Show Me the Money

Chapter 22 – Death Transformation

Haste brings waste. Seriously, haste brings waste!

Fatty muttered silently and wanted to slap himself.

It’s all my damn fault for not controlling my mouth. It’s all my fault for trying to act strong.

Fatty wanted to cry. There were at least six or seven people from the Cloud Dragon Gang waiting outside. I’m just a little rogue without his class enhancement. Isn’t me going to catch their attention the same as chucking a meat bun at a dog?

What’s more, I’m definitely a meat bun, but they’re no foolish dogs that can be easily tricked.

Fatty glanced over and saw Liu Lan’s anticipating look. He made up his mind. A man always keeps his word. F*ck this, it’s just dropping a level, I can get it back. Lord Fatty’s never tried dropping levels!

Fatty continuously chugged down potions as he tanked the arrows from the skeletal archer and arrived at the entrance of the fourth floor.

He took a deep breath.

Then took another.

And another one.

…

“Damn fatty, are you going or not!?” Darksnow was getting impatient.

“Yes, of course I am. Lord Fatty always keeps his word. Just wait, immediately run outside when I send you a message,” Fatty gritted his teeth, then stepped forward.

All of a sudden, a light flashed and Fatty appeared on the previous floor.

“Crap,” the person was shocked. He was someone that Cloud Dragon Sailing sent down to check whether Fatty and co. were still there.

“Come and meet your dooooooooom,” Fatty roared loudly, then pounced at the warrior.

This warrior was rather smart. He knew that he could not match Fatty, so he took a step back and retreated back to the third floor.

Fatty smirked, then followed the warrior up.

“Everyone, be careful, they’re going to… Ugh…”

A sharp blade stabbed into the warrior’s chest before he could finish. Then… Coil! Combo Attack. Several red numbers rose up from his head as the warrior fell down with a look of fear on his face.

It was an instakill.

The group of Cloud Dragon Gang members standing guard around the entrance couldn’t even react in time when a rogue instakilled a warrior in front of them without the latter even able to fight back. Although the warrior had not received his class enhancement yet, the warrior class itself was still a high health and high defense class by default.

“Come chase me!” Fatty charged towards Cloud Dragon Windwielder, a mage. The mage hurriedly backed off as he sent small fireballs flying towards Fatty. However, they wasn’t even enough to slow Fatty down.

Fatty’s dagger easily slit across Cloud Dragon Windwielder’s throat, then easily killed him off with two more basic attacks.

Since Fatty’s attack was still considered a counter-attack, killing his enemy did not turn his name red at all. When he broke free from the encirclement, he crooked his fingers provokingly at Cloud Dragon Sailing. It was only then that Cloud Dragon Sailing finally realized what was going on.

“Chase! Chase after him! Slaughter him! Murder him! Return him to Level 0!” Cloud Dragon Sailing clenched his teeth and ordered his men furiously. Then, a clearly rare lance radiating with a ghastly green light appeared in his hand.

“Charge!” Cloud Dragon Sailing did get his class enhancement rather quickly, so he managed to get in front of Fatty to activate his skill. It was clear that he wanted to use the pitifully low chance to stun Fatty. Even if it was only for half a second, Cloud Dragon Sailing was absolutely certain that he would be able to kill Fatty in that 0.5 second even with his own fists.

Yet… the stun didn’t proc. So Fatty merely scurried away.

Since the area around the entrance towards the fourth floor was already cleared by the Cloud Dragon Gang, Fatty moved around and danced through several players and dodged the different skills thrown at him.

Although the Cloud Dragon Gang had a lot of people, their few abilities that landed only dealt less than a third of Fatty’s max health. On the other hand, due to a single mistake, Cloud Dragon Sailing was assaulted by Fatty using Combo Attack, which nearly wiped out his health. If it wasn’t because the other players doing everything they could to attack Fatty, Cloud Dragon Sailing would definitely have been sent back to the respawn point.

