Though most of the equipment at the street stall didn't catch Ye Rong's eye, there were two that piqued his interest.
One was the Belt of Maitreya, a nanmu-wood waistband carved with the figure of Maitreya Buddha about the thickness of two fingers. It had no other attributes, just a storage space of 10 grids, which was half the size of a Qiankun Bag.
The other was the Five Feather Brocade Clothes with a defense of 50 and +80 Qi.
However, these two items were marked with extremely high prices by the seller, one for eight taels of silver, and the other for ten taels of silver.
At the height of Ye Rong's wealth, he had less than three taels of silver even when he saved up with copper coins. Previously, in his quest for the Immortal's Cave Mansion, he spent his money buying Blood-Supplementing pills and Recovery powder, now he was practically penniless.
Besides, the prices of these early game low-level equipment were significantly higher than their actual value, making them unnecessary to purchase.
After strolling around for a while, Ye Rong decided to log off and rest. He currently had half the experience needed for level eight. If the reward from the cave of langhuan was in the form of experience instead of treasures, he might have already crossed level ten by now.
Before logging off, Ye Rong quickly checked the leaderboard. The highest-level player was already level thirteen, very close to the required level fifteen to join a sect. Considering that most players were currently only around levels five or six, this was quite shocking.
"Hell, I wonder how this guy leveled up!" Ye Rong complained. But he didn't dwell on it for too long as most of the players in the game were casual, only a few would relentlessly play for tens of hours a day.
To make money in the game, he didn't necessarily need to be ahead of everyone, just being a step faster than most players would do.
After logging out of the game, Ye Rong visited the game's official forum to check out new posts from other players.
Today was the first day of The Other Shore's public test, and the number of posts on the forum reached an unprecedented peak. New posts quickly sank a few pages back, but the enthusiasm of the players for posting was extremely high.
Ye Rong only read the most popular threads, the ones with the most replies or the technical ones that were sticky-posted, looking to learn some useful content.
Many posts were about players showcasing the equipment they'd earned. Ye Rong quickly scrolled through these, only stopping to look when he spotted decent flying swords or magic treasures.
"Damn, a fifth-grade magic weapon, what kind of luck is this guy having!"
Ye Rong felt envious, even resentful. In this sticky bragging post about equipment, someone's Five-Bone Beads were a Fifth-Order Magic Treasure, far outshining all the other equipment.
On the first day of the game, the appearance of a Fifth-Order Magic Treasure was not just about being lucky. Even if the player had more experience from the internal testing, it was still not easy to achieve this.
Apart from that, there weren't many flying swords or magic treasures that surprised Ye Rong. Considering he already had a Third-order Immortal Soldier and Second-order Magic Treasure, not many better items would appear on the forum. Of course, this didn't rule out the possibility that many low-key players didn't upload their equipment to the forum.
"Discussing the gains from the first use of the Immortal Mansion Key."
This thread was highlighted and pinned. Ye Rong saw that the number of replies had already exceeded 5000.
White Lotus Water Village, a Yellow cave D-class like the cave of langhuan. The thread detailed the whole process, key points, and final gains, accompanied by many pictures.
Having the experience from the cave of langhuan made Ye Rong pay more attention to the Immortal Mansion Key. By studying other people's methods, he could reflect on the advantages and disadvantages of his own, improving where necessary.
The White Lotus Water Village was divided into three layers. The first layer had eight White Lotus Puppets, the second layer had sixteen White Lotus Taoist Soldiers, while the last layer had thirty-two White Lotus Terracotta Soldiers. The thread included pictures of the area before the monsters were cleared, and after the battle was over, but there was no complete video of the fight.
Obviously, the author of the post didn't want to share all his experiences, especially the part that would expose his fighting habits and techniques.
The main difference between the White Lotus Water Village and the cave of langhuan was that in the former, all the levels were about dealing with monsters beyond the current level limit, without any sections testing spontaneous wit. Because of this, the skill requirements for players in the White Lotus Water Village were much higher, and top-player-level skills were needed to pass.
At least Ye Rong admitted that dealing with so many monsters, even if he had twice as many Blood-Supplementing pills, he might not be able to pass smoothly.
"Looks like these advanced testers are indeed very skilled. After all, they are professional gamers and depend on this to make a living."
Ye Rong used to have his own work, so even though he invested a lot of time in games, he would occasionally convert game coins into real money to afford extra expenses. Compared to professional gamers who spent all day in games, Ye Rong's gaming skills were indeed lacking.
However, Ye Rong was confident in one aspect - his sword-wielding abilities. In Shushan Swordsman, his title of One Sword Withering and Prosperity, which signified life and death, was quite famous. With respect to flying sword operation, there weren't many people in the game who were better than Ye Rong.
Although The Other Shore had undergone considerable changes in various aspects, the flying sword operating system was still inherited from Shushan Swordsman. This was why Ye Rong was confident he could earn enough living expenses in The Other Shore.
The final reward for clearing the White Lotus Water Village was a massive 28000 points of experience, but no other items.
Ye Rong needed only 6000 experience points to level up from level seven to eight. 28000 experience points would be enough for him to level up three times.
It seemed, the player who was currently number one on the leaderboard must have completed a task similar to the White Lotus Water Village, one that granted a generous amount of experience points, allowing him to reach such a high level so quickly.
"Looks like I'm not the only one with good luck."
Ye Rong scrolled to the end of the thread, highlighted in bold and bright red font were the words 'Warmly welcome all interested players to join the Sword Pavilion. Our clan sincerely invites heroes from all walks.'
The author of the post was named Lei Ba Tian. Apparently, his aim in posting this thread was to become famous, to warm up for his future clan establishment, and to attract other players to join.
Establishing a clan in The Other Shore was only possible after reaching level thirty and obtaining a Xuantie Order. At the current stage, establishing a clan was impossible. The Sword Pavilion mentioned by Lei Ba Tian was likely a clan he moved from another game, and not an officially recognized clan by the system.
In the comments below the thread, aside from many players expressing their astonishment at the difficulty and experience reward of the White Lotus Water Village, some also asked how to join the Sword Pavilion, clearly intrigued by the clan.
Ye Rong naturally ignored the idea of joining a clan. What he was currently thinking about was just how to make money. Joining a clan might be somewhat convenient for ordinary players to level up, but he didn't have that much time to participate in collective activities or clan missions.
With his strength, he didn't need to worry about leveling up.