9: Contract Summoning

Three coins each, eighteen fish sold for a total of fifty-four copper coins!

It was mainly because the fish weren't big, and they weren't any rare species...

That was just the grocery store owner's excuse!

Although he knew he had been shortchanged, Xu Shian didn't want to waste his breath on him, and he was even less inclined to go set up a stall at the market!

Because he had already seen that the crowd at the Career Hall had mostly dispersed...

Right now, rushing over to turn in the quest and getting his game journey on the right track was the most important thing!

With 54 copper coins tucked in his pocket, Xu Shian felt much more confident!

When he arrived at the Career Hall again, although there were still many people inside, he could barely squeeze through!

"Why are you shoving? Don't you know how to queue?"

"Who the hell is touching my butt?"

"Big brother, you're a man?"

"Are men's butts free to touch? Do you have any decency?"

Xu Shian didn't care about that; he kept his head down and squeezed all the way to the inside!

He casually found a Career Mentor and submitted the quest.

[You have completed the beginner tutorial quest issued by Career Hall Administrator Zhong Hui. You can now learn two skills here for free!]

Xu Shian looked at the several Career Mentors in front of him.

They had perhaps been surrounded by thousands of players for half the morning, with nothing but chattering noise in their ears.

Now, they were all drooping their heads, looking half-dead!

Thirty centimeters in front of them, there was an invisible air wall blocking the way, and the people squeezed in the front were pressed against this wall like flatbread.

Standing within one meter of them, one could operate the interface to learn skills!

Regarding skills, Xu Shian had been considering this while fishing, and he had also read several new posts on the 【Jianghu Encyclopedia】 about skill combinations!

He was a VIP player; he had topped up money and even bought double skill slots!

Although he had twelve active skill slots and eight passive skill slots, allowing him to calmly arrange his full set of skills!

But there definitely still needed to be a core!

Then, he would arrange his skills around this core!

What was this core?

It was definitely his mythic talent!

[Talent: King of All Races] (mythic)

To put it plainly, his main career had to be the Summoner class!

He would build his leveling and combat system around this mythic summoning talent...

Therefore, the first skill definitely had to be a summoning skill!

[Ding, you have learned the skill 'Contract Summoning']

[Contract Summoning (Level 1+3)] common skill.

[Upgrade condition: Summoned creature kills a creature of the same level or higher, 0/200] (200, 400, 800...)

(The upgrade difficulty here is reduced from a Level 4 skill difficulty to a Level 1 skill difficulty!)

Skill effect: Consume two hundred energy points to contract a wild unit (beast race) whose life level is not higher than your own!

Level 4 skill bonus: Summon quantity +1, HP +150, Attack +30, Physical Defense +15, Magic Defense +15.

(A major change has been made here: it is set that there is no bonus at level one. Starting from level two, each level up adds +50 HP, 10 Attack, and 5 Defense. Every 4 and 8 levels add one Contract Summoning slot! Please bear with me if there are any parts not updated correctly later!)

A level one skill allows you to summon one creature to fight, and by level four, you can summon two!

Plus the talent... Xu Shian could bring four underlings with him at level one! Wouldn't this be enough to sweep through everything?

Furthermore, looking at this upgrade difficulty, it should be based on a level one skill, yet it really provided the strength of a level four skill!

Woohoo, taking off!

Continuing to look at the skill description, life level... includes level and rank.

The rank classification in myriad realms online is: Rough, Common, Black Iron, Bronze, Silver, Gold, Diamond, Star-Glitter, Dark Gold, Epic, Legendary, and mythic...

As for whether there are higher levels beyond that, Hu Zhihao's diary didn't mention it.

It's unclear if he didn't know or if there were no higher levels!

And all skills can have their ranks increased using extra lifespan.

Rank and level are two different systems!

For example, Contract Summoning, even if it reaches level 20, is still just a common skill!

Other than increasing the quantity, HP, and defense of the summoned creature, there won't be any other fundamental changes!

And more changes require increasing the rank of this skill...

As for the second free skill that can be learned!

