One Man Army

Chapter 110 [Episode 57] Offline Competition 1

@Offline Competition

Thanks to Sang Hyuk’s broadcast, most of the secrets about making Magic Armor were released.

As a result, the price of the material items necessary for Magic Armor production have started to go up like crazy.

Among them, the ‘power source’ which can be the core, was going to become priceless.

There were three major types of items that can act as a power source, but the ‘blood’ power source which was the best even though it was almost unobtainable, as expected simply wasn’t available at any price.

The item that the users wanted was the Devil Heart Stone, the power source that made by jewels that hold mana. Devil Heart Stone has various grade and the price varies according to the grades but anyway this was basically a production item, so it was worth watching.

And lastly, those who have a lot of surplus gold have obtained the ‘item’ series power source. However, the item series power source have some restrictions.

First, the grade must be above unique level and must be above +6.

The unique item that has been strengthened above +6 are now the main weapons for those who classified as the top users, so it could not easily obtained. But for those with lots of gold, this could be more comfortable.

In the EL world, the hot wind of the Magic Armor was blowing.

Everyone started running to make the Magic Armor first. Of course, the large-scale guilds are in the front line. They were all ready to produce the Magic Armor after they got information about the last secrets that Gale did not reveal, the ‘Mana Amplification Magic Circle’ and ‘Magic Engineering Furnace’.

Some of the foremost leading Guilds seemed to figure out those two secrets within a few days.

When all the materials were ready, you had to create Magic Armor yourself… And you needed two tools to make the Magic Armor.

From the conclusion, the Mana Amplification Magic Circle and Magic Engineering Furnace were available in a special black market called ‘Underground Devil Tower’ in the city Tune in the Heroic Lands.

Of course, you couldn’t just purchase it, you had to clear some linked quest and get the favorability of a certain NPC to colleague level. Both were quite expensive, and because they were consumable items, you had to purchase them everytime you make the Magic Armor.

One NPC associated with Mana Amplification Magic Circle and one NPC associated with Magic Engineering Furnace. You had to do work for them to raise your favorability with these two.

This kind of information naturally led to multiple quests if you keep looking for the information about Magic Armor, so it was clear that even those who tracked the information properly would take at least a few days to start working on raising their favorability with these NPCs.

Anyway, the system window for Magic Armor production opened by using these two tools and then the Magic Armor would be completed just by putting in the materials, so it was not difficult at all.

The large-scale guilds mobilized all the guilds members for the first Magic Armor Production….. The reason they did that was because they knew they could get a lot of special rewards when they made it first on EL.

But they knew only that.

They never dreamed that they couldn’t follow the existence who monopolized almost all of EL’s firsts no matter how they tried.

The materials were collected before the update by the man who knew beforehand about the production method before the update. The man who even finished the favorability work (with the NPCs) right at the day of the update.

As long as Sang Hyuk exists, nobody could ever see the ‘first’.

The Magic Armor ‘Lion King’s Fury’ level 2.5 has completed.

The first Magic Armor Production has been succeeded.

You will be given the unique title ‘Pioneer’ that best suits you, who succeeded in making Magic Armor before anyone else.

Being the first of its kind makes the Lion King’s Fury even more special.

Sang Hyuk made the Magic Armor to end the broadcast. Of course it was to preempt the reward.

Of course, this Magic Armor he made right now is a simplified prototype made for various purposes.

Sang Hyuk knew that in case of production items, when made for the first time, it had at least more than double plus because of its unconditional ‘Uniqueness’. Therefore, he wanted to make the first properly with ‘Hydra Blood’, but he could not help it due to time constraints.

So, he made the prototype the Magic Armor earlier than anyone else using the materials (from Gold Mountain).

It was made hastily, but the result was satisfactory. If you see it, you are expecting a second level Magic Armor but the result is 2.5.

At this level, he would be able to get a great price when he sold it later.

“Oh, so the pioneer title is obtained here.”

But more importantly, it was a pioneer title. Sang Hyuk knew this title.

“Those guys who took this in my previous life…. were probably Rising Guild. Thanks to this title, Rising was able to win even more after the Magic Armor patch.”

The Pioneer title was not a combat title.

