Show Me the Money

Chapter 173 - Damaged Equipment

Ding!

System Notification: Congratulations! You have slain the three-headed hellhound Cerberus. +200,000 exp. Because the Cerberus is a dark creature, the Reputation reward is multiplied for a total of +1200 Reputation. +100 Merit.

Bang! Thud! Along with the sound of the system notification, a pile of items burst from the hellhound's body.

Fatty was quite satisfied with the rewards from slaying the Cerberus, especially the Reputation since it was much harder to gain than experience points. Not long ago, Fatty had suffered a deduction of 5,000 Reputation for releasing Undead Marshal Lei Ting, which nearly sent his Rep into the negatives. Since he'd been fighting bosses, the value had slowly climbed back up again. As for the Merit thingie, Fatty tried to figure it out for a while, but to no avail.

He temporarily ignored the items on the ground and cast Harvest on the hellhound's body.

Fssht! Three inner cores, each different in size and color, appeared in his palm. They were blue, dark green and red respectively and shaped like hexagonal pillars. Radiating coronas of light, the cores felt warm to the touch.

Cerberus Demonic Nucleus—Wood

Cerberus Demonic Nucleus—Water

Cerberus Demonic Nucleus—Fire

So, the inner core of a demonic creature isn't called "Inner Core," but "Demonic Nucleus," Fatty observed. Apparently, this Cerberus was a common demonic creature; otherwise, it should have been a Yao-ranked demon instead of Gold.

Perhaps, due to being spit out too many times, the poisonous Wood and Water nuclei had been drained of too much energy and thus were much smaller than the Fire nucleus.

Holding the three demonic nuclei and feeling the bursting energy within, Fatty came up with an idea. He took out the Elemental Skill Book and placed the three nuclei onto it.

Whoosh! The skill book instantly emitted red, blue, and dark green lights that enveloped the three demonic nuclei. In response, the three nuclei also issued lights to intertwine with those from the book. The lights gradually grew brighter, and three silken wires of red, blue, and green streaked out from the nuclei only to be absorbed into the skill book.

Pop pop pop. After about five minutes, three soft snapping sounds rang out in succession. The light from the Elemental Skill Book vanished, and the three nuclei turned into two white piles of dust and one black pile. The black pile looked especially eerie.

"That must be it. The Water and Fire nuclei would, of course, leave behind white dust. As for the Wood core, although it was of the Wood attribute, it contained poison; so, the color is different from the other two." Fatty understood. He then carefully poured the black dust into a vial. This dust contains all of the poison from the hellhound's body, so the potion refined from it must be horrifyingly poisonous, he concluded.

After absorbing the three nuclei, the Elemental Skill Book showed no visible change; however, Fatty wasn't disheartened. The objective required a Legendary rank for restoration, so some mere demonic nuclei obviously wouldn't cause a special reaction.

Yet, this still shed a light for Fatty on his way to restoring the mystery realm, and he was definitely motivated!

He had always been envious of Purple Bell's Yin Yang Phantasm Realm. With an entire separate space to oneself in which to grind, the leveling speed would soar up and up.

But, this kind of core thing is rare, Fatty mentally noted. Seems I have to gun for Yao monsters from now on.

Re-equipping the Elemental Skill Book, Fatty turned his gaze to the pile of items. The black magic staff on top was quite eye-catching.

Appraisal.

Hell Staff

Violet Weapon

Level Requirement: 50

Attack: 95 - 110

END +20

INT +25

Passive: Increase fire and water magic by 10%.

With this particular passive effect, the staff could be considered quite a specialized weapon. However, this sniveling pup must have been quite poor when it ran out of the Demon Realm because the rest of the items appeared to be a bunch of useless trash.

Stowing his loot, Fatty checked the mission panel and saw the "Completed" notice. The demonized mobs had fled in all directions without the Cerberus' lead, and Fatty was too lazy to bother. He returned directly to Black Tortoise City.

Fatty entered the City Lord Manor and turned in the mission. Lin Xi nodded, very pleased. In that instant, Fatty heard a "ding" by his ear.

System Notification: Congratulations! You have completed the mission "Slaying Cerberus". +300,000 exp. +500 Reputation. You have received "Siliquaria Inner Core—Earth".

He actually gave me an inner core as reward! Fatty suddenly found Lin Xi much more palatable. This guy truly knows what Lord Fatty needs most!

Holding the inner core, Fatty pressed it to the Elemental Skill Book right in front of the city lord. This time, the book erupted with a muddy yellow light to completely absorb the Siliquaria inner core.

Clack! With a clear snap, the inner core turned to dust, and it drifted off the book.

"It'll be very difficult do restore this skill book of yours, mmm," Lin Xi remarked, squinting at Fatty as he re-equipped the book.

"Restore the skill book?" Fatty was confused. Didn't that guy say to restore the mystery realm?

"It seems successors of the Elementalist get lazier with every generation. There are many things he clearly didn't tell you." Lin Xi leaned back in his chair. "The Elemental Skill Book is one of the three treasures of the Elementalist. The other two you must already know: They are the Elemental Armor set and the Elemental Sword that you bear. Have you noticed that the Elemental Skill Book doesn't have much power?"

