*sigh* "I don't know if I should call you reckless, crazy or both... No one on their right mind would try to fight this thing, especially alone and without preparations. Seriously, how are you even still alive?" Stephen asked exasperated, as he was examining the caster from all of its sides and listening to Soren's recounting of his successful fight.
"Well... If it wasn't for the fact that this thing is territorial, like the squires, then there would be no way of surviving against this thing. It's the only reason I even managed to kill it in the first place." Soren stated, as he was watching Stephen pull out a knife to slice open the caster's belly and pull out of it a shiny blue stone, covered in fluffy stuffing, which prompted Soren to ask curiously. "So, what's the blue stone you pulled out of its guts? Some sort of mana core?"
"Yes. They're mainly found in creatures capable of using mana.They make for decent mana storage for our mana-powered tools, like the pump in the back room." Stephen explained, as he pocketed away the mana core and changed the topic. "Anyways, let's move on towards some more important topics. For starters, could you pass me your guild card quickly?"
Soren nodded silently, as he pulled out his gray card out of his pocket and passed it to Stephen, who then went below the counter and pulled out a purple stamp and pressed it hard on his gray card. As the stamp was pressing on the card, the card's gray color slowly shifted into a purple hue, which slowly overwrote the card's gray color, until the card became pure purple.
"Congratulations on skipping a rank and becoming a Purple Rank Hunter. Too bad there's no one else to congratulate you, but what can we do about it. I'd say this deserves more than a simple congratulations, but lately there have been multiple people skipping ranks like you, so it's not as much of a feat as it used to be. "Stephen stated joyfully, as he spoke in a serious manner.
"Multiple people? Who?"
"Mostly weird people who seem to be actual nutjobs, completely cut off from society. Seriously, have they even met a single person in their entire life or not?" Hearing about this, Soren couldn't help but think of other players and wonder what their behavior was like, before Stephen moved back to the previous topic. "Anyways, since you've entered the Purple Rank, for starters, now you have the eligibility to create your own party of hunters. You're free to recruit anyone, so long as they are a hunter and agree to join your party, temporarily or permanently. Aside from that, you're also eligible to join on expeditions, so long as the expedition leader is no more than two ranks higher than you."
"And that rank would be...?"
"Green rank, which is above the blue rank, which above the purple rank as well. Anyways, those are the main perks you get from entering the purple rank, although like I've probably mentioned previously, you also get access custom requests and the previously aforementioned higher priority for expeditions, since you've managed to show your potential by skipping ranks."
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"Good to know. Anything else I should keep in mind for being a purple rank?" Soren asked, as he took his guild card back and put it in his pocket.
"Hmm... Probably the only piece of advice I can give to a rookie. To never underestimate the enemy or overestimate yourself, although I have a feeling that you probably know your limits. Now, if you wish to take on a request, you know where the board is, you know what to do, so just remember to be careful." Once Stephen gave his piece of advice, he took out a ledger and started writing on it, while throwing Soren a small coin pouch, which contained 20 bronze coins.
"Um... What's with the coin pouch?" Soren asked curiously, as he was counting the coins and looking back at Stephen.
"Payment for the magic core. I highly doubt you have any use for it, don't you?"
"No I don't, but-"
"Were you intending to sell it?"
"Yes, but-"
"There you have it then. Do you need me to say anything else?" Seeing as he'd be unable to beat his logic, Soren decided to silently accept the money and pick up his other carcasses, before Stephen decided to do another forceful transaction and moved towards the mission board, while checking out his newly purple guild card.
Hunter's Guild Member: Soren Affiliations: None
Rank: Purple
Taken Quests: 2
Failed Quests: 0
Completed Quests: 3
'So it doesn't count repeated completions of the same quest.' Soren noted mentally, as he remembered he had to turn in his quests, before deciding to do so later, after collecting a few more squires and completing the requirements for more quests. Once he put away his guild card into his pocket, he turned his attention towards the extermination board and slowly went through all of the newly available purple rank missions, as well as the somewhat obsolete black rank missions.
Most of the black missions were similar to the gray rank missions, which he had been grinding up until now, but required a far higher amount of kills, while still having similar payouts as before. Aside from those, there were also multiple missions about different creatures he's both heard and haven't heard about, with a wide range of killing requirements, ranging from a single kill, to an astonishing fifty kills. Just the sheer amount of kills were enough for him to start feeling nauseous, so he swiftly ignored them and turned his attention to the purple rank missions.
The missions were similarly structured as before, just like the black rank's missions, but there were also new types, such as party missions, escorts, bounties and even expedition missions, which required him to scout newly discovered areas. Seeing such a huge variety of quests, Soren couldn't help but feel overwhelmed and decided to choose his mission later, since he didn't want to choose anything hastily and instead, turned his attention towards the others, as he was curious about something else.
"Dr.Vale, may I ask you and the others about something?"
"Uh... Sure, go ahead." Dr.Vale accepted, as she was curious about Soren's question.
"So... What is going with everyone's weird behavior? I don't remember the players acting so strangely before." Soren inquired, as his previous experiences with people in games were far less bizarre than how they were currently behaving.
"Hmm... Unfortunately, I don't know what goes on inside people's heads. Maybe they're trying to push the boundaries of the game?" Dr.Vale guessed, as she had no interest on the people's behavior inside the game.
"What about you two as well? Nora? Nicolas?"
"Sorry Soren. I don't know, since I don't really pay attention to these kinds of things." Nora stated apologetically, as Nicolas followed in a similar manner. "Me neither. Why do you ask anyways? Isn't it just normal behavior for people? There are some weird people here and there after all."
"Yeah, but I feel like their behavior is a bit too bizarre. Why would those people act like that, when most people wouldn't even be able to properly interact with the NPCs, since they don't have access to my state of the game?"