"What are you doing?"
Zhao Yingzhi asked, full of confusion.
Li Ran was rummaging through Zhou Yanze's body, replying indifferently, "Looting the corpse."
After completing the mission, Li Ran killed Zhou Yanze.
Li Ran didn't even give any explanation.
But Zhao Yingzhi could guess, it was likely related to Song Linjia.
On the surface, Li Ran seemed calm, but in reality, he was seething with anger over Song Linjia's "departure."
And the one responsible for all this was the owner of the pottery shop.
She knew that Li Ran was very strong, even stronger than Zhou Yanze, and could easily handle things without needing to complete the mission.
Before this, Li Ran had even held back his inner fury, only killing Zhou Yanze after the mission was completed. This surprised her; she didn't expect Li Ran to be so patient.
"Is there such an operation?" Zhao Yingzhi was utterly shocked, as though she was hearing about 'looting' for the first time.
But then again, in this eerie world, just completing a mission already left her trembling with fear. Killing monsters was already rare, let alone looting their bodies.
Zhao Yingzhi suddenly felt like she and Li Ran weren't in the same world.
Li Ran seemed to be playing a game, completing missions and killing monsters to get loot, just like leveling up in a game.
Is this still an eerie world?
"Eh?" The sound he made indicated that Li Ran had indeed found something on Zhou Yanze's body.
Zhao Yingzhi craned her neck and curiously leaned over. "What is it?"
"A small porcelain bottle," Li Ran said, holding a small, delicate porcelain bottle in his hand.
"It looks very ordinary," Zhao Yingzhi remarked.
Li Ran immediately checked the properties of the small porcelain bottle.
---
[Sacred Artifact: Mysterious Eerie Bottle (Epic Level)]
Attributes: None
Passive Effect: Soul Refining: Wearing this item allows you to see the souls of the deceased. In the area covered by your gaze, the souls are automatically absorbed. The more souls you absorb, the better the potion you can refine from the soul essence.
Active Effect: Soul Rest: You can place a complete soul into a suitable biological vessel.
Cooldown: 15 days.
---
"Ugh, what a crappy thing. Take it back and let your son play with it!"
Li Ran muttered in disdain, putting the mysterious small porcelain bottle into his pocket, then continued searching Zhou Yanze's body with an indifferent expression.
"Take your time looting, it's getting late. Time to rest."
"Mm."
Once Zhao Yingzhi walked away, Li Ran took out the Mysterious Eerie Bottle again, and immediately began to kiss it wildly.
"Wow, jackpot! Golden legend!"
Normal, excellent, fine, rare, epic...
Whether there are other levels, he wasn't sure.
For now, the epic-level quality was already the highest in this strange world.
After more than ten days, Li Ran almost thought this dungeon didn't have any epic-level gear. He had done nearly all the missions perfectly, yet hadn't seen a single epic-level item.
His original plan was to search for the Dragon Pearl, do the Crystal Violin quest along the way, and then kill the pottery shop owner.
However, he didn't find the Dragon Pearl, but unexpectedly obtained the full version of the Crystal Violin Lost Dream. After completing the mission, he looted and got an epic-level item.
He hit the jackpot!
A huge profit, he was rolling in it!
He finally understood why Song Linjia appeared as a porcelain doll after being burned to death.
The epic-level Mysterious Eerie Bottle's active skill, Soul Rest, could place a complete soul into a vessel, as long as the vessel's biological structure resembled the soul's.
If it was a human soul, a human-shaped vessel would be needed, such as a porcelain doll, model, or scarecrow — anything human-shaped would work.
The same goes for souls of other creatures, such as cats, dogs, birds, or beasts, which would require corresponding vessels.
A complete soul had a defined time frame; it had to have died within an hour. The longer the time, the faster the soul dissipated.
Without the Mysterious Eerie Bottle, souls couldn't be seen.
