In the instance of the Misty Forest.
The Boss was defeated, dropping five fragments with a seven-star Wood attribute, along with a complete four-star card with a Wood attribute: [Flower Monster].
Brother Chen was in a good mood and smiled, saying, "It seems luck is on our side. We got the fragments and a complete card the first time we defeated the Boss."
Xie Mingzhe asked curiously, "Brother Chen, is the drop rate of this [Flower Monster] low?"
Brother Chen nodded. "Yes, the drop rate for a complete card is under 10%. The Boss usually only drops fragments of [Flower Monster], and players need to assemble them."
Chi Qing suddenly interrupted, "Brother Chen, the client just messaged me saying that, in addition to the 100 fragments with a seven-star Wood attribute, he also wants 100 fragments with Water and Fire attributes. The total for these three transactions is 66,000 gold coins. If we can deliver all of these within one week, he'll pay in one lump sum."
Everyone was stunned.
Brother Chen replied first, clearly surprised, "Is the client a guru? He wants so many fragments for evolution all at once?"
Pang Yu guessed, "Maybe he wants to level up three cards to seven stars? Could it be a game association?"
Chi Qing shook her head. "It should be a personal acquisition. When the task was posted in the Exchange, the ID was a string of random characters. It's obviously a smurf account."
Of course, they were going to accept the task with a 66,000 gold reward. Brother Chen thought for a moment and said, "Let's take the task. A'Qing, post a job looking for players to join our team. We'll begin a raid battle at 9 o'clock tonight. We need to go through all the material instances in the next two days to gather as many fragments as we can. If that's not enough, we'll find another way."
"Can I help?" Xie Mingzhe asked. He was happy to just watch the battle; he was good at this and wouldn't be a troublemaker.
Brother Chen coldly dismissed him. "Your level is too low to enter the instance requiring a ten-player raid. Level up first, and then come back to me when you reach level 35."
"Okay!" Xie Mingzhe had already expected this answer. He waved goodbye to Brother Chen and ran off to level up.
Back in his apartment, he immediately heard the system prompt: "Welcome back! The magical World of Star Card is vast. Would you like to explore with me?"
System options:
You have to say yes whether you like it or not ^-^
"..." Xie Mingzhe sighed.
It seemed like the system was mischievous. The game's official copywriting was funny and charming.
He selected the first option. The system's voice, relaxed and pleasant, continued, "Next, let me take you to explore the wondrous world of Star Card! The stars in the World of Star Card can be divided into three types: the [Function Star], the [Resource Star], and the [Opening Star]. Please find the four functional stars on the galaxy navigation map."
Following the instructions, Xie Mingzhe approached the galaxy navigation map and saw four large stars, each about the size of his head.
As he got closer, detailed introductions about each star appeared.
The domain of Gemini was the game's residential area, where all players' apartments were located. The domain of Aquarius was a business zone, where players could auction items, open stores, and set up stalls. The domain of Peacock was for entertainment, featuring cinemas, amusement parks, food cities, bars, and other recreational places. The domain of Phoenix was a competition center where competitive events were held.
These four major stars each had different functions, and players could teleport to their targeted stars from their personal space.
The system's prompt continued, "After learning about the four functional stars, let's move on to the resource stars. There are five resource stars in the game: Venus, Jupiter, Mercury, Mars, and Saturn. Each resource star is surrounded by many smaller stars where players can enter Star Card illusion instances. Here, players can obtain cards, evolution fragments, and strengthening materials of the corresponding attributes. To make your cards stronger, you need to frequently visit these resource stars to gather materials."
The prompt continued, "There are two opening stars in the World of Star Card: Egret Star and White Crane Star. The Egret Star is filled with illusion creatures of varying levels. You can defeat them to earn experience (XP) and materials. The White Crane Star is abundant in natural mineral resources, where players can collect Nebula Paper, Repairing Stones, furniture woods, and other game materials."
The prompt concluded, "Introduction complete. Next, please explore Egret Star."
