Translator: Atlas Studios
Editor: Atlas Studios
The novice quests in most games were just a guiding process. The purpose was to let the players familiarize themselves with the location of the NPC, as well as the terrain, combat methods, and other game content. Similarly, novice quests were also the best choice when rushing through levels.
After Fatty controlled his character to find the blacksmith, he finally got his first weapons in the game.
[Curved Withered Rattan Wooden Staff]
Rank: Normal
Physical Attack: 1-1
Magic Attack: 1-2
Durability: 40/40
Equipment Requirement: Strength 1
In the Chaotic Era, the rank of equipment was divided into five levels. The first was naturally Normal Rank, and the name of the equipment was written in white font. The second one was in blue font and was called Refined Rank. The third one was Superior Rank, which was written in green font. The fourth was Legendary Rank, which was written in purple font.
As for the highest-ranking equipment, it was more special. The official name in the game was Demon Armament. Such a piece of equipment was usually a few pieces collected together to activate the ultimate stats. It was similar to outfits, but it wasn’t really one because the outfits in the game generally were not collected. A single piece of equipment would also have certain stats, but this did not apply to the Demon Armament. As long as all the pieces were not put together, its stats would never appear and it would always be replaced with the word ‘unappraised’, deeming it unusable for the player.
This would undoubtedly increase the difficulty of obtaining the ultimate pieces of equipment, such as some pieces of the Demon Armament, which was a five-piece set. Even if the players already had four pieces on hand, it would be practically unusable. They could only use it as a decoration in the inventory.
Only when all the pieces were collected could the Demon Arnament’s golden name be displayed…
Fatty had only seen the first four ranks of equipment. As far as the highest-ranking equipment was concerned, it was said that there had only been three pieces ever since the game had opened. Those who owned this equipment had a sentimental attachment to it, so they couldn’t even take it out for others to admire. Therefore, he’d never known exactly what the Demon Armament looked like.
The staff given by the blacksmith in front of him was undoubtedly the lowest-end weapon. Fatty equipped this staff and opened his stats bar to have a look.
Character Name: Chicken Sugar
Level: 1
Race: Apostle
Camp: Dark Council
Camp Contribution: 0
Strength: 1
Agility: 1
Constitution: 2
Spirit: 3
Intelligence: 3
Luck: 0
Physical Attack Power: 2-2 (Wooden Staff Bonus)
Magic Attack Power: 4-5 (Wooden Staff Bonus)
HP: 40/40
Mana: 60/60
Physical Armor: 1 (Damage Received: 100%)
Magic Armor: 3 (Damage Received: 99%)
Attack Speed: 25
Movement Speed: 25
As a novice, his general stats were a bit tragic. This was one of the reasons players were desperate to kill monsters and complete quests to level up. In the Chaotic Era, each character would receive one point for each stat except Luck when they leveled up. Plus, they could also receive two free stat points, which meant they could receive seven stat points with every level-up.
Of course, the Race stat existed because different races had different effects on the stat point bonus. Using the Constitution stat as an example, the Orc Race had the highest Constitution growth among the three races of the Dark Council, as 1 Constitution point equaled 11 HP. The Orc Race was followed by the Apostle Race, whose every Constitution point equaled 10 HP. At the bottom of the list was the Undead Race, whose every Constitution point equaled 9 HP.
Although it was only a difference of 1 HP, at a higher level, such a difference would become more obvious. If Fatty wanted to play a Venomancer with a bonus Constitution, the Orc Race would be the best choice. However, because he couldn’t choose the Wizard Class in the Orc Race, Fatty could only go back and choose the Apostle Race.
Following the quest guide, Fatty then ran to the tailor shop, grocery store, and pharmacy. He obtained a Normal Rank robe with +2 Physical Armor and +3 Magic Armor stats, Normal Rank boots with +20 Movement Speed, a poor-quality black bread that regenerated 49 HP in 6 seconds, and a bag of muddy spring water that regenerated 60 mana points in 6 seconds.
