Professional

"200 yuan an hour? What the hell-" The knight opened his mouth to curse, but the moment he saw the cold glint in Moonmark?Shadow Chaser's eyes, he swallowed the rest. "Uh, slip of the tongue, slip of the tongue."

Moonmark?Shadow Chaser seemed to be growing impatient.

"Hmph, if you don't have the money, get lost. I'm not serving you anyway." Moonmark?Shadow Chaser immediately turned hostile. I didn't expect such a pretty girl to be so fierce. Are violent women all the rage these days? Xiao Yu silently complained from the sidelines.

In truth, 200 yuan wasn't much. These days, in-game items were becoming more and more valuable. A piece of fine-grade equipment for levels thirty to forty could sell for several hundred yuan at the auction house. But for low-level characters barely past level ten, it was clearly still hard to accept.

Moonmark?Shadow Chaser continued, "One look and I can tell you two are complete newbies. Why don't you take a look around and see how many mercenaries in the entire game are at my level? An hour is enough for me to help you finish your class quest and gain another two or three levels."

The knight still wasn't convinced. "With 200 yuan, I'd be better off hiring a few adventurers to level us up. I could even hire max-level ones."

"Sure, but how many levels could you gain in an hour?"

"Well..." The paladin was at a loss for words. He really didn't know.

"Let me tell you. Even the fastest power-leveling service right now would do well to get you one level in an hour. There's a penalty system: when a high-level character helps a low-level character level up, most of the experience goes to the high-level one. Low-level characters like you barely get any experience at all. It might even be slower than leveling on your own."

"But hiring a mercenary is different. Mercenaries don't count as party members; they only take twenty percent of the total experience, while the adventurers get the lion's share. So I could easily get you three to five levels in an hour, and I could help you with your class quests too. Could high-level adventurers do that? Class quests are extremely important. Passing them isn't hard, but getting a good result isn't easy. Warlocks can summon many different kinds of demons, and each kind has completely different combat strength. Void demons and abyss demons are very different too. If you did the quest yourself, you'd be lucky to summon a voidwalker. You might only be able to summon an imp or something. But with my help, you could summon a felguard at the very least. A berserker demon or demon knight wouldn't be out of the question either."

Her speech left the two of them speechless, but Moonmark?Shadow Chaser went on, "Still, you don't look like the kind of people who'd spend several hundred yuan to summon a powerful demon. Don't waste my time. Go find those mercenaries over there. They're cheap; you can hire them for next to nothing." As she spoke, she pointed at the mercenaries around level ten nearby.

With that, she paid the two no further attention.

She really is a professional player, Xiao Yu thought. That makes things easier. He was a professional player himself, so he knew exactly what people like her were like. As the saying went, they took money to do a job. As long as he spent some money, it wouldn't be hard to deal with her. She might not only stop being a problem, but even become an asset.

In the end, the warlock hired a level 11 druid mercenary for only a few dozen silver coins. Considering that druids could turn into bears to tank monsters and also heal, it was a pretty good choice.

Once they had left, Xiao Yu carried his glass over to Moonmark?Shadow Chaser. "Hello, beautiful lady. May I buy you a drink?" He spoke night elf language with an authentic Darnassus accent.

Moonmark?Shadow Chaser glanced at the night elf in front of her. Accardo?Nightwhisper. His name alone showed he was just an ordinary night elf NPC. These guys all looked alike. When Moonmark?Shadow Chaser had first started playing, she had been quite interested in talking to these NPCs, thinking she might uncover some special events through them. She had always played her role seriously—a cold and aloof female night elf rogue with a strong sense of justice. Later, she discovered it was a complete waste of time. Level 1 civilians like these simply didn't have any valuable quests, only minor quests with romantic storylines at best. Those were a pleasant surprise for casual players who enjoyed experiencing the story, but meaningless to a profit-seeking professional player like her. After a while, she couldn't be bothered with them anymore.

"If you have something to say, say it. Otherwise, get lost."

"Heh, you certainly have a personality, beautiful lady. As a matter of fact, there is something I'd like your help with."

"Go on, what is it? Let me tell you upfront, though, my help doesn't come cheap."

"Two hundred yuan an hour, right? A professional is definitely worth that price. I just don't know whether you're professional enough."

"Huh? You're not an NPC!?" This time it was Moonmark?Shadow Chaser's turn to be surprised. She thought she was a good judge of people. No matter what template players used in the game, they always seemed out of place somehow. But the person in front of her really had seemed like nothing more than an NPC a moment ago. She was immediately intrigued.

"Tell me, what's this quest of yours?"

"It's simple. I want you to help me steal something, something very important to this village. It's inside the village's nature temple."

"Are you crazy?!" Moonmark?Shadow Chaser was confident in her abilities, but she still knew her own limits in some matters.

"I wouldn't dare steal anything from the temple. If I did, I'd be wanted. I'm not interested in running off into the wilderness to become a monster just yet. A mere 200 yuan isn't worth taking such a huge risk, so you'd better find someone else."

"Of course I wouldn't ask you to do it. In fact, I'll take it myself when the time comes. You just need to keep me safe while I'm taking it and kill any adventurers who try to stop me. I'll take care of the temple guard NPCs. How about it?"

Moonmark?Shadow Chaser hesitated for a moment. She did dare to attack adventurers; after all, killing them didn't give her any evil points.

"Fine, but it won't be cheap. One thousand yuan."

"No problem." Xiao Yu agreed without hesitation. Compared to the importance of this quest, he could afford 1,000 yuan. That was how it was for a professional player: before making money, you had to invest some. Once his template improved, he could earn it all back later. Still, to be safe, they needed to sign a contract.

Xiao Yu spent five minutes drafting an in-game employment contract. It essentially stated that he would hire Moonmark?Shadow Chaser to help him seize a treasure from the temple on the day of the monster siege, for a fee of 1,000 RMB. A breach of contract would require compensation of ten times that amount.

In this era, there were so many professional players that laws governing in-game contracts had become very comprehensive. There was basically no need to worry about the other party breaking the agreement. Once the two had settled the terms of their cooperation, Xiao Yu logged out of the game.

Now, all that remained was to wait for the time to come.