By the campfire.
Before long, a large white mosquito vividly formed.
The invisible "mosquito spirit" around Gauss surged in at the same time.
The mosquito's wings trembled lightly, slowly fluttering in the dim light.
Gauss looked at the mosquito-shaped clay creation, lifelike and realistic, feeling slightly surprised.
This time it was sculpted so well—was it because of the spirit?
So, if he wanted to sculpt a person as lifelike as this, wouldn't that mean...
Stop! Stop!
He looked back at the mosquito-shaped clay figure flying in the air.
"Stop!"The command came out, and the mosquito immediately hovered.
Quite obedient.
But soon, Gauss realized that even without speaking, he should be able to convey commands.
His connection with the clay creation was likely through the spirit.
[Gauss] — [Spirit] — [Clay King Creation]
Fly forward.
He thought so in his mind.
Soon, the white mosquito flew lightly deeper into the passage.
Unfortunately, he had not yet mastered any spell like shared vision or similar functions; otherwise, he could experience the mosquito’s perspective. Next time he enters the Maze, he should ask the Spellcasters Association to look into it.
Gauss pondered for a moment.
The white mosquito continued flying forward according to his previous command.
When his consciousness returned to reality,
“Come back.” He intended to call the mosquito back but found no response.
Perhaps it had flown beyond the control range?
He stood up.
Glancing toward the end of the passage, he chased after the mosquito.
In the distant shadows, several cloaked figures nearly dissolved into the darkness.
One took out a telescope, preparing to look at their target they were tracking.
A companion whispered quietly,
“Boss, look! That’s a huge mosquito!”
The man in charge looked up.
Using the faint light emitted by the plants overhead, he indeed saw a large white mosquito slowly flying.
“Watch out!”
He immediately sensed danger and warned sharply.
The white mosquito suddenly hovered above them, no longer flying.
Had they been discovered?
He quickly used the telescope to look into the distance.
He saw the man who should have been keeping watch by the campfire had already stood up and was slowly walking toward them.
At once, he realized this was a perfect opportunity.
The other two companions of that man were resting; now he was alone.
Although unclear why the man had discovered them yet hadn’t called his companions, this chance couldn’t be missed.
If they subdued him, their numerical advantage would become even more obvious.
He signaled to his companions with a glance and quickly made a gesture with his hand.
The others immediately understood his meaning: spread out! Hide! Kill!
The figures instantly vanished into the darkness.
“Finally connected.”
Gauss recalled the white mosquito.
Suddenly sensing something amiss, his eyelids twitched as he looked sharply into the darkness.
The hidden attackers, noticed first, had no time to wait for their companions to take position.
In the next moment, they exploded forward.
A dagger emitting a ghostly green light radiated a deadly threat, aiming straight at Gauss’s throat.
Gauss stepped back swiftly.
The sharp blade grazed his neck but was quickly blocked by the outer defense of the [Gauss Field].
“Rogue?”
Gauss quickly deduced the opponent’s profession from the slender figure under the dark cloak and the attack style.
Moreover...
His peripheral vision swept around.
There was more than one.
Three other rogues appeared from the shadows, emerging like ghosts,
well-trained and surrounding him in a four-corner formation.
Their movements were swift and silent, coordinated perfectly—obviously skilled hunters.
The image of four naked corpses during the day suddenly flashed through Gauss’s mind.
He vaguely began to understand something.
These people were the so-called “hyenas” or rather “plunderers.”
Fierce villains who survive by “cannibalizing” others in the Maze, often robbing and killing their fellow adventurers for profit, as recorded in the Labyrinth Guide.
At night, when most teams rest, was their best time to act.
Thinking of this, he felt some relief that he had accidentally stumbled upon their operation.
If it had been the latter half of the night, with Serlandul or Aria on watch and these rogues prepared with ambushes or potions, things would have been far more troublesome.
He was also unsure if these robbers could bypass Alarm, a common functional spell set around camps.
