Chapter 154 Report

The "book" looked extremely crude, with pages of uneven thickness, made by hand-cutting a relatively white piece of wood into thin slices.

After the communication was cut off last night, this kind of "paper" was temporarily produced by them to better disseminate information.

Outside the door, Colin heard some footsteps and the muffled voices of people talking.

"It seems some of them have already returned to the territory. Well, I've been lying down for at least three hours..."

Colin thought for a moment, sat up from the bed, reached out to take the "book" that carried a faint scent of blood, and then shifted back, leaning his back against the wall in front of him.

Judging from the contents above, this should be a report. The handwriting on the report was somewhat sloppy and dark red in color, and the ink used was obviously blood.

Pulling back his scattered thoughts, Colin focused his gaze once again on the blood-soaked "pages":

After the countdown disaster lasted for nearly a day, and after paying a heavy price, we successfully survived this event.

The following is the list of the fallen.

First Lamplighter Squad (Unknown)

Second Lamplighter Squad (Seven survivors...)

Third Lamplighter Squad (Three survivors...)

Fourth Lamplighter Squad (Seven survivors...)

...

Colin's gaze continued to move downward, and his mood grew somewhat heavy...

Generally, a lamplighter squad consisted of about seventeen people, varying slightly depending on the circumstances, but not by too much.

When the "darkness" arrived, there were a total of more than fifty lamplighter squads outside, and now not many people were left alive.

When the lord-class aberrations entered the battlefield under the influence of the "darkness," the defense line of the saltpeter mine was quickly breached. After several rounds of their attacks, ammunition was nearly exhausted, and they had no choice but to abandon that place.

At the same time, to ensure sufficient time to create distance, some people chose to stay behind to cover the retreat...

And this group of people who stayed behind...

Not a single one survived.

At least, when Colin arrived in that area, he did not sense the presence of many living people, which might also be related to his state.

From the twentieth to the thirty-seventh squads, along with some wounded personnel, nearly five hundred members remained behind.

The time bought by their sacrifice allowed the few chariots to break through before the positions were overrun and to put distance between themselves and the enemy.

In addition, some people who could not be taken away fled into the mine, escaping deeper into its recesses.

Exhaling lightly, Colin turned the page and continued reading.

Soon, a slight frown appeared on his brow.

Because during the escape of the chariots, a very bizarre thing happened. At that time, a lord-class aberration broke through the position and pursued them, but just as the lord-class aberration was about to catch up, it suddenly vanished...

Seeing this information, Colin quickly realized that this was the guy who frantically picked up kills.

And it specifically picked on the lord-class aberrations that they had severely injured to scavenge.

"What on earth is this thing..."

Colin rubbed his temples and pondered, but came up with no conclusions, knowing only that such a mysterious entity, of unknown intent, was trailing them.

Once it swooped in for the kill, the lord-class aberration would disappear into thin air and could never be found again.

Even the "prompt" could not provide much useful or valuable information regarding this...

"However, speaking of which, aside from its unknown risks, its existence also brings considerable benefits. Because once a lord-class aberration reaches a heavily injured state and vanishes from our line of sight, it can be executed immediately..."

The existence of this thing was equivalent to giving Colin an "execution threshold" against these monsters.

Prior to this, Colin had the means to beat them into critical condition, but lacked a way to finish them off. Relying on their powerful self-healing abilities, the lord-class aberrations would quickly recover from their injuries...

Some lord-class aberrations even possessed a second phase...

Yet with this thing around, he only needed to figure out how to beat the enemy into critical condition and then break line of sight.

Of course, benefits came with drawbacks.

"This way, we won't be able to obtain any rewards. Not a single mysterious item from those lord-class aberrations can be acquired; it's equivalent to fighting for nothing..."

When the time comes, I'll have to think of some way to lure this thing out and see what it actually is...

Colin thought to himself inwardly, then continued reading.

There wasn't much relevant content on the "report." The latter part detailed the information confirmed by Li Hang and others that all lord-class aberrations on the island were either dead or missing.

They guessed that everything was related to the suddenly rising holy light.

Of course, the more specific circumstances were only known to Colin himself.

Further down was the current status of personnel and supplies. Due to the restoration of regional communication, they had ascertained the number of personnel in the underground area.

Presently, following the "Great Bounty," the total population in Colin's region was roughly around twenty thousand, all of whom were servants of various ranks.

"No mention of special talents... It seems special talents cannot be transmitted through the system's channels, but special talents do have status panels. Is this another blunder of the past 'system'..."

The reason why special talents collapsed remained a mystery to this day, but Colin didn't dwell on it and looked at the subsequent content.

The number of casualties had not yet been finalized, but it already exceeded the number of survivors.

As for the survivors...

Colin took out the sheepskin scroll and checked the region: "There are still a little over a hundred people left..."

Barely one in ten survived...

And almost no one was chatting.

He didn't know the situation in other regions, but because of Colin, the region he was in was an absolute disaster zone...

In terms of supplies, the total amount of fog points reached several hundred thousand, and various other supplies were sufficient to support a round of expansion and fund an external exploratory operation.

"For a period of time, the 'bounty' was distributed automatically by the 'system.' It must have intervened personally to ensure that the reinforcements would not be disrupted by the 'descenders.'"

"However, one thing is certain: it was biased toward this place; otherwise, it wouldn't have been so easy to mobilize and organize a large army in such a short time..."

Colin remembered that the large number of servants he saw underground were all buffed with an exhilarated state, which was why, even in an ownerless state and without explicit orders, they could independently initiate attacks.

This was clearly the result of the system's deliberate choice.

This also meant that the "system" had decided back then to cultivate him as the "Purifier" to expel the "corruption" among those survivors.

However, wouldn't this feel a bit predetermined?

Colin rubbed his temples.

He knew he wouldn't get any rest for a long time. One trouble after another visible in the future would almost drain all his free time. Any omission would spell disaster, so he had to keep striving and working tirelessly.

Moreover, the vast majority of these events would require his personal participation, especially the most dangerous, troublesome, and complex ones, which could never do without him.

Not long after, having finished reading the report compiled by Li Hang and the others, Colin took out the sheepskin scroll and looked at the section that specifically issued quests to him...