Chapter 188: A Strange Suspicion

Who would immediately think of a self created skill?!

Go Minam could not help carefully recalling everything he had done and suddenly broke out in a cold sweat.

Could Ashfall simply be testing him and had now reached the final stage of confirming his suspicions?

No one wanted to encounter another person like themselves.

After all, a reborn person’s greatest advantage was the knowledge gained from the future.

Who would willingly accept the appearance of another person with the same advantage, someone who could compete for all of those precious opportunities?

Go Minam forced himself to calm down.

He pressing his lips together and replied with a question.

[ @HighlyCultured: Why do you ask? ]

[ @Ashfall: I’ve developed a few new ways to use my attributes. They feel a little like the prototype of a skill, so I wanted to ask whether you’ve discovered anything similar. ]

The moment Go Minam read Ashfall’s reply, his shoulders instantly relaxed.

He finally let out a long breath.

Of course.

In his previous life, Ashfall had already been a famous top tier player.

His understanding of the game was far beyond that of ordinary players.

It was not strange at all that he had already noticed some clues at this stage.

Although self created skills had only become publicly known three months later in his previous life, that did not mean no one had created one before then.

This world had never lacked geniuses.

While suppressing the uneasiness in his heart, HighlyCultured replied.

[ @HighlyCultured: Hahaha. Boss, you’re giving me too much credit. My skill dropped from a boss monster. ]

[ @Ashfall: I see. Then have you discovered anything related to this? ]

After receiving the negative answer, Joo Joowon continued.

[ @Ashfall: If you still have any unused attribute points or enough funds, you should find a way to increase your Mental Power. ]

[ @HighlyCultured: Boss, did you discover something new? ]

[ @Ashfall: Yeah. I’ve figured out a few more clues about the rain from before. I think the next disaster humanity has to face may target the mind itself. You should try to find equipment related to mental defense. Over the next few days, it’s also best not to let yourself fall into a mentally exhausted state. ]

Go Minam could not help admiring Ashfall’s sharp instincts.

For players who knew absolutely nothing about the future, it was extremely difficult to deduce how the Age of Apocalypse had arranged the progression of its events.

Of course, veteran gamers and game designers might vaguely notice some clues because of their professional experience.

Even so, very few people dared to publicly announce their guesses.

After all, no one could guarantee they would always be correct.

Once they made a mistake while speaking to the public, they would immediately become the target of countless accusations.

The zombies were a form of physical torment.

After that came mental corruption.

Then, just when players had finally managed to gain a stable foothold and begun believing that the future still held hope, all kinds of natural disasters descended upon them.

The players were like sheep being chased by hungry wolves, forever struggling under the shadow of the game.

Perhaps, in the eyes of higher dimensional beings, the desperate struggle of humanity was nothing more than an entertaining performance.

Go Minam still did not know why he had been given a second chance at life.

He replied to Joo Joowon.

[ @HighlyCultured: Thanks. I’ll keep that in mind. ]

After ending the conversation with HighlyCultured, Joo Joowon lightly tapped his fingers against his leg.

There was something unusual about HighlyCultured.

Joo Joowon had never underestimated the ability of large organizations to gather intelligence.

Many discoveries could indeed be piled up through enough sacrifices.

Some conclusions, however, could never be reached through sacrifice alone.

That was why, while HighlyCultured had been explaining the equipment drop system, Joo Joowon had already noticed something that felt out of place.

Knowing how many items Elite monsters and Bosses dropped was not strange.

As long as a major organization survived the most dangerous early stage, its ability to organize people would allow its teams to expand rapidly.

With enough sample data, figuring out the general drop rates was only a matter of time.

The truly unusual part was knowing that Bosses could also wear equipment.

Speaking from his own experience, if he had not noticed that the belt’s length was wrong, he never would have realized that fact either.

Under normal circumstances, even if someone noticed that a piece of equipment they obtained looked similar to, or was exactly the same as, an item a Boss had been wearing, they would simply assume that the Age of Apocalypse had transformed that piece of clothing into equipment.

HighlyCultured, however, treated equipment worn by Bosses as though it were common knowledge, referring to it as a special drop.

That was very interesting.

Why did he think it was a special drop?

Logically speaking, even if someone discovered that Bosses could wear equipment, it would still be difficult to arrive at that conclusion.

There had never been a game on the market with a setting that classified such equipment as a special drop.

Although Joo Joowon himself had also guessed that the belt had once been worn by the Boss, he had never connected it with the concept of a special drop.

After all, it was perfectly normal for equipment worn by a Boss to drop after the Boss was killed.

In the minds of most gamers, however, the term special drop usually referred to things such as companion pets, costumes, followers, decorative accessories and similar items.

Bosses were already expected to drop equipment when they died.

Who would classify equipment itself as a special drop?

Didn’t the word special imply that something was uncommon?

That was why HighlyCultured’s completely matter of fact attitude in treating it as a special drop felt rather abrupt.

Joo Joowon naturally understood that there were many intelligent people in this world.

There was even a player created Bug Association within the marketplace, formed specifically to search for loopholes in the game for their own benefit.