"The vast end of the world is my love,

At the foot of the mountain, flowers blossom,

What kind of rhythm is the most swaying,

What kind of singing is the most pleasant?"

……

I woke up groggily to a clear and fast-paced alarm tone. When I grabbed my phone and took a look, all the sleep in me fled away instantly. It was because it was already 3:30 pm. If my memory hadn’t deceived me, the S1 to S7 quests at Sky City should be open to players at around 7 or 8 am. Does this mean that I’ve missed the first wave? Fuck!

I hurriedly got out of my bed. When I arrived at the living room, I was surprised to find He Yi and Murong Mingyue talking about HR transfers at leisure.

"Shouldn’t you girls be playing the game right now?" I asked.

"You finally woke up." Murong Mingyue shot me a teasing smile. "Did you have fun last night? And which hotel did you take the boys and girls to? Hanting 168?"

I rolled my eyes at her. "Cut it out. Do I look like that type of person? I, Thirteen, Mamate, Xu Yang, Little Gui and the rest of the gang were together all the time…"

He Yi burst into a giggle. "We got it, we got it. I trust you, so you don’t need to defend yourself."

After that, she rose to her feet and added, "The rice in the cooker is still warm, so you can grab that yourself. I’ll warm up the rest of the dishes for you. I bet you didn’t eat anything at all at the bar, didn’t you? You must be hungry."

I was going to say that I wasn’t hungry, but my stomach betrayed me and let out a pathetic groan. I had no choice but to stuff my own protests.

I helped He Yi carry the dishes out of the fridge while asking, "Say, the seven S Rank quests of Sky City came online this morning, right?"

He Yi nodded. "Yep, they’ve been open to all players since 7 am sharp. What’s wrong?"

"Did you guys try it out yet? How difficult was it? Did you beat it?"

"You mean the S Rank quests?"

"Mn."

"No, we didn’t…" He Yi answered with a smile, "Each quest could only be activated once per week, so we decided to play it safe and tackle the A Rank quest, Canyon of Fate for the A1 set…"

"What? Isn’t that the Level 150 Earth-grade equipment set?"

"Correct."

"But why? You should aim for a Heaven-grade set at least!" I laughed.

But He Yi shook her head and said, "That’s where you’re wrong. The quest is far more difficult than anyone of us could’ve imagined. We had Mingyue, Chaos Moon, Lian Xin, Beiming and me, but the final boss got us all in the end. After we party-wiped once and dropped a level, we decided that it wasn’t worth trying a second time…"

"What?"

I exclaimed in astonishment, "You had sis, Beiming, Lian Xin and Chaos Moon, and you still couldn’t beat the final boss? Just how strong is it?"

"I know…" He Yi pouted cutely. "I’m tanky, but I didn’t have the DPS to hold the boss's aggro. Chaos Moon had the DPS, but she wasn’t tanky enough to tank the boss. Worse, the mobs in that map are at least 50 levels higher than the equipment set they drop. Even the most common mob starts at Level 200, and the boss is a Level 210 Immortal Rank boss. Our loss was totally deserved…"

"What the fuck? 50 levels higher?" I stared at her. "Doesn’t that mean that the S1 final boss is a Level 230 Immortal Rank boss or higher?"

"You got it."

"Er, I guess we’ll have to delay our plans then. We’ll need to get everyone to Level 200 at least before we can consider tackling the quest. As for S7, I reckon that we’ll need to wait until our eighth class-promotion quest and Heavenly River Realm before we can even attempt it…"

"I think so too."

He Yi let out a giggle as she recalled a memory. "Something funny happened this morning. Mad Dragon, Gods of Destruction and Hegemon Palace had fought each other outside Killing Forest—it’s the map for the S1 quest—and lost a couple thousand players each. After Hegemon Palace emerged victorious, Little Piglet, Wang Dongliang and Shangguan Wan’er went into Killing Forest with their heads held high… only to be party-wiped in less than ten minutes. They tried another three times in total, but they all ended in a party wipe. They just don’t have the strength to clear it…"

"Oh right, what level is your Ancient Divine Dragon now? You should’ve gotten a lot of experience from yesterday’s battle," He Yi asked suddenly.

"If I remember correctly, it’s over Level 70 right now. It’s still a hatchling though. It can’t be ridden, and its stats are still hidden..."

"OMG, how much longer will it take before you can ride this Ancient Divine Dragon? How about… how about we pick a quest that’s experience-rich later? We can kill two birds with one stone, getting the equipment and your Ancient Divine Dragon to the level necessary to ride it."

"Sure. Which quest are we going for?"

"There’s no way we’re beating Killing Forest as we are, and we’ve already activated A1 earlier, so let’s tackle A2. I think it’s a map called Stele Forest of the God of Death…"

"Very well, that’s what we’ll do. Tell Beiming and Lian Xin to come out to fill their stomachs. Once everyone’s refreshed, we’ll conquer the Stele Forest of the God of Death in one go!"

"Okay!"

……

I logged into the game after lunch.

Swhoosh!

The moment I appeared in Sky City, I summoned the Armored Ice Qilin Horse and the Phantom Wolf King. I also summoned the Ancient Divine Dragon so it could leech experience. The dragonling automatically coiled around my arm before dozing off again. Its scales were bright silver, and it almost looked like a rune if I wasn’t paying attention. I doubted that I could wake it up for anything unless it was a direct threat to my being.

