Chapter 150
▪️BOXLUNCH'S REAL IDENTITY
With Boxlunch and his team's completion of the sidequest, the new map of Rivendell, has officially became accessible for all the players to enter.
Many rushed into this once prosperous manufacturing city during the heyday of the elven civilization, hoping to find some valuable treasures buried underneath these new ruins just like Li Mu and Demacia did when they found those ancient meditation manuals back in Florence.
It's worth noting that even though the game had been operating for quite some time already, the best meditation technique in the exchange store is still the 'Elemental Meditation Technique' that Li Mu and Demacia found and so far, it's also the only one that had achieved a mythical purple rating!
The 'Elemental Meditation Technique' can train magical power as well as improve one's affinity with the elements and can be used up to the peak of silver ranking at level 70.
The elves themselves are inherently gifted as mana attuned creatures, and one's own magical power isn't strictly exclusive into spellcasters or melee warriors. Despite magic not being their expertise, a melee warrior will still have a small amount of magical power within them and can even learn one or two common low level spells, such as appraisal and illumination.
Therefore, almost all players will saved up money in order to exchange for this meditation technique in the hopes of improving their own magical capacity.
However, even with a discount, this meditation technique is quite expensive and it requires 5000 contribution points for anyone to acquire it. Li Mu and Demacia, the two who have discovered this technique not only learned it for free, but they also keeps receiving a 0.5% cut from each player who buys it.
It's also worth noting that this reward will last for a one whole year...
In other words, within an in-game span of one year, each time someone bought this meditation technique at the exchange store, Li Mu and Demacia will each receive 25 contribution points as their cut as well!
Although the points gained isn't much, it's still a passive income and it also adds up over time without them even doing anything.
It's been two months already since the 'Elemental Meditation Technique' was unearthed by Li Mu and Demacia and each earned more than 10,000 contribution points just by relying upon the profits generated from this meditation technique alone!
Coupled with the income from the percentage cut they received from other players' buying all sorts of other skill books, meditations, and even ancient books they also found in the same batch, the contribution points they accumulated were enough for them to exchange for a golden legendary equipment at the store!
Almost every piece of golden legendary equipment in the game is an exclusive unique item that's one of a kind!
Not only that, but they also have some unique appearances that emits special effects! Some even have a flavor text with in-depth backstories, similar to the Devil's Wand and Night Wanderer's Spatial Ring...
And even if these items eventually become outdated as its owners further improve their levels, this unique one of a kind legendary golden equipments are still valuable due to it being treated as a collector's item.
However, even after more than a month had passed since the launch of Elven Kingdom back on earth, there are only a few players who have somehow managed to own these exclusive golden legendary items.
In particular, there's only Little Salty Cat whose equipments are all golden gear, and some players even suspected her of cheating by using her real-life financial power.
This is 'whale' even spent quite a lot of money in order to build a replica of the Hanging Gardens not to mention her other private estates as well!
Although eventually, these private estates have become a place for Moe Moe Committee gatherings and also became a famous landmark in the city of the chosen ones....
With the legendary golden equipments out of their reach, most players aim is to instead own a full set of mythical purple equipments which is a tier below the golden gears.
Even Li Mu and Demacia do not have a single piece of golden equipment, but instead wear a full set of purple gear.
Of course in actuality, it's not that they could not afford any golden gears, but rather because they plan to eventually buy a full set of golden equipments once they reach max level, all at once.
Li Mu and Demacia made a fortune by discovering some ancient manuals. Even if the two doesn't do anything, they will still receive some daily passive income l, making some players green with envy.
Therefore, the moment Rivendell was finally accessible, a large number of players rushed into this ne map, hoping to replicate Li Mu and Demacia's success.
Of course, there are also many high-level players whose plan is not to scavenge items, but rather go to the underworld through its entrance located in Rivendell, especially those who are eager to quickly increase their levels.
Although NPCs can provide lucrative tasks, there are still many players who prefer to take on risks and hunt mobs rather than doing laborious tasks earnestly.
Simply put, it's more thrilling to fight mobs for these players!
At the same time, a recent newly added feature have also caught the attention of all the players.
A Leaderboard System!
The leaderboards is a recent feature that Evé added after the implementation of NPC task system and it is divided into five categories:
Level Rankings, Contribution Rankings, Combat Rankings, Task Rankings, and finally Reputation Rankings.
