The wind howled past his ears, and a slight emptiness from mana consumption lingered within him.
Jason barely maintained his balance mid-air, yet his mindset was utterly serene.
The quest he aimed to complete originated from an elderly woman in Losfall.
Her son, who gathered herbs, had mysteriously vanished after heading to Rock Gorge near the church where Jason was born.
Ordinarily, players receiving this quest would have to undergo a lengthy series of tasks—first learning about the woman's son's habits, then collaborating with his friends to explore Rock Gorge, and eventually discovering from these friends that the son had a secret base at the bottom of the gorge.
Ultimately, forging a good relationship with a dwarven craftsman would yield a rope ladder to descend to the gorge's base and find the person.
Speaking of which…
The process of this quest was both tedious and long.
The basic reputation needed to accept the quest was quite high, yet the final reward was quite mundane—
200 1-tier units.
However, the friendship between the two young men and the elderly woman's love for her son touched many, leading the unfortunate soul who completed the quest to upload the process to YouTube.
Although his in-game gain was meager, he earned a substantial sum in the real world.
For Jason, reborn with prior knowledge, he directly knew the location of the herbalist's secret base.
Speedrunning to the bottom of Rock Gorge using [Featherfall] made the endeavor highly cost-effective.
The only issue was…
The fall damage reduction provided by the novice skill [Featherfall] was not infinite.
Jason had to continuously land on some protruding rock faces of Rock Gorge while falling from a great height to reset the falling distance.
Once he missed his step, well...
He would transform into Jason sauce.
Pfft.
A mist of blood flashed before Jason's eyes.
[Died]
The large red letters appeared before him.
The death penalty in Divine Age was severe; players would directly drop 1 level, and with each version update, the consequences became increasingly exaggerated.
In the last version before merging with reality, 1.9, dying three times would result in account deletion.
But Jason was only at level one, with no levels to lose, and death meant respawning back at the initial starting point.
So...
Outside the church.
An NPC in a white suit stood there, bewildered: Wait, did I just see a young adventurer leap off the cliff?
And the next second.
The NPC calmed down.
"It must have been an illusion before."
Because he saw that the young adventurer, who had just walked out of the church doors, was now standing there again.
"Uh... hello?"
Before the NPC could finish, Jason was already at the cliff's edge, snapping his fingers and leaping.
Ah?
Three seconds later.
Splash!
The church doors were pushed open once more.
Jason took a few steps run-up and plunged into the ravine!
Then, without even a moment to mourn the three young adventurers who had died, the fourth generation young adventurer appeared.
And jumped again!
...
"Not bad, took just over twenty minutes."
Jason couldn't remember how many times he had died, but this time, he executed several difficult twists and successfully exploited [Featherfall]'s limit to land smoothly.
As he followed the directions from his memory in search of the quest, he mulled over his thoughts.
"The strategy of using [Featherfall] to bypass parts of the map wasn't discovered until two months into my previous life, and by that time, the game had updated. Each death would permanently increase soul turbidity, and too many deaths would ruin the account."
"It's only now, right after the game launch, that I can enjoy this trick."
"And the rewards are huge!"
He was almost laughing to death.
With the massive amount of information he held after being reborn, playing through the game's quests felt like cheating.
The quest to save the herbalist, if completed in the normal run, would only be considered moderately rewarding at best.
But his speedrun changed everything.
What did the initial 200 1-tier units signify?
You have to realize, each player starts with only five gold coins, and under normal gameplay, they need to enter the newbie village, find the guiding NPC to convert these five gold coins into 5 1-tier units, and then slowly start accepting quests to kill monsters and strengthen themselves.
And the rewards for early quests are generally just 12 gold coins or 12 1-tier units, yet they usually take several hours.
A regular player would need at least a week post-launch to accumulate 200 1-tier units because they must first complete those basic quests to gather enough reputation to access the higher-level quests.
That's right, one [Featherfall] put Jason a whole week ahead of other players in progress…
And that's not all.
After all, even if others complete this quest, they wouldn't be able to bring out 200 soldiers simultaneously—because they wouldn't have enough Command Limit!
