Axir walked inside the dark passage with no light.
He didn't make any sound.
This was an Elite dungeon, not a normal dungeon. The difficulty lay in how it was organized. Unaware and those without caution would die swiftly.
Everything was dark, with minor light that was coming from the end of this passage. Usually, people need to bringa torch or have some kind of card to illuminatethe area, but Axir didn't need to do that.
He knew the end of the passage was broken and without light, most first-timers would fall into the pond below, in which three level 20 Murlock Guards were led by a level 20 Elite Murlock Captain.
And within water, fighting against Murlocks was even more difficult.
But Axir had a perfect plan.
2-star card, Earthburrow Travel!
Axir moved until he reached the end and poked out his head from the wall of the pond before looking down.
Four murlocks were stationed inside the water, their crimson eyes looking up, ready to kill their prey, who had activated the dungeon and entered.
They were waiting.
'Cute.'
Axir's eyes glinted as he targeted the strongest one. Elite Murlock Captain.
3-star card, Blue-Eyed Marionette (Charm)!
60 Mana consumed, and the Murlock Captain's crimson eyes turned dark blue.
'Kill the three guards.'
As soon as Axir commanded the captain, he also jumped out and dived into the pond while activating a card.
4-star card, Siphon Chain!
[Siphon Chain]
Card Quality: 4-star
Effect:
—> You can select a target within 10 meters of yourself and establish a Siphon Chain, which reduces their vitality by 1% every second and recovers your vitality by the amount reduced. If the distance increases past 10 meters, the chain will break.
—> All physical and magical attacks you deal to this target heal you equal to 50% of the damage you deal with each attack.
—> If the chain remains established for 10 seconds, you can use Siphon Burst: dealing damage equal to 200% of your (Constitution + Arcane).
This was the ultimate card of this deck. Although it was a bit hard to fully utilize it against some type of monsters who are long-range, nimble, and evasive, as maintaing distance of 10 meters was a must.
But similarly, this card made it easier to fight equally or slightly stronger monsters as long as the chain was maintained.
Now, these monsters were not just slightly stronger than Axir.
They were too strong.
He was level 4, and they were level 20.
However, he was more skilled and could survive without being killed.
Murlock Captain had already killed one Murlock with a single skill, decapitating its head after Axir gave his command with a surprise attack.
Two remained, so Axir engaged one with a Siphon Chain attached.
He wasn't focused on killing his opponent.
All he had to do was to deflect and dodge.
Just as the Murlock Guard swung its sword terrifyingly fast at him, Axir used Leap to get away, but remained within 10 meters of it.
Murlock Captain was about to kill the second Murlock Guard, who was struggling.
The Siphon Chained Murlock quickly rushed at Axir to attack again, and crossed that distance in less than two seconds, its sword glowing and about to use its skill to attack Axir.
Alas, Axir used two cards!
2-star card, Dominion Slash!
3-star card, Scream of Despair!
[Scream of Despair]
Card Quality: 3-star
Effect:
—> Unleash a scream from your mouth with waves that disrupt the mind of your opponent and reduce their action and movement speed by 30%. If the target stays within the range of the scream for three full seconds that it lasts, they are stunned for one to three seconds.
Combo Cast!
This technique was hard to pull off for newbies because there was only a 0.2-second window after using the first card that caused body action to use the second card.
Scream of Despair would release from his mouth, and he would become stationary, so once it starts, the user would stay in place for 3 seconds while the scream lasts, unable to move.
However, by using Dominion Slash first, which was also a body action skill where he slashes vertically with both hands, and then using Scream of Despair within 0.2 seconds, both were activated.
While his slash was moving down and he was in motion, the scream of despair hit from his mouth, jolting the Murlock for half a second first as the debuffs settled.
His slash was in-motion, and the Murlock didn't even have half a second to dodge, as his sword struck it successfully.
Murlock was still in front of his mouth, in the range of the ongoing scream, because his sword attack was weak and struck the Murlock's body instead of slicing it apart.
It just pierced a nail's length into its head, dealing minor damage. A scratch.
But that was enough to keep it in front of him for this sequence of three seconds and stunning it.
And then Murlock Captain arrived and finished it off.
[ You have killed three level 20 Murlock Guards. ]
[ You have reached level 10. You have acquired 30 stat points. ]
[ You may now use teleport and leave the beginner village area to enter the World of Belkris. ]
[ World Announcement will trigger as you are the first person to reach level 10 among the players of Earth. Would you like to show your real name or conceal it? ]
'Show my in-game name, but hide the real name.'
[ World Announcement! Congratulations to Ace for being the first player to reach level 10. Reward: 1 x Mystery Gold Pouch and +10 stat points. ]
[ The leaderboard of levels has been unlocked. ]
[ Level Leaderboard ]
Rank 1: Ace (level 10)
Rank 2: —
(Requirement to enter the leaderboard is level 10).
The players all over were dumbfounded.
"What?! What the hell?"
"The leveling is so god damn slow that I am still level 3, and someone is already level 10?"
"This game just started a few hours ago…who is this godly player?"
"This player must have gotten lucky with something. This game world is so mysterious, I bet there's some cool hidden stuff."
"Ace…I wonder who it is in real life."
Naturally, there were some people who knew him.
Selena and others had just left the village after taking quests from the village chief when they heard this announcement.
"Holy, that's Axir." Kazuo's jaw dropped.
"He reached level 10 so fast? How?" Jason frowned. "Could he found some kind of exploit?"
"He is still in that area since he is not replying." Selena checked the friend chat.
"Damn, he is really something," Yuta said with a stank face. "We gotta use his brains and brawns, for real."
"Well, let's go and complete our quest. He'll call his girlfriend when he leaves that area." Lexi snickered.
…
On the other hand, Axir was grinning from ear to ear.
He jumped six levels at once!
And this was only the beginning.
"Let's go. Lead me to the next area." He commanded the Murlock Captain as they swam down.
The only way forward in this dungeon was through the pond.
Fortunately, this starting area only had four monsters.
'The next area has ten Murlocks, with one Elite Murlock General.' Axir's eyes glinted. 'I'll have to strategize the kills one by one.'
'It's going to be fun.' Axir grinned.