Staff of the Swallowed Stone

Just as Liu Xuan was about to step forward and take a look, a system announcement suddenly popped up.

【Huaxia Battlefield No. 2468 Announcement】

【The Novice Village Quarry has been conquered. Other warriors in this battlefield can no longer participate in the Quarry Battle campaign mode.】

【This area will be converted into a simplified five-person dungeon.】

【The final stage of the Lanlan River Outpost campaign is about to begin.】

【The Lanlan River Outpost is currently preparing for battle. You may speak with the outpost NPC to begin the campaign in one hour. If the campaign fails, you must wait three days before attempting it again.】

【Warning: The difficulty of this stage is extremely high. Please make thorough preparations before beginning.】

As before, Liu Xuan also received an exclusive notification.

【Campaign: Lanlan River Outpost. Step Two—Quarry Battle—has been completed.】

【You are currently ahead of the estimated advancement time for the Ascension Mainframe’s projected progress against the Blue Star humans by 1,075%. Rewards will be settled after the outpost has been established.】

Not bad. His lead had jumped straight from the previous 404% to 1,075%.

It seemed that his acceleration had been effective after all.

It made sense when he thought about it. The logging camp had already been described as a tough nut to crack, so the quarry was even tougher.

The Novice Village could be conquered by throwing enough lives at it. The logging camp could barely be overwhelmed through sheer numbers as well. After all, with nearly five thousand people fighting a little over two hundred monsters, there was still a chance of grinding them down.

In fact, that was more or less what Vaughan’s side had done.

But the quarry tested their speed at killing monsters. It couldn’t be conquered by sacrificing enough people.

If they couldn’t beat the monsters, then they simply couldn’t beat them. No matter how many people they sent in, insufficient damage was still insufficient damage.

That was why Liu Xuan’s score had shot up to 1,075%!

Even so, Liu Xuan felt that this score was still somewhat low.

“What exactly is hidden in this Novice Village? It can actually push the campaign’s progress forward by such a huge amount...” Liu Xuan muttered.

Unfortunately, he had no clue at all, and there was nothing he could do about it.

He had no intention of wasting any more time. He planned to press on while the momentum was strong and take the outpost in one go!

With Liu Xuan’s current health, regeneration speed, and damage output, if there was anything capable of killing him, then it would definitely be able to one-shot everyone else—even those above level ten.

Liu Xuan refused to believe that the requirements for the Lanlan River Outpost campaign would be that high.

After closing the announcement, Liu Xuan turned his attention to the boss’s loot.

He looked at the necklace first.

【Rock-Eater Necklace】

Quality: Fine

Level Requirement: Level 8

Effect: Increases your armor and magic resistance by 5%.

After killing so many monsters, this was only the second necklace Liu Xuan had obtained.

He was still wearing the 【Lucky Rabbit’s Foot】 dropped by the 【Bouncing Rabbit】, along with the one that had dropped from an ordinary monster.

It now seemed that necklaces were likely to be special-effect equipment. Without any special effect, the equipment’s level was actually not very important.

Take the 【Lucky Rabbit’s Foot】, for example. Liu Xuan could keep wearing it indefinitely without any problems.

The 3% increase to equipment drop rates after upgrading it was simply too valuable.

As for this necklace, it was actually less useful to Liu Xuan right now than the 【Lucky Rabbit’s Foot】.

Its magic resistance was irrelevant—Liu Xuan had none to begin with.

The armor increase, on the other hand, amounted to six points. That seemed like quite a lot, but compared with Liu Xuan’s current health pool, it was still rather insignificant.

So Liu Xuan did not replace his current necklace for the time being. Once his armor grew higher, this item might prove surprisingly effective.

Next, he examined the staff’s attributes.

【Rock-Eater Staff】

Quality: Fine

Level Requirement: Level 8

Spell Damage: 20–23

Intelligence: +5

Effect: Increases damage dealt by earth-element spells by 10%.

Earth-element spells...

Liu Xuan could not help looking at the remaining skill scroll.

【Rolling Boulder】: Consumes 100 mana to create a rolling boulder in the target direction, dealing magic damage equal to “spell damage × 3” to all enemies along its path. Cooldown: 30 seconds.

It was an extremely powerful skill, and the cooldown was not long either. Most people still had no area-of-effect abilities, so whoever obtained this skill could be said to soar to the heavens in a single bound.

Paired with the 【Rock-Eater Staff】, it would be even more powerful.

