Mushroom Lord in the Underground City

Chapter 722: Chapter 711: Shi Wu Plus Nine

Outside the city, the morning light spilled across the earth.

The corpse of the White Dragon lay across the wasteland, its scorched scales still emitting wisps of smoke, the air filled with the aromatic char of dragon meat.

Soldiers moved around it, carrying saws and ropes, stripping away usable parts. The clash of tool blades against scales rang out, occasionally mixed with a shout or two.

Inside the city, in the courtyard of the main fortress, Sword Saint Puki crouched on the stone bricks, tentacles wrapped around the sword hilt, slicing and retracting, movements calm and unhurried, engaged in his daily practice.

Inanna sat under the porch, her fingertips holding a small flame, whispering in conversation.

Deep within the main fortress, Lorenzo was sitting across from Number Ten.

He had been sitting there for a long time. Several open volumes lay strewn across the table, notes with ink still wet scattered to the side.

He asked many questions but Number Ten answered only a few, each of which required him to ponder for a long time.

Finally, the door opened.

Lorenzo walked out, dispirited, heading toward the bedroom, seemingly without having achieved what he wished.

Inanna watched, quietly asking in the Fungal Network, "Number Ten, didn’t you teach Uncle Lorenzo?"

Number Ten shrugged its mushroom cap:

"It’s not that I don’t teach, but rather that I can’t teach."

"It’s a power that must be seen with one’s own eyes and felt with one’s own body to be used; merely listening to others describe it is useless, no matter how much is told."

"Moreover...I haven’t fully mastered it myself; something is still missing."

That lightning ball that descended from the sky brought true understanding within, but not entirely.

It’s like being taught all the necessary formulas, but the final answer must be calculated by oneself utilizing those formulas.

Number Ten felt that included the notion that if one could not derive the answer, one was not deserving of the truth it held.

Hence, it was now diligently striving to solve it.

Because of this, the originally low-profile Number Ten preferred to maintain an invisible state in daily life, becoming a completely transparent mushroom.

Aside from fighting dragons, many in the team didn’t even know there was such a Puki.

Suddenly, a cheerful shout resonated within the Fungal Network: "Number Ten! Fourteen!"

Accompanied by the sound of rapid "puki puki," Number Nine and Shi Wu appeared in Inanna’s line of sight.

Shi Wu had come to help, but didn’t expect that the White Dragon wouldn’t last a day before being dealt with, making his trip in vain.

However, Number Nine clearly didn’t think so.

It first excitedly ran toward Number Ten, wanting to touch mushroom caps.

Number Ten’s feet stirred, holding it aloft vertically into the air.

Number Nine beneath, craning its mushroom cap, confirming that it was at a height unreachable even with a jump.

Thinking it over, it then ran toward Fourteen, only to be blocked with a sword sheath against its mushroom body, preventing it from approaching.

Rejected twice in succession, Number Nine drooped its mushroom cap, moving its little legs, muttering softly "If Number Four were here..."

Inanna felt heartache watching and was about to step forward.

Shi Wu was the first to lift Number Nine onto the top of his head, then immediately retreated, distancing from Sword Saint Puki.

No sooner had Number Nine regained its composure on its throne: "This time you guys acted fast! Soon, Fifteen and I will take down a few dragons too!"

Having missed the dragon-slaying, naturally there was no point in staying.

After exchanging brief greetings with Inanna and Lorenzo, Shi Wu and Number Nine departed.

Their direction was towards Dragonhowl Valley.

While dukes were doing their utmost to build new defenses, Shi Wu wasn’t idle.

After the battle, suspecting fog to be the reason, magic power concentration rose.

Initially, it was only the West Coast covered by fog, but with time, magic power concentration across the world was slowly rising.

The increase wasn’t much, barely enhancing for spellcasters.

But demons were different, those originally only fit for rookie adventurers to train on, the low-tier demons bred quickly and fiercely nourished by magic power.

Those wastelands and woodlands abandoned due to war have now become their nest.

