Adam chuckled and said "I'm a Berserker. But enough chit chat, I don't want you to die. Your father asked me to bring you back home, I don't want you to die from the poison."

Even though he said that, Adam wasn't really worried. Arno still had 230 HP left, they had more than enough time to get back to the village.

When he heard Adam mention his father, Arno dryly smiled and said "The old man knew I would get myself in danger… Can't blame him, I would have died without your help. Thank you, Valiant Heart."

NPCs, just like players, could see the name and level above every being unless they were hiding. Adam nodded and said "Wait a minute, I just need to loot these corpses. Then, we will go."

The loot was great, especially the snake. He got materials of course, but also equipment, and a skill book.

There was a pair of boots which came from the wolves, a pair of daggers from the snake, and the skill book from the snake too.

[Leather Boots] (Common, Level 5)

Requirements: Level 5

Defense: +12

[Venom Piercer] (Uncommon, Level 5)

Requirements: Level 5, Assassin

Attack: +16

Agility: +10

Wind Blade (D): Sacrifice a part of your mana to summon the Wind Spirits around your weapon to enhance your attack speed by 100% for 5 seconds. Cost: 20 MP Cooldown: 30 seconds

Adam immediately equipped the Leather Boots and put the daggers in his inventory. Then, he learned the skill. He had lucked out this time, [Wind Blade] was a really good skill. It suited him even more than any other class. He learned it, and a new skill appeared in his mind.

Adam looked at Arno and said "We can go." Arno nodded and took a step forward, and fell.

-1 HP.

Adam facepalmed. Damn quest. Arno blushed and said "Huh… I think the poison had paralyzed my legs… I should by able to crawl…"

Adam rolled his eyes and grabbed Arno and threw him over his shoulder, earning a cry from him. "Put me down! Hey, I'm not kidding! Put me down!"

Adam shook his head and said "Stop behaving like a child, I won't let you die just because you don't want to be carried. Here, take this." Adam took out a piece of bread and offered it to Arno, who reluctantly took it.

As he walked Adam looked in his inventory. Each time he killed a monster it dropped some Copper, but it was so meager that all 6 Common monsters he killed only gave him 36 Coppers each. And the Elite snake gave him 18. That means he only got 54 Copper from all the monsters he killed.

Fortunately he got 5 Silver from the Server Message. Like in most games, currency in Epoch was split in Copper Coins, Silver Coins and Gold Coins, with each of them being a hundred times more valuable than the last.

However, Adam could understand why the monsters dropped so little coins. After all, there was the possibility to exchange coins for real money, so every coins is real money. Adam didn't look at the conversion rate yet though, he would need to look into it later. But 5 Silver should be quite the sum, right?

Anyway, as he made his way through the forest with Arno on his back, Adam first looked out for any monster but curiously none attacked them. So Adam looked at everything he got.

First the attributes points from the level up. Since he would be going to the village, he decided not to place them as he might find an equipment that demands a certain stat, like 30 of Strength or something like that.

Then, there were his skills that leveled up.

Mighty Strike (E, 3/10): Dig into your hidden strengths to deal 160% of your normal damage. Cooldown: 3 seconds.

Charge (E, 2/10): Ram into your enemy to knock them over and deal 5% of your normal damage, stunning them for a second. Cooldown: 10 seconds.

Both had a qualitative upgrade, and his Charge now started doing some damage. Although it wasn't much, as he leveled up the skill it would become better and better.

As he thought back about the fact, Adam couldn't help but start believing that the biggest advantage he got from Old Adam wasn't his skills, but the strengthened soul instead. Because even with his skills, he would have died multiple times if not for his strengthened soul.

In Adam's eyes, the world flowed slower than for others. That's how he was able to follow the snake's movements. He doubted someone with a normal soul could have followed the snake's movements. Also, Adam felt lucky his opponent was a monster. Had it been an NPC, all his aerobic tricks wouldn't have worked, and would have been way less useful.

Now, Adam wondered what rewards he would get from the quest. He already knows about the Hard Fist, and there would be XP. But maybe there would be something else?

As Adam left the higher leveled area, he saw that more groups of players had entered the forest, but strangely none of them were fighting at the moment. One of those groups stopped him.

There were five players in the group, three of them being level 2, and the two others level 1. The one who stopped him asked "Hey, did something happen in the forest…"

But he stopped and looked at his comrade, who was shaking his shoulder. "What?" The other gulped and said "Look… look at his name."

The leader frowned and looked, before freezing. Adam smiled and said "I doubt I am the reason this happened, the monster I killed didn't seem to be a leader."

Having said his piece, Adam walked past them, on his way to the village. It was strange though, why did the monsters disappear? Did something happen? He was pretty sure he wasn't the one who did it though, because he himself observed the lack of monsters before his fight.

When he arrived in the plain, he saw monsters again though. But they were only level 1 or 2. Any monster level 3 or higher had disappeared. Adam felt this was weird, but he didn't pay any particular attention to it, and instead headed for the plaza.

As he entered the village, Arno said "Thanks for saving my life out there." Adam smiled and said "My pleasure."

