Level 10 Level Rankings

“????”

As question marks popped up over the monkeys’ heads one after another in the woods, Liu Xuan quickly reached the 200 successful skill predictions required to upgrade [Celestial].

“Ding~”

“[Celestial] shield counter has reached 100. Grade increased.”

After more than twenty waves of monsters, Liu Xuan finally filled the 100 counts required by [Celestial].

The entire shield shone with a brilliant light. When he checked its attributes again, they had already changed.

[Celestial]

Type: One-Handed Shield

Quality: Divine Tier II (Binds on equip. No one else can use it unless the owner dies.)

Level Requirement: Level 5

Fixed Damage Reduction: 200

Effect: When you successfully predict the hostile skill that will next land on you, you ignore that skill. If the enemy can provide at least 1 experience point, or if the enemy is another warrior, a successful prediction grants you one count. At 1,000 counts, this equipment’s grade increases.

Current Count: 0/1000

The fixed damage reduction had doubled outright, while the number of counts required for the next upgrade had risen from 100 to 1,000.

Liu Xuan was delighted by the upgraded effect, but he could not help sighing as well.

As long as he was willing to spend some time on it, raising this shield another level would not be difficult.

By then, its effect would improve once more, and none of the monsters in the entire Novice Village would pose any threat to him.

If he had not obtained this shield, his performance in the Outpost battle should have been better than expected. Still, it seemed that blessings and disasters truly did go hand in hand.

After upgrading the shield once, Liu Xuan decided not to keep farming here.

He would have plenty of opportunities to do so in the future.

He hurried to the outside of the logging camp. From a distance, he spotted quite a few people gathered at the dungeon entrance. He immediately stowed away his weapon and shield before approaching.

For dungeon runs, the team compositions they had used for leveling in the wilderness were no longer entirely suitable, so many people were regrouping.

For example, the ranged teams that had been farming Hopping Rabbits had to break up and reorganize. They needed someone to tank the monsters, after all.

There was nowhere near enough room inside the dungeon for kiting. One wrong move could easily draw the attention of other monsters.

As a result, the soldiers were finally getting their moment. Everywhere, people were shouting for tanks, and anyone who could survive was guaranteed a spot.

“Looking for a survival-focused soldier. Six hundred health and fifteen armor or more.”

“Health tank, join us! Equipment doesn’t matter—we can provide armor gear.”

“Small-monster team: four ranged and one healer. Looking for a priest with flashy footwork.”

Along the way, several understaffed teams noticed Liu Xuan dressed in a full set of equipment—having equipment meant having armor, and anyone with armor could not be weak—so they came over to ask if he wanted to join them. Liu Xuan brushed them off by saying that he already had a team.

When he reached the teleportation gate, a middle-aged man came over to ask him the same question. After receiving the same answer, the man could only shake his head and give up.

But just as the man turned around, Chen Yu, the team’s archer, came running over with an excited look on his face.

“Little Chen, what’s the rush? Did you find a suitable teammate?”

Chen Yu shook his head vigorously and tried to get around the man to find Liu Xuan, but just then he happened to see a lone figure stepping into the teleportation gate. His expression immediately collapsed.

“Ah, too late.”

The man was puzzled. “What’s too late?”

Chen Yu said regretfully, “Captain, do you know who that person was just now?”

“Who? A friend of yours?”

“I wish he were my friend. That was Liu Xuan!”

“Liu... What? Liu Xuan?!! The big shot from the battlefield?”

“Who else could it be?”

“No wonder I noticed he was fully equipped.” The captain realized what he had missed and hurriedly turned around, but the man was nowhere to be seen. “Huh? Where did he go?”

Chen Yu said helplessly, “He’s already inside the dungeon.”

“Inside the dungeon... Where are his teammates?”

“Does a god like Liu Xuan even need teammates? He must be soloing it.”

“He just told me he already had a team.”

Chen Yu let out a hollow laugh, his face utterly devoid of hope. That guy had once told me he was going into the battlefield to get himself killed, too.

Chen Yu was the same person who had seen Liu Xuan heading out alone at the farm and asked whether he wanted to join a team.

Liu Xuan had conned him at the time. It was only after the Novice Village had been conquered that Chen Yu learned the person he had met was a top-tier expert.

He never expected his own captain to fall for the same trick today.

“Forget it. He wouldn’t have joined our team anyway. Let’s hurry up and find someone else.”

Meanwhile, after entering the dungeon, Liu Xuan discovered that it was an independent logging camp space accessed through the logging camp outside. The entire layout was identical.

The monsters’ attributes were also exactly the same as before, but the regular monsters had been reclassified as elite monsters.

Liu Xuan was now only a little over 1,000 experience away from Level 10. With his massive 17-times experience bonus, he estimated that killing a dozen or so monsters would be enough to level up.

He also discovered that after becoming a dungeon, the monsters’ aggro ranges had shrunk. They no longer linked together so easily.

Previously, he had merely walked in circles in front of the smaller monsters, yet the boss’s roar had immediately summoned every monster in the area. That would not happen now.

It was perfect for farming his attributes.

Starting from the outskirts of the logging camp, Liu Xuan pulled a group of roughly twenty monsters.

Relying on his extremely high Agility, Liu Xuan moved leisurely among the monsters, making sure to poison every one of them.

