Ethan walked into the plantation, and the surrounding plants immediately attacked him.

He quickly activated Divine Dragon form, and the living plants were immediately awed by the dragon’s power.

One by one, they stopped their attacks, their gaze also becoming dull.

Ethan felt a glimmer of hope in his heart.

Since these plants could be deterred by the dragon’s power, the method provided by Ghost Vine Dark Lord seemed likely to be effective.

He stuck the scarecrow above the Mutant Seed.

The originally tattered scarecrow seemed to come to life at this moment.

Even Ethan could sense the change in the scarecrow.

After he dismissed the Divine Dragon form, the surrounding plants weren’t as crazy as before, and even became somewhat docile.

Ethan was immediately very satisfied.

Next, Ethan called back some idle NPCs and an Earth Dragon Laborer from the exploration team to work in the plantation.

Watching the camp thriving, Ethan was in a great mood.

The system also rang out with a prompt.

[Ding! Congratulations to the host, 80% of Horizon Mountains has been explored, and you can choose other map locations to explore.]

He opened the system and brought up the mini map.

The number in the upper right corner indicating the number of exploration areas changed from 1 to 2.

Did that mean he could explore two areas?

Ethan still chose the unknown area near Horizon Mountains for the first piece.

Iron was absolutely indispensable.

As he chose the area, the number in the upper right corner changed from 2 to 1.

Ethan’s face lit up with joy.

If he could explore two maps, he wouldn’t need to worry about food.

He carefully examined the resource content of each map area and finally chose an unknown area with a 95% probability of containing food.

He then left the goblins to continue exploring Horizon Mountains and divided the 4 Divine Dragon warriors into two teams, they will separately explore the two areas.

And then he summoned several Earth Dragon Laborers to follow the two teams of warriors to harvest resources.

After arranging all of these, Ethan returned to the wooden house and started his blissful life.

…

Not far from Ethan, in Riverside, the mission hall once again increased the reward for the mysterious Dark Lord of the Abandoned Temple.

After Daniel and others recruited more than 20 young men to join their team, everyone was eagerly anticipating their return.

After all, no matter how strong the Dark Lord was, facing a team led by an NPC with D+ strength, they were bound to win.

However, things did not go as expected.

Two days later, there was no news about Daniel’s team.

Many people speculated, could it be that the team organized by Daniel was completely annihilated?

Otherwise, even if they failed, how could there not be a single survivor?

The mission hall had to reassess the strength of the mysterious Dark Lord of the Abandoned Temple, leading to the increase of reward.

As a result, even the city lord’s mansion started paying attention to the Abandoned Temple.

If they let this Dark Lord, powerful enough to take down a D+ team, continue to grow, then the safety of the Riverside territory would be threatened!

The city lord’s mansion did not care about the Heroes, but those young men were the cornerstone of Riverside’s development.

If more Heroes like Daniel were to massively recruit young men and then none of them survived, it would be an unbearable blow to Riverside.

In this way, the future of Riverside would be in great danger!

The city lord’s mansion decided today to formally put the plan to subjugate the Dark Lord of the Abandoned Temple on the agenda.

It also increased the conditions for Heroes to recruit young men.

Only Heroes with at least C strength could recruit.

It could be said that Ethan single-handedly succeeded in putting the Hero Fiction of Riverside in a situation where no one was available.

Many Hero teams began to resent Ethan, as these low-level NPCs were extremely useful tools.

Whether used as laborers or cannon fodder, they could be used at a small price.

But now, with Riverside’s new regulations, these things were completely banned.

In a tavern, many Hero teams were exchanging information or chatting.

“This Dark Lord in the Abandoned Temple is really disgusting! You tell me, why do you have to be so strong? Daniel is also stupid, having an NPC with D+ strength, but can’t even run away!”

A man with an obvious flush on his face drank the beer in his glass and complained discontentedly.

“You’re right. I tell you, the new regulation from Riverside today is because of this!”𝒐𝓋𝓛xt.𝗇𝓔t

A man at the same table said mysteriously.

“Brothers, we are all Heroes, and we don’t need to say how much these NPCs are used for. I think we can form an alliance. Since one team doesn’t work, let’s form an alliance and fight the Dark Lord together. What do you think?”

The man suddenly stood on the wooden table and shouted loudly.

Teams around lowered their heads and didn’t dare to look.

The lively atmosphere in the tavern became somewhat subtle.

The man’s proposal was not bad, with so many Hero teams, if they want to defeat a Dark Lord, they could absolutely take it.

However, this mysterious Dark Lord was able to defeat a D+ level team, which showed his strength.

If they want to subjugate him, there would definitely be casualties. So, which team would die, which team would live?

Everyone had their own agenda, and no one echoed.

The lonely drunken man immediately yelled in anger, “What, are you all a bunch of cowards? A small Dark Lord has scared you?”

The accompanying man tried to pull the other man down from the wooden table, but his attempts were to no avail.

Watching the man unabashedly mocking the teams in the entire tavern, he shrank his neck and left directly.

Unsurprisingly, the man’s aggressive words provoked resentment among some teams.

A few minutes later, the man became a striking sight next to the trash can.

“Boss, it’s done,” in a private room at the tavern, two men bent over, reporting respectfully to the bald man sitting in the main seat.

The bald man waved his hand, and his subordinates backed out and closed the door.

Next to the bald man, a man wearing flamboyant clothes, even lipstick, casually commented, “Baldy, your henchmen aren’t bad. They’ve got discernment.”

The bald man shook his head, “Not enough, they’re not as good as your boys. Letting that drunk made a fuss, they’ll need more training.”

The lipstick man chuckled and stroked the cat in his arms.

“But, that Dark Lord of the Abandoned Temple has become the focus now!”

In the room, another muscular man drained his glass of fine wine and said with contempt, “Hmph! Nothing but a jumping clown.”

“Oh, are you that good?” the lipstick man feigned surprise, wearing a face of incredulity.

The muscular man said nothing, instead looking at the woman sitting across the table.

“Go, find a few Heroes, see how strong he really is.”

The woman’s voice was not loud, but it resonated with everyone in the room.

Her name was Rose, beautiful and thorny, as her name suggested.

In just a few days after the game launched, she distinguished herself among the Heroes, reaching D+ and making a name for herself in Riverside’s Hero Fiction with her ruthless style.

With her reputation, she successfully formed a guild called Black Rose.

Its members were all formidable, and core members not only needed D+ strength, but also greater reputation and capability than the average person.

Everyone in the room were core members of the Black Rose.

“Yes!” The people at the table looked at each other, their eyes filled with a fighting spirit.

The position of vice guild leader was still vacant.

If they could handle this well, the position would naturally fall into one of them’s lap.

Several people quickly left the tavern, immediately rallying their own teams, but not recklessly striking like Daniel.

Current information indicated that the mysterious Dark Lord in the vicinity of the Abandoned Temple had at least D+ strength, perhaps even stronger, so everything needed careful consideration.

The bald man decided to sacrifice his subordinates, gathering his lower ranking henchmen, and then let them select the most discordant members.

In this way, he had cannon fodder.

The lipstick man was also busy.

Under his influence, his team members volunteered to join the mission.

The muscular man was even more confident, deciding to lead the team himself!

The three teams set off at the same time, but there was only one path to the Abandoned Temple.

The three teams embarked on the journey with ulterior motives.

At this moment, Ethan was lying on the wooden bed, enjoying his blissful life, totally unaware that a major battle was quietly approaching.