The abyssal wraiths did not give up so easily. One by one, they slipped through the thinnest cracks of the realm's veil, seeking out the other clan leaders, certain they would find more fertile ground for their temptations among the grimmer, more power-hungry races.
They found no such welcome. Gromm the Demon Lord laughed in the lead wraith's face when it offered him unholy power and dominion over flame. A being forged from raw abyssal essence himself, he could smell the hollow lie in the wraith's promises—no entity without a physical form could grant the kind of true, burning power his clan craved. He blasted the wraith out of his forge citadel with a wave of searing hellfire and went back to tempering his new alloy. The Shadow Clan Warlord did not even bother to speak. The wraith stepped into the shadow throne room, and before it could utter a single line of its well-practiced speech, a dozen shadow blades pinned it to the wall. It was thrown back into the veil tattered and frayed, with a silent warning never to return.
King Theron of the human realm and Gimli Stonefist the dwarf king lasted all of three sentences before they saw through the ruse entirely. They knew a scam when they saw one. The whole realm still remembered the month Laia had come back from the Void Sphere red-faced and furious, having been conned out of twenty-three whole divine crystals by a fake "realm enhancement service." She'd complained about it for weeks straight, and Theron had rolled out a realm-wide anti-fraud education campaign in response. Between that and his constant work building up the realm's economy, every citizen had seen every trick in the book—fake prizes, false power promises, too-good-to-be-true offers of advancement.
The wraiths barely finished their speech about ascension and true power before the city guards were called. Posters went up across every village, town, and clan hold within hours: Beware Abyssal Scammers. They promise godhood. They deliver debt, exhaustion, and endless work. Protect your realm. Reject empty temptation.
The ten wraiths that had slipped into the realm were well and truly stuck. Their whole strategy relied on turning one subject at a time—each marked soul would let another wraith cross into the realm, multiplying their numbers until they could erode the god's hold entirely. Instead, they had not managed to trick a single soul. Everywhere they went, citizens threw brooms and buckets and called for the guards. Worse, the realm's inherent Desolation trait let every living inhabitant strike directly at their soul forms, while they could not so much as scratch a single dwarf or elf.
They huddled in a damp, forgotten cave at the edge of the northern mountains, beaten and demoralized. "You think that's bad?" the largest wraith whimpered, one side of his shadowy head caved flat where a housewife had whacked him with a cast-iron pan. "I found a lone human child out picking berries. Tried the nice approach, you know? 'Little one, I can grant your every wish.' Do you know what he did? He yelled Mama, there's a kidnapper! and half the village came running with mops. My face hasn't been the same since."
The second wraith patted his shoulder awkwardly. "It's not that bad. We're all soul-form. We all look roughly the same." The first wraith turned slowly, revealing the perfectly flat, sliced-off back of his head. The rest of the group fell silent, staring.
Another wraith let out a wail, pulling a crumpled scrap of printed poster from the edge of his form. "I had it worse. I told them we could elevate them to true godhood. Do you know what they showed me? This." The others leaned in. Printed in bold ink across the flyer were the words: WARNING: Abyssal scam artists active across the realm. They promise ascension to godhood. They will trap you in endless 007 work schedules with no guarantee of food. Stay smart. Stay safe. Say no to false ascension.
"I've been at this for two hundred and thirty-two years," the wraith moaned, slumping against the cave wall. "I've corrupted thousands of subjects across dozens of realms. Never once have I been laughed at and called a pyramid scheme recruiter. What is wrong with these people?"
No one had an answer. They just huddled deeper in the dark, wondering how they'd ever gotten themselves stuck in the most frustrating realm in the entire abyss.
Up in the dragon roost, Theron leaned against the stone entrance, shaking his head. "These scammers are getting bolder," he grumbled, passing a stack of rolled-up anti-fraud posters to Vorath. "Sneaking right into the realm. Dumbest pitch I've ever heard, too. 'Become a god.' Why in the world would anyone want that? Endless meetings. Budget crises. Void storm damage repairs. We finally got everyone fed and comfortable, and these pests want to drag us back to starvation wages."
