MMO: Pierce Heaven Til’ It Breaks

[You have failed to infuse your weapon with a new attribute. The Holy Crystal vanishes…]

[You have failed to infuse your weapon with a new attribute. The Holy Crystal vanishes…]

[You have failed to infuse your weapon with a new attribute. The Holy Crystal vanishes…]

Three consecutive attempts at Attribute Infusion ended in failure, and the Orange Quality Bow stayed at +1 Holy.

Li Yi shook his head helplessly. Attribute Infusion was not a sub-class, it was just a spell all players could use. In other words, succeeding or failing to infuse an attribute did not increase one’s Mastery at it whatsoever. The only way to increase the infusion success rates would be to improve one’s relationship with the Foreignland’s only Infusion Mentor, Naixiu…

After Naixiu taught the players Beginner-level Attribute Infusion, she ignored them completely. Now, the only way to slowly increase her affinity would be to give her one of her favorite gems, the Rainbow Diamond.

Li Yi knew where the Rainbow Diamond dropped, but as he was now, there was no way he could reach that place. The difference was too much to overcome. To make things worse, the Rainbow Diamond was extremely rare, so even if he could reach that place, he may not be able to obtain one.

Right now, he had no choice but to rely on luck!

Li Yi held up another Holy Crystal and slowly infused it into the Orage Quality Bow.

“Ding!”

[Congratulations, you have successfully infused your weapon. It is now Holy +2!]

There was a cheerful jingle, and Li Yi’s spirits lifted. It finally worked…

The Hunter Goddess enthused, “What power! I can sense that the Wrath of the Stars has obtained a boost in its overall attributes. Young hero, if you can continue to strengthen this power, I’ll definitely be able to break past the new seal with it.”

If he had infused a regular weapon with the Holy Crystal, all it would gain would be additional Holy points, whereas the other attributes remained unchanged. The Orange Quality Bow was different, however. With the infusion of a Holy Crystal, all of the Orange Quality Bow’s attributes would change. When it had Holy +1, all of its other attributes were enhanced by 1%. Now that it was Holy +2, all of its other attributes had a 2% increase.

According to the mythology, the Wrath of the Stars was a legendary weapon that had shot down Mount Pantheon. Although its attributes were presently no match for the other Orange Quality Weapon, the Megasnake Bow, that did not mean that the Wrath of the Stars was weak. In order to use its full power, the player had to unlock all of its seals.

Let this be third time lucky!

Li Yi took out another Holy Crystal and infused it into the Wrath of the Stars smoothly.

When a weapon started off without the Holy attribute, the first infusion would definitely succeed. However, the second time was much more difficult, with a success rate of less than 5%. That was why Li Yi continued with consecutive infusion attempts.

At the third infusion, the success rate changed again, rising to 80%. As a result, very few ever failed at the third infusion. After that, however, the rate would never again go above 5%. Instead, it would continue to fall with no chance of ever rising again.

[Congratulations, you have successfully infused your weapon. It is now Holy +4!]

There was a glow of rainbow-colored light, and when the [Holy +4] words appeared, the Wrath of the Stars gained a 4% increase in all its attributes.

“What power! However… it is still not enough. I need more power, young hero, please continue…”

The annoying Hunter Goddess seemed oblivious to the risks Li Yi was taking. She just stood next to him and urged him to continue because the addition of the Holy attribute to the Wrath of the Stars had granted her a power boost as well. Her body was almost solid now.

Li Yi toyed with the Wrath of the Stars for a while before placing it on the ground.

He did not continue infusing the Orange Quality Bow. Instead, he removed every piece of equipment without the Holy attribute from his character and began to infuse the attribute into those instead.

In the blink of an eye, every piece of Li Yi’s equipment had the Holy attribute.

Now that all of his equipment had Holy +1, Li Yi picked up the Demon God’s Hunter’s Breastplate with Holy +3 and began to infuse it.

[You have failed to infuse your equipment with a new attribute. The Holy Crystal vanishes…]

[Your equipment has lost its Holy attribute…]

As the Demon God’s Hunter’s Breastplate came with Holy +3, the system recognized this as the fourth infusion. The failure of the fourth infusion meant that the Holy attribute counter returned to zero, and there was not even one point left…

Li Yi was not bothered in the slightest, and he continued to infuse it.

[Congratulations, you have successfully infused your equipment. It is now Holy +1!]

[Congratulations, you have successfully infused your equipment. It is now Holy +2!]

After a successful third infusion at an 80% success rate, the Demon God’s Hunter’s Breastplate reached Holy +4.

Li Yi checked how many Holy Crystals he had left. Thirteen.

Putting down the Demon God’s Hunter’s Breastplate, Li Yi continued to infuse the other equipment, using up 9 Holy Crystals and eventually raising a pair of bracers up to Holy +4.

Now, he had only 4 Holy Crystals left!

Li Yi took a deep breath and picked up the Demon God’s Hunter’s Breastplate. His hand sparkled with rainbow-colored light as he began the infusion process…

[You have failed to infuse your equipment with a new attribute. The Holy Crystal vanishes…]

[Your equipment has lost its Holy attribute…]

Again!

Li Yi picked up the Holy +4 bracers and chose to infuse them.

[You have failed to infuse your equipment with a new attribute. The Holy Crystal vanishes…]

[Your equipment has lost its Holy attribute…]

It failed again!

There were only 2 Holy Crystals left. Li Yi picked up the Orange Quality Bow and chose to infuse it.

[Congratulations, you have successfully infused your weapon. It is now Holy +8!]

The fourth infusion was a success!

