Chapter 3: Efficiency

Chapter 3: Efficiency

Chapter 3

Ying Long cleared the "Homesickness" quest at the fastest possible speed.

The first thing she completed was finding the cuckoo. NPCs and items needed time to respawn, and for search quests like this, the earlier you started looking, the greater the advantage. Later, you would only be left waiting bitterly. Although she did not remember the quest's exact procedure, as long as she held down the right mouse button and rotated the camera, she could see the birds in the sky. Ninety-nine percent of the birds currently flying around were cuckoos.

The beginner quest would not contain anything particularly difficult. By standing at the entrance of the Post Station and observing for a while, she could see a cuckoo fly toward the east and disappear into a household.

To enter the house, she had to speak with the little child at the entrance and buy her a candied hawthorn skewer. This taught players how to purchase things from NPCs. After handing it to her, she could enter the house, select the cuckoo perched on the branch, and hit it with one skill.

Pick up the cuckoo, then turn around and do the first quest.

Ying Long selected the villagers. Their level was 15, while the players were only around level 11 or 12. Every few seconds, there would be an "Aah—" followed by a character model collapsing to the ground.

Corpses were scattered everywhere. It was truly miserable, and this was precisely what the real struggle over water sources had looked like in ancient times.

Many, many people died, and the hatred between them grew deeper and deeper.

If a player attacked the villagers of Upper River Village, they would gain two reputation values: "Upper River Village Hostility" and "Lower River Village Friendship." If they attacked Lower River Village, the opposite would happen. The levels of hostility and friendship determined the range of activities available to the player in the two areas.

The hostile side would become red names, while the friendly side would become green names.

Red-name characters would actively attack players. Green-name characters would not, and players could not attack them either. There was also yellow, which meant neutral. They would not actively attack players, but if you attacked them, they would fight back and become red-name.

Ying Long had not attacked any of the villagers, so all the villagers within her field of vision were yellow and neutral.

She went around the villagers. Instead of following the map's directions like the other players—similar search quests provided a small map marked with gathering locations—she instead walked to an unoccupied area downstream and jumped directly into the water.

The character's stamina began to decrease.

This brought up the character's three values.

Ying Long's panel was as follows:

[School of Medicine] Apothecary Exquisite — Lv. 17

Health: 160

Internal Energy: 80

Stamina: 30

Health was the life value, displayed as a red health bar. When it reached zero, the character died. Internal energy was the blue bar and was consumed when techniques were used. Stamina affected the character's speed. When it fell to zero, the character would become exhausted, unable to move or use techniques.

If a player had run all the way here, their stamina would have decreased by at least half. Apothecary Exquisite had ridden Little Donkey here, so hers was completely full.

But after she jumped into the water, her stamina began dropping little by little.

29, 18, 7... When it dropped to 5, she held down the space bar, making the character rise to the surface for air and recover one or two points.

Then she continued swimming underwater.

After repeating this twice, she reached the point indicated on the map and saw the clear spring at the bottom of the river.

She selected it and successfully collected the water.

Then she returned the way she had come.

This did waste some time, but without gaining hostility or friendship, she would not trigger the side quests involving the two villages, allowing her to skip a great deal of the story.

Finally, she went to the forest outside the city to find the medicinal herb.

This was where Little Donkey's superiority became apparent. Other people had to huff and puff as they ran on foot, and once their stamina reached zero, they had to sit on the ground and rest for a while. Little Donkey simply clip-clopped its way to the edge of the forest without needing to stop.

A huge group of players was grinding little snakes at the entrance. They were all descendants of the giant python, dropping snake skins and snake gallbladders that could be sold to NPCs for copper coins, after which players could obtain a map from the snake catcher.

Ying Long was high level. She killed the little snakes with a few slashes and quickly ran to the snake catcher's location. There was already an extremely long line there, with densely packed character models blocking the NPC completely.

In Nine Provinces, characters could not overlap when the non-filtered mode was active. She opened the system settings and completely hid the masses of players. Only then could she successfully select the character and trigger the dialogue.

After a series of hard labor tasks in the backyard—chopping firewood, fetching water, gathering vines, repairing the roof, and so on—Ying Long finally obtained the relevant coordinates from the snake catcher. But she did not hurry to leave. She first sold the miscellaneous items she had obtained from killing the little snakes, then bought a wrist guard from the snake catcher's wife.

