Chapter 154: Departure

"Hahaha, little punk, with your current abilities, keeping me here is truly impossible. Hmph, with a temperament like yours, it is utterly laughable!"

"Shut your noise!"

"Be straightforward. Let me leave this place, and I will spare their lives. Otherwise, you know the consequence." The Skeleton King smiled faintly; at this moment, he certainly did not feel the slightest bit nervous.

"You cannot let him go, Master! Kill him!" Shadow, whose body was restrained by the Skeleton King, could only cry out in agony.

Hearing Shadow's cry, the Skeleton King immediately tightened his grip, clutching Shadow's neck fiercely. Shadow's complexion instantly turned deathly pale, and bulging veins popped out across his forehead. Those greenish blood vessels writhed across his face like earthworms, making him look truly terrifying.

"Fine, I will let you go. But if even a single person here is injured, you can expect me to hunt you to the ends of the earth!" Li Ren hastily agreed. He was genuinely terrified that the Skeleton King might turn vicious and kill Shadow; to him, Shadow's life was worth immeasurably more than the Skeleton King's!

"Hehe, that's more like it. Kid, even though this works to my advantage, I still have to say it: you will regret what you are doing today. Hahaha." The Skeleton King laughed arrogantly.

"Why aren't you getting lost? What are you waiting for?" Li Ren gripped the Purple-Gold Winged Divine weapon in his hand tightly, staring with fury at the Skeleton King ahead, who held Shadow hostage and looked completely unfazed.

"Get out of the way!" With a wave of his hand, the Skeleton King shoved Fan Yunshan and the others—who were blocking the main hall's entrance—forcing them to stumble backward. Even if they wanted to stop the Skeleton King, they simply lacked the strength to do so.

Fan Yunshan looked bitterly at the Skeleton King's arrogant figure, his iron fists clenched tightly together.

Seeing the Skeleton King emerge from the hall, Li Ren followed closely behind. He did not trust a creature like the Skeleton King in the slightest. Without him following to apply pressure, there was a high probability that the moment the wretch felt he had escaped danger, he would take Shadow's life along the way. That was a scenario Li Ren was determined not to experience.

On the outskirts of Skull Mountain, players gazed from afar at the commotion on the mountain. More and more players had followed into the Phantom Mountain Range. In a way, Shadow and his group had paved a path for these players, allowing the latter to arrive at this place without too much danger, witnessing the rare and momentous battle on Skull Mountain from close range.

"Big brother, what is going on here?"

"Well, as far as I know, some peerless weapon must have appeared inside Skull Mountain, which is why the forces of Falling Cloud City launched a massive attack."

"But aren't those two both system monsters? Even the forces of Falling Cloud City, aren't they just spawned by the system?"

"There is much more to this than meets the eye." The big brother, carrying a glowing two-handed greatsword, stroked his slick chin leisurely, maintaining the absolute posture of an expert.

Attracted by their voices, the surrounding crowd naturally pricked up their ears, hoping to catch some inside information.

Seeing that the crowd's appetite had been sufficiently whetted, the big brother cleared his throat and continued, "I have a well-connected buddy, and he told me there would be movement on Skull Mountain these days. Perhaps we might even be able to pick up some hidden quest here."

"A hidden quest!" The crowd was inwardly startled. Any quest bearing the word "hidden" invariably offered extremely generous rewards. Although the difficulty was admittedly very high, with rewards that made everyone green with envy, who cared about difficulty anymore?

Even if one couldn't manage to complete the hidden quest themselves, they had to accept it first—at least to prevent someone else from completing it right before their eyes!

Seeing the blazing gazes of the surrounding crowd and his own underlings, the greatsword-wielding big brother coughed and slightly averted his gaze.

*(This damn me, I just got here too, these idiots. If there really was a hidden quest, would I have told them? Still, it looks awfully lively over there. If I could go over and scavenge some gear, I'd really make a fortune.)* The big brother pondered inwardly. Seeing his deep, contemplative expression, the surrounding crowd assumed he simply didn't want to elaborate further, so they cursed him under their breath and quietly slipped away toward the nearby mountain ridges. For the sake of that hidden quest, how could they not go search for it?

No one knew which rogue had spread the news of this hidden quest far and wide. In short, by the end, almost everyone lingering around Skull Mountain had heard the rumor that a hidden quest might appear here.

The once relatively calm atmosphere—which had formed with the gathering of a large number of players—vanished instantly.

Aside from Skull Mountain, which clearly looked like a one-way trip to death, there were always players brimming with blind confidence in their own peerless luck who headed toward the surrounding peaks.

This was the Phantom Mountain Range, after all. Even the outer periphery remained a gathering ground for monsters around level 100. Once these players, mostly in their forties, burrowed into the hills one by one, none of them were ever seen emerging again.

As for that damn hidden quest, naturally, not a single person laid eyes on it.

However, it wasn't a total loss; at least a few genuinely lucky fellows had stumbled upon some treasure chests before dying. Naturally, the good items inside were quite numerous.

Just as the players were bitterly searching for the elusive hidden quest, the Skeleton King emerged from the skull cave, dragging Shadow along.

"Look over there! Isn't that the Deputy City Lord of Falling Cloud City? He actually got defeated!" A startled cry rang out from one of the players, causing the crowd to lift their heads and look.

In the distance, on Skull Mountain, a giant skeleton wearing a bone crown on his head appeared in their field of vision, dragging a thin man. Sharp-eyed individuals naturally noticed the Skeleton King's armor, which was already in a wretched, ruined state, with crack marks marring even his bones.

"Just who is this powerful?! To actually beat the Skeleton King into such a state!" They marveled inwardly. With this thought in mind, a closer inspection revealed some rather unusual movements.

No matter how they looked at it, the Skeleton King's posture resembled someone fleeing from a pursuer. Rather than brandishing Shadow triumphantly, he looked as though he were gripping a human hostage.

"A hostage?! You've got to be kidding me! Monsters taking hostages now? How are players supposed to live!" The players were even more astonished, their curiosity spiking toward the person capable of driving the Skeleton King to such an extreme state.

Following closely behind the Skeleton King was naturally Li Ren. By comparison, his skeletal frame was indeed a size smaller than the Skeleton King's, appearing somewhat frail in comparison. Standing side by side, there was no doubt the Skeleton King gave off the vibe of a boss—which was correct, as the Skeleton King truly used to be the boss of all these skeletons.

"That... isn't that the City Lord of Falling Cloud City?! How did the City Lord of Falling Cloud City get so strong?! And none of these guys look like monsters at all!" The smarter players were naturally plagued with headaches by this bizarre scene. Ordinary players simply stared in a daze, while the foolish players continued searching for their hidden quests, deeply immersed and unable to extricate themselves.