Ye Kong kept the small flask and turned to run toward a specific place...
However, just as he turned around, he and all the other players heard an announcement—
System Announcement: Congratulations to "Player—rosegardencat" for being the first player to complete a "Basic Grade" Story Event. The player has received a system reward.
System Announcement: Congratulations to "Player—rosegardencat" for being the first player to reach Level One. The player has received a system reward.
"rosegardencat..."
Ye Kong was momentarily stunned, but he quickly regained his composure. "The Moon Palace Guild Leader—rosegardencat. As I expected, everything's happening the same way it did in my past life. rosegardencat discovered the fastest story event to complete, received the system's reward, and became the first level one player!"
Every region had a rewards system, which incentivised players and guilds to complete "Region First" records and achievements. In addition to receiving a reward from the system, the player's name would be broadcast throughout the entire region. For players and guilds, this was a great honor!
To explain further, the rewards system and leaderboard of each of the sixteen regions were independent of one another. This meant that the first player to reach level one in the Yggdmillennia Server would be a different player from the one to reach level one in another region.
Of course, only the rewards systems and leaderboards were kept separate between regions. Players across the world still had free passage (the ability to physically move between regions), so all the regions still belonged to a single geographical overworld. "Demon Realm" had the only server capable of synchronizing all the players in the same world, at the same time, without limiting the players to a specific region.
"If my memory serves me well..."
Ye Kong looked to the east with an inscrutable gaze. "I suppose the other large guilds have already started their operations?"
As he said this, a flood of system announcements instantly poured in, as though counteracting rosegardencat's deeds. One after another popped up like mushrooms after a rainfall.
System Announcement: Congratulations to "Player—blackwingtenjin" for being the first player to complete ten regular quests. The player has received a system reward. (Regular quests were different from story events, and should not be confused with each other. Each regular quest could be completed in a few minutes).
System Announcement: Congratulations to Players—silent, starbringer, endlesskilling, and backtothewall for achieving the first kill of an Enhanced Grade Mob. The players have received a system reward.
System Announcement: Congratulations to Player—coldwind for achieving the first kill of a player from another faction. The player has received a system reward.
Ye Kong stopped in his tracks. His brows tightly furrowed as he stared at the last announcement—
"coldwind...
"Guild Leader, it's been a while."
coldwind was the guild leader of the Ethereal Mirage Guild!
In the real world, coldwind was a well-known financial magnate. With his strong financial backing, his progress in the game was extremely rapid. Coupled with his innate talent for games, he was a force to be reckoned with!
In Ye Kong's past life, coldwind had conquered the entire Lunar Empire and the Gorse Federation, along with large swathes of their principalities. These lands accounted for nearly half the area of Yggdmillennia, and like a world leader, coldwind had absolute authority over this region. Of course, this was thanks in no small part to Ye Kong's efforts.
"In this life, I'm not going to let you all take advantage of me..."
"In this life, I'll personally destroy the dynasty you create!"
Ye Kong suppressed his burning rage. There were still important things that needed to be done.
"Looks like I need to hurry up."
With the support of their guild members, the guild leaders from each of the large guilds in Yggdmillennia were completing various achievements and first kill records, and receiving the system rewards. If Ye Kong didn't make full use of his time, he'd fall even further behind the other guild leaders!
Ultimately, Ye Kong didn't have the backing of a guild, and because he was using "D" grade equipment in real life, the amount of time he could spend in virtual reality each day was already far less than the amount of time the others could spend in virtual reality (the guild leaders of the large guilds were all backed by financial groups, and had the highest grade game cabins).
The highest grade game cabins allowed players to enter the virtual reality for 16 hours a day (including nine hours of sleep). This was more than double the seven hours of virtual reality time Ye Kong's game helmet allowed!
He didn't have a large number of men under his command, or the best environment for gaming...
Ye Kong's only advantage was his extensive experience in the game!
The six long years he'd spent on his gaming career had brought him an understanding of the game that the players of this time wouldn't even be able to fathom!
Even the players who were in the earliest First Test couldn't match his game knowledge.
Whoosh!
Ye Kong rushed toward a small alley, the same one alphabetkun had headed down earlier.
At this juncture, where every second mattered, he chose to head for the small alley instead of out of town (and toward the Dark Mist Forest).
At the same time...
Some of the other players were also making their way into the small alley.
Dexterity-type classes had an advantage when it came to speed, which was why Ye Kong, alphabetkun, and other players like them were the fastest runners out of all the players. The players who had selected other classes had only just caught up, and they too had chosen to go down the small alley that alphabetkun had gone down.
"Hurry, the Yokai Legion Guild members are already one step ahead of us," a male player, whose game ID was bigcat, said urgently. "We can't afford to fall behind any further!"
By his side, a cute-looking young female player asked curiously, "Brother cat, where exactly are we going? By the spring we passed, wasn't there an old guy with a quest notification over his head? Why aren't we going to accept his quest?"
The young girl's game ID was strollingkitty, and she seemed very lively.
"We can't accept his quest!" bigcat answered unhesitatingly. "That priest gives a fetch quest, and we don't have enough time to finish it. In three quarters of an hour, the large-scale 'Stygian Night Invasion' event will start! It's an important story event that will affect the the entire area of Yggdmillennia!
"Before that story event occurs," he continued, "we need to hurry and finish Hudgens' mail delivery quest!"
Hudgens' mail delivery quest was a regular quest alpha testers called "Mail Delivery." However, this quest was different from regular quests—if a player completed it, they would gain five points of reputation with the Horticultural Church!
It was a quest that awarded reputation!
Reputation quests were few and far between, and in the early parts of the game, "Mail Delivery" was the only quest in the whole of Qingmu town that gave reputation as a reward. Moreover, reputation with the Horticultural Church was extremely useful, because it related to the "Stygian Night Invasion" story event!
