📢 Important Update – Please Read Before Proceeding!
Before continuing with the new chapters, please take a moment to read these important updates and clarifications. This will help you enjoy the story to its fullest.
1. Chapters 89 to 130 Are Now Live
We’re excited to let you know that chapters 89 to 130 are now available for you to read. However, due to some time constraints, we haven’t added the usual navigation links between chapters yet. This will be fixed within the next couple of days, but for now, you’ll need to manually browse through the chapters. Thank you for your understanding!
2. Translation Clarification: "Chun Bai Cheng" and "Pure White City"
You may notice some variation where "Chun Bai Cheng" is sometimes translated as "Pure White City." While we generally stick to the pinyin "Chun Bai Cheng," we’ve encountered some confusion due to the opposite world where monsters live having a mirrored name. This resulted in occasional switch-ups between the two terms. We apologize for any confusion, and we’ll be more consistent moving forward.
3. About the Romance Subplot
A quick note regarding the romance aspect of the story: it’s more of a subplot and progresses at a slower pace. If you enjoy a subtle, slow-developing romance, this will be a good fit for you. However, if you're expecting a fast-paced romance, please keep in mind it takes its time to unfold.
4. What’s Coming Next?
After chapter 130, the story will enter one final instance before we dive into the highly anticipated Mo Tuo instance. Stay tuned for more exciting developments!
5. Apologies for the Delay
We’ve experienced some delays in our recent updates due to personal commitments, illness, and work on other translation projects. We appreciate your patience, and we’re now back on track to bring you the next set of chapters as scheduled.
6. We Appreciate Your Feedback!
We’d love to hear your thoughts on the chapters so far. Your feedback is always welcome and helps us improve. The rest of the chapters will be updated within the next four days, so keep an eye out!
Thank you for your continued support, and we hope you enjoy the latest chapters!
[Welcome player to the SSS dungeon <The Curse of Kripper>. In this dungeon, you may face life-threatening dangers. Surviving is always your top priority.]
[But as the saying goes, "When the lips are gone, the teeth are cold." You are a kind person and cannot watch others fall into danger. If the world becomes shrouded in a cursed dark cloud, you must lift the curse and save every innocent bystander.]
[Side Quest: <Save More People> During the dungeon, for every life you save, you will earn 100 points; for every life you witness perish, 1,000 points will be deducted.]
[Hassan is a small town under the Duchy of John. It is rich in resources, and its people are self-sufficient, living peaceful and happy lives. The people here worship the Sun God, Kripper. They are warm and sunny in nature, and living in such a place is filled with a sense of happiness.]
(You were originally a wandering healer, and on a certain day of a certain month, you passed through Hassan, drawn in by the relaxed and happy atmosphere. In the end, you decided to settle in this city.)
This time, the dungeon quest seemed endless.
The dungeon introduction was also very detailed. Not only did it explain the basic situation of the dungeon, but it also introduced Gu Zhan’s personal identity.
At least this time, he didn't have to worry about who he was.
Gu Zhan slowly opened his eyes and found himself in a dark environment.
He seemed to be standing very still, wearing a white robe that bulged slightly, as if something was hidden underneath it.
It was very quiet around him, with only one man speaking.
The man’s voice was low, solemn, and filled with reverence: "Our god of all gods, Lord Kripper, we humbly beg you to shine your glory upon us and guide us towards the light!"
Kripper.
This name, mentioned in the dungeon introduction, was the first thing Gu Zhan heard as he entered the dungeon.
It seemed to be a very solemn occasion, and Gu Zhan remained motionless, looking around.
In front of him was a carved pillar, ornate and in a flamboyant Rococo style, obscuring most of his view.
Around the pillar stood others, dressed in the same white robes as him.
Everyone was standing in a large circle, facing the center of the area...
Gu Zhan was standing too far back to see the people in the middle clearly. He could only make out a white plaster statue, a man in a white robe with wings on his back, his head lowered. At that moment, the statue was facing away from Gu Zhan, making it hard to discern its features.
But connecting the dots from the bits he overheard, Gu Zhan guessed that this statue represented the Sun God, Kripper.
There seemed to be a few steps in front of the statue, and the man speaking earlier was slowly walking up them, his hands raised in reverence.
As he stepped onto the stairs, Gu Zhan finally saw his face. He was a man around 6'3" (190 cm) tall, with chestnut-colored, curly hair piled on top of his head. His skin was pale, his features deep-set, clearly not of the same ethnicity as Gu Zhan.
