A faint, bloody hue surrounded the Dragonbone Spear. Hair dancing to the wind and feet hovering slightly above the ground, Xinran beamed at me while saying, “I have brought you a quest, big brother!”
I immediately looked around in a hurry. “Ahem. You brought me a quest? That’s wonderful! Keep it down though. I don’t want to give the players of the Northern Alliance the opportunity to complain that you are cheating for me…”
Still beaming like the spring breeze blowing across a blue lake, Xinran replied, “You worry too much, big brother. Sophie and I have known each other for a long time, and now she’s looking to me to help her. You are acquainted with both me and her, so it’s perfectly natural for me to seek your help.”
“Mn. So, what is this quest about?”
“We need you to escort a batch of supplies. Fly with me to the Violet Empire, will you?”
“Sure!”
……
Xinran pushed off the air a little and shot straight to the sky like a loosed arrow. I hurriedly activated Flight and chased after her. Thanks to the Ancient Divine Dragon, I was just barely able to keep up with Xinran. Of course, if Xinran flew at her max speed, then I still wouldn’t be able to keep up with her.
Less than five minutes later, we landed on a forest clearing. Three gigantic supply carts were parked on the clearing, and at first I thought them to be blood-colored tortoises due to how they looked. They were at least ten meters long in radius, and they moved on countless wheels. The animals dragging the supply carts weren’t mules, but the fearsome Savage Giant Beasts. Each of the beasts had four heads, and each head was bound by some sort of a steel collar that also doubled as their armor. Finally, each beast was commanded by a tamer wielding an iron whip.
Whatever they were transporting must be incredibly important. They wouldn’t have gone through so much trouble otherwise.
I saw Queen Sophia, Xue Wei and several hundred Violet Empire Undead Cavalrymen in front of the three supply carts. In fact, Karinshan, Ziyan and more Sky City NPCs were standing by at the edge of the forest as well.
……
“Queen Sophia, are you sure you don’t want our Griffin Legion to escort your Bright Arms for you?” Karinshan asked with a bright smile on her face, “It had taken you two months to prepare these supplies, right? It will be a huge loss to the Violet Empire if they were to raided by some robbers or undead!”
Sophia shook her head firmly. “Thank you for your concern, but we have already hired a powerful adventurer to escort them. Moreover, I have prepared a troop of elite cavalrymen too.”
“Very well. That is very reassuring to hear.”
Xinran and I had already descended to the ground while they were talking. Sophia immediately walked up to me after speaking with Karinshan. “I know your strength, young warrior. You are the only one I can trust to complete this quest successfully!”
I nodded. “Please speak, princess[1]!”
Sophia smiled at me before pointing at the three supply carts. “These supply carts contain a great number of Bright Arms. The Bright Arms are weapons that can deal soul damage to the undead. That is why I would like to transport these armaments to Purple Grape City, bolster Lady Sophie’s undead legion, and increase our fighting strength against Lin Na. However, the road there is destined to be crawling with thieves and robbers, which is why I would like to employ you to guard them. Do you accept?”
I slapped my chest without hesitation and declared, “No problem. Just leave it to me!”
“Good!”
Ding!
System Notice: You have accepted the quest [Violet Empire Supply Escort]! (Current Quest Rank: SSS+)
Description: Escort these three supply carts through Dragonbone Mountain Range and arrive at the eastern border. Then, pass through the ruins of Ice River Canton before delivering them to Purple Grape City for an extraordinarily generous reward. However, be warned that the quest is extremely difficult, and that you will encounter many thieves who will do everything in their power to steal from you along the way. Feel free to bring not more than 9 companions with you on this journey to ensure the completion of the quest. Be warned that failure to complete this quest will result in an extremely harsh punishment. Your level will be decreased by 5, and your Luck by 10!
……
My heart skipped a beat when I read the final line of the description. “Ahem. I’m sorry, but isn’t the punishment for failure a bit too harsh?”
Xue Wei laughed. “Of course not! These supplies are extremely important to us!”
I suggested, “Perhaps Queen Sophia would like to join me on the mission? Preferably with her personal guards?”
“Her Majesty has an even greater responsibility to fulfill, namely watching over the Violet Empire…”
“Then I want Xinran to come with me…”
Xinran said reluctantly, “You were the one who said I can’t help you too much, big brother. Also, the system chief god[2] will warn me if I try to help you. I will be literally struck by the lightning of heaven…”
“Ah?”
I placed a reassuring hand on Xinran’s shoulder and said, “Never mind then. I’ll ask my brothers to assist me!”
Xinran giggled. “You mean brother Li Chengfeng and the others?”
“Yep!”
“Do your best, big brother. I’ll be gathering energy in the ruins of Heaven Domain!”
“Yes…”
……
After that, I turned on the guild channel and asked, “So, I have a triple-S super quest here that I can’t handle myself. Eve, Chengfeng, Little Gui, Beiming, Lian Xin and sis, are you guys free? Also, Guanyue, Moon Dew and Lu Buyi, what are you guys doing right now? If you can’t go then say it right now!”
Li Chengfeng replied, “I’m fairly sure everyone will free up some time one way or another.”
