Translator: Atlas Studios Editor: Atlas Studios
Blood Bandit was a hidden job that only existed in the Dark Shrine. The requirement was that the player must be originally a Bandit and complete a set of challenging and troublesome Job-Changing Missions! Not only that, each main shrine could only hold 100 Blood Bandits while the sub-branches could only hold 10. In order to change job successfully, they needed to kill another Blood Bandit NPC or player!
Dark Blood Bandits had high burst damage! They did not need to farm monsters to level up. All they needed to do was to slaughter their opponents. After the job-change, they would acquire an item called ‘Mysterious Sword’. It was known as the ‘Man-Slaughtering Sword’. Each time an enemy was killed, a stackable buff increased the user’s Attack and Damage Received by 1%! The buff reset upon death.
Just like Berserkers, Dark Blood Bandits would have higher damage when their health points were low. The difference was that Dark Blood Bandits depended on the Max HP. A 100 HP Dark Blood Bandit would have 5 times more damage output compared to a 1,000 HP one! Killing opponents in an instant was the trait mark of this job.
The three Bandits were the top players in Midolhaar as each of them had their weapons stacked to 500 times! They were specialized in hunting Guild of Light players in Midolhaar. They would stack their buff and sell the dropped equipment. When the buff from Mysterious Sword was stacked to 10,000, the players would be promoted to Dark Shrine Advance Believer, and their ranking would increase 10 times.
“You… killed them?” The Hunter looked at the bodies on the ground and said in disbelief.
Lin Jie looked at his own health bar. There was barely any red color left in it. Lin Jie felt very lucky. If he had not learned the Enchanted Scaly Armor to increase his defense, or there was no Bone Membrane Armor that increased his Dark-Resist and immunity to corrosion or the Dark Venomous Belt dropped from Eighteen Massacres, he would be the only corpse lying on the ground right now! He didn’t expect that those three Bandits were Dark Blood Bandits!
“Can’t you tell?” Lin Jie threw a look at the Hunter and took out a loaf of bread to recover his health points.
The Hunter smiled and sat down, waiting for his teammates to resurrect. The team consisted of five people, two Hunters, two Bandits, and a Druid. They were all suitable for PK in the field. In Midolhaar, Mages and Priests were useless! Only those with excellent individual combat capability could survive.
Lin Jie looked at the system prompt message without showing any expression.
—”You have killed three enemy targets. You have received 45,000 EXP and 27 Merit Points.”
That was really a good farm! Other than the EXP, the Merit Points were one of the hardest things to get in the game. It would directly affect one’s authority to lead the army! Take the Blood Swamp mission for an example. A mission with such a high difficulty only granted 100 Merit Points. It proved that the three Bandits were really valuable.
After a few minutes, the Hunter’s teammates respawned.
The team leader was a Druid named “Orcc”. He looked at Lin Jie and tried to correspond the look with the strong players in Midolhaar. He did not recall seeing Lin Jie before.
Lin Jie did not wear the Lone Wolf Helmet as “Codename Lone Wolf” was far more famous compared to “Fu Sheng”. If Codename Lone Wolf was to appear here in Midolhaar, a large number of players would probably join Dark Shrine and hunt him down.
“Hi, thank you for saving us from being killed by those Bandits over and over again,” Orcc smiled and said.
Lin Jie raised his eyebrows and asked, “These three appeared often?”
“They are like the local despots in Midolhaar! Their damage was unreasonably high. A Cold Blood Ambush could deal up to 5K damage. By the way, how did you survive the attacks? Do you have any special tricks? Please teach me!”
“What kind of questions are those?”
The Druid leader stopped the Hunter before he could ask more questions.
Lin Jie was surprised by the kind of questions asked by the Hunter too. However, since he was willing to sacrifice his life just now, Lin Jie decided to forgive him.
“It’s okay. I’m just here for a mission. Do you know the coordinates of Blood Swamp?”
“Blood Swamp? You are here for the Blood Swamp mission too?” Orcc was delighted. “We are on the Blood Swamp mission too! We already know the coordinates. How about we party up first and go there together?”
Lin Jie thought for a moment and did not answer the question. He said, “Before that, there’s something else I need to do. I haven’t looted these three Dark Blood Bandits yet.”
“Oh yeah, that’s right! I thought I could never see them die! LOL.”
“We died once too and dropped a level. I dropped Gold equipment too… he’s going to get the loot alone?”
The team was whispering, and Orcc shouted angrily, “What’s wrong with that? He killed the Bandits on his own, and we have no share in the loot. Bro, go ahead.”
Lin Jie smiled and picked up the drops. There were plenty of drops from the three Dark Blood Bandits. Each had dropped a stack of Superior Health Potion and other food and medicine for recovery. Drop-rate after death was much higher here in Midolhaar, and that was the beauty of the war.
