Surviving the Maze of National Destiny: Hints from the Chinese Characters I Understand

[To your left lies an ice field, 1 million square meters in size. Here, you can become 15 years younger, but the -20 degree Celsius temperature will freeze you to a pulp. Twenty giant glacial pythons live here, each 15 meters long, capable of spitting ice blades. Be careful. After defeating them, you can find 10 fat barracudas (2 jin each), 1 lightning elemental, 1 wind elemental, and 5 fire elemental in their icy lair.]

Lin Mo's eyes lit up. This is great! This is really great! The Wind and Thunder Wings are a sure thing now!

There wasn't much to see on the right; the rewards were meager, and the monsters were only level 10, so Lin Mo ignored them.

Now that I'm level 17, my life essence is low when killing level 13 monsters, let alone level 10 ones.

Lin Mo plans to wait until Kabu obtains the Wind and Thunder Wings, then level up to 20, evolve and awaken his third talent, and then raise the difficulty to Hell level.

According to the system, Hell difficulty offers triple rewards, with the terrain further expanded and optimized, resulting in more concentrated rewards.

The man and the toad entered the left passage, and the biting cold wind made Kabu sneeze instantly: "Achoo!"

Lin Mo sniffed, his upper and lower teeth already chattering, just like you when you were a baby just woken up in the dead of winter.

[Congratulations on reaching a new milestone! You have earned 3 maze points, bringing your current total to 18. Your exploration progress on the third level of the maze is 50%. You will enter the fourth level after reaching 100%.]

Kabu's beady green eyes darted around, surveying the vast ice plain before him, before offering a succinct assessment: "Kajiwagugu. (Sparsely populated, starving.)"

"You're going to take the postgraduate entrance exam? You're spouting rhymes all the time. Who taught you that?" Lin Mo was increasingly unable to understand this simpleton.

The two, one human and one clam, continued forward following the directions. After walking for about 5 minutes, they saw a huge ice cellar at the edge of their field of vision. If nothing unexpected happened...

"Boom sir ka la ka! Boom sir ka la ka!"

Loud music emanated from the ice cellar, sounding like a powerful vibration emitted by a living being—quite unique.

Upon closer inspection, Lin Mo saw large, snow-white pythons writhing and intertwining, swaying wildly to the rhythm, as if having a party.

"Kaji-gu! (Lin Mo, I want to go too!)"

"Heh! Go ahead! See if they hit you or not and that's it."

Kabu's round body darted straight towards the ice cellar, shouting as he ran, "Kagoo kagoo (Count me in, count me in!)"

"Bang bang bang bang..." Before Kabu could even reach the door, 20 violent ice blades shot out from the ice cellar.

The ice blade, a meter long, hurtled through the air, its ferocious speed and friction with the air producing a sound like the howl of a vengeful ghost.

Kabu gritted his teeth in anger. "Kajigu! (Why do you look down on us crocodiles? Your prejudice against crocodiles is like a city!")

Kabu's claws danced in unison, preventing the incoming ice blades from getting close. At the same time, Lin Mo unleashed an enhanced version of Moonlit Slash for the first time.

"Boom..." The violent blade light shot through the air with a swing of Lin Mo's arm, heading straight for the ice cellar.

It's 7 meters long, with three consecutive lines; even the King of Hell would have to admit it's awesome.

"Bang bang bang..."

The first blade of light cleaved the ice cellar in two, causing the entire cellar to tremble.

The second blade of light poured into the cut, and the ice cellar was instantly filled with wails, but it was impossible to see what was happening, because the violent force shattered the ice crystals that filled the sky.

The third strike followed closely, but the sound inside was already very faint; the Ice Crystal Python could no longer make its call.

Then Kabu rushed in and started hacking away wildly.

"Kajigu! (Why aren't you dancing anymore? Do you not like me? Why aren't you talking? Is it because I'm introverted?)"

Lin Mo: ...When it comes to being inhuman, it has to be Kabu. Oh! It wasn't human to begin with.

A wave of reward notifications arrived in no time, which was the happiest moment for Lin Mo.

[Congratulations on slaying 20 level 13 Glacier Pythons (Nightmare difficulty). You have obtained 520 Beast Cores and a certain amount of Life Essence. Your Life Level has increased to 18 (13%). Kabu has obtained a certain amount of Maze Essence and his Life Level has increased to 18 (37%).]

Oh no, the level gap between the monsters and me is too big. Even at Nightmare level, I barely leveled up once with 20 monsters. Choosing Hell is imminent, and I must speed up my exploration of the dungeon.

The good news is that Kabu is now level 18, getting closer and closer to its second evolution.

【您在战斗过程中获得1%刀术熟练度，刀术等级25级（35.1%），你与卡布好感度+1，当前好感度104（54%全面增幅）】

"Use 500 beast cores." Lin Mo kept 20 beast cores because 20 were needed as raw materials to forge the Wind and Thunder Wings.

[You used 500 beast cores to raise your swordsmanship to level 26 (17.1%). Congratulations! The progress gained from using beast cores will now permanently stabilize at 0.1% and will no longer decrease. Aren't you happy? You're welcome.]

"No, no, no, thank you, you old man!" Lin Mo was speechless. The effect of the beast core had finally stabilized. From now on, whether it was level 30 or level 100 swordsmanship, consuming one beast core would increase my proficiency progress by 0.1%.

It seems like a small amount, but it's actually not much; it requires 1000 beast cores to level up.

However, once the number of monsters you encounter increases, their levels rise, and the difficulty is increased to Hell level with triple rewards, you might be able to obtain thousands of beast cores in a single battle.

The Moonlit Slash effect has been updated again: the blade's length is 10 meters, its range is 300 meters, and the interval is 3.5 seconds.

"Coo coo chirp? (Where are my wings? Lin Mo, hurry up!)" Kabu was already getting impatient.

Okay, okay, I'll get it done for you right away, stop rushing me.

Lin Mo led Kabu into the cellar and collected all the spoils from the local area: 10 fat barracudas (2 catties each), 1 lightning element, 1 wind element, and 5 fire element.

With this, all the materials needed to craft the Wind and Thunder Wings were now complete.

"System! Begin crafting the perfect Wind and Thunder Wings and return the resources."

[2212 million catties of plump mullet have been successfully returned and have arrived in China.]

【检测打造条件，检测完成，您符合条件，扣除以下材料：雷元素5枚、风元素5枚、火元素5枚、铜元素3单位、金元素1单位、兽核20枚。】

[Under construction... Ready soon, estimated time 60 minutes.]

What the heck? This time it actually took so long. Lin Mo immediately set up a campfire and started cooking. He hadn't eaten rice in a long time, and his stomach was feeling really uncomfortable. He also helped Kabu roast the remaining dozens of potatoes.

What Lin Mo didn't know was that at this moment, the most popular live stream on Blue Star was actually the live stream of Inoue Itto from the Rising Sun Kingdom.

The entire Kingdom of Rising Sun entered a state of high alert.

For no other reason than that statement from the Indian Kingdom: "Wouldn't it be even worse if the labyrinth monsters descended upon the Kingdom of Rising Sun?"

All I can say is that, currently on Earth, the "Shiva's reverse efficacy" is still too overpowered, a rule-level weapon. In countries other than China, you can't help but believe it, but you also have to be wary of it.

(Please give me some support! I found some super cute pictures of Kabu in the comments section, they perfectly match my image of Kabu, especially the Kabu in chapter 27, it's so similar.)

(Thank you to everyone for sending power, likes, and reminder tokens. Special thanks to the amazing Tianzhen.Gabriel.White for the certification; this is the first time I've received such a gift.)