Chapter 156:

The first one to complete the Black Iron Trial feat, Sword Saint Ashina, finally logged back in after being offline for four hours. It was already broad daylight, and breakfast had been eaten. However, the little players did not linger in Bataxin City.

They had caught up with the carriage, and under Maxim’s leadership, they were escorting important prisoners and a group of fallen “Blood Vulture loyalists” back to the Crimson Citadel at the fastest pace possible.

When Sword Saint Ashina opened her eyes, she saw her three companions dozing off in the swaying carriage.

This was how players appeared when they were offline. Although Maxim did not particularly favor the female players, the other little players had voluntarily given them a carriage to use exclusively.

“Ah! It’s different now!”

After hooking up with Murphy last night, Sword Saint Ashina displayed the completion of the Black Iron Trial. She then entered a forced offline state, with a note in the game helmet saying “test personnel physical projection reconstruction,” which probably meant updating her character information.

She looked down at the character interface displayed on her Computation Bead, and it was indeed very different from before:

【Test Personnel ID: Sword Saint Ashina

Character Profession: 10th Level Gunner/None/None

Character Status: Professional → Black Iron Body

Character Attributes:

Strength: 4 → 6

Agility: 8 → 12

Endurance: 6 → 7

Intelligence: 3 → 5

Perception: 6 → 8

Charisma: 3 → 4

Remaining Free Attribute Points: 6, can be manually allocated.

New Character Talent Acquired!

Pain Suppression: Reduces all melee damage taken.

Calm Hunter: Upon entering combat, mental interference from the outside world is reduced, and the duration of mental negative status effects is reduced.

Close Combat Ranger: Using hand cannons in close-quarters combat reduces the penalty to accuracy.

Black Iron Body Strength Stage Summary:

Congratulations, Test Personnel!

You have finally transcended the Mortal realm and stepped into the extraordinary realm, and your potential has been unlocked and will be discovered and released through subsequent training and battles.

But you must understand that the Black Iron Body is a very special strength stage.

In this stage, you must carefully choose and confirm the path of power you wish to walk in the future, and undergo specialized training according to your profession and skill traits to form a combat style most suitable for yourself.

The development team’s recommendation for Black Iron Body test personnel is:

In this stage, you may appropriately slow down your leveling speed and instead focus more effort on honing your combat skills. Please think deeply about what kind of person you want to become in this otherworld and how you should leave your own legend.

Of course, this is merely a suggestion!

In this completely free world, you can spend your second life as you wish! Congratulations, your future is no longer bound.】

“Wow, that’s so formal! This just makes me like you guys even more, what should I do? Should I ask my dad to spend some money and acquire your company?”

Seeing her renewed character attributes and the message from the development team, Sword Saint Ashina smiled happily in the carriage, feeling like she could now punch a cow to death with her 12 attribute points increase and 6 free attribute points to allocate!

This was no illusion.

But before Sword Saint Ashina could break free from the joy and immense sense of achievement of leveling up and obtaining the 【Server First!】 glorious achievement, she noticed a new quest quietly existing in her quest log.

Two new quests personally given by Murphy!

【Hidden Quest ‘Murphy’s Warrior’ has been triggered!

Quest Description: Murphy is a rather fastidious vampire. Beneath his benevolent exterior lies a soul that pursues perfection.

He favors and trusts his otherworld warriors, yet he has been secretly observing them all along. He only allows himself to choose the most promising and unique ones from among the otherworldly spirits to become his personal warriors.

And now!

You!

A resilient soul from another world, you should feel honored, for Murphy has preliminarily acknowledged you and bestowed upon you the title of ‘Reserve Warrior’. However, to truly become Murphy’s warrior, you still have a long way to go.

Quest Objective: Enhance your image and importance in Murphy’s eyes as much as possible, and await the triggering of the next phase of the quest.

Quest Reward: Special title “Murphy’s Warrior”.

Note!

There are only twelve of these titles in 《Reality Realm》, and you now hold one of them.】

“Hooray!”

Sword Saint Ashina jumped up excitedly in the carriage, waving her arms and shouting maniacally to herself:

“Murphy! I swear to you! Finally, someone has discovered my great talent and can reasonably use it. Even though it’s an NPC who discovered my uniqueness, it doesn’t matter. I knew this game was my destined game.

Ah, Dad and Mom, I’ve found a game worthy of dedicating my life to.”

Sword Saint Ashina nodded, looking a bit worried as she said:

“But I haven’t raised Baroness Miriam’s affinity at all since I started the game. It would take forever to start from scratch and raise it high enough. Wait! I just had an idea.”