Liu Xuan gave it a try and discovered that, as a 【Pacifist】, he seemed able to equip any kind of weapon. Even a staff worked.

However, a staff was a two-handed weapon. Once he equipped it, he could no longer use his saw blade or the door-sized shield.

Moreover, the fear effect caused by his 【Nightmare Incarnation】 did not benefit from spell damage. It only depended on his Intelligence value.

Liu Xuan could not use spells anyway, so the staff’s only function for him was its five points of Intelligence. It was useless. He would sell it later.

Finally, there was the stone.

【Rock-Eater Crystal (Rare Material): Give a certain quantity of this material to a blacksmith, and they can craft one piece of Fine-quality armor for any equipment slot. Each person can wear only one piece of armor crafted this way.】

It was similar in nature to the 【Porcupine Chief’s】 drop, 【Porcupine Leather】. Both were materials that had to be repeatedly farmed from dungeons.

Liu Xuan put it away. He had no time to farm dungeons. Once other people began running them and the material became available on the market, he could sell it together with the leather.

Next, Liu Xuan gathered up the rest of the ordinary monsters’ drops. Besides a large quantity of stone-type crafting materials, there were also more than forty stone clubs, all of them 【Excellent】-quality weapons.

They added two points of Strength.

Aside from those, there were more than sixty pieces of various 【Common】-quality equipment.

Liu Xuan replaced two pieces of his current gear, bringing his armor up to 65 points.

He was just about to contact Zhang Meng to handle the sales when the other man sent him a message first.

“Brother Liu, you’re incredible! You conquered the quarry too. By the way, most of the equipment and materials you gave me earlier have already been sold. The total came to a little over three gold and seven silver. I’ve mailed it to you.”

Zhang Meng had already reached level four and some of the way toward level five. He had returned to the Novice Village to get some rest.

He had not taken a break since entering the battlefield.

Now that he was back in the village, he had auctioned off Liu Xuan’s goods and sent him the proceeds.

Of course, he had also bought quite a few things himself.

“Great, thanks.”

With those three-odd gold coins, the total was about what Zhang Meng had estimated earlier. Liu Xuan now had nine gold coins on him.

He wondered whether he would need to spend a large amount of gold later on.

After chatting for a couple of minutes, Zhang Meng yawned. “If there’s nothing else, I’m going to sleep. Farming these monsters has made me exhausted.”

“Wait a moment. Help me sell some more things.”

Zhang Meng: “...”

So I really have become a human mailbox, huh?

“Haha, sorry to trouble you. I’ve already mailed the items over. Same rules as before—ninety-one percent.”

“All right. I’ll take a look, then calculate your total earnings.”

The moment he thought about the money he would receive, Zhang Meng was no longer sleepy. With that money, he could buy more of the equipment Liu Xuan was selling.

Then he could earn even more money.

Wait, was there something wrong with this logic?

Never mind. Having somewhere to make money and somewhere to spend it was what made life enjoyable.

But when he saw the 【Stone Clubs】, 【Rock-Eater Staff】, and other items Liu Xuan had sent over, Zhang Meng clicked his tongue in amazement.

These stats were incredible.

They should have come from that quarry, right? He would buy a 【Stone Club】 for himself later.

“By the way, I think you can start charging more for equipment of the 【Excellent】 and 【Fine】 qualities,” Zhang Meng suddenly suggested.

According to him, a lot of players had bought Liu Xuan’s equipment, which had boosted their strength. They could now farm monsters and earn gold much faster, so equipment of 【Excellent】 quality could afford to be priced a little higher.

Now that everyone had money to spare, continuing to sell the gear so cheaply would only encourage profiteers.

“All right. We’ll do it your way. If something like this comes up again, keep an eye on the market prices and help adjust the rates.”

Liu Xuan hadn’t expected Zhang Meng to have such a head for business.

But after hearing him out, Liu Xuan suddenly realized that he might not have lost money by selling his equipment cheaply before. He might even have made a profit!

Just like in many online games, the activity and prosperity of a server’s marketplace depended largely on the number of players and their overall strength.

The stronger the players, the more active the entire server’s market tended to be.

His earlier low-price strategy had whetted the battlefield players’ appetites for equipment, while also improving their ability to earn money.

Now that they had money in their pockets, the equipment he sold later would be much easier to move.

Heh. Who would’ve thought that an unintentional move would end up bearing such unexpected fruit?