Volume 5, Chapter 5: "Village of Exiles"
Short Summary[]
In real-life, Lee Hyun spends his time browsing the Dark Gamers Union website, and gets the gist of how the information exchanging for Royal Road works. Meanwhile, Hye Yeon comes across a college major for virtual reality video-gaming while preparing for her entrance exams into Korea University. She decides to set up an application for her brother given that Hyun already has a lot of experience in the subject.
After logging back into Royal Road, Weed is seen having arrived at a Teleport Gate cave in the Plains of Despair zone east of Rosenheim Kingdom. Leaving behind the Church Priests and Rosenheim soldiers for now, Weed scouts out the plains on his own, and spots in the distance the Yuroki Mountain Range with a Black Temple at the top. He figures that the temple is most likely where Bar Khan Demoph's Necromancers for his B-Rank Quest are hiding out. He also comes across, and evades, the orcs that live in the Plains of Despair.
Further scouting east across the plains, Weed discovers a human settlement known as the Village of Exiles. However, he's completely ignored by the villagers due having no reputation points with them. Weed finally comes across a villager willing to speak to him named Kokun, who offers an E-Rank Quest to get him a new shield from the village blacksmith named Lucille, which Weed accepts. Weed is able to interact with Lucille given that they're both blacksmithers, and allows for Weed to buy a replacement shield for the quest, as well as receiving a map for the Plains of Despair. Weed then returns to Kokun, and provides the latter the new shield to complete the E-Rank Quest.
Between Kokun and Lucille, Weed learns a bit about the Village of Exile's history, and the struggles that the exiled humans had to go through in order to establish a safe settlement within the Plains of Despair. Kokun offers Weed a C-Rank Quest to prove his strength to the villagers by going out and defeating 5 of the plain's powerful giant ants, which Weed accepts, and departs from the village soon after.
After returning to the Teleport Gate cave, Weed decides next to sculpt a new statue at the entrance. He uses Seoyoon's face once more, and succeeds in sculpting the Statue of the Female Mercenary, which ends up providing him a new Charm stat, as well as an experience increase buff that will help with level-up hunting. Afterwards, Weed departs the cave with the Freya Priests and Rosenheim soldiers to hunt a group of giant ants, and kill enough for Weed to turn in the quest. Returning to the Village of Exiles, Weed turns in the C-Rank Quest to Kokun, which results in him gaining the full respect of the villagers.
Kokun reveals to Weed some more information about the Plains of Despair that there are actually dark elves living in the Black Temple of the Yuroki Mountains, and that they've allied with the Necromancers to turn the tide in their war against the orcs. Kokun fears that a full-scale war is soon to erupt between the orcs and the dark elves backed by the Necromancers, but before heading out to hunt, he drops Weed a hint that villagers Moss and Amy are having an issue dealing with some sort of shapeshifting monster.
Characters[]
- Real Life
- Royal Road
Quests[]
- B-Rank Quest: "The Exiles Living in the Plains of Despair" (Weed scouts out the Plains of Despair. He spots a Black Temple atop the Yuroki Mountain Range where Bar Khan Demoph's Necromancers are supposedly hiding out, and comes across the Village of Exiles where he completes a couple quests in order to gain the respect of its human villagers.)
- E-Rank Quest: "Shield for Kokun" (Weed accepts and completes)
- C-Rank Quest: "Kokun's Doubt" (Weed accepts and completes)
- (Weed is provided a quest hint from Kokun regarding two villagers, Moss and Amy, who are dealing with a shapeshifting monster)
Items[]
- Roasted Boar Meat (cooked by Weed)
- 2 Lucille’s Shields (Weed replaces Kokun's broken one with a new one)
- Plains of Despair Map (Weed receives from Lucille)
- 20 Steel Arrows (quest reward)
- Zahab's Engraving Knife
- Hammer and Chisel
- Statue of the Female Mercenary (sculpted by Weed)
- Chitin Shells (giant ant loot)
- Giant Ant Antennaes (giant ant loot), Kokun's Knife (quest reward)
Stats and Skills[]
- Weed
- Cooking Intermediate skill
- Sculpture Mastery Intermediate skill
- Charm stat (newly obtained)
- Freya Priests
- Blessing
- Slow
Trivia[]
- Lee Hyun checks out the Dark Gamers Union site, but doesn't find any current useful information. It's also revealed that the site deducts account points when checking information to make sure that the user contributes their own information on Royal Road to gain points.
- While Hye Yeon prepares for her entrance exams into Korea University, she comes across their website showing off a major for video-gamers. Because of Royal Road revolutionizing how real-life looks at gaming, the university now offers a major dedicated to looking at the history of video-games up to current day's virtual reality gaming. The conditions one needs to apply for the major is an understanding of video-games, has a game reward record, and a high-school diploma.
- Hye Yeon believes that Hyun can enter the video-game major since he already knows virtual reality gaming quite well, and achieved selling off a video-game character for billions of won. She purchases another application for Korea Univerity to get her brother into college.
- Weed, his 50 Freya Priests, and his 414 Rosenheim soldiers, arrive at a cave housing the Teleport Gate in the Plains of Despair. The entrance is blocked by a large stone to keep the cave hidden.
- Weed departs from the cave on his own to scout the nearby areas of the Plains of Despair. He sees that the land is covered in green grass despite the zone's dangerous sounding name, as well as the Yuroki Mountain range. At the top of the Yuroki Mountains is a black temple fort that Weed believes to be the location of Bar Khan Demoph's Necromancers.
