Chapter 63: Speculation

“Brave adventurers, are you here to defeat the evil Ancient Treant in the forest?”

Little Warrior picked up five Forest Crystals, and the two of them walked out of the woods, arriving at the lake.

By the lake stood an old, small wooden cabin. An NPC old man sat on a stone next to the cabin, chopping wood with his head lowered.

The old man raised his head, saw Chen Mo and the other, and his eyes lit up as he asked.

“Yes, Mr. Mogill, but we’ve searched the forest for a long time and haven’t found any trace of it. Do you know where it’s hiding now? If we know its location, we can eliminate it!”

The NPC’s name was Mogill. Chen Mo privately messaged Little Warrior not to speak and let him handle it. Then he stepped forward and spoke respectfully to Mogill.

“I don’t know either. That Ancient Treant has long become a spirit. It’s very cunning and doesn’t stay in one place. After camouflaging itself, it looks no different from an ordinary tree. Unless it shows itself, it’s nearly impossible to find it in such a large forest.” Mogill shook his head.

“Moreover, even though both of you adventurers have impressive strength, if you rashly confront the Ancient Treant, I fear you might not be its match. The Ancient Treant has incredibly strong Defense. Ordinary attacks can’t deal effective Damage to it. From what I know, many who tried to defeat it ended up killed because they didn’t understand it.”

Mogill glanced at Chen Mo and added.

“Mr. Mogill, how can we kill the Ancient Treant then?” Chen Mo knew the key point had arrived and asked humbly.

“You’ve come to the right person.” Mogill smiled. “I’ve lived in this forest for decades. No one understands it better than I do. I know its weaknesses and have developed some Potions to deal with it. If you need them, you can take them for just the cost price!”

A shop interface popped up in front of Chen Mo, showing three items.

Corrosive Liquid: Apply to your weapon to easily break through the Ancient Treant’s Defense. Effect lasts for 5 minutes.

—Price: 5 Forest Crystals

Flaming Blade: Makes your weapon fire-attributed, increasing Damage to the Ancient Treant by 50%. Effect lasts for 5 minutes.

—Price: 5 Forest Crystals

Mutation Inhibitor: When the Ancient Treant’s Health Points drop to a certain level, it will mutate. Using this Potion prevents it from mutating for 5 minutes.

—Price: 15 Forest Crystals

Staring at these three items, Chen Mo stayed silent for a moment.

The items were as he expected; there were multiple types. But each of these three items had obvious effects when fighting the Ancient Treant, especially Corrosive Liquid and Mutation Inhibitor. These two were absolutely necessary.

“Brave adventurer, if you truly wish to defeat the Ancient Treant, don’t hesitate. Without these items, the Ancient Treant is almost invincible.” Mogill laughed.

“Thank you for your advice, Mr. Mogill. Unfortunately, we don’t have enough Forest Crystals on us. We’ll come back after we find more.” Chen Mo said regretfully.

“No problem. I’ll wait here for your return. Be careful on the road; this forest is not safe.”

Mogill nodded kindly.

“By the way, Mr. Mogill, are there any other humans in this forest besides you?”

After taking two steps, Chen Mo suddenly turned back and asked.

Mogill paused before answering, “I can’t say for sure. Occasionally, people still come to adventure in this forest.”

Chen Mo nodded, asked no further, and left with Little Warrior.

“Brother Chen Mo, it seems that if we just buy the NPC grandpa’s Potions, killing the BOSS and clearing the Instance Dungeon isn’t too hard.”

After walking a short distance, Little Warrior couldn’t help but ask Chen Mo.

“It’s not that simple.” Chen Mo shook his head.

He originally planned, like Wildcat and the other five, to stay near the lake and wait. But after seeing these three items, he changed his mind.

Among the three items, Mutation Inhibitor and Corrosive Liquid were essential. Without these two, it was impossible to kill the Ancient Treant.

