Chapter 60: Chapter 60

Chapter 60: Mutated Ogres

How can a man say no?

Jiang Chen immediately replied, “Leave it to me. I won’t let you down.”

His beautiful mentor gave him another warm smile and handed him a special white crystal. With eyes full of expectation, she said to Jiang Chen, “I believe in you. But you must be careful this time. Monsters corrupted by abyssal energy become extremely powerful.”

“If the monsters have been corrupted by abyssal energy, come back immediately and notify me. If the mutation is minor, then just kill 500 ogres and one ogre chieftain to complete the task.”

“Also, this is a special crystal imbued with spiritual power—it will track the number of ogres you’ve slain.”

“Congratulations, you have accepted the quest—[Mutated Ogres]!”

Quest Description: Head to Falling Rock Valley and investigate the cause of the ogres’ mutation. Report your findings to the Archer Mentor, Jona—or kill 500 ogres and one ogre chieftain to complete the mission. (The quest objective may change depending on what you discover.)

Important Note: Ogres are ferocious. If they catch you, they’ll toss you in a pot for soup. So if you’re about to get caught… it’s better to take yourself out first.

The hell? What kind of genius wrote this quest dialogue?

Jiang Chen couldn’t help but laugh and cry at the same time.

A quest that literally encourages players to off themselves? There’s all kinds of weird stuff in this game.

He now had a quest in hand, and it looked far from simple. From what Mentor Jona said, it might be related to the Abyss. If so, the quest rewards would surely be incredible—though the difficulty would also spike sharply.

Before departing, he went to the Forging Guild to repair his gear durability, deposited his excess equipment with the [Warehouse Manager], and then set off directly.

That guy Han Gongque had been grinding monsters nonstop lately. At this point, he’d already surpassed Jiang Chen in experience percentage.

Jiang Chen opened the map and confirmed his direction of travel.

On the way to Falling Rock Valley was Ironwood Forest—a level 20 to 30 grinding zone and a favorite leveling area among players.

He set off at full speed—Jiang Chen’s travel speed was absurdly fast.

With 438 Agility, his base movement speed was already more than twice that of a regular player.

On top of that, he had: +20% from his class passive, +10% from Wind Spirit · Strider Boots, and +25% from Hidden One. At this point, his speed was peerless.

Once [Hidden One] was activated, Jiang Chen entered stealth, and with no monsters bothering him, his path was clear and fast.

Of course, there was a cost—5 mana per second.

That’s 300 mana per minute, but Jiang Chen didn’t care. His level 3 mana potions were more than enough to keep up with the drain.

Character: [Lone Ranger]

Talents: Hundredfold Reward, Elemental Arrow, Heart of Elements

Skills: Barrage Arrow, Concussive Arrow, Insight Perception, Triple Arrow Rain

While traveling, Jiang Chen took a moment to review his character stats. Since they hadn’t changed much, he focused his attention on the skill panel.

Modes: Flame Infusion, Frost Infusion, Lightning Infusion, Wind Infusion, Thunder Infusion

Currently, Heart of Elements could switch between five modes, each with distinct effects. It was Jiang Chen’s primary skill and a versatile one—perfect for handling all kinds of combat scenarios.

Unfortunately, talent skills couldn’t be upgraded, so the buffs were fixed. Still, the skill was powerful and comprehensive enough that exact numbers didn’t matter too much.

[Barrage Arrow] (Silver) Lv8 (12550/24000)

[Insight Perception] (Gold) Lv1 (0/800)

[Concussive Arrow] (Lv10 Class Skill) Lv1 (0/350,000)

[Triple Arrow Rain] (Lv20 Class Skill) Lv1 (0/750,000)

Regular skills were quite different.

Skills learned from books weren’t too hard to level up. Early on, experience was a bit steep, but as the game progressed, lower-tier skill leveling became much easier.

But class-specific skills were a different story. Leveling a class skill was like leveling up five times over.

For instance, the level 10 class skill [Concussive Arrow]—going from level 1 to 2 required five times the experience of leveling from 10 to 11.

If you wanted to get Concussive Arrow to level 10, it would take as much XP as five ordinary players leveling from 10 to 20 combined.

The same rule applied to level 20 class skills—five times the XP of a regular level-up post-20.

It was an absolutely brutal skill leveling system.

“You have entered the map: [Ironwood Forest].”

Unknowingly, Jiang Chen had reached the Ironwood Forest.

Inside the forest, several temporary camps had been set up by city NPCs. These camps had blacksmiths and potion vendors—just enough to support players grinding in the wild. This was the system adapting to player levels and exploration progress—very considerate.

At this time, player groups were beginning to appear in the forest to grind. Jiang Chen didn’t pay them much attention and continued heading toward his quest destination.

Jiang Chen arrived at the edge of Falling Rock Valley. A chill wind blew through—no other players in sight. This was a level-30+ area, after all.

In the nearby jungle, a shallow swamp spread out, populated by level 31 Swamp Crocodiles. Even elite players, mostly around level 21, couldn’t handle monsters like these yet.

Standing atop the valley, Jiang Chen opened his quest map.

The ogres were located near the border between Falling Rock Valley and the Skyreach Cliff. He didn’t expect Jona’s archer scout team to have patrolled that far out.

He summoned his Painted Sparrow Phantom Bow and began stealthily moving in the marked direction. After nearly twenty minutes of careful travel, Jiang Chen finally found his targets: the ogres.

However, they had clearly undergone mutation—completely different from the ogres Jiang Chen had encountered before. Their bodies were nearly twice as muscular, and their skin was now covered in dark, scaly armor.

Not far away, five burly ogres were gathered around a crude cooking pot. One was skinning a crocodile they had caught, while two others were sharpening large, rugged axes.

“Damn it, these thick-skinned, four-legged reptiles are disgusting. Barely any meat, just bones—and they taste like chewing dirt. I miss eating humans, especially women. Wonder when the chief will take us to raid another human village again?”

The skinning ogre complained loudly.

One of the axe-sharpening ogres cursed, “Idiot, once the chief finishes his great work, we’ll be eating humans every day! Didn’t he eat those human women the other day? If only they had more bones—we could’ve made soup!”