14 Nymph Heart

Nie Fan quickly pulled back. Then, when he saw from skill bar that his skill had cooled down, he cast Bloodthirsty Vines again and fell another Redwood Nymph. With the crisp ding of a system notification, he saw that he was now Level 11. However, he continued by throwing Black Oil at the Redwood Nymph Warrior and followed it up with a shot of Mini Fireball.

The towering flame ignited with a bang.

Although killing a Miniboss like the Burning Redwood Nymph was too difficult with Nie Fan's current level, it was a simple matter to kill a Redwood Nymph Warrior.

With his fearsome assault, the Redwood Nymph Warrior roared grimly as damage values reaching up to sixty appeared over its head.

Not even a Level 60 offensive mage could deal such high damage!

And right after the Black Oil Mini Fireball combo, Nie Fan restrained the Redwood Nymph Warrior with a Bloodthirsty Vine.

The creature kept swinging its hammer to attack the vine coiled around itself, each blow causing more than thirty points of damage. On the other hand, each Bloodthirsty Vine would hurt it with up to seventy points of damage.

Nonetheless, Nie Fan's vine split into pieces and dropped to the ground after six hits by the Redwood Nymph Warrior.

With a brief calculation, one could see that the Bloodthirsty Vine had kept the Redwood Nymph Warrior under control for almost ten seconds and attacked it five times, dealing up to -300 damage.

On the other hand, the Redwood Nymph Warrior fell into a crazed rage after escaping the Bloodthirsty Vine. As it looked around, it found Nie Fan some thirty yards away, and promptly gave chase.

Black Oil!

Mini Fireball!

Another towering flame ignited with a bang. Its HP finally empty, the Redwood Nymph Warrior screamed into the skies before slamming heavily down on the ground.

That was easy! As Nie Fan imagined, a Level 5 skill and two Level 4 skills are peerless. Glancing at his status, he saw that he had leveled up once again, reaching Level 12.

Nie Fan hence reached out and picked up the drops from the Redwood Nymph Warrior. His heart skipped a beat when he saw that it was a Druid's leather armor! At the moment, his best equipment was the Spike Spaulders and the rest were White-grade items he simply put on after he got them from the monsters he killed.

He took a look at the stats of the leather armor. 

[Wild Leather Armor (Druid): Level 17 required, Copper-grade, Defense 22-28, Spirit +3, Durability 31/31]

It was a very ordinary Copper-grade item with good defense, and would increase his defense greatly as well add 3 Spirit points when he equips it at Level 17.

Nie Fan put the Wild Leather Armor into his bag and then searched the other Redwood Nymph corpses as well, but only found five bronze coins. Then, having collected all his spoils, he headed towards the treasure chest which was some distance away.

What could be in the chest?

However, the nearby thicket rustled suddenly when he was around ten feet away from the treasure chest. Alert, Nie Fan looked up towards the source and saw that a Mage dressed in blue robes had appeared behind several towering trees. He was male and looked around twenty, his eyes leveled at Nie Fan's direction.

It was clear that he had discovered the treasure chest too!

That being said, it was clear that he was skilled: Level 16, class unknown and yet brave enough to farm monsters in the Redwood Forest alone.

Their eyes met then, and Nie Fan immediately became alert. It was difficult for him to not be hostile with a Mage who suddenly appeared out of nowhere when the treasure chest was just in front of him, and if the Mage would attempt to claim the treasure chest, the only solution was to fight for it.

Nie Fan had yet to duel another player and did not have any experience with PK either. Moreover, his items were terrible since he had been training his skill all along, and the only thing he could rely on were the three skills on his skill bar.

It would probably be one horrible battle, but Nie Fan was prepared to fight.

***

Shadow Sadwind was a lone mage. At Level 16, the Redwood Forest was undoubtedly paradise for his class—slow movers like the Redwood Nymphs were most suited for them to level up. In fact, he had picked this place as his precious training ground at Level 13 and he had indeed been leveling up until just now, when he heard the shriek of the Redwood Nymph Warrior while looking for more Redwood Nymphs. He hurried here to check things out, running into Nie Fan and was stunned speechless: there were five Redwood Nymph corpses strewn around the ground, one of which was an elite Redwood Nymph Warrior.

Sadwind had experienced the terror of that elite beast himself himself—when he ran into one in the forest, he quickly gave up a few dozen seconds later since there was no way he could defeat it.

On the other hand, Nie Fan was only Level 12 and only equipped with worn inferior items. Did he really slay those Redwood Nymphs and that Redwood Nymph Warrior?

If that was true, the Level 12 Druid simply defied logic! Sadwind looked around and couldn't find anyone—not even another player's corpse.

Nie Fan was definitely alone.

So how did he do it?

Shadow Sadwind felt waves of chill inside. As a solo professional gamer, he had always considered that he had to find technique. Now, however, he appeared to be terribly lacking compared to the Druid before him.

And when he saw Nie Fan's gaze that was dripping with enmity, he promptly realized that Nie Fan had assumed that he was here to steal the treasure chest.

But how would he dare to do that under such circumstances?!

He would never assume that he could handle Nie Fan, and even if by chance he could kill Nie Fan, making such a frightening enemy over a mere box was not a worthwhile trade.

