Concept of a Perpetual Motion Device

Lin Fei waited until Xiao Ling's silhouette disappeared up the stairs. She turned to Tian Kuang. "I think that kid's got skills. We should invite him to join us if we bump into him in the future."

"You can tell?" asked Tian Kuang. He was always impressed by this wife of his. She was much cleverer than he was.

"I've asked him if he was here to do quests or leveling. Do you remember his answer?" Lin Fei asked.

Tian Kuang recalled his words. "He said he was here for quests, and to level up while he's at it." 

"However, using my Detection, I discovered that he's only a level 10. For a level 10 player to be doing quests here, either he must have really good equipment or he's very confident in his control skills, and I can see that he didn't have much good equipment on him," Lin Fei explained. She'd thought that the kid might actually be out of his mind, but she'd quickly stamped it out. From their conversation just now, Xiao Ling seemed like an alert person. At the very least, he was not stupid.

Tian Kuang gave it some consideration. He found that he agreed with Lin Fei.

Xiao Ling entered his room and the outside noise was instantly silenced. Every room was equipped with noise-cancelling barriers. No amount of noise would disturb Xiao Ling in his room.

He lay down on the bed and thought about his future. How should he go about distinguishing himself from all these other players? If he wore Hilaire's Demon Ring, he might become a powerful player among his peers, but if he wanted to become a real powerful player, he would have to raise his level.

Was there any way to level up quicker than the other players?

Xiao Ling's mind wandered. Tian Fei's words lingered in his ears. He mumbled, "AoE magic. It'd be nice to have some AoE magic." Although Force Blast was regarded as an AoE spell, it could only be released in short range. Also, its spell damage left much to desire.

Xiao Ling thought about the skills of the warlocks.

With all three specializations, Xiao Ling had a wide range of abilities to choose from. However, every player was only allowed to learn 20 abilities. Before he learned any of them, he would have to study them before deciding to buy their skill tomes. He would have to spend his money prudently and buy only those that he needed.

He would need to buy Demon Eye, which would improve his visibility at night. After learning this skill, Xiao Ling would have access to more leveling time than the others. If he worked hard, he was certain that he could catch up to them.

"Continuous operation for 24 hours, isn't that a perpetual motion device?" Xiao Ling wore a dreamy smile. Suddenly, a thought crossed his mind. A perpetual motion device, could he actually become a perpetual motion device?

Xiao Ling remembered an Affliction Warlock skill called Life Tap, which converted part of his health points into mana points.

While farming monsters, Xiao Ling had to sit down and drink spring water to restore his mana. If he learned Life Tap, he would never have to worry about having insufficient mana as long as he had enough HP.

A Demonic Warlock's Drain Life and an Affliction Warlock's Life Tap, what a terrifying combination that would be!

He could maintain his full health with Drain Life and delegate some to MP with Life Tap when it was running low. Then, he could continue draining life from monsters with Drain Life.

If the skill levels of Drain Life and Life Tap were high enough, Xiao Ling could abandon bread and spring water completely. In other words, he could save up to 50% of leveling time every day!

With the addition of Demon Eye, he would have twice as much time for leveling. Xiao Ling would have 24 hours of leveling time each day, a staggering four times more than ordinary players. This way, he could quickly narrow the gap between him and the high-level players.

This unexpected discovery seemed to have made Xiao Ling see light at the end of the tunnel. This was a path leading straight to the altar of the gods! This was his future.

However, it was too early to celebrate. The outrageous prices of Life Tap and Demon Eye aside, he would still have to spend much time mastering Drain Life. A low-level Drain Life was a useless skill. It was almost pitiable to see the meager amount of health points drained. Hence, Xiao Ling had to use Drain Life more and increase its mastery. Then, he would have to raise its skill level with the help of a warlock tutor.

However, there was a setting in the game. Skill mastery levels could only be raised if he killed monsters no lower than two levels from his own. Hence, it was not practical to train his mastery level by farming low-level monsters. He could only improve his skill mastery level by using Drain Life more frequently while he was leveling.

He heard that the skill tome for Demon Eye could drop somewhere nearby. However, he did not know the exact location, and would have to try his luck wandering blindly. Hasty men would not get to eat hot tofu; he would have to take one step at a time to achieve his goals.

Xiao Ling was also prepared to sell some of the equipment in his vault for money to buy skill tomes. However, skill tomes were not always available even if one had the money for it. Luck was also important. He wondered if he would have enough luck to meet someone selling the skill tomes of these skills.

Xiao Ling immersed himself in deep thoughts as he lay there on the bed. After some time, he began feeling drowsy and gradually fell into a deep sleep.

The night was dark and quiet.

In the early hours of the morning, before the sun was up and only faint white light emerged from the horizon, Xiao Ling woke up and walked out of the inn. He took a deep breath of the fresh air. It was the beginning of a new day.

He cast his gaze to the southwest. He saw four figures walking toward the Scarlet Monastery.

'What a hardworking bunch,' Xiao Ling thought. He told himself that he should get to work as well. The Mercenary Guild was already bustling with players who were here to accept the day's quests.

Xiao Ling looked at the list of quests. Most of them were about the Scarlet Monastery. Xiao Ling picked a few. If he completed the quests today, he would level up again.

There were more than 300 quests on the list with varying rewards. For a time, Xiao Ling was spoiled with choices. Suddenly, a quest stood out and caught his eye.

Finding Crazed Boar Fangs: Collect 30 Crazed Boar Fangs. Location: Alterac Valley's Boar Mine. Rewards: 50 gold coins, 5,000 experience, a level 20 Rare spellcaster Class gauntlet. Time limit: Three days. No penalty for failure.

It was also noted that players should be of level 20 and above. The rewards for this quest were not exactly generous, but the words "Boar Mine" attracted Xiao Ling's attention. These mines usually produced many high-quality ores, so perhaps he could chance upon some rare ones. After accepting the quest, Xiao Ling would be able to pin the Boar Mine's exact location on the map. Even if he failed the quest, there would be no penalty.

He accepted several other quests for killing Scarlet Mages and Warriors. Xiao Ling packed his belongings and headed toward the mountains in the southwest.

Xiao Ling remembered that Lin Fei's party was headed for the Alterac Valley. He wondered if he would run into them.