“Mages, stand in a row and cast Fireball. Warriors, stand in front of them. Don’t let him get into melee range,” someone amongst the group was smart, so they took over the command while Cloud Dragon Sailing was resting.

Fatty laughed. He dodged the small fireballs, and gradually distanced himself from the Cloud Dragon Gang and went back into the territory of monsters. He moved swiftly between several Skeletal Knights, then repeatedly mocked the Cloud Dragon gang to provoke them using the cover of the monsters.

“Get him! Kill him! No, I’m going to torture him!” Cloud Dragon Sailing was on the verge of insanity, while his voice echoed through the entire third floor of Mass Grave.

“Oh, come here. I dare you,” Fatty inched outside while continuing to get on Cloud Dragon Sailing’s nerves.

The Knight Commander’s corpse was still lying pitifully on the ground. The drop items have all been picked up. I wonder if the stuff I got was any good. If there’s nothing good, then I would have lost so much from all this!

Fatty casually used Harvest on the corpse. When he heard a ring, he quickly checked out what was the item he got. Then, a brilliant smile flowered on his face when he saw what it was.

Skeletal Spark

Mission Item

A spark formed from a skeleton’s soul. It holds mysterious powers.

Oh man, hard work really does pay off!

“Hahahaha,” Fatty laughed maniacally. “Cloud Dragon scum, keep chasing me if you dare! Lord Fatty’s done here.”

“Keep chasing! Don’t let him get away! Kill him until he’s back to Level 0!” Cloud Dragon Sailing’s face filled with malice, while he chased after Fatty with a lance in his hands.

…

“Alright, you guys can come up now. Be careful,” Fatty said in the party voice chat after seeing the remaining Cloud Dragon Gang members chase him to the second floor, then immediately left the party.

“This damn fat ass…” Darksnow was still rather angry, but Liu Lan merely smiled. She felt like it was already very nice of the fatty to do so much for them.

The Cloud Dragon Gang members were clearly unable to keep up with a full dexterity rogue. The only things that managed to reach him were the attack of a few mages who didn’t get their class enhancement yet. Since their tiny fireballs were of no threat to Fatty, Fatty managed to lead the Cloud Dragon Gang to the first level of the mass graves, then disappeared with a loud laugh.

“Money Grubber. The Cloud Dragon Gang will never be done with you~!” Cloud Dragon Sailing was more than outraged. His handsome face was twisted beyond recognition by his hatred. It was very difficult to imagine just how much hate he felt for Fatty to make him show such an expression.

On the other hand, Fatty continued to laugh the entire journey back. When he hurried back to the Class Enhancement Hall, he saw the thin noble rogue chatting with an NPC wearing a large robe and walking out of the door like real brothers.

“Huh? Reck? What are you doing here? Didn’t you go back to the Imperial Capital?” Fatty was surprised to see the NPC in the large robe.

“Haha, little fatty, it’s you. I’ve already regained my Alchemy Grandmaster title. I came back to see my old friend Salka. After all, he lost his title as a nobility because of me,” Reck, the Alchemy Grandmaster and former alchemy shop owner, smiled.

“Oh? Regained your title? Does that mean…” Fatty hesitated, then rubbed his hands together.

“Haha, don’t worry. I didn’t forget your reward,” Reck laughed, then waved his hand. A pillar of ray light shone down on Fatty.

Ding.

System Notification: Congratulations. You have learnt Alchemy and successfully became an Alchemist. Current Alchemy level: Novice 0/100.

“Reck’s gotten smarter,” Fatty smiled happily now that he received another secondary profession.

Hearing that, Reck blushed but didn’t retort.

“Oh, mentor, I brought the Skeletal Spark back. Can you get me my class enhancement now?” Now that he got his interest, Fatty recalled his reason for coming over.

“Mhm, not bad. So it’s that damn Knight Commander’s soul!” the thin noble looked up proudly as if he won a lottery.

