Instant-cast magic was extremely convenient and quick to cast. While it gave mages many advantages in actual combat, its high mana cost had always been concealed by its dazzling effects... In a one-on-one duel, instant-cast magic was undoubtedly powerful. But in a prolonged fight, or one that demanded a large supply of mana, it was better to stick to ordinary spells.
Goldtooth was a rare boss monster with a thick health bar, so Aige had stuck to ordinary magic for better efficiency... But when he needed to save time or land the finishing blow, the instant-cast Fire Blast was undoubtedly an excellent choice.
After the Goldshire Footman was cut in half at the waist by a shovel, Aige had nowhere left to retreat. But that was all within his calculations. Though it looked dangerous, no matter how fragile a mage was, he couldn't be taken down in a single blow. Besides, Aige had already cast Frost Armor on himself as a precaution... Of course, the young master hoped that shield spell would never have to come into play.
The more critical the situation, the calmer a big-match player like the great master became. Each of his last three spells struck more accurately than the one before. When Goldtooth summoned the last of his strength and killed the annoying Goldshire Footman in one blow, he had barely turned around before a series of precise strikes hit him... Frostbolt, Lesser Fireball, and Fire Blast all landed vital hits without exception. The final Fire Blast even became a true finishing move: on top of hitting a vital spot, it luckily scored a critical hit. The combined fourfold damage was enough to send the unfortunate rare boss to the afterlife.
When the Kobold's massive body collapsed to the ground, the young master discovered that he had struck it rich...
Two silver and twenty copper coins, four pieces of wool cloth, and a red six-slot bag. Bags were valuable things, something Aige had learned from Milly long ago. He still remembered the surprise on his wife's face when she received the four-slot bag he had given her. Ordinary people had no access to such wondrous spatial equipment, and even adventurers or adventuring parties rarely had a chance to equip themselves with something so useful.
It wasn't impossible to get by without one, but for adventurers who spent long periods on the road, how could they survive out there with only the limited space in their packs and no spatial equipment to store their necessities? Generally, judging whether an adventuring party consisted of high-level players meant looking not only at their weapons and equipment, but also at whether they had spatial bags like these...
To Aige, this thing was a complete rip-off, but if he put it up at the Stormwind City auction house, it would definitely be in high demand...
On the Azeroth Continent, nobody had ever heard of tailors calling out everywhere, "Bring your own coarse thread, and I'll make you a six-slot bag for free..." In fact, no legitimate tailor on the continent possessed such a heaven-defying skill. What did they know about spatial magic?
As for the wool cloth, he would make it into wool bandages. There were only four pieces, but with him about to enter the junior mage stage, linen bandages seemed a little beneath him...
The Linen Robe of the Eagle was a green-quality, excellent cloth armor piece, and Aige's first piece of name-brand equipment on the Azeroth Continent.
In the game, calling it name-brand would have been a bit of a stretch, but equipment for combat professionals was extremely scarce on the continent. If he put this piece of equipment, with its +1 intelligence and +1 stamina, on the market, low-level mages would definitely fight over it. Honestly, Aige didn't need many gold coins. Apart from improving his living conditions a little, he rarely had any use for them.
But the Azeroth Continent had one advantage: unless equipment was legendary, there was no such thing as soulbinding. He could equip it now and still sell it later if he replaced it; he wouldn't be limited to selling it to a shop or destroying it... This left the young master feeling, We are most gratified.
Unlike in the game, combat professionals on the Azeroth Continent had relatively low attributes... Really low, as one set of comparative figures showed quite clearly.
Every time an ordinary combat professional leveled up, their corresponding primary attribute increased by one point, but the other attributes were harder to predict. As few as one or as many as two points were randomly distributed among the five main attributes. The primary attribute meant intelligence for magic users, strength for Warriors, agility for rogues, and spirit for Priests. Of course, there was also the universal attribute of stamina, which corresponded to health, and so on.
The young master was a magic mage, and in this respect he was leagues ahead of them. Every time he leveled up, his strength, agility, stamina, intelligence, and spirit all increased by one point, while his primary attribute, intelligence, gained an additional point. By that calculation, he gained a fixed six attribute points per level. If those ordinary combat professionals, who could gain at most three attribute points per level, found out, they would probably go half mad on the spot... (The setting here differs somewhat from the game and has been simplified further. Please don't get too hung up on the game's settings. Thank you.)
Aige had now successfully reached level nine, and every level was precious to him, because each time he leveled up, the power of law strengthened his body. His strength, agility, stamina, intelligence, and spirit had all improved considerably compared with before...
