42. Blessing in Disguise It"s so different with someone carrying. Even if XiaoYu"s spells didn"t do much damage, the increased experience - the monsters were nearly double of XiaoYu"s level - was astounding. Thus, before it was time for the sweet baby to go to sleep, the one level XiaoYu had lost was back.
"Why is the Job Change Quest still greyed out?" Locked quests had grey text. Unfinished had white. Completed quests had bouncing red text.
"Try deleting it? Then wait before accepting it again," Poor_Man suggested.
"The game says I need to pay 100 crystals to delete a locked quest," XiaoYu replied after tapping on the greyed-out box.
"Huh? What do we do then?" I_Am_A_Poor_Man had never encountered something like this before, of course. Almost everyone could pa.s.s their second Job Change quests in one go.
"Let"s ask at the Job Change Hall." HereticKing wasn"t sure if that would work. When he failed his third Job Change quest, it auto-deleted itself.
The trio teleported over to Prole"s Job Change Hall. Awaiting XiaoYu was still that expressionless priest.
"Father, I"d like to ask about my Job Change quest. Why can I still not complete it?" XiaoYu asked.
"h.e.l.lo, little Acolyte. Your quest is currently locked. You"ll need to pay 20 crystal coins to unlock it," replied the priest.
"Deleting requires 100. Unlocking needs 20. Is the game trying to commit highway robbery?" I_Am_A_Poor_Man griped.
"Do you have enough on you?" HereticKing didn"t bother commenting on the prices and just turned to XiaoYu.
"No," XiaoYu said with a shake. Ever since he dropped all that money from being killed, he never carried more than 1 crystal on him.
"I"ll lend you some," HereticKing replied.
"I have it in my Storage. I can just go get it."
"It"s rather far from here. The earlier you"re done, the better. Isn"t it nearly bedtime for you?"
"Yes…Thank you. I"ll return it to you tomorrow." XiaoYu had considered it. It was a reasonable suggestion. A trip back and forth would take up quite some time.
XiaoYu handed 20 crystal coins over to the priest. The priest flipped open his bible and as he chanted, a gentle white light descended onto XiaoYu. After the light faded, XiaoYu looked at his Quest tab. The Job Change quest"s text had turned back to the ordinary white colour.
"Huh?"
"What is it?" Neither HereticKing nor I_Am_A_Poor_Man could look at XiaoYu"s Quest tab.
"The number of mobs has changed. It was 100 each. Now it"s 500 each," XiaoYu replied in confusion.
"Why are there so many?" Even with them high-levelled players helping, it"d be a hard quest to complete. It"s definitely not something they can finish by tonight.
"Father, is there something wrong with the quest?" XiaoYu remained as polite as ever when he questioned the priest.
"Nope."
"Oh."
"Little Acolyte, if you think it"s too much ha.s.sle, I can delete it. No charge," the priest kindly suggested upon witnessing XiaoYu"s good manners.
"It"s fine." It"s killing monsters either way. The more he fought, the more the tiny cat could collect. It"s better than changing the quest to a fetch quest. He wasn"t in a rush. He just needed to be more careful during the quest to avoid being killed again.
"G.o.ds. It"s a total of 1500. Just when will you grind until?" exclaimed Poor_Man.
"It"s fine. I can slowly hack at it. I can also help you collect more ingredients," XiaoYu replied.
"Ugh…" I_Am_A_Poor_Man peeked at HereticKing over XiaoYu. The other had a highly unreadable expression on. "I"ll help you out." A single secret quest, some ruckus, and he"d forgotten all about that. He should be punishing himself in the Zombie Cave.
"We"ll start tomorrow. Go rest up." HereticKing looked at the time and realised it was getting late. Might as well get XiaoYu to sleep early. They"ll start grinding away at the mobs like bots tomorrow.
"Chief, I think there"s a meeting with the HengXiang Group tomorrow," Poor_Man commented.
"I know. Remember to stay safe tomorrow, okay?" It was clear the second sentence was directed to XiaoYu.
"Mn. I"ll be careful." The penalty for dying after Level 10 was too high. He never wanted to experience it again.
The trio left the Job Change Hall. I_Am_A_Poor_Man who was walking at the back of the group then received a message from HereticKing.
"How"s the kill squad organising going?"
"Relax, Chief. He definitely won"t b.u.mp into that knight from tomorrow on," Poor_Man replied.
"Good."
"Well, I"m off to sleep. Thank you for today," XiaoYu said.
"No problem. We"re all friends."
"Um…Yao, I will pay you back tomorrow." It was the first time XiaoYu called QiYao out loud by his name. It made XiaoYu feel rather embarra.s.sed.
"No rush."
"Good night." The two cats waved their paws, then XiaoYu turned and walked down another path.
"Wait. Where are you going?" If memory served him right, the only place that path led to was…
"To sleep in the hotel." XiaoYu found it strange that I_Am_A_Poor_Man would call out to him.
"But over there is…"
"Mn. The poor district. The hotels there are really cheap." It cost only 1 silver a night, although the beds were rather hard and the room rather plain.
"Xiao-Yu…did I accidentally put in 100 silvers for your payment?" I_Am_A_Poor_Man was feeling rather dejected. He shouldn"t have selected the wrong currency, right? So why would XiaoYu need to sleep in the ratty hotel of the poor district?
