“Let him go, don’t waste any more time, we still have to look for the Skull-Splitter.” The girl called out from a distance.

“Yes, miss.” The man replied, shooting Edward White a vicious glare. “Lowborn, consider yourself lucky.”

After Edward White left, he resumed searching for Skull-Splitters. His luck wasn’t bad—before long, he encountered another lone Skull-Splitter and continued testing the pain points on its body.

The vital pain points on a Skull-Splitter were very different from those of a human. Edward White managed to identify thirty-five pain points on the Skull-Splitter, though there were probably a few more, but not many. Compared to the more than a thousand pain points on a human, the undead clearly had far fewer.

Thirty-five pain points were already enough for Edward White. After all, Skull-Splitters were just a low-level type of undead; there was no need to waste too much time on them.

Just as he was about to finish off this Skull-Splitter, which had already been slashed over a thousand times, the ground suddenly shook violently. A pillar of red light tinged with black shot up from the distant forest, dyeing the sky in red and black hues. The entire forest was shrouded in this ominous glow.

“The altar of the undead has appeared!” Edward White exclaimed in shock.

No one knew where the altar of the undead was hidden; humans had no way to find it. Occasionally, however, an altar would manifest. When this happened, the area around the altar would be sealed by a strange power—no one could enter from outside, and those inside couldn’t escape.

Even more terrifying, all undead within the altar’s area would mutate, becoming stronger and more fearsome, then go on a rampage, hunting down every living creature in the region. Only when all living beings were killed would the undead altar vanish once more.

If you found yourself inside the altar’s domain, the only way to survive was to charge the altar and shatter the Immortality Crystal atop it. Only then would the altar disappear, the spatial seal break, and you’d have a chance to escape alive.

But when the undead altar appeared, the most powerful undead in the area would guard it. In other words, that baron-level Skull-Splitter was now at the altar. After mutating, its strength would be nearly equal to a viscount-level undead. Defeating it and destroying the Immortality Crystal would be no easy task.

Looking at the Skull-Splitter on the ground, its body glowing blood-red as its wounds rapidly healed, Edward White didn’t hesitate—he swung his sword and severed its head.

A life scale dropped from the Skull-Splitter’s dissipating body—astonishingly, it had twenty marks. Normally, a Skull-Splitter would drop at most ten. Clearly, the mutated ones no longer had this limitation.

After absorbing the life scale, Edward White felt no excitement. With the altar’s appearance, any Skull-Splitter killed would soon revive at the altar. In other words, as long as the altar existed, there would be an endless supply of Skull-Splitters, and except for the first kill, they would no longer drop anything—not even life scales.

Suddenly, screams rang out nearby. Several people were being chased by a Skull-Splitter. Normally, they could have handled it, but after the mutation, they were nothing but prey.

“Help!” Seeing Edward White, the people being chased cried out.

“I wonder if the pain points still work on mutated Skull-Splitters?” Edward White didn’t run. Since he was trapped in the altar’s domain, escape was no longer an option.

It was better to face a single mutated Skull-Splitter now than to face a group of them later without understanding their abilities.

He strode steadily toward the Skull-Splitter. The people calling for help brushed past Edward White without any intention of joining forces; each of them continued to flee desperately.

The Skull-Splitter, reeking of blood, swung its massive axe at Edward White’s neck, its speed and strength far surpassing what it had been before mutation.

Edward White shifted slightly, the axe nearly grazing the tip of his nose. With a sudden reverse thrust, his pure white greatsword stabbed up into the Skull-Splitter’s left armpit.

“Roar!” The Skull-Splitter let out a miserable howl, its left arm snapping back like a spring, curling up unnaturally. The pain was so intense it dropped its double-bladed axe.

Moving around the Skull-Splitter like a butterfly, Edward White wielded the heavy greatsword as if it were weightless, slashing thirty-four times in an instant.

Each strike drew a wretched, agonized scream from the Skull-Splitter. Finally, with a thrust through its heart, it dissolved into motes of light, leaving behind a glowing life scale.

“All thirty-five pain points still work. It seems the mutation only enhanced the Skull-Splitter’s physical strength and speed, but didn’t make them invincible.” Edward White felt somewhat relieved. As long as the pain points were still effective, the mutated Skull-Splitters were not much different from before, at least for him.

After collecting the dropped life scale, Edward White set off toward the location of the altar.

If he wanted to survive, the only way was to destroy the Immortality Crystal. The longer he delayed, the harder it would be to reach the altar, because every Skull-Splitter killed would soon revive there. In other words, the more Skull-Splitters he killed now, the more dangerous the altar would become.