Luck was the foundation of wealth! Killing people to get rich was much faster than killing monsters.
The Hunter took a peek and asked in surprise, “They did not drop a single item? Lucky them.”
Lin Jie smirked and explored the remains of the Dark Blood Bandits with both hands. He grabbed the chest plate and then the necklace. Finally, he put his hand on the face and tore off the Bandit’s scarf.
“What…?!” Orcc was stunned. How could the equipment be forcefully removed from the remains? Didn’t that mean one could get all the equipment after killing someone?
Lin Jie smiled and said, “Dark Blood Bandits have a rare passive skill called ‘Death Feign’, which can reduce the EXP loss after death by 30%, and equipment will not drop from the remains actively. So if you are not careful, they will pick the equipment back when they respawn.”
“I see, I see… Learn something new every day,” Orcc replied with respect. “What is a Dark Blood Bandit?”
The Hunter chuckled and said, “Shhhh! Don’t ask too many questions.”
“You…” Orcc was so angry at his stupid teammate.
Lin Jie explained about the Dark Blood Bandits, it was no secret anyway. Although he had just met them, the team leader did not look like a bad guy. However, Lin Jie could not tell for sure. As for the Hunter, he was either too straightforward or stupid.
As for the scarf…
[Massacre Scarf] (Gold)
Requires: Level 25
Defense: -100
Health Points: -550
Receive an additional 50% damage.
Additional effect: Attack Power increase by 200
Additional effect: Attack Power increase by 20%
This kind of equipment was only used by the Dark Blood Bandits! Their Defense had long been negative, and their health points were extremely low. As for the negative effects such as ‘taking extra damage’ were nothing to them. They only needed one hit to be killed, so it did not matter how much extra damage they took!
However, the Attack Power increase was very tempting.
“Okay, let’s go. There will be many Undead on the way. It will take us some time.” Orcc rushed everyone, and Lin Jie joined the party. The six of them continued their journey.
The two Hunters placed a trap every step they took. Snake Trap, Hunter’s Trap, Explosive Trap, Freeze Trap—the entire road was like a minefield. Battles often broke out in Midolhaar, and the battle setting was such that “all participants can get rewarded”. Thus, Survival Hunters could get many rewards through traps without them even realizing it.
Orcc the Druid used Natural’s Breath, and his nose was enlarged to tell if there were any Bandits around. The two Bandits went into Stealth and patrolled around the team.
‘A team with decent game sense. If not for the Dark Blood Bandits, this team could easily survive in Midolhaar.’ Lin Jie came to this conclusion. Following a team like this was not that bad.
Along the way, they met a lot of scattered Undead monsters, and all of them were Rare Elites. But they stood no chance against the team, especially Lin Jie’s Broken Blade dealt an incredible amount of damage. The teammates were all in awe.
Gradually, the blood fog around Lin Jie grew heavier, and he made a new discovery. His resistance to Darkness had increased by 1%! Bone Membrane Armor could absorb the blood fog! Although the defense had gone up, it was far less effective than killing the Undead, but it was better than nothing.
‘It saves a lot of trouble to move forward with the team, but I cannot farm to my heart’s content. After reaching Blood Swamp, it’s better to solo. Otherwise, the blessings of the Holy Light and the Bone Membrane Armor will be wasted. There are many gangsters in Midolhaar that I wish to avoid.’ Lin Jie was secretly planning in his head.
Suddenly, the team stopped.
“Here we are!” Orcc said. The blood fog was so thick that one could literally see the droplets in front of them! Roars that sounded both like humans and beasts came from the inside.
“It’s the sound of the Flesh Beast!” Orcc turned around and looked at Lin Jie. He smiled and said, “We tried to kill the Flesh Beast many times but failed. We are counting on you this time.”
Lin Jie’s mouth twitched a little, and he changed the topic. “Blood Swamp, it’s creepy indeed.”
“Of course. It is an advanced map, just like the Kingdom of Destruction and Blood and Meat Furnace. There are 5 Flesh Beasts in Blood Swamp. Each of them is a level 45 Gold Boss. They will become Dark Gold Boss if they evolve! The reward is very good.” Orcc smiled. “But we are not good enough to kill them. Come on, bro, join us, and I will show you how strong my team is.”
Lin Jie turned down the offer. “I’m just here to collect some specimens. We’ll part here.”
Since he had already found the map, Lin Jie had no reason to stay in the team. He would be much better off if he farmed alone. He did not need to hold back either.
“Oh? Never mind then. See you around.” Orcc stopped persuading and waved goodbye.
However, when he turned around, a cold glint flashed past his eyes.