Lastly, Fatty found the Venomancer mentor according to the guidelines and discovered the novice’s primary skill: Miasma!
Miasma Level 1: Instant release of Miasma to attack the target, causing 3-point damage. In the next 6 seconds, the target will lose 1 HP/second. The Miasma’s toxin effect cannot stack. It consumes 5 mana points.
As soon as he saw this skill, Fatty found it ball-breaking. Although he knew very well that at the beginning of the Chaotic Era, it was difficult for a Venomancer to do well in the game, he hadn’t expected it to be so difficult.
Based on his knowledge, the novice skills of other classes would generally have about 10 points of Attack Power when their initial damage and real damage were at Level 1. However, the Venomancer’s Miasma Skill only had 3 points of initial damage. Even with Fatty’s stats added, the Miasma attack would only inflict 7-8 points, which was 2 points less than other classes!
What? The follow-up poison damage did not count? Big Brother, please! How could anybody wait quietly for a monster to slowly bleed in an overcrowded Novice Village? By the time the monsters respawned, he would be cut by countless swords and killed in seconds…
Moreover, there was a fatal weakness in the early-stage Venomancers. The poison damage of other skills could not let the monsters die directly because of the HPlost from the toxin! This meant that if a monster was poisoned by a Venomancer and its HP was reduced by the toxin without attacking it again, the monster would not die even if its HP was reduced to zero. It would continue chasing after the opponent to attack!
If the monsters didn’t die, they could not obtain EXP. However, in the Chaotic Era, there was a troublesome setting. The person to deliver the final blow to the monster could obtain 50% of the EXP provided by this monster.
This had caused a lot of players in the early stage who liked to snatch monsters to be attacked by Venomancers, especially those that were poisoned and losing HP. Not only was it as easy as pie, but they could also fish up more EXP.
This fatal weakness could only be eliminated by a passive skill in the Venomancer’s Talent Skill Tree in the later stages. With every two levels they gained, they could obtain a talent point. This passive skill roughly required 15 talent skills to be activated. In other words, one would be around Level 30 when this weakness could be eliminated.
Fatty’s character was only at Level 1, so Level 30 was still far away. Hence, this weakness would probably be with him for a while.
After whining, Fatty returned to the female Apostle NPC in the middle of the square, where he had taken the novice quest. Upon seeing Fatty dressed presentably, that NPC finally nodded in satisfaction and said, “Very good. It looks like you are ready. In that case, set off now to kill the Poisonous Scorpions outside the Northern Gate. Then, bring back 10 Poisonous Scorpion Tails. Only after you complete this test will I guide you to proceed to the Coming of Age Sacrificial Ceremony!”
This was the first combat quest of the novice quest. Fatty turned and ran to the Northern Gate without saying anything.
The Demon City Ruins called Isengard was the spawn point of all the players of the Apostle Race, and the novice quests received were the same. Thus, many people had received this first combat quest. As a result, it was baffling to see a huge crowd at the spawn points of the Poisonous Scorpions outside the Northern Gate.
Fatty broke out in cold sweat as he watched. Just as he had expected, countless players waited at every spawn point of the Poisonous Scorpion. Once they saw the Poisonous Scorpion spawn, they took out their weapons right away. The tiny Poisonous Scorpions had just come out for two seconds when they were killed.
The best solution to such a situation was to party up to kill them, but when Fatty tried to find a partner, an unbelievable incident happened.
“A Venomancer? Sorry, we don’t want a Venomancer!”
“We’re sorry. We’re a guild party, so we already have a Venomancer. Sorry!”
“Friend, sorry. If you’re a Death Knight, we’ll add you in. However, a Venomancer’s output is too low. It’ll be hard to kill-steal!”
