Nie Yan, after all, had ten years of experience; a few words from him were endlessly beneficial to Bai Kai Shui.

Waves of magic bombarded the treants. After the third round, the first treant fell. A dozen seconds later, another one collapsed.

Nie Yan went to the treant corpses and searched them, finding a few copper coins and a pair of bronze bracers for mages that granted +2 Focus.

"Equipment dropped, for mages, you guys can distribute it yourselves," Nie Yan said, tossing the bronze bracers to Yu Lan.

Tang Yao and Huang Hun naturally ignored the bracers. Although bronze equipment was good, it was much worse than what they already had.

In the end, the mage Hai Dao took the bronze bracers for twelve copper coins. Getting equipment within the team was naturally much cheaper than on the open market.

"Nie Yan, that move you did earlier was so amazing, how did you do it? Teach me next time," Yao Yao said. The techniques for using crossbows were similar to those for mages casting spells. She was considered a master among the players, but compared to Nie Yan, she was far behind.

Nie Yan smiled slightly. "Sure, it's not that difficult. Let's talk about it after we leave the dungeon." After speaking, he walked forward, continuing to attract the treants. They came over one or two or three at a time, but never more than three. Because it was an Expert-level dungeon, the equipment drop rate was more than 500% higher than that of a normal dungeon, and the quality of the equipment was far superior as well. After everyone killed those eighteen treants, they got three pieces of decent bronze equipment and one piece of silver equipment.

When Yu Lan and the others did the Treant Forest dungeon on Simple difficulty, they only got a total of five pieces of bronze equipment, and their attributes weren't that good. Now, the value of these three pieces of bronze equipment and one piece of silver equipment far exceeded those five pieces. It was a great start, and the team members were very excited.

"This Expert-level dungeon truly has amazing returns," Huang Hun exclaimed. Such an equipment drop rate was unimaginable to him.

"This is just the beginning," Nie Yan said. The rewards he had obtained from the Expert-level Treant Forest in his previous life were far more than this.

"There's a fork in the road ahead," Huang Hun said. Everyone looked ahead and saw two paths leading to different places in the dark jungle.

"Go west," Nie Yan said.

"Shouldn't we go east?" Huang Hun asked in surprise. When he and Ban Xing de Hu Li and the others had done the dungeon, they had taken the east path; the west was a dead end. No matter the difficulty of the Treant Forest dungeon, its layout was the same.

"Trust me, it's not wrong. Going west is a dead end, but don't you think it's strange for such a dead end to appear in the Treant Forest? There are good things on that dead end! But you have to be careful; there are many treants on the road, it's very dangerous," Nie Yan said. This branch of the story was hidden very deeply and few people discovered it. Without a guide, they might miss it.

Everyone followed behind Nie Yan and walked towards the west path. Treants were frequently active along the way, often rushing into the team. Fortunately, Nie Yan warned them and they were prepared.

"Sap!" Nie Yan used Sap to knock a treant unconscious, then turned to attack another one.

Bai Kai Shui and the others quickly charged forward, followed by magic spells that rained down like raindrops, hitting the treants with a series of bangs.

Two treants fell to the ground and died in succession.

Searching near the treant corpses, they found three copper coins and a skill book.

Skill Book: Spiritual Sense Dodge.

Skill Description: The rogue enhances their intuition to evade attacks. Passive skill.

Skill Attributes: Grants an additional +2 bonus to Intuition Dodge checks and a +1 bonus to Perception checks.

User Restriction: Rogue, Warrior, Paladin, any faction can use.

"It's something for rogues, I'll take it," Nie Yan said in the team chat. This skill book was a rare skill, and the drop rate was very low even in the Expert-level Treant Forest dungeon.

This Spiritual Sense Dodge skill could be used by rogues, warriors, and paladins. If sold on the market, it would be worth at least two silver coins, and it would still be a rare find. If it were in an ordinary team, everyone would definitely fight over such good equipment, and some teammates might even become enemies.

But here, Nie Yan simply took it. Although many team members coveted it, no one dared to say anything. Nie Yan had said beforehand that all the equipment he could use would belong to him, and in this Expert-level dungeon, they could hardly move an inch without Nie Yan, let alone get such good equipment.

Each class had a total of fifty skill slots. Ordinary rogues could fill in half of them, which would already be pretty good. Usually, ten or so active skills were enough, and reaching twenty was already amazing, so the vast majority of skill slots still had to be filled with passive skills.

A few skills could be upgraded, but most skills could not. After leveling up, you could forget some low-level skills to free up skill slots to learn higher-level skills.

Spiritual Sense Dodge was one of the skills that could not be upgraded.

Nie Yan learned Spiritual Sense Dodge and looked at its attributes. Intuition Dodge and Perception had both increased. A passive skill that increased permanent attributes was much more valuable than a piece of equipment.

As the group was halfway there, about to reach the edge of the forest, a melodious flute sound rang out, drifting slowly through the trees, crisp and moving.

"There's an old man at the end of the forest who says some strange things, but no matter how you ask him, he won't give you a quest. We defeated the Treant King without triggering that old man, so we thought he might be unimportant. Could that be a side quest?" Huang Hun said, looking at Nie Yan, wondering what he thought of his words.

"A Non-Player Character never appears in a dungeon for no reason. Every time a Non-Player Character appears, there's a 90% chance it's related to the main quest," Nie Yan said, walking towards the end of the forest.

Huang Hun was quite puzzled. Could Nie Yan find some clues from that old man? It was probably just a waste of time.

Nie Yan had read detailed guides for almost all dungeons, and he had personally experienced 99% of them, so this problem was easy to solve.

"Nie Yan, have you been to this dungeon before?" Yao Yao asked, she was very curious how Nie Yan knew everything.

"I came with a group," Nie Yan nodded.

"Was it also Expert level?"

"Normal difficulty."

"Then how did you dare to enter the Expert-level dungeon?"

"Actually, the Expert-level dungeon isn't that hard to pass. As long as you dig out every hidden point in the dungeon and your skills aren't too bad, it's not difficult to pass the Expert-level dungeon," Nie Yan replied.

Nie Yan's answer was very certain, as if everything could be easily solved in his hands. Yao Yao glanced at Nie Yan's profile. Nie Yan's angular features were still somewhat immature, and he had some stubble on his chin. He wasn't particularly handsome, but he had a special temperament that made people trust and rely on him involuntarily.

Yao Yao couldn't help but take a few more glances, then seemed to think of something, her pretty face turning red, and she quickly looked away.

"Yao Yao, how did you meet him?" Yu Lan asked Yao Yao in a low voice next to her. She had also become a little curious about Nie Yan. It had only been a little over a week since the game was launched, and such a powerful person was truly rare.

"That day I went to collect water sacs… he saved me. If it weren't for him, I probably would have died and lost a level," Yao Yao said with lingering fear. That day, for some reason, she was besieged by six water spiders. She drank a bottle of blood and used two scrolls to kill three of them, but the remaining three almost killed her.

Yu Lan had to say that Yao Yao was really lucky to meet Nie Yan. Even if you searched high and low, you might not be able to find such a strong rogue.

The group killed another treant, and with a ding, a white light shone from Nie Yan's body.

"I leveled up," Nie Yan said, looking at his personal attribute panel. He was already level four.

"Congratulations."

"Congratulations," the team members said one after another.

"Nie Yan, how did you level up? How are you so fast?" Tang Yao asked in surprise. His experience was much higher than Nie Yan's before, but how did Nie Yan get ahead of him in just one day?