Buddhist player

Compared to ordinary people, players are certainly superior, but at the same time, players also bear corresponding risks.

—The risk here specifically refers to the mandatory tasks issued by the system.

Each player will receive a mandatory task issued by the system approximately every month. The timing may be earlier or later, but the general frequency remains the same.

As a Damocles' sword hanging over the heads of all players, the mandatory quests have extremely high priority and are also quite difficult. If the novice trial still took into account that the players who participated at that time were basically ordinary people, the mandatory quests are somewhat inhumane.

The difficulty of a mandatory task is variable.

It could be very high, so high that everyone would be wiped out and there would be no chance of survival, or it could be very low, so low that you could even pass by lying down.

The forced missions no longer have the system's limitations and rules like the novice trials, but are real-life scenarios. If you're unlucky enough, you might even die less than a minute after being teleported there.

This is not an exaggeration; there are far too many bloody precedents.

The relevant department's records contain a typical case where a total of 13 people were involved in a forced mission, but only one returned alive.

This wasn't because the mandatory mission was incredibly difficult; on the contrary, with the guidance of several experienced members of the team, the mission went quite smoothly, and when everyone was about to leave after completing the mission, no one was injured.

But the turning point happened in those last few minutes... or rather, it was a joke played by fate.

That mandatory mission for those people was to investigate the reason for the continuous disappearances of people in a small town that was perpetually shrouded in fog, and to find the root cause of the problem.

The mission went smoothly, the team atmosphere was harmonious, and everyone cooperated well. However, just as they completed the mission and were about to teleport away, a giant's foot, which blotted out the sky, descended from the mist.

With a single kick, the entire town became history.

If it weren't for the special skills of the last survivor, that guy wouldn't have survived either.

As for the others, there are countless examples of characters trying to explore the world more deeply and attracting even more terrifying enemies, accidentally exposing their identities and being captured by the local natives and subjected to various forms of torture and interrogation, or having their missions suddenly changed and the mission location was completely wiped out by some unknown force just minutes into the mission...

Conventional strategies are useless when faced with mandatory missions; all you can do is adapt to the situation.

It is precisely because of this factor that the price of life-saving equipment and items has always remained high in the market. For example, the [Family Portrait] that Bai Chen put up in the system auction house before, he thought it was just a disposable item and wouldn't sell for much money, but it ended up selling for nearly 1 yuan, which really stunned him for a long time.

"There's still one day left... This time it looks like things might get tough."

Inside the study, Bai Chen, who had just returned from the City of Players, looked at the content displayed on the screen in front of him and rubbed his forehead with a headache.

Unlike the novice trial, the matchmaking for the forced missions emphasizes "fairness," and in the system's rating, whether or not a player has awakened their talent accounts for a large proportion of the overall strength of the player.

Given his existing talent, the teammates he was matched with were naturally not much worse. They were either also awakened with talent, or they had strong overall abilities that filled the talent gap.

Neither of these two is something he can compare to now. He estimates that the level difference between him and these people is at least 15 levels or more, not to mention the accumulation of skills, equipment or items.

Skills are unavoidable; even a common-level skill card can be sold for an exorbitant price, not to mention that such a thing simply doesn't exist on the market.

All he can do now is try to make up for the gap in equipment, items, and level.

He wasn't too worried about his level. Although his level was a bit low, his attribute growth was high. For example, an ordinary player only has one free attribute point per level, but the extra attribute points per level brought by the Empty Valley Orchid Heart Technique are unparalleled, not to mention the five extra attribute points every ten levels.

He originally went to Yuanqing's place to check how much money he had in his account and see if he could find a few pieces of life-saving equipment or items at the auction house... Unfortunately, he underestimated how fast he could spend money.

In the past two weeks alone, he has invested at least 20 game coins in the talent of [Pharmacopoeia]. Especially in the last ten days or so, in order to create an attribute potion that can permanently increase attributes, he has been buying high-level materials almost without batting an eye. He is really spending money like water, and he is too embarrassed to take the last few thousand game coins in his account.

"Let's forget about equipment for now. Although I still have some game currency, it's a necessary expense for potion points and can't be touched. As for items, the potions I've stockpiled should be enough... How about I make some trap cards when I have some free time? Like the Hundred-Ton King from the Sky or something?"

With one hand resting on the table and tapping his fingers on it, Bai Chen pondered in his mind.

The trap card he mentioned is actually a way of using the "Flat World" skill. For example, storing a large amount of concentrated sulfuric acid in the card beforehand, and then throwing it out to mimic an sulfuric acid rain spell when necessary, or stuffing a bunch of lead balls into the card beforehand, and then suddenly unleashing a devastating attack...

However, what satisfied him the most were the three poop cards he made in his spare time. The strategic significance of these three poop cards far outweighed their practical significance.

"...Never mind, let's focus on leveling up first."

Bai Chen pressed his brow and took a card out of his card collection book.

He had stockpiled some of the potions he developed. With the Flat World around, he wasn't worried about not having enough space. Among them, the Beginner Experience Potion was the one he stockpiled the most, with a total of 600 bottles.

Even including the 300 bottles that were just given to Yuanqing, he still has 300 bottles left. Assuming each bottle provides 50 experience points, 300 bottles would provide 15000 experience points.

However, although this experience seems like a lot, it's barely enough for him to reach level nine. The further he progresses, the more terrifying the experience points required to level up become.

Thankfully, he designed the medicine to be used directly rather than drunk, otherwise he would have drunk 300 bottles until he was sick of it...

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Player ID: DustWhite

[Level: Lv 9 (1257/25600)]

Free attribute points: 12

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"...What a pity, I couldn't reach level ten."

Looking at the numbers in the experience bar, Bai Chen couldn't help but feel a little helpless.

Judging from this number, even if he hadn't given Yuanqing those 300 bottles, it wouldn't have been enough for him to upgrade... It's a good thing he worked tirelessly for half a month to save them up.

There's no need to hesitate about adding points; allocate half to Constitution and half to Agility. Right now, unlike the novice trial period, survival is the priority.

As his total attributes reached 69 points, his attribute panel underwent subtle changes. In addition to the [Intelligence] attribute quietly changing to [Spirit], a plus sign appeared out of nowhere after his negative sanity value.

[Sanity: -232 (+6.9)]