"Are you a lunatic?" Said the team leader of the anonymous party mocking Cao Huang. "When we can't even clear the normal difficulty mode, you want us to try the hard mode?"
"Yes that's what I said." Cao Huang answered.
"No way. We aren't going to do that. The experience lost after death in hard mode is twice the amount lost in normal mode. Selecting hard mode is just suicide." Said the anonymous team leader harshly. "We don't even have enough potions for our team but it seems like you are just here to freeload. So you should just get out of here and stop wasting our time."
"I think he even lied to us about being level 5. He's just here to cause some trouble." whispered team member B.
Previously, Cao Huang had gone to join the party that was requesting for a Level 3 or above Assassin. When he told them he was Level 5, they welcomed him enthusiastically but Cao Huang's only request for joining their party was for them to challenge hard mode difficulty.
"If you are level 5 then why aren't you revealing your level? Or you were just bluffing to get your way in this team." Again mocked the team leader.
"Think whatever you want." Cao Huang turned and left towards the dungeon entrance alone, selected hard mode difficulty and entered the dungeon.
"He is going to die." said that team leader.
"No doubt about it." agreed the other player.
Cao Huang entered the dungeon and saw found that it was all hollow without a single monster in sight. There was many sharp rocks protruding out from the ground and walls.
"A mage who specializes in earth magic has more of an advantage here. He can take advantage of this rocky terrain and easily kill the spiders here." Cao Huang analyzed.
"These rocks can also give players cover from the spider's attacks. But in turn it can also trap large number of players making it extremely difficult to find their escape." added Vilariun.
"True."
Cao Huang started to walk deep inside the cavern and in a distance he saw a single spider infant. When the spider infant saw Cao Huang, it made a screeching noise and charged towards him.
[Spider Infant] (Normal Elite, Arachnid)
Level 5 (Night Effect)
HP 870/360 (Night Effect)
"What the fuck! How can this spider infant possess such a high number of health points?" Cao Huang asked in confusion.
"It's because of being the night time. At night every monster is twice powerful than it was during daytime and also this is the hard difficulty mode. That's why players usually go and hunt during daytime and set up stalls to sell their gains at night time." Explained Vilariun. "But where there lies disadvantage there is also an advantage of hunting at night. If a player is capable of hunting at night, the rewards that the monsters could drop also have a high chance of doubling."
"Seems reasonable. Let's go and hunt some monsters."
The spider infant had charged very close to Cao Huang in the time being. It used it's sharp legs to slice at Cao Huang. The attacks from the spider's fangs and legs also have a slight chance of causing bleeding effect so players possessing low defense usually avoid receiving a direct attack. But for Cao Huang who was wearing the Level 10 silver set equipment; the Solitary Ghost Set, this was not a problem. No level 5 monster can deal additional damage to Cao Huang when he had equipped this set.
Although Cao Huang wasn't using any movement skills, he could still effortlessly dodge the attacks even if the spider infant was an elite monster.
Cao Huang dodged the leg slice by jumping over the spider infant's body. Cao then proceeded to use his daggers to try and pierce the spider infant's head. The dagger's tip bounced back with a clanging sound, dealing a damage of - 43.
"What crappy daggers. It looks like I am the only one who's running around with a basic trash equipment at this point." Cao Huang cursed. I will definitely find myself a good weapon after completing this dungeon."
"Vilariun, can I use Force skill?" asked Cao Huang.
"Although you shouldn't use skills to hunt monsters if you want to get more fighting experience but force is different. When you get familiar with using force here in the game; you can also use Force in real life, so there shouldn't be any harm in using so. In fact, if you could master it then it will be extremely useful to you, in both game and real life. It would help you in becoming a great Martial Artist." Answered Vilariun.
Cao Huang didn't understood the thing about using force in real life but he still nodded his head as he had gained the answer he needed.
Cao Huang used Force to jump once again but this time he rolled in the air and used the torque he gained from rolling to once again stab the daggers in the spider infant's head. A large damage of - 99 appeared on top of the spider infant's head.
"That's more like it." Cao Huang said smiling.
"You should also try to train your [Eyes of Death]. It can help you to get familiar with the vital points of your opponents. Even if there is no such type of monster that exists in reality but if you can get familiar with the vital points of human body then it will be very helpful to you in the future." said Vilariun.
"But in order to use [Eyes of Death], I have to change my self to my second character. It would really tiresome if I have to change my character everytime I have to use a certain skill. I would have to double my efforts if I want to raise the level and skills of my both characters as well." Said Cao Huang.
"You don't have to worry about that. Open your character settings and enable exp share. This will automatically distribute the exp you gain from killing monsters and completing quests between your two characters. Also there is another option in your settings that will allow you to share a skill with your other character. Although you won't be able to use skills that require scythe or dark aura but the [Eyes of Death] being an eye skill, you should be able to share it with your present character."
"Before doing that I shall finish this one before me."
Under Cao Huang's repeated attacks, the Spider infant died after ten to fifteen seconds.
After that Cao Huang opened the settings window and enabled the newly appeared Exp share and skill share. In the skill share menu he saw that the only skills he can share are the [Eyes of Death] and [Rapid Acceleration]. Cao Huang shared both of there skills.
He started to head even deeper inside the cavern and after a while of walking, he saw a group of Spider Infant's consisting a about seven to eight of them. Cao Huang used [Silent Steps] to get within 20 yards range of the Spider infant and used the [Eyes Of Death] to see their vital points. As the skill duration is ten seconds, Cao Huang had to memorize their Vital Points within this duration. The Spider infants had three weak points: Their under bellies, the joints of their legs and of course their eyes.
Cao Huang picked up a stone from the ground and threw it towards the wall. The stone flew through the air and struck the wall making a feeble sound. When the nearest Spider infant heard the noise, it walked forward to inspect the source of it.
As it neared, Cao Huang leapt from his hidden spot and used dagger + [Force] to slice the dagger towards it leg joint. The dagger struck the vital point and cleanly sliced thorough it. Spider infant unable to keep it's balance, fell down. It stood up again and rushed towards Cao Huang but clearly their was a visible difference between it's precious speed and current speed.
"It worked!" Cao Huang exclaimed happily.
Cao Huang didn't give it any chance to attack and quickly finished it off. He then confidently rushed towards the remaining eight Spider infants at once. Cao Huang quickly arrived before the nearest one and stabbed it's eyes. A damage of -187 appears on top of it's head. Striking an opponent at it's vital points have a high chance of delivering a critical hit. Next Cao Huang delivered a kick at it's joint.
Crack!
The clear breaking sound signified the breaking of its joint and the Spider infant flew towards the Cavern wall.
Bang!
The spider infant struck the wall and fell upside down. Cao Huang wanted to pierce it's under belly but the remaining Spider infants started to attack him. Cao Huang dodged seven of their sharp leg strikes but was stabbed in his shoulder by the remaining one. He only received a damage of - 11 and their wasn't even the slightest nick on his Solitary Ghost Armor.
"This armor is so cool. No wonder it is one of the best silver set equipment under level 10. With this I don't have to fear anything within this Level 5 dungeon. With that, now let's aim for the fastest clear."
Cao Huang picked up pace and within another two minutes killed the entire group. The group of Spider Infant dropped 9 Lesser Spider Silk, 9 Venomous Spider Fangs and 3 poison sacs.
"Vilariun, what about that fear status? Why didn't I receive that?" asked Cao Huang.
"The Spider infants use screech when their health drops below 10% but since who have a high Attack Power, you were able to kill them before they could use it." explained Vilariun. "Your title effect reduces the opponent's defense by 20% and that coupled with your vital strikes, help you to deal so much damage."