[4,390!]

Seeing that damage, Dust’s mouth fell open. "Damn, if that hit me..."

"So stop talking nonsense." Don pulled the helmet and breastplate that had dropped from Nolan Hart out of his inventory. "Both Level 15 bronze heavy armor. Take whichever one you’re missing."

Dust looked a little awkward. "Brother Don, you’re really..."

"Don’t flatter me. I’m just in a good mood today." Don gifted the items to him without ceremony. Dust glanced at him, his eyes slightly red.

"If you’re a man, keep killing monsters. Don’t get sentimental on me." Don sighed and went back to hacking at the tree spirits.

"Brother Don, thank you. And about last time..."

"You’re so boring. Why do you keep bringing it up? Playing a game is just for fun, right?" Don chuckled. "I can tell you come from a poor background. You must’ve been carrying a lot of weight when you started Realms Online, weren’t you?"

Dust was silent.

Cappuccino pulled Don into a private channel and activated Realms Online’s heart-to-heart function. Don had used it before in Faith. The user didn’t need to speak, as long as you formed the thought, the system translated it into language.

"Don, after we beat that boss together yesterday, Sister Diana gave us our shares. But Bernita and I didn’t take any. We gave it all to Dust."

"Is someone in his family sick?"

"No. The patient already passed. It was his girlfriend. He spent every dollars he had and took on a huge debt to treat her. That debt was crushing him for two years. Until yesterday, when he finally paid it off."

"This kid is loyal."

"He’s a bit blunt, but don’t mind him. He’s a good person."

"Yeah. I don’t mind. I was actually worried you might mind, since you and Bernita are so close..."

"Us? Cough! Let’s talk about that when we meet in person, brother."

Watching the faint melancholy flicker across Cappuccino’s face, Don felt a small pang of sadness.

Society had certainly progressed, and people’s lives were getting richer, but their troubles had grown along with everything else. Love really was a bottomless pit.

Sometimes you poured everything in and ended up with nothing. But if you had no feelings at all, what was the difference between you and a walking corpse? Troublesome either way.

After equipping the two bronze pieces, Dust’s tank performance improved considerably. His Sweeping Strike damage started reaching the thousand-point range, and the damage he took from Whip dropped to barely over a hundred. Bernita was under far less pressure now.

Diana made her move too, charging directly in front of the monster Don was attacking. A single devastating strike took away over 6,900 HP from the target, making everyone marvel at the strength of her gear.

If Don had to guess, her equipment level was probably second only to Elias Finch’s in the entire region.

Lily’s damage was average at best. As a full-Agility crossbowman, her early-game skill list was limited and her DPS was low.

Don considered the team balance and, after consulting with everyone, adjusted the experience distribution to be even. Otherwise he and Diana would have hogged the lion’s share, since their attack power was simply too far ahead.

Lily complained quietly. "Brother Don, I kind of regret picking this class."

He comforted her. "Little girl, you’re shooting too carelessly. Pure-Agility classes have high hit rates, so you need to focus on hitting weak points. See the tree spirits? They have something in common with humans, the neck. Just make sure your arrows land there."

"There’s so much to learn. I thought it was just point and shoot."

"Silly girl, don’t forget this is a high-realism virtual game. Also, the patch notes say crossbowmen get armor penetration and elemental enchants after their first job advancement, which will boost your damage invisibly."

He didn’t know why, but whenever he tried to patiently explain things to her, she listened with full attention.

Diana saw it all and just smiled. There was a warmth in that smile that Don found strangely familiar.

In less than five minutes, they had taken down the entire pack. A generous pile of gold coins dropped, nine coins between five monsters. The experience was substantial too. Even after splitting it evenly, Don picked up another two percent. As for drop rate, after only five kills, it was hard to say.

They continued along the path, pulling tree spirits in groups of five or six. Even with a newbie like Lily on the team, formation discipline held.

Don would describe Lily as a player with genuine long-term potential, plenty of room to grow, unlike the brainless rich kids who threw money at top gear and recklessly charged into dungeons, getting themselves stranded and dragging their teammates down with them.

Finally, while fighting the third wave, Don heard a thud on the ground. He looked closer and felt a surge of joy, a metal breastplate lay there, gleaming with a stainless-steel sheen.

[Rare Wood Breastplate — Bronze Grade]

[Metal Armor]

[Level Req: 20 ]

[PDEF +250]

[MDEF +60]

[+15 STR ]

[+10 AGI]

[+15 CON]

[Sealed Slot: 1]

[Collecting all five pieces unlocks a set bonus.]

That last line of small print made the two mercenary players very envious.

Cappuccino was crafty. He deliberately asked, "Diana, how about we roll for it?"

Diana laughed irritably. "Don’t pull that with me, brat. I wasn’t planning to take it anyway. My chest and leggings are silver-grade, and I have two Level 25 silver pieces in my inventory I can’t even equip yet. What would I do with a bronze set?"

Neither mercenary was surprised. The Sword Song team’s strength was undeniable, and it was no shock that Diana, as one of their core members, already owned several high-tier pieces.

Bronze armor with set bonuses was nice, sure. But if you had two or three silver pieces, the base stats and bonus points were already more than enough.

There was no reason to wear a bronze set just for the bonus. Both mercenaries were veterans and understood this perfectly. So they didn’t roll either. They simply gave the breastplate to Dust.

Dust immediately unsealed it and rolled an attribute that added eighty points of physical defense. He was almost ecstatic.