Cathulhu Online, MUNYA!

Chapter 19 – Cat Dad’s Dungeon Diving (1)

Xiaomao looked at the support character and nodded in satisfaction. Then, he operated the trade menu and gifted the character 2,000 gold coins, which he had earned from selling trash items.

“Follow me!”

Slave One blankly nodded. Then, Xiaomao led his first slave out of the building.

Both of them went to a shipyard, directly north of the town.

The shipyard was a rundown dome on top of a pier. Many carpenters and shipbuilders had been busy working on their new wooden fishing boats.

Xiaomao hopped toward a clerk NPC, who had been fiddling with an abacus.

“I’m here to buy a fishing boat, munya!”

Ding

A shop menu appeared before Xiaomao. He quickly selected a wooden fishing boat, which had a price tag of 400,000 gold coins!

<You have purchased Wooden Fishing Boat x 1.>

The item entered Xiaomao’s game inventory right away as an icon. However, Xiaomao hadn’t finished shopping yet.

He went to a fishing shop nearby and snagged two brand new fishing rods, ten jars of earthworms, spare fishing lines, and a large fishing net.

Xiaomao turned toward his slave and passed the items to him. Then, he went to another place.

This time, Xiaomao went to a weapon shop and bought 20 bamboo spears. He stored them in his inventory and rushed back to the dock.

Slave One waited there patiently. After Xiaomao returned, he followed after the latter.

Xiaomao rushed to the pier. He clicked on the fishing boat icon on his inventory screen.

Ding

<Would you summon Wooden Fishing Boat?>

“Yes, munya!”

A green blueprint hologram of a wooden fishing boat manifested. The hologram moved around according to Xiaomao’s line of sight, acting as a preview of where the boat would appear upon activation.

Xiaomao moved closer to the sea and directed the hologram to the water. Then, he activated it in his mind.

A brown wooden fishing boat materialized in midair and dropped to the sea as if someone had input a GTA car summoning cheat code.

The boat was 7 meters in length and 2.5 meters in width. It came with a standing shelter and a pre-installed mana motor, which could be fueled by the player’s MP. However, nothing was luxurious about it as no radar or bed was installed on it.

After all, it was a basic fishing boat, not a cruiser or a yacht.

Slave One’s eyes glittered. He opened his mouth and drooled.

Xiaomao laughed at his support character’s behavior. He unloaded the bamboo spears on the boat.

“Get on the ship, munya! I’ll bring you to a nice place, munya!”

Slave One smiled and nodded. He hopped on the fishing boat and examined it for several minutes.

Xiaomao opened his game menu. A new tab appeared, and the status of Slave One was shown.

.

Rarity: Common

Race: Human (Evolvable)

Job: Fisherman (Evolvable)

Unique Skill: Fishing Spot Finder

Racial Skill: [???]

Current Orders: Follow Xiaomao.

.

LEVEL: 1 / 50

EXP: 0 / 1,000

Status Attributes

STR: 1

DEX: 1

AGI: 1

VIT: 1

INT: 1

WIS: 1

Allocable Status Points: 5

.

Combat Status

ATK: 0

DEF: 0

HP: 10 / 10

MP: 10 / 10

.

As expected of a common character, his starting allocable attribute points were low, and the level was capped at 50. However, this character’s level could be increased a lot faster than Xiaomao’s character.

Xiaomao sighed as he allocated one point to STR, DEX, AGI, VIT, and WIS each. At least, he wouldn’t be fighting against monsters other than using his basic strength to fish.

After Xiaomao had done everything, he hopped on the boat’s console and started the engine.

The old mana engine let out a TA-TA-TA sound. Xiaomao moved the accelerator throttle forward, and the ship began to sail.

…

The ship sailed north for five kilometers.

Xiaomao looked ahead while he operated the ship with his weight and tentacles. He could see a famous island where many players in his previous life always competed for a farming spot.

As no scenario quest had been triggered yet, nobody knew about the worth of this abandoned island.

Xiaomao parked the ship at a broken pier of the island. He hopped down and turned to Slave One.

“You have all the tools and the ship. From now on, the ship is yours, munya! I want you to get as many blue-rarity fishes and rare items for me. If your inventory is full or your boat can’t store more items, you can go back to the labor guild and store all fish and rare items in the chest, munya! As for the rest, sell everything and use that money to restock your weapons and baits, munya! Oh, focus on fishing around this island. There are gold-rarity fishes around here, munya!”

Slave One nodded. As if he knew what he needed to do, he got on the ship and sailed west.

Xiaomao laughed as his bot didn’t even care if his boss would be stranded on this abandoned island.

The catopus turned around and looked at the high forest mountain. From a glance, the peak should be at least 100 meters above sea level.