Vorath batted one of the posters aside with a claw, half-asleep on his hoard. "Had one of 'em in here earlier," he rumbled. "Couldn't even conjure a cream cake. Calls himself a wish-granter? Can't even bait a hook properly. Just swat 'em if you see 'em. Waste of time." "Fair enough. Stick these up around the roost, will you? Keep the hatchlings from getting curious." "Sure, sure."
Out in the purple mist of the outer abyss, Laia was on a roll.
First and second tier abyssal spawn and minor cult beasts littered the rocky ravine behind her, all cleanly taken down with her modified hunting rifle. The rich vein of divine ore she'd uncovered in her realm months prior had left her with more than enough ammunition to burn—she'd even had the human engineers rig up a few small explosive traps for larger packs.
She knelt to tally her haul, counting quickly under her breath. Twenty-three kills total. Mostly second tier, a handful of first. At fifty and one merit each respectively, that came out to just over seven hundred merits for a single afternoon. She grinned, slinging the carcasses over her shoulder with a spatial strap. At this rate, she'd hit fifty thousand merits for the Box of Avarice in barely two months. Easy.
She marched back to the garrison as the sun dipped low over the badlands, cheerful and unbruised, and the receptionist's eyes went wide when she walked through the gate. New recruits never went out on their first day. Most spent the first week hiding in their villas, working up the courage to step past the mist line. And the ones that did come back early always looked hollow, shaken, their faith frayed at the edges. Laia looked like she'd just had a very productive errand run.
"Uh—welcome back, ma'am," the receptionist said, leaning forward slightly, cautious. "If you don't mind my asking… is your divine realm holding up alright? No unexpected side effects?"
Laia blinked, and flicked a quick glance through her divine link. The realm looked fine. People were going about their day, hanging up flyers, tending to farms, forging tools. Some kind of anti-fraud campaign, by the looks of it. Nothing urgent. She could give them a proper lecture on scam identification later, when she had time. "All good," she said, nodding. "No issues."
The receptionist stared for another beat, then hastily processed her kills and deposited the merits into her account. Laia leaned in to glance at the glowing merit exchange board mounted on the wall behind the desk, and her eyebrows lifted. The Box of Avarice was still there, fifty thousand merits, exactly as she remembered. It was nothing compared to the top three listings glowing at the very top of the board.
Waters of the Far Shore – 1,000,000,000 merits The Dual Veil of Avarice and Austerity – 500,000,000 merits Shattered Divine Realm Fragment – 300,000,000 merits
Laia shook her head immediately. Those numbers weren't even real to her. They might as well have been written in a foreign language.
"Those top listings are mostly for the great houses, ma'am," the receptionist said, following her gaze. "Individual hunters almost never go for them. The official rules allow merit transfers between registered clan members for a five percent processing fee. A few of the major noble houses have been pooling merits for months now, fighting over the Far Shore waters."
Laia's thoughts flicked immediately to the Voss clan, to Lyra and her sick sister, her desperate plan to trek into the void for the same exact waters. That made sense. Of course a wealthy noble house would throw every merit they had at the cure instead of sending their youngest daughter into the void alone. She wondered if Lyra even knew her family was bidding on it.
"Is that all the high-tier rewards?" she asked, curious.
The receptionist shrugged. "These are just the ones we post at the outer garrison. The real rare stuff is listed only at the central command fortress, the ones personally vetted by the God King border commanders. Those all start in the hundreds of millions, usually over a billion. Nothing we out here ever get to see."
Laia nodded, filing the information away for later. For now, the Box of Avarice was more than enough. Everything else was a problem for future her. She turned toward the garrison dining hall, her stomach already growling. Free all-you-can-eat meals, she reminded herself. That alone was worth the trip. She had three months of hunting ahead of her, a clear goal, and a steady supply of hot food. Life was looking pretty good.
在功勋榜的顶级榜单上有哪些物品?
Laia会选择用功勋换取贪欲之盒吗?
Laia在食堂会遇到什么人或事?