Chapter 7: Chapter 7: Burning Money

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

After spending two hours, Li Yao had finished walking through the entire plaza. He had visited the warehouse dozens of times to store items, and his gold coins had dwindled to thirty.

Some were bargains, and some were items that he couldn’t use at the current stage. Li Yao sold anything he found valuable.

Even after wandering around the plaza, Li Yao was still not content. But all this was just what he did casually. If he wanted to, he could spend fifty silver coins to go to another Beginner’s Village and continue scouting for items.

On the way to the blacksmith’s shop, Li Yao thought of his sister.

“This girl tricked me into thinking she started playing the game later than she actually did. She actually started playing as soon as the server opened.”

The structure of the Beginner’s Village is simple. The blacksmith shop not only has a blacksmith but also an NPC that makes clothes. When no players can forge or make clothes, they usually go to the NPC.

The NPC basically makes standard equipment that’s common. But at this stage, having even one set of equipment is already extremely luxurious.

“Young clansman, is there anything I can help you with?” the equipper in charge of making equipment asked.

Li Yao performed an elf ritual and said, “I want to make two sets of equipment.”

“I’m not yet intermediate level, I can only make equipment with materials from bosses and underneath. If you use materials from elite monsters, you can have some set effects.” the equipper said.

“Hmm, I want an Elite Hunter Set and an Elite Warlock Set.” Li Yao said, handing over a batch of materials and twenty silver coins.

After waiting patiently for ten minutes, Li Yao finally got his equipment.

Each set consisted of a helmet, shoulder armor, a cloak, chest armor, a belt, leg armor, armguards, gloves, and boots. The hunter set even had an extra Arrow Bag.

Each piece only added a few points of armor value. The Arrow Bag is quite a bit better than the newcomer’s, adding three more slots.

The three-piece set effect was to increase 50 life points, and the five-piece set effect was to increase 10 attack points.

This was top-of-the-line for the early game. With a full set, his armor was almost fifty, and his life was almost two hundred. Even a newbie who put on this set could become a decent player.

The Warlock Set’s three-piece effect was to increase 50 mana points, and the five-piece set was to increase 10 intelligence. It was equally overpowered.

Li Yao changed into the new set of equipment except for his shoes, the spiky shoulders, the headgear that looked like a fearsome velociraptor face, to him, the equipment looked simple and crude. But other players looked enviously at him, wishing they could have such a cool set.

As Li Yao passed by the mailbox, he mailed the Elite Warlock Set’s “Elite Velociraptor Crown” and 1 gold coin to his sister. Then, he headed to the engineering shop.

Engineering and Alchemy were both in the same building.

As Li Yao entered, the Alchemist warmly greeted him, while the Engineering Trainer didn’t even glance at him, continuing to drink his alcohol.

“I want to buy twenty beginner life potions, ten bottles of beginner antidote potions, and ten bottles of underwater breathing potions.”

“Each bottle of Life Potion is one silver coin, the Antidote Potion is three silver coins per bottle, and the Underwater Breathing Potion is two silver coins per bottle.”

“Thanks.”

At this stage, absolutely no player would buy these luxury goods. Ordinary players worked hard to kill monsters all day for just the income of a bottle of antidote potion.

Li Yao went to the other side and greeted, “Hello, I want to learn Engineering.”

The Engineering Trainer didn’t even lift his head and said, “Okay, first bring me a thousand pieces of copper ore.”

Even the major guilds couldn’t get a thousand pieces of copper ore at this stage, and this was just the first step. If you want to learn engineering, you need to complete ten linked tasks, each one more troublesome than the last.

“This is your old sweetheart, no, it’s a letter of introduction from Instructor Eileen.” Li Yao put the envelope on the table with a smirk.

The Engineering Trainer quickly picked up the letter and started reading it himself. After a moment, he asked doubtfully, “Ahem, you didn’t peek at this letter, did you?”

“How would I dare?” Li Yao quickly replied, even without looking, he already knew what was written inside.

“On account of Eileen, you don’t need to run errands.” With a wave of the trainer’s hand, Li Yao had learned Engineering. “There are some recipes over there, and some basic engineering materials are priced. If you want to learn something or make something, just leave the money.”

After finishing speaking, he rushed out of the room as if smoke, not even staying in the shop.

Li Yao was no longer surprised. Every NPC in this game was a sentient being, just like a real person.

Li Yao went over there, learned all the recipes he could, and as the recipes disappeared, his money bag also began to shrivel. Several recipes cost three gold coins.

Li Yao didn’t hold back and immediately started practicing Engineering on the engineering table. At first, he could only make some explosive powder and then make explosives.

He logged off in the middle to sleep for three to four hours, had dinner, and then logged on again.

By eight o’clock in the real world, the sky in the game also started to light up.

Li Yao’s engineering skill was now 856/1000, just over a hundred points short of intermediate level, but he only had twenty-three gold coins left in his money bag. It couldn’t burn any more money.

The remaining hundred or more proficiency points were even harder to practice. Either make some useless engineering items, or make fire guns. But making fire guns requires a lot of copper ore, and hardly any players have learned auxiliary professions at this stage.

The copper ore on the market is not only expensive to death, but even if all collected, it’s not enough for him to use. However, he will be able to get a pet at level ten, so he still has some time.

In this period, he needed to gather enough copper ore and get a blueprint for a mechanical chick. This is the first mechanical pet blueprint that can be obtained before level ten.

Although he has the Eye of the Creator which allows him to make engineering items at will, this is only in theory. If he wants to make a living thing, blueprints are essential.

