Chapter 72 - Crafting Tools and Team Gathering

Several players walked up to him to chat and ask about the pegasus.

"How did you get this?"

"Can’t say, but logically, it was a mission reward. There’s a lot of hidden stuff scattered around the world, so I’d recommend exploring as much as you can."

"Can I pet him?"

Arthur smiled. "Go ahead."

He sat on the plaza bench, chatting with player after player and letting them mess around with his pegasus. None of them tried to mount it, obviously. That would’ve been pushing it.

The goal was simple: plenty of them were taking screenshots and recording, since Arthur had just become the first player to own a flying mount. The first to own any mount at all, actually.

And that only made his reputation grow.

Louise, who had been buried in her training lately, showed up at the plaza to talk to him.

It was cold, snowflakes catching in her hair. She sat down beside him and tucked both hands under her thighs.

"It’s officially yours now, huh? Congrats," she said, smiling at him. "I could really use a ride, honestly."

"Tsk, a ride? You think I’m your personal driver?"

Louise smacked him on the head.

"Stop being an idiot. I’m sick of this cold and I just want to go somewhere warm. I dream about the beach every single day."

The Aldora Kingdom wasn’t entirely buried in snow. The northern regions were warmer, and of course it varied by season. Since it was winter and they were in the south, escaping the snow wasn’t exactly easy.

Arthur genuinely wanted to help her, since he was itching to visit distant regions himself, but right now it was out of the question.

"I need to get stronger before heading to the central and northern areas. When I’m ready to take you, I will. Don’t worry about it."

Louise shrugged, her expression a little pouty. "Fine, I’ll wait."

She chatted with him a bit longer, then left.

Point Blank came by too, along with Suzy and Tower. Shadow Cloak had vanished and was already back to grinding monsters. She didn’t waste time.

"When are we heading to that dungeon?" Suzy asked, keeping her voice low. "I’m really excited to explore it."

She made sure no one nearby could hear. Not that it mattered much. Everyone was so focused on the Cloud Chaser that they weren’t really paying attention to Arthur or what he was talking about.

"We can actually head there right now. We can fly over in no time. We just need to pick up some potions and some repellents."

"Repellents?"

Arthur nodded. "Exactly. Alright, let’s go then. I don’t want to waste any more time. I still need to collect materials after getting the blueprints."

The first step was getting the blueprints for his new level 20 gear, items good enough to carry him all the way to level 30. Arthur already knew exactly where he’d find the ores he needed to craft the armor and weapons.

Before they left, everyone split up to hit different shops for supplies.

"I’m going to craft some tools before we go," Arthur told them. "Start buying the supplies. I’ll send you the list."

He blew the horn and had Cloud Chaser return to his inventory, the pegasus vanishing from the plaza. Without it there, the other players quickly lost interest and went back to doing their own thing.

Arthur headed to his shop to use the crafting station. He grabbed the materials directly from the store’s stock. Since he was just making basic steel tools, everything he needed was already there. No need to buy anything or go hunting for resources.

He just had to log what he took and deduct it when he collected his profit percentage from the shop later. Simple.

’Finally crafting collection tools. Should’ve done this a long time ago.’

He thought back to all the crocodiles he’d killed in that swamp and left without skinning. From what he knew, selling crafted items was impossible, but everything dropped or collected from the world could be sold freely.

That meant materials could serve two purposes: use them for crafting, and sell whatever was left over. Collection could actually be a solid income stream for him.

Anyway, he selected the blueprint for a steel skinning knife, crafted it, then did the same with the rest of the tools: a shovel, a pickaxe, an axe...

And every single one of them had special attributes because of his class.

[Steel Skinning Knife (Rare)]

[Allows the user to collect hides from creatures up to level 30]

[Bonus: +20% material yield when collecting]

[+10% chance to preserve quality when collecting]

These bonuses existed because of the Soul Artisan class. Regular tools, especially starter ones, just enabled resource collection. They didn’t actually affect quantity or quality.

In other words, Arthur was already starting with a huge advantage over players using standard tools.

"Incredible," Arthur murmured, unable to hold back his grin.

And the same effect applied to every other tool he crafted. The values were identical across the board, so apparently the system gave a fixed bonus to anything classified as a tool, unlike his weapons and armor that received those random Soul Augments.

After crafting everything and storing the tools in his inventory, Arthur met up with the rest of the group to head to the dungeon.

Shadow Cloak had come back to the city too. They’d messaged her.

"No way I’m missing out on this," she said. "I want to be the first to clear it too."

Shadow Cloak was obsessed as always with being first on the level ranking, first to clear dungeons, first at everything.

Her competitive drive was honestly impressive.

"We’ll need 2 trips," Arthur told them. "Cloud Chaser can’t fit more than 3 people. Everyone okay with that?"

There were 5 of them total: Arthur, Tower, Suzy, Point Blank, and Shadow Cloak. Two trips was unavoidable.

Still, it was way better than making 2 of them walk. That would’ve taken ages compared to flying.

Teleportation would’ve made everything easier, but since the area was a secret location, the elves still needed to set it up and link the city. In Arthur’s past life, that had taken a long time because it had to be negotiated with Ray.

Either way, nobody complained.

"Waiting in the city is a hundred times better than hiking all the way there like an idiot," Tower said. "And what kind of name is Cloud Chaser? You couldn’t come up with something less generic for a pegasus?"

Arthur had to laugh. "Are you serious? Look at your own nickname for a tank..."

The girls laughed too. Tower looked mildly embarrassed but recovered quickly.

"So who goes first?"

Arthur already knew the answer to that one.

"Point Blank and Shadow Cloak," he said immediately.

The reason was simple: he had a better relationship with both of them, and he wanted to enjoy the flight with 2 beautiful women by his side.

Tower didn’t complain, which surprised Arthur, since the guy loved to complain about everything. Suzy, on the other hand, was clearly dying to go with him. You could see it all over her face.

Arthur blew the horn and called Cloud Chaser back. He helped the two girls climb on, and somehow, neither of them wanted to be in the back.

"I’ll take the front," Shadow Cloak said. "Ehh, I’d rather have a better view while we fly. Point Blank can go behind."

That basically meant Arthur would end up sandwiched between the two of them, which was far from a bad thing. If anything, it was shaping up to be one of the best trips of his life.

Arthur grabbed the reins once both girls were seated. Cloud Chaser broke into a short run and beat his wings, lifting into the sky.

The cold wind hit them immediately. Arthur was fine thanks to his cloak’s weather resistance, and having two beautiful women pressed close on either side certainly helped with the warmth.

Point Blank, her face visibly red from Arthur’s arms wrapped around her waist, said, "do you think we can actually clear a level 20 dungeon at our current level? I’m a little scared."

It was normal for her to feel that way. None of them had any idea what a dungeon was like inside, so the difficulty was completely unknown.

Arthur, on the other hand, knew dungeons inside and out, and he knew exactly what they were walking into. He was confident they’d clear it.

Not to mention he was significantly stronger than any normal player at his level. By a wide margin.

"Relax," he said, trying to put her at ease. "Trust me. We’ll clear it without too much trouble."

Shadow Cloak, holding onto his waist from behind, said, "obviously we’re clearing it. I’m here. Your girl is number one, baby."

Arthur rolled his eyes.

After landing at the elven settlement, he left the two girls there and flew back to pick up Tower and Suzy. And once everyone was together, the time had finally come to tackle the game’s very first dungeon.