He wasn’t walking up the stairs alone, either. Behind him, he was dragging someone with their head lowered, face obscured.
In his other hand, the man held a dagger. He raised it high toward the statue of Kripper and declared loudly: "Today, we offer this sacrifice before you. Please accept our devotion and receive our worship, O Sun God, Lord of all things in the universe, Kripper!"
The man's words were highly stirring, and the people around him followed suit, chanting loudly: "Look upon us, Lord Kripper!"
"Lord Kripper, I am your most devout follower!"
Amidst this frenzy, no one paid attention to the "sacrifice" the man was dragging behind him. The sacrifice was a teenage boy, shedding tears of despair in the midst of the feverish oaths.
At first, Gu Zhan merely observed, but soon he realized something was off.
A "sacrifice" — weren’t they meant to be killed?
"..."
He recalled the system's announcement of the side quest.
For every life saved, you would earn 100 points. For every life witnessed perishing, you would lose 1,000 points.
The penalty for witnessing death was ten times the reward for saving a life. Clearly... saving lives was the main objective in this dungeon.
But he had just arrived! He didn’t even know who he was.
Gu Zhan knew this system had no good intentions. He had been tricked many times before, but still, he wasn’t used to it.
However, this situation seemed different from the past. While he was still thinking about how to resolve this mess, his body instinctively drew a bow from beneath his robe and slowly raised his arm, aiming at the man in the crowd.
"…"
So, this was part of the scripted plot.
Apparently, his current identity was that of someone skilled with a bow. After a brief moment of aiming, the arrow shot forth, flying straight at the man in the middle!
The arrow flew with incredible speed, skimming just above the heads of the crowd.
The people seemed to sense the danger and instinctively ducked, trying to avoid it.
Everything happened in an instant, but to Gu Zhan, it played out in slow motion.
In the end, the arrow pierced the man’s chest, staining his robe with blood.
The "sacrifice" he was holding screamed and broke free from his grasp.
That scream triggered chaos in the area, with everyone starting to flee in panic, fearing death would befall them.
At that moment, Gu Zhan’s vision went black, and when he opened his eyes again, he had been transported to a different place.
Now, he was standing in a dim, narrow corridor. There were chaotic footsteps in front of him and behind him, and not far away, people were shouting.
"The high priest has been assassinated! The assassin is among them! Capture him and execute him on the spot!"
Gu Zhan was still holding the bow he had just used to kill.
The system's voice sounded again.
"Congratulations, player Gu Zhan, for triggering the side quest <Escape>. As the name suggests, you need to escape from here alive."
Once again, Gu Zhan could hear a hint of schadenfreude in its tone.
The system seemed to enjoy watching people suffer.
The footsteps grew closer, and the shouting became louder. It seemed they had detected Gu Zhan's presence and were closing in on him.
Gu Zhan pressed himself against the wall, trying to use his watch’s abilities.
Unfortunately, the watch was unusable.
His tools seemed to be restricted by the setting here.
Gu Zhan had to think of another way.
Fortunately, his hearing was sharp enough to discern the direction people were coming from. He carefully avoided them, circling around them in the corridor.
"Strange, didn’t the leader say he was in here?"
"Where is he? Where did he go?"
Faint voices came from the adjacent corridor, and Gu Zhan stood in the shadows not far away, carefully controlling his breathing to avoid being discovered.
At that moment, a faint sound suddenly came from behind.
The conversation nearby abruptly ceased; they seemed to notice something here.
Who?
Gu Zhan turned around and saw a terrified young boy pressed against the wall.
The boy looked at Gu Zhan's white robe and the blood on it, his eyes rolling back as he looked like he was about to faint.
Wasn’t this the "sacrifice" from earlier?
Gu Zhan quickly approached, covering the boy's mouth with his hand and shaking his head. “Don’t make a sound.”
The boy suddenly realized something and nodded repeatedly. Only then did Gu Zhan let him go.
“Clang.”
“Clang.”
Heavy footsteps were approaching from this direction, as if a group of armored men was coming closer.
Gu Zhan frowned and looked in that direction.
At the other end of the corridor was a dead end. What to do?
Just then, the boy suddenly said, “Follow me.”
“What—”
Before Gu Zhan could ask, he was pulled away by the boy.
They reached the end of the corridor, where the boy squatted down and began knocking on a section of the floor.
Gu Zhan glanced at it and immediately realized what he was trying to do.
