I finally returned to the Village of Despair and handed the mayor's reply to the village chief. The village chief happily gave me the "Village Chief" badge (Charisma +1, Magic Effect +10%). Although I was mentally prepared on the way, when I received the badge, I still had a urge to cry. I truly realized how happy it was to have my efforts recognized by others. Moreover, my presence became stronger. I was no longer an insignificant individual in the game, but a person with a certain status. When others saw me, they should value me more.
The existence I was pursuing was originally an intangible thing, but I really cared about it. I had been forgotten by society in reality, and I couldn't afford to be ignored in the game. Only if my image was deeply remembered by more people, could I be sure that I was still alive...
After the excitement wore off, I worriedly asked, "I'm a player and usually not in the village. What if other players still send the mayor to look for me?" The old village chief smiled and said, "Actually, being a player as the village chief is just a name. As long as you appoint a village manager, you can fully entrust him with the work, and the power of the village chief is to give orders to the village manager, village guards, messengers, etc."
Such a good thing is worth doing, so I used the management authority and appointed the old village chief as the village manager. Looking at the financial column in the management window, my salary is 10 silver coins per day, and it also records that I didn't receive 8 silver coins as a village guard. A daily salary of 10 silver coins is quite high. I wonder what the salary as the mayor is...
There are also special products around the village, topographic maps, etc. in the management window. They are really very useful. The topographic map clearly shows the level and distribution of each monster, and the special products are marked one by one. With these two things, I can save a lot of trouble.
The architect who built the teleportation array hasn't arrived yet. It seems that he is walking. I'm so exhausted. There's no way out. For now, I'll just build the village first.
First, I used the newly learned "Construction Magic" and "House Construction Method" to renovate the six dilapidated old houses in the village that were not occupied. The largest one was set as my own residence. When I moved in, I discovered that a complete house has the effect of restoring health and mana.
The village manager (the old village chief changed his name, and I really didn't get used to it) told me that one of the most important functions of a house is a warehouse. Besides, players have hidden hunger and fatigue levels. I knew that eating dry food could reduce hunger, but I didn't know there was a fatigue level setting. This was mainly because my physiological consumption was low, so I didn't feel tired usually. However, an increase in fatigue level would lead to diseases, and after multiple diseases, the system would deduct some attribute points from the player. And the house can reduce fatigue level.
I had always wanted to use my illness to level up my abilities, but fortunately, I didn't try it. Who knows how many attribute points the system would deduct from me.
Since I am the village chief, I can stay in a room for free, but others' accommodation requires paying rent to the village or buying a house at a high price. To attract more outsiders to settle down, I lowered the house rent to the lowest level of 10 copper coins per day in the financial column, and the house sale was set at 10 silver coins. Both were one percent of the recommended prices by the system.
Next, I used the quarrying and logging magic to gather a batch of materials and combined it with the "House Construction Method" to build a new house. This was much more difficult than renovating old houses. With my current beginner-level first-class construction magic, I failed several times, but the construction magic improved gradually, and I reached the beginner-level second grade. I built one house, although the quality was quite poor, I was already very satisfied. Riding a horse to the best mine on the speciality distribution map, using mining and prospecting skills, after one hour, the harvest was abundant, with over a hundred copper mines (each worth 20 copper coins), sixty iron mines (50 copper coins), as well as dozens of cinnabarite and black iron ore, and blue iron ore. These were valuable. According to the market information I had in Shadi City, each was worth over 100 copper coins, and they had already been sold out by NPCs. They were all bought at high prices by blacksmith players.
One hour earned 10 silver coins. This was still my level as a beginner miner. It seems that this mountain is truly a treasure mountain. Thinking of the hard days when one sheepskin was worth one copper coin, and killing a deer took half a day to earn 10 silver coins (of course because the vendor had offered me four times the price), it was really an emotional experience.
In the following days, except for fighting monsters, I spent most of my time practicing life skills. The reason was simple. In the past, when playing the game, there had never been a "full-time" profession to allow me to play. After years of being tired from leveling up and collecting treasures, this time I wanted to change my lifestyle and relax a bit.
Using the skins of the newly caught monsters and the wolf king's skin to practice my skills, I finally successfully raised the mending skill to the third level, and the leathercraft and painting skills to the second level. The full-body equipment made with the wolf king's skin had a total defense of 40. Since the system classified this set of equipment as a set, it also added 1 point of charm and 10% wood resistance, making it a top-quality iron-level equipment. With such a set, it should be worth more than 2 gold coins. With such a good set, I even threw the silver-level boots under the bed.
The new house added six rooms (with multiple failures). The skills of carpentry, quarrying and logging were all raised to the third level; mining, prospecting, smelting, and crafting were raised to the second level. However, only one iron bow and one iron gun were produced, and the rest were junk goods below copper level; horseback riding, herding, and animal training were raised to the second level; trapcraft was raised to the second level; cutting was raised to the third level; woodcraft was raised to the third level.
The application scope of wood is very wide. Besides making doors, windows, beams, furniture, and decorations, it can also be used to make weapons and various jewelry. However, ordinary wood-made products are definitely junk. I also made jewelry with iron ore, but it was still junk. It seems that jewelry materials still need gold and gemstones.
Pharmaceutical and herbalcraft skills were also the ones I used most frequently. Combined with the "Basic Drug Crafting Methods", although the failure rate was high and the cost was higher than buying medicine from the vendor, before the vendor returned, these were my only options. These two skills have now also reached the third level.
Twenty skills such as planting, fishing, identification, etc. are all at the first level and have not changed (it's really due to lack of energy).
