Yeah, just a perfectly ordinary NPC, no different from the villagers in the village.
Bryce’s face lit up with excitement. “In that case, I’d better hurry home.”
Liu Xuan, however, was thinking that in a normal game, an NPC suddenly appearing here would most likely have a quest to offer. But this Promotion Battlefield was different, so it was hard to say.
He cautiously asked, “Did you escape when the monsters took over the village?”
“You could say that, and you could also say you couldn’t.” Bryce hesitated before finally sighing. “Well, there’s no harm in telling you. I doubt I’ll ever find that thing anyway.”
As expected, there was something to this!
“I’m the village hunter. Back when the village was still safe, I often came to this forest to hunt. A month ago, while chasing some prey, I saw a golden light shining from inside a tree hollow.”
“I thought I’d catch the prey first and come back to take a look. But when I returned, I couldn’t find that tree hollow anymore. I searched until nearly dark, then had no choice but to return to the village.”
“After that, I refused to give up and came back several times to search, but I never found it. Who could have imagined that one day, when I returned home, I’d discover the village had been overrun by monsters? With nowhere else to go, I could only hide in these woods.”
Liu Xuan glanced at the tree hollow behind Bryce. “So this is the one you found later?”
“No, it isn’t. I set up this tree hollow as a hideout a long time ago. Whenever I was out hunting and ran into rain or something similar, I’d stay here.”
Bryce shook his head. “But I’m certain that the tree hollow containing the treasure should be somewhere in this area.”
At that, Bryce’s smile returned. “I can’t be bothered to look for that treasure anymore. If you want to find it, you can give it a try. I need to hurry home. My family must be worried sick.”
With that, he handed Liu Xuan a sheet of paper so crumpled it was almost beyond recognition. “This map shows some of the places I’ve already searched. You can use it to look around.”
“You’ll be able to make it back on your own?”
“No problem. I’ve been in these woods countless times. They won’t give me any trouble.”
After thanking Liu Xuan, Bryce left excitedly.
Liu Xuan began considering whether he should search for the so-called treasure.
This battlefield was completely different from the games he usually played. The wilderness was full of monsters, yet he had never seen anything like a treasure chest. NPCs outside were also exceedingly rare.
But judging from Bell, who had been able to level up earlier, the few NPCs encountered in the wilderness were probably all extremely important. With that in mind, he decided he should at least look for the treasure.
Liu Xuan analyzed the situation. Bryce had probably been hiding here for quite some time. Logically speaking, he should have already searched the surrounding area. If he still hadn’t found it, then the treasure probably wasn’t simply lying inside some tree hollow.
Even if Liu Xuan searched the trees one by one, he would likely end up with the same result.
Still, he had no better option at the moment. All he could do was search around blindly and see if he happened upon anything.
He unfolded the map Bryce had given him. It depicted the stream Liu Xuan had seen earlier, with a simple little house drawn beside it. That was probably meant to represent Bryce’s tree-hollow hideout.
Nearby, there was a long arrow marking the route Bryce had taken while chasing his prey.
The arrow was surrounded by three concentric circles, and an × had been drawn inside each one.
Liu Xuan guessed that they represented how Bryce had gradually expanded his search area.
The innermost circle was where he believed the treasure was most likely to be, but he hadn’t found it there, so he had no choice but to search farther out.
However, the area covered by the third circle was already enormous. Bryce hadn’t found anything there either. Was Liu Xuan really supposed to expand the search area even further?
That would make the search far too broad.
Although the others would still need another two or three days to finish their 10,000 tasks, Liu Xuan couldn’t afford to waste time searching blindly.
Staring at the map, Liu Xuan considered the matter from every angle. In the end, he still felt that the treasure was most likely in the innermost circle.
As an experienced hunter, Bryce surely had excellent eyesight and an impressive memory for routes.
Although he had only caught a hurried glimpse of the treasure at the time, with his experience, he should still have been able to locate the route along which he had chased his prey.
The route itself was correct, and the forest was dense enough that anything farther away would have been impossible to see. Therefore, the treasure could only be somewhere near that route.
Unless the treasure could move on its own.
With that thought, Liu Xuan decided to search the inner circle one more time. If he still found nothing, he wouldn’t have wasted much time and could continue farming attributes.
Using the locations of the tree hollows and streams marked on the map, Liu Xuan quickly found the route.
Bryce had even left some marks along the way.
As he followed the route, Liu Xuan observed the trees on either side.
He hadn’t held out much hope of finding the treasure. Yet, to his surprise, less than a minute after setting out, he spotted a massive tree on the left side of the route—at least three people would have needed to join hands to encircle its trunk.
At the base of the tree was a waist-high hollow, and inside it lay a treasure chest made entirely of gold.
“How could it be right beside the path? How did Bryce fail to find something this obvious?”
The location was completely within the innermost circle marked on the map. Bryce hadn’t searched the wrong area.
There must be something strange going on!
Finding it so easily made Liu Xuan even more alert.
Suppose this was the treasure chest Bryce had seen in the beginning. Why, then, had he been unable to find it when he returned later?
The chest was so conspicuous that when Bryce came back afterward, either the hollow had been blocked—or the tree itself had never been there at all.
Either way, there was definitely something wrong with this tree.
Liu Xuan shifted his gaze away from the treasure chest and focused intently on the enormous tree. The Insightful Eye immediately reacted.
[Fortune Treasure Tree (Special Boss)]
Level: 1
Health: 100,000
Armor: 1,000
Magic Resistance: 1,000
Skills: [Lucky One] Each person may encounter the Fortune Treasure Tree only once every ten thousand years. The Fortune Treasure Tree will appear only during that first encounter. After its treasure is taken, the Fortune Treasure Tree will fall into a long slumber.