As for soul refining, it didn't require a complete soul. Fragmented souls could also be collected, though the refined potion wouldn't be as good. The more fragmented souls collected, the better the potion effect.
---
As for the Dragon Pearl, he had come too late; the golden finger tip-off had already been taken.
It was precisely because of this hint that he had decisively killed Zhou Yanze. Part of his emotions were definitely involved in the decision.
There was nothing else on Zhou Yanze's body. Li Ran was quite satisfied with getting an epic-level item; it was an unexpected surprise.
Holding the Mysterious Eerie Bottle, Li Ran surveyed the pottery shop.
At this moment, to his eyes, ghosts and spirits were floating around the pottery shop, shadows of souls dancing in the darkness.
Had he not been mentally prepared, Li Ran might have been startled.
"Chitong, smash everything!"
Li Ran summoned Chitong and ordered it to smash all the porcelain in the pottery shop.
Little Demon Baby also came out, grabbing the tuft of red hair on Chitong's head and flying out.
Since learning that Chitong had a separate safe summoning space, Little Demon Baby no longer returned to the safety room and spent all its time following Chitong in the summoning world.
Li Ran envied it a lot. He also wanted to go, but that space was inaccessible to humans unless they turned themselves into a summoned beast or a contracted beast, which was clearly impossible.
Little Demon Baby tilted its head and cooed in a baby voice, "Butt pinch?"
"All of it, not just the butt, smash everything, not pinch..."
"Butt... pinch!"
"Fine, you win."
"Yay! Butt pinch!"
"Eeek?!"
Little Demon Baby was so happy, finally having something to smash again. All the porcelain in the shop turned into toys for it to vent its frustration.
Then, the whole shop erupted with a series of "crash bang" sounds.
As more porcelain was smashed, more ghosts appeared in the shop. Looking around, the whole shop was filled with a greenish eerie glow.
Soul refining was a passive skill. Li Ran didn’t need to do anything, and the small bottle automatically absorbed the soul essence. Though most of it was fragmented, the quantity more than made up for it.
Li Ran saw streaks of ghostly light being sucked into the bottle. How the soul refining worked inside was unknown to him.
"Zhou Yanze actually harmed so many living beings?"
The ghosts weren't just human; there were all sorts of common animals and even forest birds and beasts.
After smashing all the porcelain, Li Ran realized that even those cute little porcelain figurines of living beings contained traces of soul fragments. It was clear that Zhou Yanze had harmed countless innocent creatures in the pursuit of his so-called perfect artworks, committing acts that angered both gods and men!
Li Ran walked deeper into the shop and entered a room labeled "No Entry for Idle People."
He was going to turn the clay slab he made into pottery.
He placed the clay slab into the kiln.
High-temperature firing.
An hour later, it was done.
Li Ran used an iron spatula to take it out and cooled it with water.
The steps were written on the kiln wall, and Li Ran just had to follow them.
"Not bad," Li Ran said with a satisfied smile as he looked at the fired porcelain.
He took a colorful pen and used his kindergarten-level drawing skills to sketch a family of three, plus a nine-tailed fox and a little demon baby on the surface of the pottery.
"Looks like my drawing skills haven’t diminished over the years."
Little Chitong, standing nearby, squinted its eyes and stuck out its little tongue, clearly unable to bear looking at it.
Li Ran stood up and walked out. Just as he reached the door, he saw Little Demon Baby attacking the Dancing Silks Fairy Doll figurine with dark energy.
"Don’t smash this one!" Li Ran shouted.
Little Demon Baby obediently flew back to Li Ran's head and excitedly danced around, "Not pinch?"
The Mysterious Eerie Bottle had absorbed all the ghosts in the shop, leaving only the beautiful Dancing Silks Fairy Doll figurine in the pottery shop.
The moonlight was like frost, shining on the face of the fairy doll. Li Ran couldn’t tell if it was an illusion, but he seemed to see a faint smile on her lips, as if relieved or even grateful.
(End of this chapter)