“What do you mean? You mean that other skeletons will also drop this?” Fatty tilted his head and looked at Salka. Why does that seem off?

“Skeletal Sparks are formed from the souls of those skeletons, so naturally every skeleton will have one, including the lowest level Skeletal Soldiers,” Salka looked at Fatty as if he was glancing at an idiot. “I have already regained my honorary noble title, so I’m going to move to the capital. I’ve already stopped helping people get their class enhancement, but since you helped Reck get the Poison Immunity Orb, I’ll make an exception and give you a bit of extra benefits.”

Salka waved his hands. The Skeletal Spark let off a spark, then flew over to Fatty’s chest and merged with Fatty.

“Huh? I don’t feel anything,” Fatty looked around his body. There’s no change aside from my class changing from Thief to Rogue.

“Alright,” Salka nodded. “You are truly fortunate and honored to let a great noble give you your class enhancement.”

“But… You said you would give me some benefits? I don’t see that anywhere?” Fatty couldn’t help but ask.

“Is that so?” Salka asked calmly.

A system notification rang out coincidentally beside Fatty’s ear.

System Notification: Congratulations. You have learnt the skill – Death Transformation

Death Transformation? What’s that? Fatty took a look.

All he could see was that he had a new skill in his skill bar. However, it was completely greyed out with several question marks after its name. There wasn’t any explanation of the skill at all.

“How do you use this Death Transformation? Do I get to transform when I die?” Fatty asked.

“Oh cute little rogue, figure it out in your own time. Stop disturbing the chat between a great and honored noble and his old friend,” Salka waved his hand, signaling the end of the conversation.

“Work hard little fatty. I might have tasks I need your help with after returning to the capital,” Reck said with a smile, then left with Salka.

“Tsk, so stingy.”

However, Fatty was rather happy even though he couldn’t use the skill yet. At the very least, he got his class enhancement and the alchemy secondary profession.

He entered the class enhancement hall once more. There were more people in there now, but that didn’t affect the players.

“Mentor, I want to learn some skills,” Fatty said to the female mentor. Man, Star Fantasia is truly strange for setting a beauty mentor for lecherous rogues.

The mentor smiled sweetly at Fatty,” Rogues have Stealth, Rogue’s Eye, Steal and Close Combat as their level 10 skills. It costs 10 gold coins to learn each skill. Which one would you like to learn?”

“10 gold coins? It’s that expensive!?” Fatty exclaimed.

“I’m sure you can tell that there’s an economic crisis recently, so the market’s pretty bad. We all have to feed ourselves,” the mentor shrugged as if that was only natural.

Damn, even NPCs are embezzling money now. Fatty thought to himself, but still chucked 40 gold coins over.

“All four of them.”

Stealth

Novice

Disappear from sight, causing the enemy to lose sight of the user. The chances of being discovered is negatively proportional to the enemy’s level. While stealthed, the player cannot attack and movement speed is reduced to 50%. Stealth will break when taken damage. Cannot be used during combat. Lasts permanently.

Cooldown: 10 seconds.

Rogue’s Eye

Novice

See some of the statistics of a monster or player lower than the user’s level. Can also see normal traps.

Cooldown: 10 seconds.

Steal

Novice

Steal an item from the target. 1%-5% success chance. The user will be frozen for 5 seconds upon failure.

Cooldown: 3 seconds.

Close Combat

Novice

Passive

Increase melee weapon damage by 10%

Rogue’s Eye was inferior to Fatty’s Appraisal, which is nearly at the Intermediate rank, but it did have the advantage of being able to detect traps. As for the other skills, there was only one attacking skill amongst them, so it was obvious that rogues weren’t meant to farm solo. It was still going to be more convenient for them to team up in order to level up quickly.

However, Fatty was no mere commoner, so he was able to just disregard that. There were only two skills that he cared about.

Stealth could let me peek at girls bathing, and Steal can steal their underwear. Wakaka. Thank god I chose Rogue.