SS Awakening: My Monster Merging System!

Chapter 141: The Central City

After walking out of the Undead Crypt’s teleportation portal, Zich still carried a faint aura of death and the smell of bone ash.

He lowered his head and glanced at his clothes.

The corners of his outfit were stained with grayish white bone powder, and there were several tears on the sleeves left by undead claws. Although he did not look miserable enough to be unable to face people, if he attended the so called most anticipated Chosen One Tournament on the first layer looking like this, he would more or less resemble someone who had just crawled out of a grave.

... In a certain sense, that was not exactly wrong.

After closing the Undead Crypt’s teleportation portal, the first thing Zich did was not check his equipment, nor reopen the forum, but head straight upstairs to take a bath.

Hot water quickly filled the bathtub.

He took off his clothes and stepped into the water. As his body sank into the warm bath, the exhaustion that had built up over several days finally seemed to find an outlet and slowly faded away. The chill from the Undead Crypt, the bone powder, the smell of sweat after battle, and that lingering aura of death were all gradually washed away by the hot water.

Zich leaned against the edge of the bathtub and closed his eyes to rest for a moment.

After finishing his bath, Zich changed into clean black clothes and adjusted the Blood Knight Commander Cloak.

The dark red patterns on the cloak glowed faintly under the light, but they were not overly eye catching. It looked more like a low profile yet expensive battle coat, one that would not immediately reveal its true effects.

Zich stood before the mirror and took a look at himself.

His face still showed some signs of fatigue, but he was presentable now.

As soon as he walked downstairs, the sound of his doorbell ringing was heard.

... Someone was at the door.

Zich did not even need to guess who it most likely was. He walked to the front hall and opened the door.

Helen stood outside. She was wearing a clean combat outfit today, her golden hair tied behind her back. She looked much more energetic than before, although the expression on her face was not particularly cheerful.

"You finally came out," she said, annoyance evident in her tone.

Zich looked at her. "I’ve been home the whole time."

"I know you’ve been home." Helen took a deep breath. "The problem is I’ve been looking for you since this morning, and you never responded."

"I was preparing."

"Preparing since when?"

"Yes." Zich stepped outside and casually closed the door behind him. "Standing outside getting excited for half the day won’t make anyone stronger."

Helen rubbed her forehead. "I’m not asking you to get excited. I’m here to tell you... Ugh, never mind. Did you see the notices?"

"Yes."

Helen felt like face palming. Everyone had been waiting for him for several hours, and he deliberately decided to stay back.

"You..."

"Well, I was taking a bath."

Helen was momentarily speechless.

She looked at Zich’s clean and tidy clothes and his handsome face. Her expression softened slightly.

"Sigh. At least you weren’t planning to go to the main venue looking like you just climbed out of a grave."

"That might suit my profession better."

"Stop making jokes like that."

Zich said nothing further. However, call it scummy, but in the future, if the secrets of his class ever became known, he could always refer back to this conversation and say he had already told her.

Helen glanced at his storage bag before looking at his empty shoulder and asked with a bit of concern in her voice.

"Where’s your slime?"

Before Zich could answer, Slimy poked a small blue part of its body out from behind the door.

The moment it spotted Helen, it hesitated.

Helen crouched and extended a finger.

"You little thing." She smiled. "Are you still scared of me?"

Slimy slowly bounced forward, stopping just out of reach.

Helen didn’t force it. She simply smiled and waited eagerly.

After several seconds, Slimy cautiously stretched out a tiny slime tendril and lightly tapped her fingertip before immediately bouncing back behind Zich.

Helen could not help but frown when she saw the slime’s reaction, but she didn’t push it, subconsciously vowing to make it like her.

She turned toward the road outside the manor.

"Let’s go. The vehicle is already waiting outside."

"Vehicle?"

"You didn’t think the main tournament was being held inside the First Shelter, did you?"

Zich paused for a moment, a gleam of genuine surprise in his eyes.

"It isn’t?"

Helen turned back to look at him, her expression seeming to say she had finally found something he did not know.

"Of course not. We’re going to the Central City of the first layer."

Zich’s interest was finally piqued a little.

"Central City?"

As they walked, Helen explained, "Every layer has a central administrative city. It doesn’t belong to any particular shelter. It’s the rule management center for the entire layer. Large scale tournaments, cross race agreements, major trade regulations, secret realm and dungeon registrations, dispute resolutions, and many other matters are all handled there."

Walking beside her, Zich’s expression gradually became more serious.

"So it’s not simply a human city."

"It isn’t," Helen replied. "The Central City of the first layer is a neutral zone. Humans, Verhari, Sorath, Kaith, and even the rarely seen Nullborn may all appear there."

Zich fell silent for a moment. That was quite different from what he had imagined.

He had originally thought the Chosen One Tournament was merely a large competition between several shelters and would be held here, but it seemed there was more to it.

Helen continued, "The rules in Central City are much stricter than those in the shelters... You can’t..."

...

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