Qin Feng allocated all five of his free attribute points into Agility.
The numbers on the panel shifted, and he immediately opened his combat stats.
[HP: 130]
[Physical Attack: 13 (+10)]
[Physical Defence: 13]
[All Elemental Resistance: 15]
His base 13 points of attack came from Strength, while the extra 10 were added by his weapon.
[Scrap Iron Dagger (Low-Quality): Grey Quality. Attack +10]
Every player started with a basic weapon suited to their class. Qin Feng was no exception.
He held the dull grey dagger in his hand, testing its weight and balance. It was rough and a little too light, but familiar.
In his past life, he'd been a Warrior, not an Assassin. Still, he'd used daggers plenty of times when the situation demanded it, though using a weapon outside your class only gave seventy percent of its full power.
He gave a small smirk. "The feel's not bad."
His eyes drifted to the Physical Attack line again. With 23 total attack power, this was about the same as most new players. Nothing special.
But that just made the Shadow Cloak skill even more terrifying.
Ninety bonus attack power on a single strike from stealth, almost four times his base strength.
"That's a gap most people can't even imagine," he murmured. Qin Feng tightened his grip on the dagger, his expression hardening. He needed to hunt. Monsters meant experience, and experience meant Evolution Points. The more, the better.
But most players didn't understand the danger waiting outside. The monsters in this world weren't like those in normal online games. They didn't just stand in place, waiting to die.
They hunted you back.
In their eyes, players were nothing but walking sources of lifespan. Monsters would chase you down, ambush you, and even team up to take you out. And Lifespan...
Qin Feng's tone grew quiet, his eyes sharp. "Lifespan is the currency of .....Everything."
There were two kinds, tradable and non-tradable.
"The lifespan you're born with is non-tradable. Mine's seventy-five years."
That was the baseline, the time he had to live. Once it ran out, he'd die, both in-game and in reality.
Tradable lifespan, on the other hand, was everything. It could be used to stay alive, to trade for resources, or even to extract equipment and skills from the God Forsaken Game into the real world.
That was how the extraordinary had first appeared on Earth.
But just like players could gain lifespan by killing monsters, monsters could do the same by killing players. That was the cruel balance of the God Forsaken Game.
"Players think they're the hunters," Qin Feng muttered. "But most of them don't even realise that they are just prey."
Countless players would soon realise that they couldn't even kill a single monster. They'd die again and again, watching their lifespan drain away bit by bit, until it hit zero.
Then, well, there was no 'then', they'd simply stop existing, no respawns, no last chance, just the cold embrace of death.
He'd seen it happen before.
This world wasn't about levelling up—it was about surviving.
Qin Feng's gaze darkened. "In my last life, dragging Qin Xiaoyou along slowed me down."
He thought of her face for a brief second, then dismissed it.
"This time, I'll go solo. No burdens. No weakness."
He slid the Scrap Iron Dagger into his belt and began walking toward the town's edge.
On the way, he passed groups of confused new players.
A chubby guy sat on the roadside, scratching his head. "Huh? What is this place? 'Land Abandoned by Gods'? Class? Codename? I just got home after an all-nighter and lay down, am I dreaming?"
Next to him, a man with glasses looked just as lost. "No idea. I played Battle Royale all night, and when I fell asleep, boom, I woke up here."
The chubby one snorted. "What kind of chicken dinner were you eating, bro? Hook me up next time!" (Note- The last survivor of a popular battle royale game gets an achievement of Winner Winner Chicken Dinner, this is a pun on that)
Qin Feng walked past them without a glance.
He'd seen this kind of confusion before. The first batch of players always went through denial before reality set in.
Suddenly, several white lights flashed in front of him.
Five silhouettes took form in midair, then solidified into human figures.
Qin Feng blinked. "Ah, right. The resurrection point." Qin Feng smiled lightly, memories of his past life rushing in like a river.
He was about to walk around them when one of the figures caught his eye—a young woman in a black short-sleeved shirt, her hair tied up in a neat ponytail. She held a worn longbow, her face pale, probably from just dying.
The others beside her, a mix of three men and one woman, also looked equally drained.
Their lifespans had clearly just been halved.
"That wild monster was insane! One bite took half my HP—how are we supposed to fight that?"
"It was just a level one Crawler! The weakest type! Five of us, and we couldn't even drop it to half HP?"
"We were completely wiped…"
"Li Zi, what do we do now?"
The others turned to the young woman with the ponytail. She was clearly the leader.
Her longbow gave her away; ordinary Archers only started with shortbows. This girl was a Hidden Class user, just like Qin Feng.
"If we can't beat it, we'll just add one more person," Li Zi said, her eyes locking onto Qin Feng. "That guy over there, he's got a Hidden Class too. Let's invite him. The more people we have, the better our odds. Team limit is six, and we're one short."
Her reasoning was sharp. One glance at Qin Feng's weapon told her enough.
A long-haired girl from their group jogged toward him with a polite smile. "Hey, brother! Wanna team up? The monsters outside are too strong. You'll die if you go alone. We've already been wiped once, we know what to watch out for!"
Qin Feng almost laughed.
Experience? They only had experience in dying.
He didn't even answer. Just gave a small shake of his head and walked straight past them.
His silence said everything.
Li Zi's face darkened, and so did her teammates'.
"Seriously? Too cool to talk, huh?"
"He's gonna regret it. We just told him how dangerous it is outside, and he still wants to go alone?"
"The Crawler that killed five of us, does he think he can solo it?"
"Eh, he's an Assassin. Maybe he can run faster than we did."
They laughed it off, not taking him seriously.
Only Li Zi's eyes lingered on him. When he passed earlier, she'd glanced at his codename.
"'Shadow'? What a dramatic name." She smirked. "Fine. Let's follow him. If he dies, maybe we can learn something about monster patterns."
With that, she led her team after him from a distance.
They weren't trying to mock him, just desperate to understand this strange world better.
Qin Feng reached the edge of town.
The boundary wasn't clearly marked, just a line of half-rotten wooden fences. Beyond that line was danger; no safe zones, no rules.
He felt their eyes watching from behind, but he didn't care.
He drew a slow breath and whispered, "Shadow Cloak."
The world blurred around him. His body melted into the air, blending perfectly with the shadows.
In the next instant, he was gone, vanished from their sight completely.