Chapter 12

The human capital, the City of Divine Blessing, is located in the center of the Minas Tirith Plain in the province of Gondor. Although it is a city on a plain, it is surrounded by double walls 30 meters high and a moat 5 meters wide, earning it the title of the Impregnable City. At the center of the city is the Royal District, which occupies a quarter of the city's area. To the south of the royal palace is the noble district. The commercial district is concentrated in the western part of the city, and the largest area is occupied by the residential district.

This is the human capital in "Heart of Glory," where all the buildings are red-tiled and white-walled, resembling a city with a medieval European architectural style.

When Li Huailin was first teleported to this city, he was also stunned, just like many other players, staring at the surroundings in amazement for a long time.

"Indeed, this game is amazing," Li Huailin muttered to himself after a while.

On the seventh day of the server opening, about half of the players had already left the newbie village. Unlike the newbie villages that are separate like dungeons, all players were teleported to the same city. This allowed Li Huailin to finally understand what it means to have a large number of people.

For example, where Li Huailin was standing in the city center square, just a short distance from the commercial district, the flow of people could only be described as a human tide. Occasionally, he could see pairs of armored soldiers patrolling the city, making it lively and bustling.

Li Huailin had just reached level 10 in the afternoon, right after Knightal had tricked him before dying. Although Li Huailin was a bit depressed, he thought to himself that as long as he didn't complete the quest, he wouldn't lose 10,000 experience points and 1 gold coin. The quest hint only mentioned that Knightal's nephew had appeared in the north, with no other information, suggesting that the nephew would be hard to find. As long as he didn't look for him, he wouldn't lose the experience and gold.

Having figured this out, Li Huailin started leveling up on his own. Although he had fought a boss, the boss didn't die, and the quest wasn't his, so he didn't lose any experience. He was still level 7, so he spent time dying 30 times in the mine, reaching level 10 and teleporting to the City of Divine Blessing through the newbie village's teleportation point.

Li Huailin's character status was quite impressive. Since he couldn't kill monsters or complete quests, he had no source of equipment or money. He still wore the newbie cloth armor set given at the start, which would never drop. Other players, even the poorest, would have a set of white equipment and at least 50 silver coins by level 10. Li Huailin, however, had nothing in his inventory, only 18 silver coins and 40 copper.

Of course, he didn't care at all. What was the point of equipment? Wearing it would increase health and defense, making him die slower, which would affect his leveling.

"Right, I should change my class first," Li Huailin suddenly realized his goal. Now that he was at the maximum level of 10, if he didn't change his class, he wouldn't gain any experience even if he died. To level up, he had to change his class.

Originally, Li Huailin wanted to play a mage. He didn't think much about it, nor did he have a deep understanding of mages. He just thought it looked cool to throw fireballs and ice bolts after watching the official trailer. Now, due to the human racial penalty of 10% intelligence, he immediately switched to a warrior.

"Heart of Glory" did a great job with the details. To ensure that the newly teleported players wouldn't get lost, a huge sign was placed on the right side of the central square, pointing to the Class District. The sign was so large that it could be seen no matter where you were.

The first building in the Class District was the Warrior Guild. As the most popular class in MMORPGs, the Warrior Guild was probably the most chosen among the eight classes, so its entrance was very large, with two staff members maintaining traffic to prevent congestion.

When Li Huailin walked in, he saw a display in the center of the Warrior Guild hall. However, he was a bit surprised because he found that half of the hall was a work area, and the other half was an indoor training ground. There were many wooden dummies, and many players were hacking away at them. Not only that, but there was a queue of players waiting to hack the dummies.

"Strange, during the golden time of the server opening, these guys are not leveling up but hacking dummies. Even if they want to try new skills, they don't need to be so eager," Li Huailin thought to himself, a bit puzzled.

No matter how strange it was, Li Huailin couldn't care less about what they were thinking. He walked up to the warrior mentor to change his class.