Yes, the players had found out about the Venomancer’s initial low-output skills. Maybe if there were fewer people on the spot and more monsters, it wouldn’t be a big deal to have a Venomancer in the party. However, with so many people looking covetously and trying to kill-steal at any time, a low-output Venomancer was not so popular…
Fatty scanned the venue and found out that there were indeed very few Venomancers. Even though there were some Venomancers, they were probably led by the guild members.
In a situation like this, the best way to go was to run a little farther, find a remote place that could respawn Poisonous Scorpions, and slowly kill them. Most people would choose this way when they encountered such a situation.
However, after being rejected by many parties, Fatty felt somewhat angry.
Hence, he made an absurd decision. He was going to kill-steal the monsters!
When others heard about this, they would probably think that this guy was crazy. He wanted to kill-steal the monsters from so many people alone?
Fatty was not insane, though. He was very aware of the situation. After observing the party distribution of the surrounding spawn points, he took two steps to the upper left and then settled at that point.
Two parties were waiting on the right-hand side of Fatty, one party on his left-hand side, and one party on the upper-left-hand side.
Instead of rushing to attack, Fatty first observed the respawn order of the monsters above the four points and calculated the instantaneous output damage of the four teams.
The level of the Poisonous Scorpion was Level 1 1-Star. This was the representation of the monster’s level in the Chaotic Era. It was roughly converted to about level two, and its HP was 80. The armor of the junior monsters was not high, so the players could inflict 100% damage.
Fatty had been standing in place for a while. Just as the surrounding players started to think this guy was a fool, he finally moved.
As soon as he raised his hand, a ball of dark green Miasma attack flew out of his staff and shot straight to the scorpion attacked by the party on the left!
That Poisonous Scorpion had been left with low HP from the attack of the party on the left-hand side. A player of that party had originally wanted to kill it. However, Fatty’s Miasma attack kill-stole the Poisonous Scorpion in front of them!
“-8!”
The damage counter rose and that Poisonous Scorpion turned over on the ground!
The team on the left froze for a moment, as they hadn’t expected someone to kill-steal from them and deliver the final blow. Half of the EXP of the Poisonous Scorpion had been given to someone just like that. That party of people looked up in anger at Fatty. To their dismay, he didn’t even care about them. He only raised his hand to deal with another Miasma that flew toward the Poisonous Scorpions that players were attacking on the rear left-hand side!
He kill-stole again with the final blow!
This time, the players of the two parties were a little stupefied. They had realized that this player, who looked a little fat, had been very precise with his two moves and had happened to deal the final blow to the Poisonous Scorpion in front of them.
The players of both parties didn’t utter a sound. Instead, they held their breath as they watched Fatty strike for the third time.
This time, he dealt the final blow of one of the two parties on the right side.
This way, Fatty had actually dealt the final blow on three Poisonous Scorpions in just six seconds and gotten half of the full EXP of a Poisonous Scorpion!
Upon looking at Fatty’s eyes, the players of the fourth party panicked. They knew that Fatty had his eyes on the Poisonous Scorpion they were killing. Once they saw the staff in Fatty’s hand move, they accelerated their attacks, wanting to kill the Poisonous Scorpion before Fatty did.
Unfortunately, the Poisonous Scorpion that this party had been attacking had been left with 60 HP. Even though five players were attacking it, they only managed to reduce the Poisonous Scorpion’s HP by 52!
When Fatty had raised his hand earlier, he hadn’t immediately executed his Miasma attack. He had paused for a while before shooting it out!
In just a short pause of 0.5 seconds, Fatty’s attack lagged behind that party’s players by a little and he dealt the final blow!
The players of the four parties gasped in unison and finally saw that Fatty had faked an action! He had known that the five players could not kill the Poisonous Scorpion. In order to prevent the attack cooldown caused by his first shot, he’d first lured the five players to attack before taking advantage of their attack cooldown time to deal the final blow!
Last-hitting! Damn, this was definitely last-hitting!