Chapter 172 – Stratified Abyssal Realm

When Shi Feng, Crimson Heart, Blood Hammer, and the others opened their eyes again, what entered their vision was a dark and moonless sky. The only thing they could see in the sky were floating landmasses.

Before Shi Feng and the others could get a good feel of their surroundings, a series of system notifications rang in their ears.

…

System: You have discovered the Stratified Abyssal Realm.

System: All communication with your homeworld has been severed.

System: Due to the influence of the Abyss’s power, your Physique is reduced by 50%, and your five senses are weakened by 30%.

System: The gravity in the Stratified Abyssal Realm is five times greater than God’s Domain. Your mobility is weakened drastically.

System: The Stratified Abyssal Realm’s level limit is 120. You are unable to get promoted to Tier 4 while you remain here. This restriction will only be removed when you enter a higher world.

…

The system notifications stunned Shi Feng and the others.

They might not have lost any Basic Attributes after entering the Stratified Abyssal Realm, but their Physique and five senses were weakened significantly. The gravity acting on their bodies had also increased drastically. In a situation where all sorts of Level 105-plus Grand Lord ranked Abyssal Beasts surrounded them, receiving such penalties would put them through hell.

At this time, even Shi Feng had a headache over these penalties.

Everyone in their group might be above Level 105, but under the Stratified Abyssal Realm’s suppression, they couldn’t even exhibit half of their usual combat power.

In their current situation, the only ones who stood a chance against the Level 105-plus Grand Lords roaming around them were players who had converted to another race like himself, Hidden Soul, and the Tower Alliance’s members. Even Domain Realm experts such as Crimson Heart and Cleansed Rue would have difficulty going up against a Level 105 Grand Lord by themselves. As for Su Qianliu and the others, they could just barely fight against a Great Lord of the same level.

When Gentle Snow tried using her Mana Domain, she couldn’t help but exclaim, “The suppression here is absurd. Even though the Mana here is so dense, I can only extend my Mana Domain up to thirty yards away. That’s only one-third of my usual range…”

“That’s normal. Over 70% of the Mana here is of the dark element,” Shi Feng explained as he scanned his surroundings. “Skills and Spells that aren’t of the dark element will be drastically weakened here. Conversely, Dark Skills and Spells will be strengthened.”

When observing his surroundings with the Eyes of Reality, Shi Feng could see everything for what it was. Particularly, his ability to see the composition of the Mana around him had reached an extreme extent. Meanwhile, the Stratified Abyssal Realm’s Mana composition was so skewed that it surprised even him.

Even in special elemental worlds, the dominant element there wouldn’t occupy more than 30% of the world’s Mana. Yet, it was already more than enough to amplify the power of attacks of that element by 100% or more. Yet, the dark element occupied over 70% of the Stratified Abyssal Realm’s Mana.

This situation was incredibly disadvantageous for players like themselves, who had spent most of their time living in God’s Domain.

Fortunately for Shi Feng, he had the Abyssal Eye, and it could reduce all hostile dark-type effects by 50%. Meanwhile, this effect encompassed even the suppression coming from the Stratified Abyssal Realm. So, while he still couldn’t exhibit 100% of his usual combat power, he could still exhibit 70% of it.

After a brief discussion between Shi Feng, Crimson Heart, and Blood Hammer, they decided to move as a team until they reached a settlement in the Stratified Abyssal Realm. After all, there were many Abyssal Beasts around them. It’d be more efficient if they broke through this area with more people.

Subsequently, after everyone decided on a general direction to move in, they began advancing and killing the Abyssal Beasts in their path.

The Abyssal Beasts came in all sorts of shapes and sizes—Three-Headed Wolves and Twin-Headed Lions, to name a few. Although their levels only ranged between Level 105 and Level 110, and the majority of them were at the Great Lord rank, the challenge difficulty of these monsters gave Crimson Heart and the others a scare.

“Why do these monsters have such quick reaction speeds?” Crimson Heart exclaimed as she fought against a Great Lord ranked Three-Headed Hellhound. She had thrust her spear at the Great Lord over a dozen times, yet only three of her attacks had landed.

There wasn’t anything special about the Three-headed Hellhound’s Basic Attributes. Each of her attacks caused over 600,000 damage to the Great Lord. Meanwhile, the Three-Headed Hellhound only had 50 million HP, so it wouldn’t take her more than 100 attacks to take it down.

However, unlike the Great Lords she was used to fighting, the Three-Headed Hellhound’s dodging capabilities practically rivaled Refinement Realm experts. Combined with the penalties she was currently suffering from, the Three-Headed Hellhound’s challenge difficulty was greater than even Great Lords found in the Miniature Ancient World.

“These monsters aren’t the only problem. Our Stamina is also depleting much more rapidly here than on our homeworld! The consumption rate has increased by at least five times! We have to end the fight and leave this place quickly!” Maria, the Demidragon woman from the Tower Alliance, said, a frown forming on her face as she fought against a Grand Lord ranked Abyssal Two-Headed Manticore.

It wouldn’t have been a problem if the monsters here were merely more challenging than normal. However, the increase in Stamina consumption was a fatal problem.

Under normal circumstances, they could fight continuously for at least ten hours before having to rest. However, they could, at most, fight for two hours continuously while subjected to this penalty.

A Grand Lord here had upwards of 200 million. Even if all 20 of them attacked a Grand Lord together, they’d still need three to five minutes to take it down. In a situation where each monster group had six or seven Grand Lords and at least forty Great Lords, it would only take five or six monster groups to kill them from Stamina exhaustion…

Everyone nodded their heads when they heard Maria’s words. Immediately, they started using stronger attacks to finish these Abyssal Beasts as quickly as possible. After all, it was common sense that the longer a fight dragged out, the higher the chances of the fight attracting other nearby monsters.

After fighting for nearly half an hour, Shi Feng and the others finally defeated the group of fifty or so Abyssal Beasts.

As these Abyssal Beasts died one after another, everyone noticed that the Stratified Abyssal Realm’s monsters provided significantly less EXP than the monsters in God’s Domain; it was only one-third of what they were used to receiving. Moreover, the items they dropped were unexpectedly few.

The 40-plus Great Lords they defeated had only dropped a bunch of beast materials and nothing else. Even the Grand Lords had only dropped a bunch of materials and six pitch-black ore pieces.

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“Isn’t the Stratified Abyssal Realm supposed to be a land of riches? Why is the loot of these monsters so terrible?”

Blood Hammer was greatly confused as he looked at the loot they acquired. This situation was completely different from the information they had gathered on the Stratified Abyssal Realm.

It should be known that the beast materials were only good for making food and nothing else. As for the ore pieces, as far as he could tell, they did not contain an astonishing amount of energy within them. At best, this black metal could be considered a type of rare metal and nothing more. While it was still a good item, it didn’t make sense that this was all of the loot six Grand Lords had to offer.

“No, this is indeed a land of riches,” Shi Feng said, shaking his head as he looked at the black metal piece in his hand. “This dark ore isn’t as simple as it looks. It might not contain an astonishing amount of energy, but you’ll get the Black Iron that you’re familiar with as long as you refine it. I’m sure I don’t have to explain the effects of Black Iron to you, right?”

“Black Iron? This is the raw material of Black Iron?” Blood Hammer was filled with disbelief as he looked at the dark ore in his hand.

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