Even the Rat King, largest of the monstrous golden-furred rats, panicked. It rammed the closest zombie down to the ground, forcing it to release the rat that it was chomping on.

Without any hesitation, the rat king bit down on the zombie’s bony hand with a loud cracking sound. In moments, the zombie had already lost several of its fingers.

The zombie tried to climb to its feet, but it was crushed under the weight of the rat king, and its attempts to free itself were futile.

“Jip jip jip!” The rat king squeaked furiously at the zombie, either in triumph or in retribution for its deceased comrades.

Its squeaks were met by a resounding thwack to its head.

*Bam!*

Another zombie held a wooden bat and swung it, sending the monstrous golden-furred rat king flying several meters before finally crashing back down to the ground.

“Jip!”

The infuriated rat king arched its back and aimed the golden fur behind its head right at the zombie. 

“Holy shit!” Zu An was alarmed. The rat king was clearly far stronger than its companions—its spines were a meter long, and every single one of them shone with a golden luster. They looked just like javelins.

*Shoosh shoosh shoosh!*

The spines shot out a speed far faster than a slow zombie could dodge. The rat king’s target was struck squarely by the spines, and the sheer impact of them pinned it to a cliff wall.

“Jip jip!”

The monstrous golden-furred rat king squeaked in glee. It had returned the favor for the earlier bat to its head.

Utterly astonished, Ji Xiaoxi remarked, “If those spines were to strike us, we might just lose our lives!”

Zu An nodded in agreement. He wasn’t too familiar with how ferocious beasts in this world were ranked in terms of power level, but the monstrous golden-furred rat king seemed to be around the pinnacle of the third rank, or even the early stages of the fourth rank. 

He wasn’t confident of defeating the rat king in a direct battle without relying on his cheats. 

“W-what is that?” exclaimed Ji Xiaoxi. Her voice quivered as she pointed.

Zu An quickly looked at what she was pointing at, only to see that the zombie that had been pinned to the cliff face had started moving. It lowered its head to glance at its chest, causing its eyeballs to pop out a little from its face. It looked almost like a literal expression of horror.

Then, it raised its hand and began plucking the spines out of its body. There was no splatter of blood; only a mysterious, viscous fluid dribbled out of the puncture.

Zu An’s lips twitched. It was fortunate that he hadn’t eaten too much earlier, or else he might have just retched at this sight.

As for Ji Xiaoxi, she had long since turned her face away, not wanting to look any longer.

The zombie plucked out all of the spines impaling it before charging toward the monstrous golden-furred rat king once more, the bat still in its hand.

“Jip~”

The fur on the rat king pricked up, not out of aggression, but fear. It had already resorted to its strongest move, but its enemy seemed completely unharmed despite being struck by it squarely. How could it possibly fight against an opponent like this?!

Fearing for its life, it turned tail and fled. As a king, it might have felt compelled to protect its own people, but it realized that the current circumstances were so dire that it would be a blessing if it could escape with its own life.

Watching the scene from above, Zu An couldn’t help but frown. The defensive prowess of the zombies had shocked him. He didn’t think that they would be unaffected even after suffering such a heavy blow. He couldn’t fathom just how much it would take to kill one of them.

“Xiaoxi, are there any records about zombies in this dungeon?” asked Zu An.

Ji Xiaoxi shook her head in response. “I have never read or heard of any records of zombies in the Ursae Dungeon before. There’s nothing on this in the academy’s archive, and my father has never mentioned it to me before.”

Zu An felt a little unnerved. He recalled hearing that the dungeon had opened ahead of its anticipated time, and Jiang Luofu had reminded him that there was something amiss about the dungeon this time around as well. 

Is something going on right now just because I’m here? What the hell, isn’t this sort of special treatment only accorded to the protagonists in stories?

As a part of him argued with himself in his mind, the other part of Zu An’s mind was still whirring, trying to process the situation. “Are there light elemental spells or something like that in this world? How in the world are we supposed to kill off such monsters?”

“Light elemental spells?” Ji Xiaoxi frowned. “I don’t know much about spells, but there are cultivators who have awakened the light element before, although they are incredibly rare. I don’t think that there are any light element cultivators in Brightmoon City. As for dealing with the zombies, there are some records relating to that. It seems like they would stop moving once you decapitate them. Aside from that, there are rumors that they are vulnerable to fire element cultivators.”

“Fire element?” Zu An frowned. 

Will ordinary fire work against them? But again, it seems almost impossible to light a fire in this windy mountain valley.

He swiftly ran through all of the skills he had learned, but none of them seemed to be of much use against these zombies. Even his prized ‘Bixie Swordplay’ didn’t seem too useful against these zombies, given their incredibly high defense rating. He could totally imagine his sword striking a zombie’s neck, just to bounce off its tough skin.

In the end, only a third of the monstrous golden-furred rats managed to escape. Most of them were picked up by a zombie and munched on like sandwiches. It was unfortunate that they were land creatures, and that a huge number of zombies had just happened to be lurking underground.

In fact, the only reason why a third of them were able to escape was because not many zombies had awakened initially. However, as the scent of blood began to fill the valley, more and more decrepit zombies climbed out of the ground in search of prey.

