Further on, the number of players at last dropped off sharply, until not a single player’s figure could be seen anymore. This was the territory of Level 5 monsters, and starting at Level 5 most monsters began to carry the property of attacking on their own initiative. For a game only just past its opening, this was forbidden ground that ordinary players couldn’t set foot on; Level 3 was already the upper limit of what they could handle — though, of course, that applied only to ordinary players.
Ye Tianxie stepped forward, about to cross into this pack of monsters’ territory, when the corner of his eye suddenly caught a faintly swaying figure. He turned to look and was startled to find that, not far off to his right, someone was actually sitting beneath a stunted tree. She sat leaning against the trunk, her body so withered and shrunken, her face as dry and cracked as tree bark, that her whole form seemed to have all but fused with the tree itself — which was why Ye Tianxie hadn’t managed to notice her a moment ago.
A gaunt old woman… an NPC of this world? Ye Tianxie walked over toward her.
“Is there anything I can do for you?” Ye Tianxie asked as he approached, squeezing out a somewhat distorted, kindly smile. If his question were put more plainly, it would be: “Got any quests? Hand them all over.”
No sooner had he finished speaking than his expression stalled. He’d noticed the old woman’s legs… Those legs, folded beneath her on the ground, sat utterly motionless, and the exposed parts of them had taken on a dull, ashen color.
Petrification… two words flashed swiftly through Ye Tianxie’s mind.
“This world’s energy core — the Hour of Eternal Fate — has vanished, drifted off to who knows where. Without the power of the Hour of Eternal Fate, the sealing force of the Tower of Fate has finally crumbled apart, and the Eight Demon Kings have all escaped. The demonic energy spilling out has begun to affect every land, until even the gentlest of animals has turned savage… Adventurer from another world, would you help me gather ten wolves’ eyes? I have need of them… but my body is sealed here and cannot leave. Would you be willing to help me?”
“Ding… The Sealed Old Woman asks you to help her gather ten wolves’ eyes. Quest type: Ordinary. Time limit: None. Quest reward: Unknown.”
“Accept.” Ye Tianxie chose to accept without the slightest hesitation. Though this was an ordinary quest, the “Unknown” listed for the reward gave him a bit of added interest. This early in the beginner stage, that sort of mystery-teasing wording shouldn’t, in theory, appear at all. Since it had appeared, it suggested there might be some hidden mechanism buried within. This was the keen nose he’d cultivated over his years of gaming.
“Ding… You have accepted the quest ‘The Sealed Old Woman’s Request’…”
“Could you tell me why your legs ended up like this?” Ye Tianxie didn’t immediately leave to go hunting for the wolves, but instead crouched down and asked with a face full of kindness. If the word “Unknown” in the quest description had piqued a little of his interest, then this old woman’s title — with no specific name to it — piqued a great deal of it. In the World of Fate, every living being had its own independent mind. And having stubbornly maxed his Charm attribute, he reckoned those extreme 10 points shouldn’t have been added for nothing. He was making an earnest effort to see whether he could dig something out of this old woman.
“Go on, young man. Some things are better left unknown.” The old woman replied coldly.
“Then… if it’s not convenient for you to move about, how about I carry you back to the novice village?” Ye Tianxie hesitated, then said.
“My body cannot leave this place. Thank you for your kindness. Go on now.”
“All right.” Ye Tianxie gave up. “Where’s the nearest place wolf packs appear?”
“Ahead.”
“Good. I’ll bring back what you need shortly.”
Leaving behind that one bit of transitional dialogue, Ye Tianxie glanced around and continued on toward the deeper reaches. The weather in the World of Fate right now was plainly springtime, a warm and heartening breeze drifting gently against his face. Ever since he’d first officially stepped into the gaming world, he’d never once had the experience of killing Level 1 monsters at the starting Level 0. His starting point each time was invariably a jaw-dropping Level 5, or even higher. Because only that way could he steer clear of the enormous leveling crowds and enjoy the quiet of being alone.
The northern hills, territory of the Level 5 Wild Wolves.
Wild Wolf — Level 5. HP: 170. A rather savage-tempered animal that likes to live in packs and will attack approaching humans on its own initiative.
Level 0, wearing nothing but attribute-less novice clothes, going alone to face Level 5 monsters — in nearly every virtual game, this would be no different in essence from courting death. But that rule applied only to ordinary players.
Since no other players had set foot in this place, the Wild Wolves here were spread relatively densely, each of them wandering about aimlessly, taking no notice at all of Ye Tianxie standing outside their territory. Ye Tianxie stepped forward a few paces, probing the aggro range of these Wild Wolves, then picked a stone up off the ground, flicked his wrist, and hurled it at the nearest wolf.
-1.
The stone struck the Wild Wolf’s head, floating up a bright-red block of forced damage. The quiet Wild Wolf was instantly roused; a pair of wolf-eyes flickering with a faint bloody glint snapped toward Ye Tianxie’s direction, and it loosed a long howl from its throat, bared its fangs, and came bounding swiftly toward him.
A wolf’s movement speed was fast — at least 1.5 times a player’s base movement — and this wolf’s howl wasn’t a simple howl of rage: at the sound of it, two more Wild Wolves were roused and gave howls of their own, charging toward his position alongside the wolf Ye Tianxie had provoked.
Three of them! Looking at the three Wild Wolves closing in from front and back, Ye Tianxie didn’t choose to immediately retreat out of the wolves’ territory to escape. Instead he narrowed his eyes, and the novice shortsword in his hand rose slowly…
Swish!
Wind carrying a savage air rushed at him head-on. Ye Tianxie’s gaze stayed calm, and only in the instant those sharp fangs were about to reach his waist did his body suddenly twist aside, giving way by the smallest of margins, so that the massive wolf’s body all but grazed him as it hurtled past. The larger the dodge, the greater the time it took and the momentum it generated — and controlling it to a perfect, just-right evasion was by no means something one could pull off simply.
The first Wild Wolf lunged past into empty air, and another gust of wind followed hard on its heels. Without even looking ahead, Ye Tianxie snapped the body he’d only just steadied back and down, upper and lower body bending nearly into a textbook ninety-degree angle, while the right hand holding the novice sword flicked casually upward…
Shrrk! -15!
The second Wild Wolf’s body soared through the air over Ye Tianxie’s torso, likewise striking nothing, and the novice sword he’d flicked up traced a straight line across its belly, kicking up a blood-red number. In any game, wolves were the textbook high-attack, high-speed, low-defense type — which was one reason Ye Tianxie went straight for killing wolves. If what he faced right now had instead been a bear-type monster — low speed, low attack frequency, high defense — it might be far easier to deal with, but he’d have had basically no chance of breaking through its defense.
The third Wild Wolf lunged in right behind the second. Ye Tianxie straightened his torso halfway, and borrowing that slight twisting force, his body pivoted a right angle with his left foot as the pivot point; the third wolf grazed past him, and Ye Tianxie turned with the motion, stepped forward a few paces, and thrust the novice sword ahead, landing two strikes in a row on the second Wild Wolf that had barely caught itself before toppling to the ground, kicking up two damage numbers.
The three Wild Wolves’ back-and-forth attacks, added together, had absolutely taken less than two seconds — and they hadn’t simply attacked all at once, but arrived one linked to the next — yet all of them had been safely evaded by Ye Tianxie, whose body had shifted no more than a single body-width to the left, changing only from facing forward to facing sideways.
(End of Chapter 8)