In this village, there were many jobs to be found, basically divided into two main categories.
The first category had no requirements at all. As long as you were willing to work, you could take the job.
Lumberjack, woodcutter, farmer, miner, Shepherd, Pig Herder, Harvester.
Naturally, these jobs did not require much technical skill. Once players accepted a job, the NPC offering it would tell them how to do it, letting them learn an Entry Level professional skill for free.
The other type consisted of jobs that required certain prerequisites, and each job had different requirements.
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First were the militia. You had to get the job from the Militia Captain. The work involved protecting the village from monsters, standing watch, and even following the militia into the forest to clear out monsters.
Xiao Jie was very interested in this job. If he could kill monsters and level up alongside a group of militiamen, his safety would undoubtedly be much more assured.
However, when Tie Qianli, the Militia Captain, heard that Xiao Jie wanted to join the militia, he said Xiao Jie was not strong enough and did not yet qualify for the profession.
Xiao Jie guessed there was probably a level requirement. He was only level one right now, so naturally he did not qualify. Once he reached level five or ten, he should be able to join.
Next was Hunter. Xiao Jie also wanted this job badly. If he could learn Archery, a ranged profession would always be safer. Besides, the Hunter in the village kept several Hunting Dogs, which suggested that Hunters could have pets. Maybe he could even learn a skill like Taming. If he had a meat shield in front of him during battle to tank monsters, it would undoubtedly be much safer.
Yet the Hunter also flatly refused Xiao Jie's request to become his apprentice. He did not even give a reason, merely saying that he had no interest in taking disciples.
This left Xiao Jie quite frustrated. The trigger conditions for this profession were probably rather demanding.
The third was blacksmith. This one was relatively straightforward. With Wang Kai as a senior before him, Xiao Jie directly learned the prerequisites. First, he had to pay five taels of silver as an apprenticeship fee. Back then, Wang Kai had spent a full two years saving up those five taels. On top of that, he had to raise Zhou Tong's favorability to 80.
Xiao Jie was not very interested in this. Five taels of silver meant fifty thousand yuan—far too expensive.
The fourth was Chef, which was relatively cheaper. The apprenticeship gift only cost 500 copper coins.
Cooking was still very practical. Food was a long-term consumable, after all, and learning to cook would undoubtedly save quite a bit of money on buying food.
The fifth was Fisherman. He had to get the job from an old man by the small river south of the village. Through conversation, Xiao Jie learned that the old man was a drunkard and especially fond of alcohol. Xiao Jie guessed that giving him a jug of good wine would probably unlock the job, though what kind of wine counted as good wine was another matter.
The sixth was Herbalist. He could get the job from the Pharmacy Owner and learn herb gathering. However, when Xiao Jie applied, the Pharmacy Owner said his Perception was too poor for the trade. It seemed that his Perception attribute had to reach a certain threshold. There was nothing he could do about that unless he leveled up and assigned points.
The final profession was night watchman. This profession was rather unusual. There was no work during the day; he only had to patrol the village at night. It sounded extremely dangerous.
However, the pay was high as well. He could earn five hundred copper coins in a single night.
This job was triggered through the Village Chief. However, the Village Chief said Xiao Jie's Yang Fire was not vigorous enough, and that working as a night watchman might get him into trouble, so he refused him.
Xiao Jie was somewhat baffled by this prerequisite. Did he need to pray to his ancestors while offering incense, asking for protection from ghosts and gods?
But the BUFF bestowed by his ancestors only lasted seven days. Did this job have a time limit too?
Unfortunately, there was no profession for learning swordsmanship, which disappointed Xiao Jie somewhat.
It was not that he had any particular interest in swordsmanship. Mainly, in a world with immortals and Demons, swords undoubtedly had more style, and perhaps a higher ceiling too.
Taking all these dozen or so jobs together, the one Xiao Jie wanted most was undoubtedly Hunter.
Archery + Taming (suspected)—in Death Game, this combination was practically perfect.
There was no need to explain the advantages of a ranged profession, and having a pet that could fight alongside him would be an enormous advantage.
Three Wild Dogs had beaten I Want to Become Immortal so badly he could not tell north from south, while Han Luo and Xiao Jie, two blank-slate alts, had taken down a formidable Lost Soul Bandit. They had relied on strength in numbers.
A righteous two-on-one was sometimes more useful than any equipment or skill.
But how exactly was the Hunter job triggered?
With no clues at all, Xiao Jie ultimately decided to ask Wang Kai. He had spent three years in the village and met so many players; he surely had plenty of information.
He was only worried that Wang Kai would demand something in exchange for that information. That would be troublesome.
When Xiao Jie entered the Blacksmith Shop, Wang Kai was still hammering away at his Iron Sword. He was single-mindedly grinding away to make money, with no intention whatsoever of leveling up and improving his strength.
"Eh, Brother Following Wind, what brings you here? Buying equipment or buying gold?"
"Do you know how to get the Hunter job?" Xiao Jie asked bluntly.
"Hehehe, little brother wants a pet?" Wang Kai was quite sharp.
"How did you know?"
"About two hundred players come and go through Ginkgo Village, and at least one hundred and fifty of them want pets. How do you think I knew?"
All right, so I'm not the first person to think of this.
"Then can Hunters learn Taming?"
"Of course, but it's not Taming. It's Dog Training, and it can only train dogs. It's decent in the early stages, but once your level gets high, it's not much use."
Xiao Jie could not help feeling disappointed. "What about Archery?"
"That's very useful. At least before you learn spells, Archery is one of the best ranged skills around. You definitely won't lose out by learning it. Of course, that's just what I heard from others. I've never played it myself."
"Then do you know how to get the Hunter job?"
Wang Kai smiled. "Of course I do. It's not really a secret. For a while, it was practically an open secret. But very few people could pull it off. That Hunter has a wife with some strange illness. She stays hidden indoors all year and cannot see sunlight. She needs Century-Old Wild Ginseng to stay alive. As long as you give him one Century-Old Wild Ginseng, you can become Yang Baichuan's disciple.
You'll learn Archery and Dog Training, and when you complete your apprenticeship, he'll even give you a Hunting Dog."
That was a pretty good deal. He even got a pet upon graduation.
"Where do I get Century-Old Wild Ginseng?"
"Pick it in the depths of the valley. If you're lucky, you can find some. The Medicine Shop in Ginkgo Village occasionally stocks it too. It's not expensive—just ten taels of silver per root."
Ten taels of silver! That was a hundred thousand yuan.
Xiao Jie was speechless. That was way too expensive.
"Want to buy some gold? It's only a hundred thousand yuan. Learning Dog Training and getting a ranged weapon skill in the early game is absolutely worth it."
Wang Kai was certainly dedicated. The moment he saw an opportunity, he started pitching his business.
No thanks.
Xiao Jie hurriedly shook his head. He could not come up with a hundred thousand yuan. Besides, he had the [Enlightenment] BUFF. Spending money to learn a standard version of Dog Training would be far too wasteful.
Xiao Jie looked through the jobs he had recorded in his notebook once more, his mind rapidly making connections.
To learn Taming, he simply needed to do a job related to taming animals. Shepherd and Pig Herder both met that requirement, and neither job had any prerequisites. He could completely work from those two professions. With 21 Intelligence, if he could achieve Sudden Enlightenment and figure out blade techniques by himself, there was no way he could not figure out Taming.
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