Game of the World Tree

“The favorability system has really been modified just like I predicted!”

“A bonus percentage? As well as discounts when using the store and luck buffs?”

“Hmm? The bonus percentage can actually double depending on the value of my favorability? That means it’s like getting twice the amount of experience after completing a task or quest!”

“Moreover the price for skills, books, and resurrection can be discounted up to fifty percent? Whoa…that’ll save me a lot of contribution points!”

“And…luck buffs? This is great! Players with high favorability with the NPCs will now have more chance of getting rare equipment properties, won’t they?”

“No wonder Demacia says he’s finished…with the favorability system getting overhauled like this, the gap between high and low favorability players will now completely widen, especially when doing the main questlines wherein the rewards are incredibly lucrative.”

Li Mu’s heart was filled with excitement.

After all, he was the player with the highest reputation value amongst the entire server!

“Uh…by the way, what’s my current comprehensive reputation rating?”

Thinking of this, Li Mu quickly entered his status screen and scrolled all the way down.

After the game was updated, there was a new section added to the player’s status screen, which was called reputation tab.

He clicked on it then looked at the data shown especially the numerical figures listed and just as he expected, his reputation rating was a grand total of 100 points!

The numerical score also had a golden aura-like visual effect added to it which is shining brightly, making him feel like he’s one of the few VIP players.

Not only that, but there was also a brief system evaluation text underneath which states;

‘As a widely renowned chosen one, you have gained the admiration of the elves. Your comprehensive reputation rating is: Honorable!’

Li Mu couldn’t help but pump his fist up high and shout in english,

“Yes!”

Then, he eagerly opened the exchange store next.

As soon as Li Mu entered, he instantly noticed that the store interface had new subtle differences compared to before, and the system was now greeting him with a sweet voice which wasn’t there before.

“Welcome, Honorable Chosen One!”

There was also a cute chibi version of the goddess holding flowers while cheering on the side.

“Interesting!”

Li Mu’s eyes lit up and he instinctively took a screenshot, before checking the prices of all the items being currently sold at the exchange store.

Sure enough, the prices of all non-equipment items on display had been discounted! Moreover, in the lower right corner of the equipment exchange section, he noticed a golden icon that shows, ‘luck buff (1/1)’ along with a caption which states;

“Congratulations, honorable chosen one! Your luck value has reached 100 points! You will be granted more chance to aquire rare special properties upon purchasing equipments!”

Honorable… Rare special properties…

Li Mu’s couldn’t help but grin after seeing it.

In fact, one of the reason he still hadn’t yet upgraded his gears to epic-class equipment was not only because he had already obtained the equipment of the Orc High Priest, but also because he always felt that his luck was quite bad especially when playing games.

Prior to this patch, he had also purchased one or two purple equipment, but unfortunately, all of them had rubbish special properties.

Li Mu once talked to other druids like him and discovered that their weapons usually have special properties like ‘accelerated casting’ or ‘spell enhancement’ but compared to them, his staff just had a useless ‘Spell Attachment: Illuminating Spell’ for its special properties…

It was embarrassing.

It was just a level-zero magic spell, that any player could also acquire regardless of their jobclass and level, since the skill manual for illumination spell can be easily bought from the store for measly 200 contribution points.

Although it was commonly used spell, it was still a worthless special properties to have in one’s primary weapon.

Of course, this wasn’t even the worst of it.

One of the worst special properties to have on your equipment is called ‘shiny.’

This particular special properties had no actual combat value, and its function is to simply make the equipment look…well, shiny.

Maybe some casual fans would like it for its cosmetic value, but most combat-focused players absolutely abhorred this kind of superficial rubbish equipment properties.

Luckily for everyone, this ‘Shiny’ properties is quite rare and only people that have really bad luck had somehow managed to get this kind of rubbish special properties…

Sadly for him, he’s one of those few unlucky one’s who had somehow gotten this lame properties for the equipment that he bought.

But now things were different.

“With this luck buff, I’m now guaranteed to at least get a good equipment properties!”

Li Mu was delighted.

Although he had acquired the high priest’s equipment, it wasn’t a full set. He only had the orc chieftain’s staff and robe, and was still wearing an old pair of black pants with ‘shiny’ special properties that he unluckily bought ages ago.

Thinking about it, Li Mu decided to test his luck and ran all the way towards the side hall of the Temple of Nature, intending to buy something at the store.

After arriving, he instantly knelt down and prayed to the goddess statue, and entered the exchange store.

Li Mu then browsed all the available equipment for Iron-rank, and eventually gritted his teeth and decided to use his hard-earned 30,000 contribution points to buy a new pair of epic purple-class mage shoes.

He felt a bit of heartache after seeing the five digits figure reduced to zero after emptying his entire CP savings.

“It’s a bit of pity that the 50% discount isn’t applicable when purchasing equipment, otherwise I could have saved half of my contribution points…”

Nevertheless, although he couldn’t get a discount for his equipment purchase, simply getting a rare special properties added to it would be good enough for him!

After a couple of seconds, a burst of holy light then flashed in an instant, before a pair of exquisitely crafted shoes appeared in front of Li Mu.

Li Mu couldn’t wait anymore and instantly picked them up to check its properties…

This new epic purple-class mage shoes has a rating that was twice compared to the one he was currently wearing.

And on the special properties column—

“No way! It’s actually acceleration!”

Li Mu gasped in a mix of joy and amazement.

‘Acceleration’ was a very rare special properties for footwear, since it could increase the movement speed of its user by half.

Don’t underestimate this buff of half speed acceleration.

With the shoes accelerating one’s movement, if one also learned the skill [Grace of the Cat] and use both these in tandem, then the user’s movement speed will rise to an astonishing degree…

Players jokingly call these playstyle, the ‘kung fu’ casters.

