Infinite Realm

"Over here."

Fudo, Xue Yan and the others waved at Sato right after they saw him step into the pub.

Right as he was headed to the meeting room with Kolin, Sato had told the others to what for him at a pub as it would be weird if they did so at the arena. The reason was quite simple; out of all the contestants, only the Cloudsmith was taken away by an NPC and had yet to return. If the team were to wait for Sato, they would be suspected of either trying to poach him or having a connection with the Cloudsmith, and chances were that it would be the second one. Once that thought was born in the minds of other players, it would be easy to correlate the once most wanted player in Black Rock Province with the Cloudsmith. And while the chances were small, Sato didn't want to take any risks and so had the others wait for him elsewhere.

"So? How was it?" Fudo hurriedly asked.

"A bit problematic but nothing too serious." Sato replied before he sent a short narrative of his experience to the team chat.

Included in the 'report' were the questions Sato was asked as well as the fact that he was pretty much saved by Galvin and the later events that took place.

"Oh? That old fogey has his eyes on you?" Yato abruptly said.

"Apparently so." Sato nodded.

The old fogey Yato referred to was the vice-guild leader Kolin.

"In that case, it would be best you keep a low profile for a while." Seiichi stated.

Sato, however, shook his head in response.

"This is the early stage. It won't be worth it to do such as it could affect our progress."

"Wow. You got a lot of rewards." Katsuo commented.

After Galvin and Lord Yugo had made it into the meeting room, Kolin was forced to stop his interrogation and simply reward Sato before leaving. However, the two Master blacksmiths, Halford and Fuol, were interested in recruiting Sato. In the end though, Sato rejected as his main was a fighter and not a blacksmith. While dabbling in the profession wasn't a problem, Sato had no intention of getting too close to it.

With the problem at hand settled, Sato was then given his rewards by Kolin.

"Yeah, but they're more of strategic advantages for the team." Sato replied.

Apart from Savir's manual, Sato was given a Practitioner's badge alongside a few rare materials and monetary compensation.

It should be recalled that from the Master rank and above, individuals were subdivided based in their rank. The same could be said to happen with the Practitioner rank.

To prevent a newcomer like Sato, from soiling the name of the Blacksmith guild, Practitioners were classified into 5 grades with a Grade. The reason for this was that even in the Practitioner rank, there existed differences between each another. For example, despite being promoted to the Practitioner rank, it was very obvious that Sato couldn't compare with the individuals who had been there for years so it would be unfair to put him at the same level as them. He was at the lowest wrung of the rankings with the gap between him and the 5th grade being a lot. It was for this reason that Practitioner ranks were able to become masters of some of the performers or even the winner of the tournament as long as they were of the 5th grade. Otherwise, it would be strange for a Practitioner to teach another Practitioner. But since there still existed a difference of grades between them, this was no longer an issue.

While the difference in grade wasn't as insurmountable as with the Master rank and above, the 5 grades of the Practitioner ranks each signified the blacksmith's abilities which made things easier for jobs to be allocated. For someone like Sato, who recently just got promoted, he was at the 1st grade, implying that his skills were still basic and not much different from an Apprentice in the eyes of the pros. It was from the 2nd grade onwards that one would be considered to be a true Practitioner of the art.

Unlike the Master rank and above, whose subranks could simply be differentiated by their attire, the Practitioner rank's subranks were differentiated using their badge which contained their information including how many years they've been at the service.

Apart from being promoted to the next rank in his subclass, Sato had also gotten a few useful items and materials for forging. He would also enjoy a few privileges from the Blacksmith guild for a while, such as discounts and priorities in buying materials from the stores owned by the Blacksmith guild. All these benefits piled up together made Sato a strategic resource to the team.

"Hehe. You're now our lucky star." Fudo smirked.

"So what's next?" Seiichi asked.

"What next?" Sato closed his eyes for two seconds before opening them once again.

"The previous week or two was simply the calm before the storm. By now, most of the top guilds should have completed their preparations for the exploration of the new dungeons. Chances are that the same is happening with the top guilds round the world. Their first few approaches would be to test out the difficulty of the dungeons before making adequate preparations. However, I doubt that they've found most of the dungeons so far, especially that one." Sato signaled with his eyes.

"According to my sources, it doesn't appear on the dungeon map purchased at the city center so in this regard, we have an advantage." Seiichi nudged his glasses.

"That's right, we do." Sato acquiesced.

After Sato had unlocked the dungeons, the locations of the dungeons were marked out in special maps tat could only be gotten in the city center. However, those maps didn't include the dungeon in Maldora Canyons which was the one the team was referring to.

"The bonus in the dungeon is a 10% increase in both material and experience rewards and it lasts for whooping 5 weeks RT. That's 10 weeks of game time. Compared to the 1 week grace the other dungeons possess, the difference is absurd." Yato couldn't help but sigh.

"And it's exactly because the difference is absurd that we have to be careful. For such a large increase and differential treatment, the dangers within is definitely something the other dungeons can't compare to." Lu Zhen shared his thoughts.

Great rewards come with great risks. This was the law of IR and every player understood that perfectly. The best example so far were the 4 clover towns who experienced dire situations that would either level the town to the ground or raise the overall strength of the town's players. The dungeon at Maldora could also be looked at in a similar way. The difficulty of completion was surely something that would drain the time and energy of any player and compared to the other dungeons, it could be estimated to be about 3 time as tough. However, the 10% increase in rewards was still tempting even if one knew how difficult the dungeon was.

Nonetheless, this wasn't the time for such. The main reason was that every to team was currently aiming for the title of first to complete a dungeon. Hence, no one would purposely choose a really difficult dungeon when the others went for something easier. 

Seven Star Glory took the top teams and guilds as their target, therefore, it was safe to say that they weer also eyeing the achievement of first completion. As a result, choosing a difficult dungeon would be unreasonable, but the gains from completion would be very attractive.

As for why they didn't simply aim for a normal dungeon before coming to Maldora Canyons later, there was no assurance that the location of the dungeon in Maldora Canyons would remain a secret long enough. Even as they spoke, some players were already farming at the spot and the longer they took to fully explore the dungeon, the higher the chances that it would be discovered by others. And if that were to happen, their monopoly over the dungeon would be lost and they would be competing with several teams for who would complete the dungeon first.

"So we need to decide now. Do we go for the regular dungeons or do we try our luck with that dungeon?"