Li Yi took a deep breath and picked up the last Holy Crystal. His hands shone with rainbow-colored light, and he held them over the Orange Quality Bow with an air of determination…

If this failed, the 600+ pieces of worthless Holy equipment he had collected earlier would all be for nothing…

Well, go big or go home!

[Congratulations, you have successfully infused your weapon. It is now Holy +16!]

The cheerful jingle rang again, and the fifth infusion was a success. The Wrath of the Stars’ Holy attribute doubled, and all of its other attributes gained a 16% increase as well.

“The Wrath of the Stars’ attributes have increased again, but… It’s not enough, young hero. Please continue…”

The annoying Hunter Goddess was still urging him on, infuriating Li Yi so much that he rolled his eyes at her. With a flick of his wrist, he forced her back into the Orange Quality Bow.

If he had any more Holy Crystals, he would definitely continue on. The problem was that he had completely run out.

He had used 30 Holy Crystals and ended up with an Orange Quality Bow with Holy +16. Overall, his luck was not too bad.

Li Yi was quite satisfied with his infusions this time around.

Aside from his weapon, of his ten pieces of equipment, three had Holy +2, five had Holy +1, and two were blank slates, having failed. Add that to his weapon’s Holy +16, Li Yi now had a total Holy attribute point tally of 27 points!

What was Holy +27? His Territory Power alone would end up four to five times its previous strength, and that was setting aside its effect on his overall attributes…

Li Yi savored his Orange Quality Bow for a while before he glanced at the clock and logged off.

He had Holy +27 now, but it was still impossible for him to simply saunter out of Karan City. If he left the straw hut, the only thing awaiting him outside was death.

Still, he had a Sacramental Stone Fragment with him, so even if he died and was sent back to his country, he would not lose too much. In that case, though, he would have to run all the way back here, and it was just too long a journey to be worth it. He might as well just log off and take a break until it was time to log on again tomorrow. By then, Aragon would give him another Morphing Potion.

The next day, Li Yi logged on and chose the right time to slip out of the straw hut. He then avoided the Demon Soldiers on patrol, making a beeline for Aragon’s dwelling.

Aragon had not left his house yet, so when Li Yi rushed in, Aragon was stunned for a second before he threw him a Morphing Potion.

It was only Li Yi consumed the Morphing Potion that Aragon’s gaze on him softened. After exchanging a few pleasantries, Aragon continued to tell him about the demons’ history.

Li Yi pretended to listen carefully, but in truth, he was secretly surfing the posts on the official forum.

He had heard the so-called demonic secrets Aragon was ranting on about one too many times and had completely lost all interest in them.

After Aragon spoke for a whopping half an hour, Li Yi finally received the system notification. [You listened to his demon history lesson, so Aragon’s affinity with you has increased by 2,000 points!]

The increase in Affinity meant that Aragon’s name as displayed above his head changed as well. It was no longer yellow, signifying Neutral, but was now green for Friendly.

He was finally making some headway into the Demonic Camp.

Aragon said angrily, “Ruth, the green-skinned demon wandering outside Karan City, is the worst. A few days ago, it stole my Summoning Spell Tome when my back was turned!”

“Ding!”

[Will you accept Aragon’s quest, Revenge on Ruth?]

Li Yi nodded to accept it.

Now that the two of them were on Friendly terms, Aragon would give him a random quest every day. If one wanted to increase his Affinity, they had to complete his quests.

[Quest Title: Revenge on Ruth]

[Quest Contents: Find the green-skinned demon outside Karan City, Ruth, and take back Aragon’s Summoning Spell Tome.]

[Quest Difficulty: Rank C.]

[Time Limit: 48 hours. If you don’t complete the quest in time, Aragon’s Affinity with you will drop.]

[Quest Tip: The green-skinned demon, Ruth, has often been sighted in the Demonic Forest. Perhaps you might find it there.]

[Quest Reward: ???]

…

The quest timer began ticking down before Li Yi even left the straw hut.

“F*ck!”

Li Yi cursed and ran out of the straw hut, racing toward the outskirts of Karan City.

The green-skinned demon, Ruth, would randomly spawn at one of the areas within the Demonic Forest. At first glance, it looked just like any other green-skinned demon, but the only difference was that it had a name and was not simply called ‘green-skinned demon’.

By the time he left Karan City, Li Yi’s morph had also run out. He dove headfirst into the Demonic Forest and scoured all over.

Aragon’s random quests were extremely frustrating because the quest monster would spawn completely at random. The Demonic Forest was huge, and there were demon monsterlings everywhere, so it was quite difficult to locate the quest monster.

Thankfully, Li Yi had a Divine Looking Glass with him. Although it was pretty useless at finding strong monsters, it was perfectly accurate when searching for quest monsters.

[Ruth the Demon. Level: 110. HP: 75,317,221. Target’s current location: 897 steps to your left.]

Li Yi aimed the Divine Looking Class to his left and checked it again, only to see that the notification had changed.

[Target’s current location: 897 steps straight ahead!]

There was no doubting it!

Li Yi launched a mad dash in that direction.

Along the way, he saw many other demonic monsterlings, but Li Yi ignored them all. Not everyone could do that, but with his Pseudocide and Camouflage, Li Yi was perfectly capable of fleeing from battle and keeping himself safe.

Li Yi finally arrived at Ruth’s location. However, the scene unfolding before him took him somewhat by surprise.

The green-skinned demon, Ruth, was surrounded by a group of players, and it could not break past their barricade no matter what it tried, so it just roared over and over.

The leader of the group was none other than Fluttering Snow Purple Water Chestnut!

…