I asked in confusion, “Huh? Why’s that?”
Beiming Xue replied, “It’s because a player who meets the requirement to ascend has a very low chance to ascend if they complete an SSS Rank quest. Don’t you know about this, big bro? It’s why SSS Rank quests are super hot right now…”
“Damn, I had no idea. In that case, come to the eastern gate of Violet Empire. I’ll be waiting for you here. I don’t need to say this, but prepare yourself fully before you come over.”
“Right away!”
……
And so, I stood alone at the forest clearing while waiting for the others to come to me.
A few minutes later, I felt a sudden chill in the wind. My Domain was telling me that a faint but definitely present killing intent was emanating from the forest. I could tell that someone was going to attack me!
Swhoosh!
Suddenly, a deep blue-colored figure rushed toward me at high speed. The next moment, a sword brimming with incredible power broke through the trees and flew straight toward my chest! What impressive power, what incredible speed!
I crossed the Xuanyuan Sword in front of myself just in time to knock my opponent’s blade out of the way. Then, I raised my leg and attempted to kick them in the stomach. However, the mysterious attacker was faster than I expected, and they managed to punch me in the boots and sent me staggering a couple of steps away from them. I hadn’t even caught a glimpse of their face up until this point. Their deep cyan cloak whipped back and forth in front of me as they performed a zigzag and arrived on my flank. Then, they spread open their fingers, clenched them again and punched out with so much force that space itself had cracked like a spider web! Icicles manifested from pure divine energy flew straight toward me!
A divine player!?
My heart skipped a beat, but I counterattacked without a single pause in my movement. First, I smashed my opponent’s fist aside with the Dihai Shield. Then, I leaped into the air and kneed them right in the chest!
“Damn, it hurts!” shouted my attacker as he did a backflip. Then, he kicked out at me from an unusual angle.
Still in midair, I met his kick with a punch!
Bang!
The resulting shockwave from the clash between two divine energies caused the surrounding trees to be knocked down like dominos. Both of us dug deep gorges on the ground after we were propelled away from each other and landed on our feet.
……
Chiang!
I sheathed the Xuanyuan Sword and smiled at my attacker. “Your power and speed have finally reached super-tier, Chengfeng!”
The attacker was none other than Li Chengfeng. He shot me a lazy smile and shrugged. “Super-tier my ass, you managed to hit me an extra time before I could react, and my strength didn’t affect you too much either. Also, that knee of yours froze me in place for at least tenth of a second. It was terrible…”
I laugh once before adding Li Chengfeng to my party and sharing my quest with him.
Li Chengfeng grew more and more astonished as he read the quest description. “Holy shit, it really is an SSS+ Rank quest. How long has it been since we performed such a difficult quest? Also, what the fuck is this punishment, man? Is it too late to withdraw now?”
“Yeah, no. Success or failure, you’re with me on this until the very end!”
“No, I don’t wanna! Thank goodness I won’t be the only one who suffers if we do fail this quest. I can’t wait to see Little Gui, guild leader Eve and everyone else’s faces when they see this…”
I grinned. “Quit complaining already. This quest is an excellent opportunity for all of us. Little Gui, Beiming and Lian Xin have already met the requirement. Assuming that we succeed, this SSS+ Rank quest may trigger one or even multiple ascensions at the same time. Five levels is nothing compared to that!”
“True. Speaking of the others, what the hell is keeping them? So slow…”
“You don’t say! You can fly, but they have to ride over on their mounts!”
“Haha, that’s true. Little Gui’s legs are pretty short…”
“He has a dragon, bro…”
“…”
……
Despite Li Chengfeng’s joking complaint, it didn’t take long for the rest of the gang to arrive. After I added everyone into the party and shared my quest with them, I gave the party leader for Lu Buyi so that he could buff all of our stats by 225%. Purple Dragon was the main reason I decided to add him to the party. Otherwise, I would probably have brought Chaos Moon instead.
After Pure Love buffed me with her Seven-string Yaoqin, and I used a Hunter Card to buff my stats further, my total HP nearly gave myself a heart attack. My base HP was 2.95 million, and it was increased by 200% by the Hunter Card, 225% by Purple Dragon, and 240% by the Seven-string Yaoqin for a total of 665%. Add that to the base 100%, and my HP was 7.65x its base, or 22.56 million max HP in total. I was probably the player with the highest HP in all the servers right now.
Lian Xin stared at the party screen with wide eyes. “Wow. Who was the guy who said that cavalrymen could never exceed 20 million HP again? Big brother Lu Chen has over 22 million HP right now. What do you have to say for yourself?”
Li Chengfeng rubbed his nose in embarrassment. “Come on, he’s clearly the exception to the rule. Just look at the equipment he’s wearing…”
Pure Love asked worriedly, “We can’t possibly fail this quest… right? What kind of enemies will we face along the way?”
I shook my head. “Who knows? We’ll meet them eventually!”
“Yeah.”
1. T/N: don’t ask me why he calls her princess when she hasn’t been one for ages. She’s not even Princess Karinshan ☜
2. T/N: can make it just The System I suppose, but then people won’t know that it’s a chief god ☜
