Silver Wolf King

After running for five or six minutes, Wu Shaozhen finally reached the depths of the valley and spotted an enormous Silver Wolf. With its proud head held high, it actually had the bearing of a king.

"Holy shit, you can tell just by looking that this thing's a beast," Wu Shaozhen muttered, casting Insight on it.

[Silver Wolf King] (Bronze boss)

Level: 10

HP: 200,000

Attack: 550

Defense: 200

Speed: 40

Skill 1: Extreme Speed: Lets out a long howl, gaining 50% attack speed and 50% movement speed for 30 seconds. Cooldown: 2 minutes.

Skill 2: Dire Wolf Roar: The Silver Wolf throws back its head and howls, dealing a sonic attack equal to 130% attack that ignores defense to all targets within 10 meters, and reducing their damage output by 30% for 10 seconds. Cooldown: 1 minute.

Skill 3: Summon: When the Silver Wolf King's HP drops to 30%, it summons nearby Silver Wolves to fight alongside it.

"Holy shit, a Bronze boss! Doesn't that mean it can drop Bronze equipment? But those stats are insane. Two hundred thousand HP-even if it stood still and let me hit it, I'd need over two hours. And that's not even counting those bullshit skills. Its second skill hits everything in range and ignores defense. With my current HP, I'd get one-shotted. Isn't this fucking difficulty a little excessive? This is a Novice Village boss? And that third skill is downright cheating. How many Silver Wolves are in this valley? If it summons all of them, how the hell am I supposed to fight?" Wu Shaozhen looked utterly dejected. He had thought another big payday was waiting for him, but there was no fucking way he could fight this thing.

Forget it. If I can't take it on, surely I can stay out of its way? Wu Shaozhen backed off. Getting to level 10 and heading off to choose a class was the way to go. With that, he went back to his endless monster-grinding mode.

Meanwhile, in every Novice Village except Beginner Village 8365, major factions were gathering players to take down the Boar King. Someone from Beginner Village 8365 had posted the Tusk Greatblade's stats on the forums, leaving countless people green with envy. Plain equipment simply couldn't compare to Black Iron equipment, so everyone had begun attempting the Boar King. Since someone had already killed it, they figured it had to be beatable.

Reality, however, delivered a brutal slap to their faces. Countless teams suffered devastating losses, yet not a single one managed to kill the Boar King. Many teams sacrificed player after player to whittle its HP down to 10%, only for a single heal to bring it back to 30%. Then, by the time they wore it down again, five minutes had passed and it healed once more. The cycle repeated until they had no choice but to give up. They simply lacked the damage. The Boar King had 120 defense, and very few players could currently break through it, leaving them nowhere near capable of taking off 30% of its HP within five minutes.

Then the entire forum exploded. Everyone was tagging Dustseal, hoping to learn how he had killed the Boar King, but no reply ever came.

"The forums are blowing up," Lin Zi said with a gloating grin as he closed them. The forums could actually be accessed in-game, but Wu Shaozhen had been so focused on killing monsters that he knew nothing about any of this.

"Should I jump on the bandwagon? I want to know how he killed the Boar King too," Hao Ran said.

"His talent must counter the Boar King's healing. Otherwise, there's no way anyone could deal fifteen thousand damage in five minutes at this stage, especially with the Boar King's defense as high as 120," Jun Lin said with certainty.

Elsewhere...

"Miss, didn't you say you knew who Dustseal was? Could you ask him how he killed the Boar King?" Uncle Liu asked Su Muxue curiously.

At the mention of this, Su Muxue's cool, aloof expression vanished instantly. Looking a little embarrassed, she said, "I can't contact him yet. He hasn't added me as a friend."

"Uh, all right."

"Achoo! Who's talking about me?" Wu Shaozhen rubbed his nose and continued tirelessly slaughtering Silver Wolves.

Finally, after nearly six hours and 152 Silver Wolf kills, he reached level 10. Only four pieces of equipment had dropped, though.

[Silver Wolf Belt] Plain: HP +50, defense +5

[Silver Wolf Bracelet] Plain: HP +20, attack +12, attack speed +1%

[Silver Wolf Boots] Plain: Speed +6, defense +4

[Silver Wolf Legguards] Plain: HP +60, defense +4

He could use all three pieces apart from the [Silver Wolf Legguards], and the [Silver Wolf Bracelet] was an excellent piece too. He quickly equipped them. His stats changed as follows: level: LV9 → LV10; HP: 680 → 730; MP: 140 → 150; physical attack: 20 → 32; physical defense: 40 → 42; movement speed: 50 → 52; EXP: 60/20,000. Everything else remained unchanged.

He opened the Auction House and saw that quite a few people had already listed Toad equipment, with prices ranging from 5,000 to 20,000 yuan, but none had sold. He figured players with money and strength no longer wanted this equipment, while the remaining solo players weren't willing to spend that much on it. After a moment's thought, Wu Shaozhen listed his replaced [Toad Belt] and [Toad Boots] for 2,000 yuan each. Even a little money was still money. He listed the remaining [Silver Wolf Legguards] for 10,000. No one else could fight Silver Wolves yet, so some big spender would still buy them. Sure enough, all three pieces were snapped up almost as soon as he listed them, netting him 12,600 yuan. Sigh. After just one night's sleep, his income from selling Plain equipment had fallen sharply. After all, Plain equipment now offered players only very limited improvements.

Finally, level 10. Time to hurry back and have that old village chief teleport me to the Main City to choose a class. But first, I should turn in the Silver Wolf quest. Looking at the more than two hundred fangs in his bag, he knew they would bring him another batch of experience and money. Materials of the same type could stack up to 1,000 in his bag, so they didn't take up much space.

Wu Shaozhen soon returned to the Novice Village and found the general store owner to turn in the quest. He was the one who had issued the Silver Wolf Fang quest. Wu Shaozhen handed over 100 fangs and received 2,000 EXP and 10 Silver Coins-a very generous reward. He sold all his remaining materials to the owner for over a hundred Copper Coins.

Wu Shaozhen found the village chief at the village entrance and said politely, "Hello, Chief. I've reached level 10. Could you teleport me to the Main City?"

"Oh? Adventurer, the speed at which your strength has grown astonishes me. However, I'm very sorry, but the teleportation array leading to the continent's Main City has fallen into disrepair after going so long without maintenance. Could you help me by killing the Silver Wolf King in Silver Wolf Valley and bringing me its Monster Core? With the Silver Wolf King's Monster Core, I can repair the teleportation array and send you to the Main City," the village chief said.

Ding! The village chief has issued you a quest. Quest objective: Go to the depths of Silver Wolf Valley, kill the Silver Wolf King, and bring its Monster Core back to the village chief. Quest reward: Title [Novice Village Hero].

"What? Are you kidding me? I still have to fight that wolf?" Wu Shaozhen was utterly speechless. He had thought that even if he couldn't beat it, he could at least avoid it. In the end, he still had to face it. Sigh.

Though he was extremely reluctant, he had no choice but to accept the quest. Otherwise, he couldn't get to the Main City. Besides, the reward was actually a title. Titles were extremely difficult to obtain, and players could equip multiple titles and stack their stats, though they could only choose to display one or hide them all. No one could turn down a title reward.