Shock Collar vs NPC (1)
Jisha heard the unfamiliar voice as well and was surprised to find another entity was trailing them. It was easy to deduce that this entity was not a member of Shock Collar as they seemed to show signs of surprise as well.
*Hm...*
*>Name: ???*
*>Level: ???*
*It's an NPC.*
Players would instinctually know whether an entity was a player, NPC, or something else simply by appraising it. This was one of the conveniences of full-dive VR; information could be relayed to the brain without any sort of verbal communication.
Though Jisha didn't find this situation bizarre, it was clearly different for Shock Collar.
"Who are you??" asked a panicked member.
"Hand over the dagger, and nobody needs to get hurt," the NPC said.
*Yep, just as I expected...*
A high-level NPC had shown up to claim the unique dagger by the same "fickle means" Jisha had predicted. But even though this NPC was "high-level", she didn't feel like she was in too much danger. Why?
There were a few reasons for this.
First off, Synergy's early game, or levels below 100, was a bit strange. Before this level, fights were a bit rudimentary and NPCs' combat intelligence was still very poor.
*And... it still feels a bit strange to fight without the gem system.*
Secondly, every level was a small percentage boost to one's stats. Even by level 100, this percentage wasn't affecting base stats by that much. A level 1 player had around 100 HP as a base stat, but a level 100 player only had around 500-550 HP as a base stat.
*If I recall correctly, level 250 is where stats really start to ramp up...*
But there were obvious caveats here. These stats were only the base. There were many factors that affected one's base stats, such as weapons, armor, and more. In addition, an NPC was not a player. Their HP was not determined by the same formula as the players'. So it was impossible to predict how much HP an NPC had simply by their level.
Thirdly, as long as the NPC was below Tier 1, it wouldn't be too dangerous.
At the moment, every player was Tier 0. Along with class evolution, players would have to undergo Tier upgrade quests as well. And Tier upgrades were more significant than class and level upgrades. This was because any Tier had a 90% resistance to any Tier below it! For example, an attack from a Tier 0 that ordinarily dealt 100 HP would only deal 10 HP of damage to a Tier 1 entity.
And this effect only stacked at higher tiers. A Tier 2 entity would receive 99% less damage from a Tier 0. A Tier 3 would receive 99.9% less damage from a tier 0. And so on and so forth.
But in Synergy, rewards only came with appropriate difficulty. Tier upgrade quests were much more difficult than class evolution quests... so much so that only roughly 10% of the player base could ascend to the next tier at the minimum level.
One in ten could ascend to Tier 1 at level 100. And one in those ten could ascend to Tier 2 at level 200, which meant only 1 in 100 would be Tier 2 at level 200... and so on and so forth. Naturally, if one could accomplish the feat, it was well worth it.
So Jisha watched on as the newly-arrived NPC harassed Shock Collar.
*I wonder if I can kill it?*
---
*>Lujen: Who the fck is this?*
*>Axis Jack: ... It's an NPC.*
*>Lujen: Well we know why it's after us, don't we? Get rid of it!*
Luden was furious that none of his subordinates had taken care of the obvious threat. But he couldn't hear their silent prayers for peace!
Axis Jack was also getting a bit frustrated with Luden's antics. Jack knew that Luden wasn't good at games but only skilled at managing finances in the real world. And with those finances, he was also good at allocating tasks to those who specialized in a skill. And in this case, Axis Jack and the rest of Shock Collar were the "specialists". They knew this NPC wasn't something they should be provoking, but Luden's quick temper prevented them from speaking up.
*>Axis Jack: We don't know what level it is. Appraisal yields no results. It's highly likely this NPC is too strong for us to deal with. Between this mysterious NPC and the anonymous Slingshotter, we're pretty screwed...*
*>Lujen: Are you saying we should just give it the dagger we spent a thousand Copper on?*
*>Axis Jack: That's...*
*>Lujen: Either we die, or they die. We're not handing anyone our valuables.*
*>Axis Jack: ... Run and we'll distract them. None of our items are worth what that dagger is. Everyone, get ready.*
When they received this order, Shock Collar wanted to cry, but at least they were getting paid in real life!