Divine Hunter - Chapter 23
Chapter 23: The Conditions of the Mutation
Translator: Exodus Tales
Editor: Exodus Tales
Translated by XephiZ
Edited by SnowPeaches
Slime Valley.
The vast valley was crowded with slimes of different colors between Level 8 and 10. The different colors represented the different traits of the slimes.
When a Green Slime was being attacked, it would unleash a green poisonous liquid. Players that excelled at close combat would avoid them. It would end up as a fight that neither side would win.
White Slimes had high HP while Black Slimes had low HP, but crazy defense. A Level 10 Player could at most deal 3 damage to a Black Slime regardless of the skill they used. Red Slimes would detonate themselves when they died. Blue Slimes would use strange sonic waves as their attacks, placing Players they hit in a temporary Confused state.
Compared to the monsters in the Rookies Village, the adorable and crystalline slimes in the Slime Valley were actually a lot trickier to deal with. Not many people would bother killing them if the Rookies Village was not overcrowded with Players.
When Chen Mo arrived in the Slime Valley, he did not head straight to the coordinates of the Slime King. The coordinates were not really a secret anymore. He did not have to find the Slime King himself.
Chen Mo had to kill 50 Green Slimes first before visiting the Slime King.
At Level 8, a kill quest would be available for Hunters in Aiur Town, asking Players to kill 50 Green Slimes at the Slime Valley. After completing the quest, the Players would be rewarded the skill book for “Minor Poison Bolt”.
Using the Minor Poison Bolt would add extra poison damage when they were attacking with a crossbow. At the Novice Level, the Minor Poison Bolt would add 3 poison damage which was stackable up to five times. If the poison was maintained at five stacks, he would deal 15 extra damage to the target. It was a very useful skill.
“We are a melee party with a Priest, looking for a range Player or a melee Player with good awareness!”
“Our party has a Priest with three skills. Looking for high DPS Player with three and above pieces of equipment!”
Most Players would form parties when grinding levels in the Slime Valley. It was difficult to take on the slimes alone without proper equipment. Normally, lone Players would have to sit down on the ground to recover their HP after killing a single slime, and if they were unlucky, they might even die to the slimes.
Priests with healing and dispelling skills were the most popular in the Slime Valley. Range Players would not have a hard time finding a party either. However, melee Players were struggling to form parties due to the Green Slimes and the Red Slimes. Many melee Players ended up forming a pure melee party. Even though they were slower at killing the slimes, they did not have any problem staying alive.
“The Hunter over there, brother, fancy joining our team? We still have one slot open, we have a Priest!” A Warrior’s eyes glittered when he saw Chen Mo approaching. He quickly went up to him.
The Hunter class was not the best class when it came to killing monsters and doing quests in the early game. Many Players had decided not to pick Hunter as they wanted to raise their levels quicker.
However, Hunters were surprisingly popular in the Slime Valley.
Hunters could set up traps to slow down the target’s movement speed, and while the crossbow did not have a long attack range, the DPS of Hunters was quite impressive when attacking at intermediate range because of the Minor Poison Bolt, especially against the Black Slimes that had an outstanding defense. The extra poison damage was extremely effective against them. In the Slime Valley, the Minor Poison Bolt was the only attack that could deal more than 3 damage to the Black Slimes. When the poison reached five stacks, a normal crossbow attack and the extra poison damage of the Minor Poison Bolt would deal a total of 7 damage to a Black Slime, which was equivalent to the damage output of two to three Players of other classes.
Black Slimes were quite common in the Slime Valley, thus Hunters were very well-received in the Slime Valley.
“It’s fine, I’m already Level 10, I only came here to look around,” Chen Mo shook his head.
“I see,” the Warrior left in disappointment.
There were too many Players in the outer areas of the Slime Valley. Chen Mo decided to venture deeper.
Fifty Green Slimes was not a lot, but it would certainly take some time if he had to wait for them to spawn in a specific area, especially when there were so many Players around.
Chen Mo decided to kill the Green Slimes while going deeper into the valley. He believed he would kill more or less the number of Green Slimes he needed once he reached where the Slime King was.