"If we let the Yokai Legion Guild finish the mail delivery quest first, the Hegemony Guild will fall a step behind!" bigcat said. bigcat was a core member of the Hegemony Guild, and also a closed beta tester. His objective was the same as alphabetkun's. Both were aiming for Hudgen's mail delivery quest.
"Brother cat, why are we doing 'Mail Delivery' again?"
strollingkitty's expression went blank, but in a silly, endearing way. Like bigcat, she was also a member of the Hegemony Guild. However, she wasn't a closed beta player, so naturally, she had no insight into the contents of the game.
strollingkitty was cute-looking, and even though her looks couldn't compete with Ye Bai's peerless beauty, she was a beauty in her own right. Her charms could definitely have an effect on the male players.
This could be seen in the way bigcat was acting. Even though bigcat was anxious to complete the quest, he earnestly explained the reason for the quest to her while they ran. "The reason is this. In the 'Stygian Night Invasion' story event, Qingmu Town is one of many invasion points—in the Eastern Plains outside the town, many spatial rifts will suddenly appear. The large Stygian Army will swarm through these, crossing into our region and raiding Qingmu City.
"When this happens, all the players here will receive a 'Survival Quest.' The quest requires players to try to survive the onslaught of the Stygian Army for five minutes. If a player successfully completes the quest, they'll receive a large amount of experience points as a reward.
"But, a select group of players will receive an 'SOS Quest' instead of the normal 'Survival Quest'!
"The requirements of the SOS quest are as follows: players must set off immediately by using the Qingmu Town Teleporter (for this event quest, the use of the Teleporter is free), and head for the Northern Fortress, Terrance City, to seek aid from the Winter Commander, Thors!
"The rewards from the SOS quest are far superior to that of the survival quest normal players get. And, by completing the SOS quest, players can get into Thors' good books, which will lay the foundation for future story events at the Fortress!"
bigcat continued patiently explaining the details to his companion. "The mail delivery quest awards five points of reputation (with the Horticultural Church), and is the only reputation quest in the early parts of the game. As far as I'm aware, when Qingmu Town chooses which players to send for the 'SOS Quest,' the criteria is the players' 'Reputation'—players with the highest reputation will be automatically assigned the 'SOS Quest'!"
"Oh, I get it now," strollingkitty exclaimed, putting all the pieces together. "So that means if we finish Hudgens' mail delivery quest before the 'Stygian Night Invasion,' we become the players with the highest reputation. Then, we can automatically receive the 'SOS Quest'!"
"Correct!"
bigcat nodded and said, "We should hurry to where Hudgens is. He should be at the end of this small alley... Oh, that's right! Whatever you do, don't interact with the old beggar at the entrance to the alley!"
"Why not?" strollingkitty asked. She didn't understand.
At this time, they were close to the small alley, and bigcat hastily pulled her close and warned, "That old beggar there is an enemy in disguise. Later on, he attempts to assassinate the Horticultural Priest, Pulitzer, and they both end up dying in the process!"
"What?!"
strollingkitty was frightened when she heard this, and she immediately tried to put some distance between the old beggar and herself as she rushed into the alleyway with bigcat.
However, they still managed to draw the attention of the old beggar. The old beggar was covered in scraps of patched-up clothes, and he tapped the broken alms bowl he held in his hands. "Do a good deed. Give me some water to drink..."
When strollingkitty saw the sad state the beggar was in, she felt pity for him. "Is that old beggar really an assassin?"
"Of course he's an assassin. Don't be fooled by him," bigcat said, shaking his head. "He's good at scamming people in trades. That old beggar requests players to give him liquid materials. During the closed beta test, a player tried giving the old beggar the infused tears from a newt (a liquid material worth one Silver). But in the end, the old beggar only gave him five Copper for it!
"Back then, our Hegemony Guild also tried trading with him, and we reached the conclusion that no matter what you gave the old beggar, you'd get cheated. The returns he offered were around a 1:20 ratio compared to the market rate. If you gave him something worth 20 Copper, you'd get back one Copper."
There were three kinds of coins in "Demon Realm"—Gold, Silver, and Copper. These constituted the game's currency system. The exchange rate between the coins was 1:100. That is, one Gold was equivalent to 100 Silver, and one Silver was equivalent to 100 Copper.
In the early stages of the game, even one Copper was fairly valuable, since players only started out with five Copper. A full stack (100 pieces) of Blue Wolf Fur (dropped by Blue Wolves), which had the highest drop rate of all the items in the Eastern Plains, would only sell for one Copper in the NPC shops. Even when trading it with other players, the going rate was a measly two Copper.
This showed how terrible the old beggar's black-hearted nature was.
"His rate's that bad?" strollingkitty stuck out her tongue. She was about to turn away, when she suddenly paused, shocked.
"Brother cat, look behind us, quickly!"
"What is it this time?" bigcat was getting a little impatient. They had to hurry to finish the quest and couldn't afford to waste any more time. Even so, he still turned around to see what attracted kitty's attention.
The very next moment, bigcat also stood frozen in place, dumbfounded.
A handsome-looking young man with fair skin and black hair was making a beeline for the old beggar.
"Do a good deed. Give me some water to drink..." The old beggar continued repeating these same lines, while the players around him avoided him like the plague, afraid of falling into his clutches.
The black-haired youth, however, actively approached the beggar. He stepped close to him and asked with a smile, "Old mister, you need some 'water'?"
As he said this, the black-haired youth took out a small flask and held it in front of the old beggar.
The liquid in the small flask reflected a dreamy luster in the sunlight...
It was the Quest Item, Small Blessed Flask!