Two Little Idiots

Ye Fengxing froze. Was this a class quest? Could I finally escape the embarrassment of having only two spell skills?

"Thank you for investing so much in me, Captain." Since he had already received something worthwhile, he could afford a few sickeningly flattering words. He would be leaving soon anyway.

"Come with me." Eske turned and headed toward the Dragonkin Camp, blowing a whistle as he went. Every Dragonkin Guard's name immediately changed back to "Dragonkin Laborer," and their Morale Like a Rainbow buff disappeared. They jogged back to camp, scattered in twos and threes, and resumed digging.

Eske led Ye Fengxing into the enormous cavern. Once he saw that no one else was around, his expression changed instantly. With an eager look, he asked, "Well? Did you find what I asked for?"

"I found it." Ye Fengxing took out Esk's Lost Scroll and handed it to the anxious NPC, watching his expression as he did.

Ye Fengxing's instincts told him something was fishy! This fellow's reaction to the scroll was far too unusual!

On second thought, Ye Fengxing wondered, Am I being too sensitive? The NPCs in Chronicles of the Sky had such advanced AI that a little humanlike behavior was hardly abnormal.

Eske cradled the scroll, a strange gleam flashing through his eyes... His expression kept shifting, from long-awaited anticipation to troubled indecision, with even a trace of deeply concealed fear, as though something about it was forbidden.

What a waste if this guy didn't go into acting! The way those expressions mingled and shifted was downright unfathomable. He could probably land a best actor award without much trouble.

After standing dazed for a short while, Eske finally came back to himself. He cleared his throat, handed Ye Fengxing a slip of paper, and said, "We Dragonkin are an exceptional race. Not only are our bodies strong, but we have also inherited our ancestors' gift for magic. You must make good use of that gift and bring honor to our people."

"Yes." Ye Fengxing had no choice but to play along.

"I know a Dragonkin master mage. He lives at coordinates (XX, XX). Take my letter of recommendation to him. I believe he'll be happy to teach you how to fight with magic."

System notification: Accept the quest "Find the Mentor"?

Of course I would!

Ye Fengxing accepted the quest, bowed to Eske, then turned to leave.

A class quest, huh? Here I come!

"Oh, right. Take this with you." Eske tossed an orb over.

Ye Fengxing caught it, took a look, and immediately grinned. This "captain" really did look after his subordinates. He had even remembered to give him a handy weapon before he left. Nice!

Eske's Precious Orb (blue, excellent quality): Magic Device

Attack: 27-37　Attack speed: 2.2

Constitution +2　Intelligence +6　Spirit +5

Equip: critical strike rating +5

Equip: haste rating +4

Required level: 10

"Critical strikes" let a character deal more damage than usual, generally 150% of normal damage. For instance, if you would normally take 100 Health Points off someone, a critical strike dealt 150. The damage number would also suddenly grow larger and leap into view, creating an utterly mesmerizing visual effect.

Everyone loved critical strikes. After all, who didn't like huge damage numbers? But the stat was genuinely hard to stack, and its effectiveness depended entirely on luck. You might pile on critical strike gear and still never land a crit. When luck was on your side, though, you could crit every single time without wearing any gear at all. The logic behind that... well, there was no logic. It all came down to personal luck.

Sometimes, you couldn't blame society for your own rotten luck...

Haste affected attack speed and casting speed. Some people adored it; others weren't fans.

The prime example of a haste fanatic was that lunatic Lan Xi. Everyone knew he was a PvP addict, and whenever he fought, he never stood still if he could move. He insisted on running around until his opponents' eyes spun. But running alone wouldn't make someone drop dead from dizziness. You still had to put out enough vicious damage to pressure them.

Among the many rules governing spells, there was one unwritten rule: the more powerful a spell, the longer its casting time and the greater its mana cost.

Of course, it was only an "unwritten" rule, because plenty of spells were both instant and immensely powerful, defying all common sense. Naturally, those spells had drawbacks of their own, such as... very long cooldowns.

If you wanted to kill someone, relying solely on long-cooldown skills obviously wouldn't work. A mage still had to chant and cast.

"Chanting" was just a general term. In reality, every spell required chanting to release; the only difference was how long it took. The shortest duration was naturally "none," which made it an "instant spell." As for spells that required some time to chant, players generally called them "cast-bar spells."

While chanting a spell, players could see a casting timer counting down to its release, hence the name.

Generally speaking, when players talked about chanted spells, they meant cast-bar spells.

Naturally, the shorter that cast bar, the better. Who wanted to stand there like an idiot, mumbling away forever? As everyone knew, you generally couldn't move while casting, or all your progress would go to waste. Melee classes often used this mechanic to disrupt spellcasters.

If you don't move, I'll slash you. If you still won't move, I'll use a skill to make you move. Skills that launched, used Knockback, or lifted targets into the air were all things spellcasters thoroughly despised...

Ye Fengxing's style undoubtedly made him the sworn enemy of spellcasters everywhere! Lan Xi's obsession with haste was probably thanks to a certain someone, too. There was no helping it. If you could find a chance to finish an entire cast while fighting that guy, that alone proved you were an expert...