“Do you have any medicine to erase our scent? Hurry up and scatter them around us, or else it’ll be too late!” said Zu An anxiously.

It felt as though they were sinking ever deeper into danger. They had only been facing monstrous golden-furred rats lurking beneath them earlier, but now, the threat against them had been replaced by these stronger zombies. There was no chance for them to escape, even if they wanted to. Their only hope right now was to not be discovered.

“I do.” Ji Xiaoxi whipped out a bottle of medicine from her pouch and began sprinkling it around them.

Zu An finally heaved a sigh of relief.

“How long will it take for them to crawl back into the ground?” Looking at the zombies lurking beneath him, Zu An felt his heart growing heavier and heavier. 

According to the movies, zombies usually shied away from direct sunlight. At the moment, it was still daytime, but the natural sunlight had been blocked off by the mountains surrounding this valley, meaning that the valley itself was relatively shady. To make things worse, the sun appeared to be setting.

Are these corpses going to roam for the entire night?

Zu An found himself wondering how these dungeons came to be. The concepts of day and night applied here, and there was a sun in the sky during the day as well. He wondered if the moon would rise when night fell later on.

Meanwhile, the zombies were feasting heartily on their prey. Although flesh and blood seemed to be the finest delicacies to these zombies, the same couldn’t be said about the humans present.

As the air grew thicker and heavier with the stench of blood, Zu An felt his stomach churning, but he forced his lunch back down.

Ji Xiaoxi, on the other hand, wasn’t that fortunate. Not only was she naturally afraid of such things, she had eaten a lot earlier on as well. The heavy stench of blood and the sight of zombies chomping on the monstrous golden-furred rats all around her strained her ability to control her stomach.. She eventually succumbed and started vomiting.

I guess even the most adorable of fairies don’t puke out strawberries and rainbows.

“Shit!” Zu An’s heart skipped a beat, because something worse was occurring.

The slight disturbance caused by Ji Xiaoxi’s vomiting drew the attention of the feasting zombies. Most of them didn’t have eyeballs, but Zu An was certain that they were staring at them.

Some of those that had failed to secure a monstrous golden-furred rat for themselves earlier began shambling their way towards the tree.

Zu An shuddered in fear. The tree was extremely unstable from all of the nibbling the rats had done to it earlier, and it wouldn’t take much to topple it. Just thinking about the pitiful plight of those rats that had fallen into the clutches of the zombies sent a shiver running down his spine.

He quickly turned to Ji Xiaoxi and asked her, “You should have no qualms using your poison against zombies, right?”

“My poison only works on living beings. The undead aren’t afraid of poison,” replied Ji Xiaoxi, her face pale. “I’m sorry. It’s all my fault.”

Had it not been for her earlier gluttony, she wouldn’t have drawn these zombies over to them.

“There’s no point talking about this now,” said Zu An. “I’ll lure them away. Make sure that you don’t make a single sound.”

Ji Xiaoxi was alarmed. “You can’t! We should go together!”

Zu An shook his head and said, “I have a movement skill that should allow me to maneuver around these slow zombies. It’s likely that both of us will die if we go together. Besides, if I lure the zombies away, you’ll be able to call the others over and rescue me.”

“Big brother Ah Zu~” Ji Xiaoxi’s eyes reddened. She knew that she would only make things more difficult for him by sticking by his side, but human emotions didn’t always obey logic.

She couldn’t shake the feeling that she was the one who had landed Zu An in such a dangerous position.

Noticing the dull look on Ji Xiaoxi’s face, Zu An quickly said, “You mustn’t do anything foolish, or else my efforts will be in vain!”

“All right… but big brother Ah Zu, you must promise me that you’ll stay alive!” Tears were brimming in Ji Xiaoxi’s eyes as she spoke.

“Are you planning to repay me by betrothing yourself to me if I manage to survive this ordeal?” Zu An teased her as he assessed the situation below.

Ji Xiaoxi’s face reddened. “But you already have a wife…”

“Hahaha, my wife doesn’t mind me having other women. All right, I’m heading out!” With a smile, Zu An leaped downwards toward an opening that he had spotted.

His sudden move alarmed the zombies. Most of them turned towards him right away, but a small number of them continued looking toward the crown of the tree where Ji Xiaoxi was.

So, Zu An clapped his hands loudly and shouted to attract their attention. “Hey, you bony freaks! I dare you to catch me! If you catch me, you can stick your bones into me wherever you want!”

Perhaps it was because the zombies understood his words, or perhaps because he was simply making too much of a commotion, but all of the zombies immediately turned in his direction and charged towards him.

In the face of such a terrifying threat, Zu An executed his Sunflower Phantasm right away, weaving in between the gaps left by the zombies, trying to lure them further away from Ji Xiaoxi. 

Unfortunately, there were simply far too many zombies, and dodging them all was no easy feat, even though he had a powerful movement skill in his arsenal. Without warning, barely after his foot had touched the ground, a black shadow smashed right down onto his head, in the split second in which he was gathering the necessary momentum for his next move.