[Welcome to Apocalypse]
The white light faded.
John had entered the game.
Before his eyes lay the familiar scene of Novice Village.
Many players were already there, their expressions full of excitement, marveling at how realistic the game felt.
John, however, paid them no mind.
He had already spent half an hour at the login screen, deliberately delaying to accumulate system points.
"Based on the progression of my previous life, these people should still be grinding monsters at this time."
John opened his game panel.
[Attributes]: Strength 10 | Agility 20 | Mind 15 | Stamina 10
[Skills]: None
[Equipment]: Novice Dagger, Novice Robe
[Copper Coin]: 0
…
Apocalypse was highly realistic.
The only way to earn copper coins was by killing monsters.
"First, let's boost these system points."
There was no way he could solo grind with raw stats alone.
After thinking for a moment, John decided to raise the base attack power of his plain dagger from 5 to 1000!
Early-game monsters and player HP rarely exceeded 1000 points.
With this boost, his dagger could now one-shot anything.
The remaining 800 points naturally went into his robe.
After the modifications, although John was still level 1, the attribute bonuses from his equipment made him comparable to a level 10 player!
Unless he encountered enemies with true-damage skills, he could now dominate Novice Village effortlessly.
"This… is the joy of stat allocation?"
Gripping his dagger, ambition burned like fire in John's heart.
At that moment, a chat window popped up with a familiar avatar.
[Sein]: "Why are you so slow? It's been half an hour since you logged in.
We've already reached level 2 grinding monsters.
Can you stop holding us back? Come here and team up immediately, or don't blame the guild if you're left out!"
The message came with coordinates.
Before entering the game, they had agreed to log in with their old IDs, to prevent getting separated before the guild functions unlocked.
John's eyes glinted coldly.
In his previous life, they had constantly oppressed him, making his life miserable.
Now, reborn, it was the same familiar words.
"Come grind with us," they said—really meaning they wanted him to be cannon fodder.
"Heh, ruining my first life wasn't enough? Now you want to ruin my second one too?
Fine then…"
A bold idea flashed through John's mind.
He suppressed his smile and swiftly headed toward the coordinates in the wilderness.
Fifteen minutes later.
Arriving at the designated spot, John immediately spotted several players hidden in the bushes.
Nearby, a Lv.3 wolf was roaming.
Clearly, the players had their eyes on the wolf but hesitated because of its level.
One of them was none other than Guild Leader Sein.
Sein caught a glimpse of John out of the corner of his eye and brightened.
"You're finally here. Perfect, you're an Assassin class.
Use your stealth to check the wolf's stats.
If you can take it down, I'll give you half the loot!"
Early-game didn't allow for detection skills.
The only way to know a monster's stats was to attack or take damage and estimate the numbers.
John heard Sein's promise and sneered inwardly.
"The same old empty promises. In my last life, I trusted you so many times, and each time you only gave me scraps. The big rewards always ended up in your pockets."
He didn't reply, instead taking his dagger and stepping forward deliberately.
Sein and the other guild members smirked, thinking their plan to use John as cannon fodder was working perfectly.
Sein, impatient with John's slow pace, called out,
"John, why is an Assassin so slow? Early game is all about time.
Every second you waste affects everyone's progression!
Can you hurry up and stop dragging?"
As Sein nagged, John was already behind him.
"What are you doing here? I told you to scout the wolf, isn't your ear…"
Pfft!
Before Sein could react, John's dagger, with 1000 attack power, stabbed precisely into his back.
[-1500!]
Sein's meager 400 HP was instantly depleted.
His entire body dissipated on the spot, respawning back in Novice Village.
[Other player killed detected. Plunder talent triggered!]
[Congratulations! You have plundered S-level talent: Universal Synthesis!]
[Universal Synthesis: Can synthesize all items of the same category, upgrading their rank by one]
[You have plundered 360 copper coins]
[You have plundered Fine Robe ×1]
[You have plundered Refined Iron Sword ×1]
[You have plundered…]
Everything that belonged to Guild Leader Sein, including talents, had been completely plundered by John.
"Of course, the talent he awakened is the same as in my previous life—S-level Universal Synthesis."
Seeing the golden entry in his talent panel, John's lips curled into a smile.
In his previous life, Sein had used this talent to gradually expand the guild, eventually becoming a dominant power.
Too bad…
Now it all belonged to John!
With this talent, even low-level equipment could be synthesized step by step into top-tier gear!
"Bastard, what are you doing?!"
As John tallied his gains, the other guild members finally reacted.
They stared at John in disbelief, shock, and rage.
Although the first three months of the game allowed unlimited respawns, each respawn resets your level.
To keep up with progression, they had allocated most of the experience to Sein, getting him to level 2 in just half an hour.
Their plan was for high-level Sein to lead low-level players and grow quickly.
But before it even worked, John had one-shot him!
Only now did they realize that newbie protection only applied inside Novice Village.
Once in the wild, players could kill each other freely.
"Damn it! He must have joined another guild. Kill him and avenge the leader!"
A quick-thinking swordsman-class player roared, raising his greatsword high.
The swing was heavy, aimed directly at John.
But they underestimated his reaction speed.
At such close range, an Assassin's advantage was absolute.
John pulled his dagger from Sein's corpse.
A cold flash of steel.
A fine line of blood appeared on the swordsman's neck.
[-1590!]
A red critical hit number popped up.
The swordsman's head and HP vanished simultaneously—another one-shot kill!
[Plunder talent triggered]
[You have plundered A-level talent: Shift]
[Shift: Increases movement speed by 20% and movement range by 10% when activated]
[You have plundered 20 copper coins]
[You have plundered Worn Cloth Armor ×1]
[You have plundered Longsword ×1]
[You have plundered…]