Chapter 1 Afternoon

One in the afternoon, Xiao Tan and two NPCs arrived together in front of a large house in the northwest corner of the community.

The three children stopped outside the fence of the house, side by side.

"Well... I guess we really can't find anyone else to translate this book..." Sean said to Xiao Tan.

"But... someone has to knock on the door, right?" Horace said, glancing at Xiao Tan.

"Don't worry, I'll go." Xiao Tan agreed generously. As an adult, he wouldn't be afraid of an unfamiliar neighbor because of certain stereotypes like these children.

"You have to think clearly... Wang, he's terrifying..." Horace reminded him with a serious look, "He's German, maybe he doesn't even speak English."

"Hmm..." Sean thought for a moment and added, "Should we look up how to say 'Please don't kill us' in German first?"

"Bitte_toten_sie_mich_nicht." The next second, a voice suddenly came from their side, speaking this sentence in fluent German.

The three were startled and looked around in unison.

What came into their sight... was an old man wearing a red plaid shirt and a gray woolen coat.

Ten minutes later, inside the house...

"Young men, time is running out." The weird German man, holding a sharp knife, stood in front of the sofa with his back to the light, revealing a serious expression, "This is your last chance today..." Saying this, he leaned over and cut open a piece of fruit pie on the coffee table, "...to taste my freshly made, hot pie."

As he spoke, he handed a cut piece of pie to the opposite side of the coffee table.

At this time, Xiao Tan, Horace, and Sean were already sitting side by side on the sofa. Horace took the pie handed over by the old man with a silly grin, and looked at the two beside him, as if to say, "I didn't expect to encounter such a good thing."

"Alright, where were we?" The weird German man finished cutting the pie and returned to his seat, putting on his reading glasses. He faced the children and picked up the book, saying, "Oh, here... The volume of the amulet itself is not large, and it is engraved with profound incantations..." Translating to this point, he seemed to have discovered something, and immediately turned the book over, facing the page toward Xiao Tan and the others, "...Isn't this thing's appearance quite strange?"

Xiao Tan stared intently and saw a hand-drawn stick figure on the page. The overall pattern... was two miniature dragons (similar in appearance to the dragons in Western mythology, rather than Eastern dragons), clinging to an oval-shaped heterochromatic boulder, one on the left and one on the right, one high and one low.

Of course... if Feng Bujue were here to observe, he might see that Van Helsing used a quill pen instead of a fountain pen when drawing this picture, and deduce from the ink that the other party was in a hurry when drawing; he might also be able to deduce the true appearance of the amulet from this poorly drawn picture. But... Brother Jue is not here at the moment, and no one would care about these details.

"Is this the amulet?" Xiao Tan asked, looking at the pattern.

"I think so," the weird German man replied.

"Hey, guys..." Horace lowered his voice and said to the two little partners next to him with an excited tone, "The weird German man is awesome."

The old man, referred to as the weird German man, glanced at the children and said with a subtle expression, "My name is Leonardo Cimino."

"Uh... Mr. Cimino," Sean asked at this time, "Can you explain the 'balance' part in detail? I didn't understand it."

"Hmm." Cimino responded, "According to what it says in this book... the power of good and evil will constantly ebb and flow, and alternate with each other. And every hundred years, at a specific point in time, these two forces will reach a perfect balance." He paused for two seconds, "And the amulet we were just talking about, which gathers the 'power of good', is a holy artifact for exorcism, not only can it resist evil, but also... it is 'indestructible'." He pointed to the page with his finger, "Here... the word 'indestructible' is used, and there is also an underline."

Speaking of which, he turned a page and continued to read, "And on the 'Night of Resurrection' that occurs once every hundred years, when the clock strikes midnight, the amulet will become particularly fragile. During this time, it will become 'destructible'."

"What happens if the amulet is destroyed?" Sean asked.

"Then the balance between good and evil will be broken." Cimino replied, "Evil... will become the new order of this world." He looked up and scanned the children, "But, our friend Mr. Van Helsing said... even on the Night of Resurrection, there is at least one way to stop the dark forces..."

"What is it?" Xiao Tan quickly asked.

"If someone can get the amulet before the dark forces, they can open the Gates of the Borderlands through a ritual... a ritual that can only be held once every hundred years." Cimino replied, "It will be like a terrible vortex, a fierce tornado... that can swallow up the evil forces and everything around them... thereby maintaining peace for an entire century."

Xiao Tan and the two Monster Club children were all listening attentively to Cimino's narrative, and even Horace put down the pie in his hand.

"Does he describe the process of the ritual?" Xiao Tan quickly asked again.

"Yes, and in great detail." Cimino replied, "This 'diary' continues until the last day of his struggle with the dark forces. Interestingly... judging from the date, there are less than twelve hours left, that is, midnight... we are exactly one hundred years away from that day."

…………

One forty in the afternoon, the suburbs.

I don't know what the structure of this planet, which is similar to America in the 1980s, is, but in this place not far from the city, there is actually a swamp covered by thick fog. Although the drive from the city is only thirty minutes, the terrain here is comparable to a primeval forest.

"It's nearby, can you smell it?" Dracula walked through the muddy ground with his elegant, unhurried pace.

"Ah? Ah—" A werewolf wearing a tattered jacket and jeans followed behind Dracula, responding with a few howls that were like a wolf but not a wolf, like an ape but not an ape.

Whoosh—whoosh—

Just as their conversation ended, the sound of something being dragged came from not far away.

Dracula and the werewolf turned to look and saw... a mummy.

"Heh..." Dracula smiled and said nothing.

He also knew that there was nothing to say to the mummy, as the dried corpse was obviously not very good at communicating.