Still, Nie Fan felt so mysterious that Sadwind cast Scout on him and saw that his ID was Dark Night.

"Dark Night. I'll remember that name." He muttered under his breath. They would definitely meet each other again since they were both from Tajit Village.

Gesturing with his hand at Nie Fan, Sadwind slowly retreated.

***

Nie Fan's tightened heartstrings slowly relaxed when he saw that Shadow Sadwind had gone far away. Though Bloodthirsty Vines were incredibly powerful at Level 5 it was a different matter with player combat, and Nie Fan could hardly be certain of his chances in a real duel against a Level 16 mage.

A player who could reach Level 16 in such a short time? He was definitely skilled!

Nonetheless, he arched his back and was about to unlock the treasure chest… when he found that it had no lock. Most White-grade treasure chests were rarely sealed, but one would have to give up on any sealed treasure chest unless they were Thief-class or had a key.

[System: Opening treasure chest… 21%... 36%...]

Around six seconds, the treasure chest opened with a click.

Feeling around the inside of the chest, Nie Fan touched something that was at once very smooth and hot with his right hand. That sensation… could it be a magic item? His heartbeat quickened even as he drew out the object: it was a fist-sized crystal with a unique designed. It looked like a beating heart and was entirely blood-red, with crimson specks of light dancing around it like fairies, releasing hot energies outwardly.

Nie Fan was curious. It was neither a gem nor jewelry, and so he checked the attributes of the item.

[Nymph Heart: A key to enter the Heartlands of the Wood Nymphs' Forest. Single-use for a party of 5, level requirement 20-25]

It was a special item… and a key?

Nie Fan remembered something then: there was definitely a small but quite difficult dungeon in the heartlands of the forest. The drops include Level 20 enchanted items, and there was also a chance to obtain top-grade rare items.

Nie Fan made a search about the heartlands of the nymphs' forest in the website that his father left him and soon found a pile of information. He started to read through it as he hurried back to Tajit Village.

It turns out that the heartlands require a five-person party to enter, with many elite monsters spawning inside. Compared to outside, the drop rate of Level 20 enchanted items is 160%, and the most powerful Boss in the dungeon was the Nymph King, which item drop immediately caught Nie Fan's attention: The Skill Tome for Feral Lycanthropy!

Lycanthropy was a necessary skill for Druids at Level 20, and it was only having that Morphing ability when Druids would truly be strengthened in melee combat, and would not lose out to Warriors or Holy Knights who were synonymous with close-range fights. Feral Lycanthropy was itself an upgraded version of Lycanthropy, boasting 10% improved attributes and a higher growth rate.

That being said, the heartlands of the nymphs' forest was not open and could only be entered with the Nymph Heart in the forest itself. Since the drop rate for Nymph Heart was low as well, there were any players who could make it inside those heartlands.

Nonetheless, Nie Fan decided that he must get the Feral Lycanthropy skill tome, because it is of vital importance towards his future development! As for the five-person party, Nie Fan remembered that he already had a group of three, and he could simply look for two other people when Xue Yu and Su Yue reached Level 20.

When he almost arrived at Tajit Village, Nie Fan messaged Xue Yu, "Come back to Tajit Village, I'll bring you two somewhere to level-up."

***

Xue Yu and Lin Suyue were busy farming feral deer, with Xue Yu glancing at his bag to find that all fifty grids were stuffed full of Deerskin, each grid holding twenty Deerskins and making it a thousand. Su Yue's bag had almost eight hundred skins too, and after some counting, they realized that it could sell for over five thousand coins!

"Go back now? But Suyue's bag isn't full yet, we could still farm for a while." Xue Yu replied, a little reluctant to return with the rapid earning he was doing here.

"Hurry back. We won't miss that bit of money, and there's all the opportunity to make a killing from now on!" Nie Fan could not help but laugh—Xue Yu had become such a money-grubber that he didn't want to return!

"Alright, we're coming back right away." Despite being unwilling to leave, Xue Yu ultimately decided to listen to Nie Fan, calling out to Lin Suyue to hurry back as well.

Somehow, there were even more people in the village now: there were probably six thousand players who chose to spawn at Tajit Village, and the center of the village bustling with crowds moving here and there.

Nie Fan, Xue Yu, and Lin Suyue gathered outside the apothecary at the center of the village.

"Hi, Nie Fan. Long time, no see!" Lin Suyue greeted Nie Fan with a smile. She had a pretty face despite her tomboy personality, a look that others would feel comfortable around even if she was not exactly a beauty.

"Long time, no see." Nie Fan smiled in return to the both of them.

"You look well. It seems that the air in Yinhai is quite accommodating." Lin Suyue grinned.

Xue Yu laughed too, and punched Nie Fan on the chest. "You didn't even call after arriving at Yinhai, and I thought you've gone missing. I thought you must have lost your head to some gorgeous babe in the big city!"

"I barely settled down in the last few days. I wanted to message you guys online, but never found you two." Nie Fan smiled apologetically. He had been soaking in the data his father left him and did not go online much, which made sense that they could not get in touch.

Nie Fan chatted for a while with Xue Yu and Lin Suyue then as his heart stirred with emotion. He had thought that he wouldn't see them in two or three years, and certainly did not expect to meet them in the game just three days after coming to Yinhai.