It was also a white-quality piece of equipment, but it had one characteristic—30% resistance to snake venom.

The reason there was such a reward was because the giant python was designed as an open-world boss with extraordinary power. However, the snake catcher would not tell you directly. Players had to learn things through conversations with NPCs. For example, the snake catcher's mother would say, "The old lady's work isn't finished yet. You are not allowed to enter the mountains tomorrow." This would reveal that his wife had always been weaving equipment, and players had to try speaking with her to trigger the event.

Ying Long did not remember the giant python's mechanics, but even after ten years, she still remembered the agony of dying over and over again back then.

After putting on the wrist guard, she controlled Apothecary Exquisite as she entered the mountain forest and crouched in the grass, patiently observing.

Some players came over to fight the monster immediately. At this moment, quite a few characters surrounded the red-name giant python. One player named [Iron Horse Autumn Wind], a disciple of the School of War, carried a battered great saber and tried to kill the boss, but was basically chased around by the monster. If he was careless for even a moment, half his health would disappear.

Seven or eight characters nearby circled around the python and continuously attacked, but the python's aggro target remained [Iron Horse Autumn Wind].

Hmm, so little damage, yet such stable aggro. It seemed to remain fixed on the first player who attacked.

Then there was no need to compete for it. She would watch first.

[Current] Iron Horse Autumn Wind: Is there a healer? Heal me, heal me!

[Current] Iron Horse Autumn Wind: Damn!

He died, his corpse collapsing into a pool of blood.

The giant python's locked target became a Mohist disciple named [Since We're Here]. He released a trap and immediately turned to run. The python's movements slowed slightly, but it pursued relentlessly. Three seconds later, one bite sent him to his death.

Then it began attacking another unlucky person.

[Current] Cloud Garment Misses You: The aggro is random. None of us can withstand two hits. Let's form a group to fight it.

She was a disciple of the School of Yin-Yang, holding a compass in her hand. After chanting, an iron chain rose from the ground and briefly trapped the python. But she was only level 13. The python broke free of the control with two sweeps of its tail and lunged at the nearest scholar.

The scholar was flattened.

A distant memory surfaced in Ying Long's mind.

Yes, that was right. The giant python, the nightmare of beginner players. No matter how they tried to fight it one-on-one, it was extremely difficult to defeat. Players had to cooperate in a team before they could kill the first boss of their Nine Provinces careers.

—But there was no time to think too much.

Because of the scholar's positioning, the python's attack range encompassed Apothecary Exquisite's position.

It locked onto the level-17 female doctor. A casting bar appeared beside the portrait on the right, meaning the boss was charging up to use a technique.

Ying Long reacted extremely quickly. She pressed the keyboard, making Apothecary Exquisite jog two steps diagonally forward, dodging the bloody maw. She then used the School of Medicine's lightness skill.

Spirit Flight Step: A lightness technique. Increases Body Technique, adds 10% evasion, and increases movement speed by 20% for 60 seconds.

The female doctor's speed suddenly became much faster.

Then she rapidly pressed the skill keys and unleashed a series of offensive techniques.

Pluck Flower Sever Meridians: Uses internal energy to shock the enemy's heart and lungs, causing a small amount of damage while reducing the enemy's defense.

Drowsing Smoke: Poison powder with area damage that makes enemies drowsy and slows their movements. Requires a poison sac to use.

Leaf Burst Body: Releases internal energy outward, breaking through the enemy's defenses and causing a large amount of health loss.

Players who had not yet graduated from their sect only had the 10 qualification points accumulated during the beginner tutorial. They could only learn the first two low-level techniques from the four manuals, meaning eight techniques in total. They also only had 30 sect reputation points. Although low-level skills did not require much reputation, they still could not learn everything and had to make choices.

The four manuals studied by disciples of the School of Medicine were:

The Plain Questions Classic, primarily for healing, including healing methods such as stopping bleeding and acupuncture.

The Spiritual Pivot Classic, primarily for offense, including weapon attacks such as Pluck Flower and Leaf Burst.

The Difficulties of Poison Classic, primarily for offense, including the use of various poisons such as Drowsing Smoke.