A little more than ten minutes later, Chen Mo found the massive green Slime King.
Even though many Players were curious about the Slime King at the beginning, the attention that the Boss monster was getting gradually decreased over time. A few Players would show up occasionally and die to the Slime King, but the number of Players that did so had reduced significantly. They would rather die to the normal monsters and revive in the town instead of wasting ten minutes looking for the Slime King and die to it.
The Slime King was in a soft green grassland. It would bounce up and down at times and look around it out of boredom.
Chen Mo was pretty lucky. He had killed fifty Green Slimes along the way. He could boldly proceed with some experiments he had in mind without worrying about dying.
Chen Mo was not completely clueless about the Slime King. There were already Players that managed to kill the Slime King. There was lots of information about the Slime King on the forum.
In a nutshell, the Slime King had high defense and attack. At the present stage, most Players could only deal low damage to it, and since they did not have much defensive equipment yet, they would most likely be one-shotted by the Slime King, thus not many Players bothered to come and challenge it.
As a matter of fact, it was not difficult to kill the Slime King. A human wave attack consisting of a few hundred, or even a thousand Players could easily eliminate the Boss monster.
However, the only problem was, since there were so many instances of the Rookies Village, even the guilds that could gather hundreds of Players were unable to gather all of them at the same Slime Valley. The only way was spending a huge sum of money to recruit the Players in the same instance like the Nouveau Riches Club. They had basically stoned the Slime King to its death with money.
Since the Nouveau Riches Club had done it first, it was no longer as effective to use the same way again. The benefits of killing the Slime King could not even pay off the price they paid.
Chen Mo carefully observed the Slime King from a distance. He did not go up to the Slime King right away. The Slime King’s movement speed was not high, yet there was no way he could outrun the Slime King without equipping the title “The Corrupted”.
He hid in a corner and observed the Slime King for more than half an hour. A few Players had shown up to die to the Slime King. Each time, the Slime King would let out a furious cry and jump on top of the Players mercilessly to crush them.
“Jumping attacks and rolling attacks, its attacks are pretty straightforward, the same as what the Players have described on the forum,” Chen Mo believed he had done observing the Slime King.
There were no other Players around. Chen Mo ran toward the Slime King.
Roar!
The Slime King began to bounce in Chen Mo’s direction after it was aware of its new challenger’s presence.
Chen Mo took out a stone and set a trap on it while he was moving.
The Slime King soon reached a spot close to Chen Mo. It would catch up to Chen Mo with a few more jumps and smashed him into mincemeat.
Chen Mo was fearless even when the Slime King was approaching. He tossed the trap at the Slime King.
Boom!
The Slime King was knocked over a meter back!
“Nice! It can jump over a meter high into the air. The knock-back still works, even though it isn’t as effective!”
“The problem is my speed; even with the Goblin Boots and the title “The Corrupted”, I’m still slightly slower than it. Maybe I should try and find a pair of boots that can increase my movement speed by 1 or 2.”
Chen Mo had unequipped the title “The Corrupted” before going back to Aiur Town previously, thus he was currently not equipping it. Otherwise, he would not be able to enter Aiur Town.
After seeing the Slime King’s speed first-hand, Chen Mo realized even with the title “The Corrupted”, the Slime King was still faster than him.
The Slime King soon caught up to Chen Mo. It jumped into the air and crashed down on Chen Mo.
The damage of a critical hit floated in the air. Chen Mo died without any surprise.
“I can take my time looking for the boots with extra movement speed. The question is, how can I make the Slime King mutate?”
Chen Mo fell into deep thoughts after he came back to life in Aiur Town.
What were the conditions to trigger the Slime King’s mutation?
By killing a certain number of Players?
Impossible, if that was the case, the Slime King in every instance would have killed a similar number of Players by now. As time gradually passed, the Players should have spotted more than two Mutated Slime Kings by now.
Therefore, the Players must have used a certain item on the Slime Kings or themselves that caused the Slime Kings to mutate!
