MMORPG: The Elementalist

Inside a booth in Champion’s Restaurant, Subjugator and gang were excited to receive Qin Ruo’s voice message. They had been tired of waiting for Qin Ruo to return from the Graveyard.

“Damn, is the trip that exhausting?’

Once he saw his worn-out face, Black Rock widened his eyes and forgot to ask about the details of Qin Ruo’s quest for a moment. He mumbled, “We asked you to collect points, don’t tell me you went to mine coal instead. Why the sickly look?”

The others were shocked by Qin Ruo’s terrible appearance too. They shared the same opinion as Black Rock when they saw Qin Ruo lay tiredly on the armchair. His dark circles were visible under the cape. “You do look a lot like a coal miner who’s been working excessively for consecutive days. What happened to you?”

He was speechless.

Qin Ruo did not have the strength to argue with them and could only roll his eyes at the heartless bunch. He ignored their sarcasm and gulped several drinks down continuously to rehydrate. Anyway, he was somehow reluctant to share his true feelings, especially in front of Snowleaf. When he entered the Graveyard to farm for the first time, he was too excited to care about the exhaustion as he was fascinated by the lucrative wares available in the Lost Merchant’s store.

This time was different. He no longer desired anything since his vault was full of loot, so he could clearly feel the torture of being continuously drained by the Bloodthirsty Tree. ‘F*ck, this task is a pain. It’s like being in an S&M scene where I’m tightened up by the tree monster for more than 10 hours.’

The torture was especially obvious when he was so mentally exhausted and could only manage a short half an hour rest when he had a meal offline.

“Ahem, don’t get me started.”

In the end, Qin Ruo chose not to share with them the suffering he experienced in the Graveyard. He sent them a party-forming request and placed the stuff he had exchanged with the Lost Merchant into the party’s Sharing Column. He spoke hastily, “Haih, I’m done for good. I really need a rest. You guys take a look and see if the redeemed items are to your liking. If not, each of you can just take 40 Great Tree Saps from me directly.”

As soon as he finished talking, Subjugator and Black Rock exclaimed at the same time, “Damn!”

“Qin Ruo, did you take out your reserve from the bank vault as well?”

“Yeah, how did you manage to exchange so many items?”

Judge, Fateless, and Snowleaf were equally shocked by the variety of things put forth in the Sharing Column…

The bottles of Great Tree Sap alone numbered 160 pieces.

Next to those bottles lay a handful of Gold equipment. They all belonged to the Ignis Swordmaster Class, and all of their attributes contained Fire Damage…

“F*ck, this is one whole set here! Hahaha! I love you so much Brother Qin Ruo. You’ve managed to fulfill my request, bravo!” Subjugator was overjoyed when he noticed the attributes of the equipment set. After he took over the items, he kept his gaze fixed upon them as he examined them repeatedly.

Qin Ruo stared at him and explained, “I collected the whole set from three different merchants. Each cost 400 to 700 points, which adds up to a total of 4,200 points. There was a Dark Gold set too, but I felt that it was too expensive. It was priced at 8,000 points, so I passed.”

“Haha! This is better!” Subjugator answered with a wide grin. Four thousand and two hundred points for a whole set of Gold equipment was more practical and cost-efficient than the cost of a set of Dark Gold equipment.

“Qin Ruo, how many points did you farm on Level 1? These Great Tree Saps alone are 8,000 points, right?” Judge asked curiously after he requested 40 Great Tree Saps.

“Eighteen thousand,” Qin Ruo replied while he approved Judge and Fateless’ requests for the saps. At the same time, he also handed over more than ten colorful Enchantment Gemstones in the column to Snowleaf.

The Sharing Column was now half empty after eighty Great Tree Saps, more than ten Enchantment Gemstones, and five Ignis Swordmaster Equipment were retrieved by the four players aside from Black Rock.

The items left in the column for the stunned Black Rock to choose from were another eighty bottles of sap, three Pet Eggs, and a Gold necklace.

Black Rock scanned the three Pet Eggs and was troubled by how little information (only their names and general attributes) was relayed to him.

The first was a Three-tailed Terratoise, the second was an Auxilliary Defense-type Darksteel Snowsnail, and the third was a Combat Shadow-type, Two-headed Poisonscorp.

“Well… which one cost the most points?”

“They’re the same. All were redeemed with 1,000 points.” Qin Ruo reflected the ball thrown by Black Rock back to him.

Black Rock was a little bewildered. “A thousand points? So cheap?”

Black Rock instinctively made a comparison between a Boss Sealed Mana Core and a Pet Egg. The conclusion he came to was, the cost of the three-hour use of an Amethyst Orc was two times the cost of a Pet that would persist for the rest of his player’s life. ‘This is indeed cheap, but does it necessarily mean that it’s a good bargain?’

Qin Ruo shrugged and said nothing. He had foreseen that the items he picked would not satisfy everyone. “Why don’t you take the Great Tree Sap? I redeemed the necklace for you too. It cost 500 points. It increases your Intelligence by 10 and grants a maximum of 200 HP.”

