Chương 31: Nobody's Treating You Like a Mute

Storm Squad now had eight members. Every single one of them had survived life-or-death trials again and again. Their power levels differed, but their experience rivaled Xiao Chen's own. Against packs of Lv95 mobs, they coordinated flawlessly. Efficient pulls, perfectly chained AoE skills, maximizing DPS at every turn. Xiao Chen was running Ninefold Shot now, stacked with multiple buffs. His clear speed was terrifying.

"Kill +9, EXP +4, 215, Silver +102." With eight people splitting the experience, those numbers were more than satisfying.

"Breaking Lv100 within three years gets you bonus rewards from the Planar Vault."

"We won't need three years. We'll hit that target in two." Xiao Chen checked the level leaderboard daily now. Xiao Yan was already pushing Lv180. Xiao Yan was Blue Star's hero. Saying he saved an entire plane single-handedly wasn't even an exaggeration. Xiao Chen couldn't match that pace, but he'd keep pushing forward all the same.

"At this leveling speed, we'll definitely break Lv100 within two years."

"Bao, this leveling speed is insane."

"How come I feel like I was leveling slower at Lv70 than I am now?"

"Fang Chenghu, shut your damn mouth."

"You leveling slow -- have you looked at your own DPS? And you're blaming me, the tank?"

"Yeah, if you don't contract your fourth and fifth summons soon, we're kicking you from the party."

"What do you want from me? I can't even afford to raise my second summon properly, let alone a fourth."

"Everyone shut up! Look at your damage output -- all of you combined can't match the leader alone." These guys were clearly used to trash-talking each other while grinding. Growing up together, surviving together -- that kind of bond was something to envy.

"The leader really is the strong silent type. Just keeps his head down and grinds."

"I strong your sister!" Fang Chenglin looked confused.

"Leader, I wasn't talking about you." Right. Xiao Chen forgot -- Bao's sister was literally standing right there.

"I wasn't talking about you!"

"Fang Chengcai, you just hit Lv90, so stop farming trash mobs."

"Scout the perimeter for elites or bosses. We don't leave a single boss alive in this area." Fang Chengcai was the party's only Assassin. With Stealth, he was the natural choice for reconnaissance. Trash mobs got farmed, bosses got hunted. Whatever they found, they killed. And the trash mob clear speed barely took a hit. Fang Chengbao just had to hold the boss at range, and Xiao Chen would divert one of his Ninefold Shot arrows to handle it. It was only a matter of time.

With his current attack speed, Lethal Strike would proc at least once every couple of hours.

"Boss and elite loot -- I take half, the rest of you split the other half evenly."

"Gotta set the terms upfront so nobody thinks I'm being shady." No one had any issues with that split. Without Xiao Chen, they couldn't kill Lv90 bosses at all. Looking at base damage alone, even Xiao Chen couldn't manage it. Everything depended on Lethal Strike.

"No complaints here."

"Fair is fair. The leader's carrying the most weight."

"The leader is wise and mighty. Whatever he says goes."

"Getting to leech experience is already amazing. Loot on top of that? What more can I ask for?" Xiao Chen was discovering that he had a vanity problem, and it was getting worse. Compliments were addictive. Feeling generous, Xiao Chen relented.

"You guys are broke -- split sixty percent among yourselves." The group erupted in cheers. Xiao Chen immediately regretted it.

"Damn it, compliments make me lose my mind." 【Ding! Guild member Chuan Mufeng has slain a Lv130 Silver Lord. All guild members: All Stats +5. 】 Hearing that announcement, Fang Chengbao lost it again.

"There's a guild-wide stat bonus too?!"

"Bao, you didn't know?"

"During the Undead World Invasion half a year ago, I got five or six hundred stat points in a single day." If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it.

"Dude, stop talking."

"Bao, we shouldn't have listened to you back then. If we'd joined a guild earlier, we'd be so much stronger now."

