I created the myth of the Great Old Ones.

However, this year's poetry festival is somewhat different.

The giant doll suspended in mid-air, the suffocating pale gray fog, the vanished artist—all speak of the eeriness.

[Task Difficulty: Selectable]

[Mission Requirements: Participate in the poetry festival and search for the missing artist]

[Mission Requirement: Survive until the end of the Poetry Festival]

"Communication first, life second!"

Chapter 096 Uncontrollable Positive Energy

The difficulty level for [Alienation] is still not unlocked, and there are still more than 10,000 points to go before it is unlocked. Theoretically, if this mission is successful, and with the career development missions that come back, Lu Ban should be able to unlock the new level of [Silent Department Store] and the new difficulty level.

He looked at the remaining three difficulty levels.

"Hmm? The difficulty of [Erosion] is still tripled, and the base reward is 3,000 points, which hasn't increased. In that case, 3,000 points should be the base reward for regular missions in the future?"

The rewards for the previous missions were higher each time, and Lu Ban thought it would snowball and keep increasing. If the rewards for the [Mortal] difficulty level were to reach tens of thousands, Lu Ban would just grind them all.

It now seems that 3,000 points is the peak difficulty of [Erosion]. He only truly entered the daily routine of [Silent Land] after starting his last mission.

To gain higher rewards in missions, you can only increase your exploration level or choose a higher difficulty level!

"If [Erosion] is three times, then [Alienation] might be four times?"

With the increase in basic rewards, a single [Alienation] mission could potentially yield over 20,000 Silent Points, making it an incredibly powerful tool for farming points.

Lu Ban couldn't help but feel excited.

Of course, the most important thing right now is still the present moment.

"Finding a missing artist seems like a real brain teaser, huh? Wait a minute, it seems the mission doesn't require the artist to be alive?"

Lu Ban was suddenly inspired.

"Last time, Trist simply found a way to give the bride and groom a good shot and thus survived until the end of the wedding. So this time, if I can just blow up the entire Song Island, wouldn't that mean I've 'found' the missing artist again and survived until the poetry festival 'ends'?"

He felt that his idea made a lot of sense.

However, Lu Ban is, after all, a kind, gentle, and law-abiding citizen, and would never do something as heinous as genocide.

He always adhered to the principle of positive energy. After all, based on the experiences of Drizzt and Dudanping, if they were left to their own devices in this "Silent Land," they might encounter even more terrible things.

Thinking of this, Lu Ban couldn't help but want to go downstairs to help the old lady cross the road and release the positive energy that filled him up.

Lu Ban got up and cleaned the room thoroughly, to the point that the toilet water was drinkable, before sitting back down.

"The organizers of the poetry festival, Sakajima, are so irresponsible. As a law-abiding citizen, I must correct their mistakes!"

He said angrily, then suddenly remembered something.

"By the way, air friends are also a specialty of the island. If you come with me there this time, you might even see your companions."

Lu Ban said to the air friend next to him.

"I hope you won't be snatched away by some other female friends by then."

After packing his things, Lu Ban opened the mission panel and selected the [Erosion] difficulty level.

[Enter the Silent Land?]

【whether】

He confirmed it decisively.

A mist spread from the computer screen, and Lu Ban could smell the salty smell of seawater, as well as some pungent, throat-itching odors.

clatter--

Da da—

Da da da—

A crisp sound rang in his ears, growing faster and faster, which annoyed him.

The thick fog completely covered Lu Ban's body. Surprisingly, the room did not become cooler; instead, it became even hotter.

Just as the last few cicadas outside the window reached their loudest chirping, Lu Ban and Mi Wu disappeared from the room.

The flow of time in the Silent Land is different from that in the outside world.

The time ratio for this trip is 2:1.

Number of companions: 0

[On the way to He Island]

Shaking, floating, bewildering.

Lu Ban, still reeling from the dizziness, opened his eyes to see a thin mist permeating the deep green sea. A small boat swayed helplessly on the waves, while behind him, a huge three-masted sailing ship, like a giant beast, peered into the mist, watching all living things.

"It's almost there."

The boatman who was rowing said something that completely brought Lu Ban back to his senses.

"The island of Go is shrouded in fog all year round, it's no big deal."

The elderly boatman took a deep breath of the air mixed with damp sea fog, and his hands, which were rowing the oars, seemed to have become even stronger.

