Chapter 20: Time-limited Unique Mission

Huh?

Su Sheng stepped out of the town gate and froze; he saw that at the entrance of Parasol Tree Town, a middle-aged NPC had a large exclamation mark above his head, standing anxiously at the roadside.

Such an obvious quest?

Su Sheng found it strange for a moment, but since there was a quest, he naturally went to check it out.

"Hello, may I ask if there's anything I can help you with?" Su Sheng stepped forward and asked.

In the game, some NPCs have intelligent templates, so it's best to be polite when dealing with NPCs.

The middle-aged NPC's eyes lit up upon seeing Su Sheng: "You must be an Explorer, right."

"Explorer" is the player's identity in the game world.

"Yes." Su Sheng replied.

"That's great; I'm a merchant, but my goods were robbed by bandits along the way. The goods themselves are fine, but my little daughter is hidden among those goods."

"I implore you, Explorer, to rescue my daughter before those bandits discover her."

"I will certainly give you a generous reward."

System Notification: Triggered time-limited unique quest, rescue the merchant's daughter.

A merchant's goods were looted, but the merchant's daughter is hidden among the goods; if the daughter were discovered by the bandits, the consequences would be unthinkable.

Please rescue the merchant's daughter before the bandits discover her.

Accept, Decline.

Unique time-limited quest!

Su Sheng's eyes lit up; normally, the rewards for special quests are very generous.

And this time-limited unique quest is just blatantly placed at the town gate; Su Sheng thought it might be a benefit for the first player to arrive at the town.

Accept!

System Notification: Accepted quest, rescue the merchant's daughter.

Time-limited unique quest.

Countdown: 70 minutes.

"The bandits' lair is right…"

There are only 70 minutes, and that includes travel time; Su Sheng glanced at the quest coordinates and estimated that walking there would take about 10 minutes.

In effect, the actual quest time is only one hour.

Without hesitation, Su Sheng immediately drew his sword and set off.

At that moment, the female player had just arrived at the town gate.

She saw the merchant NPC waiting expectantly, and also saw the back of the knight player departing into the distance.

"I…"

The female player gripped her longbow, feeling a surge of frustration.

Too late by a step!

There are actually players faster than me, even though I deliberately chose a relatively remote town, yet someone still beat me to it.

That's right; this female player came specifically for that unique quest. She has her own connections, learning from players who had already reached level 10 and entered the town that each town gate has a time-limited unique quest.

The quest may differ, but completing it grants a piece of purple equipment corresponding to one's profession.

That's purple equipment; at this stage, having even a single piece of green gear is already impressive.

In Zhu Lu Game, the quality tiers are: white common, green fine work, blue excellent, purple supreme, orange epic, red legendary, and colored divine artifacts.

At this stage, obtaining profession-appropriate purple gear would definitely give a huge advantage.

This unique time-limited quest, there is only one per town; although there are many towns on the game map, altogether they amount to roughly one or two thousand.

Compared to the massive player base, two thousand… really isn't many; on the first day of the game's launch, someone already tallied it, with concurrent online players reaching up to 600 million, domestic server… this is still just the domestic server.

"Zhu Lu" having launched globally, it's no wonder Teng Long Company's servers struggle not to crash.

"I'm so angry! My older brother will laugh at me again—no way! I've got to push myself!"

The female player stomped her foot, gripped her longbow, turned and went to find the career instructor to change her class.

As for the source of this information, it was her older brother.

As for why, she doesn't continue to other towns.

Because after leaving the Newbie Village, choosing a town means settling down there.

After settling, one can only travel to other towns after seven days; of course, you could also walk there on foot…

But the game map is vast and boundless; even if you know the way, walking there would require crossing many high-level monster areas. After leaving the Newbie Village, the penalty for death is steep: you lose a level, lose your equipped gear and backpack items, and randomly drop one to two items.

Of course, in special circumstances, you might lose even more levels and all non-bound equipment and items on your person… for example, blacklist.

…

Su Sheng didn't realize he had inadvertently snatched someone else's quest; even if he knew, he wouldn't care, after all it's first-come, first-served, it's just a game.

After about eight minutes, Su Sheng finally reached the quest coordinates.

Along the way he encountered many wild monsters, but the anxious Su Sheng avoided them all.

"Huh? It's actually still a dungeon."

Su Sheng was somewhat surprised that the quest location was actually a dungeon entrance.

Game dungeons differ from outdoor maps; normally, the experience and rewards from monsters inside dungeons far exceed those of same-level wild monsters.

Furthermore, dying inside a dungeon carries a lighter penalty: you lose only fifty percent of your current level's experience, and no items are dropped.

If the experience is insufficient for fifty percent, then all current experience is cleared.

In other words, if you had just leveled up and then died upon entering the dungeon, it's almost as if there were no penalty.

After checking the quest time, Su Sheng didn't hesitate and walked straight in.

Ding~

System Notification: About to enter the mission dungeon, Return Dragon Mountain Stronghold.

This dungeon is a mission dungeon; only players who have accepted the mission can enter, and they only have one chance to enter—if the mission is completed or fails, the dungeon disappears.

Enter!

Su Sheng didn't hesitate and directly chose to enter the dungeon.

After the scene slightly distorted, Su Sheng appeared on the outskirts of a bandit stronghold.

Ahead was a bandit stronghold surrounded by a wooden fence, with bandits guarding the entrance.

Su Sheng immediately picked up his sword and shield and walked forward.

"Who goes there?"

The two guarding bandits immediately noticed Su Sheng's presence.

Humanoid monsters, according to the game's AI settings, are intelligent.

They wouldn't foolishly come up for a one-on-one duel.

Immediately, the two guarding bandits each picked up their broadswords and came over.

Su Sheng rushed forward and struck directly.

Heroic Strike!

-188

-187

Two streaks of yellow damage jumped from the bandit's head, Weak Spot Attack!

Su Sheng's strike was aimed at the neck.

Bandit lackey

Level: 11

Attack: 110

Defense: 100

HP: 1800

Skill: Tetanus Blade.

Description: …

Indeed, compared to the monsters in Newbie Village, the monsters in the town have all attributes greatly increased.

The attack power of a level 10 Mountain Wild Wolf in Newbie Village is only 45, and the attributes of these ordinary bandits are already comparable to the Wolf King.

It's just that the HP is a bit low, but that skill is interesting; Su Sheng glanced at the bandit lackey's rust-stained broadsword and probably understood where that skill came from.

However, facing Su Sheng's attack and defense of up to 181, these ordinary slight lackeys are just trash; even one versus two, he shows no fear.

Another bandit lackey is level 12, with attributes slightly higher than the previous one.