Su Chen, Gaming Expert or Martial Arts Master?

[ Ark ].

Ancient City of Ten Thousand Towns Dungeon.

Peach Blossom Town.

A system notification suddenly sounded out in the ears of countless players.

"Congratulations to Su Chen for becoming the first newbie to single-handedly kill the Heartless Bloodwolf Lord!"

At this moment, Liu Wankun, a level 36 [ Shield Warrior ] wearing battle-worn armor and carrying two shields on his back stopped in his tracks, together with his three party members beside him.

Everyone's eyes were filled with shock.

The reason was none other than the contents of the system's announcement!

"Brother Wankun, do my ears deceive me? Where on earth did this monstrous player come from!"

"A newbie single-handedly defeating the most difficult Boss of the [ Wasteland ] dungeon? It must be fake!"

"This... Thinking back to the time when the four of us were in the newbie dungeon. Back then, we've put in blood sweat and tears, and even then, we barely managed to kill despite our tacit understanding of one another. How could this [ Su Chen ] possibly do it alone?"

"Ridiculous, this is absolutely ridiculous!"

The party was instantly in an uproar as they ridiculed Su Chen's "fake" achievement in disbelief.

Seeing that everyone was suffering such a huge blow, Liu Wankun decided not to express his true thoughts on the matter. He decided to keep a brave front and acted indifferently to Su Chen's achievement whilst he consoled them.

"No matter how exaggerated this achievement is, he's still a newbie. He's two months behind us. There's no way he'll be able to catch up to us."

"Let's go. We have to hurry up and hand-in the quest to slay the level 40 [ General Baiqi ]."

Only then did Wankun's party members regain some confidence. They hastened their pace to submit the quest that they had just completed.

...

Ancient City of Ten Thousand Towns.

Outside Qingfeng Town.

"The Boss only has 50,000 HP left. Just fire off everything you got! I'll personally cover all of your HP and MP potions!"

A Level 42[ Swordsman ] with the ID of Li Kai quickly retreated to the back of the party the moment his HP dropped low. Upon confirming his safety, he then brought out a HP potion and chugged it down.

As the [ Unstoppable ] game company's most important player in [ Ark ], he had gathered 3 parties consisting of 12 players each to take down a level 50 Boss in a raid.

This was one of his go-to methods to power-level.

At this moment, a system notification sounded in his ears.

"Congratulations to Su Chen for becoming the first newbie to single-handedly kill the Heartless Bloodwolf Lord!"

Li Kai could not help but take a deep breath.

Was this a joke?

A solo kill!?

What game company did this expert belong to?

Li Kai recalled the mob that had yielded him enough EXP to reach level 10. He too, had slain a Boss. In his case, the Boss that he had defeated was the [ Venom-spewing Golden Python ], and although it was a different Boss from the Wolf Lord, he was well aware of how tough the battle against it was, since he had tried to fight it as well.

The Wolf Lord was considered to be the most difficult Boss within the newbie dungeon of Wasteland City.

At that time, he had even spent a pretty penny to hire three players to take down the Golden Python together with him.

Is the system working correctly?

I should get someone to investigate this Su Chen player later.

I'll need to see whether he's already hired under a different company, and if not, I'll get him to join mine...

"You mortals, don't even think about taking my head!"

While Li Kai was marveling at Su Chen's achievement and healing up with potions, the boss, Wang Jian, suddenly shouted.

Now that his HP was bottoming out, the Boss had entered his Berserk state.

Wang Jian waved the long spear in his hand, striking four members of the party in a single swing!

The critical damage instantly killed two of them!

Worse still, their equipment had dropped upon death!

"F*ck!"

Li Kai cursed in anger. Upon realizing that he needed to compensate those players for their losses, he suddenly realized that Wang Jian was left with only 20,000 HP. As such, he charged forward without a single ounce of hesitation.

"Don't stop! I'll cover all the costs for your deaths, even if you somehow returned to level 1 because of it!"

...

[ Badlands ] Dungeon.

The same system notification rang out in Si Luo and Si Weiwei's ears.

Only those with level 50 and above could enter the Badlands.

As such, there were not many players present in the dungeon.

