MMORPG: The Elementalist

Forming a Clan was not something that could be successfully accomplished overnight.

First of all, you had to first obtain the Qualification Quest to form a squad. After that, you had to wait until you obtained enough strength to enter the Mythical Battlefield—also known as the junction of between the sacred and the evil continent. After accumulating a certain amount of Battle Points here, only then could you obtain the quest to upgrade your squad into a Clan.

In usual cases, players who were sent into the Mythical Battlefield by their squad or Clan were masters who possessed a certain level of battle power. Because having their manpower crippled would also reduce their battle power… in order to accumulate enough battle power in the most efficient way, it was only wise that they send Tier 4 elite players into the Mythical Battlefield. (Sending rookies into that battlefield would be giving away free points)

Having to go back and forth so much, it would require more than half a month for them to accumulate enough battle power. Perhaps they would even need a longer time than that. Of course, throughout the history of the game, quite a number of squads were eliminated from the battlefield by scoring negative scores, and they had never been able to succeed in building their Clans up until today.

So, the Clan that Luo Qian spoke of would definitely not be formed for a while. During this period of time, Qin Ruo could do his own thing with no distraction to get him off track. He could strive to get himself up to Tier 4. He could follow Slayer’s Heart to accumulate experiences and improve his strength. He could also raise money to bare the surgery costs for Xin Yu who had been diagnosed with leukemia.

***

When Qin Ruo returned to the game, it was already half past six in the evening. Qin Ruo confirmed the supplies he had with him. It seemed that they were still sufficient. Leveling up did not seem to consume much as well. Once he reached the bottleneck of his current level, he could straight away prepare to accept a rank-up quest.

But it seemed that he still had some time to spare. So, Qin Ruo decided to head over to the market and get himself a set of Level 38 or perhaps Level 39 Violet Equipment first. He thought he may as well resupply some of his Tier 3 Water Magic Scrolls as a precaution too.

Upon entering the market, Qin Ruo found that the number of resources in the market was obviously much more than it was in the early morning before dawn. The choices on attributes had also become very abundant. When some old players noticed Qin Ruo’s level and equipment, they took the initiative to greet Qin Ruo and invite him over to have a look at the equipment they were selling—a Level 39 player coming into the market naturally meant that he was searching to purchase better Tier 3 equipment in order to prepare himself to progress into Tier 4.

As a result, Qin Ruo also saved himself the trouble of going over to each stall to look for what he wanted. Having the merchants who could provide equipment for Tier 3 Aquamancers taking the initiative to invite Qin Ruo over, all he needed to do was look at the goods and see if they were suitable for him. Then, he could decide whether to buy them or not.

Top grade Tier 3 equipment were still selling well in the market. The number of Tier 3 equipment moving in the market was quite large as well. It did not take long for Qin Ruo to finally come across a few pieces of Tier 3 equipment that he found more desirable for purchase. Their attributes in every aspect were much more powerful than the attributes of the equipment he was currently decked out in. The most important one was in fact a staff.

Gold-tier Water Elemental staffs were rarely seen on the market. Needless to say, their Magic Attacks were naturally higher by a notch compared to the Magic Attack of his Level 35 Frostsoul. Not to mention, a Gold-tier Water Elemental staff would have three extra attributes as well. One of the attributes improved Water Element cast time by 10 %. Another attribute provided an increase of 10 MP, while the last attribute among the three increased Freeze Effect by 3 %. Truth be told, when Qin Ruo first saw the magic staff, he was very tempted to make the purchase…

It was often said that the equipment of Aquamancers had a few attributes that were most sought after.

Naturally, the best thing was to improve Affinity. That attribute included shortening the time of casting magic, improving Attack, and increasing the success rate of Attribute Effects. Affinity was the best attribute there was. It was extremely rare to come by!

The next important attribute would be equipment that could increase Magic Attack. That was the basic and also most practical attribute for Elementalists. The higher the Attack an Elementalist possessed, the greater the status of the Elementalist would be!

A lesser popular attribute would be one that improved Magic Effects. Many Clans had put effort into training that sort of Elementalist. They specialized in Attribute Effects in order to use it in their dealings with Bosses.

Last but not least, among the several good attributes that were the least popular, improvement in the speed of casting magic was also an extremely difficult attribute to gather. Furthermore, the rate of improvement would not be the same. Getting that attribute from two or three normal equipment would not even show any sign of its effect.

Behind these several attributes, of course, there were also some other miscellaneous attributes such as Increasing MP, Increasing HP… Strength, and increasing some aspects of magic. It was just very complicated. However, some of the best attributes were also among those miscellaneous attributes such as additional skills… If it turned out to be a good skill, it could be something that the players would swarm after!

But then again, the Gold Tier 3 Staff was already the best for having the attribute of improving magic casting speed. It could best the attributes of two normal equipment with normal Magic Casting Attribute combined. Other than that, he could use the staff until he achieved Tier 4, and perhaps he could still use the staff a little while more after that…

More importantly, Qin Ruo knew that many Elementalists were putting together a full set of equipment with the attribute of Increasing Speed in order to rapidly cast high-tier magic. That could buy them at least one to two seconds, or perhaps even more time. But Qin Ruo had a completely different thought on that. If Qin Ruo could gather equipment with such attributes, his ability to rapidly control Tier 1 Elementalism would become even faster than before! Having a full set of such equipment would be an extremely horrifying thing especially when a player was in an environment that improved the affinity of the Water Element.