Assuming a full team of six members all attacking, at least one Mutation Inhibitor and six Corrosive Liquids were needed, totaling 45 Forest Crystals.

The Potion effects lasted five minutes, but could they kill the Ancient Treant within five minutes?

Before using the items and fighting the Ancient Treant, no one could know.

So the safest method was to have one teammate use Corrosive Liquid after the Ancient Treant appeared, estimate the Ancient Treant’s Health Points and the team’s Damage output, then return to Mogill to buy the Potions.

If they could kill the Ancient Treant within five minutes, that would be perfect. But even in that case, a team needed to buy one Mutation Inhibitor and seven Corrosive Liquids, costing 50 Forest Crystals.

Then clearing the Instance Dungeon fixedly required 60 Forest Crystals. So a team needed at least 110 Forest Crystals to clear it!

But this was a hell-level Talent Trial that no one had passed so far! For a team to kill the Ancient Treant within five minutes using only Corrosive Liquid and Mutation Inhibitor—the possibility was just too low, no matter how you thought about it.

If they couldn’t kill the Ancient Treant within five minutes, the team had several options.

One was to use Flaming Blade to increase Damage to the Treant. Six people needed 30 Forest Crystals.

Two was to recruit four more teammates, which would greatly increase Damage output, but it required a considerable amount of Forest Crystals—60 crystals.

Three was for all six to buy one more Corrosive Liquid and Mutation Inhibitor, costing 45 Forest Crystals.

These three methods would cost between 140 to 170 Forest Crystals in total, about half of 300 Forest Crystals.

Getting half of 300 Forest Crystals wasn’t easy, but if they could kill all other Players in the Instance Dungeon, leaving only their own team or just ten people, they could gather about 250 Forest Crystals.

According to those three plans, with 250 crystals exchanged for items, the possibility of killing the Ancient Treant was already very high.

This high possibility wasn’t just for him, but for all teams.

But what about those monster roars before death?

Chen Mo believed those monster roars weren’t meaningless. Following the normal approach—buying Potions to kill the Treant—would result in failing the Trial!

But the Instance Dungeon clearance conditions clearly stated that having 10 Forest Crystals and killing the Dungeon Guardian counted as clearing it.

Failing to clear it had only two possibilities: one was not having enough Forest Crystals, and two was not killing the Dungeon Guardian.

Having 10 Forest Crystals wasn’t hard to achieve, so only the second possibility remained!

The killed Ancient Treant wasn’t the Dungeon Guardian!

Although Mogill said the Ancient Treant usually didn’t show itself, he never said the Ancient Treant was the Dungeon Guardian!

If the Ancient Treant wasn’t the Dungeon Guardian, then the Dungeon Guardian was someone else.

But if the Ancient Treant wasn’t the Dungeon Guardian, it might be exposed when Players used 100 Forest Crystals to summon it directly, or when there were fewer than 10 Players.

Could it be that the System intended this fake forest guardian to waste Players’ Forest Crystals, so when the real guardian appeared, they wouldn’t have enough, causing them to fail?

Chen Mo didn’t think so. At least, Players in this Instance Dungeon wouldn’t spend Forest Crystals on Mogill’s items until the last moment.

So there was only one possibility: even if Players used 100 Forest Crystals or there were fewer than 10 Players, and the Dungeon Guardian appeared, Players still couldn’t tell whether the Ancient Treant was the real or fake Dungeon Guardian.

Based on this assumption, Chen Mo had a speculation.

…

Little Warrior noticed with confusion that for almost half an hour, Chen Mo had been leading her in circles around the lake. Whenever they saw tall or suspicious-looking trees, he would shoot an arrow at them.

“Whoosh!”

Chen Mo shot an arrow at an ancient tree, and Little Warrior jumped in fright.

The ancient tree actually moved!

“Just as I thought!”

Staring at the ancient tree, Chen Mo gave a cold laugh.

He had pretty much figured out how this Instance Dungeon worked!