Chapter 4 Chapter 4: One Hit Kill And Everyone Loses Their Mind

Sixty-three White Common swords consumed.

A low hum vibrated through Ethan's palms as the last fusion completed and then the golden light bloomed again, steadier this time, like it had always belonged there.

He turned the finished weapon over in his hands and pulled up its full stat panel.

【Blade of Slaughter】

Level: 0 | Quality: Gold Ancient Immortal (Highest Tier)

Attack: +42

Bonus Stat: Strength +20

Special Effect Slaughter: All attacks deal an additional 30 damage.

Description: A blade forged at the moment of creation, capable of splitting heaven and earth. Perhaps it will also help you carve through the hide of a wild boar.

Note: Soul-Bound

Ethan did the math in his head before the excitement could overtake him.

Base attack bonus, 42.

The 20 Strength converted directly into 20 additional attack.

The Slaughter effect, a flat 30 damage on every single hit.

Total attack contribution: 92 points.

From a starter wooden sword. At Level Zero.

He laughed under his breath, quiet, almost disbelieving, then pulled up his full stat screen to confirm.

His attack had jumped from 4 to 64.

Sixteen times the attack power of every other Level 0 player on the server.

He stared at that number for exactly three seconds.

Then he hid the golden glow effect, making the sword look like a perfectly ordinary piece of starter gear.

In his past life, he'd watched it happen too many times, some low-level player gets lucky, forgets to hide it, and within minutes they're getting camped by a stronger player who takes everything. The Oracle World had no mercy for people who advertised their advantages.

Ethan had learned that lesson with his life.

He wasn't advertising anything.

Next, defense.

He turned his attention to the shirts and pants he'd collected.

19 Starter Cloth Shirts. 21 pairs of Starter Cotton Pants. Combined with his own equipped pieces, that gave him 20 shirts and 22 pants to work with.

Not enough for Ancient Immortal tier on either. The math required 64 identical pieces for that ceiling.

But it was enough for something.

He sat back down, ran the fusions methodically, and watched the quality tier climb

White Common ~ Green Fine ~ Blue Rare ~ Purple Epic ~ Orange Legendary.

Both pieces stopped there. He'd hit his material limit.

He pulled up the results.

【Starter Cloth Shirt】 (Lv0, Orange Legendary)

HP: +55 | Bonus Stat: Stamina +5

Special Effect, Recovery: Regenerates 1 HP per second automatically.

Note: Soul-Bound

【Starter Cotton Pants】 (Lv0, Orange Legendary)

Defense: +12 | Bonus Stat: Intelligence +5

Special Effect, Resilience: Reduces all incoming damage by 5 points flat.

Note: Soul-Bound

Orange Legendary wasn't Ancient Immortal. He knew that.

But at this stage, with every other player on the server running around in base-tier White Common gear, Orange Legendary armor was essentially a cheat code.

He equipped both pieces. Hid the orange glow. Pulled up his stats.

Defense: 2 → 18.

HP: 40 → 85.

Ethan nodded slowly.

That'll do.

He stood, rolled his neck once, and looked south toward the tree line of Silverwood Forest.

The Wolf King was still in there.

And Ethan had never actually planned to leave it alone.

Killing it meant the first-kill bonus, which alone made it worth going. But more importantly, Ethan remembered something from his past life. Something he'd only learned about long after it was too late to matter.

Every starter village in NeuralVerse had one hidden quest. Just one.

And the trigger for Maplewood Town's hidden quest was a specific item that dropped from the Silver Moon Wolf King, an item nobody else in this town would know to look for, because nobody else had lived through what came after.

That hidden quest was a shortcut. A straight shot to Level 10, out of the starter zone, and into the real game, with rewards that would make everything that followed dramatically easier.

Ethan turned toward the forest.

Let's go.

He could hear the crowd before he could see them.

A thick ring of players had gathered at the tree line, hundreds of them, clustered and muttering, nobody willing to step back inside. The ground just past the first row of trees was littered with white light residue where players had dissolved. Starter gear was scattered everywhere.

The battle, such as it was, had lasted less than three minutes.

The Wolf King hadn't taken a scratch.

As Ethan walked through the outer crowd and kept moving toward the forest entrance, heads turned.

"Wait, is that the scavenger guy?"

"It is! The one who was looting the ground during the chaos!"

"Hahaha, he's back for more trash?"

"Hold on, look at his walk. Is he actually going for the Wolf King?"

"No way. If he could kill the Wolf King, he wouldn't have spent the last ten minutes picking up one-copper junk off the ground."

"For real. But hey, if somehow this broke scavenger kills the Wolf King, I'll go live on Twitch eating a whole sock."

Laughter rippled through the crowd.

Ethan kept walking.

The tree line. The shadows of the forest. The scattered gear crunching under his boots.

Awoo.

The Silver Moon Wolf King noticed him from across the clearing, a lone figure in basic starter gear, approaching with no weapon visibly drawn, looking for all the world like he had absolutely no idea what he was walking into.

The Wolf King didn't even bother standing up.

It flicked its massive head toward the nearest cluster of gray wolves.

Handle it.

Three Vicious Wolves broke from the pack and stalked toward Ethan, low and slow, lips pulled back from long yellow teeth.

Ethan didn't stop walking.

He casually activated his Detection skill as the first wolf closed to range.

The stat panel blinked into view

【Vicious Wolf】 Level 3, Common Monster

Attack: 15 | Defense: 3 | HP: 80

He read it once.

Felt the tension leave his shoulders entirely.

15 attack. I have 18 defense.

It can't touch me.

The first wolf lunged.

A gray blur of fur and claws, closing the last few feet in a fraction of a second, jaws wide open

Ethan drew the Blade of Slaughter in one smooth motion and swung.

Swish.

The blade passed through the wolf in a single arc.

Blood caught

the light.

A damage number materialized above the wolf's head,

-91!

The wolf's HP bar went from full to empty in a single frame.

It was dead before it hit the ground.