MMO: Pierce Heaven Til' It Breaks

[You have obtained 100,000 Ironhammer Town (Neutral Dwarf Faction) Reputation points.]

[Congratulations, your Reputation in Ironhammer Town is now Intimate.]

[You have obtained a reward of SP +5.]

[You have obtained a reward of Gold Coins +50.]

Super Trampoline 250 was a very different kind of novelty dungeon, so achieving a first kill there did not assure a Hall of Fame record. On the other hand, it rewarded a whopping 5 SP to each player.

“Damn that Doka, where has he gone?”

Karone ran around angrily, ending up in front of Li Yi. “The technician who was in charge of cleaning up the factory disappeared off to somewhere. It’s partly your fault this place ended up like this too, so y’all clean it up, thanks.”

Karone ran off.

“Clean?” Fire Ice was confused.

“We can leave once we find the red casket.”

Li Yi and Fire Ice split up, going in search of the red casket in the room filled with debris.

The Super trampoline 250 Instance Dungeon awarded a red-colored treasure chest upon completion. Thanks to the explosion, the red-colored treasure chest could appear anywhere randomly. Every time players passed this dungeon, they had to spend a long time digging around for it. That was why the players jokingly called it the red casket.

“Found it!”

Fire Ice gave a cheer, pulling the red casket out from under Black Steel’s metallic remains.

“Open it!”

Fire Ice opened the red casket, and a Virtual Inventory Pane appeared before Li Yi’s eyes.

[Cardiac Pacemaker Model V1 Blueprint]

[Fine Iron Screw x10]

[Bronze Pipe x10]

One gold-colored design drawing, two blue-colored parts, and that was it for the clearing rewards.

“Is that lucky or unlucky?” asked Fire Ice.

“It’s average.”

Li Yi shook his head helplessly and picked up the three items.

The two blue-colored parts were not rare. Intermediate-level Engineers could already craft those by themselves, and the Cardiac Pacemaker Model V1 was not very useful either. Its base success rate was 2%, so even Li Yi, a Legendary Master Engineer, would only fail horribly if he tried to use that save anyone.

It really was no more than a toy. Engineers could make five different types of Cardiac Pacemakers, with Model V1 being the most ineffective and Model V5 being the most effective. Compared to V1, however, Model V5 was a lot less likely to drop.

“C’mon, let’s exit and give it another shot.”

“We can try it again?”

Li Yi nodded. “Yeah. Each entry is 100 Gold Coins, but we get unlimited entries.”

The novelty dungeon Super Trampoline 250 did not have a cooldown period. It reset itself as soon as the players completed it. Each entry cost a fee of 100 Gold Coins, be it for one person or five.

Li Yi did not learn the Cardiac Pacemaker Model V1, because there was no point even if he did learn it. Besides, this thing was still relatively rare right now, so if he put it on auction to trick a couple of people, there would be plenty of willing fish to jump at the bait.

After paying the 100 Gold Coins, the two of them entered the dungeon once more…

Even if no one had tried to block them at the dungeon entrance, the friend summoning tool was still a must-have. It could pull people to them regardless of area, at any time or any place. Regardless of the circumstances, it was still a very vital thing to have.

Fire Ice understood what Li Yi was after as well, so she followed after him obediently and continued to tramp.

The positions of the trampolines in the Super Trampoline 250 Instance Dungeon were not fixed, with several hundred possible permutations. Players had to truly get a grasp of the jumping technique if they wanted to pass safely each and every time.

Thankfully, after the first practice run, the two of them grew visibly better at jumping. They leaped and they bounded, and two hours later, they successfully reached the final boss.

With the orange bow’s special skill, Soul Bind, High Tinker Torqa’s Cardiac Pacemaker Model V5 no longer took effect. He fell in one shot, and there was never any doubt that he would.

The same thing repeated once more. Fire Ice used Hand of Salvation to protect Li Yi, and then Karone ran out, saving Fire Ice…

They found the red casket again, and Fire Ice was tasked with opening it once more. However, the drops left the two of them speechless.

[Cardiac Pacemaker Model V3 Blueprint]

[Fine Iron Ingot x10]

[Bronze Frame x10]

…

“The summoning tool sure is a rare drop…” Fire Ice felt a headache coming on. They took two hours to clear the dungeon once, so if this went on, anyone would find it hard to keep going.

“We took more treasure chests this time, that’s why we got the Cardiac Pacemaker Model V3 Blueprint. I’m wondering, does that mean that the more treasure chests we take, the better the drops?”

“That must be it.”

“Urk…”

The more treasure chests one got, the better the clearance reward at the end. This was no secret, and in fact, it was amply clear to anyone with a brain. However, getting more treasure chests was far easier said than done.

“Why don’t we give it another try. This time, we’ll try taking more treasure chests.”

“I have to log off now, there’s a class soon.” Fire Ice looked apologetic.

“Oh, in that case, we’ll just have to leave it for next time.”

Once he really calmed down and calculated, he realized more than seven hours had passed…

Fire Ice logged off, but Li Yi still could not give up. Just then, he received a mail from Chen Yang, saying that the Little Drunk Cat Guild was now fighting the Southern Continent’s Arthur’s Dynasty Guild.

Arthur suffered a loss, so now his temper was completely out of control. He led his men back to Dragonbone Waste and killed everyone on sight, except for members of the Three Major Guild Alliance. In no time at all, the situation was utter chaos.

“Just keep going at the dungeons, ignore him,” replied Li Yi.

“He keeps stopping our guys in their tracks. If we don’t fight back, what will others think of us?” Chen Yang was slightly perplexed.