Xiaomao grinned. He hopped into the dense forest of the island.

Even though no road existed here, Xiaomao strolled through the thick bushes and dense plants as if he had been here a thousand times in the past.

In five minutes, Xiaomao stood in front of a cave, located on the top of the mountain.

A totem of human skulls was placed in front of the cave while several dirty clothes were made into banners. Scratch marks and dried feces of animals were everywhere nearby.

No matter how Xiaomao looked at it, it was a gnoll dungeon – One of the low-leveled monster dens in the game.

However, that was not the case here. This cave of gnolls was a disguise as there was another hidden main scenario dungeon underground beneath the mountain.

The average level of the local monsters in the cave was 20 while the boss monster’s level was 30. However, the gnolls always moved and hunted in packs, and every pack had at least one elite monster as the pack leader. Most players came here with their party members as the gnolls were too difficult for solo players.

But if the players could kill the boss, they had a small chance of obtaining a quest item, which was required to unseal the secret dungeon below the gnoll dungeon.

And that dungeon hid countless level 30 to 50 elite monsters there, which made this place so popular. Everybody could grind here from level 20 to 50 without the need to search for another grinding spot, so players with common NFT characters used this place to grind their characters to the max level and farm some blue-named items to sell for pocket money.

‘Here we go. I’m be grinding here for those spirit stones!’

Xiaomao walked toward a pile of dung. He closed his mouth and scooped them and smeared it on his body.

It smelt disgusting, but it was a sure-fire way to not get swarmed by the packs of dog-like humanoid monsters.

Xiaomao picked a few pieces of rock and put them in his inventory. Then, he strolled into the cave.

Ding

<You have discovered Fishy Gnoll Dungeon.>

<You are the first to enter this dungeon. Please select one of the following rewards.>

<One: Temporarily increase the monster drop rate by 50 % for 72 hours.>

<Two: Temporarily increase the acquired experience points by 50 % upon killing monsters in this dungeon for 72 hours.>

<Three: Temporarily increase your status attributes by 50% for 72 hours.>

Xiaomao only glanced at his notification panel and picked choice number three right away.

Ding

<Your status attributes will be increased by 50% for 72 hours.>

<Will you announce your discovery to the global server? You will obtain a rare weapon summoning ticket as a reward.>

“No, munya. Also, hide my name as well, munya.”

Xiaomao would have been a fool had he publicized the existence of this dungeon to the world. A good grinding spot like this would have been overrun by top guilds and greedy gold farming companies instantly, and Xiaomao would have been kicked out of the dungeon.

<You have chosen to hide your discovery.>

Even though the system message said that Xiaomao had chosen not to disclose the dungeon to the public, the game suddenly sent an announcement to every player on the server.

DING

<An anonymous player has discovered a new dungeon. The detail and the location are classified.>

“…”

Xiaomao scoffed and entered the dungeon.

…

The cave was pitch black. Unless the player could see through the dark or bring a source of light, they wouldn’t be able to see anything in here.

This was when a catopus like Xiaomao could display its hidden potential. Most monster NFT characters came with the Night Sight ability, but it was never shown in the status menu as a racial passive skill.

There was an exception. A few races, such as Vampires, Werewolves, and demi-humans, had different versions of Night Sight Passive Skill as their racial abilities due to the extra perks.

For example, Vampires had infrared eyes that could see the heat of players or mammal creatures through walls, but it wouldn’t work against spirit monsters or non-mammal creatures. Werewolves could see and sense everything in a radius of 100 meters as long as they were injured or wounded. But they could only see things in green, including the daytime.

As for Xiaomao, his pupils worked the same way as a night scope. When there was no light, Xiaomao saw everything in grey as his eyes produced the light for him.

After walking 10 meters, the first group of gnolls was before Xiaomao.

The leader of the pact was a two meters tall demi-human with a hyena head. He wore leather armor and wield a large club.

As for the other gnolls, they walked around naked and sniffed around.

Xiaomao quietly hid behind a rock and made himself as smallest as possible.

One of the gnolls twitched his nose. He snorted and panted while he approached Xiaomao.

Xiaomao pretended to be a rock and sat still.

Soon, the gnoll stood before Xiaomao. He crawled on all four and raised one of his legs.

Golden liquid splashed on the rock next to Xiaomao. A few drops got on his fur.

The gnoll was remarking his territory as he sensed the smell of another gnoll’s poop!

While the gnoll was peeing, Xiaomao crawled behind it. He brought out the Fuiyoh Cleaver. Then, he leaped at the gnolls, who had shown his butt and balls.

SUEK

With one slash, the round balls of the gnoll was cut off!