Those that were present were mostly the first batch of players that played [ Ark ] since its release.

Moreover, they had the backing of companies behind them as well.

As the system notification sounded out.

The two of them exchanged glances at one another.

They could see the surprise in each other's eyes.

"Sister Wei Wei, a newbie killed the Wolf Lord all by himself?"

"That's impossible."

Si Luo refuted subconsciously.

As one of the first batch of players to enter Ark, he knew just how difficult it was to defeat the Boss of Wasteland City.

Even he and Si Weiwei needed to join hands and use up a near-infinite amount of HP and MP potion just to stand a chance against it.

As such, the fact that a newbie had accomplished such a task felt like a fever dream.

Si Weiwei remained silent for a moment before shaking her head.

"Since the system has announced it, it can't be fake."

Si Luo was still in disbelief. "But I'm sure you're aware just how difficult it is to take down that particular Boss. We needed to join hands just to stand a chance against i!"

Si Weiwei's expression did not change. "At that time, we were the pioneers of [ Ark ] . Many aspects of the game were still unknown to us back then."

"However, with the number of guides and resources readily available on the Internet now, it's only a matter of time before a powerhouse would manage to make history. Though, I do admit that I didn't expect such a day to arrive this early."

Si Weiwei analyzed the matter bit by bit and quickly sorted out her thoughts.

"But Sis, no matter how powerful this Su Chen is, he's still only a level 9 newbie! There are limits to both his attack and defensive stats!"

"That is, unless he had a pile of orange-ranked equipment at his disposal, but I'm sure no company would be willing to waste their money on such a vain venture! It's just not worth spending such a huge amount of gold on a newbie dungeon's Boss!"

"A reward of 200,000 Gold Coins wouldn't even make a dent on the cost of such a venture!"

Upon hearing this, Si Weiwei turned around and looked towards Si Luo again.

"As a game that grounds itself to reality as much as possible, after eliminating various factors, the only reason that I could think of that allowed this newbie to accomplish such a feat would be his dodging ability."

"This..."

Si Luo did not know how to respond.

One's ability to dodge and weave was an extremely precious resource within a realistic game like [ Ark ]. They were priceless, as they were raw, unadulterated talents that no amount of money could purchase.

After all, one's ability to dodge was tied directly to the basic attacking and defending mechanics of the game.

If movement skills were rampant within the game, monsters and bosses would have difficulty landing hits onto the players, and as a result, the power level of the game would completely collapse.

It was for this reason that [ Ark ] did not sell any movement or evasion abilities within its shops.

However, according to the official website, there were actually two ways to obtain movement or evasion skills.

The first was to obtain a hidden quest that could be taken upon reaching level 40.

The second was via a mechanic that was already coded into the game, but in an effort to maintain the game's balance, the developers have decided to withhold the information until further notice.

"Hmm, maybe this person is a martial arts master in real life."

Realizing that there was no way to get to the bottom of this, Si Luo decided not to think too hard on the matter any longer.

Si Weiwei had been able to successfully dodge a few times by accident during her stint in the game. As a human that had received genetic modifications via the latest research of this parallel world, her body's constitution and reaction speeds were far superior to that of ordinary individuals..

However, at this moment, a thought suddenly occurred to Si Weiwei.

"Lil' Luo, do you think it's possible that this Su Chen is the anonymous player on the compatibility score rankings?"

"... Although I also really hope that it's actually the case, even with a max compatibility score, he would only gain an extra 30 to 40 points at level 10. That's not a lot to be a game-changer."

Si Luo quickly denied this idea.

Then, as if to change the topic, he suddenly took on an eager tone.

"Let's go, Sister Weiwei. The beast hide that we obtained last time has been purchased for 80,000 Gold Coins by a player of the Job [ Heavenly Craftsman ]. We just made a killing!"

"Once the guild system comes online, we'll need a large sum of money to maintain operational costs."

After hearing about the financial troubles regarding the guild, Si Weiwei retracted her thoughts on the matter and set off towards the location of her quest.

At the same time.

Su Chen, who had finally completed the level-sprint quest and received his reward, also temporarily went offline.

He had returned to reality.