Chapter 43: Sacred Training Ground
Translator: Zenobys Editor: TheRealSeal
After waking up from a good night’s sleep, Zhang Yang logged into the game filled with energy and spirit. Opening his Friend List, he saw Fatty Han online and realized that he was only Level 15! So painfully low! Hundred Shots was online too, and he was only a level lower than Fatty Han!
Looking through the Level Ranking Board, Floating Fire Ball was at Level 19, while the other three were Level 18, except for Clear Color who was Level 17. Hundred Shots and Fatty Han’s levels were just too low!
Zhang Yang suddenly had an idea; I know an excellent place for a quick level up! He sent the party invitations to them, and Fatty Han accepted it immediately.
Even Hundred Shots accepted it. He has been maintaining good ties with Zhang Yang by chatting him up for the past few days.
“Guys, I found an amazing place to grind!” exclaimed Zhang Yang through the party channel. “Go, go, go!” Fatty Han shouted excitedly.
“Hold up! I need to invite two more players!” and Zhang Yang sent a message to Little Snow, “I found a great place to train, want to join? All I need is a healer and an attacker.” After some time, Little Snow finally replied, “Scrawny rascal, what are you planning to do with me?”
“Tch! Yes or no. I could always find someone else!” Even Zhang Yang knew how to act tough.
“Yes! Of course I want to! Hang on, I’ll call Drizzler!” And she logged off immediately. Soon, she re-logged in and sent a private message, “Send a party invitation to Drizzler and me!” and they were added into the party too.
Fatty Han was thrilled to see them. “Whoa! Pretty ladies!” Hundred Shots could only chuckle at him. “You haven’t even seen their faces, how could you call them pretty just because they are ladies?” Fatty Han decided to play the devil’s advocate against Hundred Shots,
“Ladies, this guy dared to say you’re not pretty! Should I just punch him in the face?”
Drizzler giggled and said, “Punch him! I’m definitely a pretty lady, and soon to be a pretty queen, charming thousands around me!”
Little Snow couldn’t help but to rain on her parade, “Little brat. What’re you bragging about when you just woke up? You haven’t even brushed your teeth!”
“Han Yin Xue! How dare you say that out loud! I was sound asleep until you came in and made a mess! Hmph! Hmph!”
Fatty Han tried to keep the conversation going, but he was just spouting nonsense, “Eh? Pretty Snow is also a Han. What a coincidence, my surname is Han too! This is destiny, truly destiny!”
“Everyone, gather at the North of the city. We’ll follow my lead once everyone is here!” Zhang Yang could not resist adding another sentence, “Drizzler, please keep that directional idiot on the right track!”
“Who is the idiot?!” Little Snow retorted.
“Whomever that responded is the idiot!” Zhang Yang laughed as he replied. “Now, hurry up and stop wasting time! We have to get to Level 20 today!” Drizzler seemed doubtful about this and strongly protested against the idea.
“Level 20? Zhan Yu, have you lost your mind? At my current Level, I need at least 1,000,000 Experience Points and even if I spend my whole day grinding, I can only gain one level. My couusin and I are only at Level 13, and I don’t think you can even make it to Level 20 either!”
“Haha! That’s the reason why I called you here; to grind at the Holy Training Ground!”
“Oh? Is there really such a place?” Drizzler began doubting her own thoughts as Zhang Yang spoke with such confidence. To think this man actually defeated the once undefeatable boss Martyr Unduin… He definitely has some secret up his sleeve! “Let’s go for it!”
After finally meeting up, they embarked on their journey through the sky-blue lakes and peaceful plains, before finally entering the Spider’s Forest. It was dark and dim, filled with all kinds of spiders roaming everywhere, leaving cob webs hung with animal carcasses as the forest’s decoration. There were little globs that were white spiders’ eggs rest beneath the tree, and they were absolutely disgusting.
“Eww…” Little Snow and Drizzler both frowned at the sight of it. Fatty Han stepped forward in front of them and said, “Don’t worry ladies, for this Fatty will protect you!”
“Follow me!” Zhang Yang continued to lead the way, guiding the other four into the deeper parts of the forest. They slain a number of minions along the way and soon reached a cave entrance.
“Enter!”
Not being fond of darkness in the cave, Little Snow and Drizzler forced themselves to press on as they were already here and it would a waste to turn back! The girls stuck closely behind Zhang Yang while Fatty Han and Hundred Shots guarded their rear. As they proceeded on route while killing more small spiders, they finally arrived at the deepest part of the cave. It had a massive space and two gigantic spiders as tall as two-storey buildings sat on their webs, taking up almost half of the area. All eight of their legs were thicker than an elephant’s and the hair covering them looked more like daggers.
[Broodmother] (Green-Copper Boss)
Level: 20
HP: 60,000
Little Snow whispered, “Hey, do you actually think we could level up to 20 after killing these monsters?” Zhang Yang laughed loudly. “Of course not!”
In the game, speaking loudly would not provoke or attract a monster’s attention, unless you were in the monster’s aggro range.
“Little Yang, where is this so called training ground that you spoke of?” Fatty Han looked somewhat confused despite having faith in Zhang Yang. “We’re here!” Zhang Yang spoke nonchalantly.
