Adder stared at the village gate as a warrior in leather armour walked across it.
Ding!
[The player induction ceremony is about to begin. Please rush to the shop you are interested in.]
The very moment the notification appeared, everyone in the queue rushed into the now-empty village.
The big queue split as people ran toward all different kinds of shops.
Multiple bigger queues had already formed before a couple of core shops like the blacksmith, baker, butcher, guard, and so on.
But the biggest of all led deeper toward the village head's house.
Now, with the game already being out for three years, people knew what each of these shops had to offer.
Unlike most, Adder rushed deeper into the market.
The biggest problem with his Dungeon Master class was the lack of powerful class skills.
In his past life, he had only relied on the extra stat gains, but that was too limited without any good skills.
To compensate, this time he was aiming for a special subclass.
Soon, he slipped into a small alley as a small, run-down miscellaneous shop appeared before him. This shop was related to witchcraft.
Thankfully, the queue was only a couple of people long. Just as he joined, multiple others rushed in. The line kept getting bigger.
He was not that surprised. While this shop did not have as high rewards as those central shops, it still provided unique witchcraft-related rewards.
All the competition for them was just too much.
In his last life, when he reset his character, he had also made the mistake of choosing those shops. In the end, he had barely gotten to the third stage of the chain task.
That was another thing about these chain tasks. A player could only take one of them. And once you failed, you couldn't take any others.
He shook his head as it was finally his turn.
He entered the small wooden shop. There, behind the counter, sat a small old man wrapped in a big brown robe.
Without a word, she just threw a sharp knife toward him.
Adder carefully caught the knife, making sure it didn't cut his hand, and the next moment, a notification popped up in front of him.
[Chain Quest!!!
Quest: Witch Hunting Quest 1.
Quest Rank: E
(Only players with level 10 or less can take part.)
-> You have passed the assistant witch test by handling the knife.
After seeing your precaution, the witch requests you to bring five pairs of rabbit eyeballs.
Task: Bring five pairs of rabbit eyeballs.
Reward: Basic body preservation, 20 copper coins.
Witch's requirement: 25/5000 rabbit eyeballs.
Failure Condition: Not delivering the eyeballs before the required deadline.
Failure Penalty: Pay 20 copper for renting the witch's knife.
Extra Penalty: Random low curse.
Note: To help with the task, the witch rents you her ritual knife. Destruction of the knife will result in an extra penalty.
]
Adder twirled the knife in his hand while staring at the quest panel.
His main focus was on the failure conditions. First was the total eyeballs requirement.
There were 5000 for 2500 players. He glanced at the big queue behind him and shook his head. Well, at least nobody was going to mess this one up.
The second was also not that hard, to be honest.
As for the reward, the 20 copper coins were nothing, but that was okay, as it was just the first task.
From the dungeon fund, he had saved that last silver. That already made him five times richer.
In Zenaris Online, 100 copper coins equaled one silver, 100 silver equaled one gold coin, and 100 gold equaled one platinum coin.
Beyond that, there were some gems used at very high levels, but those were beyond his past self.
Heck, in his past life, he had only gotten to see platinum coins just one time.
He shook his head and started walking out of the shop, knowing the witch's requirements were going to get stricter with each task.
If he remembered correctly, by the third task, fewer than 100 people would remain after the third-stage quest.
Not wanting to give others any chances to catch up, he rushed toward the village while checking the witch's knife.
[Worn-out Witch's Ritual Knife:
Grade: Mid Trash.
Attack: +1.
Durability: 5/10.
-> Special Enhancement: Any body part extracted using the witch knife will remain fresh for 30 minutes.]
It was a decent nine-inch plain knife. Beyond the special effect, it was pretty much useless junk.
He opened his inventory.
Ding!
[Congratulations, player Adder, you received a beginner sword.]
Adder just sighed. He had kind of forgotten about this thing.
Well, now that it was there, he placed the knife into the inventory and took out a dull, one-arm-length blade. It was full of chips, and he even saw a bunch of cracks.
It had been so long that he had even forgotten about its stats, so he mumbled, "Weapon stats."
[Beginner Sword:
Grade: Low Trash.
Attack: +3.
Durability: 8/10.]
At least it provided more attack stats. Now, equipped with the new weapon, he rushed out of the village.
…
The moment he stepped into the forest, a notification popped up before him.
Ding!
[You have learned the Slash skill!]
Adder nodded and then started poking his sword in the air.
In Zenaris Online, you could gain skills either by training yourself manually.
This was the big reason many players learned martial arts and similar skills in real life.
Or you could use skill tokens that one could gain by killing mobs or doing quests.
The years he had spent in the game came into effect, as in just a few minutes, Adder managed to develop three basic blade skills.
Slash, Stab, and Parry.
The absolute basic sword skills barely enhanced damage by a couple of decimals.
The good thing was that these were plain physical skills, and they did not require any use of mana.
Suddenly, the air around him changed as a thick, damp fragrance entered his nose.
He looked up and saw that the trees before him were much denser, and even the grass grew from ankle height to calf height.
From all this, it was clear that he had finally entered the hunting ground…