The mummy retreated, and then suddenly rushed toward Austin again while bellowing.
It was clumsy and unable to move steadily on its feet. The only thing it did was move its body forward.
Austin dodged, jumped to its left, and punched it on its left arm with great power.
Although every body part of the mummy was dry and very tough, it couldn't bear the force of 8, 000
pounds.
With Austin's punch, the left arm of the mummy broke off, exposing the dry muscles underneath.
A black corpse miasma with a repulsive stench was released from the exposed part of the mummy.
As more and more of this corpse miasma was released, the mummy seemed to be getting more
exhausted, as if the vapor was the source of its energy.
With another bellow, the mummy turned around to escape, realizing that it could not defeat Austin.
With every movement, its heavy dry feet left footprints on the ground so deep that it looked as if it had
been engraved by knives or axes.
Of course, Austin wasn't going to let it go so easily. He started his Wind-commanding Skill and leaped
in front of it before thrusting his arm out at lightning speed. Bang! With a single punch, he sent the dry
corpse flying backward.
The sound of bones cracking echoed. The mummy's skin tore off and a big pit appeared in its chest.
At the same time, the dense black miasma was released into the air.
In a second, the mummy was surrounded by the dense black corpse miasma.
It suddenly collapsed onto the ground as if it had used up all its energy.
Then, without warning, it started to cry out again and again.
'Oh, no, this isn't good.
It's asking its friends for help!' Austin thought, horrified.
Austin and Violet exchanged meaningful glances. They were both thinking the same thing.
It had been easy for them to fight one mummy. But if they had to face dozens of these things, they
would have a hard time defeating them.
"Violet, let's go. It's very risky for us to stay here. This place is too dangerous for us," Austin said to
Violet.
Violet nodded, but before they could run toward the exit of the valley, they heard bellowing sounds
coming from the surroundings.
Austin and Violet saw three mummies appear from three different directions. One came from a crack in
the ground, another crawled out of the trunk of a dead tree, and the last one appeared from behind a
wall. These three mummies growled in low voices and tried to surround Austin and Violet.
Seeing the three mummies, Austin and Violet did not feel frightened. On the contrary, they let out a sigh
of relief. It was a good thing that there were only three of them.
It wouldn't be difficult for Austin and Violet to defeat three mummies at the same time.
But when the three mummies rushed toward them, Austin realized that while two of the mummies were
as strong as the one they had destroyed, the third one was much stronger. In fact, it was almost twice
as strong as the one they had destroyed. The black dense miasma it was releasing was much denser
and had a stronger stench.
It was obvious that the mummies had different ranks.
Austin started his bodily movement skill and attacked the two weaker mummies first.
While fighting the mummy just now, Austin had understood that the power of mummies lay in their
strong physical bodies and their corpse miasma.
Fortunately, Austin's Golden Sun Scripture could suppress the corpse miasma. And in terms of physical
strength, Austin was stronger than the mummies. So, he approached the two mummies swiftly and
attacked only a few times before they collapsed onto the ground. They were unable to attack anymore.
All the while, the tall mummy, the strongest of the three, chased Austin and tried to attack him. But with
his Wind-commanding Skill, Austin moved as quickly as a ghost, so the mummy wasn't able to touch
him at all.
Once Austin completely destroyed the two weaker mummies, he stopped dodging the attacks from the
tall one and turned around slowly to stare at it.
"It is now your turn to die," he said solemnly.
"Austin, this one seems to be stronger. Be careful!" Violet reminded him.
While Austin was fighting the mummies, Violet just stood by without joining the fight. Unlike Austin, she
could be affected by corpse miasma. If it touched her, it would harm her even if it didn't kill her.
The remaining mummy let out a growl, agitated by the way Austin was provoking it.
It exposed the sharp nails on its hands and charged at Austin at the speed of lightning.
"Good. Let me see how much strength you have," Austin drawled.
He leaped up and punched it without using any fancy moves.
Bang!
Austin's fist collided with the mummy's hand.
His body remained still and steady like a mountain, but the mummy slid back more than ten steps from
the force of Austin's punch, leaving two rows of deep tracks plowed by its heavy feet.
Still, it was obviously the strongest mummy that Austin had faced so far. The other mummies had been
destroyed after just one or two hits from Austin.
This one only retreated a few steps after being hit by a force of 8, 000 pounds.
Austin guessed that the strength of this tall mummy must be thousands of pounds.
It was a huge force for ordinary cultivators.
If Austin hadn't learned the third stage of the Overlord Body-refining Formula, it wouldn't be easy for
him to defeat this strongest mummy.
"Let's do that again!"
It was a rare chance for Austin to have such a powerful opponent that he could practice his Overlord
Body-refining Formula on.