Hence, when Qin Ruo saw that piece of equipment, he was immediately tempted to make the purchase…

However, the price labeled on the price tag was also making it hard for him to decide. It cost a total of 13,000 gold coins. There, he was straight away refrained by the 100,000 gold coins he had finally saved up in his bank. It was not worth it for him to spend that money, man…

Lifting his head, he took a quick glance at the player who was selling the equipment. Qin Ruo noticed that the player was, in fact, a Bowmaster. Qin Ruo felt some pent-up frustration. “It’d be great if he was a Bandit. Perhaps I could use the Gold equipment that Godslayer dropped to trade with him.” While he was muttering relentlessly to himself, the Bowmaster, who had been observing Qin Ruo from the side, noticed that Qin Ruo’s attention had been fixed on the golden magic staff with the highest price tag. He smirked a little as he maintained a smile on his face and squatted down.

“Brother, see anything that catches your interest? The price is negotiable.”

Qin Ruo pointed his finger at the “Frostburst Staff” that he took a fancy to. “That weapon, how much lower are you willing to go for it?”

“If you’re sincere about buying, you can take it back with you for only 12,000 gold coins.”

“That’s too expensive.”

“Expensive… Then you can look at something else.” The Bowmaster behaved as if he was not worried about selling that staff in the coming days.

After he clapped his hands helplessly, Qin Ruo did not show any interest to continue negotiating for a better price. He got up and walked elsewhere. He was suddenly reminded of one thing… If he was ever aimed by some players with bad intentions while he held a piece of eye-catching Gold Weapon in his hand, would it not be an unfortunate event if he got killed and dropped the weapon?

Qin Ruo had never gotten involved in these sorts of ugly things, mostly because his equipment were second-rate goods that were not worth much. If he really hid a Gold Equipment like that on him while he wandered around… Not to mention, he was a Tier 3 player with no squad or Clan… It would be really difficult to imagine what kind of things would befall him.

Although one set of Gold equipment could really boost his strength a lot and garner him more chances to earn more money, if other people could kill him and cause him to drop one piece of his precious equipment before he was successful in obtaining his goals, he would definitely feel utterly anguished, would he not?

After casting away his intention to bargain for the Gold Equipment, he turned towards the market as he decided to search for the remaining pieces of equipment he needed…

However, unexpectedly, the Bowmaster suddenly felt anxious about Qin Ruo’s leaving. After waiting for a long time in the same spot, he did not see Qin Ruo coming back to him to bargain. He could not help but feel annoyed. He thought that he had found a rich imbecile and he could finally sell the Frostburst Staff, which was half good half bad. He never expected Qin Ruo to leave straight away without even trying to strike a bargain with him.

Truth be told, not many players would actually fancy this kind of Gold Equipment. Unless it was a full set of equipment that possessed the attribute to improve casting speed, it would be very difficult for this sort of equipment to arouse the interest of any player out there. The Bowmaster really believed that he had met an idiot. But it turned out that the idiot was actually as clever as a fox. The Bowmaster now regretted that he had given Qin Ruo too high of a price.

Fortunately for the Bowmaster, the situation was not beyond salvage. His target was a Tier 3 player. He could still remember details about Qin Ruo.

***

Along the way, Qin Ruo was still thinking about the attribute of that Frostburst Staff. He was not able to find another weapon that was more suitable for him. It was no wonder though. The Frostsoul he held was already considered a very good weapon among Tier 3 Elementalists… Furthermore, what he came across just now was, in fact, a weapon of Gold Tier. It would truly be like finding a needle in a haystack for him to be able to find a second weapon that was nearly as good as that one.

As he looked at the time, which was ticking towards 7 o’clock, Qin Ruo suddenly received a system notification. It was a voice message request from a stranger. The player’s name was… urgh, “Elf Prince”… It choked him up… Disgusting… Who on earth would give himself a bloody name like that?!

Qin Ruo rolled his eyes as he refrained from greeting the stranger with Brother Da’s greeting style. He accepted the request sent to him by the stranger.

Huh?

It was him.

Qin Ruo was a little surprised. That man went straight to the point and made his intention clear. It seemed that the Bowmaster who tried to sell Qin Ruo the Forstburst Staff only wanted 8,000 gold coins before he was willing to sell it.

“Eight thousand?”

Qin Ruo was slightly moved by the offer. He had cast away all the words of consolation in his mind to comfort himself.

“That’s right. I only want 8,000. I can’t go lower than that.” Even though the Bowmaster clearly said that he could not go lower than that, his anxious tone had given up some information. Qin Ruo was sharp. He was able to catch it. A wicked grin spread across his face as he intentionally tried to make the situation difficult for the Bowmaster. “In that case… I think I’ll pass. You know that I’m just a Tier 3 Aquamancer, and I don’t have much of a background. I’d be killed by the other players and I’d drop my equipment if I ever carry a Gold Tier Weapon like that.”

“Umm… Brother, you’re kidding, right? How can there be such people out there?”

Qin Ruo did not respond though. Three seconds later, the Bowmaster felt helpless and he became willing to compromise even further. “…Okay, 7,500 gold coins, buddy. I really can’t go even lower than that… If I do, I’ll lose money.”

“Stop bluffing me. How much will you lose? It’s not like you’re the one who’s used this weapon. Which Boss did you kill to have it drop this equipment?” Qin Ruo instantly saw through the Bowmaster’s little tricks.

The Bowmaster on the other side chuckled and said, “Hehe, I’ll discount another 500 gold coins for you. And, I’ll give you additional information about where the equipment came from. How about that?”

“Deal!”