"Stop talking. I'm regretting it enough myself." Chuan Mufeng taking down a Lv130 boss -- even as a team effort, that was seriously impressive. True big shot territory. The kind of player Xiao Chen looked up to. Still, Xiao Chen wasn't doing badly either. His level gains were slower, but his power kept climbing steadily.

"As long as you stay alive, you'll keep getting stronger." Xiao Chen's group had pushed ten miles beyond guild territory now, roughly thirty miles from Tiannan City. Elite monsters were everywhere here, but bosses were rare. Xiao Chen wasn't picky. Sometimes elites dropped better loot than bosses anyway. Silver Grade gear in the Lv90 range was a serious upgrade for the other party members.

"The higher the tier, the fewer bosses there seem to be."

"Makes sense. At Lv150, there might only be a handful of bosses on all of Blue Star."

"Looks like high-level bossing will come down to dungeons eventually." Dungeon bosses were actually stronger -- they required coordinated parties, and the confined spaces made them even tougher.

"If we practice our teamwork, eight of us might be able to clear a Tier-10 raid dungeon."

"Leader, that's crazy talk. Tier-10 raids are hundred-player content." Nobody in the group had run a Tier-10 dungeon before. The bosses there were monstrous, their stats terrifying. An average tank could get one-shot by a single boss skill.

"The monsters in Tier-10 and beyond are sentient alien beings -- same as what we saw in the Tier-4 dungeon." Most Epic Grade items on the market came from Tier-10 dungeons and higher. A dungeon run often ended in total party wipe. Even successful clears usually came with casualties. Most people waited until Lv110 before attempting Tier-10 dungeons. They slowly upgraded their gear to Epic Grade, and only then did their clear rates start improving.

Wang Zhen and the others from Tianxing Guild were already Lv120, fully decked out in Epic gear. Multiple powerhouse teams like that were what brought the guild's mortality rate down.

"Every Tier-10 dungeon is basically a real small-scale war." The fact that Xiao Yan could solo clear dungeons over Lv100 was incomprehensible to Xiao Chen. The gap between them was staggering. Maybe Xiao Yan had an S-Rank talent. Maybe even SS-Rank. Talent was something you couldn't change. But lower talent didn't mean zero chance -- just a much harder road. At least Xiao Chen could see the path forward now. Daily experience gains were solid.

Wang Zhen and Liu Mei had the lowest levels, so they advanced the fastest. The two of them quickly hit Lv80, while Xiao Chen only gained a single level. Fang Chenghu noticed the discrepancy.

"Leader, are you getting less experience than the rest of us?"

"You're lower level than me, so you should be leveling faster."

"I've got a summon splitting my experience." He didn't mention his Soul-Bound Weapon. He barely understood it himself -- how he'd ended up with the same kind of weapon as a powerhouse like Xiao Yan. Xiao Yan had a summon siphoning his EXP too, and he still leveled like a madman.

"A summon?"

"Yeah. A universal summon."

"What grade is it?"

"Epic."

"Holy crap -- who's the real Summoner here?" Fang Chenghu's pride and joy, his Silver Grade White Tiger, suddenly felt pathetic. A universal summon raised to Epic Grade? That was just unfair.

"Work hard and you'll get there too."

"I've got a Summoner buddy at Lv110. I'll have him give you some pointers."

"See? Life's looking up already. Another elite down."

"Soon all three of your summons will be Silver Grade." For an average Summoner, Silver Grade was the ceiling for their summons. Every Summoner started with one innate summon. Every twenty levels, they gained another summon slot. Fang Chenghu was Lv90, so he theoretically had five summon slots. Zhang Fan at Lv110 had already gone crazy with six summons. When he broke Lv120, he'd immediately contract his seventh. The guy's innate talent wasn't anything special, but he had an incredible talent for making money.

He was thriving in Tier-11 dungeons now. For Summoners, innate talent mattered less than having deep pockets. Actually, that applied to every class. Even Xiao Yan, ranked number one, was constantly broke.