“You’re the hyenas, right?” Gauss looked at the leader and asked.
Though phrased as a question, his tone was firm.
The leader was unsurprised.
They had been following Gauss’s team from afar.
So he was well aware that after Gauss’s party found those corpses, they would be wary.
However, perhaps thinking they had already surrounded Gauss and had victory in hand,
the leader nodded in acknowledgment.
Of course, he didn’t waste words. His admission was only to apply more pressure on Gauss.
“Attack! Kill him! He’s a spellcaster!”
A strange purple light covered the leader’s eyes.
Gauss’s figure radiated a strong glow under his gaze,
signaling his profession as a spellcaster who relied on magic power to cast spells, though the opponent’s total mana made him uneasy.
But from past experience, a mage caught in close quarters by four of them was doomed!
“Break his defense!”
He threw several white spheres from his hand.
“Bang!!!”
The white balls struck near Gauss, exploding with fierce flames and shockwaves.
Although Gauss dodged immediately, the aftershocks still swept over him.
The force field buzzed, firmly blocking the scorching flames.
Gauss propped himself up.
Two other figures from different directions gripped pale green daggers, stabbing toward him with cold murderous intent that felt tangible.
From afar, a crossbow was locking onto him steadily.
Gauss’s mind cleared slightly. Relying on his strong intelligence attribute, he instantly shook off the suffocating sensation.
His hand trembled, gripping the steel longsword tightly.
With a thought, Monstrous Strength surged suddenly. His previously smooth arm muscles bulged instantly, twisting like steel wires, veins popping.
The steel longsword felt weightless in his hand, slicing through the air with a piercing whistle, carving a crescent arc toward one attacker.
Gauss didn’t choose to block but instead launched a fierce counterattack!
Anyone who dared to target their squad wouldn’t get mercy from him.
“Clang! Clang!”
The clash of metal suddenly rang out in the quiet.
The pale green dagger in the rogue’s hand snapped under the strike; the longsword slashed a deadly semicircular arc, the momentum cutting into his bracer fiercely.
The man screamed and flew backward.
His forearm and bracer were cut off, and a terrible wound appeared on his chest.
Meanwhile, the other attacker’s dagger and the crossbow bolt were still blocked firmly by Gauss’s nearly impenetrable Gauss Field.
The rogue squad had underestimated the strength of Gauss’s protective spell, thinking that after absorbing the explosive attack, the shield was heavily weakened or even broken.
But in reality, even after absorbing so many attacks, most of Gauss’s field remained intact.
Moreover, they believed that in close combat, as rogues, they should have the advantage over Gauss.
These misjudgments led them to a decision they would deeply regret.
At the distant camp, the moment Aria and Serlandul heard the explosion, they quickly rose from their tents.
Pulling back the canvas, they saw no Gauss by the campfire, and alarm bells rang instantly in their hearts.
They looked toward the explosion’s direction and saw the flash of blades.
Serlandul twisted his waist and transformed into a golden flash, dashing forward.
Aria followed closely.
Facing Gauss, the rogue leader’s pupils kept contracting.
Gauss’s arm swelling and the ferocious slash left him baffled.
Had the skill malfunctioned? Was this man a warrior?
Seeing reinforcements rushing from the distant camp,
he realized it would be difficult to finish Gauss quickly.
He decisively shouted to the other two companions,
“Retreat!”
As for the last injured companion, in this crisis, he naturally became a sacrifice.
Gauss refreshed another [Gauss Field], but saw the remaining rogues slowly vanish into the darkness.
He hadn’t expected them to retreat so decisively.
His heart grew anxious.
He couldn’t let these vipers who had targeted him and his teammates escape.
There’s a saying: thieves act a thousand days, but who can guard against thieves a thousand days?
Even if they couldn’t beat him head-on, having a few rogues lurking nearby meant no peace at all.
Watching the three rogues abandon their injured comrade and flee quickly,
Gauss made a firm decision.
Ghost Form, activate!
