Kill the BOSS?
At this, Ye Weiming's interest was piqued, he immediately asked, "Are you referring to Chen Ming, the leader of the West Lake bandits?"
The task of exterminating Chen Ming, the West Lake bandit leader, was also listed on the "Detective Bureau"'s task list. It was a 4-star difficulty task. The description of the task didn't clarify whether Chen Ming was a BOSS or an elite creature. It only mentioned that he was very elusive. Even his lair was unknown. The local government couldn't handle him.
Ye Weiming had planned to undertake this task. But then, You Jin recommended him a 5-star task from the Dragon Gate Escort Bureau, a task which also penalized failure remarkably.
To avoid potential distractions, he decided to abandon this relatively common task.
When he entered the underground palace and found it teeming with West Lake bandits, Ye Weiming guessed it might be Chen Ming's lair. This woman mentioning fighting a BOSS pretty much confirmed his suspicion.
The Scarred Woman seemed surprised and asked, "Aren't you here for him?"
When asked about his purpose in coming here, Ye Weiming simply gave a mysterious smile, neither confirming nor denying.
The Scarred Woman caught on quickly, "I see. I was presumptuous. How about we team up?"
"We can work together." Ye Weiming thought for a moment, and then added, "But you might have to wait for me to accept a task first."
"No need for that, let's team up first and I'll share the task with you." The Scarfed Woman's straightforward style didn't falter as she sent a team invite to Ye Weiming without further discussion.
Ding! The player "Yuyi" has invited you to team up.
Looking at "Yuyi", her name seemed as elegant as her, which was quite a contrast to her bold demeanor. After Ye Weiming accepted the invitation, he casually asked, "Isn't this a Sect mission you accepted? Can you even share that?"
"No, it's not!" Yuyi answered with straightforward honesty, "Since we're already planning to kill this BOSS, we might as well take up all the related tasks - including the government's bounty tasks."
Everyone could accept the government's bounty tasks but it was limited to tasks below five stars. Tasks like the Escort Services of Dragon Gate could not be claimed by players from other factions, unless, of course, they belonged to factions such as Wudang and Shaolin that are inherently tied to the task.
Elimination of West Lake's Water Bandits.
Task Level: Four Stars
A great number of water bandits are active around West Lake in Hangzhou, plundering traders. Their leader, Chen Ming, is a ruthless villain with secretive movements. The local government lacks the manpower to deal with this situation so extermination or capture of Chen Ming is sought.
Reward for task: 4000 experience points, 400 cultivation, and 5 gold.
The shared task was essentially the same as what Ye Weiming had seen in the Detective Bureau. He glanced at how the loot was divided in the team, surprisingly it was set to 'leader distribution'.
Hehe...
Such a loss wasn't Ye Weiming's style at all but before he could raise an objection, another system prompt popped up.
Ding! The player "Yuyi" has transferred leadership to you, you are now the team leader.
What the hell, this woman is so straightforward!
It seems she actually only wants the mission item?
After Ye Weiming took over as team leader, he adjusted the loot distribution method to equal distribution: "Since we're going to do the task, we might as well do it thoroughly. Let's hunt down every bandit in every corridor one by one until we're finished, and then deal with the BOSS."
At Ye Weiming's words, Yuyi gave a nonchalant smile, "Are you planning to level up here? Suit yourself, I don't mind."
"Not just that!" Yuyi was certainly boisterous, but Ye Weiming saw no need for secrecy either, "I've noticed a pattern in task rewards when comparing my previous tasks. Besides the fixed rewards, a lot of them seem to have a hidden efficiency grade. Considering the name of this task is 'Elimination of West Lake's Water Bandits', I premise that if we get rid of all the bandits here, the reward will be much higher than just killing a single BOSS."
Ye Weiming's statement wasn't an idle boast.
Take the task of killing the enemy called Choubah, for example. The normal way to accomplish the task would be to catch Choubah and distract him. After a while, You Jin would naturally arrive to assist. But by doing it this way, not only would they miss out on the BOSS's loot, but also the task reward would be limited to what was mentioned at the outset. With the method they used, killing Choubah, the benefit gained was more than twice that of completing it in the conventional manner.
In fact, Ye Weiming had begun to notice this pattern since his time in Novice Village. The local blacksmith in the village asked players to help collect ten pieces of chicken meat for his pregnant wife's health. At that time, the village was crowded with players. As soon as a chicken of the lowest level appeared, it would be torn apart by nearby players within two seconds. Other players were eager to hand in the task as soon as they gathered enough chicken meat. They would then retrieve a fine steel sword and joyfully go to work on higher-level tasks or battle a more advanced monster.
Only Ye Weiming persisted in killing chickens until he had collected ten pieces of meat dropped by female chickens, only then did he hand in the task. As a result, he received a better-quality hundred-refined sword and an additional task from the blacksmith: to deliver a message to Dou Xiaobai. And then... he became a disciple of the Detective Bureau.
Ye Weiming even speculated that such hidden settings in the game were an indirect way to tell immigrants that the rewards for jobs taken seriously, and those done just for the heck of it, are often different.
Yuyi wasn't as thorough as Ye Weiming in her thinking, she didn't even bother asking for details. Once Ye Weiming suggested clearing out the bandits, she immediately prepared her crossbow.
As they moved forward and turned a corner, they found seven West Lake bandits entrenched in the corridor. Seeing them from a distance, Ye Weiming couldn't wait to use his special active skill, Dai Zong.
His left hand manipulated as if calculating, Dai Zong's active skill, activated!
555×13=
Upon activating his special skill, Ye Weiming was presented with a math problem.
What's happening?
To activate Dai Zong's active effect, do you first need to solve this math problem?
What kind of bizarre special skill is this!?
Despite this, as Dai Zong's active skill was activated, one of the West Lake bandits angrily yelled and charged towards him, battle-axe held high.
Fortunately, Ye Weiming wasn't alone in this fight. Yuyi fired a crossbow arrow at their target from the side, inflicting 56 hit points of damage.
However, although her attack hit successfully, it didn't switch the bandit's hatred from Ye Weiming to her. The bandit, with bloodshot eyes, continued its onslaught.
"Swoosh! Swoosh! Swoosh!"
Seeing her pull of aggro unsuccessful, Yuyi decided to go for a burst of rapid-fire, wiping out more than half of the bandit's life bar.
Meanwhile, Ye Weiming was still engaged in stressful calculations.
Seeing this, Yuyi stepped forward to meet him, avoiding his mighty axe, trapping his wrist, kicking his groin, and executing a shoulder throw. After knocking him down, she immediately pinned him and aimed the hand crossbow at his forehead.
Finally, Ye Weiming calculated the answer to the math problem.
7215!
However, immediately after, another math problem appeared before his eyes.
111×15=
???
Isn't this endless?
Ye Weiming reluctantly continued his calculations. At this time, Yuyi again pulled the trigger.
"Plop! Plop! Plop!"
After another volley, while Ye Weiming was still doing the calculations, he received a system prompt that the target was already dead, and Dai Zong's active effect activation failed!