Fifteen minutes later,
John stepped out of the burial passage and arrived in an enormous circular tomb chamber.
The chamber was filled with all kinds of scattered stone coffins.
The air reeked of decay.
Unlike the tunnel, however, the hall was lit by candles burning with ghostly green flames,
making the entire chamber feel even more sinister and eerie.
As usual, John tossed out several smoke bombs, blanketing the hall.
The moment the smoke spread,
dozens of undead figures were revealed in just the area closest to him alone.
Judging by that density,
there were probably close to a thousand undead in the entire chamber.
They all stood inside the stone coffins, staring fixedly at the intruding John.
At this moment, however,
John had no interest in those undead.
His attention had been drawn to the nearest stone coffin.
The coffin was massive and heavy, obviously no ordinary burial container.
A coffin like this... yet there was no undead creature inside?
A thought stirred in John's mind. Avoiding several trap plates in front of him, he made his way over to the coffin.
Its lid had already been removed and was leaning against the side.
Inside the coffin lay a young man dressed in an ornate mage's robe.
His eyes were wide open in death, as if he had witnessed something utterly horrifying in his final moments.
John's gaze landed on the silver badge pinned to the man's chest, and he paused slightly.
"This is... the identity badge of a cleric from the main city?"
The dead young man's identity was immediately obvious.
He was the very cleric the female knight in Novice Village had mentioned.
And judging from how young he was, yet already dressed in such luxurious robes,
his background had to be extraordinary.
John's eyes shifted to the hand the man had clenched tightly.
Reaching out, John pried it open by force.
A small notebook and a pale golden amulet fell out.
John opened the notebook first.
Several crooked lines of writing were scrawled across the page.
[I miscalculated. The way these undead attack isn't through curses at all—they use purely physical attacks!
I have no chance of making it out alive. I only hope...]
The handwriting ended abruptly there, with several drops of blood staining the end of the sentence.
John placed the notebook back into the coffin and reached out to close the man's eyes.
Letting out a sigh, he said, "I didn't expect even NPCs could be misled by bad intel."
In his previous life,
because the female knight had used the word curse when describing the underground burial grounds,
many players had assumed the undead creatures down here used magic-based attacks.
They had eagerly stocked up on magic-resistance gear and rushed into the underground tomb complex full of confidence.
Without exception, all of them were sent straight back to the respawn point by the undead creatures' bone spikes, fangs, and other physical attacks.
This cleric had made the exact same mistake.
He had assumed the undead in the underground burial grounds relied on magic attacks.
So he had brought a top-tier anti-magic item and come here to eliminate the undead.
But because his information was wrong—and because the undead creatures could turn invisible and had that disgusting resurrection ability—
he had ultimately died inside this coffin.
John looked at the pale golden amulet in his hand with genuine regret.
[Spellward Amulet] (S-Rank)
[Attributes]: HP +500, Magic Resistance +500
[Effect]: While equipped, grants immunity to 50% of magic damage
...
An S-rank magic-resistance amulet.
The cleric's backing must have been terrifyingly powerful.
If the undead creatures in this underground tomb complex had really been using magic attacks,
the entire dungeon might well have already been cleared by this cleric.
But sadly, in this place, the amulet was as useless as scrap metal.
"Don't worry. I'll take good care of your belongings."
John reached out and lowered the coffin lid back into place.
Then he opened the system panel.
Without wasting a word, he decisively began modifying the amulet's stats.
He pumped points into it madly, all the way to the cap.
[Spellward Amulet] (S-Rank)
[Attributes]: HP +1500, Magic Resistance +500
[Effect]: While equipped, grants immunity to 100% of magic damage (current rank modification limit reached)
...
After being modified, the amulet had become downright bug-level.
As long as it was magical damage, John could ignore all of it.
From now on, whenever he stood in front of mages, it would be no different from having invincibility cheats turned on.
"Not bad."
John nodded in satisfaction.
Then he continued onward.
Relying on his practiced mob-pulling technique,
John darted left and right through the tomb hall.
While evading all kinds of traps triggered by the mechanisms, he successfully lured another batch of undead creatures into attacking him.
The moment they entered attack range, John spun around and unleashed his dagger.
[-6041!]
[-6041!]
[...]
Just like in the burial corridor,
a large group of undead creatures instantly lost half their HP.
John followed up with two rapid stabs, harvesting their first lives on the spot.
He waited patiently for three seconds.
Then, with two more lightning-fast strikes,
a flood of red damage numbers filled the screen, instantly wiping out the entire pack.
[You killed Lv.24 Vampire. Copper Coins +4000, EXP +8000!]
[You killed Lv.26 Werewolf. Copper Coins +6500, EXP +10000!]
[You plundered the B-rank skill "Vanish" from the Lv.26 Werewolf!]
[...]
After clearing out that batch of undead creatures,
John did not stop. He continued pressing deeper.
Pull monsters. Dodge traps. Clear monsters.
Again and again.
This was supposed to be an A-rank dungeon where even the slightest mistake meant death.
Yet under John's control, it had turned into something like an assembly line—almost tedious in how easy it felt.
The tomb hall really was enormous.
John had used nearly thirty smoke bombs before he finally reached the far end of the chamber.
[You killed Lv.28 Zombie. Silver Coins +10, EXP +25000!]
[You plundered the B-rank skill "Vanish" from the Lv.28 Zombie!]
When the final kill notification appeared,
John's experience bar was already completely full.
Since he could not continue leveling before his class advancement, all excess experience was stored in the experience pool instead.
Still, when he saw his skill bar packed full of B-rank [Vanish] skills, the corners of his mouth curled upward despite himself.
"The undead in this area are basically all dead now. Time to start synthesizing."
John let out a slow breath and activated his [Universal Synthesis] talent.
In an instant,
the [Vanish] skills in his skill bar began disappearing rapidly.
One synthesis notification after another popped up.
[Consumed 10 B-rank skills "Vanish." You synthesized the A-rank skill "Shadow Escape."]
[Consumed 10...]
John hardly paused at all, continuously synthesizing upward rank by rank.
At last,
only ten pale golden skill entries remained.
"Synthesize!"
John gave a low shout.
[Consumed 10 S-rank skills "Veil of Hidden Traces." You synthesized the SS-rank skill "Godshadow."]
[Godshadow] (SS-Rank)
[Effect]: Enter an invisible state for 10 hours after use. While invisible, Movement Speed +30%. Attacking does not break invisibility. (Cooldown: 24 hours. MP Cost: 100)]
As that golden notification appeared,
the SS-rank skill had finally been synthesized successfully.
Yet John was still unsatisfied.
His gaze flickered slightly as he opened the panel and began adjusting the values.
"Now let's max out every parameter—"