Translator: Atlas Studios
Editor: Atlas Studios
After muttering, the Knight Mentor immediately put on a solemn expression and said to Liu Ming, “Floating Cloud, it’s time for me to fulfill my promise since you have completed your mission.”
After saying that, the Knight Mentor pressed an orange crystal—which looked somewhat similar to the Skill Crystal Liu Ming had back then—onto Liu Ming’s forehead.
[Congratulations, Adventurer, you have activated the special hidden quest: Greater Challenge.]
[Congratulations, Adventurer, you have learned the Core Skill: Solar Swordsmanship (Orange).]
…
Before Liu Ming could check his new Skill’s information, a series of system messages popped up.
[Congratulations, Adventurer, you have completed Elite Profession Promotion Quest (Hell): Challenge the Inferno Hegemon. Successfully advancement to Elite Guardian Knight.]
[Adventurer, your Skill, Horse-taming Technique (White), has advanced to Horse-taming Technique (Blue) under your tireless efforts!]
[Adventurer, your Skill, Combat Mastery (White), has advanced to Combat Mastery (Blue) under your tireless efforts!]
…
[Congratulations, Adventurer, you have learned a new Profession Skill, Charging Slash (Blue).]
[Congratulations, Adventurer, you have learned a new Profession Skill, Body Of Vitality (Blue).]
[Congratulations, Adventurer, you have learned a new Profession Skill, Heroic Stance (Blue).]
…
[Congratulations. Adventurer, you have learned Core Skill, Imperial Military Swordsmanship (Green).]
…
As Liu Ming’s original passive Skills improved and he learned new ones, the Stats on his panel surged again.
Liu Ming’s various Stats had each increased by 40% to 50%. His HP had also increased to 18,600. His Attacking Power had also broken through 2,000 points, reaching 2,241 points. His Defense had also reached an unprecedented 1,312 points.
In fact, his passive Skills’ advancement had also increased his resistance by a lot. Liu Ming’s 1,312 points of Defense could be regarded as 1,600 points.
In other words, if Liu Ming were to fight the Flaming Demonic Vulture again, the Flaming Demonic Vulture’s best Skill would probably cause Liu Ming to lose 200 to 300 HP at most.
Even Liu Ming’s Magic Points, which had always been his shortcoming, now had an upper limit of 6,120 points.
It could be said that his Stats were worlds apart from what they used to be before the profession advancement. Other than the difference in Stats and Skills, the Core Skill Liu Ming learned also allowed his combat prowess to change qualitatively.
Other than bringing a certain increase to a player’s Stats, Core Skills would also change the player’s attack pattern.
The most obvious evidence was the changes in a Mage’s casting speed and Skill power, which would both improve once they learned a Core Skill.
Those in physical professions would have some additional combat techniques, which allowed players to have more Skills to choose from when fighting.
Of course, the higher a Core Skill’s quality, the higher the grade of the Skills attached to it.
The Skills attached to superior-grade Core Skills could even result in some special effects. These Skills were equivalent to Skills with no cooldown, but they did not come with additional damage effects.
Also, only one Core Skill could be chosen during battles. Players could only switch to another Core Skill after leaving the battle for three minutes.
Now that Liu Ming had obtained an additional reward, Solar Swordsmanship, he naturally did not need Imperial Military Swordsmanship, a fixed bonus Skill. After all, Solar Swordsmanship was an Orange Core Skill.
Solar Swordsmanship (Orange): Increases damage dealt by attacks by 40% while greatly optimizing normal offensive combat moves, which will gain a certain probability of inflicting a blinding effect to the target.
…
Just Solar Swordsmanship’s effect of increasing Liu Ming’s Attacking Power by 40% was enough to beat Imperial Military Swordsmanship’s effects.
Imperial Military Swordsmanship (Green): Increases damage caused by sword attacks by 10%. Increases damage done by normal attacks by only 5%.
…
Imperial Military Swordsmanship only increased Liu Ming’s damage by 10%. That effect was no different from that of Solar Swordsmanship.
The last special effect was not bad, but it only increased Liu Ming’s damage by a small margin. It only increased the damage of his normal attacks by 5%, which did not affect the big picture much.
With such large differences between the two, those who understood their effects would naturally know which one to choose.
…
Just as Liu Ming was learning about his new Skills, the nation’s players were once again shocked by the news of Liu Ming’s successful promotion.
[System Announcement (National): Congratulations, Adventurer Floating Cloud, you have completed the Second-Promotion mission and become a Second-Promotion player. The system is hereby rewarding you with 2,000 Reputation points and 100 Gold Coins.]
…
[Little Handsome Ma (National): Damn it!]
[Horse Shop Resident Bigmouth Yuan (National): Damn it!]
[Domineering Brother (National): Damn it!]
…
[Happy Fatty (National): Enough, you guys… Okay, an uncultured person like me can only curse.]
…
Countless players suddenly began cursing in the national channel, making the various guilds’ senior executives discuss Liu Ming’s promotion in their own guild channels.
Unlike ordinary players, the major guilds’ senior executives had a clearer understanding of the difficulty of advancing in the future.
The major guilds’ senior executives had plenty of resources and advantages. They were far beyond Level 23 and level 24. The first thing that came to the minds of the various major guilds’ senior executives when they saw Liu Ming successfully going through his second promotion was ‘Why did Floating Cloud advance so quickly?’
However, most of them quickly suppressed that thought.
After all, they did not have a feud with Liu Ming. They had no potential conflicts of interest between each other either. Thus, they had no need to provoke a tricky enemy like Liu Ming because of their jealousy.
Under such circumstances, the discussions going on in the major guilds’ guild channels were mostly about how they could befriend Liu Ming or were analyzing the reasons for Liu Ming’s success.
However, a certain guild’s guild channel was going through a different situation. None of the senior executives dared to say anything in World Guild’s guild channel.
[World’s Best (Guild): Invincible, what did I tell you before I left!?!]
[World’s Best (Guild): Even if you can’t contact me in the game when a major event happens, just give me a call. Don’t make presumptuous decisions on your own.]
[World’s Best (Guild): You only decided to look for me when you had no means to deal with the situation. What have you been doing all these days?]
[Invincible (Guild): President, I didn’t want to ruin your mood and affect your state of mind lest something goes wrong when you’re performing a quest.]
[World’s Best (Guild): I can’t be bothered to say anything else now. On the account that you have put in plenty of effort all these years, I’ll forget about it this time.]
[World’s Best (Guild): If this happens again, you shall scram back to the Gold-Grabbing Team.]
Invincible immediately made his stand when he read the message.
[Invincible (Guild): President, don’t worry. I definitely won’t take matters into my own hands again.]
If he were to get banished to the Gold-Grabbing Team, his career would be ruined.
Although many ordinary players were proud of themselves for being in Gold-Grabbing Teams, in the eyes of the major guilds’ true elite players, members of Gold-Grabbing teams were just tools who didn’t qualify to be cannon fodder at all.