The other four players began expressing confusion. This is a Level 20 boss, and even though it is a Green-Copper boss, the divided experience points earned after killing it would be low! The only way to gain even one level from this was if the boss had unlimited respawn and we killed it 40 to 50 times!
The unpredictable Zhang Yang then pointed to the two rocks to their left and said, “I’ll give the signal to hide later. Fatty, Hundred, and Little Snow; you three must stand in the middle of the rocks while Drizzler and I defend the front.”
“Why?” Drizzler asked.
“You’ll know soon enough! Get ready, I’m starting the fight!” Zhang Yang then wielded his sword and used <Charge>.
‘-133!’ Normal attack.
Broodmother quickly recovered from the stun effect that lasted for a second and then moved one of its long legs to thrust it towards Zhang Yang.
‘<Block>!’
‘-78!’ <Block> reflected damage.
‘-178!’ <Shield Bash>!
Zhang Yang shouted “Start the attack!” after he made sure he kept the aggro on him. Little Snow and the others still had no clue to what Zhang Yang was thinking, but they played along and began to strike.
95%, 83%, 71% … the boss’ HP kept dropping at a tremendous rate.
Within two minutes, Broodmother was left with only 15% HP. “Stop! It’s time to hide!” Zhang Yang ordered loudly. Having left a professional impression on the team, Little Snow and the others followed the plan even if they still had some doubts in him. They stood between the rocks once more, having to lean on the side as it was too small for three of them.
14%, 12%, 11%, 10%!
Broodmother gave a piercing shriek, ignoring Zhang Yang and climbed the web to its eggs. With a swing of its feet, 4 smaller spiders jumped out and tackled Zhang Yang.
‘Ding! Broodmother hatched Baby Spiders!’
With the system notification sound, Zhang Yang withdrew to the rocks with Drizzler. With each taking one side, they stood their ground and defended Little Snow and their team. The Baby Spiders did not stop hatching from the eggs and swarmed at them.
[Hatched Baby Spider] (Normal)
Level: 15
HP: 300
“Kill the smaller ones!” Zhang Yang yelled as he swung his sword, using <Horizontal Sweep> that caused numerous damage texts to pop out, ranging from 286 to 302. Some of the Baby Spiders were killed, while the rest had only a sliver of health left. His <Shadow Rage> necklace was frantically activating, popping out “-20” constantly.
‘Ding! You and the party members around have killed Hatched Baby Spider. Obtained 110 Experience Points (50 points party bonus)!’
‘Ding! You and the party members around have killed Hatched Baby Spider. Obtained 110 Experience Points (50 points party bonus)!’
‘Ding! You and the party members around have killed Hatched Baby Spider. Obtained 110 Experience Points (50 points party bonus)!’
‘Ding…’
Little Snow and the others were both surprised and happy. “Do you understand now?” Zhang Yang asked while he smiled at them. Fatty then asked, “These Baby Spiders… do they spawn unlimitedly?”
“Yeah, as long as you don’t kill the boss, they’ll keep on spawning!” and thus the secret was revealed. According to the boss mechanics, having lesser than 10% HP prompted it to continuously summon minions to fight. The proper way to fight was to battle until it was dead, but a player’s wisdom knew no limits. Someone immediately thought of a way to abuse this mechanic to level up fast! As long as there were two high defense class players blocking the rocks with healers to sustain them, they could grind indefinitely without a problem!
However, as soon as the method was revealed to the public, the game developers immediately modified the boss’ mechanics to only summon ten Baby Spiders instead, demolishing the unlimited spawn method. Since Zhang Yang played the game a little later, he was not able to personally experience this method of levelling. He only heard it from others as they joked about ‘God’s Miracle’.
Aside from Little Snow, Zhang Yang and the rest of the party were attacking furiously. The two melee fighters were blocking any incoming attack while the range attackers fired from behind. Little Snow did her job to heal Zhang Yang and Drizzler. As they were blocking a stone each with half of their body, only 10 Baby Spiders could attack at once. Most of the aggro were held by Zhang Yang and having 70 points of defense, they only struck him with a measly 4 points of damage each. It was a breeze! Safe, fast, and with unlimited monster spawning, this was the smoothest way to level up!
Zhang Yang’s devastating Attack Power truly allowed him to perform at his best here! As there is a high monster count, <Block> reflect damage could be considered a multi-target damage skill. Each damage could bring three to four ‘120 and above’ damage text. <Horizontal Sweep>, on the other hand, was much more overwhelming. With high basic attack damage, it could accumulate up to 5,000 damage in a single use against 10 monsters!
Drizzler did not have any multi-target skills, so her total damage output was far from Zhang Yang’s; from 30%, it jumped to 74%.
Fatty Han began to feel the excitement, “This is awesome! Look at my EXP bar go!” Even Hundred Shots expressed his gratefulness, “Zhan Yu, you’re amazing! You could even discover such an amazing way to level up!”
Two of them gained a level first. Even though it was slow for Zhang Yang to level up, it only took him 20 minutes longer to reach level 19! After an hour, Little Snow and Drizzler levelled up to 14.