Chapter 199 |
Chap 101 Korea’s Downfall
Sanghyuk annihilated the monsters of the Dark Jungle using the Ice Flame, as he always did. He began to gain perfect control over his weapon and thought he could use it as his second weapon next to Blood Wire.
Ilia had organized Geumsan in the Lower Lands while Sanghyuk worked, and now Geumsan functioned as the supplier for Geumhae.
After all this, Sanghyuk brought her to the Sun Land through a gate. If the Recall could be used by a single person, gates could be used by party members. However, gates were ten times more expensive than Recall. Sanghyuk only used it to bring Ilia.
He entrusted Geumhae to her and introduced her to the Sun People. They thought of her as their friend, as she was subordinate to Sanghyuk. He now did not have much to do in Geumhae, but he had a lot else to do.
Sanghyuk first strengthened Volcano and Blizzard from +5. While luck was a major factor, he had two skills, the title ‘Divine Reinforcement’ and ‘Lucky Strike,’ that increased his probabilities. Most users said that in order to reinforce a weapon to +10, one needed at least 10 million gold, which was about 700 million won. However, Sanghyuk planned to reinforce both weapons using only(?) 12 million gold, which would be normally impossible.
**
“So, this is my last high-level reinforcement stone…”
Sanghyuk murmured to himself as he reinforced Blizzard. He had already strengthened Volcano to +10, which he managed to do using his Light Reinforcement Stone, and only spent about 2 million gold. Light Reinforcement Stone trebled his success rate, which he had used after reinforcing Volcano +8. However, Blizzard was not easy to do so, as he had spent 9 million gold but was still at +8.
While normal people would have given up, Sanghyuk still had money left over from buying the car. He needed both weapons to be +10 for Ice Flame to be +10.
“Once more, please.”
Sanghyuk handed the Reinforcement Mage NPC another stone and asked for a rush job. This NPC was the best Reinforcement Mage out of all Sun People. While his fee was expensive, his skill increased the success rate by 10%. He would be known as an NPC necessary for users to be friendly with in the future. Sanghyuk had already done so using cigarettes, making it easy to ask the NPC to accept his request.
The NPC nodded and tried one more time; this time, a rainbow hue shone out on the weapon.
‘All right, just one more step…!’
Sanghyuk fisted his hands and stared at the NPC. Before in his previous life, he used not check the outcome, but this time he did not lower his head.
The rainbow light fused into Blizzard, and the reinforcement would succeed if the light stayed in. While the process only took a couple of seconds, Sanghyuk felt his heart beat wildly. The result appeared.
‘Oh…!’
The NPC emitted a whistle, which showed the result. The Blizzard was now +10.
“Nice!”
Sanghyuk was joyful, as he had spent a fortune already. If he had not succeeded this time and the reinforcement level went down to +7, the damage would be severe.
“Congratulations.”
“Thanks. You have done a good job.”
Sanghyuk spoke a few words with the NPC and immediately checked the Blizzard. Now both weapons were strengthened to +10. Both exceeded their normal level. While Blood Wire, which had been strengthened up to +10 and was a divine item, would be a stronger weapon, the Yin and Yang Gunblade was also formidable with its special ability and set effect.
As the Blood Wire’s basic attack stats were not that strong, one could say the weapons were at the same level.
‘I could use Blood Wire and this for at least seven years.’
Not only that but these two weapons could be renewed through ‘Reawakening.’
Sanghyuk came back to Gorren immediately afterward without strengthening other items. He had a few reinforcement stones left but could not raise the reinforcement level with them. While he had thought of broadcasting this process, there would be more cons than pros. He had not even recorded it.
**
Other users were also busy solving their problems along with Sanghyuk. The high-level users were the busiest, and the Rising Guild, one of Korea’s famous guilds, was the busiest.
Rising was ranked No.1 after One Guild had disappeared. While some considered them to have become weaker than before, Rising allied with other major Korean guilds to keep pace.
However, as major alliances in EL were now sponsored by global firms, Rising was short on funds and had to work even harder. Storm, the representative user of Rising, contacted several large Korean firms for sponsorship, but none replied in the affirmative.
It was the same in the past. The major Korean firms had acted late and only observed other global firms take in the advertising benefits. They would invest heavily in the future, but it would take time to catch up to other firms.
These factors made it difficult for Rising to survive.
“Ilsung replied.”
“What did they say?”
While Storm could see what the answer would be after seeing Shooting Star’s face, he still asked.
“They said they would answer back…but the answer seems no.”
“What are they waiting for? The rest of the world is going hard for EL. Why is Korea so stupid?”
Storm looked livid.
“They think this would be a short fad and that LC Soft’s next year release would shift the virtual game trend.”
“I am telling you, that game will go down, and LC would go bankrupt after spending all that money for development.”
Storm’s words would become true in a year.
“We have no money left…I mean, I sold my car last month.”
“It’s like pouring water into a broken glass…”
“If someone tries to battle us, we’re in trouble.”
“We still look formidable outside, so maybe…”
However, worst wishes tended to come true. Shooting Star and Storm’s faces grew dark on seeing the emergency message pop up.