Chapter 77 Clash
After managing to escape the Howling Cliff, Kaizen ran off mounted on his Epic Rank Beast Mount without looking back.
There was no telling whether the angry players would start a chase or not.
Any action is possible when it comes to high-level players of an MMORPG game. After all, everyone used to spend many hours of their days immersed in the game and this was even more real with the players of Rise Online. In this game, leveling up a single level past 20 could take several days, or even weeks, if the player wasn't comfortable taking the risk, and most didn't take it, they would do tactical farming.
However, as the experience with each kill decreased after killing countless monsters of the same kind and type, players who farmed with monsters of the same or higher level, not only gained more XP for the bonus but also became more skilled. Thus, gaps appeared from player to player.
This was exactly the difference between Kaizen and 80% of the other players in Rise Online. Most were not willing to risk themselves against death, which is why it was so common for newcomers to be unable to get anywhere near the strength of the players who started playing at launch. Also, the fact that upon death, not only some levels were lost but also all items in the user's inventory at the time of death, made people choose to stay only around safe cities and famous farming areas.
There was the possibility for players to store their items in warehouses or rented houses or even buy a piece of land, so as not to lose what you have. But considering that in-game currencies could be converted into dollars, most players wouldn't spend that money. It was also common for people to leave Rise Online after getting frustrated from their first death, losing all their items.
Either way, Kaizen was sure that he could get out of any life or death situation in the game unless he was poisoned. No one reasoned as well under pressure as he did.
Once he was sure that no one had followed him from the Howling Cliff, he looked toward the Silver Mountains not too far away and directed the Druid Beast to head there. Kaizen still had a vague idea of how to return to Holinda City. However, passing through a safe zone and updating the map would be great. Luckily, he met Xisrith along the way and now knew exactly where the nearby safe zone was.
Driving the Epic Beast Mount was not easy. A few times during the road, the creature suddenly stopped and neighed, refusing to follow Kaizen's commands.
When they left the Howling Cliff, Kaizen noticed that his mount only jumped with speed out of the previous region because it was afraid of the thunder and not because it was following his commands.
The Druid Beast began jumping and coercing on its own, trying to get the man off its back. Kaizen kept calm, and as one of his grandfathers used to have a small farm, he knew some basic things about riding a horse. Still, riding a horse and a Beast Mount were two completely different things.
Usually, when a horse refuses to follow your commands, it is because you are doing something wrong, bothering him in some way. However, with the Beast Mount, it soon became apparent that such disobedience was due to a great level disparity between the pawn and the mount.
<strong>[Creature:</strong> Druid Beast Mount (Insert original desired name)
<strong>Level:</strong> 1 <strong>| Attribute:</strong> Mystic <strong>| Nature:</strong> Epic
<strong>HP:</strong> 1000<strong> | MP:</strong> 40
<strong>Attack:</strong> 10 <strong>| Defense:</strong> 100<strong> | Speed:</strong> 235
<strong>Strength:</strong> 50 <strong>| Wisdom:</strong> 50 <strong>| Resistance:</strong> 90
<strong>Resistance to Spells of:</strong> Fatigue<strong>]</strong>
When Kaizen saw the 'Insert desired original name' field and clicked on that, a smaller screen with a blank space appeared before him.
"I can choose the name of this thing? Hmm~ Let me see, you look like..."
Kaizen was not really much creative when it came to names. This was a trait that Rhyzer tried to teach him, but whenever he had to select a name, the nicks were always generic. Once, as a child, he got a fish at a local festival, and he ended up naming this fish Nemo. To make matters worse, the fish wasn't even orange with stripes, but since this was the only fish name he could think of, this is what he nicknamed the poor animal.
This time, with his Epic Rank Beast Mount, he wanted to get it right and leave his lousy reputation for naming behind.
"Um... Rocket? No, too weird. Hercules? Nah, that doesn't even make sense... How about Chiron? Oh, that's not a bad name."
The name Chiron descends from a wise centaur in Greek mythology, who acted as a teacher to well-known figures like Achilles, Heraclitus, and Jason. The Druid Beast was not a centaur, but since the Boss who dropped it was, it still made sense to correlate the two.
"Okay, the name of the Druid Beast mount from now on will be Chiron." Kaizen declared.
Impressively, the mount's agitated behavior became much calmer after it was named. The rest would eventually improve as long as Kaizen continued to level up.
When Kaizen finally returned to the oak forest using an adjacent region of stunningly green plains, he breathed a sigh of relief.
Kaizen didn't even know how lucky he was to make it alive out of the Howling Cliff after facing a Mythic Rank monster and dozens of players alone. There was no doubt that he was much stronger than when he started the journey, but the other players in that place were on another level in terms of attributes, although they were a bit too dumb.
"Ha... I thought I would die when I tried to lift that guy and all I managed to do was make him feel a slight discomfort in his throat. Almost all the MP I had just recovered went down in just a mere second... That guy is ridiculously strong."
After descending from the mount, Kaizen made it disappear with an order in his thoughts, just as he had done to summon it. He then removed the Guardian's Elmo and, for the first time, took a good look at the large item responsible for concealing his identity.
<strong>[Item:</strong> Guardian's helmet
This ancient gem hides the answer to mysteries from a distant past that monsters did not even inhabit Midgard.
(Visit a Druid Antiquities Expert to learn more about this item).
<strong>Class:</strong> Epic.
<strong>Item Level:</strong> 1 of 3
<strong>Attack:</strong> 0
<strong>Defense:</strong> 70
<strong>Fitness Level needed:</strong> 1<strong>]</strong>
...
Edited by: DrHitsuji
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