Comprehensive Manga: The Master is not here today

Chapter 179: Broken Punishment Mechanism, Connecting All Clues
"Why did it break?"

The owner of the weapon murmured in a daze, then suddenly stepped forward and grabbed the other party's collar, lifted him up, and shouted with a distorted face:
"It's just a strengthening of the weapon. How could my sword break?! I've never heard of such a thing!!"

"You must have done something! You thief, bastard, give me my sword back quickly——!!"

Despite being treated so roughly, the blacksmith player did not resist at all. The angle of his eyebrows had dropped to the extreme. There was a completely guilty expression on his face, and he kept apologizing:
"Yes, I'm sorry! I will refund the handling fee in full. I'm really sorry! I'm sorry."

Although the other party's honest and guilty expression makes people unable to bear to be overly harsh, everyone can understand the excitement of the weapon owner.

Failure to strengthen leads to the weapon being directly broken. This kind of punishment is too cruel.

As the commotion here became louder and louder, not only Fujimaru Ritsuka and the others, more and more players came to watch out of curiosity.

After gradually understanding the current situation, some players looked scared, some felt regretful, and some started discussing in low voices.

"If the reinforcement fails, the weapon will be directly destroyed. Isn't this punishment mechanism too severe?"

"Who says it isn't? This mechanism is too unreasonable."

"But it's not just the player in front of me, I heard that someone in the main city also encountered the same situation."

"real or fake?"

"Hiss—! Originally I was planning to strengthen it, but now I'm suddenly a little scared."

"Forget it, let's talk about it tomorrow. It will be terrible if we get into bad luck."

At this time, more and more players were gathering here. After the three of them looked at each other, Fujimaru Ritsuka quietly withdrew from the crowd.

Originally, they planned to find the blacksmith player to maintain the weapons, but looking at the current situation, they may have to find someone else.

After maintaining weapons and equipment, replenishing props, and selling other useless dropped materials in their backpacks, the three of them arrived at the restaurant shared by Argo yesterday to prepare for dinner.

At this time, they couldn't help but discuss what happened just now, and Asuna couldn't help but ask:
"Will failure to strengthen a weapon cause the weapon to break? Why haven't I heard of this mechanism in SAO before?"

"I haven't heard of it either, at least not during the closed beta period."

Kirito nodded and confirmed her statement, frowned slightly and said:
"I remember very clearly that the guide on the official game website at that time only recorded three failure penalty mechanisms: [material loss], [enhanced attribute conversion] and [enhanced level reduction]."

"Just now a player said that other players in [Urubas] have encountered such a situation. In other words, this may be a punishment mechanism that was added after the public beta."

"but"

"But if this is the case, there should also be players on the first level who encounter this situation."

Fujimaru Ritsuka took over and continued:
"But the reality is that there was no such news on the first level. What those players just said also happened in the main city on the second level."

Asuna guessed:

"The probability of such a severe punishment mechanism should be very low. Is it possible that on the first level, no one of the players around us happened to have triggered this effect, so we didn't know about it?"

"It's also possible."

Kirito held his chin with his right hand and muttered:
"But even so, there should be someone among the ordinary players on the first level who has triggered this mechanism."

"Of course, we really didn't know much about the situation of ordinary players at that time."

But when it came to this, the three of them suddenly thought of one person.

If it were her, she would probably know something about things in the first-level ordinary player circle.

The three of them looked at each other and said in unison:
"Argo!"

So Fujimaru Ritsuka opened the system window and was about to send a message to Argo to ask about the punishment mechanism for weapon fragmentation, but at this moment——

"You guys are really on time. You rest at this time every day and play games just like getting off work."

A joking voice came, and the petite figure walked up to them and lifted up the cloak on his body, revealing short golden brown hair and beard-like paint underneath. It was the Argo they were looking for.

Seeing Argo, Fujimaru Ritsuka was surprised and said:
"We are looking for trouble!"

"Oh?" Argo raised his eyebrows slightly when he heard this, sat down unceremoniously, and said with a smile while ordering:

"What a coincidence, I'm here specifically to find you, but you should talk first."

"Such"

Fujimaru Ritsuka gave an overview of what had just happened, and then asked Argo the question they had just planned to ask.

After listening to her story, Argo suddenly showed an interesting smile and said:
"What? It turns out that you already know about this matter. By coincidence, I have actually been investigating this matter recently and have reached a clear conclusion——"

"In the current SAO, there is no failure penalty mechanism in which the weapon will be broken if the reinforcement fails."

"what?!"

Kirito and Asuna's eyes widened for a moment, shocked by this amazing information.

If this is really the case, it means what happened just now, there is definitely something wrong with that blacksmith player!
Seeing their surprised looks, Argo stretched out his index finger and shook it, smiling mysteriously:

"Don't show that shocked expression so early. The next information will be even more exciting."

"But when it comes to this, it's really thanks to Ritsuka's entrustment to me. Otherwise, if I were to investigate by myself, I don't know when I would be able to find the connection."

"I?"

Hearing Argo's words, Fujimaru Ritsuka was a little confused at first.

But the next moment, she seemed to suddenly think of something, and she looked thoughtful.

Argo asked them:

"The blacksmith player you saw who had the accident just now should be called Nezha, right?"

"Nezha?"

Kirito and Asuna were stunned for a moment, then quickly reacted.

"Is that one called Nezha?"

In SAO, players do not directly see each other's game names, but when setting up a stall, the store name set by the player will be displayed in the player's field of vision.

The blacksmith player's shop name is very simple, called [Nezha's Blacksmith Shop]. Nezha should be the name of the other player's game, but now they know that it is originally pronounced Nezha.

Because many of the player names are weird and weird, it's sometimes hard to figure out how to pronounce them.

For example, there was a trident user named [Hokkaikura] in the first-level attack force. After thinking for a long time, they thought that the name should be pronounced [Hoke Iizuka]. However, when the opponent introduced himself, they found out that it was [North Sea Salmon Roe]. 】.

"But does the name Nezha have any special meaning?"

Asuna asked subconsciously.

"Who knows."

Argo spread his hands and said:

"I just overheard his companion calling him that. As for whether it makes sense, this probably needs further investigation."

"But that's not the point I want to make."

Having said this, she propped herself up and leaned on the table, looking serious, and announced with a smile:

"According to my current investigation, the blacksmith named Nezha——"

"He is also a member of the [Legendary Heroes]."

".Eh?"

"Eh--?!"

(End of this chapter)