Maria wandered around the continent for the next few days not knowing what to do. She had been fighting every monster that came in her way but the monotonous farming and grinding for levels became a little tedious and boring for her because she truly didn’t know what to do anymore. Most of the high-leveled players in the game and rankers that were part of one of the factions had been focusing their efforts to explore the Void Sea Realm with no one looking like they wanted to exit from the place just yet.
The new gaming capsules had been on sale the moment the IGC had ended and many players were able to acquire one for themselves, especially the top rankers, since the money they earned from the game enabled them to do so. The gaming capsules were even purchasable using Unitale gold coins because it could be said that Unitale gold had become a form of cryptocurrency which could be used for just about any digital transaction.
Some players even needed to wait for their capsules because although they had the money, the capsules were already sold out. The gaming company’s factories that were spread throughout the world could only create 150,000 units a day and in that single day, millions of payments for said capsules would be conducted so only those who were lucky would be able to have their transactions completed with a capsule arriving at their house by the end of the day with a staff that would help them set the VR equipment up.
Due to the limited supply, the capsules’ price sky-rocketed to 3 times their original price and the ones that were being sold on the black market by those that were lucky enough to get a hand on one sold theirs for twice that price. As one of the investors of the gaming capsules’ project, the Heltania family raked in quite a large fortune due to all of this. Not only that, but as they were VIPs, the entire family was each given a customized unit of their own.
Maria’s eldest brother and father both received customized units so they had their interests piqued in the game, especially after both of them watched her performance in the IGC. They too wanted to experience the world that Maria was also experiencing and watch her as she completed her awesome feats up close in person. She didn’t know that Corinthus and Mikael had started playing Unitale since they decided to keep it a secret. They didn’t even tell Gerald about it because they knew that he would likely spill the beans to Maria.
The two started playing together with Mikael playing as a Bard and Corinthus as a Merchant. It was quite fitting for them since, in real life, those two had talents and occupations that revolved around those two classes. Naturally, as non-combatant players, they struggled quite harshly at the beginning since it was hard for two Merchant and a Bard class players to complete battle quests. They had read a few guides before starting but unfortunately, they read the wrong guides.
They read the guides that were directed to battle class players instead of the lifestyle class players. Due to this blunder, they accepted battle class quests to slay monsters, raid dungeons, and procure monster drops instead of the item production and material gathering quests. Just like Maria, they were clueless in their own ways. It seemed that being clueless and going at their own pace ran in the Heltania family, however, there were naturally times when that cluelessness completely disappeared and the family took things seriously.
For instance, Maria. The only time she would ever be serious was when something interested her, then all of that playfulness would immediately disappear, replaced by a very serious attitude. Speaking about Maria, her new capsule unit had arrived just this morning and she was testing it out right now once the staff installed it after replacing her old one inside of her room.
Naturally, this old gaming capsule wasn’t old at all. It was still the newest version that people were trying to grab on the market but she didn’t want it to go to waste so she decided to gift it to one of her friends. Lizzy didn’t need it as all of the winners and participants of the IGC had priority for purchasing the capsules so she already got her hands on one. Not only that but since she got 2 gold medals, she was allocated an additional 2 slots for purchasing the capsules so Amanda and Emily also got their hands on one as well.
This left only Zach, Amanda’s little brother, being the only one among them who started the guild Fallen Angels that didn’t have a capsule. This was great since Maria could gift the one she used to him. It was great and all but when she gave Amanda a call and told her friend about the proposition, Amanda immediately rejected it and said that instead of gifting her capsule to her little brother, she’d take it instead and give hers to him.
Maria just went along with it so now, all of them had gaming capsules though she didn’t understand why Amanda was so adamant that she gift her used capsule to her instead of her little brother. She wouldn’t understand even if Amanda explained it to her so she decided not to and just told her friend that whatever she did in the future, never give any of her personal belongings, especially if they were used, to another person who was a male if he wasn’t her boyfriend since that was a bad thing. Maria only nodded and kept that in mind so that she wouldn’t make the same mistake in the future. She immediately dove back inside the game once she was able to and now, she was hunting on the seaside at a beach in the far north of the continent.
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It was strange that despite being in the far north, it wasn’t snowing at all. Maria guessed that it was because the continent they were on was probably near the equator of the planet and far away from the poles which were why there wasn’t any snow in either of the regions in the far north and south of the continent.