Xie Mingzhe was teleported to Egret Star through the galaxy map.
Egret Star was similar to the area outside the residential zone in online games. It was an open world where players could freely kill each other. Unlike instances, there were no guards to protect players from death—they could be killed in the wild. Players needed to be extra cautious. The star featured forests, deserts, oceans, swamps, grasslands, and snow mountains, all inhabited by fierce beasts and plant demons. Players could gain experience by defeating them.
Since Xie Mingzhe was still a level 5 beginner, the system kindly placed him at a lakeside where low-level mobs appeared.
As he approached the lake, he saw a frail girl being chased by several Golems. Her HP was rapidly depleting as she stumbled around, shouting, "Help, help!"
Xie Mingzhe took two steps forward. The girl thought he would help, so she ran toward him. But Xie Mingzhe immediately stepped back, keeping a wary eye on the Golems to avoid getting caught in their attack.
His movements were quick, evading the attacks with ease.
The girl was killed by the Golems in three seconds and collapsed at Xie Mingzhe's feet.
Her ID was "Sisi." Since she couldn't use voice chat after death, a text box appeared above her head asking, "Why didn't you save me?"
Xie Mingzhe replied, "Why should I save you? I don't know you." Interfering wasn't his style.
"..." The girl, furious, immediately clicked the resurrection button and said, "Even if you don't know me, you should help when you can. Helping others is a virtue!"
"I couldn't have helped you." Xie Mingzhe analyzed, "I only have a one-star card with 100 attack power, while the Golem chasing you has 1000 HP. With five Golems, that's 5000 HP in total. I can't defeat them and save you. If I tried, I'd just get killed too."
"..." The girl was speechless; what Xie Mingzhe said made sense.
As he turned to leave, the girl stood up and hurried after him, saying, "Hey, Uncle Chubby, let's level up together!"
Xie Mingzhe: "?"
Uncle Chubby? Who was she calling?
Looking at his own ID, Xie Mingzhe remembered that he had named his account "Uncle Chubby" when he created it earlier that day. No wonder she called him that. He didn't bother explaining. After all, she was just someone he'd met in the game—no need to treat her like a real-life friend.
Just then, a boy next to him spoke in a deep voice, "Sisi, what happened?"
Xie Mingzhe turned his head to look at them. The boy had regular features but looked somewhat serious, while Sisi was petite and adorable. Xie Mingzhe wondered if Sisi's appearance was her real one or just a virtual image in the game.
Clearly frustrated by her failure, the girl walked over to the boy and said, "I was just killed by five Golems because I wasn't careful."
The boy gently tapped her head with his hand and said, "I told you to wait here. Why did you run off?"
Xie Mingzhe, watching them, couldn't help but feel a bit awkward. Was it really necessary to flaunt your love in front of a single guy?
Annoyed at the display of affection, Xie Mingzhe was about to turn and leave, but the girl stopped him. "Uncle Chubby, let's team up to level up! It's hard to find low-level players in the newbie area since the game has been out for ten years. I've been here for ten minutes and you're the only novice I've seen."
The boy quickly sent an invitation, saying, "Come on, we'll level up faster together."
Thinking it might be good to make some friends in the game, Xie Mingzhe accepted.
The boy's game ID was Senior Brother Qi. From their conversation, Xie Mingzhe figured out that Senior Brother Qi was using a smurf account to help his girlfriend level up. He had clearly been playing the game for at least five years and knew far more than a novice.
Senior Brother Qi suggested, "We won't get much experience from the small Golems. If we use our crowd control skills well, we can take down higher-level mobs for more Exp."
As a seasoned player, his advice seemed solid. The three of them made their way to a lake.
The fourth-level mob by the lake was called the "Willow Monster." It could deal significant damage to players, but it was manageable with good crowd control. Each of them had received an Icy Snake card at the start of the game, which could control one mob. Using these cards, they each took control of a Willow Monster while launching an area attack with their Thunder Bird cards. With their skills well coordinated, they quickly defeated the monsters.