Lu Ban looked around.

He was the only person on the small boat, seemingly having been lowered from the massive three-masted sailing ship behind him.

Doesn't Goto Island have a deep-water pier?

He asked the question instinctively.

"Yes, of course. The pier on the island is the most bustling pier on the island, but it's not the right season now, so no one wants to come."

The sight of the boatman rowing so hard made Lu Ban feel uncomfortable. He wanted to help, but unfortunately, he didn't know how to row at all, and helping would probably only make things worse.

So Lu Ban could only blow two breaths behind him to help the ship accelerate.

"Why don't you want to come? Isn't this the poetry festival?"

Lu Ban used the rhetoric he had learned from Trist. According to Trist, to communicate with a stranger, one must first agree with what the other person is saying, then show that one is listening attentively, and finally have a meaningful response.

"Ah, a poetry festival, indeed, a poetry festival is a major event. Poets and painters from all over the island will come here, but it's not the right time, now is not the right time..."

The boatman sighed, but then a wave suddenly surged up, causing the small boat to rock violently.

"Be careful, it might be a big fish."

Upon hearing this, Lu Ban looked into the water.

The dark green seawater churned, but it did not appear murky; on the contrary, it became even clearer.

So much so that Lu Ban could see the things swimming in the water.

"A fish that glows? No, this is..."

He saw a small group of slender fish emitting a ghostly green light swimming through the water, and then he saw jellyfish of changing colors floating in the deeper water. As his gaze continued downward, Lu Ban saw only darkness.

No, it wasn't the refraction of the seawater that caused the darkness. In fact, even in the fog, sunlight could still penetrate the water and illuminate a section of the sea.

What Lu Ban saw was the body of some kind of enormous creature.

His gaze swept across the area, looking forward and backward, but he couldn't catch a glimpse of the enormous creature in its entirety.

This small boat moved above the creature that was as big as a small mountain.

Lu Ban quickly spotted its eyes.

The creature resembled a whale, at least its upper body. At the top of the whale's head, hundreds of eyes opened from the cracks in its skin, looking around. But soon, as one of them caught sight of the small boat, all the eyes turned to the land in an instant.

In this brief moment of eternity, Lu Ban met the monster's gaze.

Not knowing which eye to look at, he simply looked straight ahead.

"what is this?"

Lu Ban pointed at the monster. Since the boatman didn't react unusually, it must be a very docile creature.

However, when he turned to look at the boatman, the elderly man was already filled with terror and jumped into the sea.

The next moment, Lu Ban felt himself being lifted up.

The entire ship was lifted up, and the enormous whale monster leaped out of the sea, letting out a heart-stopping low roar, before flipping over and crashing heavily back into the water.

Lu Ban fell into the sea with a splash, with only a few bubbles rising to the surface.

Chapter 097 Welcome to the Poetry Festival

The moment he fell into the sea, Lu Ban was most grateful that he had brought waterproof compressed rations.

That way, if we were stranded on a desert island, we wouldn't run out of ammunition and food.

He saw in the clear sea that the enormous whale wasn't coming towards him; it might have simply rolled over, just as a human walking on the road wouldn't notice the life or death of an ant under their feet.

The whale darted away in an instant, swimming at a speed no less than that of the sailfish that Lu Ban had seen on television.

Fortunately, it did not choose to crash into the distant three-masted sailing ship, but instead moved to the other side.

Only then did Lu Ban see the whale in its entirety.

In fact, it is inappropriate to call it a "whale".

That enormous, spindle-shaped body, hundreds of meters long, was only part of the monster's body.

Deeper still, in the ocean where even sunlight cannot penetrate, on the seabed once covered with coral, lies a gigantic monster beyond description. The whale's head is merely one of its tentacles, and there are at least a hundred such tentacles.

Lu Ban even had the illusion that the island was residing on the body of that monster, and that the monster was much larger than the island.

In that dark, deep seabed, some indescribable being is peering up at Song Island. Human creations are but a drop in the ocean before them.

Lu Ban floated in the sea and saw that the huge tentacles seemed to want to reach upwards and try to bind the three-masted sailing ship.

Just then, a flame burst forth from the mist.

The flames were cold and dark blue, giving off a chilling and desolate feeling.

Like a shooting star, it plunged directly into the water, and instead of being extinguished by the seawater, the flames grew even more intense, illuminating the dark ocean.