On Shark TV, an anchor known as Mr. Qin, affectionately called Lao Qin by fans was broadcasting live.
Live broadcast content! Naturally, it was about the game Dark Souls.
Lao Qin has been streaming the game since its launch.
Initially, like most ordinary players, he was stunned by the various insidious traps and challenging mechanics in the game.
But unlike most anchors, Lao Qin showcased significantly stronger technical skills. He was among the first batch of players to clear Dark Souls.
In addition to live-streaming, he created detailed guide videos and uploaded them to video platforms. According to him, the purpose of these strategy videos was to help ordinary players clear the game.
The guides were comprehensive, explaining everything from tackling bosses and elite mobs to navigating complex maps. As a result, the videos earned high click rates on the platforms.
Recently, however, his updates had slowed, and fans began speculating.
"I'm not slacking off! I swear, I'm not slacking off!" Lao Qin explained while opening the game interface.
"The new strategy program is on its way. You'll see it soon."
He continued, "The purpose of these guides is to help beginners better understand Dark Souls. They're especially meant for players who might lack the skills to progress otherwise. The game itself is quite intricate, so creating these videos takes time. But trust me, I'm working on it as fast as time permits."
While speaking, Lao Qin navigated the game's menu and set up a new save file. Since the random mode doesn't coexist with the normal mode, he had to start fresh.
He skillfully created a new character, carefully considering his choices on the creation interface. The options—such as roles, origins, and funeral objects—were familiar yet crucial.
After a moment of thought, Lao Qin selected the knight class. He reasoned that starting as a knight guaranteed at least one usable equipment set. Alternatively, choosing the deprived class offered a different kind of advantage, flexibility.
"If luck is on our side," Lao Qin muttered, Deprived can actually be one of the most effective choices in this mode."
For the funeral object, he selected the flame gem. "This should ensure a decent level of fault tolerance," he commented. "As for the Ring of Life? Meh. You'll probably die anyway."
Lao Qin's quick wit and detailed commentary kept his audience entertained as he dove back into the unforgiving world of Dark Souls.
After pinching the face casually, I entered the game and skipped the opening animation. After all, I've seen it countless times.
Once I skipped, the game interface didn't appear in front of me. Instead, several options popped up:
[random items only]
[random bosses only]
[all enemies random]
[random items and bosses only]
[all random]
"If it's random, then it must be completely random!" I didn't hesitate much and chose all random.
Soon after making the selection, a knight climbed out of the coffin.
But at this point, I noticed that the soul in the lower-right corner wasn't the 0 from the original version. Instead, it showed that I was born with 30,000 souls, enough to upgrade to level 15 in the game.
According to the update I read earlier, instead of upgrading by the fire keeper, I could choose to upgrade at the bonfire.
Clearly, this change was made to give some leeway to players at the start.
"This soul... I feel like it has become a burden!"
Without moving forward immediately, I stood still, feeling speechless as I woke up in the ashes' cemetery.
The barrage in the live broadcast room were filled with cheers.
Up ahead, the living corpse, which was originally just a target for players to attack, had now turned into a majestic black knight.
Just like the original setup by the fountain, the living corpse that players once called the pulsating had transformed into a chubby winged knight.
If it were a 1v1 fight, I felt that with my own skills, plus the starting damage to the knight, I could handle it.
But the problem wasn't about fighting—it was about needing space to move.
Now, these two enemies were so close, and unlike the original living corpse, they weren't in a dormant state. This fight would definitely draw more unwanted attention.
It started as a 1v2 battle, with a winged knight and a black knight armed with a big sword. How could I possibly handle that!
All the way forward, Lao Qin took the black knight to a corner, then rolled away and ran towards the path on the right side of the birth.
In this dead end, there is an item called Abandoned Corpse Soul that adds 200 souls.
Since all items are random, normal plot items like this must be too, but this soul is not guaranteed.
"Come on, a weapon must be in it! Here's a weapon! The exile sword, the dark sword, the black knight's sword... if nothing else, just give me a good straight sword!"
Because the black knight was chasing immediately, Lao Qin didn't bother with any specific prayer posture and simply rolled on the ground.
He picked up the item — the broken straight sword!
"What does this mean!?" Lao Qin was speechless.
This first item-this thing—can it even be used?
The barrage in the live broadcast room was full of laughter:
_____________________
"Haha, don't you want a straight sword?"
"This is a weapon! And the straight sword you wanted is fine!"
"If you don't pray before the lottery, you're not sincere!"
_____________________
Looking at the barrage, Lao Qin's mouth twitched: "It doesn't matter, there are still more opportunities later. There are plenty of items left to collect in the Ashes Cemetery."
While speaking, Lao Qin controlled the game character to roll several times in a row to avoid the black knight and continued moving forward.
As for the pulsation on Chubby's side, it was ignored.
Continuing forward, the enemies in the Ash Graveyard in random enemy mode were all kinds of strange creatures.
Jailers from the Underground Prison, Treasure Monsters in Standing Mode, Lothric Knights, and Ordinary Sewer Rats.
Most of them were not to be messed with.
Adhering to the strategy of avoiding fights whenever possible, Lao Qin ran towards the cave of the crystal lizard.
For the purpose of gathering more souls, he still had some to pick up.
If a weak enemy appeared randomly, Lao Qin would take the opportunity to deal with them.
Ignoring the advice on the ground to return, Lao Qin walked across the path to the crystal lizard's cave.
Inside the cave, which was normally spacious, the monster that was usually huge was now squatting there motionless.
The stray demon of the broken bridge at the top of Farah Fort.
"This a hammer!"
