043 Rapid Leveling!

65,000 gold coins!

The high price of the Fear Talent Stone suddenly catapulted Morning Wind into prosperity. With this sum of gold, he could accomplish many things. Moreover, after selling his Blood Dragon Burst equipment using an alternate account, Morning Wind had accumulated over 80,000 gold coins. Gold was scarce now, and there were few in the game who possessed more than him. Once they reached the larger map, the price of gold would soar again, and the need for it would only increase. Morning Wind had no plans to sell any for the time being.

Last time, Morning Wind used the Talent Stone to lure professional players into the arena, winning 150,000 gold coins, which he exchanged for a “Plane Essence.” This could only be traded at a hidden NPC in the main city. The game had just begun, so the amount of gold required wasn’t much—only 140,000 coins. But as the game progressed, millions or even tens of millions of coins might be needed, along with certain equipment and completed quests. In the past, obtaining Plane Essence was exceedingly rare; it wasn’t something one could acquire simply by having gold. Morning Wind hadn’t expected it to be so easy early on.

[Plane Essence]: Plane item.

1. Protects you from being consumed by chaotic temporal currents during planar travel.
2. Upon use, randomly teleports you to another plane balanced with Oglas. Cooldown: 30 days. Level restriction: 60.
3. Allows continued online presence after three deaths in the wild or dungeons per day; upon the next death, you will be forcibly logged out.

Plane Essence enables travel to other planes, making it the rarest traversal artifact in the game. An additional benefit was an extra chance at survival—if killed, you could still log back in. Its true value would shine once they entered the perilous big map.

Morning Wind set aside 10,000 gold coins at the Eternal Auction House to have them gather materials, then pulled Cheng Xue along to level up.

“Morning Wind, isn’t it risky to level up without a healer?” Cheng Xue felt uneasy about the two of them training in Wind Serpent Valley. The wind serpents were level 28 flying creatures, extremely fast, with hate chains that made separating and killing them difficult. Without a healer, tanking them would be tough.

“Don’t worry. With our two pets and your damage, our burst power is more than enough. Besides, Sandstorm Birdmen can whip up sandstorms to obscure vision, making it hard for wind serpents to attack me.” Morning Wind had no concerns about survival—with the passive skill Resurgence Wind and Blood Strike, as long as he maintained the damage mitigation cycle, he’d be fine. “And with just the two of us, the experience is split less—one hour is equivalent to three hours for others. Our leveling speed is fast.”

Morning Wind was aiming for level 25 and wanted to speed things up. Few people could reach level 25 right now, making it difficult to assemble a team for the heroic “Wrath of the Trolls” dungeon. Even in the overseas servers, gathering a full team was tough.

Few ventured into Wind Serpent Valley—the wind serpents were high-level, fast, and clustered in groups of five to eight with linked aggro, making them a nightmare to kill. At low levels, hardly anyone came here.

“Let’s just be careful while killing monsters. If we can’t handle them, we run.” Cheng Xue remained worried; their levels weren’t high.

Arriving at the entrance to Wind Serpent Valley, Morning Wind and Cheng Xue saw a swarm of wind serpents roaming about—clearly, no one had come through yet. Morning Wind summoned his fiery Sandstorm Birdman, while Cheng Xue summoned her blue Thunder Bird. Without hesitation, Morning Wind charged forward, stamping his foot as a surge of lightning spread outwards, dealing area damage and paralyzing the wind serpents, slowing both their movement and attack speed.

Intercept!

Having just secured aggro, Morning Wind immediately intercepted another group of wind serpents, activating Bloodlust Attack and then following up with a sweeping strike to establish aggro.

Guard! Heroic Leap!

After pulling two waves of wind serpents together, Morning Wind immediately guarded Cheng Xue, then leapt back, landing with a heroic leap that dealt area damage, followed by a Whirlwind Slash, firmly locking in aggro. “Don’t worry about me—just keep casting Blizzard!”

To maximize output, Morning Wind barely blocked any attacks—he simply battered away. When his health dropped to 35%, the passive skill Resurgence Wind restored 3% per second, enough for him to withstand the damage.

The Thunder Bird unleashed a barrage of lightning for area attacks, supplemented by Blizzard, creating powerful output. Morning Wind’s Sandstorm Birdman flew to another group, pulling wind serpents over. As soon as a few wind serpents fell, Morning Wind took over aggro from the Sandstorm Birdman.

At this moment, the Sandstorm Birdman summoned a massive killing cyclone, trapping all wind serpents together and dealing heavy area damage. Morning Wind could retreat, letting Resurgence Wind quickly restore his health to 35%, then move on to pull more wind serpents.

[Blood Strike]: Recovery skill. Gather the power of blood to deal 120% attack damage to the enemy and restore 15% of maximum health. Requirement: Defensive Stance. Cooldown: 25 seconds. Cost: None.

Morning Wind still had an orange skill pilfered from the Alliance Arsenal—a rare short cooldown recovery skill, and it also dealt damage. If his health dropped, he’d use Blood Strike to temporarily heal, then let Resurgence Wind restore his health before launching another attack. If things got dangerous, he still had Shield Wall and Last Stand—plenty of options.

