003 Talent Gem!

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Summons from Xiluo Main City: Race Mission. Xiluo Main City calls upon all adventurers arriving on the Spirit Realm Continent. Upon entering the game, the first 100 players to reach the main city will receive three general profession skill books as a reward. The first 10 to enter will get additional rewards, and the very first to arrive will earn the title "Herald of Xiluo's Call." Players ranked 101 to 100,000 to reach the city will have a chance to win one general profession skill book. Mission time: 2 hours.

This quest is only available on the first day of the game's official launch, designed to make players try every means to return to the main city and experience the thrill of the game. Essentially, 99.99% of players, upon receiving the quest, mindlessly sprint toward the city, while only a few unusual souls take advantage of the two-hour unlimited resurrection period to explore the surroundings, looking for better rewards.

"It's finally here!"

The gloomy sky was as if the end of days had come, easily underscoring the players' anxiety about being ambushed after leaving the main city. In the space connected to the Augris Continent, orcs, trolls, undead, and goblins still roamed, relentlessly hunting the heads of the Human Alliance. Encountering wild monsters or patrols usually meant death for most.

Morning Wind had only joined the game three years later, so his knowledge of its early days was limited. Previously, when doing quests, he had learned about "Talent Stones" and "Dimensional Merchants" from the game's analyst guild—nothing more. The reason Morning Wind agreed to play as a tank that day was to make use of the unlimited resurrection opportunity to obtain a Talent Stone, thus gaining dual talent abilities.

He appeared in a gloomy forest, surrounded by inkwood trees with deep green, broad leaves—a common, hardy plant of the Spirit Realm Continent, which also bore sweet fruit.

"Aukaya Forest, good, not far from the Elemental Highlands." Morning Wind felt lucky—his teleportation had landed him not far from his destination. "Not far" still meant about two thousand meters, so he had to hurry. With only two hours, he wasn't sure if he could get one of the items he wanted.

A benefit of the Xiluo Main City summons mission was that nearby monsters were only half as numerous as usual, making it easier to avoid them while traveling. Though he could die endlessly, corpse running wasted time; avoiding it was best. (Corpse running: after death, a player's spirit appears at the graveyard and must recover their body to revive. If revived at the graveyard, all attributes are reduced by 50% for ten minutes. Logging out dead makes the body disappear; logging in restores it.)

Like a lone wolf, Morning Wind sprinted swiftly through the forest, deftly avoiding monsters to keep from attracting their attention. Monsters had both a visible range and an aggro range—so long as he stayed out of the latter, they'd ignore him. Even if he entered their aggro, as long as he avoided their sight for a second, he was safe. With these strategies and his stealth skill for hiding, the journey out of the forest and toward the perilous Elemental Highlands would be much easier.

Reaching the sandy terrain of the Elemental Highlands, Morning Wind paused. Ahead lay the Duststorm Zone, where sandstorms raged year-round, reducing visibility to nothing. The place was crawling with Stone Giants—an encounter meant certain death.

Normally, dying here would mean quitting the game, making the trek through the duststorm nearly impossible. But now, Morning Wind could exploit this by sprinting straight through—charging as far as he could, dying, then corpse running and charging again.

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He was instantly slain—simple as that. As a spirit, Morning Wind appeared at the graveyard, the world now a black-and-white void devoid of life. Only when he neared his corpse would monsters become visible; nowhere else.

He sprinted back to his body, revived at the maximum distance, then dashed forward again, ignoring all else—only to die, revive, and repeat. For fifteen minutes, Morning Wind continued this cycle until he finally emerged from the duststorm before a thousand-meter-high barren mountain—his destination: Thunder Mountain.

Lightning streaked everywhere atop Thunder Mountain, and apart from highly conductive Thunderstones, there was little else. Hence, it was nicknamed Bald Mountain. The lightning was lethal—one hit meant instant death!

"Still ninety-five minutes left—plenty of time!" Morning Wind charged up the mountain, dodging lightning where he could, dying and running again when he couldn't. In his previous life, the first player to cross the duststorm and reach the summit a year later had spent a full month studying the storm's patterns and practicing evasive maneuvers atop Thunder Mountain.

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That player had originally intended only to use Thunder Mountain’s lightning to practice dodging, but by chance leapt to the summit and acquired a Talent Stone—an event that, combined with his dodging skills, made him famous!