In short, the mummy and the werewolf seemed to have defaulted to their "follower" status and naturally followed behind Dracula, and Dracula didn't take it seriously and led the two of them forward.

As they walked, they came to a deep, vast swamp.

"It's here." Dracula stopped at the edge of the swamp and said in a deep voice.

After he spoke, silence descended.

A moment later, the middle of the swamp, as if boiling... a large number of mud bubbles emerged.

Hiss—rip—

Seconds passed, accompanied by a rhythmic, bizarre footstep sound, a rectangular wooden box floated out of the swamp.

Immediately afterwards, a figure covered in mud also appeared.

This "human" figure held the box high with both hands and walked out all the way from the bottom of the swamp.

After going ashore, the mud on his body quickly faded, revealing his true face.

Overall... he was just a fish spirit (according to the end credits of *Monster Squad*, this monster is called gillman, and I personally think it can be translated as "gillman"), his face was like a combination of Ben Bo'erba and Ba Bo'erben (both of whom are minor demons in *Journey to the West*), his body looked similar to that of a human, and he had distinct pectoral muscles and abdominal muscles; his hands and feet had webs and claws, and his whole body was covered with crocodile-like skin.

This was another monster who looked like he had a low IQ. After he carried the big wooden box ashore, he silently looked at Dracula, waiting for the boss's instructions.

At this time, faint thunder rumbled in the sky above the thick fog.

Dracula once again squatted affectionately next to the big wooden box, and handed his cane to the mummy standing behind him.

"I've waited too long..." Dracula slowly reached out and uncovered the lid of the wooden box, "...too long..."

Seeing the count in this state, nine out of ten people would guess... that his old lover was lying in the wooden box.

However, after the lid was opened, what was revealed was a tall and strong man.

Compared to the other three monsters, this one lying in the wooden box was still somewhat famous - Frankenstein.

"Cane." Dracula stared at Frankenstein for a few seconds, then turned back and said to the mummy.

The mummy obeyed and immediately extended the cane in his hand, placing the head of the cane in front of Dracula.

The head of this cane was a copper bat carving, the size of an apple, and its shape was lifelike.

Without even looking at it, Dracula skillfully pulled out the two "bat ears" on the head of the cane and pressed them onto Frankenstein's two ears respectively.

I don't know who designed it for him... after these two parts were pulled out, they actually brought out two slender copper wires, and the two "bat ears" themselves could be used as clips.

"Wake up... my old friend." After Dracula finished doing these things, he took the cane and stood up, reciting with an excited look, "Our era has arrived!"

After saying that, he raised the end of the cane high, and after pressing a certain mechanism on the cane, a section of metal rod popped out from the end of the cane in an instant, turning it into a strange, erect lightning rod...

…………

On the other hand, in the community, in the sewer.

The four-person battle between Hell Frontline and Swords Edge had moved from the ground to the underground.

From a sniper battle across the street, it became a surprise attack in a specific environment.

"Another trap..." After encountering the sixth small-scale directional blast, Greed Wolf's survival value finally dropped below 20%. To be on the safe side, he had to drink a large dose of survival value supplement.

"Each one is placed in a different way..." Greed Wolf thought, "Although I also know... Hell Frontline has more than just Feng Bujue as a strategist... but to be able to do this to such an extent is really admirable..."

"Hey... you've been hit six times, are you really okay?" Po Jun, who was more than ten meters behind his teammate, asked with some concern, "Otherwise, I'll go ahead?"

"Don't be ridiculous." Greed Wolf replied, "If it was you, it wouldn't be a matter of being hit six times... maybe you would have died six times already."

"You really dare to say that." Po Jun curled his lips and responded with an ambiguous tone.

"I'm telling the truth..." Greed Wolf replied very seriously, "I've been moving forward with a high degree of concentration, and with the support of specific equipment and S-level medical expertise, otherwise I would have died several times already."

"Oh? Just some traps are so troublesome?" Po Jun asked strangely.

"It might be okay normally, but don't forget..." Greed Wolf replied, "...our bodies have been shrunk. Under this premise, the products of machinery and summoning expertise will exert greater effectiveness." He paused, "And the most typical example of this is... explosives."

"If we're talking about explosives, I have them too." Po Jun said again, "Since it's so disadvantageous for the chasing party, why do we have to take the initiative to attack? We can also learn from them and lay traps and detour all the way..."

"Then wouldn't we lose the advantage we gained on the ground earlier?" Greed Wolf said, "We finally gained a certain degree of suppression by relying on the first move, forcing them to escape underground... If we stop chasing and let them retreat completely, wouldn't all our previous efforts be in vain?"

"Calm down..." Po Jun deserves to be a man favored by Brother Jue. In this situation, he considers the problem more rationally than Greed Wolf, the strategist, "...Maybe the other party is using this mentality to lure you to continue chasing... and then expand the loss..."

After the captain's guidance, Greed Wolf also suddenly realized: "Wait... you're right..." His expression changed slightly, "I seem to have unconsciously fallen into a gambler-like thinking..."

The so-called gambler-like thinking is composed of many parts, and the two most typical parts are: first, winning a little doesn't count as winning, not winning more is the same as losing; second, the more you lose, the more you have to increase your stakes, so that you can get your money back.

"Yes! We can't chase anymore..." At this moment, Greed Wolf's mind buzzed, and many images flashed before his eyes. He quickly said to Po Jun, "It's not that I'm so clever, but those explosive traps... are just tricks to distract attention! The other party's real purpose is..."

Boom—

At this instant.

A blast interrupted his words.

A burst of giant shock interfered with their steps.

But see...