Infinite Trial from the Giant

In order to enter the game world of Sword Art Online, one must enter through a device called NERvGear. It is precisely because of entering through this device that nearly 10,000 players currently in Sword Art Online have become Kayaba Akihiko's 'hostages'. Unless they clear the level, no matter what method they use to try to escape, the device called NERvGear will destroy the player's brain in an instant.

However, Xia Tian, ​​or the fighters from the arena, are fundamentally different from these nearly 10,000 players. They did not enter the world of Sword Art Online through NERvGear, but came directly in the form of flesh. This means that, except for synchronizing their own health points into the same digital body as in the game, everything else has not changed, for example, the orange-red name setting.

However, fighters like Xia Tian are different, even if they hurt or kill people, their names will not change at all. It was because after he chopped the pervert with a knife and found that his cursor and name did not change color, Xia Tian killed the pervert without hesitation. If the name would change, Xia Tian would definitely not do it himself, but would find a way to throw that guy into the pile of monsters. After all, this is just the beginning, and the appearance of red-named players will cause great trouble.

Apart from the cursor display, Xia Tian has other considerable differences from other players. For example, in Sword Art Online, the players' feelings of hunger and fullness are actually virtual. Eating in the game cannot bring any nutrition to their bodies. But Xia Tian is different. Their feelings of hunger and fullness are completely real. If they do not eat for a long time, they will never just feel hungry like normal players. Instead, they will have a series of negative reactions to not eating. It is not surprising that they starve to death if they do not eat.

So Xia Tian stayed in the village called Fos Village, enjoying the lunch provided by the village. Like the previous Dosla Village, this village, which was still considered a "novice village", still had no other players. The tasks provided here were different from those in Dosla Village, except for the addition of subjugating wild wolves, and the rest were still errands. With the idea that even a small mosquito is meat, Xia Tian accepted all the errands, cleared the errands in Fos Village, and continued to move on to the next village.

After leaving Foss Village, Xia Tian, ​​who did not encounter any abnormalities this time, successfully arrived at the next village called Horonka. Rather than calling it a village, it was more like a small stronghold. It was larger than Foss Village and was protected by a wooden fence, leaving only two exits. In the Horonka stronghold, Xia Tian finally saw the closed beta players, but there were only a few of them, and from the looks of it, they were all returning to the stronghold for supplies.

As the third village that players can reach, the number of NPCs issuing quests in the Horenka stronghold is much greater than that in the Foss Village and Dosla Village. At the same time, most of the quest contents are no longer those tedious errands, but have become quests that require defeating monsters.

Although errands are basically carried out in the safe zone, there is basically no need to worry about the safety of life, but this is the only advantage. Compared with errands, the experience points and Keer (the currency of this world) provided by the reward of the subjugation mission are far more than those of errands, and you can also get some auxiliary items such as paralysis removal potions or strengthening materials as rewards.

The only thing you need to pay attention to is that the subjugation mission is not as safe as the errand mission. In the current situation where you can actually die, facing those monsters is equivalent to throwing yourself into the crisis of being defeated and killed at any time. But it is precisely because of this that the gap between closed beta players and novice players is clearly reflected.

Players with closed beta experience are superior to novice players in terms of sword skills and understanding of monsters, and this experience allows them to give up those errands and come directly here to accept more cost-effective crusade missions.

Although Xia Tian has accepted the subjugation missions, he arrived here later than the closed beta players, so he may not be able to complete them as quickly as he completed the errands. After all, there are only two places around the Horenka base where monsters will spawn. The first is the plain where Xia Tian came from, and the second is the forest in front. The target and number of monsters required to be subjugated in the subjugation mission are the same. In other words, if a certain place where monsters spawn will spawn 100 monsters in a certain period of time, and the goal of the subjugation mission is to require players to subjugate 10 such monsters, if 10 players accept this subjugation mission at the same time, then it can be foreseen that the 100 monsters will be divided up by these 10 players in a short period of time, and the 11th player who arrives later will face the dilemma of having no monsters to subjugate and causing the progress of the mission to be delayed.

The above are just examples. The actual situation is much more complicated than this. For example, some crusade missions can be accepted repeatedly. In other words, the delay in mission progress may continue until others are satisfied and no longer intend to do the mission.

Of course, Xia Tian did not intend to wait patiently for those closed beta players to leave after they were satisfied. Although he did not have the idea of ​​"killing anyone who gets in the way", the idea of ​​"each one depends on his own ability" was absolutely correct in Xia Tian's opinion.

After all, these hunting grounds and monsters are not marked with the name of a particular player.

After checking the mission status and his own condition, Xia Tian left the Holenka stronghold and headed towards the forest.

In this forest, most of the monsters that will be refreshed are beetles or wild wolves, and only occasionally some bird-type monsters will appear. What Xia Tian plans to deal with is the most common beetle monster - the black beetle.

Walking in the huge forest, Xia Tian was looking for the figure of the black beetle. Suddenly, there was a noise from the front of him. Following the sound, Xia Tian saw a figure wrapped in thick armor, even with an airtight iron helmet on his head. In front of this figure, there were two black beetles.

The appearance of the black beetle is similar to that of the rhinoceros beetle, and both of them attack by relying on the huge ramming horn on their heads. In fact, compared to the manic boars that players can encounter at the beginning, the black beetles are not much stronger. Their only threat lies in the hard black shell on their bodies. If you don't attack the vital parts, it will take quite some time to drain the black beetle's blood. In addition, its half-human-sized body makes it an absolutely difficult opponent for some players who have a unique fear of insects.

But obviously, this player who is dealing with two black beetles at the same time does not have this problem.