I Just Want Players to Save Money, They Insist on Giving Me!
Chapter 643 - 201: OK! Having fully explored Sobs Peninsula, the game progress bar should be over half now!_3

Chapter 643: Chapter 201: OK! Having fully explored Sobs Peninsula, the game progress bar should be over half now!_3

Second, the health bar was only a short segment above the head, not a long string of health bars displayed at the bottom of the screen like with a BOSS.

The mobility and aggression were also much lower than that of the Omen.

In fact, players had a fairly large margin for error.

For instance, just now, PDD had been dodging and weaving around the Blood Finger for some time.

But the enemy only took a few steps forward to probe, then stopped after PDD continued to increase the distance.

Or it might symbolically throw out a blood blade.

Raising a shield could completely absorb the damage.

"Doesn’t feel as tough as a single Omen!" PDD had just sharply criticized when he heard another person’s voice beside him.

「...Found you, ’Blood Finger’ Nerius.」

「Let’s put an end to you and that Curse Blood of yours.」

No sooner had the words fallen than a swordsman emanating dark golden hues and wearing a conical hat burst forth from behind the Fading One.

[’Blood Finger Hunter’ Yura has been summoned.]

"What the? Another brother?"

"This invasion and summoning setup is kind of interesting."

"Big bro, save me!"

As PDD was speaking, he saw the Blood Finger Hunter Yura already charging forward with sword raised.

Soon they were tangled in a scrum with the Blood Finger.

"And it seems like they have some beef with each other." Judging from their titles, it was clearly a hunter-prey relationship.

And PDD discovered.

When someone else drew the enemy’s attention away,

he was completely freed up and could even sneak up from behind to execute them.

With that, the situation suddenly became clear.

The Hat Brother was attracting fire in the front, and the Fading One was delivering righteous sneak attacks from behind!

With them pinching and flanking, the Blood Finger was caught between a rock and a hard place, and death was merely a matter of time.

Before long, its health was rapidly depleted, along with PDD’s final sword strike.

The Blood Finger gave a whimpering sound as it fell to the ground, dissolving into a burst of light.

Granting players over a thousand Runes in the process,

It also exploded with a weapon named [Reverse Sting].

PDD immediately brightened up, hurried to his inventory to find this weapon, and checked it out.

As a short sword, in terms of attack power, the Reverse Sting was even inferior to the Straight Sword in his hands.

It had an attack of only 79+31, (the former is the base value, the latter is damage scaling— for instance, if a weapon has a Strength scaling of A, the higher the player’s Strength investment, the higher the weapon’s damage scaling.)

Considering some enemies’ resistance, a hit might only inflict sixty or seventy points of damage.

But PDD noticed that the weapon had an additional effect.

Cumulative bleed build-up (30)

"I remember just now when that Blood Finger hit us, a debuff progress bar would pop up at the bottom of the screen."

"Could that bar be the bleeding progress bar, and once it’s stacked, it would burst for a large amount of damage? Or maybe cause slow bleeding?"

"If that’s the case, this weapon is kind of strong. Let’s go test it at the camp."

However, before teleporting, PDD didn’t forget to have a conversation with the big brother who had come to help.

After a conversation, he found out.

The Fading Ones were a group that had been exiled beyond the borders of the realm long ago.

And the leader of this group, Gefrei, was once the first King of Elden of the borderlands.

He married the Golden Tree goddess Marika, was crowned, and established impressive feats of valor.

But after securing the entire borderlands for the Golden Rule,

he was inexplicably exiled, along with all the warriors who had fought side by side with him, the reason unknown.

But one thing was certain.

Those who were exiled could no longer receive the Blessing of the Golden Rule, nor could they even approach the borderlands, and their eyes lost their luster.

Therefore, these people came to be known as the Fading Ones.

Without the Blessing, the Fading Ones could no longer see the guidance formed by the golden glow, unable to find their way home.

They wandered for life in the haze outside the realm, until they met the end of their lives.

"I can totally relate to that. It’s like us madly riding horses everywhere looking for Blessing Spots, feeling unsafe without finding one."

"The Fading Ones can’t even see the Blessing Spots, so it’s completely normal for them to get lost in the borderlands." PDD joked before hearing Yura continue.

Even within the large community of the Fading Ones, there were countless individuals with devious intentions.

Some Fading Ones, after losing their Blessing, turned to worship the Curse Blood to gain power.

Targeting the hunting of their kin and absorbing their fresh blood as their goal, strengthening themselves in this way, they are known as the Blood Fingers.

Yura expressed.

These guys had gone mad, and if ever encountered, remember not to show mercy just because they were once compatriots.

The conversation ended there, and the player learned some vague past about the Fading Ones from his mouth.

PDD was stunned.

"Damn! Story pieces that complete the world view are hidden in such trivial places?"

"And the whole process had no guidance, it was only because I accidentally fell off the bridge and wandered around that I stumbled upon it..."

"If I hadn’t explored here, wouldn’t I have missed out on understanding the complete storyline?"

"Wow! Designer Ke, could it be that the entire game is filled with these fragmented stories?"

He had seen games with fragmented stories.

But he had never seen a game that hid the story without any guidance, this was a first for PDD.

And this mode was not at all displeasing.

"Honestly, this kind of bold move seems only possible for a number-one player."

"But you know what, without any guides, just randomly arriving at a place and inadvertently triggering a storyline, listening to a story, dwelling on the past, obtaining a weapon, that feels pretty good. It’s like finding an unexpected oasis after a long drought, you know what I mean."