Fletcher said, “To thank you for your care, I’ll conveniently raise your archery proficiency by 1 level.”

Beginner Archery: Increases bow accuracy by 10%, range by 10%, and damage by 10%. Proficiency increases with bow usage, divided into 10 levels. Each level up increases accuracy by 1%, range by 1%, and damage by 1%. After reaching level 10, you can advance to Intermediate Archery. Intermediate Archery allows the use of more powerful bows and the learning of special skills.

See, the reward has come again—your archery proficiency is directly raised by 1 level. What does 1 level mean? For hunter players, it’s not a big deal, but for other classes who pick up archery halfway, that’s a whole day of target practice and a thousand arrows—that’s all money. To reach level 10 and advance to Intermediate Archery, it takes at least a week of target practice.

Paladins learning archery isn’t a helpless move for leveling strategies—it’s genuinely useful. Learning archery makes it easier to pull monsters, which is an essential skill for power-leveling professionals. In fact, a professional paladin power-leveler relies entirely on level to crush monsters, so personal stats aren’t that important. Not only do you need to learn archery, you need to major in it! Learn as much as the class allows.

At this moment, Audrey Collins spoke up: “You’re really a warm-hearted person. My uncle Oswald runs a jewelry shop in town. If you could go help him, that would be wonderful.”

Jack Carter quickly nodded, “Sure, absolutely! I’ll go right away.”

First step done, now onto the second. The key to this quest is that you must win over Fletcher, otherwise Audrey Collins won’t introduce you to her uncle Oswald. Oswald is a key NPC for the leveling route. To ordinary players, he’s just a jewelry shop NPC, but in fact, he’s a hidden trainer for the jewelry crafting skill. Only after triggering a series of events will he teach the jewelry skill and give jewelry crafting quests.

Oswald is a middle-aged elf with a long beard. He squinted at Jack Carter for a long time before slowly saying, “Did Audrey Collins send you? That child is impatient and picky. Earning her approval is no easy feat.”

Jack Carter hurriedly replied, “I don’t deserve it. I just value efficiency—if I can save time, a little hard work is nothing.”

Oswald nodded in satisfaction. “Not bad. Your temperament suits her, and it suits me too. Let’s get to work. Take a boat to Echo Island and collect 20 pearl oysters from the seabed there. Be back before nightfall tomorrow. Here’s a temporary work permit valid for one day—keep it safe.”

“Alright, I’ll go right away.”

Only with Audrey Collins’s recommendation will Oswald give this quest directly to the player. Otherwise, you’d have to cozy up to him for days, raising favorability to a certain level before there’s even a chance to trigger it. And this quest is the first wave of rocket-leveling.

Echo Island is half a day’s journey from Nasseyan Port and is one of the main sources of pearls. The island is guarded by the regular army of the Elven Kingdom. Approaching without proper documentation will get you expelled. Jack Carter’s work permit is only valid for one day, so he must leave after that.

There are quite a few NPCs dedicated to oyster gathering on the island, but not a single player. Jack Carter opened the player level rankings and grinned at the list of future big shots who had just reached level 27 after two days. Don’t know how to play, do you? You have no idea, do you? You won’t get to see the first rocket wave.

Haha, transmigration really is an advantage!

Echo Island was only discovered by players two years after the game launched in the previous life. Once it was discovered, it was packed with people—there were more people than crabs.

As a professional power-leveler, whenever Jack Carter took on a job for an elf alt, Echo Island was a must-visit. How to snatch as many oysters as possible from the crowds and the dedicated NPC gatherers was a profound skill. Regular players would leave after finishing the quest and leveling up, never bothering to study it. But studios were different—they meticulously recorded the respawn times and locations of pearl oysters, summarized the patterns, and made charts. Computer simulations produced over 40 gathering routes. In other words, as long as a professional power-leveler camped at the first respawn point of a route, once it refreshed, they could follow the route and gather all the way through, basically arriving at each point just as it refreshed. With preparation, it was almost impossible for others to snatch them.

Now, Jack Carter was the only player here. How could those randomly wandering NPCs possibly compete with a professional like Jack Carter? In half an hour, he had collected 20 pearl oysters.

Quest completed at lightning speed! Given how impatient those two are, the faster you turn in the quest, the better the evaluation, right?

Wrong, absolutely not! If you turn it in right now, it’s basically as if you never came—you might as well delete your character and start over.

After recovering his stamina on the shore, Jack Carter dove back into the sea and collected another 20 pearl oysters. Then he rested and continued! Rested, continued! He gathered all night without stopping, until noon the next day. In total, he had 560 pearl oysters. Now he had to leave—not because the work permit was about to expire, but because he had to factor in the return trip to make it back to the jewelry shop before it closed at night. In his previous life, quite a few players got so caught up in gathering oysters that they lost track of time, only to fail at the last moment and waste all their effort—a hard-learned lesson.