The cave was pitch dark, with a few will-o'-the-wisps floating out from time to time—truly frightening. Although I’m not interested in the word “justice,” these guys are just way too ugly! It’s not their fault they’re ugly, but coming out to scare me is a huge mistake. Slaughtering skeleton soldiers and zombies! The skeletons here are much stronger than those outside; some even have full sets of armor. Unlike the ones outside wielding rusty, broken axes, these all brandish swords and sabers. Watch my fireball, fireball, and another fireball! Kill, kill, kill—huh? Why are there fewer and fewer of them? Whatever, I’ll just keep my head down and keep grinding. The loot here is pretty good; I’ve leveled up to fifteen, saved up three hundred silver coins, and my inventory is full. Although there’s not much good equipment, there’s plenty of health potions and mana crystals dropping here—enough for self-sufficiency. This really is a great place to level up; why is no one else coming here? A few skeletons coming straight at me interrupted my thoughts. Whatever, kill.

My fireball spell is well-practiced now. Hmm, time to check out the second floor. I found the entrance to the second floor, healed up, and carefully walked into the passage. The second floor mainly has skeleton mages, skeleton archers, and ghosts (which can drain life and mana), and occasionally a few liches. My level 3 fireball has a hard time killing them, especially when I run into ghosts—my damage is reduced by 50%. When I see a ghost, I can only run, but the experience is still pretty high. The good thing about this floor compared to the first is that there’s a shady shop (who opens a shop here? Gotta say, that’s impressive). The shopkeeper is a little old man, and just one look at his shifty eyes tells you he’s no good. Sure enough, buying things here costs three times as much as outside, and selling to him only gets you 60% of the price at the Imperial City shop—what a rip-off! But thinking of the long road back to town (I’m lazy, though it’s not actually that far), I can only grit my teeth and accept it. Luckily, the loot here is even better than on the first floor. I don’t need to buy potions, and there’s even more equipment. I’ve already prepared a full set of gear for a level 20 mage, and I’ve got 600 silver coins.

I don’t know how long I’ve been grinding, but I finally reached level 18 and can learn the mage’s second-tier spell, Lightning Bolt. Feels great. I bought the spellbook from the shady old man and cursed that black-hearted geezer while I was at it. Every time I see his smug face, I wonder if he’s actually a real person. Sigh, the AI these days is really amazing. During this time, Little Henry contacted me a few times. I told him I was leveling up in the Ghost Cave and invited him to join me. With such a great spot, there’ll definitely be a lot of people here in the future. But he just wouldn’t come, saying this place isn’t as good as Half-Beast Mountain, where there are beauties. ??? I had nothing to say. Beauties, huh, I like them too, but they’re just too much trouble. I don’t have the patience, nor am I handsome enough for girls to chase after me, so I’ll be single for a while.

Just as I was about to test out the power of Lightning, the system reminded me that I’d been online too long and my fatigue level had reached the warning line—I should log off and rest. I checked the time; it was already 8 p.m. I quickly logged out to get some rest and prepare to keep grinding later tonight.

After resting, I felt refreshed and first checked the official website for any news. Oh my god! Since the game launched, there are already 200 million registered users, with over 80 million online at any given time—truly fierce. Looks like this game has a future; if I play seriously, I’ll get something out of it. The official announcement says the game is fully hosted by “Future” as the main server, which also handles all monitoring. The staff only deal with technical issues, and there won’t be any special characters. It’s a full simulation of reality, with a lot of randomness, and hidden quests that players have to discover on their own—each hidden quest is unique.

A month after the game starts, there will be a tournament, divided into team and individual categories. The prizes for the winners will be announced at the time.

Actually, after playing for a while, I’ve found that this game isn’t new at all—it’s just retro. After years of playing space war and mecha games, I’m kind of tired of them. Suddenly, it feels like I’ve gone back a few hundred years, and with the game’s graphics being more detailed and still having lots of room for development, it’s attracted a huge number of players. I guess that’s what the creators intended.

Back in the “World,” I found that the skeletons all looked so cute (haha, how twisted). Zapping them—now that’s satisfying! Second-tier spells really are extraordinary! Plus, these bones have weak resistance to lightning, so they’re easy to kill. There were a few messages in the long-distance chat, all from Little Henry. Just the usual: “Boss, what level are you now? Why haven’t you come back?” and so on. This place is so great, I don’t want to go back yet—I’ll wait until I hit level 20.

Up ahead was a lich, which is still pretty rare on the second floor, so it should drop something good. I slowly cleared out the small monsters around it before taking it on. Zap! Huh, only 15 HP lost? Damn, what a huge poison cloud, and it stinks. God, is it made from its own fart? Turns out it has 40% resistance to lightning magic, so only fireballs can take it down. I fought for a full ten minutes before finally killing it—exhausting! Heh, not bad, besides potions, it also dropped a new level 20 robe (you can change clothes every 20 levels; accessories and weapons require the corresponding class skill points), and it’s a top-tier one, with 2 extra mana points. Time to start killing again—I can’t wait to try out the new gear. After another round of fighting, I finally reached level 20. I put on the Cursed Armor (a specialty of the Ghost Cave, not available in shops now), spent some money at the old man’s shop to buy a town portal scroll (I’m rich!), whoosh, and back to town I go.