The ogre mage was roaring in the pond, and the head that had stabbed William Carter was now completely blind in both eyes. Its huge hands slapped the water frantically, sending up splashes dozens of meters high before they crashed down again, as if it were raining.

The more it struggled, the faster it sank, and soon only two of its heads were left above the water.

William Carter's face was twisted in pain, unable to smile anymore, and he had no interest in checking on the ogre mage's condition. He just stared anxiously at the cooldown timer for the Purple Limit, counting down the seconds one by one.

It truly felt like every second lasted a year.

Normally, a mere thirty minutes now felt like an eternity.

Finally, William Carter endured that inhuman half hour and couldn't wait to use Vitality.

The sensation of that purple light shining on his body was just too comfortable. William Carter felt all his pores open up, like the relief after holding in a bowel movement for a long time and finally letting it all out—utterly satisfying.

Ding! With a flash of golden light, something shot out from the water. William Carter picked it up and saw it was a white ring and a shiny gold coin.

A hoarse prompt sounded, "Cross-level monster kill, exceeded level 9, drop rate increased by 9,600 percent. Reward: Ring of Dexterity Recovery (one star), +1 Agility, +1 Intelligence, Health regeneration, 0.5 points per minute. Reward: one gold coin. Gained 30 experience, 1970 experience needed for next level up."

Drowned by the swamp and it still counts as my kill? This NPC is really something. "Hmm, the greater the risk, the greater the reward. Turns out I'm a legend too."

A piece of equipment dropped at ninety-six times the normal rate is pretty much top-tier.

It's just a pity that the health regeneration attribute isn't very useful for William Carter, since he has the Purple Limit.

William Carter grinned foolishly as he examined his loot. This ring counted as an accessory, and in this world, there was no limit to the number of accessories you could equip, unlike in games. As long as your fingers were long enough, you could wear a hundred rings if you wanted.

However, if you equipped more than three rings at the same time, their effects would be greatly reduced. Because the magical fluctuations of the equipment would interfere with each other, generally, items with stronger magical effects would override those with weaker effects.

Besides that, you could only use up to two weapons, and only wear one piece of armor. This was another difference from games.

He quickly put on the ring. Now William Carter had Strength 3, Agility 2, Intelligence 2. Health 57 points, Mana 26 points. Attack 5-5, Armor 0+0.1, Damage reduction 2%.

Looking at his pitiful armor value, William Carter couldn't help but smile wryly. Actually, for William Carter right now, Strength was still the most practical, but Intelligence wasn't bad either. He'd always been thinking about the second hidden attribute of the Purple Limit. After all, it required 5 Intelligence points, and he couldn't afford to put too many level-up points into Intelligence, and using skill points for attributes was really a waste.

After searching hard for two days, William Carter finally spotted a demonized giant wolf. Before he could get excited, he noticed its level was slightly higher than the first demonized giant wolf he had killed. Could he persuade it?

Demonized Giant Wolf:

Level: 9.

Attack: 10-11, Attack type: Normal attack.

Health: 150.

Armor: 3, Armor type: Heavy armor.

Attack speed: Medium

Movement speed: 35 meters per second

Skills: Command Aura, increases the base attack power of allies within 50 meters by 10%.

Desperate times call for desperate measures. If I can't recruit it, killing it won't be a problem.

"Holy Persuasion, come here, my cute little wolf."

William Carter looked at the demonized giant wolf with anticipation as a white light shone on its body. Unfortunately, the smile he had prepared didn't appear. A sudden wave of pain made William Carter howl, clutching his head and collapsing to the ground.

The giant wolf also fell to the ground at the same time, howling in agony and struggling, its belly flattening a patch of tall grass.

Unlike in games, monsters affected by Holy Persuasion would resist fiercely, unless the caster's mental strength was far higher than the monster's.

William Carter felt as if his mental strength was being torn apart by a wild horse. He pounded his head in pain, rolling around on the grass.

He didn't know where he rolled to, but when he reached out, he grabbed a handful of wolf fur.

At this point, William Carter was a bit delirious. When he opened his eyes, he vaguely saw a huge head swaying in front of him, and the wolf's gaze was already starting to glaze over.

In a daze, William Carter took a wooden stick from his inventory and started whacking that head.

He had no idea which part he was hitting, only that the stick landed on something hard, and he could hear the giant wolf's wails.

This wooden stick, with no attack attributes, normally couldn't harm demonized creatures. But the poor giant wolf was already suffering from a splitting headache, and William Carter's blows only made it worse. Before long, it passed out.

A prompt sounded: "Successfully persuaded the demonized giant wolf. Due to the hero's low mental strength, you cannot persuade a second level 1 wild monster."

William Carter didn't have time to ponder the meaning of this message. He scrambled to a pond, buried his head in the water for a while, and finally felt a bit clearer. Rubbing his still throbbing temples, he thought, Good grief, if this happens a few more times, my mental strength might be destroyed and I'll end up an idiot.