A-level Dungeon

Inside the memory space—

"The Land of Time is an A-rank instance. Our objective is to eliminate the corruption and find its source," Tian Xiaotian said, looking at the people in front of her while gripping her spiritual sword.

"An A-rank instance isn't hard for any of us. Look alive and prepare for battle!"

"Understood, Sister Tian."

"With a big shot leading the team, there definitely won't be any problems."

Hearing the players in the team call her that, Tian Xiaotian's expression became dazed for a moment. Finally, she shook her head and said, "Don't call me a big shot. We are all teammates, just call me by my name."

"Alright, Sister Xiaotian."

"Let's move out!"

Soon, guided by the quest, the players arrived at the royal capital and met the king in the palace.

The king sat high upon his throne. He was a middle-aged man who looked down at Tian Xiaotian and the others below. Upon learning the details of the situation, he merely spoke indifferently, not even showing much interest.

"A plague is indeed running rampant through the kingdom. Since you come from another world, do you truly have a solution?"

"We will find a way to solve it," Tian Xiaotian said.

If they wanted to clear this instance, they had to deal with the corruption first.

"If that is the case," the king raised his eyes, "I will send you to a village. A plague has just broken out there."

"Alright!"

...

The village.

The wind in the village carried a heavy stench of blood and rot as it blew past the adobe houses. Ruin and decay were everywhere.

As Tian Xiaotian and her group walked deeper into the village, the sight before them made all the players gasp.

Seven or eight villagers were huddled in the corners of the walls, their appearances long having lost their human shape.

Their skin looked like soaked, rotting meat, showing a deep dark brown color. It was ulcerated and oozing pus in multiple places, revealing bruised, purplish muscle tissue beneath the peeling flesh.

The villagers' eyes were so cloudy that only the whites remained, devoid of any sanity. The corners of their mouths were torn all the way to their ears, exposing ghastly white teeth as they continuously let out hoarse roars.

"These villagers... they've already half-turned into anomalies." A team member lowered his voice, gripping his weapon tightly.

"Sister Xiaotian, should we just kill them?"

"No, don't forget that our mission isn't to kill anomalies, but to resolve the corruption," Tian Xiaotian shook her head.

"They haven't been completely eroded yet. We might be able to find a way to purge the corruption. This is the key to the instance, and also the only chance to save them."

As she spoke, she took the lead and dashed forward. The spiritual sword in her hand emitted a faint white glow. Spiritual energy gathered at the tip of the blade as she swung it at the closest villager.

The white light of the spiritual sword landed precisely on the villager. It did not cause any harm; instead, it formed a gentle barrier of light that temporarily trapped the villager inside.

The villager struggled frantically, roaring and crashing into the barrier of light, only to be repelled by the white light and fall to the ground, writhing continuously.

Seeing this, the other team members immediately followed Tian Xiaotian's rhythm. They used binding skills or items one after another to control the seven or eight villagers one by one, using specially made binding nets to trap their limbs and prevent them from hurting themselves or others.

"Quick, bring out all the medicine we brought."

Tian Xiaotian said as she crouched in front of a villager.

The team members immediately dug out the medicine from their backpacks. There were universal antidotes and purifiers from the anomaly world, as well as special effect sprays specifically meant to combat corruption infections. They were densely arranged all over the ground.

In order to clear this A-rank instance, everyone had made ample preparations.

A team member first picked up an antidote, carefully pried open a villager's mouth, and fed it to him.

But the moment the medicine touched the mucus in the villager's mouth, it instantly turned into a wisp of black smoke and dissipated, without any effect whatsoever.

"It's useless?" The team members' expressions darkened. They tried several other medicines in succession, but no matter what it was, once it touched the corrupt mucus on the villagers' bodies, it was either melted or had no reaction at all. Instead, it only provoked the villagers into becoming even more frenzied.

A player pondered, "These are the top anti-toxin medicines in anomaly instances, yet they are completely useless? Could it be that this corruption isn't a toxin at all?"

Tian Xiaotian did not speak. She suddenly felt that her spiritual energy seemed to be able to resist the corruption inside the villagers' bodies. That cold, corrupt aura actually showed signs of shrinking back when it encountered her spiritual energy.

Her heart skipped a beat. She decided to hesitate no longer and gently pressed her palm against the villager's forehead. Slowly circulating the spiritual energy within her body, she allowed the soft white light to seep into the villager's body bit by bit through her palm.

"Sister Xiaotian, what are you doing? Be careful of getting infected!" The team members were all startled and quickly spoke up to warn her.

Tian Xiaotian did not look back. Her attention was entirely focused on the spiritual energy in her palm.

She could clearly feel that the corrupt aura inside the villager's body was violent and stubborn, madly resisting her spiritual energy. Meanwhile, her spiritual energy acted like warm water melting ice, enveloping the corruption bit by bit and slowly devouring and purging it.

As the spiritual energy poured in, the villager's roars gradually weakened. A trace of clarity faintly appeared in his cloudy eyes. The ulcerated skin on his arms stopped deteriorating, and the secretion rate of the dark purple mucus noticeably slowed down.

A few minutes later, Tian Xiaotian retracted her palm.

And the villager whose corruption she had purged had stopped struggling. He slumped limply in the binding net, his eyes gradually regaining their sanity. Looking at Tian Xiaotian, he spoke in a weak voice:

"Thank... thank you..."

"Oh my god, what did I just see... A goddess..."

"It works! Sister Xiaotian, your power can purge the corruption!" a player on the side said.

Tian Xiaotian looked at the villager's improving condition and breathed a sigh of relief.

However, no one noticed that after the white light in her palm dissipated, a microscopic trace of dark purple aura lingered on her fingertips. It was slowly seeping into her meridians through her fingertips.

She only felt a slight tightness in her chest. Thinking it was due to excessive consumption of spiritual energy, she didn't take it to heart. Turning to her team members, she said:

"Quick, I'll purge the corruption for them one by one. You guys guard the surroundings and don't let any anomalies get close."

After treating all the residents in the village, Tian Xiaotian and the players returned to the royal capital and stated that they had completely cured all the corrupt infections in the village.

"Oh?" A hint of surprise flashed through the king's eyes.

"I wonder where the corruption first appeared," Tian Xiaotian asked, wanting to find a clue.

"Where did it appear..." the king said, suddenly smiling.

"I will give you the locations."

...

In the time that followed, Tian Xiaotian traveled all over the kingdom, treating the residents infected by the corruption. But for some reason, the corruption seemed as though it would never stop, and Tian Xiaotian still hadn't found the source.

Not only were there no clues, but whenever Tian Xiaotian finished treating one place, corruption would break out somewhere else.

Not only that, as time went by, during the battles with numerous anomalies, Tian Xiaotian also inevitably lost team members.

Days like this passed by for several years.