After half an hour of battling, all three had reached level 10, and their cards had leveled up to 20.
Once a card hits level 20, it must evolve before it can level up further. They had gathered plenty of low-level evolution fragments from the Willow Monsters. Senior Brother Qi said, "Let's go back to evolve your cards in your personal space. Evolve the Thunder Bird card for its Area of Effect first."
Xie Mingzhe opened a portal to his personal space and began the card evolution process.
In front of the console, the light green one-star Thunder Bird card at level 20 slowly absorbed 100 two-star fragments, spinning continuously. The pattern on the back of the card shifted, and eventually, the card turned fully blue.
— Level 20, two-star evolution, blue card.
Xie Mingzhe noticed that after the evolution, the color on the back of the card had changed, but the front pattern remained the same. In terms of stats, all base attributes doubled. For instance, the base attack power of the Thunder Bird had increased from 100 to 200 after evolving into a two-star card.
In other words, upgrading a card increased both its skill potential and base attributes, while evolving it gave a significant boost to its core stats.
Upgrading and evolving cards was crucial for improving them overall.
However, cultivating a seven-star card required a lot of materials. For average players, obtaining a high-level card wasn't just about skill—it also took a lot of effort to gather the necessary resources, which could be exhausting.
Sighing, Xie Mingzhe returned to the lakeside after finishing his card evolution. Sisi and Senior Brother Qi were already back.
Senior Brother Qi said, "We need to buy more attack cards. Our team doesn't have enough to kill mobs efficiently."
Sisi asked excitedly, "Where can we buy cards?"
Senior Brother Qi replied, "In the black market."
Sisi blinked, surprised. "Black market? There's such a place?"
Senior Brother Qi nodded. "Yes, there's an underground city behind the commercial street, known as the black market. Players can set up stalls there without paying rent. You can bargain, and there are a lot of good cards and materials, especially low-level original cards. They're much cheaper than in regular stores."
Sisi scratched her head. "But I heard original cards are more expensive."
Senior Brother Qi explained, "The original cards I'm talking about are low-tier or even failed cards. The high-quality original cards will be sold at auctions."
Xie Mingzhe thought to himself, So only failed cards are sold cheaply in the black market. Still, for a beginner like him, buying a few "failed cards" created by experienced players to grind mobs wasn't such a bad idea.
So, they transferred to the Aquarius galaxy.
This was Xie Mingzhe's first time visiting the downtown area in the game.
In the center of the Aquarius planet, there was a square with a beautiful crystal sculpture of a water container. Four skyscrapers stood at the square's corners: the "Auction House," the "Star Card Bank," the "Exchange," and the "Service Center."
Behind these buildings, commercial streets stretched in a maze, with many shops run by players. Xie Mingzhe looked down one of the streets, spotting stores with unique names like "An Affectionate Couple's Repair Shop," "Monopoly Store of Seven-star Cards," "Doudou's Material Store," and "Boss Wants to Have a Girlfriend." The area was bustling with players, more so than many real-world shopping districts.
They were heading to the black market, but when they reached the Auction House, they found a large crowd gathered at the entrance. Sisi stood on tiptoe to peer through the crowd and asked, "Senior Brother, what's going on?"
Senior Brother Qi looked at the crowd and answered, "The Auction House holds an auction at 3:30 every afternoon. These people are probably here for that."
Xie Mingzhe had only ever seen auctions on TV, which seemed geared toward high-income buyers. He'd never been to one before, and he was curious to check it out. Before he could speak, Sisi exclaimed, "Can we watch? It seems really interesting!"
Senior Brother Qi nodded. "Sure, we'll go to the auction first, then head to the black market."
As they stood at the Auction House's entrance, a loud shout from the crowd caught their attention: "I heard Tang's card is being auctioned today!" "Is it Tang Muzhou's original card?" "It's insider info, not sure, but let's go see!" "Hurry, tickets will sell out fast!"
The crowd surged forward, and Xie Mingzhe quickly slipped inside to catch a glimpse of the auction.