"Wonder if I'll ever meet Awakened from other planes. I bet their lives are easier." Xiao Chen pondered this while continuing to fire arrows. Ding! You have slain the Elite Demonspider. Gold +630, Guild Contribution Points +7, 000, EXP +90, 000. You obtained Purple Helmet (Epic Grade!) Seeing that drop, Xiao Chen couldn't help getting excited. A dozen elite kills and only one Gold Grade drop so far. Who would've expected an Epic item to show up now?

Xiao Chen glanced at his teammates, sighed, and listed it on the Auction House. As nice as it was, they didn't deserve it at their level. You received 200, 000 gold! You distributed 120, 000 gold to your teammates. Each party member suddenly received close to nineteen thousand gold. Every single one of them thought their eyes were playing tricks.

"Leader, what--""Good drop. Everyone gets a cut!"

"Holy crap, that's huge!"

"This is the biggest payday of my entire life!"

"Thank the heavens! I can finally contract a new summon!"

"Finally buying a Gold Grade piece! Ninety level gear, here I come!" Xiao Chen envied his teammates a little. Seventeen thousand gold was enough to make them ecstatic. He kept eighty thousand, but seeing how far he still was from two million, his happiness was short-lived. Still, watching his teammates hug each other in excitement -- that made him smile.

"Always something to hope for. One big step closer to the goal." A typical elite boss only netted one or two thousand gold per person after splitting. Killing several per day added up nicely though. Storm Squad farmed trash mobs while moving, clearing as they went. Three months later, they'd circled a hundred-plus miles around Tiannan City, nearly completing a full loop. Xiao Chen and Wang Zhen hit Lv90 around the same time. Fang Chengbao and the others had reached Lv94. Every ten levels provided a decent boost.

【Level +1! All Stats +5, Free Attribute Points +20, Attack Range +10m, Attack Power +5, 000】 【Congratulations on breaking Lv90! You stand among the elite of your plane. Planar Vault reward: Gold +6, 000】 Attack range hit 220 meters. Base attack power spiked dramatically. Combined with the One in Ten Thousand stat bonuses he'd triggered over the past three months, Lv90 Xiao Chen had climbed to a whole new tier.

"Time to upgrade to Lv90 gear!" Higher level gear was always more expensive. Xiao Chen already had a Lv80 set, so swapping wasn't too costly. Six pieces of gear only set him back twenty thousand gold. After all that grinding, Xiao Chen's total wealth finally reached 1. 2 million gold. Xiao Chen: LV90 (7. 29M EXP) Total Stats: 51, 236 | Attack Power: 66, 006 | HP: 198, 000 | Defense: 16, 725 Attack Range: 220m | Attack Speed: 3. 8 | Movement Speed: 58 Skill 1: Ninefold Shot Skill 2: Armor-Pierce Arrow Lv.

2 (Damage +20%) Power Strike: 10% chance to deal double damage. Nearly a year had passed since the Undead World Invasion dungeon. His growth rate over that year was something even Xiao Chen found staggering. Popping attack and agility potions, his attack power could hit 68, 000, and his attack speed reached 6. 0. With party buffs on top, Xiao Chen's attack broke eighty thousand. Factoring in Armor Shatter, Power Strike, and critical hits, five or six arrows could delete an Lv90 trash mob.

At that attack speed, he cleared entire mob packs every second. Three months of running with the squad, and Storm Squad was thriving. Fang Chenghu now had five summons. Fang Chengbao had a full set of Gold Grade gear. Everyone else had improved significantly, leveled up rapidly. Xiao Chen had told them from the start -- he'd only carry them for a while. Now it was time for a temporary farewell.

"Alright, head back to the city."

"I've already talked to Chen Zhan. You'll be running Tier-10 dungeons for a while."

"The carries are strong, but dungeons are still dangerous. Be careful."

"You won't get much more EXP running with me. Go grind dungeons and level up." They weren't like Xiao Chen. Without money, leveling was the best way to get stronger.

"Got it, Leader. Go solo those bosses. Once we level up, we'll come carry you."

"Bao, who's carrying who isn't so clear-cut."

"Even at Lv110, our attack power probably won't match the Leader's."

"Nobody's treating you like a mute."