At first, it was as if the Players who were forming groups two or three to search and capture the hill-folk were playing whack-a-mole. However, they were all caught off guard when Kaven Mor led a whole village and ambushed them.
Aside from several not well-known second-rate Player groups who were team-wiped, even Marni himself accidentally fell to their trap. After he was stripped naked, he was stabbed dozens of times to death and eventually revived at the Sky Horizon without wearing a thing. There was even a photo of his tragedy posted on the Player forums, offering a cheer and was kept on top of all posts by everyone.
Still, for better or worse, the Players were still in the middle of an event. Aside from making fools of themselves if the hill-folk legion that had appeared out of nowhere managed to find the Sky Horizon, it would be a real shame if they lost their shot at the hidden-class promised to them!
As such, to avoid the worst from happening, the Players quickly gathered at the Crookes refugee camp as they usually did whenever there was an event.
“Right now, the gap between the strongest and weakest hill-folk is confirmed to be very large.”
And as always, Edward was the first to speak. “Although there aren’t old, women or children with them, the lowest level of hill-folk is level ten. And the one confirmed to be the highest level amongst them is the Hill Shaman, who is level 46 and suspected to have a Chosen One module!”
“Doesn’t that mean that he is very noob?” Joe couldn’t help exclaiming in delight. After all, the first-rate Players now averaged around Level 50. After learning their powerful colored skills, a Boss who was merely Level 46 would not be a threat to them.
Even if the Chosen One was invincible, they simply had stronger Rule Resistance. With their advantage in level, the first-rate Players who were rich with combat experience could wear them down anyway.
“The problem is that he has over three thousand hill-folk serving him, with no lack of Level 40 elites.” Edward added then.
In fact, three thousand monsters were not too many for the Players with their current level. It was the same even if they faced a superboss
—thanks to their undying bodies, they would eventually clear them away after a few tries.
The problem, however, was that their objective was not wiping out every hill-folk, but to protect the Sky Horizon.
If the Players’ main force was somehow kept occupied while their opponents used some unknown method to uncover and leap up to the Sky Horizon, it would be the Players’ defeat!
“That said, there’s no use in overthinking. Right now, it is better if we go face them directly.”
Marni Wilf shook his head. “In fact, it was better to say that the current situation is good. According to what I know, there are three major hill-folk tribes near Valla, but only one Hill Shaman was with the ambush force. That means only one of the tribes has come out, and we definitely have the chance to destroy one tribe after another!”
“That’s true…” Edward thought that it made sense after some thought.
Instead of debating it, directly removing the threat was clearly the better choice.
Hence, he called for a Roundtable vote to take Sky Horizon higher into the air. Then, with the new added dice-rolling function, he stationed a group Players who use long-range attacks to stay behind while he led the other Players to attack the hill-folk like an oncoming storm!
People cannot be generalized-as the old saying goes: when enemies come face to face, their eyes blaze with hatred, Marni was so furious now that he could instakill anything, though not to the level of punching through a fifty-meter thick steel plate.
With his short sword in-hand, he slid beneath one of the hill-folk who undressed him before while cutting the man in two. While his victim screamed that his stomach was falling out, he rose to his feet and cut off his head, more or less exacting terrible vengeance for himself.
Still, he was soon struck by a sacred art unleashed by Kaven Mor, the Hill Shaman who was waiting nearby.
The divine art that was shaped like a rock ball pierced Marni through the chest, and with such profound devastation that it continued flying over dozens of meters after tearing through Marni. In the end, it crashed resoundingly, forming a crater up to six meters wide, catching hill-folk and Player alike by surprise and killing them.
When Gou Dan saw it, he was about to shout ‘Marni is dead again’, ‘you bastards’, ‘still, we got this in the bag’ as usual when he found Marni’s body turning into a blur, just before it became solid again.
That naturally left Gou Dan doing a double-take.
“How did you come back to life?” He asked Marni.
“It’s the power of runes,” Marni answered proudly. “Someone who studied runes for some time had discovered that the Tiga rune is very special. It has a Lumenize function that keeps the user immune to physical damage for 1 second after using it!”
“Doesn’t that mean you’re Invincible?!” Gou Dan exclaimed in surprised.
“How could it be that simple? This gimmick needs anticipation and some charging. First, you would need an item equipped with the Tiga Rune, and then you would have to chant ‘Simmer the bones into broth’ in front of the God of Games’ statue five times. Moreover, it can only be used once after each charge… it’s so troublesome.”
“You actually have so much time to study that, Mister Marni…” Gou Dan murmured, at a loss for words.
Although there’s no telling what simmering bones had to do lumenizing, Gou Dan at least knew that he wouldn’t have the patience to do such a thing. It seemed that he would have to give that nice gimmick a miss.
“Hey now. I’m a businessman, earning hundred thousand coins with every passing second-why in the name of Valla would I make the time to do that?” Marni retorted cheekily. “I simply asked newbie Players who don’t have much money to help me. I pay them a thousand game coins for each item charged, and now with five items charged on my body, it means I’m safe from five lethal blows!”
Gou Dan throw Marni a look that say ‘So that’s the power of money, as expected of
you!’
But in the next split second, every Player received a System notification.
(Ding]
(Player System updated to V3.1]
[-Bug fix for Tiga runes. Players now have to charge the runes personally)
[-Change for class skill: Lumenize. No adjustments against damage or effects now, but it looks cooooooler now.]
(Happy playing!]
Marni gaped at the notification.
Due to the incredible shock, he did not even realize that a hill-folk had blindsided him, punching him into the dirt. If Gou Dan hadn’t helped, he might have been stripped naked and beaten to death once again.
Even as he dropped to the ground, he was still thinking: The God of Games has it out for me!
***
To tell the truth, Xi Wei wasn’t having it out against Marni.
Still, leaving that bug alone would make the Tiga Rune wildly popular. Though it was a good thing for the Players and it did increase the Players’ ability as a collective, it was a headache for Xi Wei because he didn’t have the Authority of Light.
That was why a power like lumenize was very costly to his divine power…
Therefore, to save divine power, as well as adjusting for the rune system which he had wastefully implemented and left a hidden glitch, Xi Wei had to issue the System patch.