[Give and Take] Before taking a treasure, one must first place another item inside. Otherwise, the Fortune Treasure Tree will disappear immediately.
[Nurture] Any item placed inside the Fortune Treasure Tree will gradually increase in quality over the course of many years.
[Peaceful] Upon being attacked, the Fortune Treasure Tree will disappear immediately.
This tree was actually a special boss!
After seeing the Fortune Treasure Tree’s skills, Liu Xuan finally understood why Bryce had been unable to find it afterward. It turned out that each person only had one chance to encounter it.
Moreover, judging from what had happened when he first came across it, this boss was a special type whose identity could not be discerned with the naked eye.
Liu Xuan had relied on the Insightful Eye. Everyone else would simply have assumed it was an ordinary tree. Upon seeing the treasure chest, they would naturally think it was loot that had spawned in the wilderness and eagerly try to take what was inside.
But because they hadn’t put another item inside first, the Fortune Treasure Tree would immediately disappear.
“This Eye of Insight is way too powerful. I never imagined it could be used like this.”
Liu Xuan was thrilled. Now that he knew the boss’s true nature, there was nothing left to worry about.
He confidently stepped into the hollow of the tree and reached out to open the gleaming golden treasure chest.
Inside were three items.
Liu Xuan’s eyes immediately landed on a round shield at the very bottom, glowing with a red light. It had a red outer ring and a white center, with a large…
Uh, a question mark?
close your eyes and open them again, only to find yourself transmigrated into the role of a villainous male supporting character. Readers familiar with urban wish-fulfillment novels know that it is only through the relentless antics of the villainous male supporting character that the plot between the male and female leads can progress. As the villainous male supporting character, Long Aotian not only has to bully the female lead, harass the second female lead, and flirt with the third female lead, but he also has to go all out to antagonize the male lead. In the end, when his body is discovered, he is still clutching half a moldy fried dough stick in his hand. Fully aware of the plot, Long Aotian is determined to change his fate, starting with the female lead! In the beginning, the female lead lacks confidence: "Big brother, I hope I didn't scare you?" In the middle, the female lead treads carefully: "Brother Long, please don't hit me, okay?" Later on, the female lead becomes coquettishly clingy: "Aotian, it's time to pay the 'public grain' tonight." Long Aotian's legs go weak, and he feels like crying: "I taught you to be thick-skinned, not shameless!"
uld barely embark on the path to immortality. Just as he was on the verge of death, his golden finger awakened. No matter whether it was poison, drained blood and vital energy, diminished lifespan, or any other physical debuff caused by paying a price—once midnight passed, everything would be refreshed. From then on, whenever someone asked what kind of person Chu Ran was, the answer was simple: Forbidden arts that other cultivators dared not learn? Chu Ran would learn them. Prices that even demonic cultivators dared not pay? Chu Ran would pay them. Lifespan that even righteous cultivators dared not burn? Chu Ran would burn it. All the blood essence in his body? Take it. Want both his hands and feet? He would cut them off and send them to you. You say he’s finished? He wasn’t built to sit idle. You think he’s gone mad? No—he was simply waiting for midnight. From that day onward, Chu Ran would respect neither Heaven nor Earth, bow to neither gods nor ghosts. He had only one wish: For midnight to arrive a little sooner.
nd fell into a coma while saving his younger sister from an out-of-control car. He became a vegetable. No one knew that his consciousness had crossed into a world of cultivation. Over the course of sixty years, he began as the lowest kind of mine slave, struggling to survive amid mountains of corpses and seas of blood. By sheer chance, he eventually obtained the complete memories of a fallen Immortal King. Alchemy, medicine, formations, feng shui, physiognomy, artifact forging… Every great inheritance of the cultivation world was now his. But when he opened his eyes again, he discovered that ten full years had passed in the modern world. To pay for his treatment, his father had sold the family’s shop and house, leaving himself covered in lasting injuries and illness. His mother had cared for him day and night, and more than half of her hair had already turned white. His younger sister, who had been only fifteen back then, was now twenty-five. To help repay the family’s debts, she had been forced to lower her head and put on a smiling face in places of glittering lights and endless revelry. Only then did Chen Xuan understand that what he had lost was not merely ten years. He had lost the life his entire family was meant to have. The good news was that he had brought back the memories of an Immortal King’s entire lifetime. The bad news was that his soul had returned alone—his cultivation had not come with him. Spiritual energy was scarce, resources were depleted, and the modern world still had firearms, surveillance, capital, and laws. If he wanted to protect his family, break free from everyone’s control, and become truly invincible beneath the heavens, he would have to start all over again.
s + Rent Collection Wealth】 At the start, he inherited a rundown house in the urban village from his grandfather. The house had no tenants, but the moment he was diagnosed with a terminal illness, a self-proclaimed empress from the Tianxuan Continent arrived as his first tenant. Ye Chuan soon discovered that with every new tenant moving in, not only did he receive massive daily payments, but he also obtained unique items related to their backgrounds. 【Acquired Bai Qianshuang’s related item: Tiger Strength Pill—dramatically enhances physical power!】 【Acquired Bai Qianshuang’s related item: Deer Blood Pill—significantly boosts vitality!】 …… From that day on, all sorts of bizarre tenants began appearing in the house: the empress from Tianxuan Continent, an apocalyptic sorceress from the Magic Realm, a mysterious scientific girl who fell through a spacetime rift… Every single day, he received strange, powerful items and endless money. Then one day, he suddenly realized—he had become invincible. Enough, enough! Stop giving me more!