- Weed discovers the orc race of the Plains of Despair. He attempts to greet a lone orc he comes across, but backs off when he sees about 3,000 nearby orcs marching.
- Weed scouts further into the eastern part of the Plains of Despair, and manages to come across a small human settlement of 300 makeshift wooden houses known as the Village of Exiles. He gains 300 Fame as the first to discover the village, and gains a week long buff where he will receive double the rewards from the village quests.
- Weed attempts to communite with the people of the Village of Exiles, but is ignored by everyone due to his low reputation with the village. He attempts to win the villagers over by showing off his cooking and sculpting skills, but they're left unimpressed. Weed confirms that he's dealing with savages who have no sense for art.
- Weed finally comes across a villager named Kokun willing to speak with him who appears to own some sort of broken shield.
- The villager explains the Times of Chaos to Weed, which causes Weed to see a vision of the past in the Plains of Despair. Basically, the ancestors of the Village of Exiles were banished to the Plains of Despair, and fought with their bare hands against the banishers chasing them who used spears and swords. The result was a complete bloodbath amongst the hunted, but those that survived became strong survivors amongst the Plains of Despair.
- Before Kokun could tell Weed more, Kokun offers Weed an E-Rank Quest to replace his broken shield with one made from the village's blacksmith, Lucille, which Weed accepts. Running away with the shield would cause Kokun to get angry.
- The Lucille’s Shield in Kokun's possession has a 50% change to block projectiles.
- Weed arrives at the Village of Exiles' home of Lucille the blacksmith. Despite Weed having no reputation with the village, the blacksmith allows Weed to speak with him since he can tell that Weed is also a blacksmith.
- Weed pays Lucille 5 gold to purchase a replacement Lucille's Shield for Kokun's E-Rank Quest.
- Before Weed could return to Kokun, Lucille explains a bit more about the Times of Chaos. The strong survivors set up camp in a cave, but then began to send out explorers to finally settle down and start a village. Through trial-and-error, people die discovering the homes of monsters and predators of the land, but they eventually found this location, the Village of Exiles, as the safest place to finally settle down.
- Weed receives a map of the Plains of Despair from Lucille that shows the zone's locations of its castles, villages, monster dens, and cursed places.
- Weed returns to Kokun, and completes the E-Rank Quest by providing the latter a new Lucille's Shield. Weed is rewarded .001% level experience, and 20 Steel Arrows.
- Kokun continues to tell the Times of Chaos history to Weed where Lucille left off. The Village of Exiles, despite living in poverty, has been at peace since they've mastered using weapons, such as bows, and found an iron mine nearby to forge weapons. However, the village is often raided by the orcs for food, and even started taking some of the villagers; over 100 the past few years.
- Due to the strength displayed by the orcs, Kokun offers Weed a C-Rank Quest to go out and defeat 5 giant ants. Doing so would earn the villagers respect toward Weed, which he accepts. Failing the quest would cause Kokun to not want to talk with Weed anymore.
- Weed returns to the Teleport Gate cave where the Freya Priests and Rosenheim soldiers continue to wait on standby. Using Seoyoon's face, Weed goes about sculpting a rock outside the cave entrance, and completes the Statue of the Female Mercenary, which has an Artistic Value of 600. The statue temporarily increases health and mana regeneration by 15%, movement speed by 15%, +100 Charisma, +10 Strength and Agility, +5 to all stats, allow the player to take higher missions at mercenary guilds, and 5% increased experience gain.
- Weed gains some level experience to Sculpture Mastery, +85 Fame and +1 Endurance stat for completing the Female Mercenary statue. Weed also obtains a new Charm stat, which will give him the ability to better attract people towards him. Weed's Charm stat is raised by 20 to start with due to having the Legendary Moonlight Sculptor class. He also gains +5 Perserverance for obtaining the Charm stat.
- Weed moved out with his Freya and Rosenheim army to hunt giant ants. Coming across the group of giant ants, which are around level 350, the Priests cast Slow so that the Rosenheim soldiers have an easier time attacking them. Eventually, they kill the group of giant ants, and Weed gets a level-up.
- Weed returns to the Village of the Exiles, and shows the chitin shells he got off the giant ants to prove to Kokun that he killed 5 of them to complete the C-Rank Quest. As a reward, Weed gains the respect of the villagers, 15% level experience, +6 Fame, and Kokun's Knife.
- Weed finds having Kokun's Knife pointless since he already has Zahab's Engraving Knife.
- After completing the quest, Kokun continues the Times of Chaos history where he warns Weed to avoid the orcs, but also reveals that dark elves live in the Yuroki Mountain Range. Kokun explains how the dark elves have been winning many battles against the orcs recently, because the elves have allied with dark creatures that can raise up dead warriors to fight against the orcs. As a result, the dark elves were able to built a fortress with towers and walls in the Yuroki Mountains. Weed puts it together that these dark creatures aiding the dark elves are obviously Bar Khan Demoph's Necromancers.
- Kokun warns Weed that the nights have been getting longer because of dark clouds that emerge over the dark elves' Black Temple in the Yuroki Mountians. He figures that the elves are most likely preparing for all out war against the orcs.
- Kokun warns Weed to stay away from Moss and Amy due to them dealing with a doppelganger enemy.