The adventurer’s guild’s clearing tasks filled the bulletin board from the beginning to the end of the year, never being fully cleared.

Worse yet, occasionally a particularly troublesome and strong individual appeared, with ordinary adventurers only able to flee when encountering them.

Shi Wu’s time was mostly spent on these commissions.

Wherever troublesome demons emerged, he would hurry there with Number Nine.

Through one real combat after another, his swordsmanship improved, and his cooperation with Number Nine gradually formed a routine.

This trip to Dragonhowl Valley was planned, helping with the White Dragon was a temporary detour.

Though Dragonhowl Valley was highly defensible and played a significant role in the war, its proximity to High Castle Fortress led humans to abandon it post-war.

Recently, along the new defensive lines’ frontier, sightings of new demon species appeared, most notably strong.

According to guild analysis, their lair might lie near Dragonhowl Valley, but the last adventurer group to take up the mission never returned, so the guild deferred it to Shi Wu.

On the way, Number Nine sat atop Shi Wu’s head, tentacle resting on his forehead, swaying.

Number Nine couldn’t let go of being cold-shouldered.

"Fifteen, after this, let’s go find a dragon!"

"I probably can’t beat one alone."

"I’m here too!" Number Nine’s tentacle patted his head, not heavily but making a soft ’puh puh’ sound, "Together, one or two dragons are no big deal! Then drag back the dragon and show those two guys, Number Ten and Fourteen!"

"Even if we did kill a dragon, I couldn’t move it."

"Then move just the dragon horn?"

"That’s still too big." Shi Wu thought, "At most, I could carry one dragon toenail."

Number Nine was silent for a moment, tentacle retracting from Shi Wu’s forehead, twisting atop its mushroom cap as if weighing the difference between the weight of a dragon nail and a dragon.

Then it leaned back again, tentacle back on his forehead.

"That’ll...be fine, I guess."

Man and mushroom, engaging in another routine conversation.

The content wasn’t nourishing, but Shi Wu liked using this method to kill boring travel time.

At some point, Number Nine’s previously limp mushroom body suddenly tensed.

Having grown familiar with this reaction, Shi Wu immediately asked, "What’s the situation?"

"Over there," Number Nine’s tentacle pointed forward, "A group of big things, heading this way."

Finished speaking, it wrapped around the telepathy stone, and slid off Shi Wu’s head, nestled onto his shoulder, and quickly burrowed into the iron canister behind him.

The mouth of the canister had soft padding, its edges smoothed, its nesting made minimal noise, only a light sound when the lid closed.

Several tubes snaked from the canister, connecting to Shi Wu’s chest and the half-mask at his waist, currently he wasn’t wearing it.

Underfoot, the ground began to tremble.

At first faintly, like far-off drumbeats, each thump transmitting through thick soil layers.

Then heavier, gravel danced on the road surface, roadside dry grass quivered alongside.

Shi Wu raised his head, a swirl of dust billowed beneath the distant horizon.

Dense and wide, a storm of dust pressing down, seemingly as if something ran amidst the gray-yellow haze.

Sturdy limbs, arched spine, short and thick neck, covered in mottled scale armor—Dragon Beast.

Shi Wu’s brows furrowed slightly, roughly estimating their numbers, his hand resting on the sword hilt.

"Nine, Plan Four."

"No problem!" A crisp mental response came, followed by the emergence of red and blue spores from two tubes, coursing into the mask.

Shi Wu donned the mask, tightening straps clicked just as the familiar sensation rose.

Red was heat!

Burning from the chest to the limbs, heat pulsing through veins, muscles taut as if strung, body ablaze, every inch of skin brimming with explosive energy.

Blue was cold!

Cascading over the head, quelling the heat, burying all excitement, tension, fear deep in consciousness.

Shi Wu’s breathing slowed, the world beyond the mask’s lens appeared peculiarly clear.

Feet swung beneath him, he was now in front of the Dragon Beast pack.

Dual swords unsheathed, one left, one right.

"Slash!"