Under this boost, the user’s speed can even rival that of hunters of the same level!

And the hunter jobclass has always been known for its high agility stats.

Having this speed will also greatly improve the user’s overall self-defense. Therefore, for magic-based jobclasses with weak melee abilities, ‘Acceleration’ is a must-have for survival and equipments that have been imbued with this special properties can be considered extremely valuable!

Although this special properties is very powerful, it is also really difficult to obtain. Amongst the 1,200 closed beta players, only a few have somehow managed to get a equipment with acceleration properties, and most of them are rare blue-class equipment.

Li Mu’s intermediate iron-ranked shoes with the ‘Acceleration’ properties, which is also an epic purple-class footwear, is the first of its kind in the entire server.

“Hahaha! This is awesome!”

Li Mu was very pleased with his purchase.

At this point, he also noticed that his luck buff had disappeared and had become ‘0/1.’

There was also a message underneath that read, “Recovers after 24 hours on earth time.”

“24 hours in reality? That means… I can only use it once every four days in the game?” Li Mu pondered.

After the feeling of joy, it is natural for one to share their own happiness with someone else and revel upon the envy and jealousy of others.

Thus Li Mu grinned and looked around his vicinity for potential people to boast about.

At this time, he was surprised to find that there were actually fewer players in the temple’s side hall, where big crowds usually gathered. And the people who came to the side hall today were obviously simply there to check their luck buff or discount percentage, just like him.

However, Li Mu would also occasionally see them exhaling disappointed breaths after checking their status screens.

“Ah danggit…I only have 20 points for my reputation rating! The task and quest rewards I’ll get can only be increased by 20%.”

“Tsk you should be content dude, I only have 10 points you know!”

“Yeah man, do you know that we aren’t even the most pitiful? Do you know that player named Demacia? I heard that he has a whopping score of zero points! His reputation rating shows ‘Indifferent,’ and it hasn’t even reached ‘Neutral’ like most players.”

“What… hahaha! Really now, zero points? How the hell did he even managed to achieved that? I mean, I grind mobs in the wilderness most of the time and have never interacted with any of the NPCs. Still, my reputation rating is five points, which makes me ‘neutral’.”

“It’s because all his NPC favorability, except for Aél Moonlight, are in the negatives. I think he even has the lowest reputation rating within the entire server.”

“Hahaha, that guy is too miserable!”

A few players who thought their scores were too pitiful suddenly burst into laughter after hearing their conversation.

Li Mu: “…..”

No wonder…

No wonder Demacia kept saying he was done for.

Due to the recent modifications in the favorability system, Demacia’s negative reputation will definitely have a huge impact upon his gameplay, especially his luck.

Li Mu sighed.

Demacia’s dilemma really reminds him of the saying, ‘Don’t court disaster, unless you want to die.’

Only this red-haired punk still has the guts to tease the NPCs despite knowing they have a bad impression of him.

At this time, some players finally noticed Li Mu.

“F*ck! Isn’t that Brother Mu?!”

“Hey Brother Mu! Bro! Your reputation is so high with the NPCs isn’t it? Can you tell us how many points you have on your comprehensive score?”

“Could it be…100 points?”

Upon hearing their words, Li Mu’s mouth gently curved upwards.

“Yep, I got 100 points.”

The others gasped in shock and stared at him af if he suddenly grew another head.

“What the hell! It’s really 100 points!”

“I heard that HootyBird only has 65 points! I guess that makes her second in the entire server.”

“Amazing! Brother Mu, what’s your reputation rating then?”

“My rating? Hmm… it’s honorable.” Li Mu replied.

“Wow… Honorable!”

“This is really amazing! It’s the highest level, right?”

“I’m so jealous man! And 100 points… doesn’t that also come with a buff of good luck? You can draw one rare properties on one of your purchased equipment?”

Li Mu nodded, “Yes, just now I bought an epic purple-class shoes with ‘acceleration’ properties added to it.”

Other players: “……”

“What the hell!”

“Damn!”

“Footwears with acceleration properties are definitely top quality equipment!”

“That is too enviable dude!”

“Aww man! Why didn’t I properly raised my favorability before!”

“Oh right, Brother Mu, I watched your video series, you’re just way ahead of everyone else bro! No wonder you’ve been raising the NPC’s favorability all this time… did you perhaps anticipate the devs would do this?” A curious player asked.

Li Mu pondered for a moment and nodded, “Yes definitely, because ‘ElvKing’ emphasizes immersion, and its main theme is about fighting alongside the native elves while helping them rebuild their civilization, and assisting the goddess in regaining her strength…”

“Based upon these facts, I knew for certain that the devs will definitely emphasize our cooperation with the NPCs and make it an integral part of the game. Otherwise, why would they make the NPCs act and behave so realistic? I mean, if it wasn’t the case then the devs could simply make the NPCs just like your typical NPCs from other games.”

“So…just like I said before, although we know ElvKing is simply a game, we can’t just treat it like a normal game. We have to roleplay and integrate ourselves within this virtual world!”

“Immerse ourselves within the story! Immerse ourselves within the world! And finally, Immerse ourselves within our own emotions!”

“This is true essence of role-playing and ElvKing is the most realistic MMORPG!” Li Mu said with impassioned tone of voice.

Other players listened and fell into deep thought.

Seeing the players beginning to contemplate the meaning behind his words, Li Mu was very satisfied.

He then looked around and asked with some confusion, “By the way, why do I feel like there are fewer people here today?”

“Don’t mention it bro. Once the favorability system was modified, almost everyone instantly rushed towards Florence to raise their own favorability with the NPCs. Now it’s almost overcrowded over there…” A player replied while shrugging his shoulders.

Li Mu: “……”