Chapter 12: The Soul Stone—Joy Found in a Free Gift
“Beep, beep, beep…”
As soon as the announcement ended, Su Mubai noticed his communicator ringing urgently.
The friend request list instantly surged from zero to over 999.
He had anticipated this, but not so soon.
“Reject all.”
With a thought, Su Mubai immediately rejected all friend requests and set his profile so that no one could add him by search.
Compared to these people, he was more concerned about the rewards just granted by the system.
Waving his hand, he summoned two new skeletons. While commanding his skeletal army to continue exploring, he opened his backpack.
A look of wild joy broke across his face.
The effect of the Soul-Life Stones was exactly as he had imagined!
[Primary Soul-Life Stone]
Special Item
Absorbing it increases your lifespan by thirty days.
Note: Whether placed in your backpack or storage, you will lose one-tenth of it upon death, with a minimum loss of three days.
“Is this the item that can extend lifespan?”
The Primary Soul-Life Stone was perfectly round, about the size of a baby’s fist, emitting a gentle white glow.
Lifespan was Su Mubai’s greatest concern.
He had thought such treasures would be hard to come by in the early stages, but he had obtained them so easily!
He had only single-handedly defeated the Mist Tree Python King, yet was rewarded with six Primary Soul-Life Stones.
That was a full half-year of extra life!
If the wealthy elites from the Blue Star knew about this, they would go wild.
However, with the entire world crossing over into this game, times had changed.
Those elites were now just ordinary players among many.
At the beginning of the game, only the strongest in each newbie village could obtain Soul-Life Stones.
“For me, this isn’t just half a year of life.”
Looking at the Primary Soul-Life Stones in his hand, Su Mubai’s lips curled slightly.
[Catastrophe!]
[Target: Primary Soul-Life Stone]
[Prompt: Please select rank to ascend: Rank One / Rank Two / Rank Three.]
“Rank Two.”
Though he knew he probably didn’t have enough money, having just acquired 6 gold coins, Su Mubai still wanted to try.
What if?
[Prompt: Ascending a Primary Soul-Life Stone requires 10,000 Soul Coins.]
[Insufficient resources, ascension failed.]
Well, no luck.
He didn’t even have enough gold to qualify for the ascension.
“Soul Coins?”
Looking at the system prompt, Su Mubai murmured, “A higher-tier currency?”
Such currency would only appear if the system announced it; otherwise, in the newbie village, it was unattainable.
Su Mubai shook his head with a smile and, with a thought, activated [Catastrophe] again.
This time, he chose to ascend just one Primary Soul-Life Stone to Rank One.
Having learned from the previous mistake of upgrading copper coins to bronze coins, he dared not upgrade all Primary Soul-Life Stones at once.
If something went wrong, he wouldn’t even have a place to cry.
[Prompt: Confirm to ascend one Primary Soul-Life Stone to Rank One with no resource cost?]
[Confirm]
[Cancel]
“Confirm.”
[You have obtained one Intermediate Soul-Life Stone.]
[Intermediate Soul-Life Stone]
Special Item
Absorbing it increases lifespan by 120 days.
Note: Whether in your backpack or storage, one-tenth will be lost upon death, with a minimum loss of twelve days.
From the two levels of Soul-Life Stones, it was clear that upon death, players not only lose one-tenth of their lifespan but also one-tenth of their Soul-Life Stones.
“The joy of free gains is truly addictive.”
Su Mubai, following the same method, ascended the remaining five Primary Soul-Life Stones in his backpack to Intermediate.
However, he did not rush to absorb them but planned to keep them.
Six Intermediate Soul-Life Stones would only extend his life by two years—not nearly ten years or more.
Even if he absorbed them all, after leaving the newbie village, he wouldn’t survive the death penalty from a single death.
Better to save them for now.
What if, within this year, he earned enough Soul Coins to ascend these stones another rank?
Clack, clack, clack…
The sound of bones colliding grew near as several skeletons approached, carrying the loot dropped by the Mist Tree Python King.
With the hell-level difficulty and the first kill, the Mist Tree Python King generously dropped a pile of items.
Besides the system rewards, this was the first time Su Mubai saw a monster drop silver coins outright.
And thirty silver coins at that!
Additionally, the Mist Tree Python King dropped five pieces of equipment and two skill books.
Four were silver-grade gear; the fifth was a backpack.
The rest were materials usable for crafting in secondary professions.
After a quick look, Su Mubai waved his hand and ascended all the items at once.
[Reinforced Snakehide Bag]: Contains 100 slots.
[Venomous Ring]
Ring, Accessory
Level 5
Gold Grade
Durability 100/100
Spell Power +30
Agility +10
Spirit +10
Spell skills have a chance to inflict 150 poison damage, triggering at most once every 10 seconds.
(When you can’t win, poison them!)
Each player may equip five backpacks. After equipping the Reinforced Snakehide Bag, Su Mubai’s storage expanded to 150 slots.
Items like Soul-Life Stones could stack up to 100 per slot.
His backpack space should be sufficient for the time being.
Apart from the Venomous Ring, the other three pieces of equipment were physical-type gear, so Su Mubai tossed them into his backpack.
He planned to sell the unused items after leaving the dungeon.
As for the two skill books, before ascending, they were only grade D.
The Mist Tree Python King was a silver-grade boss.
From its drops, it was clear that high-level skills were not easy to obtain in the game.
Players who started with awakened advanced talents had a significant early advantage.
Unfortunately, neither skill book belonged to the Necromancer class. Su Mubai sneered lightly and threw them into his backpack.
Just as he was about to summon skeletons again, he suddenly paused.
Looking at the skill [Summon Skeleton], Su Mubai had a thought.
[Catastrophe]
[Target: Summon Skeleton]
[Prompt: Please select rank to ascend: Rank One / Rank Two / Rank Three.]
“Rank Two.”
[Prompt: Confirm to consume 5 gold coins to override previous ascension and upgrade the skill ‘Summon Lesser Skeleton’ to a higher rank?]
“That’s really expensive.”
Frowning at the 5 gold coin price, Su Mubai suddenly regretted having ascended those two skill books earlier.
Summon Lesser Skeleton was an F-grade skill, and after ascension, it would only reach D-grade.
Even so, it required a full 5 gold coins.
Those two skill books he ascended became C-grade skills, which players nowadays could hardly afford.
If sold cheaply, it would be a huge loss!
The game didn’t care if players were broke early on; the rule was clear: ascending an F-grade skill cost this much.
“Money spent can always be earned back.”
Gritting his teeth, Su Mubai chose to confirm.
With the [Catastrophe] talent, making money was easy.
The Summon Skeleton skill practically represented all his current combat power.
If he had enough gold, he had to ascend it.
At the next moment, the icon for Summon Skeleton in the skill bar changed noticeably.