Boom!
Arthur’s fist collided with the orc leader’s blind spot, narrowly missing the cleaver that came sweeping toward him. The force of the impact made the orc stumble several steps backward. With 250 points in Strength, Arthur could deal around 1,250 damage with each successful hit. That meant he would need roughly 24 clean strikes to defeat it, but taking the orc’s external defense into account, he would probably need closer to 40 successful hits.
Fortunately, his speed was simply too overwhelming.
Bam!
Another hit landed squarely on the orc’s body.
"Roar!"
The orc leader let out an enraged roar. The other elite orcs immediately tried to rush toward Arthur, but the five skeletons blocked their path perfectly. None of them could get close enough to interfere with the battle.
"Heh heh! You can’t take any help either. I spent all that money on them for a reason."
Arthur smiled and continued his relentless assault. Although he was technically a mage, his Strength far surpassed that of most warriors at the same level. More importantly, he had been an assassin in his previous life, so close combat was actually one of his strongest areas.
The orc leader tried to dodge several of his attacks, but its efforts were futile. Arthur’s speed was simply too great, allowing him to constantly find openings and land one attack after another.
Five minutes later, the battle finally came to an end.
[Ding! You have gained 25 Platinum.]
The five skeletons had successfully killed the five elite orcs.
At almost the same moment, Arthur delivered his final blow to the orc leader.
[Ding! You have gained 25 Platinum.]
[Congratulations! You have cleared the Graveyard of Orc, Hard Mode, for the first time on the server. A serverwide announcement will be made.]
Arthur looked at the three glowing orbs floating before him. The dungeon had actually dropped three items.
Two of the orbs were gray, indicating Common Grade items, while the remaining orb was blue, indicating an Elite Grade item. Arthur reached out and touched each of them one after another.
[Ding! You have gained a low-quality Legendary Grade skill, Tornado Flame.]
[Ding! You have gained a low-grade Legendary Grade item, Lightning Wand.]
[Ding! You have gained a top-quality Legendary Grade item, Wind Boots.]
Arthur was a mage, so he could naturally equip the wand and learn mage skills. However, Necromancer belonged to the Dark Elemental group, meaning skills from other elemental groups would suffer a 60% reduction in effectiveness when used by him.
He needed Dark-type skills.
Besides, a player could only equip three skills at Level 10. He had no intention of wasting one of those precious slots on a skill that was heavily weakened by his class.
"I’ll sell the wand and the skill. But the boots are useful."
Arthur inspected the boots.
[Name: Wind Boots]
[Grade: Legendary]
[Function: Provides 100 Agility.]
With the additional 100 Agility, Arthur’s total Agility reached 350. His movement speed, reaction speed, and attack speed all increased to a terrifying level.
...
[Welcome to Blackstone Town.]
Jake opened his eyes and looked around.
"So this is the Genesis Realm, huh?"
He was slightly disappointed when he learned that he had been assigned to Blackstone Town rather than Azure Town. Darklord belonged to Azure Town, and Jake had been curious about meeting the player who had already attracted so much attention.
"Let’s see. How can I get to Azure Town first? I should ask the guild."
Besides that, he needed to reach Level 5. The government had provided him with 36 million dollars, and he needed to exchange that money into the currency of the Genesis Realm.
"But what were those absurd talents about?"
Jake narrowed his eyes as he remembered the 99 talents that had appeared before him when he was choosing his class.
"Ten billion for a single talent? What kind of robbery is that?"
He had also become curious about Darklord.
"I wonder if Darklord bought one of them. Ninety-nine is an unusual number."
Jake was an extremely intelligent officer. In his career, he had personally solved three terrorist cases that had left even experienced investigators struggling. That was why the general had trusted him with the government’s 36 million dollars.
Just as he was thinking about it, a system announcement suddenly echoed throughout the entire town.
[Serverwide Announcement: Congratulations to Player "Darklord" from Azure Town for clearing the Hard Mode of the Graveyard of the Orcs dungeon for the first time. He has gained 2 Reputation Points.]
Jake stopped mid-step.
"So this is what those gamers were talking about. This player is really operating on a completely different level."
His curiosity toward Darklord grew even stronger.
Soon, Jake arrived at the Adventurer’s Guild.
"Hello. I would like to exchange for 3,610 Gold."
The receptionist smiled politely.
"First, you need to register as an adventurer. After that, you can exchange your money."
Jake nodded and completed the registration. He chose the Assassin class because he preferred close combat and had confidence in his physical abilities.
"How can I travel to another town?"
"Once someone reaches Level 6, they can activate the teleportation array of the town. After that, players can teleport from one town to another once a week."
The receptionist handed him his adventurer card.
"Here is your card. 3,610 Gold Coins have been added to it. Don’t lose the card, or the treasures stored inside its slots will also be lost. You will need to pay another 50 Gold to register a new card."
"Thanks."
Jake left the guild with a determined expression. He wanted to reach Level 6 by himself without relying on the money he had brought from the real world.
He needed to earn 3,500 Gold, and killing monsters alone would not be efficient enough. He would have to form a team, search for treasures, and sell them for enough money to reach his goal.
"Let’s begin."
...
[Do you want to challenge Hell Mode?]
Arthur thought for a while.
Hell Mode contained a Royal Grade boss along with five Elite Grade bosses guarding it. The difficulty was on an entirely different level compared to Hard Mode.
"It would be tough without a weapon. Let’s sell the items first. That should allow me to reach Level 10."
Arthur looked at the three Legendary Grade items he had yet to exchange.
For a moment, he considered abusing his talent as an endless money-generating machine.
He could sell one item, receive 10,000 times the normal amount, then use that money to buy another item and repeat the process. If it worked, his wealth would grow exponentially.
However, the system immediately crushed that idea.
[Multiplied items cannot produce multiplied money, and multiplied money cannot buy multiplied items.]
Arthur’s expression stiffened.
That instantly brought him back to reality. His talent was absurdly powerful, but it was not powerful enough to manipulate the fundamental rules of the entire game.
He had simply been thinking too much.
"I can always sell the Epic Grade daggers. They should fetch around 5,000 Divine Gold each. But I’ll need them for my evolution trial, and I won’t be able to buy another Epic Grade item before Level 11."
He shook his head.
"That’s out of the question."
Arthur began calculating his resources and future expenses.
He needed 42,500 Divine Gold to reach Level 10. His skeletons required the same amount of Royal Gold each to reach the corresponding level, and he would have five more warriors by that point.
It was an enormous amount of money.
Moreover, he would need a huge amount of money to take his stats outside of the game.
"At least 60,000 to 70,000 Divine Gold for now."
Arthur frowned.
That amount was equivalent to roughly 12 to 13 Epic Grade items. That was equvalent to 30 billion dollars as his game money were already been multiplied and he couldn’t buy anymore royal items from the guild which would become epic grade.
"I’ll have to milk the government."
Arthur sighed.
Once he entered the city and gained enough means to get his hands on Epic Grade items, or perhaps even Mythical Grade items if he was lucky, this temporary money problem would disappear.
But for now, his situation was simply too tight.