The First Store System

Lily took a deep breath and stepped forward. She didn't even remember how many times she had been pushed to the starting point.

There was no life-threatening danger in the maze. One mistake, and the user would be sent to the starting point. The challenge would continue until the user had exhausted their lifespan.

Lily didn't have to fear for her lifespan due to the characteristics of an adventurer, but others had to. At the starting point, she saw numerous creatures who had died an unknown number of years ago.

Their bodies were still preserved to the point where they had exhausted their lifespans. Some had eaten pills, so they still looked young, whereas some looked so old that their skins had sunk deep into their bones.
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Even Lily felt creeped out by that kind of scene, so she wanted to leave this stage as soon as possible.

The left and right paths would randomly change, so trusting her gut, Lily stepped onto the left road.

The next moment, she breathed a sigh of relief as there was a road ahead. She proceeded forward cautiously as there were runes engraved on the road.

One wrong misstep and a wall could immediately pop out of nowhere and block her road ahead, forcing her to move back to the starting point.

The challenge seemed easy, but it wasn't, as there were some areas where the time was flowing so slowly that even a step took several minutes to complete, while there were some areas where she moved so quickly that she wouldn't even notice when she had stepped on a wrong rune and was forced out to the starting point.

A rune appeared in Lily's sight. With a smile, she stepped on it, and the next moment, the road ahead became an upward slope. Lily immediately climbed it and reached its peak.

From there, she could see some distance and remembered the position of all the walls. Even though they could change at any time, they could also not, so remembering their position was vital.

Lily then jumped down to the road below, seeing a path continuing from it.

Rumble!

She hadn't walked very far when suddenly a rumbling sound rang in her ears. Lily looked in the direction of the sound and immediately started running.

The road that had become an upward slope was now descending as the rune's effects had worn off.

Lily wouldn't be injured even if it fell on her, but it would cut her road off, so she desperately ran.

"Ddddddaaaaaaammmmmmmnnnnnnnnnn!"

Lily didn't even know when she had stepped into a time dilation lane, and her speed immediately reached a minimum. The curse word took quite a while to be completed, and at that moment, the road had descended on Lily.

Lily reappeared at the starting point and immediately let out hundreds of vile abusive words in one breath. It took some effort for her to calm down.

Time flew by, and after several months of hard work, Lily finally reached the end and caught the crystal.

It wasn't as simple as catching the crystal, as Lily had to bear the brunt of the entire maze when holding it, but she succeeded in one try, and the door for the next stage appeared in front.

Lily couldn't help but slump down to the ground as it took every ounce of her strength to keep holding the crystal shard until the door appeared.

After taking a rest and recovering to her peak, Lily walked into the gate and was greeted with the surroundings of the third stage in the challenge.

What appeared before her was the store, and Aakesh, with his usual gentle smile sitting on his chair. Khaval was also sleeping on Aakesh's head.

"Congratulations! You have come this far!"

"Now to move to the last challenge, you need to-"

Aakesh was speaking something when he suddenly stopped. The next moment, a cracking sound rang in the area, and things returned to normal.

Lily only scoffed when she saw that happening. The moment she saw Aakesh and the store, she immediately understood things were going to be easy that round.

Not far from her, a gate had appeared. She didn't waste any time and walked inside after pushing it open.

The next moment, she found herself standing in front of an endless road. And there were numerous beasts walking here and there.

Neither of them seemed to be aware of Lily's presence and kept patrolling the road.

Lily was about to take a step forward when suddenly she felt a chill crawling down her spine. Her instinct immediately warned her that something extremely dangerous was waiting there for her.

Lily would have ignored that instinct, but she had rarely felt that sense of danger, so she became solemn and immediately retracted her step back.

She suddenly had an idea as she was thinking of what to do there and took out one fragment of the time crystal. As soon as it appeared, the space around the area began to fluctuate.

The beasts patrolling the vast road immediately froze. Lily raised her paws to step forward, and there was no sense of danger at that time, so she completed her step.

After walking ten steps, she noticed that the crystal shard in her hands was shrinking, and the more she moved, the quicker its rate of shrinking.

She immediately quickened her pace, and as the fragment was on the verge of disappearing, the beasts on the road showed hints of being unfrozen.

Lily took out the second crystal fragment, and the small remaining energy from the first shard merged into the latter.

After walking for a few more minutes, even the second crystal had completely shrunk, unfreezing the beasts on the road.

Roar! Roar! Roar!

One after another angry beastly roars rang in the area as they sensed how far an intruder had come to their territory without them even knowing.

Lily only scoffed and didn't try to fight back, as she could sense that whoever gave her that intense sense of danger was quickly approaching her side.

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