spawned a Zombie Monk and checked the hole it left behind, they couldn't enter. After Oldest and Fourth brothers repeatedly questioned if Lin Jia had remembered the location wrong—and after Lin Jia pounded the table and swore he hadn't—the three finally gave up.

"Maybe it was like that time you were level 20 and equipped the heavy armor; the server just glitched out," Fourth brother speculated.

"Maybe?" Lin Jia agreed. "Could it have been a server map connection error? It teleported me in there? So many Corpse Kings! They definitely would have dropped some great loot!" He drooled at the thought.

Although they couldn't figure out what happened, the brothers had to return home disappointed. Fourth brother tabbed out of the game to check the time and gasped, "Holy crap! It's past 10 AM! How is it morning already? Haven't we only been playing for a little while?"

"No way," Lin Jia checked the time as well. "It really is 10 AM! Damn! Time flies when you're playing games! Forget it, let's log off and go home. We'll come back tonight?" Disappointed by the failure to find the Corpse King Hall, Oldest and Fourth brothers logged off.

Lin Jia said goodbye to Little Shrimp and the others in the guild before logging off as well.

In the following days, Lin Jia, Oldest, and Fourth spent their time leading guild members and participating in PvP battles. They gradually grew weary of it, as the "Alliance of the Past" had ballooned to over 1,800 members. With more people came more drama. One minute a brother was being bullied and needed backup, the next there was a territorial dispute with other leveling players. Fighting four or five major skirmishes a night became routine, which severely dragged down their leveling speed and equipment income.

Lin Jia spoke to Little Shrimp about this. Little Shrimp promised to reorganize the guild, establishing dedicated departments like the PvP Hall and the Training Hall. When the guild needed to fight, the battle-hungry warriors would take charge, while the Training Hall, managed by Taoists, would focus on leading newbies. He even organized a "Treasure Hunting Hall" responsible for gathering gear for guild members. Of course, the equipment still had to be purchased with gold, as the players doing the hunting wouldn't be happy otherwise, though it was cheaper than market prices.

The gold bars left with Mei Mei to be sold on commission were also put on hold because she took a week off. Oldest asked with concern if something had happened to her, and why she got sick after just having a few drinks. Lin Jia mumbled some excuse about an alcohol allergy to brush it off—could he really tell them the truth?

Although the gold bars hadn't sold, the brothers still had money left over from the 700 yuan they made that night after paying for their internet fees. Furthermore, the regulars at the internet cafe knew the three of them, and occasionally stopped them to buy gold, netting them another 300 to 400 yuan. There were even players from other nearby cafes waiting for them. One man in his thirties, who said he heard from a friend in the game that someone at their cafe was selling gold, drove from a neighboring town and spent 1,000 yuan at once to buy 10 million gold coins!

Looking at the 10 million left in their warehouse, the brothers decided to stop selling for a while, or they might run out of funds for their own use.

That day, the trio arrived at the Ao Lai Internet Cafe with their usual punctuality. After turning down a few kids who looked like middle-schoolers trying to buy 100,000 gold coins for 10 yuan, they headed upstairs to the room that had essentially become their private suite.

As their levels increased, it became harder to progress. Having been level 25 for several days, the experience bars for their characters were still stuck at the one-quarter mark. Fourth brother couldn't help but complain, "How long is it going to take to reach the level 35 cap? This is way too hard to level up, right?"

"If you could hit the level cap instantly, what would be the point?" Oldest brother said while logging into the game. "Besides, the game company hasn't even started charging subscription fees yet. If you reached the cap so fast, how would they make any money?"

"That's true," Fourth brother muttered, starting his own machine.

Lin Jia quickly typed his account and password, then asked curiously, "By the way, how come you guys are suddenly able to pull all-nighters every day? Don't your parents care?"

Fourth brother rolled his eyes. "I'm not as lucky as you! I had to turn over most of our earnings, telling my stubborn old man that I earned it playing the game. I had to explain for ages how you could make money gaming before he finally let me come out. Otherwise, forget it!"

Oldest brother chimed in with a grin, "Heh! I told my family I found a job at the internet cafe working nights. I even bought them some nice food and drinks to take home, then handed over the rest of the money. People are easy to handle once they've enjoyed your gifts. They don't give me any trouble now."

Lin Jia felt a pang of shame and remained silent. Aside from what they spent on drinks and internet fees, the brothers had split the remaining 1,200 yuan, each getting 400 yuan.

Both his brothers had the sense to take that money home to their parents, but he had been so distracted lately that he hadn't even considered giving it to his parents or buying them something nice. Instead, he had just tossed the cash into his desk drawer, intending to use it whenever he needed it.

Reminded by his brothers, Lin Jia decided to give the 400 yuan to his mother when he got home. It was the first money he had ever earned, after all. Since the internet fees were already covered and he had hundreds left on his VIP card for food and drinks, he didn't really need the cash. If he ran out, he could always sell more gold. It had only been ten days since the server opened, and they had already made over 2,000 yuan; surely they would earn more before their internet credit ran out.

Currently, at level 25, Fourth brother still hadn't obtained his "Assassination Sword Skill" book, and Oldest hadn't bought his "Holy Armor Spell" yet. It wasn't that the books weren't available, or that they couldn't afford them—it was that the market prices were simply too high. Those two level 25 skill books would cost over 2 million gold coins each. When Gu Feng Yizhen told them that, the brothers, who had already sold gold bars, felt a bit reluctant. Over 2 million gold was equivalent to over 200 yuan in real money!