"Nope. You did give me 100 crystals. Because I kept spending money when I entered the game, I found the cheapest hotel in the city. I"m used to sleeping there now," XiaoYu replied.
At once, both I_Am_A_Poor_Man and HereticKing felt a sense of guilt. The former because he asked for so much materials in return for nothing, yet he never realised XiaoYu was on the brink of poverty. The latter because he recalled the letter that was sent over to him late in the night. He really did hit the nail on the head with that wild guess. XiaoYu had worked hard late into the night just to have enough silvers to mail that.
"Is there a problem?" XiaoYu didn"t understand what the two were brooding for. His wide catlike eyes filled with question marks.
"No. Ah! Right. Wait here for me." I_Am_A_Poor_Man casted a Rush at himself and quickly disappeared from XiaoYu"s view. (Rush is a skill that"s unlocked once Haste reached 500 proficiency. It can only be casted on the spellcaster. Triple the Haste boost for 5 minutes with a cooldown of 5 hours.)
"You have money now. Why not treat yourself better?" HereticKing ruffled XiaoYu"s hair.
"It just needs to be a sleeping surface. I"m not very picky."
"Then how about treating your kitten better? Otherwise, it might really run away with me." HereticKing stroked the tiny cat"s head. He knew just how important the small cat was to XiaoYu. Perhaps going in from the kitten would persuade XiaoYu. Ah. This kid was good in all ways but he"s somewhat stubborn and dense.
"Yes…true." XiaoYu thought about it. The little one always slept curled up by his side. While it never complained, even he thought the bed was too hard.
"At least find a softer bed. Poor should be bringing something interesting back."
"Dun, dun, dun! Take a look at this." With Rush, I_Am_A_Poor_Man came swaying back not 10 minutes later. He waved a thick wad of paper in the air.
"Free Hotel Coupon…?" XiaoYu squinted at the vouchers in his hand and read the name out.
"That"s right. You can stay 1 night for free in any hotels that aren"t 5-stars. Luckily I recall not having thrown out the prizes from the Labour Day event." His interest was piqued. He wanted to sleep in all the beds in A.O. So, he s.n.a.t.c.hed away all the coupons the guild members bought with their points. His interest waned fast and there were still plenty of coupons left, just gathering dust at the bottom of the chest.
"Those will last you for two months straight at least. Here, take them." As he said so, he stuffed them all in XiaoYu"s hand.
"Thank you."
"No need to be a stranger. Remember to tell me where the best beds are."
"Okay."
The next morning, XiaoYu returned to the old days of camping in the Zombie Cave. One by one, the mobs shuffled over. One by one, they died. The only change was the decrease in how often XiaoYu was poisoned.
I_Am_A_Poor_Man, HereticKing and even Below_The_Moon would come help out, but not for the entire day or together. After all, they still had their own jobs to attend to and their own grinding to do.
By the fourth morning, the grand mob ma.s.sacre drew to an end.
"Xiao-Yu, I really admire how you just immersed yourself in this place for days on end before. It"s really tiring to one"s tastes." I_Am_A_Poor_Man mimed putting on an eye mask and exercised his eyeb.a.l.l.s.
Stepping into the Job Change Hall once more four days later were XiaoYu with his previous companions, I_Am_A_Poor_Man and HereticKing. Both of them wanted to witness the moment he succeeded turning into a Priest.
"Congratulations, player LuckyCat, for succeeding in becoming a Bishop."
B-Bishop? Shouldn"t it be "Priest"?!
Translator"s Notes:
Something interesting: Ever wondered why Asians always use the word interesting? That"s because the common Asian counterpart to that phrase means "of note", "fun", "peculiar/weird in a good way" or even "kinky" (if used along with certain connotations) all at once. Bear with us poor translators as we all struggle to decipher the exact English equivalent in that line and find something that"s not just "interesting".
I couldn"t decide if HereticKing meant XiaoYu would like what Poor would bring back, or if he was talking about how Poor would be bringing one of those special effect items that XiaoYu might be interested in, or if he just meant Poor would be back with a thing.
Bottom of the chest: Not a phrase I"d translate usually as it"s a saying from days of yore that doesn"t really apply to modern life. As one might guess, it"s from back when banks didn"t really exist. You"d keep all your valuables and money in a single chest somewhere in the house. The more valuable it is, the less likely you"ll use it (or it"s a useless valuable that you shove in a corner and forget about). Hence, it"d be relegated to the bottom of the box.
It"s also why the saying, "lining the bottom of the chest", is used to refer to items/cash that are the last line of (financial) defence. Without that lining, there are no more cash to spend. All you"ll have are immovable a.s.sets like the house and farm. Even then, those will likely be gone because land deeds would be in that chest of treasures.
Poison by zombies: The original text state the rate XiaoYu got poisoned was higher, however it should be lower with his new necklace"s +30% Poison Resistance. Perhaps the author"s referring to how reckless he was being. We"ll never know because this chapter also got "locked" by the new jjwxc censorship bots. Hurrah.
Bishop: This is not an actual cla.s.s in RO. Its special skills will be revealed in the next chapter. I"ll discuss more on why this name was chosen even though the direct translation would be "High Priest".