Originally, one should choose the Summoner's supporting passive skill 【Summoning Space】!

This is where summoned creatures live daily, a space where time stands still.

After all, for many people, a Summoner cannot just contract one summoned creature!

But the number that can be summoned to fight monsters is limited!

Facing complex wilderness environments and different Dungeons, one always needs to find underlings that counter each other to handle the situation!

And what the skill mentors teach here are all common, basic stuff...

A level one 【Summoning Space】 is a common skill, possessing three spaces for summoned creatures!

That is to say, one can contract at most three summoned creatures...

This doesn't mean that if you have three spaces, you can contract four summoned creatures.

Theoretically it's possible, but the problem is, if you contract four, you lose the space to adjust.

At level one, if there is already one summoned creature outside that hasn't been sent into the Summoning Space, you cannot summon the pets in the Summoning Space!

You'd be bugging yourself!

But 【King of All Races】's 【Skill 2: King's Legion】 comes with a pet space called the Emerald Dream!

It looks incredibly awesome at first glance!

You can stuff infinite 【Subordinate】s in there!

So...

[You have learned the passive skill: Attribute Buff]

[Attribute Buff (Level 1)] common skill.

[Upgrade condition: Kill a wild unit of Elite rank or higher of the same level: 0/20]

Skill effect: All summoned creatures will receive a 10% Attribute Buff from their master.

The monsters in the game are divided into common monsters and elite monsters!

Common monsters are everywhere, while elite monsters are relatively rare! Whether you can encounter them depends on luck!

After learning these two skills, Xu Shian squeezed out of the crowd with difficulty again.

Going in and coming out, he felt like he had lost half his life!

He opened the leaderboard, and it was still blank!

According to what Xu Shian learned from the forums, there were already lucky people who were fortunate enough to spawn on the outskirts, learned skills, received weapons, and were even almost level two!

But they still hadn't made it onto the leaderboard; he didn't know if it required reaching level two or some other condition!

These were too far away for Xu Shian.

He had to go to the blacksmith shop and continue squeezing...

Sigh, there were no beautiful girls with filters, and no exquisite or gorgeous clothes!

Even the pungent perfume that usually accompanied beautiful women when they walked by was gone!

Everyone was wearing coarse linen clothes, which caused everyone's attractiveness to drop by several levels uniformly...

His favorite hobby of looking at girls had been discounted, so he could only work hard to level up!

If he didn't work hard, he would really only be able to set up a tent and sleep on the ground in the square today...

He opened his own status panel.

[Satiety: 88/100]

[energy points: 76/100]

After all, Xu Shian had come prepared.

He had a nice nap in the afternoon, ate a full meal at five, and only then entered the game.

Therefore, his various stats were currently quite good!

He walked and arrived near the blacksmith shop!

There were far fewer people here than at the Career Hall!

After all, at the blacksmith uncle's place, you could leave as soon as you received your weapon, so there was basically nothing to struggle about!

Although there were still many people, Xu Shian had already squeezed to the spot where he could operate to submit the quest.

"This shitty game, why is there no anti-harassment function? I'm going to report all these perverts who are shoving like crazy!"

Just as Xu Shian wanted to see whose Subordinate was so valiant, he heard someone retching nearby!

"What the hell do you mean? Do you look down on me, Prince Qiao?"

"Ugh..."

"Big brother, if you want to puke, go outside and puke! Don't puke into the crowd!"

Taking advantage of the chaos, Xu Shian passed through the most crowded area and submitted the quest without a word.

[You have completed Village Chief Wang Hu's beginner tutorial quest, reported to Ou Yeqing, gained: EXP +10, Copper Coins +10.]

[Ding, Blacksmith Ou Yeqing has issued a beginner tutorial quest to you!] Quest content:

Choose a combat direction! Quest reward: You can choose one beginner weapon for free, and learn one weapon mastery for free.

Xu Shian, who had already thought it through, didn't hesitate at all, nor did he need to!

After all, he was different from others; he had four weapon mastery skill slots.

He chose the bow and learned Bow Mastery, then left the crowd...

He was truly afraid someone would puke into the crowd!