He knew Aria and Serlandul were right behind him, protecting him even if he was exhausted, so he felt especially at ease.
Once decided, his body changed instantly.
His neat black hair wildly grew longer, its color visibly fading—from jet black to dark gray, then to pure frost white without a trace of impurity.
On his forehead, two sharp white horns formed, flickering with a bone-like hard sheen.
Dense, teeth-grinding “crackling” sounds came from inside him; his body stretched to two meters tall in a breath’s time.
After entering Ghost Form, Gauss’s mind became extremely calm, and surging power flowed inside him.
The original "refined" aura of a spellcaster weakened, replaced by a fierce wildness mixed with cold killing intent.
“Hoo—”
Though his appearance changed drastically, the process was brief.
The fleeing three had only run a few paces ahead.
Gauss exhaled thickly, his fingers becoming longer and stronger.
“Click! Click! Click!”
His knuckles cracked crisply.
In the next moment, his cold-white light, as solid as an ice spear, locked onto the three fleeing backs.
After yesterday’s power point allocation reaching nine points, his Ghost Form’s burst strength had become even greater!
He stomped down.
“Boom!!”
The hard ground emitted a deep boom.
Centered on his landing point, spiderweb-like cracks spread instantly, and tiny stones were violently shattered and scattered by the raging force!
His figure suddenly disappeared.
No, more precisely, he moved so fast that ordinary eyes couldn’t catch him clearly, only a stretched, blurry white shadow remained.
In Aria’s astonished gaze from afar, and in the panicked eyes of the fleeing rogues who glanced back, that afterimage tore through the thin light with a piercing rush of air, instantly crossing the seemingly safe distance between them.
The first to feel a strong threat was the crossbowman at the rear.
As Gauss approached, a bone-chilling cold crawled up his spine.
He didn’t even have time to dodge or protect himself; a long, cold hand containing inhuman strength clamped precisely like iron tongs on the back of his neck.
That slender hand didn’t pause; as it grasped, it pressed down fiercely.
“Crack!”
A scalp-tingling sound of cervical vertebrae breaking rang out.
“Boom!!”
The crossbowman’s entire body was smashed to the ground with unstoppable force, like being hit by a battering ram.
His head violently collided with the hard rocky ground, sounding like a melon smashing.
Red and white matter splattered between the slender palm and the ground.
The crossbowman didn’t even scream; his body went limp like a rag, completely silent.
The entire process was as fast as a phantom: approach, grab, press kill, all in one smooth flow without hesitation!
Gauss’s white light then turned toward the other two who had run further away.
Those two didn’t dare to look back; the huge commotion behind and the ghost-like figure they’d just seen terrified them into losing all will to resist.
They erupted with unprecedented survival instinct and finally reached a corner, splitting left and right to escape.
However, the white reaper shadow quickly pursued again.
Without slowing, upon nearing the wall, his thigh suddenly stepped onto it.
In the next instant, the wall cracked like a spiderweb, and Gauss used the rebound force to instantly stop his movement.
Gauss’s hawk-like eyes locked onto a rogue; his fingers clenched the air, and the white wand appeared in his hand.
“Magic Missile!”
Five missiles wrapped in pale energy instantly formed.
In the next moment, five blue-white energy spheres shot fiercely toward the target.
After releasing the missiles, Gauss didn’t look back, turning to attack the last rogue on the right.
“Bang! Smash! Bang!!!”
Explosions erupted behind him.
As the blasts sounded, Gauss closed in on the last rogue,
intending to leave a live captive.
Though his body felt inexplicably hot, Gauss’s mind remained clear, quickly suppressing the violent killing urge.
Then, with light footsteps, he appeared directly above the rogue.
While the rogue was upside down, Gauss’s long fingers gripped his neck again.
“Take a deep breath; dizziness is normal.”
Gauss’s other fist fell, deliberately restraining some power, striking the back of the rogue’s head.
“Bang!”
The last rogue fainted, unconscious, his body sliding several meters on the ground with Gauss still holding him down.