Chapter 568: The Serpent King’s Hidden Chamber
Boom! Crack!
The cave echoed with explosive impacts as Marcus and Pebble unleashed Blazing Dance, their attacks striking the black ice serpents with enough force to trigger critical hits.
Bright yellow damage numbers burst above the creatures’ heads in rapid succession: -13,000, -15,800, -17,000... Not bad at all.
The fire-element arrows were proving particularly devastating. After drinking the Millennium Fire-Apricot Wine, Marcus’s Fire Attack had increased by thirty percent, allowing his attacks to deal respectable damage even against Level 70 monsters. Between his attacks and Pebble’s, the two had already stripped more than 30,000 HP from the serpents in a single exchange.
"Blazing Dance!"
The second volley followed almost immediately. None of the arrows landed critical hits this time, but Marcus hardly cared. His pets had already joined the attack, and five Royal Sorcerers and four combat pets unleashed a storm of dazzling elemental magic that crashed into the remaining serpents from every direction. Their final 30,000 HP vanished almost instantly, and the creatures shattered apart, exploding into countless frozen fragments that scattered across the cave floor.
That took care of them.
Still, these were Level 70 monsters, and they were particularly troublesome because they attacked from range and fought in groups. Every Venom Ice Cone they launched struck the Sea Demon Souls for more than 2,000 damage. By the time the battle ended, the two Sea Demon Souls had lost nearly 20,000 HP between them.
Fortunately, their health pools were roughly twice Marcus’s. Without that advantage, even with Adamant Shield protecting them, neither Marcus nor Pebble could have endured such a relentless barrage for long. Fighting monsters nearly twenty levels above his own was still a serious disadvantage, no matter how many advantages he possessed.
Marcus waited for the Sea Demon Souls to recover before moving on. About twenty meters ahead, another group of black ice serpents came into view.
"Blazing Dance!"
The battle unfolded almost exactly like the previous one. The Sea Demon Souls rushed forward first, drawing the attention of every serpent while Marcus, Pebble, and the rest of his companions attacked safely from behind. Two rounds of Blazing Explosive Arrows later, the entire group had been reduced to shattered corpses scattered across the icy ground.
Marcus stepped forward and retrieved the two arrows from his opening volley before preparing for the next battle. Then he continued deeper into the cave, repeating the same process again and again. One group of serpents after another fell before him as he slowly made his way through the endless passages of the Black Serpent Cave.
’This place is a nightmare...’
From the outside, the entire islet covered barely a thousand square meters, yet the cave beneath it was practically an underground world. Endless corridors carved from ice-blue stone twisted in every direction, each passage nearly identical to the last. It was the sort of place where someone could walk in circles for days without realizing it.
Even with his vision capable of piercing through both mist and solid walls, Marcus still spent nearly two hours simply locating the entrance to the second level, and the second level was even larger and more confusing than the first.
According to Silas’s records, the Iceflame Black Serpent Man was somewhere within this enormous labyrinth. Marcus finally understood how five Arch-Sorcerers could have searched the cave and still failed to find him. In a maze this vast, locating a single creature was difficult enough, let alone one that clearly knew the place better than any outsider ever could.
"Let’s keep going."
Marcus and his companions descended to the second level and resumed their search. Another three hours passed before they finally reached an enormous blue stone door. Several giant black serpents had been carved into its surface, their scales rendered with such lifelike detail that they seemed ready to slither free at any moment, while their open jaws revealed rows of vicious fangs.
Marcus planted both hands against the door and pushed.
Nothing happened.
According to Silas’s notes, this entrance led to the third level of the Black Serpent Cave, which had once served as the cultivation grounds of a powerful Demon Clan expert ten thousand years ago. There were almost certainly valuable treasures hidden beyond it, but unfortunately, the door required a key.
Silas himself had reached this exact location in the past, but after failing to open the entrance, he had been forced to leave empty-handed.
As an explorer, Silas possessed powe stealth and escape abilities that made him exceptionally difficult to detect. Even Divine Beasts had trouble finding him. He had wandered across nearly every corner of the Dreamland Continent, relying on his ability to avoid danger rather than confront it head-on.
Inside the Black Serpent Cave, he could activate his stealth, teleport through obstacles, and navigate the maze in less than an hour while memorizing its passages along the way. Unfortunately, his combat strength had always been his greatest weakness. Any monster above Level 50 or 60 was enough to force him to retreat, no matter how valuable the place he had discovered might be.
If Silas had possessed enough strength to defeat the monsters guarding the places he uncovered, the countless treasures and maps he had accumulated over the years might have made him one of the most powerful people on the continent. Instead, he had become an elusive treasure hunter, someone who could discover secrets that others would never find but lacked the strength to claim most of them for himself.
Marcus couldn’t help feeling a little sympathy for him.
Being able to find treasures was one thing; having to leave them behind because you weren’t strong enough to take them was another.
’Hopefully, the Iceflame Black Serpent Man is carrying the key.’
Marcus gave the massive blue door one last look before signaling Blackie to move on. There was no point wasting time here. If the key was anywhere in the cave, there was only one person who was likely to have it.
The search continued deeper into the maze.
Two hours later, Marcus’s gaze pierced through three thick layers of ice walls, and for the first time in hours, he noticed something that did not look like another ordinary passage.
A brilliant blue pool filled the chamber beyond, its surface dotted with chunks of black ice while thick black mist churned endlessly above the water. ’That’s got to be it.’ His spirits lifted immediately, and he quickened his pace.
More than an hour later, Marcus finally reached a circular stone doorway. Beyond it was the same pool he had spotted earlier, though most of it was now concealed beneath dense black mist, but the fog was no obstacle to him.
Marcus stepped through the doorway and swept his eyes across the darkness, taking in the entire chamber at a glance. The hall covered roughly two thousand square meters, its walls and floor formed from smooth ice-blue stone that reflected the faint light coming from the pool.
Along the right side of the chamber, a narrow spring poured a steady stream of water into a broad pool spanning more than two hundred square meters. Countless chunks of black ice drifted lazily across the vivid azure surface, their unnatural darkness creating a stark contrast against the brilliant blue water.
But Marcus’s attention was drawn to the figure standing motionless at the center of the pool.
A slender middle-aged man stood there with a blue trident clutched in his right hand. At first glance, he appeared tall and imposing, almost completely human in appearance. A closer look, however, revealed glossy black scales covering his entire body.
His face was particularly unsettling.
A long crimson tongue repeatedly flicked between his lips as a faint, continuous hiss escaped his throat, giving him the unmistakable appearance of a serpent that had somehow taken human form. ’So that’s him. The Iceflame Black Serpent Man.’
Just as the Town Lord had described, his upper body was completely human, while below the waist his body transformed into an enormous serpent’s tail that disappeared beneath the water.
Marcus’s gaze shifted toward the right side of the pool.
Dozens of blue figures stood there, each one so lifelike that they could easily have been mistaken for ice sculptures carved by a master craftsman. But Marcus knew better; his expression changed as he looked more closely. Those weren’t sculptures. They were the eighty-eight missing soldiers from Dragon’s Roar Town, every one of them frozen alive inside solid blocks of ice.