Gaia did say something about the uniqueness of the continent is that thanks to her power, the resources of the continent would be everlasting and inexhaustible. Compared to the first planet whose resource areas could exhaust after a period of time, the second planet would probably be the largest gold mine if anyone were to find out about this fact. She hadn’t informed any of her friends about this but even if she did, all the resource locations were in the hands of either the Pantheon, Celestial Order, or the neutral NPCs that worshipped Gaia as their one true goddess.
For now, it could be said that all of the resource collection areas on Gaia were locked by the NPCs since they had occupied them and the players wouldn’t have any access to them at the moment so it would be pointless even if she did remember to tell her friends about them.
Maria had come across one of these collection areas while she was roaming around the beach and noticed that Celestial Order NPCs were mining the area of various ores and minerals near the cliffs next to the beach she was on. Out of curiosity, she approached the area but was immediately warded off by one of the guards stationed around the place.
“Hey you, get lost! You’re trespassing on private property!”
The guard was so rude to Maria and that was a big mistake. If the guard had simply told her to turn around because she wasn’t allowed to be here, Maria would have just done as she was told but faced with such rudeness, she didn’t tolerate it one bit. She quickly appeared in front of the guard and smashed her battle ax onto the unsuspecting guard’s face, sending him flipping and flying into the cliff. Her strike embedded the poor guard deep into the cliffside.
“Hmph, rude.”
The guard may have been level 150 but Maria’s stats put her far above that even if the guard was an NPC. Even though she had been away from her faction for a long time, Maria was normally worshipped as a Queen and a goddess back at ‘home’ so she wasn’t going to tolerate anyone being rude to her even if they weren’t in her territory anymore.
The Celestial Order may be one of the powers that ruled over Gaia, but in the end, they were unwanted guests on this planet. The true power that ruled over Gaia was the Goddess Gaia herself whom she was currently helping. After she had dealt with the rude guard, a few more NPCs noticed the commotion and they immediately gathered together to surround her.
“Hmph, so you guys wanna piece of me?”
The NPCs were just about to tell her something but Maria made the first move and started attacking them. She sent them all flying away without killing them though she actually wanted to. Gaia had reminded her before she left that she shouldn’t antagonize any of the two factions since it might attract attention to her who hadn’t sided with either of them yet.
“Ugh, the goddess can’t blame me for doing this. They were the ones that were being rude to me first!” Maria said to no one in particular as she strolled into the resource collection site.
“I only approached the place. If the guard had politely asked me to leave then I would have left!”
She was saying all of this just to justify herself. However, Maria only made it partway through the collection area before she felt a dangerous aura radiate from deeper within the place. She immediately stopped in her place before squinting her eyes and turning around after shrugging.
“Whatever, I’m not welcome here so I’ll just head back.”
She had noticed that a few more NPCs had appeared out of nowhere and were radiating with hostility this time so she thought it was best to get out of this place before she actually did cause trouble. It wasn’t only that, but the menacing aura she felt indicated that there was someone much stronger than she was waiting for her deeper inside of the resource collection area.
She couldn’t make out if this place was a mine or a fishing area as she could see some poor-looking NPCs who seemed to be slaves, working their asses off without rest. Seeing the cruelty, Maria wanted to step in and do something about it but she feared that the powerful monster that had warned her with their aura would make a move if she tried anything.
Maria loved a challenge, but she wasn’t stupid enough to accept a challenge that she was doomed to lose no matter how hard she tried due to an absolute difference in strength. Naturally, this didn’t mean she’d only accept challenges where she would win. The challenges she accepted were those that at least had a small hope where she’d be able to secure a victory.
The presence that had warned her to stop walking deeper into the forest had a level barrier that she just couldn’t cross even with her insane stats. At least, that was what she deduced from the overwhelming presence that even made her shiver a little in her boots. Maria quickly flew away from the place before the NPCs surrounded her. She looked back and saw a knight in shining armor walk out of a building that was near the cliffside.
She hadn’t noticed it before because it was hidden behind a concealment magic formation. The knight caught her eye and she noticed that it had wings made out of light on its back. There were 3 pairs, almost as many as hers, and this knight was the source of that menacing aura that she felt which halted her in her place earlier. She tried inspecting the NPC but noticed that she couldn’t see anything except for the NPC’s name which was marked in Red.
“Hmph, I’ll be back once I get stronger.”
The NPC was likely at level 200 or even more. It probably already went through its second class advancement so even if she was an Awakened Player, it’d be hard for her to contest against a player or an NPC that had gone through their 2nd advancement.
“Hey, wait a minute...class advancement...shouldn’t I be able to advance my class now?”