She looked up at Fatal Orchid and said:

“What if a player who already has affinity visits the baroness, and then I go along as a follower or friend? He could make the request to view the gift.”

“That’s theoretically possible!”

Fatal Orchid nodded and said:

“But you may not be able to find a player willing to take the adventure with you. Actively making requests to NPCs will definitely lower affinity, let alone the affinity of an important NPC like Regent Miriam.”

“What about other NPCs then?”

Sword Saint Ashina gestured and said:

“If an NPC brings me in, there wouldn’t be that problem, right?”

“Huh?”

Fatal Orchid looked at the little Sword Saint Ashina holding her Computation Bead in surprise and asked doubtfully:

“So, what’s your plan?”

“Of course, to find the charming and gentle Murphy!”

The little dwarf laughed and said:

“Apart from patrolling his territory, he basically doesn’t do any real work. He has plenty of time to spare. As his reserve warrior, this small request shouldn’t be enough for him to remove me, right? You also said his affinity algorithm is different from other NPCs.

I’ve already obtained the qualification, so I should be entitled to preferential treatment, right?”

“Yeah, that’s feasible!”

Fatal Orchid nodded, glancing at the smug Sword Saint Ashina, and said:

“You really are a clever little devil.”

——

The news of Sword Saint Ashina passing the Black Iron Trial last night was like a bomb that exploded. After a few hours of fermentation, it had spread like wildfire on the forum, blowing almost all the little players out.

There were constant posts on the forum asking how she did it. The patient Lumina eventually just opened a dedicated thread and described the entire process.

At this moment, the faraway Onboard Joy Stick, who was in the sewers of the Crimson Citadel deploying troops and preparing for a “raid battle” against a group of zombies, let out a yawn. He opened the forum in-game and read the textual descriptions in the post.

He was obviously contemplating how to approach his own trial.

“Does a 100% realistic game require realistic thinking as well?”

Stick squinted his eyes, feeling like he had grasped a clue.

However, he became so deeply absorbed in his thoughts that he forgot to command the three newbies charging too fast to retreat in time. A gap appeared in their formation, and three zombies rushed in, causing a chaotic melee that nearly resulted in serious casualties for the team.

“Damn it! What are you afraid of? Use your spears and push them out! Gunners, prepare to open fire!”

Stick jumped up and shouted, quickly restoring order to the messy formation.

But his mind was no longer on the battlefield before him. Stick took a hand-drawn sewer map from his side, stroked his chin in thought for several minutes, and said to his comrades:

“We’ll keep grinding for another 30 minutes, and then a few of us will go set some traps with me!”

“Huh? Stick, what’s the point of setting traps?”

Tiger Leopard Rider asked curiously. Stick narrowed his eyes and said:

“To lure an elite zombie over. I’m going to pass the Black Iron Trial tonight! I’m also planning to develop a combat strategy that everyone can use. We’re real men, we can’t let a little girl outdo us, right?”

At the same time, in the outskirts of the city sewers, the fierce male warriors accompanying Master Mao for leveling were also discussing last night’s events.

Sword Saint Ashina’s server-wide achievement had fired up the fierce men’s hot blood, making them wish they could capture a zombie right now and practice.

“For a girl to actually accomplish the feat of solo challenging a Black Iron elite... tsk, how embarrassing!”

North Forest Dog’s Paddle slapped his face and mocked himself with a prolonged tone, leaving the other three brothers speechless. However, the nearby resting Master Mao grinned, picked up his water pouch and took a sip, then stood up with his greatsword and said:

“What’s the point of constantly comparing yourself to others? You should compare yourself to yourself! This game’s parrying and dodging is so realistic. If you practice your techniques, forget just soloing an elite, you could do it without taking any damage.”

“Huh? I believe you could beat an elite, Master Mao, but unscathed? Tsk, that’s too exaggerated.”

“Why? Don’t believe me? Hey, give me a few more days to get the hang of this game, and then let me open your eyes. But the Blood Vulture Sword Arts definitely won’t work, they have plenty of attack power but lack agility, which is an inherent weakness of that sword style.

You need to learn a balanced set of offensive and defensive skills. First, tell me how to raise affinity in this game?

When I was sparring with Lord Maxim before, I saw him use a sword art that allowed unscathed dodging. I plan to learn it, and then I should be able to solo an elite.”

“Achoo!”

At that moment, Maxim, who was escorting the caravan departing from Bataxin City, suddenly sneezed without warning, causing one of the Descendants beside him to give him an odd look and say:

“My lord, what’s wrong? Are you injured?”

“No.”

The fully armed Maxim, riding a warhorse, waved his hand and said:

“It’s just a very strange feeling, like I’m being watched by something really troublesome.”