“The necklace is fine, but I’ll skip the Great Tree Sap.” Black Rock decided to pick the Two-headed Poisonscorp in the end. “Wish me luck.”

After he kept the Pet Egg and necklace, Black Rock suddenly thought of something. He raised his eyes to meet Qin Ruo’s and asked, “Oh yeah, this doesn’t add up. What else did you exchange for with the extra points?”

“Only one Boss Sealed Mana Core was left among the three Lost Merchants, and now, it’s mine.” Qin Ruo took out the Mana Core, swung it in front of them and said, “I used 2,600 points for this. Black Rock and Snowleaf, yours aren’t up to 2,000 so you two can take another ten Great Tree Saps as compensation.”

“Tsk! You c*nt, keeping all the good things to yourself, eh. Hehe, thanks for the saps.”

“Me too. I’ll take it is as a pre-celebration to your upcoming advancement to Tier 5.”

Qin Ruo laughed and put the remaining stuff back into his pack. He then deposited those items into the Bank through the restaurant service counter.

That was when…

***

The Solar Eclipse Event has now officially ended; the Graveyard of the Gods will be closed immediately!

The thundering system notification immediately sounded across the entire Mythical Continent.

Right then, the radiance of Warp Portals beamed unceasingly across millions of towns.

After a series of disappointed exclamations, players still inside the Graveyard of the Gods were forcefully dragged out of the godforsaken place by the dimensional rifts, which appeared in front of them. They were instantly sent back to the Mythical Continent.

***

Amid numerous sighing voices, the sensational Graveyard of the Gods event finally came to an end under the witness of hundreds of millions of players.

Turning his head, Judge who seldom talked, met Qin Ruo’s tired and sleepy eyes. “The Graveyard of the Gods is now officially closed. What’s your next plan?”

“Plan?”

“Train our Pets and aim for Tier 5, what else?!” Black Rock shouted their common goal without delay.

Subjugator shrugged and interjected, “Of course we’re all aiming for Tier 5. I have a suggestion, why don’t all of you join Tyranny Clan. That way, we can form a party and train together in the future. How about we form a party that specializes in farming loot from monsters?”

There was silence.

Judge, Fateless, Black Rock, as well as Qin Ruo and Snowleaf looked upward and observed the beautiful ceiling at the same time.

Those present, with the exception of Subjugator, were used to playing solo. First of all, they did not have the intention to join a Clan just yet. Even if they did, it would not be Tyranny Clan. They had never heard of the Clan, and Subjugator was not even the leader of Tyranny. So naturally, nobody would entertain the idea of becoming a subordinate for some unknown Champion.

“Well…” Subjugator stretched his hands out, seeing that nobody responded to his invitation. “Please ignore my suggestion then. Let’s add each other as friends. In the future, if anyone needs help, we can always call each other.” He accepted his fate. A mere Field Commander had little influence over these prideful solo players.

Despite rejecting his Clan invitation, the others were more than willing to approve his friend request.

“Oh yeah, Qin Ruo…”

Fateless sincerely suggested to Qin Ruo after they accepted each other’s friend requests, “Your Shadowfox is nothing short of special. Before you tackle Tier 5, I suggest you train Poochie’s level up to Tier 4 first. Of course, Tier 5 will be even better. In addition, you should change your Equipment too. After this event, high-tier pets will no longer be a privilege to the minority like before. Your advantage against those Field Commanders from big Clan will soon evaporate.”

Fateless knew that after the event, those players from Netherspirit’s Claw would most probably start to turn on Qin Ruo—Dark Dragon was famous for his unforgiving nature among the Tier 5 Supreme Champions.

On the fifth level of the Graveyard of the Gods, Qin Ruo was able to avoid conflict with Netherspirit’s Claw largely thanks to his guardian Amethyst Orc and the secret protection provided by the Bauhinia Clan. But after the event, Netherspirit’s Claw members would no longer stay put and allow Qin Ruo to run wild. Those who were offended by Qin Ruo previously would take revenge on him beyond measure with Dark Dragon’s “blessing”.

Therefore, a full set of Dark Gold Equipment could at least fend off a majority of these troublemakers.

“He’s right. You should treat yourself better. You’re considered rich now with so many rare pieces of equipment in your possession. Legendary Equipment may be too glamorous for you at this level, but you’re certainly more than capable of putting up with a whole set of Dark Gold Aquamancer Equipment.”

Qin Ruo nodded. Actually, he had long planned to replace his equipment when he was in the Graveyard. He was determined to prevent the disaster in Killer Bee Valley from happening ever again.

In the meantime, he would train hard and aim to reach Level 49 at full throttle! He wished to fuse with Divinity in the shortest time possible.

They chatted for a while longer in Champion’s Restaurant, and Qin Ruo finally yielded to his sleepiness. He went offline and removed the helmet before he fell directly onto his bed, fast asleep.