Now that [Celestial] provided 200 points of fixed damage reduction, he could practically bathe in the middle of the monster pack without losing a sliver of health.

“Defeated [Porcupine Warrior]. Gained 85 experience.”

“Defeated [Poisoned] monster. Base Health +1.”

“Defeated [Porcupine Warrior]. Gained 85 experience.”

“Defeated [Poisoned] monster. Base Health +1.”

“.....”

That was way too much experience.

After finishing off the entire wave, Liu Xuan unexpectedly leveled straight up to Level 10.

He was just about to draw a passive skill when an announcement suddenly popped up before his eyes.

[Blue Star Announcement]

[It has been detected that someone on Blue Star has reached Level 10. The Blue Star Level Rankings are now unlocked.]

[The Blue Star Level Rankings are visible to all humans on Blue Star.]

“There’s a ranking system, too?”

Liu Xuan’s heart stirred, and a list immediately unfolded before him.

A glance was enough to confirm that he was unquestionably in first place: Level 10, with a glittering title before his name—Blue Star’s Number One Warrior.

Those ranked second through tenth were all Level 8, and eight of them were from Huaxia.

With the experience bonus, that was hardly surprising given the country’s population.

What was slightly unexpected was that tenth place belonged to a Japanese player named Ikeda Masato, whose class was Ninja. He was also Level 8.

Who knew how he had managed to level so quickly? Perhaps his class was particularly powerful, or perhaps he had encountered some kind of lucky opportunity.

Interestingly, all of the top ten had hidden classes.

That made sense, too. The initial attributes of Blue Star’s humans were simply too low. If you did not have a hidden class, what could you possibly rely on to stand out?

......

Just after the level rankings announcement appeared, the entire Blue Star—both those inside and outside the battlefield—erupted into chaos.

This was the first time everyone had learned the true identity of the great expert from Huaxia.

“Holy crap, the number-one big shot is already Level 10? I’m only Level 4!”

“Nine out of the top ten are Chinese? This is outrageous!”

“They get an experience bonus—more than ten times as much.”

“They’re only level 10. Even without an experience bonus, the experts from our island nation have reached level 8. If the Chinese didn’t have that bonus, we’d definitely be number one.”

“Bah! If your experts are so incredible, how come the experience bonus isn’t yours?”

“Blue Star’s Number One Warrior? Why not just call yourself Blue Star’s Number One Baturu?”

“Damn it, why are there hidden classes too? The entire top ten are hidden classes!”

“So it’s not that I’m bad. I just had lousy luck and didn’t draw a hidden class.”

“Is it possible that you’re both bad and unlucky?”

“I can understand the other classes, like Ninja, Judge, and Tyrant. But what the hell is a Pacifist doing in first place?”

“Going by the name, that class doesn’t sound like it can fight. How did he grind monsters and clear the campaign?”

“Does anyone else feel like the name Liu Xuan sounds familiar?”

“I know. The Imperial Uncle, right?”

“Yellow Book? Where’s the yellow book?!”

“I looked it up on a search engine. If I’m not mistaken, Liu Xuan seems to be a famous figure in the gaming world. People call him the ‘God of Gaming.’”

“Could gamers have an advantage in this battlefield?”

“Perfect. I suggest our country force every gamer into the battlefield. They’re all parasites who don’t do honest work, people whose minds have been poisoned.”

“Damn it, are gamers eating your rice?”

At that moment, the powerful figures from every country on Blue Star were staring at the Pacifist ranked number one, all of them completely baffled and unable to make sense of it.

Their own classes had names that sounded more imposing than the last—Overlord, Tyrant, and the like. How could they possibly lose to some Pacifist?

The class was called Pacifist. Surely he couldn’t level up without killing monsters, just by lying around?

A great many of them were currently stuck on the Battle of the Quarry.

That stage was simply too difficult. Even with hidden classes, it was hard for a single person to clear.

All they could do was wait for everyone else to catch up in level.

When the rankings first appeared, they had hoped to glean some clues from the other person’s class. Instead, they were even more confused.

What the hell was this?

How could it possibly be this strong?

Only some of the people who had once been gaming experts recognized the name Liu Xuan on the rankings. Recalling the times they had been utterly crushed by him, their expressions changed dramatically.

So it was him!

No wonder. No wonder at all.

……

The United States.

A group of high-ranking officials sat in a conference room, discussing whom they should send to the battlefield next.

After the number of people in the battlefield had fallen below thirty percent last time, they had realized that they could no longer leave the selection to chance.

What if they were chosen next?

Even more frightening—what if they weren’t chosen, but someone claimed they had been?

Recently, a governor had disappeared from his home. No one knew whether he had been pulled into the battlefield or murdered.

The former would at least be manageable. But if it was the latter……

“So why don’t we use this opportunity to get rid of all the homeless people and prisoners?”

“Homeless people are fine, but not prisoners. I mean, prisoners bring in a huge amount of revenue every year.”

“Do we even have that many homeless people in this country?”

“We don’t?”

“Even if we do, what happens when we use them all up? We need to find other sacrificial lambs.”

Just then, the rankings appeared. When they learned that the person ranked first in China was actually a top-tier gamer, the officials exchanged glances and immediately reached a consensus.

“Good. Once we’ve used up the homeless, we’ll send in the gamers. Get the data from the gaming companies. The players with the longest playtimes get priority. It’s time they served their country.”