The clearest outward sign was that as his level rose, his strength and stamina had each increased by eight points. That was already astonishing, and it showed directly in his appearance. Before, he could have been called frail, but now he was merely a little on the thin side. He had also grown taller, and his actual strength was no less than that of an ordinary Warrior of the same level; he simply had no need to show it normally.
To him, the Linen Robe of the Eagle was merely +1 intelligence and +1 stamina, nothing remarkable. But to other combat professionals, it was equivalent to gaining a whole extra level... Combat professionals on the continent leveled up slowly, and only after long and arduous training did they have a slim chance of advancing. The chance of comprehending a skill at each level was even smaller.
In fact, most combat professionals might comprehend only a handful of spells belonging to their profession in their entire lives. If you later encountered a high-level combat professional, such as a swordmaster over level fifty, and discovered he had only five or six Warrior skills, please don't be surprised. Combat professionals on the Azeroth Continent had a terribly hard time comprehending skills. They couldn't possibly enjoy the same generous treatment as Warriors in World of Warcraft, who could learn dozens of skills simply by paying for them. A combat professional backed by a family might be able to learn a few more from the family's experts, but among ordinary "free combat professionals," having only a few skills was extremely common...
These so-called "wild ones" couldn't inherit skills from their elders, nor did they have enough money to learn from the money-grubbing instructors willing to teach them. They could only make do with the few skills they occasionally comprehended in flashes of inspiration while leveling up... For them, the fundamentals were especially important. Only with high base attributes did they have a chance of taking on others. This made them even more demanding when it came to equipment.
A simple calculation would show it: suppose a Warrior was level fifty. His base attributes at level one would total roughly twenty points. With fifty opportunities to level up, a minimum of two points per level would give him 120 attribute points, while a maximum of three per level would give him 170, spread across five attributes. If a piece of equipment could add several or even more than ten points to his primary attribute, how do you think he would react?
Aige took out the enchanting materials he had prepared earlier, ready to enchant this Eagle-brand garment. He now had enchanting recipes that added +1 to various attributes on equipment, including intelligence, stamina, strength, agility, and spirit. He even had recipes for +1 magic attack, +1 magic defense, +1 physical attack, and +1 physical defense. Naturally, adding +1 to his primary attribute, intelligence, was the best deal for him...
He set to work at once, quickly taking out his enchanting rod. (This story simplifies the enchanting profession. The only rod that will appear is the enchanting rod mentioned here; things like the Runed Arcanite Rod probably won't exist! Kushou finds it difficult to keep track of complicated things like how many glimmering shards and how much nether essence were disenchanted, so all enchanting materials have been simplified into quantities of portions.) Guiding the rod with his mental power, he dipped it in the enchanting materials and traced an intricate magic array onto the excellent cloth armor... The work required an extremely steady hand and great care, as well as patience over a relatively long period.
He spent a full three minutes or so tracing the array onto the cloth armor before it finally took shape. A flash of magical light signaled that the enchanting array had officially taken effect... A description stating that the cloth armor gained one point of intelligence appeared in green among its equipment attributes. The Linen Robe of the Eagle now displayed +1 intelligence, +1 spirit, and an additional enchanted +1 intelligence. As for the materials in Aige's space that could be used for enchanting, only two portions remained.
These had all been accumulated by disenchanting excellent equipment that monsters had dropped before, equipment he couldn't use himself. Just because Aige couldn't use it didn't mean other combat professionals couldn't, and it would have fetched a good price if sold. It wasn't that Aige was unaware of this; he simply had his own views. As long as he had enough gold coins, that was sufficient. In truth, they didn't do much to improve him.
That was the most annoying thing about the Azeroth Continent: even with money, you might not be able to buy what you wanted. If he obtained equipment he couldn't use but that was a minor top-grade item for another profession, such as an Owl-brand piece for Priests or a Monkey-brand piece for rogues and hunters, he could always save it for auction. Surely someone would be willing to pay a high price for such top-grade equipment...
But Great Bear-prefix equipment with things like +1 strength and +1 spirit was a bit of a consolation prize... That was the kind of equipment Aige disenchanted. He had to make choices, or how would he raise his enchanting skill? Money wasn't everything, but without it, you couldn't do anything! The great master understood that well. He was the sort of player who planned before acting, not someone who dealt with everything thoughtlessly in the same way!
Handling items by category like this let him keep himself supplied with gold coins without being so stingy that his profession skills failed to advance for ages... The one thing he hadn't fully considered was that the drop rate for excellent-quality equipment or better seemed awfully low on this continent!