Chapter 10: Killing Goblins, Extracting Attributes
Block! Block! Block!
These devious goblins, all level 10 or above, easily countered Alice's arrows, only receiving up to 10 points of damage.
[Name: Forest Goblins]
[Level: 10]
[HP: 400]
These things had high hp, but their magic resistance was extremely low, only being at 12, their strength on the other hand was no joke, reaching 28!
A single stab could cause [Blood Loss], and adding that to the initial damage, both Alex and Alice could die in one hit.
Fireball! Red Crystal! Rock Throw!
But once met with Alex's attacks, the goblins couldn't block.
"Argh, human is strong!" the group of five goblins couldn't even get close that they were all annihilated.
-149! -137! -178!
"Wow…" Alice's eyes sparkled, her arrows couldn't reach, but the mage's spell hit all goblins with incredible precision, not a single one missing its target.
[Killed level 10 forest goblin, gained 21 experience points.]
They gave around 42 experience each, but of course, it was divided.
Ding!
[Goblin Dagger (Common)
7 strength attribute points
Goblin Ear (Common)]
"!!!" Alex got the option to increase his stats again, and this time the other items were garbage, meaning that he immediately selected it.
If it worked like he thought, then it meant he would surely rise far beyond others!
Ding!
[Your strength has been increased by 7!]
He had never used his free attribute points on strength, and it started with 3 at the start, meaning that after 5 levels, it should currently be at 28.
[Attributes:] Vitality 30; Strength 35; Agility 33; Spirit 47.
And yet, it seems like the 7 points were indeed permanantly added!
This was incredible news, and Alex immediately thought about the possibilty of doing the same thing with his spirit attribute since he remembered there being more [Goblin Mages] the closer he got to the king.
To be honest, he had no use for [Strength] right now, but it would be useful later, especially when he got to the [Profession Task] or to the [Class Orb].
"Hey?" Alice appeared in front of Alex as he was spacing out, "You ready?"
"Oh, yeah," he nodded.
"Sorry for being useless…" she was sad, thinking that she could be useful, yet here was Alex, doing all the work!
"It's fine, archers are supposed to stay at the back anyway, cover my flanks."
Alice beamed, these were the words she wanted to hear, "Aright! I'll try my best!"
They went deeper inside the goblin territory, Alex taking care of the goblins with two of his spells, then Alice waiting for the perfect opportunity to strike them.
Soon enough, they met up with another type of goblins: [Goblin Archers]!
"That's my time to shine," Alice laughed as she pulled out her arrows and began to shoot.
And she actually managed to aim her bow perfectly, hitting the goblin archers before they could even realize what was happening, and of course, aiming at the head was a weakness, meaning that she dealt 300% of the damage she usually did, killing them instantly!
Meanwhile, Alex was profitting from all of this!
[Your strength has been increased by 7!]
[Your strength has been increased by 7!]
And he managed to extract 5 agility from the archers!
[Your agility has been increased by 5!]
[Your agility has been increased by 5!]
When they got rid of the all the goblins, he had gained over 42 strength and 25 agility!
Plus, he leveled up to level 7, and all his spells except for [Earth Shield] went up by one level!
[Fireball Level 5; Deal 100 points of damage to target + 100% of spirit to target; consumes 10 mana; 3-second cooldown.]
[Red Crystal Level 4; Deals exactly 150 damage to target; consumes 15 mana; 5-second cooldown.]
[Rock Throw Level 2; create a small ball of rock that you can throw at enemy dealing 250 damage, chance of stunning; consumes 20 mana; 3-second cooldown]
Attribute points being a possible extraction drop made it so much better in Alex's eyes, since he could always choose them if none of the items pique his interest, and if they did, then he could just select them and keep repeating the process over and over!
Extraction was truly deserving of being an SSS-Level talent, merging luck, items and plundering all in the same spot!
Of course, beginner items were bad since it was only the novice-village, but when you went deeper, you would soon realize that some monsters even have some items with a 0.00001% drop rate, and then, Alex would be able to extract those, right?
He clearly remembered in his past life people speaking about the "LEGENDARY UNDROPPABLE DEMON DRAGON EGG" or "0.0000000001% EXCALIBUR", some people farming against certain monsters for months, but with no luck in dropping any of them, so would he be able to extract them too?
One of the rankings that would reveal itself in a week was the [Item/Equipment Ranking], the person with the rarest item of all being at the top, and to be honest, there was no chance anyone could beat Alex at it except if they got godly luck, or if he himself gave/sold them the overpowered item.
After a while and a bunch of stat gains, Alice and Alex reached the outskirts of the [Goblin Territory], finally able to see flickers of light.
"Alright, that's where the real challenge begins," everything before that was only the path to the goblin area since the goblins from before were only there to defend it.
In here were the strongest of goblins: [Goblin Warriors], [Goblin Mages] and at the end was the [Goblin King].
Goblins warriors were taller goblins wearing armors, and mages wore small dresses, carrying a [Stick Staff], able to cast only two spells.
Both these monsters were level 15 though, almost double Alex and Alice's.
"A-Are you sure?" she could feel that a single strike would result in death, and so her confidence plumetted.
But Alex was excited: mages are heavily focused on spirit, meaning that with enough luck, spirit attribute drops should appear!
And if they didn't, then he would sell their staffs to low-level players since they were definitely better than the default ones.
Alex would greatly need money for later, because even though it wasn't the case right now, money would become one of the core parts of Universal Descent.
Want to participate in a giant trial along with some other players?
Whoops, it's 100 gold coins for entry, and you lose it all if you die!
Want to declare war on a village, guild or city?
Double whoops, it's 1000 gold coins, and dying resets you back to level 0, oh and we're also taking some of your skills as compensation!
Alex had already experienced it all, the ruthlessness of this world, and so he was ready.
As said before, Universal Descent was going to completely change the entire economy of this world, and even though it had only launched less then 4 hours ago in the real world (8 hours in the game), it would quickly change as more people discovered about the stakes at hand.
But people that weren't in the game weren't gonna take it seriously until the very first attack on the Starfield's family home, the footage of the novice beasts terrifying the world.
Only after a month would the number of beta spots increase to 100 million, making Universal Descent even more popular.
And this is when more disasters would occur.
"Earth to Alex, wake up!" Alice waved her slender hand in front of him as they were currently hiding behind trees under the mage's command, "You said you were gonna do something!"
"Right," he nodded, and so he pointed his staff at the closest [Goblin Mage].