Online game: God-level Assassin, I Am the Shadow.

"Hey, where did he go?"

The five of them were left stunned, searching the surroundings but unable to spot Qin Feng.

The tall male assassin among them appeared confused: "That must be an invisibility skill, right? He has invisibility from the start? What kind of class is this? So overpowered."

His chosen 'Assassin' class didn't have invisibility as a starting skill.

After searching for a while with no success, and unwilling to leave the safety zone, the group begrudgingly returned to Shell Town.

Li Zi Jie spoke in a low tone, "It's too dangerous outside. We died once, and our remaining lifespans have been halved. Let's search the town for any opportunities to improve."

The soft, long-haired girl's eyes lit up, "Yes, yes! Let's see if we can find treasure chests or NPCs!"

The tall male assassin remained calm, laughing, "You guys are all so nervous. I mean, yeah, this game is strange, but the idea that it can affect our lifespan? That's nonsense... I say, since we're resurrected, let's just head out and take down that crawler."

Another male warrior said, "I agree. We almost had it to half health. We can't let that guy steal the kill."

Li Zi Jie sneered, "With our five-man team's damage output, we barely took down a third of that crawler's health. One guy alone, relying on invisibility to stay alive? He can't take it down. He's dreaming."

Qin Feng, of course, had no idea about Li Zi Jie and the others' thoughts.

Even if he did, he wouldn't care.

Because inside the starting town, there was nothing that could help with improving his strength. It was merely a safe zone for players to rest.

At this moment, Qin Feng activated the "Shadow Step" skill and moved through the darkened wasteland.

Once invisible, all sound—footsteps, breath, heartbeats—was erased!

Aside from the physical size of his body, everything else was as if he didn't exist.

The only way to detect an invisible player was with a counter-invisibility skill.

Of course, as an "Shadow" class player, Qin Feng had +1 invisibility level.

In the early stages, no player or even wild monsters could detect his invisibility.

Soon, Qin Feng walked more than a hundred meters from the town and arrived at a sparse forest.

In the distance, he spotted the shadow of a crawler resting in the trees.

[Crawler (lv1)]

[Grade: Ordinary (evolving...)]

"That thing just killed those five players. Is it consuming their lifespan?"

Qin Feng squinted his eyes.

This was something he had seen often in his previous life.

After hunting the lifespan from players, monsters needed time to evolve. This crawler was clearly greedy.

It had already hunted five players and could have evolved in a safe place, but it was still here, clearly wanting to kill more...

"Since that's the case, give me back the lifespan."

Qin Feng found a hidden corner.

Once his invisibility ended, he used "Shadow Step" again, seamlessly transitioning between invisibility phases.

Holding the rusted short sword, Qin Feng silently crept up to the crawler.

As he got closer, he could even smell the foul, decaying scent from the crawler.

The shadowy figure slowly became clearer—a faceless creature with gray skin and long limbs, crouching beside a tree. It was surrounded by a mist of grayish-white vapor.

This vapor was the visible form of lifespan.

It indicated that the crawler was consuming lifespan to evolve.

"Any lifespan not consumed by the monster will be turned into loot after its death..."

Without hesitation, Qin Feng remained invisible and approached the crawler from behind, striking instantly!

The rusted short sword materialized from the darkness, flashing with a cold gleam, and struck directly at the crawler's neck.

The "neck" was one of the crawler's weak points. A successful hit there would deal 50% extra damage, meaning 1.5 times the normal damage.

-372 (Weak point attack)!

With a single strike, grayish-white blood poured from the crawler's neck, and it collapsed to the ground!

"This Shadow class is too powerful!"

Even Qin Feng was stunned.

But he knew well that it wasn't just the Shadow class at work.

The majority of the damage came from the two-level evolution of his "Shadow Step" skill.

The 90 bonus attack points had tripled his damage.

If it were the initial, inferior "Shadow Step" skill, the damage would have been less than half of what it was now.

[You have killed 'Crawler (lv1)'.]

[You have gained 10 experience points.]

Aside from this, the crawler's body had gathered a grayish-white orb, a visual representation of lifespan that could be collected.

Qin Feng reached out and grabbed the orb.

[You have gained 3 days of lifespan (tradeable).]

[You have gained 54 years and 155 days of lifespan (non-tradeable).]

The system prompt came, and Qin Feng shook his head.

"They lost at least twenty to thirty years of lifespan each... That's over a hundred years combined."

"And from the crawler's body, I only got fifty-four years..."

"Well, no matter. Non-tradeable lifespan doesn't have much use for now."

Qin Feng understood this well.

When a person is alive, they consume non-tradeable lifespan every second. It has no other use for now.

Only the tradeable lifespan mattered!

"By consuming tradeable lifespan, equipment, skills, and professions can be extracted into reality!"

"But three days of tradeable lifespan from a small monster is too little."

"It's not enough to extract any equipment or skills."

"Time to find more monsters."

Without thinking too much, Qin Feng absorbed the grayish-white mist swirling around him.

Then, he reached down and picked up two items from the crawler's corpse.

An equipment piece and a skill book.

[Corrupted Hide Boots (Inferior): Gray quality. Physical defense +3, movement speed +5%. Equipment requirement: Level 1.]

[Skill Book · Ice Spike (Normal): White quality. Mage-class skill book. Learning requirement: Level 1.]

The crawler was a level 1 ordinary monster.

Its loot was mostly inferior, with a small chance of being normal.

"Two items from one kill, not bad."

"Too bad, neither of them are very useful to me..."

Qin Feng put on the Corrupted Hide Boots.

He felt a bit regretful.

This monster didn't provide evolution points, nor was it enough to level him up.

Qin Feng could only continue using "Shadow Step" and move deeper into the forest...

At this moment, other players began to venture out from Shell Town.

Some formed teams, while others, braver or perhaps more naive, ventured out alone.

Before long, a pair of young lovers arrived at the place where Qin Feng had just killed the crawler. They saw the crawler's corpse at a glance.

"Someone killed a monster here?"

"Looks like this game isn't that hard. I told you not to be so nervous, haha."

"Xiaoya, you stay back. I'll take care of the monsters that show up!"

However, the couple didn't notice...

Above their heads, in the trees, a huge shadow loomed!