Watching the experience soar, Cheng Xue couldn’t believe it was real. Two people farming monsters was even faster than five, and she had no idea where Morning Wind had gotten his recovery skill—it let him heal so rapidly.

Since Morning Wind ignored the loot on the ground, Cheng Xue called two girls from the guild to handle cleanup. When they arrived, they were overwhelmed by the pile of wind serpent corpses. Eventually, three more girls had to join to keep up with the farming speed. None could believe someone could kill level 28 wind serpents as easily as level 5 monsters—this was faster than any newbie farming squad.

Originally, the five girls thought it was a guild event, but when they arrived, they found Morning Wind and Cheng Xue with two spell-casting bird pets, rapidly clearing wind serpents. Even a twenty-man team couldn’t farm monsters as fast—how did they do it? And how could a tank pull so many so quickly?

Two Brotherhood Swords for output, all high-level multi-skill spell pets, a ferocious dual-talent berserker shield tank! All of this created the miracle before their eyes. Not only were the girls stunned, even Morning Wind was surprised—he hadn’t expected his killing speed to be so fast. What was meant to be a three-hour plan was completed in less than an hour.

With a legendary Brotherhood Sword for leveling, and Morning Wind’s exceptional skill proficiency, his killing power alone was tremendous, so leveling speed was naturally swift. Combined with a Sandstorm Birdman with sand magic, the damage output was even higher.

“Sister Xue, could you let us join your leveling party?” One of the girls approached when Morning Wind and Cheng Xue paused to rest, hoping to join their squad. With a team like this, leveling up would be a breeze.

Cheng Xue turned to Morning Wind for his opinion. “Morning Wind, should we bring them along?”

“Alright.” Morning Wind was reluctant, but now that he was level 25, it didn’t matter. For the next three hours, the group leveled up at breakneck speed, everyone’s experience soaring. Equipment drops were distributed to guild players, materials sent to the guild warehouse. In three hours, Morning Wind nearly reached level 26, the girls each gained more than a level, and experience flew upwards.

After clearing the wind serpents around the altar in Wind Serpent Valley over thirty times, Morning Wind and Cheng Xue prepared to leave when the battered altar suddenly lit up. Around the altar, eight broken wind serpent statues shone with different colored lights, all converging at the altar’s peak, as if something was about to happen.

“Is it spawning a boss?” Many leveling scenes contained ancient structures, but Morning Wind hadn’t expected these decorative buildings to hide secrets. He had seen similar situations before, where usually a scene boss would appear. After all, they had killed so many wind serpents—a boss should be emerging.

Morning Wind had everyone retreat, lest the boss spawn and instantly kill them. Yet after waiting two minutes, he realized the altar didn’t spawn a boss but rather a few ancient chests. Seven battered treasure chests appeared atop the altar, seemingly very old.

System: You have triggered the special effect of the Wind Serpent Valley altar. The ancient treasure chests sealed within the altar have descended. When all chests are opened, the Wind Serpent King will be resurrected using the corpses and blood of nearby wind serpents.

“There are treasure chests—and a boss!” Morning Wind’s eyes widened. Scene bosses weren’t something a handful could defeat, so he had no intention of fighting the Wind Serpent King. He just wanted to get the treasure chests. “Let’s go take a look. We can’t open all the chests.”

“Morning Wind, I didn’t expect we’d trigger a scene special effect,” Cheng Xue admitted, anxious. She had heard of guilds triggering similar events while leveling but never imagined she’d encounter one herself.

System: Opening an ancient treasure chest requires 10,000 gold coins.

“No way—who has that much gold?” The girls had hoped to see what these ancient chests contained, but hadn’t expected they’d require 10,000 gold coins each to open.

Morning Wind already knew rare chests required a price, so he didn’t care if the girls opened them or not. Seven chests probably corresponded to the seven people present, but to open one required 10,000 gold coins—only the wealthiest guild leaders in the China region could afford it. Even Frost Snow Guild’s leader, Cheng Shuang, couldn’t cough up that much at once.

After tonight’s auction, gold prices were rising, and it was hard to amass such a sum. It wasn’t a lack of wealth, but simply a lack of gold for sale. Since the game started, 80% of the gold farmed by the gold farming groups had ended up in Morning Wind’s pocket—some from the Talent Stone, some from selling Blood Dragon Burst equipment.

“Let me see what a chest worth 10,000 gold coins has inside!”

Cheng Xue was about to complain about not being able to open the chests, but Morning Wind spoke suddenly and squatted down to open one. The six girls’ eyes widened—they couldn’t believe he had that much gold. Opening one chest required 10,000 coins, worth 200,000 in reality; even if they possessed that much, they wouldn’t dare risk it, but Morning Wind seemed utterly unconcerned, as if it was pocket change.

“Morning Wind, where did you get all that gold?” Cheng Xue knew Morning Wind had no real-world income—where had he gotten so much gold?

“I had an extra Talent Stone and sold it at the auction. I’ve got plenty of gold now!” Morning Wind replied lightly, but everyone was stunned. They hadn’t realized that the Talent Stone sold at tonight’s Eternal Auction was Morning Wind’s. If so, he could open six chests. They were dying to see what treasures worth 200,000 could contain—could it be a divine artifact?