As the number of players in The Other Shore continued to surge, and the number of Newbie Villages didn't increase, the issue of scarce monsters and too many players wasn't going to resolve anytime soon. A slightly good monster spawn that refreshed quickly would almost constantly involve PKs fighting for the monsters, which greatly impact the leveling efficiency.
The Rotten Tree Spirit's active area was not too far from the Newbie Village, just a ten-minute walk away. Rotten Tree Spirits were distributed about ten meters apart. It's not that nobody had considered killing them, but even hunting in a team was extremely inefficient, as the consumption of Blood-Supplementing pills during the leveling process alone required a large expense.
Ye Rongfan's leveling process could be described as comfortable, and he even considered attracting four or five Rotten Tree Spirits together to kill them all at once. However, due to his lack of an AoE (Area of Effect) attack, this approach wouldn't increase his leveling efficiency, so he decided against it.
When his stomach started to growl with hunger, Ye Rong logged out of the game. He had already reached more than half the experience bar to level 8, and it wouldn't take long to reach level 9.
After quickly settling his lunch, Ye Rong logged back into the game and opened the level rankings.
"Damn! Damn! Damn! This person must be using some sort of cheat, they are already level 14 after just one morning!"
Ye Rong almost shed tears of frustration. Just a moment ago, he had been feeling smug about his leveling speed, but now he could only express astonishment.
The experience needed to go from level 13 to 14 was much more than that from level 7 to 8, so it was impossible for a player with average leveling speed like Ye Rong to keep up with this leveling pace.
Such leveling speed could only mean that the player had either continuously received Immortal Mansion Keys and gained experience rewards through the Immortal Cave Mansion, or it meant that they completed extremely complicated chain missions.
If it was the former, it would mean that the person had the support of a large guild behind them, otherwise obtaining consecutive Immortal Mansion Keys would be inexplicable. If it was the latter, it would show that the player was a highly experienced super-player from the closed beta, and they had received task clues from the game company for their high achievements or discovering major bugs.
During the closed beta, there were at least several hundred rewards handed out by the game company. Most of them were task initiation clues or the origins of flying sword magic treasures, which wouldn't affect the game balance during the initial stages.
However, in the hands of super-players with rich experience, having just a clue could make difficult chain missions easier for them.
Reaching level 14 at a rocket-like speed could only be for these few reasons.
Aside from this person, the second-ranked player was only at level 12, with the top 10 players all at level 11. Compared to them, Ye Rong's leveling speed was not worth mentioning.
"Kill! Kill! Kill!"
Stimulated by this, Ye Rong did not get discouraged but instead became determined. He saw every Rotten Tree Spirit that crossed his line of sight as an experience point.
Apart from remote attacks with fire spells and Aquarius spells, he simply stood his ground and bombarded monsters with fireballs, waiting for the Rotten Tree Spirits to slowly approach him. Withstanding their attacks, he pulled out the Peach-tree Sword and fiercely slashed away, causing their bodies to crack and turn into ashes.
By doing this, Ye Rong gave up some of his life value to improve his Monster Killing efficiency by nearly one-third.
Moreover, the lost life value would restore slowly during the next round of attacks, without even requiring a Blood-Supplementing pill.
Without any meditation or practicing techniques, the initial player's life-recovery speed was very slow. However, Ye Rong's Crescent Collar allowed him to recover life points automatically, albeit slowly, at a rate of one life point every ten seconds.
Ye Rong continued to massacre the Rotten Tree Spirits, slowly moving into the denser area of their distribution.
"Someone has the idea of killing Rotten Tree Spirits as a leveling target again."
During this time, Ye Rong had already seen almost ten players attempting to kill Rotten Tree Spirits. However, after killing only a few, they'd soon give up voluntarily. Without continuous long-range attacks, leveling here would require a lot of Blood-Supplementing pills or taking breaks to meditate and restore life value after killing each monster.
Now that The Other Shore has not yet opened an official trading platform, the conversion ratio for purchasing game items and currency in the black market was outrageous.
As for meditating to recover life values, it would take too much time, and there would be no efficiency in leveling up.
There were four players in the newcomer leveling team - three men and one woman. They all looked puzzled when they saw that Ye Rong was already leveling up there.
"Stop watching, start the fight!"
A tall and skinny man with a somber air in the four-player team said, raising his weapon - a dark red pointed hammer.
"Alright!"
The somber man was obviously the leader in the team and had great prestige. The other three also used their weapons to encircle the nearest Rotten Tree Spirit. Apart from the pointed hammer, the weapons held by the other three players were ordinary Green Steel Swords, and they had no other magic treasures on their bodies.
When the Rotten Tree Spirit saw someone rushing towards it, it excitedly waved its withered branches, making a creaking sound.
At the same time, as the four players got close to the Rotten Tree Spirit, they felt their feet sink as if into mud. When they looked down, they found that the soil under their feet had been softened and eroded into a rotten swamp, slowing down both their movement speed and attack. What was more annoying was the system notice that told them they would lose one life value per every two seconds spent in the corroded soil, with the more players affected, the greater its effect.
"Quick battle, quick decision!"
The somber man shouted a command after being hit by a branch of the Rotten Tree Spirit, losing almost 20 life values. The horrible attack power made his heart pound. It was no wonder that everyone preferred to fight in groups for limited monsters rather than attacking Rotten Tree Spirits.
He got the pointed hammer as a reward after completing a hidden quest, and its damage was 1 point higher than the Green Steel Sword, with an additional 2 points of fire damage but with a slower attack speed.
So, every time the somber man attacked, an "-2" orange number would float above the Rotten Tree Spirit, indicating the fire damage inflicted by the pointed hammer.
With the combined efforts of the four players, the Rotten Tree Spirit couldn't withstand for too long, letting out a low howl and dissolving into ashes after a crazy onslaught of attacks.
"Damn, it's really hard to deal with!"
It was like having fought a Great War, leaving them all panting for breath. A slightly chubby player that seemed to be a student grumbled and used his Green Steel Sword to poke into the ashes, as if there was something valuable hidden inside.
"Damn, that kid's monster-killing speed is almost the same as ours!"
The other man in the couple seemed flabbergasted as he watched Ye Rong's fireball kill a Rotten Tree Spirit. He clearly remembered that they had started attacking new Rotten Tree Spirits at almost the same time.
"Let's go and team up with that guy!"
The somber man stared at Ye Rong's figure for a long time before saying these words.
"Team up?"
The slightly chubby student-like player scratched his head, looking somewhat confused as he asked the man next to him:
"Radish, would that guy team up with us? Has the boss gone crazy?"
"Stop being a chatterbox and follow!"