But Jason doesn't need to worry about whether his Command Limit is sufficient; as long as he has soldiers, he can lead them!
Lost in thought, Jason suddenly saw something promising ahead.
A cave covered in vines came into view; he stepped forward, exerting a bit of force to part the tendrils.
Entering the cave, he was hit by a foul stench.
With Jason's approach, a figure in the cave, a man with long, unkempt hair, wearing ragged clothes, with his right leg exuding a putrid smell, lit up with a desperate hope in his eyes.
"Who… who are you?" the man asked, somewhat fearfully.
Jason responded without hesitation:
"Your mother is very worried about you. She sent me to find you."
"Can you walk?"
As he spoke, Jason stepped forward, helping the man to his feet.
"Let's go. I've been told by your friend that there's a path through this cave that leads to a farm near Losfall."
"I'll take you there."
"Yes, yes, thank you," the herbalist exclaimed excitedly, seemingly moving too abruptly, as he winced, his facial muscles twitching from the pain in his leg.
The two of them followed the path and left the place, the rest of their journey uneventful.
Jason swiftly escorted the man back to the farmstead behind the cave, then spent one gold coin to hire local farmers to send him home.
"Hurry back and heal up," Jason bid him farewell.
At that moment, the herbalist bit his lip and suddenly produced a card from his bosom.
"Thank you, adventurer."
"This is a card I found when I was young. I can feel there's some magic hidden within it. This is the only reward I can offer."
As his words fell, a screen flashed before Jason's eyes.
[You have completed the quest [The Missing Herbalist].]
[You have received [Tarot Card: The Tower].]
There it is!
Jason smiled slightly, his efforts finally rewarded.
He took the card, pondering for a moment.
Then he picked up a pitchfork lying nearby the farmhouse, presumably left by someone.
Swish!
He ended himself with it.
...
After successfully respawning at the church starting point, Jason began to examine his rewards.
[Tarot Card: The Tower]
[Effect: Receive 200 random 1-tier units.]
[Effect: Add one to the Fate's Gaze Scale.]
Huh?
Jason was familiar with the first reward from the Tarot Card, identical to his previous life, but the second reward left him somewhat puzzled.
Fate's Gaze Scale?
I've never even heard of it. And wasn't the reward for completing this quest in my past life a unit treasure chest, not some card...?
Could it be because I completed the quest ahead of time?
According to the progression in my past life, this herbalist was supposed to be found two weeks after the game launch, surviving barely on the scant water source in the cave until then, and dying after being rescued and seeing his mother.
But with the speed Jason completed the quest, the herbalist should recover swiftly.
"Could it be that I changed his fate, hence receiving the Fate's Gaze Scale?"
All he could do at the moment was speculate wildly.
Jason didn't dwell on it too much and quickly used the Tarot Card.
Two notifications followed immediately.
[You have activated the Tarot Card, receiving 200 1-tier unit militias.]
[Ding! Undead Plague activated, your [militia] have been upgraded to 3-tier and completed undead transformation. Beep… Unknown data detected, your militia have been upgraded to a 4-tier hidden unit—[Banshee]!]
A hidden... unit?
Could this be the effect of the Fate's Gaze Scale?
And they got upgraded by 3 tiers straight?
Holy smokes!
This is taking off!
No need to mention anything else, the initial training cost for a 1-tier unit is one gold coin, while the minimum training cost for a 4-tier unit is 200 gold coins, let alone for a hidden [Banshee]!
The profit from completing this one quest alone is more than 200 times that of others!
And the time it took to complete the quest is significantly reduced by who knows how many folds!
A total windfall!
In his excitement, Jason looked towards the interior of the church.
The scene, which was empty before, now possessed an eerie atmosphere.
Figures of Banshees, floating mid-air, clad in grey-white gossamer gowns, wielding scythes dripping with blood-like substance, almost filled the church to the brim.
Their mere presence emitted an indescribable aura of death.
The figures in the church's oil paintings, previously solemn and dignified, now seemed to be... sinisterly smirking!