When Adam reached the plaza, he saw Harold suddenly get up from his stool, and run toward Adam, uncaring of the gazes of those around. The players had already been looking and him and whispering earlier, either because of his name or because of the fact he was carrying an NPC.

As Harold reached him Adam took Arno off his shoulder and said "He is alive, and conscious, but he has been poisoned, and the poison has paralyzed his legs."

Harold frowned at his son and said "You really attacked a venomous monster?" Arno lowered his head and said "I could have won, but I was ambushed by wolves."

Harold seemed about to say something but didn't say anything in the end, and just took Arno in his arms. Meanwhile, the village's alchemist, Jerome, came next to them and asked "You talked about a venomous beast, which one was it?"

Arno replied "An Elite Scarlet Fanged Snake." Jerome nodded and gave him a vial filled with a transparent liquid, and said "Drink this, it will cure you."

Arno accepted the potion and drunk it once. As he gave the empty vial back though, he began coughing. Neither Harold nor Jerome seemed worried, so Adam just watched too.

After a moment, Arno's skin returned to a healthy rosy skin, and he spat out a black matter, which began eroding the ground as it fell on it.

Harold patted his son's back and said to Adam "Thank you adventurer, for saving my son."

[B Quest 'Save Arno' Completed!]

Rewards: [Hard Fists], 700 XP, [Steel Greatsword], 100 Fame in Rosewatch village, 1 Silver Coin.

[You have leveled up to Level 5! AP +5]

Harold took out a pair of metallic gloves and a sword, and said "Ken, the blacksmith, owed me one. And seeing how you are still going around with that basic sword of yours, I asked him for this sword. Use it well, Valiant Heart."

Adam smiled as everything was transferred into his inventory. Adam nodded and said "Thank you, I sure will." Harold smiled and said "Now, I think the village chief has something for you. He must have heard of what you did."

Adam smiled. That was what the fame was for. It looked like the village chief indeed had a quest, but it was only for those who could have 100 fame. Or maybe 200? After all, he had to take the kingdom reputation into account.

Before doing anything, Adam equipped Hard Fist, and the Steel Greatsword. Then he looked at his status to see the change.

Name: Valiant Heart

Level: 5 (30/5000 XP)

Title: None

Race: Northman

Class: Berserker

Rank: Iron

HP: 170/170

MP: 70/70

Strength (+3 per level): 30 (55)

Agility (+1 per level): 16

Endurance (+1 per level): 17

Intelligence: 7

Wisdom: 5

Free AP: 15

Skills: -Mighty Strike (E, Level 3/10)

-Charge (E, Level 2/10)

-Wind Blade (D, Level 1/10)

Just two pieces of Uncommon equipments, and his Strength had almost doubled! On a sadder note though, the XP needed to level up had increased once again. The first few levels were easy to pass, after all if one spent hours grinding the first levels, people would just stop playing.

But once one reached Level 5 it started getting harder. That was because every 5 level represented a special barrier. When someone fought a monster 5 levels higher, they would suffer a penalty. The next suppression came at 10 levels of difference, and was also why there would be another difficulty upon reaching level 10. Here for example, at level 4 he only needed 800 XP, and yet he now needed more than 5 times more XP.

[System Message: The players in White Eagle Village have activated a Village Quest and have failed in protecting the village, which has now been wiped out. Please prepare to defend your village as the monster tide will attack every village in the Azure Sky Kingdom until it is stopped.]

Adam looked around in shock. What was happening? Looking at other players' reactions, it looks like they read the same message. Adam reactivated the chat and looked at the various reactions of the players.

"Which idiot activated a Village Quest so early!?!"

"What's a Village Quest?"

"To the one above, since a few games new types of quests have been added. Now, most quests are split between the ranks of F to SSS, but there are special quests, such as this. A Village Quest means it involves to whole Village. There also exists City Quests, Kingdom Quests, World Quests… They give out incredible rewards, but are incredibly hard to clear."

"So we have to stop a monster tide by ourselves? That's crazy!"

"Hey, I'm a player from White Eagle Village, I just revived. When the beast tide will attack, every player in the village will receive a quest thirty minutes ahead. Tell us in the chat so we can come take our revenge!"

"You from White Eagle, how strong is the tide?"

"There are hundreds of monsters, the weakest of them being Level 3 Monsters, and the strongest are Level 5 Monsters. Additionally they are led by 10 Level 5 Elites."

As Adam read, he felt that this was just impossible. Not right now. Only the expert players able to kill monsters above their own levels were Level 3 right now, but most players were still Level 1 or 2. Within each village there was only several hundreds players, meaning there are about as many players as monsters. Just dealing with the weakest monsters would be difficult for the village.

And even if they could take care of the Common monsters, there was still the ten Level 5 Elites monsters. For the current players, it was simply impossible to take care of those monsters.

[Ding! A Village Quest has been forced upon you!]

Quest Detail: A beast tide is about to attack your village!

Quest Difficulty: Village Scale

Objective: Destroy the beast tide and protect the NPCs from your village.

Reward: ??

Failure penalty: Lose 2 Levels.

Time before the attack: 30 minutes.