But after this practice of engineering proficiency, he made a lot of engineering items. The journey of the Mechanical Hunter truly began now. At least the level grinding monster hunting won’t be as exhausting as today.

Of course, this is just what he thinks to himself. If he were to say it out loud, he would probably get flamed by the players. You, a single player, soloed an elite monster and even bossed, and still not contented? Do you know how heartbroken our ordinary players are when we can’t even kill elite monsters, let alone face a boss?

Li Yao will, of course, not be satisfied. Having reincarnated once, if he has to struggle like he did in his past life, then this reincarnation is a joke. If it’s still that hard to kill monsters, how can he justify the legacy equipment prepared for players above level sixty, and how can he justify the massive amount of strategies in his mind?

In the last world, I had played as a thief for two years, getting chased around like a dog, so I quit that character.

Later, playing as a Hunter for eight painstaking years was just as miserable. Reincarnation allowed me to keep my skills, but it still felt like banging my head against a wall.

With the engineering expertise from my past life, Li Yao was able to create everything a novice engineer could make.

Blueprints for the Mechanical Sheep allowed Li Yao to create hundreds of them.

At the same time, Li Yao transformed the blue bow he got from missions into an engineering bow which resembles a compound bow. Not only did its damage improve, but the range also increased a bit.

Of course, these accomplishments alone didn’t earn Li Yao the title of either a mechanical hunter or an engineering hunter. Based on his memories from the previous world, Li Yao also built an invaluable weapon, the Arrow Tower.

Ordinary hunters would need to be at least level 20 to obtain an Arrow Tower through skills. However, it doesn’t inflict much damage and is only used for security purposes, such as alerting the player of dangers during camping. The Arrow Tower is indispensable as it allows you to spot dangers in advance.

Li Yao’s Arrow Tower was self-made based on his previous life’s knowledge. Due to the Eye of the Creator, the Arrow Tower can also be considered as his pet, thus benefiting from the character’s attribute bonuses.

Self-made Arrow Tower

Health: 60 (One-third of the character)

Armor: 21 (One-third of the character)

Damage: 9-13 (Varies with the character’s level)

Range: 45 yards

Firing Rate: 1 shot per second

Quantity: 3/3 (Recovers quantity 1 every 60 seconds)

Item is bound

When held in hand, it resembles a small but elegant tower with a crossbow on top, about the size of a palm.

This item is similar to a Shaman’s totem. When a Shaman obtains a totem column, it can only project the image of the totem.

Li Yao wasn’t entirely satisfied. He remembered towers armed with cannons, crossbow cannons, and even magic arrow towers. However, he was limited by his current proficiency and the available materials, so he could only make a toy-sized cannon, which was far from becoming a tower. This slight disappointment made him work harder.

When Li Yao successfully created another type of inventor’s item, his spirits rose again.

The Spike Trap, not a skill-based trap, but an engineering consumable, similar to a hand grenade.

Once triggered, the trap explodes, filling a certain area with spikes that inflict continuous damage or a “bleeding” effect on monsters in the area.

“At last, I can be considered as a mediocre mechanical hunter. It will be perfect if I had a fire gun,” said Li Yao, packing his stuff and heading towards the outskirts of Beginner’s Village.

As per his plan, he could earn some enviable honors as a Star Fire, and to be on the world’s honor list, he needed to use his identity as Star Fire and act as a traditional Hunter when appearing in public.

As for Prairie Fire, he would follow the path of the mechanical hunter, only using fire guns and engineering items in the future. Even if people envied Star Fire, they wouldn’t find anything noteworthy about Prairie Fire, allowing him to accumulate wealth quietly.

Of course, to realize these plans, he needed to prepare and make some equipment. However, he hadn’t attracted much attention so far, so there was nothing to worry about.

After half an hour of travel, he arrived at a respawning area for level four to five monsters, where no other players were present.

Looking at a level four Demon Wolf Elite accompanied by two ordinary level four Demon Wolves in the distance, Li Yao clacked his tongue and set up his three Arrow Towers in the form of a triangle.

Then, he placed an Exploding Sheep on the ground.

The Exploding Sheep trotted up to the Demon Wolf Elite. The Demon Wolf Elite found it unforgivable for a harmless lamb daring to approach it, and clawed at the Exploding Sheep.

Boom…

A bright explosion ensued. The three Demon Wolves let out tragic screams.

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Visibly damaging figures popped up, indicating that the damage on the two ordinary Demon Wolves had exceeded a hundred. However, this also meant that he just spent 50 copper coins. This basically amounted to one-sixth of a normal level three player’s daily income.

The three Demon Wolves roared, their eyes turning red as they rushed towards Li Yao.

The two Arrow Towers biubiu-biu would start to shoot relentlessly as soon as the Demon Wolves came within range.

However, their tragedy was not over yet. Another explosion occurred beneath their feet.

Thud thud thud…

The Spike Trap exploded into action, leaving the three Demon Wolves full of holes.

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A whole bunch of damage numbers popped up above the heads of the three Demon Wolves.

Concussive Shot.

Li Yao’s arrow hit the Demon Wolf Elite’s head which slowed down its speed by fifty percent.

After testing the damage, Li Yao didn’t waste time. He slowed down the Demon Wolf Elite and started using Charged Arrow.

The two ordinary Demon Wolves, miserably stepping on the spikes, fell to the ground and took their last breath, while the Demon Wolf Elite was even more tragic.

With spikes continuously making it bleed from its legs, three arrow towers firing at it, and Li Yao, whose arrows always hit its nose, it barely managed to move out of the Spike Trap’s range before it unwillingly fell to the ground. The whole process was effortless, much faster and expended less effort than yesterday…