The Seven Emotions Classic, primarily for internal techniques, including support skills such as Spirit Flight Step.

For her character, Ying Long selected Spirit Flight Step, Pluck Flower, Leaf Burst, Drowsing Smoke, and Stop Bleeding. Stop Bleeding did not have a weapon restriction. Although it provided little healing, its cooldown was short. Acupuncture provided more healing, but had a longer cooldown and required a [Needle-type] weapon to use.

Not counting her lightness technique, she only had three offensive skills she could actually use. She could not perform combos. Every time she attacked the monster, she had to start moving, relying on agile positioning to avoid damage while waiting for her skills to come off cooldown.

Fortunately, Ying Long's level was not much lower than the boss's. She had also activated the movement technique to increase her Body Technique and evade some of the damage, while the wrist guard resisted snake venom, leaving her with much more health than the other players.

And her Intelligence was high, so her techniques dealt high damage. Pluck Flower lowered defense, Drowsing Smoke slowed the target, and Leaf Burst increased damage. The three skills connected in an orderly sequence, steadily grinding away nearly half of the boss's health.

[Current] Cloud Garment Misses You: Watch out for its berserk phase.

Ying Long smiled.

This was clearly a veteran player. She knew that many bosses in games had similar mechanics: once their health dropped to a certain value, they would go berserk and unleash a powerful attack. If players were not careful, they could easily be killed.

[Current] Apothecary Exquisite: ^_^

She used one Stop Bleeding, taking advantage of the School of Medicine's most basic single-target healing skill to begin restoring her own health.

After healing twice, she had just reached 89% when the giant python unleashed a frenzied tail sweep.

Not only did her health drop by 50%, but it was also an area-of-effect skill. The players nearby who had been secretly casting skills or watching the spectacle were all unfortunately swept up in it and died together.

Ying Long did not rush to heal. Timing it with the duration of Spirit Flight Step, she activated the permanent status again and continued grinding away at the boss, calculating the cooldown of Stop Bleeding and healing herself back up to 70%.

The giant python did not go berserk again. For a beginner boss, one berserk phase was enough. Any more would simply be screwing over the players.

Its health bar continued to fall and fall. Then, unwillingly, it let out a howl and collapsed.

Glowing blades of grass appeared on the ground.

She clicked to pick them up. Sure enough, the medicinal herb required for the quest was there, along with bonus snake gallbladder, snake skin, and fangs.

She calmly summoned Little Donkey, preparing to leave.

The interface suddenly filled with carrier pigeons.

Someone had sent her messages.

[Iron Horse Autumn Wind] has requested to add you as a friend.

[Cloud Garment Misses You] has requested to add you as a friend.

[That Bystander] has requested to add you as a friend.

...

There were also people speaking in the current channel.

[Current] Iron Horse Autumn Wind: Healer, please help me fight it.

[Current] Iron Horse Autumn Wind: I'll pay.

[Current] Apothecary Exquisite: ^_^ I'll turn in my quest first.

Ying Long controlled the female doctor back to Beauty of Xi City to turn in the quest.

After she handed the three items to the senior sister, she said:

[Senior Sister]: "I didn't expect that at such a young age, your martial arts would already be quite impressive. I underestimated you. From now on, no matter how vast the martial world is, there will be a place for you in it."

The senior sister waved her hand grandly. The experience bar surged, sect qualifications increased by 5, reputation increased by 10, and she also gave her a hat that increased defense.

Ying Long equipped it, immediately clicked level up, and, with three side quests and one main quest, shot all the way up to level 20.7.

In Nine Provinces, reaching level 20 meant a player had just emerged from obscurity, leaving the protection of the beginner stage. They could enter dungeons, conduct business, learn life skills, and... kill people.

After that, the experience required for each level became more outrageous than the last. Dreaming of gaining twenty levels in a few hours was simply wishful thinking.

In game terms, the martial world had begun.

The grievances and conflicts of the martial world, along with the struggles of the imperial court, would follow.

A carrier pigeon also appeared.

It was very strange—a black pigeon.

Player messages used white pigeons, while system messages used blue pigeons. As for whether black pigeons had existed before, Ying Long genuinely could not remember.

She clicked it, and a letter appeared on the screen.