The level rankings, as it name suggests, is a leaderboard that list the concurrent level of all the players. It is arranged in descending order with the highest at the top whilst the lowest at the bottom.
The leader of this leaderboard has always been 'Boxlunch' ever since its implementation.
Next is the Contribution rankings. This leaderboard are based upon the players' accumulated contribution points, and the more CP a player have, the higher their ranking is.
However since CP can be traded, the players also jokingly refer to this leaderboard as the 'rich list', and Little Salty Cat is almost always listed in the first place.
Her ranking is also a good indication as to whether there would be one less golden equipment available in the exchange store since her name would always sink below second or third place whenever Salty Cat would buy something expensive.
The combat rankings is a leaderboard based upon the combination of one's level, equipment, number of battles fought and the amount of experience gained through battles. Boxlunch is once again at the number one spot of this list followed by a player named Tomato with Little Salty Cat sitting at third place.
The task rankings is based on a comprehensive evaluation of the tasks completed by a player, and HootyBird, the leader of Moe Moe Committee's construction brigade, who also frequently takes on construction tasks, has the highest score upon this leaderboard.
Lastly, the reputation ranking is based on a comprehensive evaluation of a player's favorability rating with the NPCs, and Li Mu, as the player who is most respected and skilled at gaining favor, deserves his first-place position at this leaderboard.
However, this time, the two major factors within the level and combat leaderboards have undergone some changes.
It is not that a major change occurred in the rankings, but rather in the values instead.
Some players have noticed that Boxlunch's level is no longer at 20, but instead had risen to 21!
By achieving this feat, Boxlunch has become the first player in Elven Kingdom to be promoted to intermediate iron-rank!
The peak of rudimentary iron-rank is at level 20, and only upon passing that level, one would finally be considered as an intermediate iron expert.
There is only a one-level of difference, but make no mistake, there is a huge gap in power and abilities between a rudimentary and intermediate experts.
When Boxlunch was promoted to level 21, his score on the combat leaderboards instantly tripled, reaching up to 10,000 points, far surpassing the second place by 1,500 points...
This discovery made some players envious and amazed.
"As expected of Captain Box, he was promoted to intermediate rank so very quickly."
"My goodness... a combat rating of 10,000 points...Let's see, dammit! I'm only at 233 points even though I'm already at level 15. Maan, is the gap really that big?"
"Aren't you a casual player? It seems you don't engage much in combat? You know your score will quickly increase if you defeat some mobs."
"I'm also an active combat player... but my rating is only a little over 800 points..."
"That player named Boxlunch is a hardcore gamer right? I'm afraid this guy can easily sweep the competition..."
"He's more than just your typical grinding fanatic, I heard that he single-handedly killed more than ten iron-ranked human mercenaries at his last quest..."
"Wow... that's terrifying..."
Evé also took notice of Boxlunch's promotion. In fact, she had paid close attention to his combat capabilities.
It has to be said that this guy is indeed a combat genius. Evé couldn't find anyone as fierce as him amongst the concurrent 1200 players in the closed beta-test.
He has an immense amount of experience in reconnaissance, combat, and even rescue operations!
However, considering Boxlunch's real-life profession, Evé was really not all that surprised.
The 1200 players participating in the closed beta-test wasn't randomly selected by her. In fact, Evé carefully curated them based upon their proficiency in games.
In addition, she specifically selected streamers, professional players, and even some highly educated people.
Of course, Evé was also aware of all the personal information of these selected players. After all, earth's online network is very advanced, and she can find any information she wants through it.
As for Boxlunch, his real-life identity is a retired frontline drug enforcement police officer, and his personal record is so rich that it could even be written into a book...
Like Li Mu, Evé also considered Boxlunch as a key observation target and she have plans to cultivate him in the future if necessary.
After Boxlunch had reached intermediate iron-rank, Evé also plans to update the goods being sold at the exchange store.
"Many high-level players have already saved up for a full set of mythical purple equipments. With Boxlunch paving the way to intermediate rankings, soon more players will as well gradually reach the same rank due to the appearance of a new map."
"To motivate them even more, it's the best time to update the contents of the store."
After pondering for a moment, Evé then took out a batch of equipments for intermediate iron-ranks that had already been prepared within her celestial domain...
These were once the 'junk' equipments sent over by the players to her as an offerings.
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