Adder rushed past the long queue and tapped on the side door.
Creak!
With a loud creaking sound, the wooden door snapped open to the big hall.
Inside, a hunched woman was guiding a group of young witches.
As he entered, all of them suddenly stopped and started staring at him.
Unbothered, he took out the 5 pairs of eyeballs.
The instant the young witches saw the eyeballs, they focused back on the pots before them.
He just took a breath and walked to the old witch, handing 5 pairs of eyes along with the knife. "Here, Ma'am. These are the 5 eyeballs you have asked for."
She started examining each eye one by one, furling those bloodied eyeballs like marbles in her hand.
He just held his breath. Now, he just hoped she did not reject any of these eyes.
For the three small pairs, she had no reaction, but when she reached the two big eyeballs, a small smile formed on her face.
At that instant, another blue notification popped up in front of him.
Ding!
[Witch Hunting Quest 1 complete.]
[Do you want to take the reward and exit the chain quest, or would you want to take the second quest?]
Adder smiled at the notification. Already expecting this gambling trick, he just asked the old witch, "Miss, do you have any more orders for me?"
A standard response for quest continuation.
The old witch scanned him up and down. She pointed to the pot next to her. "I do need some sacrifice for my ritual."
At that very moment, the quest panel popped before him.
Ding!
[Chain Quest!
Quest: Witch Hunting Quest 2.
Quest Rank: F
(Only players with level 10 or less can take part.)
-> Old witch is impressed by your ability.
Description: After examining the clean eyeballs you handed her, she requested you to find a suitable sacrifice for her ritual.
Task: Bring an appropriate sacrifice for the witch's ritual.
Reward: A random weak witchcraft, Coins based on your sacrifice.
Failure Condition: The rarity of your sacrifice fails to impress the witch.
Failure Penalty: Random mid curse.
(Note: To help with the task, the witch is willing to rent her prized sacrificial blade to you.)
]
Adder just groaned in his mind. 'Ah, it's this task!'
He cursed his luck to get the worst possible continuation task.
The old witch motioned to a young witch. "Take him to the Sacrificial Blade."
The young witch turned. "This way, warrior."
He followed her while reading through the chain quest again. His luck was really shitty to get this task.
He just focused on the penalty. A mid-tier curse was really overkill, but then again, this task did not have any time limit.
It was just annoying in another sense.
He did not get to think much as the young witch ahead of him opened a small door at the back of the hall. "Inside, warrior."
Just as he stepped into the room, multiple screams came from inside.
AAAAAAAAAAA!
"Shit, shit, there's so much blood!"
"Ahhhhh, why am I doing this task?"
"Shut the fuck up! I'm trying to concentrate here!"
With the sound came the thick, bloodied smell.
Inside, a couple of players were clustered around the elevated mud platform in the center of the room.
A dozen big blades were stabbed all over the platform.
A couple was already up on the platform, but the main focus was on a middle-aged man standing in the center.
The young witch pointed toward the platform. "Warrior, you can take any one of those." With that, she rushed away from the ongoing madness.
Adder took a deep breath and walked to the platform.
Finally, the man stopped screaming and placed his pinky finger at the edge of the blade.
Silence engulfed the room.
With one last look at the surroundings, the man just swiped his hand on the blade.
Plop!
A small finger fell on the platform.
Puich!
With a stream of blood, the mud was painted.
Ahhhhh!
The guy screamed, with veins popping all over his neck. He almost fell on another blade when the guy standing beside him pushed him down the platform.
The guy rolled on the ground just before Adder.
After drinking a bunch of potions, the guy finally wiped snot and tears off his face.
The man quietly rushed out with his pinky finger in his hand.
That was the start as another man got up on the second blade.
Adder rubbed his eyes and walked up to a clean blade on the platform.
He glanced at the room and saw most at the back hesitating. Well, at least this would trim down the competition a bit.
This was one of the easiest tasks.
He remembered a video from the past. Basically, to impress the witch, you have to hunt a high-potential beast.
In Zenaris Online, you could find different rarity creatures that were based on their potential.
Most creatures were of normal potential. Then there was Elite -> Unique -> Rare -> Epic -> Legendary -> Myth -> ??? -> ???
Even finding an elite potential beast might take an entire day, and that was a no-go.
After 3 years into the game, players found that they would offer their body parts to impress the witch.
All the players in the room were here for the same method.
It was just that Zenaris Online wasn't only about external realism.
It also included internal realism, including the pain.
In normal situations, the pain threshold for all players was fixed at a 50 percent synchronization. Meaning you experience half the pain you would in real life.
He just clicked his tongue and touched the sacrificial blade.
[Sacrificial Blade.
Grade: High Iron.
Attack: 1.
Durability: 40/40.
-> Special Enhancement:
* Extra sharpness: Ignore 20% of the defence.
* Sacrificial target: Any creature attacked by the blade experiences 50% more pain. ]
'85% pain.' Adder just smiled. Now he understood why most were still hesitating around the platform.
It was even higher than the 70% pain threshold that he had experienced in the past.
Though that was not his concern.
It was nothing to be proud of, but in his past life, he had experienced much worse in real life.
Heck, would anything topple getting shot in the head? Unbothered by pain, he just focused on his hand.
The big question now was, just how much should he sacrifice for this task?