Then I completed the 20-level task given by the old village chief. I had to kill thirty "Flying Tens". "Flying Tens" were only 25-level monsters, but they were very troublesome because they could fly. Fortunately, I had a silver-level bow and magic to complete the task with difficulty. After finishing it, the prize directly arrived in my package: an iron-level helmet, which was of no use. However, what I valued more was the contribution points given by completing the task.
At this time, I had already reached level 27. The various skills for combat: healing skill at the third level, fireball skill at the second level, basic knife skills at the first level, bow and arrow skills at the third level (the silver-level bow dropped by the Moon God of Healing had a +30 attack and +10% hit rate, which was my fastest leveling tool at the moment, and the silver sword given by the Tiger King, because I don't have sword skills, was rarely used), the newly bought detection skill, acceleration skill, windstorm skill, and blocking skill are all at the first level.
That day, Ah Shui suddenly ran back to the village and told me that when he was fishing, a giant turtle crawled out of the river ditch and swallowed his horse. It seems that the boss I had been longing for appeared.
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It's been a long time since I encountered a boss, so of course I wouldn't miss it. I rode a horse to the river ditch. Sure enough, I saw a large turtle, basically an enlarged version of a turtle, but its body was golden. Although my investigation skills are still not very good, with the high intuitive ability I have, I was able to successfully obtain the information about it.
The "Xuan Gui" is a 25-level demonic beast boss. Although it has over 20,000 health points and high defense, its agility is still a little lower than mine. It can use water-based spells such as "Spray Water" and "Downpour".
My current equipment and abilities have changed a lot. I have a silver-level bow, a sword, and two silver-level rings. The clothes, armor, hat, and boots are all made of wolf king skin. Maybe some 30-level players have even worse equipment than me. I immediately bravely engaged this "Xuan Gui" in battle.
Originally, my speed was higher than that of the Xuan Gui. By adding an "Acceleration" spell, the powerful physical attack of the Xuan Gui couldn't reach me. The "Spray Water" spell would reduce my health by 60 points each time, but its range was slightly inferior to that of my arrows and magic. As long as I was careful, I wouldn't be hurt; although the "Downpour" spell is a range magic, I couldn't dodge it, but its power wasn't very strong, only reducing my health by 40 points.
My arrows dealt 30 points of HP to the Xuan Gui, and the Fireball spell was suppressed by the Xuan Gui's water attribute, only dealing 25 points. So I mainly used the "Gale Wind" spell, dealing it 30 points.
Watching the little wind blowing this creature with an extremely high health point, I felt hatred. I hated myself for not being able to create a successful magic staff! Without this thing, the power of the spells was too weak.
I once tried to create a magic staff based on my memory several times, and the results were a "Staff with +1 Speed" and a "Strange Stick with +1 Attack". Believe it or not, there was also something that wasn't available on the market: "Celtic Ox Cart Staff". It raised the "Pasturing Spell" level by one...
While thinking about boring things, I repeated the "Blow Wind, Shift, Take Medicine" procedure. The Xuan Gui, facing my monotonous and effective tactics, seemed very annoyed. Although it also has a certain intelligence, the low sensitivity set by the game determined its fate. Don't be angry, the game has an evolution setting, right? In the next life, I believe your speed and attack methods will be strengthened.
Seeing the Xuan Gui's gradually sad and desperate eyes, a bit of compassion suddenly appeared in my heart. Why? Why does this Xuan Gui act so helpless? This doesn't seem like the behavior of a boss. Although before the death of the wolf king and the blue demon, there were also some moans, they didn't make me feel the slightest pity. But in this Xuan Gui's sadness, there seemed to be a sense of attachment to life, as if it had some unfinished wishes and didn't want to die like this...
Leaving aside the distractions, I regarded this as the Xuan Gui's psychological tactic. If I explain it this way, it would be a bit easier for me to bear.
After nearly an hour of grinding, the Xuan Gui finally died. I leveled up to 28. However, since I was higher in level than the Xuan Gui and the battle wasn't very difficult, this upgrade only gave me 4 points of strength, 4 points of constitution, 2 points of agility, and 4 points of spirit.
There's no way around it. If I deliberately pursued the difficulty of the battle to obtain higher reward points and used close combat against the boss, the danger of the battle would definitely increase, and the loss of levels due to death would be very painful. Of course, this was also because the Xuan Gui belongs to high attack and high defense, and my close combat attack power is not as strong as magic, and if the battle lasts too long, it will also lose points.
One of the reasons I don't insist on the difficulty of the battle now is that I seem to have lost the desire to pursue perfection in playing games. Now I cherish life and enjoy the game. If I make my nerves too tense to get the maximum reward for each level, it's not worth it. Games are for playing, right?
Like me, this plant-like person has no self-protection ability in reality. Maybe one day a natural disaster will occur, and the hospital won't have time to transfer me. Or maybe one day the cleaner makes a mistake and tears off my life tube without reinserting it. Or maybe the country decides to abandon me as a patient and stop paying for my life support. In this society, anything can happen. These things aren't just my imagination. I've seen some TV dramas with such plots.
Although I had such negative emotions in my heart, while enjoying the game, I didn't give up my efforts for recovery. Recently, I felt that my willpower had indeed strengthened a lot. However, every time I quit the game, the surroundings remained dark. Unlike before, my consciousness could now freely move in the dark space, and my thinking and reaction were also normal. However, I couldn't break through the darkness and connect it with my body and senses.
I was very curious. Could the intense mental exercise I had in the game not be detected by the hospital at all? What's the use of brain waves? Is it because I don't have money, they stopped giving me...?
Also, since I discovered that the improvement of mental power in the game couldn't significantly increase my chances of recovery, I no longer insisted on the excitement brought by close combat with monsters. In fact, archery and magic skills could better exercise my mental power. This became my main combat method in the recent period.