“Just trust me. You’ll understand in less than three days.”

“Sigh… That d*ckhead, looking at him really pisses me off.”

“When have we ever lost to anyone? He won’t stay on his high horse for long.”

“Ding!”

Just then, Li Yi received a mail. When he opened and read it, he immediately burst out laughing. It was a threatening letter from Arthur.

“I give you one day’s time to send that accessory back to me, or you’ll suffer the consequences!”

‘What a bold tone to take. But why should I return it to you?’

Not long ago, Brother Windcloud Nine lost five pieces of equipment to Li Yi, and each one was no worse than Arthur’s accessory. However, even though Brother Windcloud Nine was furious, he never sent Li Yi any threats. ‘This Arthur really doesn’t have a sense of morality at all, huh.’

“Did you hear me? Send it back ASAP, or I’ll make you pay!”

Arthur sent one threatening message after another, and each of them was basically the same. They all demanded that Li Yi return the accessory as soon as possible, or else.

“Send me 50,000 Gold Coins and I’ll return the accessory toot suite.”

Upon receiving around a dozen emails, Li Yi finally lost his patience somewhat and responded to Arthur.

“For real?” Arthur’s reply was instantaneous.

Li Yi ignored him.

About 5 minutes later, Li Yi received a mail from Arthur. Inside, there were 50,000 Gold Coins.

“I’ve given you the money, now send over the accessory.”

“I said 500,000, are you nuts? You think a Level 60 purple-colored accessory is worth a measly 50,000?” Li Yi’s tone was dripping with contempt.

“You pig, you tryna play me?” Arthur was furious.

“Why would I play you? It’s up to you if you want to buy it. I’ll put the accessory on auction now and sell it for 1,000,000. Let’s see if there are any willing buyers.”

Arthur grew even more infuriated. He sent Li Yi three emails on one go, full of cursing and threats…

Li Yi ignored him completely. Instead, he went to the Guild Channel and began to ask, “Who here is an expert at Super Mario? Tell me now. There’ll be points and rewards.”

Super Trampoline 250 was harder than he expected. Li Yi could easily kill any monsters, but he really did not have the right tramping skills…

“Alright, I’ll trust you one more time. Dark Wing, you’re a superstar as well, so I believe you won’t cheat me.”

Arthur sent another mail, which Li Yi ignored completely.

A while later, his inbox lit up again. When he opened it, he found 450,000 Gold Coins inside, no more and no less.

“You should give me the accessory now, right?

“You pig, reply damnit! Are you giving me that accessory or not? If not, I’ll report you for fraud!

“Fine, fine! Superstar of the Eastern Continent, Dark Wing, you’re cheating in broad daylight. I’ll report everything you did to the officials now, just you wait, you’re gonna get banned!

“Dark Wing, answer me!”

Arthur was losing his mind. He sent one email after the other, but Li Yi did not reply at all, ignoring him completely.

In the end, Arthur was true to his word. He uploaded he and Li Yi’s chat history to the official site and complained that Li Yi was a cheater.

The Pantheon officials replied quickly. “Dear honored player, the other party is anonymous in this conversation with you. As seen in the first rule of in-game trading, anonymous conversations may not be used as evidence. Anonymous trades are performed at one’s own risk.”

“F*ck that in your f*cking *sshole!”

Arthur went berserk. He launched into an angry tirade on the official site, shared his chat history with Li Yi all across the World Channel, and swore that the Pantheon officials were biased. As a result, he was given an eternal ban from the forum within half an hour. The ID, Arthur, had effectively become useless.

The official forums became slightly heated for a moment thanks to Arthur’s declarations, but most players believed that Arthur had spun this tall tale to defame Dark Wing after he dropped his equipment.

The reason for that belief was simple. Was Dark Wing desperate for money? He could earn several million at the flick of a finger, so why would he bother trying to cheat someone else?

“Wake up, man. Even if you wanna lie, you gotta do better than that. 500,000, what a joke! If you said 5,000,000, I might give you some benefit of the doubt, but 500,000? Even I couldn’t be bothered.”

“Arthur, if you dropped your equipment, just make sure he drops it back for you. After all, you’re still the Southern Continent’s King of First Kills. Aren’t you worried about your reputation, trying a stunt like this?”

The tone of the official forums leaned heavily toward Dark Wing’s side, and this infuriated Arthur so much that he lost his mind completely. Since his ID, Arthur, had been banned, he opened an account called Arthur1 to argue with the players. Once Arthur1 was banned, he started Arthur2. Once Arthur2 was banned, he went with Arthur3…

It was true, Li Yi really did not care about 500,000 Gold Coins at all. The sole reason he had for doing this was so that he could tick Arthur off.

It seemed pretty effectively, judging by the results.

Li Yi watched Arthur launch into a flame war with the many players on the forum, secretly ecstatic.

In the game, one could face down ten, a hundred, or even a thousand enemies at once, but was that possible in a forum? If one man waged a flame war against tens of thousands of others, what could he possibly accomplish? He would just become increasingly frustrated.

Besides, why was he taking his temper out on some random bystanders rather than the Pantheon officials or even Li Yi himself?

His aggro had changed targets, but the funny part was that Arthur himself was completely unaware of it.

In Ironhammer Town, more than a thousand members of the Little Drunk Cat Guild had gathered here. At Li Yi’s behest, they all took turns jumping onto the trampoline and showing off their tramping skills.

There were trampolines in Ironhammer Town itself, and players could use them as they pleased. It was just like a playground where players could have fun when they had nothing better to do.

Li Yi observed them carefully from the side. He wanted to find the best tramp of the lot to tramp with him.

…