All babies are like that though. They slept a lot now so they could become strong and healthy in the future.

The damage done to Sky City during Sophie’s event had been fully repaired. Its former glory as the King of Cities had been restored, and cavalry troops were posted in front of its gates. Besides that, every combat NPC had the golden emblem of the King of Cities floating above their heads. The emblem didn’t just look cool, it also enhanced the NPCs’ Attack by 50%. It was one of the major reasons Sky City was ultimately able to hold off Sophie and her army.

However, the other major cities such as Eternal Love City, Titan City and Cyan Earth City didn’t fare nearly as well as us. From what I heard, humanity would’ve lost a couple of main cities if we hadn’t persuaded Sophie against her folly as quickly as we did.

……

The four girls of the Frost Cloud workshop joined my party, reforming the champion team that had conquered the WEL once more. Assuming that the WEL added 5v5s to their format in the future, we would still be the indisputable champion. It was because we had two offensive tanks, two super ranged damage dealers, and one of the best priests in the entire game. There were very few line-ups that could go up against us!

The Stele Forest of the God of Death was located to the northeast of Sky City. It was also less than 20 minutes away from Dark Moon City. It almost felt like the system was watching over us because four of the seven maps of the S Rank quests had spawned pretty close to Dark Moon City. As player levels increased, and more and more people tried to challenge the S Rank quests, they would be forced to teleport to Dark Moon City and replenish their supplies there. This meant that our income was going to grow significantly for a long time to come. If I could give the system a kiss, I would!

I teleported to Dark Moon City and went to the eastern gate because that was where we had agreed to meet. It wasn’t long before He Yi showed up on her Dragonlight Horse, and Lian Xin with Beiming Xue and Murong Mingyue in tow. After everyone had arrived, I declared with a smile, "Alright, let’s go! Let’s try and take down the Stele Forest of the God of Death in one try!"

Beiming blinked once before saying, "I wonder if people will look down on us if they learn that we chose the A2 instance for our first attempt, big bro. We are the champion team of the WEL after all…"

I shrugged. "Who cares about what others think? It’s better to act within our capabilities. I believe we can beat the S1 instance even if the final boss is a Level 230 Immortal Rank boss at least, but the problem is, we’ll lose someone for sure. It’s not worth it paying a level or more just to grind an instance like this, and we’re not in a hurry, are we? I would rather that we wait until Eve, Little Xin and Mingyue all become Divine Generals. It’ll be a much easier battle that way."

"Yeah. Let’s do our best. And who knows, maybe we’ll become Divine Generals when we tackle the A2 instance?"

"Haha, you’re right. Let’s go!"

We left Dark Moon City and traveled straight toward the Stele Forest of the God of Death. To be honest, we didn’t need the Earth-grade set it rewarded at all, but the experience would serve as a good gauge of our strength. After all, assuming that we couldn’t even beat the A2 instance, how could we possibly challenge the stronger ones?

It was at this moment we received a system announcement—

System Announcement (Sky City): Congratulations to player "Song of Cloud and Water", "God Bone", "Song of Ice and Fire", "Ringwraith" and "Shadow God" for killing the final boss of "Tomb of the Ancient Gods" and becoming the first party to conquer the B1 instance. All players of the party are awarded 1 Luck!

……

My saliva nearly trickled down my mouth as I said, "What the fuck? Being the first to clear the instance gives Luck? Let’s go tackle the D7 instance then…"

The four girls stared at me expressionlessly for a moment. Then, He Yi said, "You have 70+ Luck already, you greedy bastard. And what would people think if they found the champion team of the WEL in a D1 instance? Aren’t you embarrassed?"

I rubbed my nose. "Ahem, fine, we’ll stay on A2. It was just a suggestion. Please don’t look down on me, please don’t let my suggestion affect your image of me…"

Beiming Xue lowered her palm to knee length before saying, "Don’t worry, big bro. You’re only as tall as this in our hearts, so…"

"Fuck! Just you wait, Stele Forest of the God of Death! I’m going to fucking murder you!"

……

Meanwhile, the guild chat channel was full of activity—

Li Chengfeng: "Holy shit, even a shit instance like C1 gives 1 Luck! What are we waiting for, people? Chaos Moon, Little Gui, Fighting Spirits, grab Moon Dew and join my party now! Let’s clear D1 to D7 now and grab that 7 Luck!"

Chaos Moon: "Did you just wake up or something? Someone already cleared D1 this morning. We will have a better shot going for D7. There’s no time to grind the mobs, so Gui Guzi, you tank everything until we reach the boss, and High Fighting Spirits, you clear everything with Xiezhi Howl. Let’s hope we make it in time…"

Gui Guzi: "Well, what else are we waiting for then? Let’s meet up at the eastern gate now!"

Li Chengfeng: "Okay! Here I come!"

Me: "Damn, you people have no shame. CGL Hall of Famer in a D7 instance? Tsk tsk…"

Li Chengfeng: "..."

Lian Xin: "Says the guy who wanted to clear D1 earlier…"

Li Chengfeng immediately laughed heartlessly.

Chaos Moon: "Stop wasting time, people. I want to grind as many instances as I can before heading back to Xinjiang tomorrow. It’s my grandmother’s one-year death anniversary, and I need to sweep the grave since there’s no one at home…"