"The only downside is the lack of defense."
"If both boots and greaves were level 5, I'd probably gain another twenty defense points without much trouble."
The Misty Forest was still a considerable distance from the newbie village, and the monsters' levels gradually increased as one moved away from the village.
After crossing the territory of the evil centaurs, Jiang Bai saw a sunken valley ahead. From a distance, the valley was shrouded in mist and clouds, and Jiang Bai had to follow the downhill slope all the way down to enter the Misty Forest.
The air here was humid, and the vegetation was tall, with the smell of decaying leaves permeating everywhere.
"Must say, the realism of holographic games is just unbeatable."
Not long after Jiang Bai entered the forest, an Enraged Snow Wolf appeared in his line of sight.
Enraged Snow Wolf
Level: 8
Attack: 80
Defense: 40
Health: 700
The enchanted wolf had a sleek, silver coat and a powerful, streamlined physique that exuded an aesthetic of raw strength.
As Jiang Bai examined the wolf, it turned its head and stared straight at him.
Its blood-red eyes radiated wildness, and its snow-white fangs were sharp and chilling.
"Can't deny it, this wolf is really beautiful!"
Despite his reluctance, Jiang Bai took off the longbow from his back.
"Vibration Shot!"
-298!
The level-8 wolf instantly lost nearly half its health.
"Aaoo!"
With a howl, the majestic wolf charged at Jiang Bai.
However, its pride in speed was lost with a 20% reduction.
Jiang Bai followed up with a "Precision Shot," dealing 336 damage.
At this point, the wolf was still more than halfway away from Jiang Bai, but its health was down to just 66 points, and it was mercilessly finished off by Jiang Bai's regular attack.
"No defense, this makes things much easier."
Jiang Bai's gaze fell once again on the skill Multi-Shot. Against these close-range, defenseless wild monsters, grinding them in groups was incredibly comfortable.
Without hesitation, Jiang Bai began to pull monsters, holding his longbow.
The active attack range of the Enraged Snow Wolves seemed a bit larger than that of the evil centaurs. Some wolves, even at a distance of about twenty yards from Jiang Bai, still chased after him like mad dogs.
Since they were melee and the enchanted wolves were fast enough, their speed was not much slower than Jiang Bai's. They occasionally managed to bite him from behind.
However, the damage was quite pathetic, with either -1 or a miss.
After about three minutes, Jiang Bai turned his head and took a look.
"Wow! There must be at least twenty of them!"
Seeing that his health had already dropped by over a hundred points, Jiang Bai stopped and turned around to fire a Precision Shot. Immediately, damage numbers started to pop up all over the screen.
"-224" "-40"
"-448"
"-40"
...
A normal shot could deal 268 damage to a snow wolf, but with over twenty wolves and Jiang Bai's 7% critical strike chance, a critical hit from Multi-Shot was more likely than not.
Seeing the cooldown of Multi-Shot instantly reset to zero, Jiang Bai exclaimed, "This Multi-Shot is just too satisfying. It's the ultimate skill for grinding groups!"
After a Multi-Shot, the wolves affected by the Frost debuff immediately slowed down. As Jiang Bai turned and continued to run forward, the distance between them gradually increased. This way, they could no longer attack him, which was the brilliance of Frost.
As the cooldown of Multi-Shot reset to zero again, Jiang Bai turned and fired another Multi-Shot. As the damage numbers popped up all over the screen, some wolves that had been critically hit in the previous round were now killed off.
This round of attacks triggered another critical hit, so Jiang Bai fired a third round of Multi-Shot. As a shower of arrows whistled through the air, the remaining dozen or so wolves all fell to the ground, turning into experience points that flowed into Jiang Bai's body.
"Awesome! Amazing!"
"Three critical hits in a row!" Jiang Bai couldn't help but shout in excitement as he watched the rapidly increasing experience bar. His 7% critical strike chance might not seem high, but with the sheer number of wolves, it was almost guaranteed to land a critical hit.
"You have killed [Enraged Snow Wolf], gained 40 experience points."
...
The system prompts kept coming in. Jiang Bai checked his experience bar; it took 6000 experience points to level up from level 6 to level 7, which was quite absurd...
"Even if I solo grind, I'd need to kill 150 of them to level up. If ordinary players come here in groups, it would be utterly exhausting!"
"The leveling difficulty in this game is really outrageous..." Jiang Bai couldn't help but sigh. "But then again, everyone has quests to do. There aren't many experience rewards for the quests in the newbie village. I just didn't do any of them."
Given Jiang Bai's current abilities and level, following the routine quests would slow him down rather than help. Only these hidden quests were worth doing.
Jiang Bai began to clean up the battlefield. The twenty-plus wolves dropped less than four hundred copper coins and some wolf skins and teeth. The equipment drop rate remained as low as ever, with no items at all.
As for the quest material Wolf Blood, only five portions were dropped.
"Damn it, the drop rate for quest materials can't be this low, can it?"
Jiang Bai stared at the five portions of wolf blood, feeling somewhat speechless. Based on his previous gaming experience, quest materials were usually guaranteed to drop, but he didn't expect this item to drop only five times out of over twenty wolves.
"So, to get a hundred portions of blood, I'd have to kill at least five hundred wolves?"
"Whoa... Even if I can grind in groups, how long would that take?"
Grinding monsters was initially thrilling and exciting, but as time went on, it became a bit monotonous.
Jiang Bai roughly calculated that in an hour, he had ground over a hundred snow wolves and leveled up to level 7, but he had only collected a little over thirty portions of wolf blood. The drop rate was simply disheartening.
"Fortunately, this crazy quest doesn't have a level cap; otherwise, I'd really lose the motivation to keep grinding."
Jiang Bai estimated that by the time he collected a hundred portions of blood, he would probably reach level 7.
Of course, there were still some rewards from grinding over a hundred wolves, including two pieces of white equipment and a green necklace, which netted him six gold coins.
And, quite miraculously, he also obtained another Skill Enhancement Scroll, which was a pleasant surprise.
"It seems that Skill Enhancement Scrolls aren't nonexistent from regular monsters, but the probability is extremely low!"
As for the Plunder skill, it only triggered twice, but the good news was that both times it added to his agility.
Seeing his health status about to drop below 10%, Jiang Bai, feeling a bit bored, found a relatively safe spot and logged out of the game. It was time for eating, drinking, and other necessities.
As for resting, players didn't need to worry about it, because the game pod had a sleep simulation function. In other words, while playing the game, players were essentially satisfying their body's sleep needs.
Jiang Bai casually ordered some takeout and opened the official forum.