After looking at the terrain and the location of the white light-emitting item, Lao Qin decisively turned back.
Relying on the rolling terrain all the way, Lao Qin reached the first bonfire.
However, instead of upgrading immediately, Lao Qin continued to move forward. There were still two more collectibles: one was the original fire pot and the other was a keystone shard.
But on the trail where the flame pot was collected, Lao Qin fell silent again, gazing at a Lothric spear knight and a big axe man on the road.
"It's okay, there is one last hope."
Running on the edge of the cliff and pressing space, Lao Qin jumped onto the coffin. At that moment, Lao Qin noticed some remarks on the ground. He hadn't paid attention to this when the black knight chased earlier.
"Can I see the advice left by other players in random mode?" Lao Qin opened it with curiosity.
[Black Knight Shield]
[Wolf Riding Shield]
[Exile Sword]
[Red Tear stone Ring]
[Blood Madness]
[Soul of the Unknown King]
So many top items!?
Looking at the information left by other players, it was clear that these were all items they had picked up. This made Lao Qin look forward to what he might find.
Instead of picking up the items immediately, Lao Qin turned around a few times and adopted the resting posture obtained when lighting a bonfire.
Afterward, Lao Qin finally picked up the items on the ground.
The light dissipate!
"I vomited! You might as well give me the original keystone fragments!"
Lao Qin burst into tears.
Is this mode unfriendly to darker people? Can I still use this items I found?
Looking at the soul count in the lower right corner, Lao Qin returned to the previous bonfire, added some souls, and consumed them all. Then, he used the remaining life to go to the demon to pick up the items.
The soul of Bordeaux.
Seeing this, Lao Qin finally breathed a sigh of relief. After all, it wasn't completely useless garbage.
Then, Lao Qin ran to the flame pot area to collect the random item.
Battle Axe +4.
A weapon from a soldier's origin, but it turned out to be +4!
"I earned it! I earned a lot! Not only did I earn an axe, but I also got a lot of reinforcement materials! I can feel it, my luck is back!"
"Let's go! Let's go and take a look at the boss. It really is bittersweet! I have a feeling the first boss might be very simple! Crystal lizard, big tree, ice dog, just come."
Lao Qin resurrected at the campfire, equipped the strengthened +4 battleaxe he had just picked up, and his previous frown was replaced with a smile.
But after entering the boss room, he fell silent.
The boss in front of him was indeed weak in terms of story plot, but now there isn't any story plot?
The Lonely King of the City of Sin - Giant King Yhorm
The UI at the bottom of the screen displayed the BOSS's name and health bar.
"Only a storm can knock down a tree!"
"Only a storm can knock down a tree!"
"Only a storm can knock down a tree!"
...........
Lao Qin glanced at the live broadcast room, where the entire screen was filled with this sentence. It was the official advice left by the original version when facing this boss.
The giant king in front of him was actually a plot BOSS. As long as the exclusive weapon Storm Controller was used, the fight could be easily won. In terms of difficulty, this boss was one of the easiest, almost on par with the overlord Wolnir at the bottom of the difficulty scale.
But now, where did I get the Storm Controller?
"Are you going to be a coward for a lifetime, or a warrior just once, even if you're torn to pieces?"
Looking at the screen full of motivational comments, Lao Qin fell silent for a while, then took a deep breath and made a decision.
I didn't quit the game and start a new file, as suggested by my mind. Instead, I switched the battleaxe in my hand to a two-handed form to release a battle cry. Then, I switched it back to one-handed mode and rushed forward bravely.
"Mr. Qin, the pedicure technician No. 33 of Yangtze River, is here to serve you!"
With an axe hitting more than 50 points of damage, I felt completely focused.
This might be the toughest Dark Souls fight I've ever had. But there's one thing that reassures me: the giant king in front of me, although the defense and blood volume are very abnormal, has a balanced attack power.
His attacks only take away 8% of my health, which gives me a bit of room for error. If it were a one-shot kill, this would be almost impossible.
But even so, it's still incredibly difficult with only three Elemental Bottles.
One axe after another, the toenails of the giant king were being neatly chipped away like the teeth of Simba in the zoo.
Ten minutes. Twenty minutes...
Entering the second stage, the giant king's attacks became even more ferocious, but I managed to resolve them with perfect rolls.
The giant king HP continued to drop.
The durability of my battleaxe was almost cut by half.
Victory was within reach.
Looking at the giant king yhorm in front of me, with only a trace of health left, I was filled with excitement.
Although the weather had turned cold, my clothes were soaked with sweat from the intense excursion.
"Who else! Who else?" I roared passionately.
With one final blow, the giant king yhorm fell to the ground.
[Salary King soul]
The salary King, the quest item, was automatically obtained.
After the giant king body vanished, a white light remained on the ground, not the giant soul entering my backpack as it would have in the original game.
With the successful defeat of the giant king Yhorm, the barrage in my live broadcast room exploded.
-----------------------
"666666!"
"Brother Qin is too strong!"
"No problem! Axes can chop any trees down!"
"Real macho, daring to face the giant's king!"
"The macho is you!"
-----------------------
Looking at the various compliments and gifts flooding in, I took a long breath. The fierce battle seemed to bring me back to the time when I first started playing Dark Souls.
"Only a storm can knock down a tree?"
Looking at the white light on the ground, I muttered with disdain.
"The next step is the happy and joyful prize draw!"
With a full smile, I stepped forward to pick up the loot.
But then, a terrible realization hit.
"Crack!"
The sound of something shattering echoed in my ears.
I, who had not been defeated by the giant king Yhorm, finally couldn't bear this cruel reality.
"I… let's start a new file again."