Chapter 457: Chapter 457: Dissection Technique

The stone forest before him was indeed as described on the map – the dwelling place of a swarm of demonized bats. There were numerous Level 30 bats here. However, apart from the demonized bats, Song Jian was surprised to discover another creature in the stone forest. These were giant scorpions, their bodies gold as if draped with a layer of golden armor. They had two large pincers in the front and a segmented, curved tail with a venomous stinger on the back. Even when climbing the rock wall, they moved quickly and effortlessly.

At the moment, these golden scorpions were burrowing out from various underground caves, spreading like tides against the rock walls, battling the demonized bats that were fluttering in mid-air.

The claws of the demonized bats could easily break the defense of the golden scorpions, and their sonic attacks could make the golden scorpions lose control of their bodies and fall from the rock walls.

On the other hand, the huge pincers of the golden scorpions were formidable weapons against the demonized bats. They could easily sever a demonized bat in half, and the scorpion tail was swift and accurate as a piercing spear, even the bats flying in the sky could accurately be nailed by it. Any demonized bat stung by the scorpion tail would be dyed a light green and corrode into a sludgy liquid in no time.

The corpses of the golden scorpions and demonized bats rained down, amassing a thick layer on the ground in no time. The situation was grim.

Both sides fought ferociously, neither willing to back off, hundreds of golden scorpions and demonized bats ended up as broken bodies.

At this point, Song Jian dared not make a sound or even step into the stone forest. He could only silently wait for the end of this battle.

Seeing all the corpses, Song Jian thought to himself, “Good, this saves me a lot of trouble; I don’t have to lure them out one by one.”

Song Jian had originally planned to slowly lure out three to five of them one at a time. He had chosen several terrain depressions on his way here, perfect for solo hunting monsters.

But doing so would certainly take a lot of time. The sudden battle presented him with a straightforward way to obtain the Magic Source Stones.

In fact, this battle was precipitated by Song Jian’s elimination of the lead demonized bat. The demonized bats became weak, and the golden scorpions took advantage, causing this battle.

And more importantly, it’s implausible that a task in the game would be impossible to complete. Given the number of demonized bats in this habitat, let alone one Song Jian, even if there were ten times as many people, even a team of ten attempting to raid this location would ultimately return empty-handed. Song Jian was powerless in face of the rush of hundreds of demonized bats.

After this major battle, most of the demonized bats would die off. The remaining ones could meet the kill quota for a small team and would not appear too odd.

Song Jian simply had to wait patiently. Charging in now would be pinpointing his own grave.

Half an hour later, the battle in the stone forest was drawing to a close.

Right now, of the entire stone forest, there were no more than dozens of demonized bats left. The remaining golden scorpions had also fled back through the underground caves they had originally emerged from. Many of them were dragging the broken bodies of the demonized bats into the caves.

Even so, there was a thick layer of corpses of demonized bats and golden scorpions decorating the ground of the stone forest.

Seeing this, Song Jian’s eyes brightened. After all, he had not come here to clear out an instance; he had come for the Magic Source Stones. Now he didn’t have to kill the demonized bats one by one, seeing all these bat corpses strewn around.

The remaining demonized bats flew to the uplands of the stone forest to rest. Song Jian cautiously entered the stone forest and took out a dissection knife to poke at the bodies of the bats.

The dissecting knife was a bronze knife he had purchased with reputation points in the village before this instance. The knife was substantially better than the one the militia had lent him before. This green-quality weapon not only increased the chance of successful dissection by 10% but also increased the chance of acquiring items by 5%.

Unlike other players who perform dissection carefully, making light incisions to get more monster body materials, Song Jian was intending to look only for Magic Source Stones. Thus he did not operate like other players. Instead, he jammed the knife directly into the body of the demonized bat and fiercely tore downwards, making a huge wound in the bat’s abdomen. Afterwards, he ran his hands inside the bat’s stomach.

Each Magic Source Stone was tiny, some were even smaller than half a pinkie fingernail. There would be residues of undigested food in the bats’ stomachs, making the search quite troublesome. On some occasions, after a long search, Song Jian would find that the bat’s stomach did not contain a Magic Source Stone.

After dissecting tens of demonized bats’ stomachs, Song Jian finally received a system alert:

System: You have learned the life skill – Dissection Technique (Level 1). {[Dissection Technique]}: Passive, Level 1. Increases dissection efficiency by 5% when dissecting a creature’s corpse.

“Phew, I’ve finally mastered this dissection technique, learning skills is so much harder now than when I first entered the game!” Song Jian shook his head, thinking to himself.

When they first entered the game, players quickly mastered any skill. Most attack skills could be mastered by attacking monsters effectively three times and mastering the corresponding passive skill. One could master a life skill by successfully completing a task once on their own.

For skills like the Dissection Technique, if one were just starting the game, Song Jian would have stood a great chance of mastering it after dissecting just one monster. But now, he has dissected nearly a hundred demonized bats, which goes to show how difficult it is to learn a skill now.

Of course, this also had something to do with Song Jian’s technique. Song Jian was only concerned with the bat’s stomach. One cut from him would practically split the demonized bat in half. To call it “dissection” was somewhat of a stretch.

There were over a hundred demonized bat corpses on the ground. This would be a fantastic opportunity for those who had mastered the techniques of skinning or dissection to level up.

But Song Jian was only after the Magic Source Stones. The fact that he had mastered the Dissection Technique was just a pleasant surprise.

The monster corpses he had dissected collapsed and decomposed much faster, turning into a pile of black ash in a mere few seconds. Song Jian moved quickly; in no time, there were fewer and fewer demonized bat corpses scattered across the ground.

As he was dissecting another demonized bat, one injured bat that was hovering on a stalactite noticed him. Its little red eyes stared intently at the human intruder in their habitat. Its sharp fangs revealed, it looked ready to strike.