There was a secret passage here.
He squatted down to help.
Suddenly, he knocked on a hollow brick, and the boy's eyes lit up as he hurried over. “We can get through here.”
He used his fingers to pry at the brick joint, and with great effort, he managed to create a gap. A cold breeze blew up from below.
“This is it.” The boy was delighted and pushed even harder.
He was very thin, with bony wrists and prominent veins.
It didn’t look like he could lift the brick on his own, so Gu Zhan quickly reached out to assist.
At that moment, the heavy and orderly footsteps reached behind them, and someone shouted loudly, “They’re over there!”
“Traitors of Kripper, catch them!”
A group of people surged forward.
The boy was sweating with anxiety. “Quick, hurry!”
The two of them exerted their strength together and, before the group arrived, lifted the brick. The boy jumped down, and Gu Zhan quickly followed. The brick crashed down behind them, and then they heard the sounds of footsteps echoing in the passage.
It was pitch black all around. The boy grabbed Gu Zhan and said, “This way.”
Gu Zhan’s eyes adjusted to the darkness, and he noticed there were many forks in the passage.
The boy was familiar with this place, guiding him left and right, and soon, their figures disappeared into the tunnel.
Meanwhile, those chasing them also pried up the brick and followed.
However, they were unfamiliar with the route and quickly got lost in the maze of the passage, completely losing track of the two.
---
Gu Zhan followed the boy through the tunnel for quite a while, and the boy's breathing gradually calmed down.
He was no longer as frightened and began chatting with Gu Zhan. “I recognize you; you were the one who saved me during the ritual earlier.”
“Yeah.” Gu Zhan replied nonchalantly.
The boy's voice was slightly excited. “You’re amazing! You subdued those followers in no time.”
“Me?” Gu Zhan had no memory of that period; after all, it was just a cutscene for him.
The boy continued, “Yeah, it was you. But it’s also because those followers were praying all the time. They were out of practice. If they hadn’t left me hungry for several days, I would have run away long ago.”
“You were hungry for several days?” Gu Zhan looked at the boy's nimble movements and asked, “What about now?”
The boy replied proudly, “The first thing I’ll do after escaping is go to the kitchen for food. Don’t worry, I won’t hold you back.”
Gu Zhan said, “Isn’t it because you went to the kitchen for food that you wasted time and ended up getting cornered here?”
“Uh…” The boy was momentarily speechless. After a while, he said, “Why say that? This chaos was brought here by you! They weren’t searching this way at first.”
He seemed to take it lightly, quickly smiling again. “Doing it this way had its benefits; otherwise, wouldn’t you have been caught by them sooner?”
Gu Zhan had no strong opinions about this matter.
As they walked a bit further, the boy asked, “But I thought all the people from the Sun God sect were crazy. I didn’t expect to find someone normal like you.”
Gu Zhan replied, “I didn’t expect they would use living people as sacrifices.”
“Living sacrifices…” The boy pondered for a moment and said, “To be honest, I didn’t expect that either.”
“Really?” Gu Zhan was surprised. He suddenly realized he could learn more about the Sun God sect from the boy, so he asked, “Why?”
The boy replied, “Aren’t the people in Hassan all followers of Kripper? Their sacrificial rituals used to be public. I even attended one. At that time, they were sacrificing flowers and plants. It was said that their god Kripper doesn’t like to see blood, and sunlight helps flowers grow. It’s the thing their god likes the most. Who knows what these people were thinking, wanting to use me as a sacrifice…”
This revelation was quite unexpected for Gu Zhan. He asked, “When did they start using living sacrifices?”
“Eh, I really haven’t paid attention to that,” the boy said. “I’ve never heard of it… When I was first captured, I thought it was human traffickers!”
Gu Zhan asked, “How did you get captured?”
“I was caught while going to the market.” The boy looked at Gu Zhan with suspicion and asked, “Why are you asking so much? Did you just arrive here?”
Gu Zhan thought about his backstory and ultimately chose to tell a little truth: “Sort of. I’m a wandering doctor who just arrived in Hassan not long ago.”
“You just arrived and already joined the Sun God sect?” The boy said incredulously. “You’re pretty impressive…”
He wanted to say more, but suddenly stopped and said, “Hey, we’ve arrived.”
The boy quickly walked ahead, but a mud wall blocked his path.
The boy was feeling around the wall while calling out to Gu Zhan, “Hurry up and help me find the mechanism to open the door; I forgot where it is…”
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