He punched the mummy continuously, alternating between his two fists.
Each time Austin's fist made contact with the mummy, the black corpse miasma infiltrated his body.
However, he wasn't affected by it as he had activated the golden vital energy inside his body, which
was able to completely drive away the black corpse miasma. . .
While Austin was fighting the mummies, there were a few people talking inside a huge underground
tunnel nearby.
The whole tunnel was covered in a black fog.
"So far, we've successfully produced five hundred corpse soldiers and ten corpse generals in our
base," one of the people said.
"You're right. And this is what we can produce at the highest speed.
The main reason for this is that we're short of dead bodies of cultivators. A while ago, in the outside
part of the Grand Desolation Mountain, a Tomb Owner from our Ghost Sect tried to make a Soul
Collection Array using the ghosts and dead bodies of a huge group of cultivators. But before he could
make it successfully, his plan was discovered by several Elders and stewards from the five big sects.
That was when the Elders of the five big sects learned some information about the Ghost Sect.
It was rumored that the seniors of our Ghost Sect later killed that Tomb Owner for being so careless
with our secret.
After all, our plan has always been to accumulate our strength in the dark so that we can stand up one
day when we are powerful enough and destroy all the huge organizations in the Violet Orchid Empire.
We didn't expect a Tomb Owner to reveal our secret and ruin our plan.
That's why our seniors commanded us to lie low for the time being and not go outside to obtain ghosts
and dead bodies of cultivators," the first man explained.
"Okay. We will follow the directions of our seniors. This place is our base as well as the original place of
our Ghost Sect, so we'll just continue spreading the news that there are many treasures to be found
here. Many greedy cultivators have already come here and provided us the resources to produce our
corpse soldiers.
Otherwise, we wouldn't have been able to obtain so many ghosts and dead bodies of cultivators.
I really wish we can avenge our Ghost Sect soon," another man said with a sigh.
"Don't worry about it. I have been told that our headquarters has made a great many corpse kings while
our new leader is secretly making a corpse demon.
Once the corpse demon is successfully made, none of the five large sects will be a threat to us,"
another man said.
"Corpse king? Corpse demon?
Is that true? Oh, my! Our new leader is trying to make a corpse demon? I've heard that a corpse
demon is the strongest corpse in the world. It can kill a cultivator at the Mysterious Realm as easily as
we kill a chick.
But I've also heard that it is extremely difficult to make a corpse demon. Although our Ghost Sect was
really good at making corpses before we were destroyed, a few of our leaders could make a corpse
demon.
But I never expected that our new leader would have learned to make one. If it's true, our Ghost Sect
will definitely succeed soon. I really look forward to that day," the first man said.
As they were having this conversation in the dark fog, one of them suddenly raised his voice.
"One of our corpse soldiers is facing some cultivators," he said.
"You're right. There are cultivators nearby.
That means we can get more resources soon!"
Everyone in the tunnel looked excited.
But a moment later, their expressions darkened.
"Shit! The corpse soldier is giving off a signal for help. It seems that one of these cultivators is really
powerful. Let's go outside to take a look," one of the men said.
"Don't be hasty. I think this is a good opportunity to test the corpse general we have made, isn't it?" a
second man said.
"That's a good idea!"
The other people nodded in agreement with the second man. . . . . .
At this time, Austin was going head to head with the tall mummy.
He wasn't scared of the black corpse miasma being released by the mummy at all. He just kept
punching continuously with the force of 8, 000 pounds.
The muscles of the tall mummy had begun to tear off and some of its bones were broken. Its body kept
releasing black corpse miasma here and there, like a leaking tank.
The dense black corpse miasma was as smelly as the stench from a rotten body, which could make
people feel ill.
A few minutes later, Austin's punches had hacked the whole body of the mummy into pieces. The black
corpse miasma it was giving out faded off into nothingness.
Finally, the mummy collapsed motionlessly onto the ground. It couldn't attack Austin any longer.
Austin let out a sigh of relief.
He felt exhausted after taking down the mummy with just his physical strength. This particular mummy
had a lot of strength. Austin estimated that it must have had about five or six thousand pounds of
strength.
Just then, a small figure appeared on Austin's shoulder with a flash.
It gestured to Austin as if trying to express something to him.
It was the gnome!
The gnome was the one that had led Austin and Violet to the Ghost Valley.
However, ever since they had entered the Ghost Valley, the gnome had disappeared. It had probably
gone someplace else to look for treasures.
Austin had met the gnome only a while ago and wasn't attached to it, so he hadn't worried about it
much when it had disappeared. He had been more focused on fighting the mummies and getting out of
the Ghost Valley in one piece.
In fact, he had forgotten about the gnome altogether and hadn't expected it to show up
now.
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