Finish a cast in less time, then use the time saved to do more things. That was haste's purpose in PvP.

Finish a cast in less time, then use the time saved to cast more spells. That was haste's main purpose when fighting monsters.

Choosing between haste and critical strike had always been an endless topic of debate among spellcasters.

Stacking haste meant sacrificing some critical strike. Sure, you could cast more spells, but if you rarely crit, your damage still wasn't impressive. On the other hand, critical strikes depended so much on luck that stacking them might not help. You might be better off squeezing in a few extra casts. Attacking more times within the same period was an advantage in itself.

Of course, melee classes had the same debate. Haste's role simply became "I can get in more slashes than you within the same amount of time." The underlying argument was no different from the spellcasters'.

As for a certain someone's personal preference... he probably belonged to the "haste school."

At this early stage of the game, though, nobody could afford to worry about haste or critical strike. Anyone who managed to get equipment with either stat should count themselves lucky.

Ye Fengxing equipped Eske's Precious Orb. The little orb, glowing white, floated into the air on its own and slowly circled him.

The importance of a Magic Device to a spellcaster hardly needed explaining. It was essentially equivalent to the blade in a melee fighter's hand. A Magic Device could amplify a spellcaster's damaging spells, adding extra damage, so its quality directly determined a mage's damage output.

Eske's Precious Orb seemed like quite a little treasure... Ye Fengxing was extremely pleased with it. After carefully calculating his overall stats every which way, he reluctantly put all five attribute points he had earned from leveling from nine to ten into intelligence. After all, he still needed to level up. However satisfying PvP and killing people might be, he couldn't level through them. They didn't give experience.

A bout of whispering suddenly drifted over from a short distance away...

"Brick, do you think that guy's Brother Ye?" A young archer with "Sky Wanderer" above his head asked his companion doubtfully.

"Probably not. That's definitely an NPC. Didn't you see the 'Dragonkin Guard Squad Captain' title over his head just now?" His companion played a missionary, and his name was a real winner: "Brick to the Face." Just looking at it gave off a thuggish air!

"Holy crap, Brother Ye's fame has even spread into Chronicles of the Sky! There's actually an NPC with the exact same name. Probably the handiwork of some designer at Blue Star. Nice job!"

"We'll ask him later. Let's hurry up and level. You useless bum, I told you to play a warrior, but you insisted on an archer. You said one of us shooting and the other healing would make leveling fast. Why didn't you mention that a monster could slap you dead in three hits?"

"Well... my mistake, my mistake." Sky Wanderer laughed awkwardly and was just about to come up with an excuse when he saw that "NPC" stride toward him.

System notification: One Leaf Windwalk has challenged you to a duel.

Sky Wanderer froze, then suddenly shouted, "What the hell! You're... you're a real person?"

Ye Fengxing gave him a solid punch and laughed. "As far as I can tell, I belong to the same species as you. Of course, if you insist you don't, I've got nothing to say."

Brick to the Face caught on too. He punched Ye Fengxing as well and cursed, "Why didn't you answer any of our whispers earlier? Hiding out in this godforsaken place to level alone. You bastard."

"You whispered me?" Ye Fengxing glanced at his message inbox in confusion.

Whoa! He wouldn't have known without looking, but the sight gave him a shock. More than three hundred private chat requests had piled up in his inbox. Apparently, he was still in high demand. So many people had been thinking of him.

Apparently... after chatting with Lan Xi earlier, he had switched off his message notifications because he was afraid the guy would pull his old tricks again...

"You can hardly call this hiding." Ye Fengxing handled the chat requests as he spoke. "The system forced me to become a Dragonkin. I didn't have a single monster to fight from level one to level nine. I had to level by mining. You think I wanted that?"

"Enough talk. Things are easy now." Brick to the Face rubbed his hands eagerly. "We've got someone to tank, someone to deal damage, and someone to heal. Our three-man leveling party is finally complete. Let's head out."

"Have you two done your class quests?"

"No. Why?"

"Come with me first and finish them. After that, I'll find us a tank, and we can level together."

"Aren't you already... holy shit! Why are you playing a mage?"

"I play whatever I want. I got tired of warriors and wanted a change of pace. Got a problem with that?"

"Damn you... where do we do the class quests?"

"See this mountain? Head south around its base for a little over two kilometers, and you'll find the class mentors."

"That's so far. Can we not go?"

"No."

"Damn, that's not democratic at all!"

"Then let's vote."

In the end, Brick to the Face and Sky Wanderer's two votes against were neatly overruled by a certain someone's single vote in favor... The guy was just that unreasonable. He turned and left without another word, and to keep clinging firmly to his coattails, Brick and Sky could only "painfully" abandon their "noble" principles.

"I know an exploit for beating a level-twenty boss. Yep, that King of the Scarabs you saw. I can solo him. Look, I'm a very democratic person. I always respect your wishes... would you like to reconsider?" That was what a certain someone had said when faced with two votes against his one.

"Let's go see what the class mentors look like." Sky and Brick immediately made their positions clear. With resolute expressions, they strode to the front of the party...