"Sorry, I didn’t mean to…" As a skilled player, Morning Wind’s dodging was decent, but the speed of the lightning was still too much—he died fifteen times. At last, he opened a small chest atop Thunder Mountain, quickly sidestepping to avoid lightning, and grabbed the contents in one motion.

System: You have obtained Thunder Stone.

System: You have obtained the Barbarian’s Manifesto.

Thunder Stone: Class Talent Stone. Cannot be dropped. 1. You may select an additional class talent, empowered by the Thunder. 2. May be fused with other Talent Stones, though the more types you attempt to fuse, the greater the risk of failure. On failure, all Talent Stones are destroyed. Use requirement: Level 10.

Morning Wind’s objective had been the Thunder Stone—a rare gem, the coveted tool for elite players seeking to become legends. With this, he could select both Shield and Berserk talent paths.

Death!

Struck down instantly, Morning Wind’s spirit appeared at the base of Thunder Mountain. This time, he revived at the graveyard, accepting a weakened state—all stats reduced by 50%.

"Sixty minutes left—maybe I can get another one…" He knew the locations of several Talent Stones, but time was tight. The nearest one was not far—he could leave Thunder Mountain by other means, such as heading for the Wildwind Barrens north of the mountain.

Wildwind Barrens was frequently swept by tornadoes, hurling players from the Elemental Highlands to distant lands. Few visited, as reaching its core was nearly impossible. Morning Wind didn’t plan to go in—he just wanted a tornado to toss him away!

System: You have discovered the Dark Abyss.

"Seems luck is on my side—getting a second stone should be no problem!" Morning Wind never expected to be blown here. Beneath the Dark Abyss lay a Talent Stone he greatly desired. Originally, he’d intended to grab whichever stone was closest, leaving the one he truly wanted for another time. Now, fate had saved him much corpse-running.

Carefully, Morning Wind reached the cliff nearest the Blood Cavern at the bottom of the Dark Abyss. He couldn’t simply jump—doing so would mean instant death and forced graveyard revival, preventing corpse-running. The game forbade players from treasure hunting in the abyss by such means.

But players had later discovered a trick to descend—if you died skillfully! Morning Wind had done this once during a Dark Abyss quest with his guild—late at night, they’d used this method to save time.

He corpse-ran to the abyss’s edge, turned his back, and revived. Instantly, a roaming Death Skeleton spotted him, drew its bone bow, and fired a bone arrow.

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Knocked backward, Morning Wind tumbled into the abyss—killed by the Death Skeleton’s arrow. A level 50 Death Skeleton’s shot could kill a level 0 player a hundred times over.

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Morning Wind’s corpse plummeted into the Dark Abyss. Living players couldn’t fall into the abyss, but corpses could—this was the key to dying skillfully.

In spirit form, Morning Wind could jump straight down. Spirits didn’t die from the fall. Once at his corpse, he revived at the spot closest to Blood Cavern and dashed inside without delay!

The Blood Demon in the cavern was level 80, but Morning Wind knew the place well—reaching the chest was only a matter of time.

System: You have obtained Bloodstone.

System: You have obtained Racial Talent Enhancement.

As he scooped up the stone and scroll from the chest, the Blood Demon hurled a fireball, incinerating him instantly. In spirit form at the graveyard, Morning Wind revived and sprinted onward, hoping to snatch one more stone.

…

"That was close!" Barely a minute later, as he seized a third Talent Stone, he was forcibly teleported to Xiluo Main City. Had he been killed by the skeleton just a moment later, he’d have needed to corpse-run again—and time would have run out. His luck held; he managed to open the chest and grab the loot in the final moment.

In addition to Thunder Stone and Bloodstone, he now also had the Dread Stone—a backup, for now!

Three Talent Stones, and each such stone usually came with scrolls related to racial abilities. Morning Wind had never encountered Talent Stones before; only now did he understand their importance.

He paid no mind to the players bustling about on various errands—these fetch quests familiarized players with the main city’s locations: auction house, weapon shop, armor shop, apothecary, arena, barber, general store, and more. Everyone had to do the fetch quest at least once, as the reward was a general profession skill book.

He would run the errands later—right now, with three Talent Stones in his bag, he faced a grave decision: whether to fuse two or all three into one. This was no trivial matter!

Fusing two Talent Stones allowed him to learn an additional class talent. In other words, at level 10, he could undertake two class advancement quests. While others had only one talent, he would possess two—even if some skills were overwritten, the advantage would be substantial.

"All or nothing…"