The warrior mentor was a tall but somewhat slender middle-aged man named Alenst. He wore a red and silver armor set, without a helmet, and had a red ponytail tied at the back of his head.

"Rookie, I am the warrior mentor Alenst. You have come here to become a great warrior, haven't you?" Alenst said to Li Huailin as soon as he approached.

System prompt: Warrior mentor Alenst wants to change your class to a warrior. Do you accept?

"Yes."

A green light flashed from Li Huailin's body.

System prompt: Class change to warrior successful.

Li Huailin checked his character status panel. He found that his health and other attributes hadn't changed, but his physical attack had increased significantly. After becoming a physical class, the strength attribute had a greater impact on attack, and he had maxed out his strength points...

Before the class change, Li Huailin's physical attack was 57-73, but now it had skyrocketed to 97-121.

"Rookie, are you interested in learning warrior skills?" Alenst asked after Li Huailin finished checking his status.

"Oh, right, I still need to learn skills," Li Huailin realized. From birth, he only had a Heavy Slash skill that added 5 points of damage, and he had never used it, so his skill experience was still 0. He thought that if he used the skill, his experience might even become negative.

In "Heart of Glory," skills are divided into common and rare skills. Common skills are taught by the class mentor and can be learned every 5 levels. Rare skills are obtained from skill books dropped by monsters or taught by special NPCs, and are very valuable. There is no limit to the number of skills in "Heart of Glory," and you can learn as many as you want as long as you have the energy.

"What skills are there?" Li Huailin asked, naturally curious.

Alenst waved his hand, and a virtual screen appeared in front of Li Huailin, showing four skills he could learn.

Attack skills:

- Rend 1 (0/300): Increases attack by 10 points and causes a bleeding effect, dealing 10 damage per second for 12 seconds. The bleeding effect cannot stack. Instant cast, consumes 10 mana, 6-second cooldown. Learning cost: 1 gold.

- Cleave 1 (0/500): Simultaneously damages three targets in front, dealing 80% of your attack power. Instant cast, consumes 15 mana, 10-second cooldown. Learning cost: 1 gold.

Defense skills:

- Defensive Stance (no level): Reduces physical damage by 20% but decreases movement speed by 50%. Instant cast, no cooldown, no mana cost. Learning cost: 1 gold.

- Shield Block 1 (0/300): Instantly raises your shield to reduce physical damage, the amount of which depends on the shield's attributes. Requires a shield. Instant cast, consumes 5 mana, 3-second cooldown. Learning cost: 1 gold.

"Damn!" Li Huailin wasn't scared by the skills but by the "Learning cost: 1 gold" attached to each skill. He didn't expect learning skills to be so expensive. One skill costs 1 gold, and all four would cost 4 gold, but he only had 18 silver coins.

"Damn, how many people can afford this?" Li Huailin shouted at Alenst.

"Oh, it seems you don't have enough money to learn, you poor rookie," Alenst frowned, his expression full of disdain. He then pointed to the training ground behind him, "Since you are a member of the Warrior Guild, I will guide you. I will teach you the secrets of the Rend skill. Practice on the wooden targets 1000 times, and you will learn the skill."

"Damn..." Li Huailin finally understood why so many people were queuing to hack dummies. The game provided an alternative way to learn skills for those who couldn't afford them, but hacking dummies 1000 times... The Rend skill has a 6-second cooldown, so it would take at least 6000 seconds, or 100 minutes, which was a lot of work...

"Hey, poor guy, go queue up over there, quickly, quickly." Li Huailin had been chatting with the warrior mentor for a while, and the players behind him were getting impatient.

"Ah..." Li Huailin sighed softly, raised his right hand, and muttered to himself, "I don't want to be amazing anymore... but... why are you forcing me..."

"Hey, what are you saying over there..." a player behind him asked, puzzled.

"Smack!" Before the player could finish speaking, Li Huailin slapped Alenst in the face.

System prompt: Due to your attack on Alenst, Alenst's favorability towards you increases by 20. Current favorability: Friendly.

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