"That's right. Aside from the five elemental Movement Arts, there's nothing special about it," agreed Fatty.

Lin Xi nodded. "Because the Elemental Mystery Realm is damaged, the Elemental Skill Book suffers by association. To say it strictly, the book is actually the most powerful asset of the Elementalist."

"Why is that? Because the user can use the Elemental magics written within?"

"That's right." Lin Xi's eyes shone brightly at the subject. "There are so, so, so many elemental spells that even a Saint Magus couldn't thoroughly grasp them all. But, that's no longer a problem with the Elemental Skill Book: As long as a skill is recorded in it, the user can use it at will. Hence the saying 'There's no such thing as inadequate power, only inadequate mana'."

"That formidable?!" Fatty couldn't believe it.

"What do you think?" Lin Xi rolled his eyes. "The Elementalist is among the top five most powerful of the entire Dynasty; how could they not be formidable? If it wasn't for the Elemental Skill Book being undroppable, I would have killed you right here and now."

"Then, how are the elemental magics recorded in the book?" Fatty couldn't care less about Lin Xi's book-burgling schemes. If the book was that easy to take away, the game would have been a huge mess already.

"I don't know," Lin Xi stated outright. "The previous generation of Elementalist passed away several thousand years ago. I don't know much about him."

"Then, you must know how to restore the skill book, right?" Fatty was full of hope.

"Frankly, the Elemental Skill Book is the door to the Elemental Mystery Realm. If you want to enter the mystery realm, you must go through the Elementalist's book. But, because the realm is damaged, the book is damaged as well. So, for now, you can only use the most basic Elemental Movement Art. If you want to restore the realm, you must first restore the book." Lin Xi rattled off the convoluted explanation, and Fatty grew almost dizzy from it.

"I understand. In short, if I can't restore the book, the mystery realm won't be restored either," Fatty finally concluded.

"And, if you want to restore it, you require a huge amount of elemental materials. It's highly difficult." Lin Xi sighed. Then, he suddenly said, "Actually, the Elemental Sword isn't whole either."

Fatty seriously wanted to faint. What kind of shitty class is this? People's levels leap-frogged after getting a hidden class enhancement; how is it all bull crap when it comes to Lord Fatty?!

"Elemental Sword: As the name indicates, there should be five swords, and they can be split or merged at will. However, while your sword is named 'the Elemental Sword,' it is only the Elemental Sword's unrefined natal form. Even though it can grow, it can only reach the Violet tier at most. Celestial is harder than hard. Divine and Legendary? Out of the question."

"How should I fix it then?" Fatty was completely baffled.

"Refine it yourself." Lin Xi dropped a bomb.

"How do I refine it?"

"Don't ask me." Reclining, Lin Xi lazily remarked, "I'm not omnipotent; how do you expect me to know everything? Alright, mission completed. You should leave. Next time you come across any demonic creature, just clear them out and spare me the trouble of making it an order again."

Fatty was long used to Lin Xi's act of chasing out people when his own purposes were fulfilled. Once Fatty exited the manor, he realized he'd forgotten to ask about the Merit stat.

Forget it then. I'll ask next time. Fatty wandered around Black Tortoise City.

Passing by the Auction Hall, he decided to go in. The Auction Hall was crowded as ever. People bustled about, busily searching for good items. Pulling out the Auction item list, Fatty went through it for elemental materials. He didn't find anything special except for two inner cores; however, they were terrifyingly expensive.

Rotten Bone Spider Inner Core - Wood: Venomous inner core. Can be used to refine poison or smeared on equipment. Starting bid: 20,000 gold coins. Instant deal: 100,000 gold coins. Bidding ends in: 3 hr 40 min.

Gale Wolf Inner Core - Wind: Wind attribute inner core. Can be used to refine equipment or embedded on equipment. A true love of Wind-attribute classes! Starting bid: 35,000 gold coins. Instant deal: 120,000 gold coins. Bidding ends in: 5 hr 12 min.

There were still several inner cores down the list, but all of them were deathly expensive. From the looks of it, everyone seemed to know that inner cores were a precious thing. The players would either keep it to themselves or sell them for an extremely high price. Fatty felt like he'd lose out if he bought an inner core for tens of thousands of gold coins.

Making one round through the Auction Hall, Fatty didn't find anything useful; but, this was within his expectations. Apparently, I can only rely on myself on this trip for restoring the Elemental Skill Book.

"Master, whatcha doing?" Just as Fatty was bored to death wandering around the hall, he suddenly got a message from LittleLi's FlyingDagger.

"Bored. What are you doing?"

"Heheh, if you're bored, let's look for the Celestial item together?" LittleLi's FlyingDagger offered with a laugh.

Celestial item? Fatty was stunned. He suddenly recalled the map he'd given to LittleLi's FlyingDagger. As this map occurred to him, he was reminded of another. It was the one he'd acquired while searching for the Dragon Revolution Herb at the Wraith Swamp: the Door of Misfortune Map.