I get out of the tent and I'm on my own. The campfire is now have become ashes. I fold the tent and put it in my inventory. It's nighttime and I'm leaving this area and on my way to Galsadt Plains. I open the party chat to ask for their coordinate, Ivonna replies and gives me the coordinate. I wear the Moon's Series and use [Moonsteps] immediately.
I've arrived at the Galsadt Plains. I feel so thirsty and I already drink a lot of water since left that area, but this thirst won't go away and it's getting worse. I'm so confused and then I realize and look at the Ring of Blood on my right middle finger. I check the buffs and debuffs on my screen. There's a blood icon on the buff side, and I expand it to see the details.
[You are thirsty for blood. Your Damage Output, MS, and ASPD are increased by 5%.
23mins 12secs before you are in [Madness] (Debuff) status.
Madness: Your blood lust is unfulfilled, you will lose your mind and will harm yourself to smell and see blood. The more blood is coming out from your body, the more excited you are to harm yourself. You cannot control your own body and will keep harming yourself until you die.]
"..."
Now I know why I'm feeling so thirsty this whole time. I look around to find a monster. There's a Giant Scorpion not far from me. I immediately equip my chained sickles, approach them and kill them. The smell of blood should be tangy, but for some reason, it doesn't, and it smells so sweet instead. The more I smell it, the more I desire to kill. It's like my body is producing a massive amount of endorphins and it makes me feel really good.
I look at the buff's status again. The timer on Bloodthirst got reset and it becomes 2 hours. So I have to keep killing monsters every 2 hours if I don't want to die. That's annoying. I will remove this ring for now because it's inconvenient.
"..."
"Oh no... It's stuck..."
I sit down and think about how to get rid of this annoying timer. I look at my stats and my VIT is high enough to have 52% of status resistance, but it can only buy me 2 hours. I look at my dodge rate and it's 53%, then I have an idea on how to stop the timer. I open my inventory and grab my dagger. I equip it and look at the timer.
"Heh, it stops. Nice..."
Since I need the soul essences of the monsters here, I will farm those monsters by using my daggers to have a greater chance to get them. But, I have to meet up with Ivonna and the other first. They're waiting for me and they're resting not far from where I'm at.
I follow the coordinate Ivonna gave me, and then I can see smoke coming from in front of me. It must be the campfire that Ivonna and the others made. Then I can see their tents and I can hear their laugh and chuckle. I remove my Moon's Series and put them in my inventory then walk toward them. Kyle notices and he waves at me.
"Oh, you're back! Welcome back!"
The others turn around and look at me. They're waving at me and Ivonna raises her eyebrows. She must be curious about the outcomes. I wave back at them and sit on the log with them. Cecilia leans her head to see my face.
"So, are you done taking care of the business?"
I nod and look at her.
"Yeah, sorry it took so long. How was your leveling?"
They start to tell about their first experience in Galsadt Plains. On the first day, they were overwhelmed by the monsters because the monsters are different from the information they got in the forum. The Giant Scorpion is now above level 130 and there are other monsters here that migrated from their original areas. There are Sturdy Sandworm, Desert Falcon, and many more. Galsadt Plains is no longer a 110 - 130 level monster, but 130 - 150. It took them quite a while to kill one of them, and Ivonna patiently teaches and helped them. Thanks to her high DEF, VIT, and equipment, she barely took any damages because her regeneration rate is almost equal to the damage she took. The reason why they're choosing this area to spend the night because that it's safer compared to the other area they have explored.
After they told their experiences, they all go to sleep. it's just me and Ivonna outside. She looks at me excitedly.
"So, how was it? For you to take 3 days to come here means that you died and waited for 3 days to respawn."
I nod with agreement.
"Yeah, you're right. I tried to wear the ring when my dodge rate is 100% and I didn't die, but it didn't meet the requirements. Then I tried it again with a 53% dodge rate. I died and then finally I met the requirement, but it took 3 days for the system to process it. Then here I am, with this ring stuck in my finger."
Ivonna looks at my finger and she chuckles. I sigh and stare at her.
"Yeah yeah... you can make fun of me. It's ridiculous that I can't take the ring off..."
Ivonna clears her throat.
"I'm sorry. Anyway, what is the ring does? Is it good?"
I share my equipment status with Ivonna. She looks at it and tilts her head.
"I still can't see the ring's description and its effects."
I'm humming with understanding and tell her what's the ring does. She's surprised and looks at me with disbelief.
"Rather than being an unbelievably strong item, it's quite terrifying because of how it can harm the user. The drawback is too much to handle. But of course, if it's you, then it's broken."
She chuckles at what she just said, and I scoff while looking at her.
"So, how many Betelgeuse's Coin do you have now?"
Ivonna raises her eyebrows then looks at her inventory.
"I have 68 of them."
I'm humming with understanding.
"How many monsters did you kill?"
Ivonna furrows her forehead and looks at the sky.
"Around two hundred, no it's almost three hundred... Yeah, I'm being unlucky. They all got around 60 coins by killing two hundred-ish monsters while I'm staying up late and protected them from the monsters while they were asleep."
I nod with understanding and then Ivonna yawns.
"I have been staying up late to be a lookout for them because there's no safe zone in this place. So I barely have time to sleep for the past 3 days."
I stand up and grab another dagger from my inventory. Ivonna looks at me with confusion. I look around and then look at her.
"You can go to sleep now. I'm here, and I'll be on the lookout from now on. I have enough sleep and I want to farm coin around here."
Ivonna nods and stands up.
"Thank you, I will go to sleep now. Be careful and I'll see you tomorrow morning."
I nod and Ivonna gets inside her tent.
I equipped everything and started to farm monsters. As they said earlier, the monsters here are stronger and other monsters were lurking near the camp. But it didn't matter for me because my levels and passive skills are superior compared to them even though I'm using Lazy Luck Daggers, and it's perfect for me because the monster's level is not that far from mine, so the EXP is great for me to leveling up as well. Since I'm on my own, I used [Divine Aura] and [Frenzy]. I farmed Betelgeuse's Coin for an hour and I already have 42 coins, 1 kill for 1 coin. I used [Reawakening] to refresh all the skills cooldown. Then I activated [Divine Aura] and [Frenzy] again.
[You are thirsty for blood. Your Damage Output, MS, and ASPD are increased by 119%.
23mins 12secs before you are in [Madness] (Debuff) status.
Madness: Your blood lust is unfulfilled, you will lose your mind and will harm yourself to smell and see blood. The more blood is coming out from your body, the more excited you are to harm yourself. You cannot control your own body and will keep harming yourself until you die.]
I look at the Ring of Blood on my finger. I smile and this [Bloodthirst] skill is so good, when I was in Frenzied status, I felt great and refreshed, and since I didn't control my own body, I was watching myself killing monsters while feeling high from this skill. Not just that, the more I kill, the higher the buffs from this skill. 119% and I believe it can be stacked without limitation because the buff's status screen showed me, and the duration isn't moving since I equipped my Lazy Luck Dagger. I will try to aggro dozens of monsters later and see how it goes. This item is dangerous, it makes me feel like a maniac.
I chuckle and shake my head.
"I love this ring..."