But, the effect of the title was stronger than any combat title.

Title – ‘Pioneer’

Rating? Unique

Explanation? It is a very special to be able to get ahead of everyone. You have to be a pioneer to lead everyone from the front.

Effect – [Prefix: None] [Suffix: None] [Sustainable Effect: Pioneer’s Path (S): You can have a very high probability of a Plus Effect in the Magic Armor Production. Moreover, Magic Armor can be produced even without Mana Amplification Magic Circle and Magic Engineering Furnace.]

The explanation was simple, but the power of this title was more than he imagined.

In previous life, Rising Guild used this title to keep creating great quality Magic Armors, which has became a powerful force of the Rising Guild.

The plus effect did not seem to be a big effect in some ways, but if you go beyond one plus, double or triple plus, it made a difference that could not be ignored.

Added to it, it was a bonus to not have to buy Mana Amplification Magic Circle and Magic Engineering Furnace. Considering that the magic circle was 20,000 gold and the furnace was 30,000 gold, it was money that could not be ignored.

“This will be used to attack Hydras and then sold through the auction.”

Sang Hyuk was planning to dispose of the Lion King’s Fury through an auction when he made the Magic Armor that he really wanted. Lion King’s Fury would bring a huge amount of money through an auction.

First, the materials used into Lion King’s Fury was never available to ordinary users. Especially Drake Blood, which was used as the power source, was not as good as Hydra Blood, but it was a pretty good blood.

He could have sold only the Drake Blood in auction for more price than the wyvern blood he sold before.

It was processed again to make it more special. It was so easy to predict how explosive the reaction would be at this level.

“If it was Lion King’s Fury…. At least more than a million dollars.”

The auction was hard to predict because the price changed by a lot due to various conditions and situations, but goods such as Lion King’s Fury would to go over than one million dollars unconditionally.

The minimum was $1 million, and if there was the competition for it, the price could go up to few million dollars.

Even when Sang Hyuk earned a billion stars a month through live channels, millions of dollars was still a huge number of money.

The more money there was, the better it was.

Though it was said that money could not buy happiness, at least Sang Hyuk thought that he seemed more likely to be happier than having no money.

Especially when there is a lot of money in reality, then he can invest that money into the game, so that was not that bad at all.

* * * *

“How are you all? Do you have some good kids?”

Kim Jongwoo, a PD (Production Director) of LGN (Live Game Net), bought coffee for his subordinates who were working hard to review the supporting documents and asked them with a slight expectation.

Kim Jongwoo had to succeed in this offline contest unconditionally. Originally invitational type invites the famous rankers only, ignoring the opinion of many people to open a small light competition and he was confident that he was able to raise the scale of the competition, but it was true that he was a little uneasy apart from his confidendent attitude.

The event, which will be held under the name of the first Eternal Life (EL) ‘The Best One’, required passing in one of two qualifiers to participate

Anyone who can apply for the non-starter tournament, which is exempted from the offline qualifying, had to rank at least the 1,000th place in Gladiator Hall and Hall of Mortality.

And there was virtually no requirement for the preliminary contest to qualify for the offline qualification. Anyone who plays EL can freely participate.

This way, the applicants for the offline qualification increased exponentially, and of course, the scale of the existing competition, which only invited the ranking players, had to change.

As the scale grew, more people and money were needed.

Therefore, if there is a single failure, Kim Jongwoo might have to consider leaving for various reasons.

Of course, he was confident of success. It was already assured with the participation of some of the most popular rankers and Raon Soft also promised close cooperation.

However, this was not enough.

He needed a “hook” to pull in the viewers. Because the rankers were expected due to Kim Jongwoo’s direct involvement, it was not enough if one of them became the winner.

It was best that an underdog suddenly pops out or an unexpected person would appear.

So Kim Jongwoo was once again thoroughly reviewing more than 200,000 entries, which is the same as 99% garbage.

“Fiuh, no one appear yet so far. Just in case someone did appear, I was reviewing everything received by email as well as mail…. But as expected, most were chaff.”

Kim Jongwoo’s college junior, who also his strong right hand named Shin Seung Gyun looked at Kim Jongwoo with his head shaking.

Now his team was working day and night to find the “hook”, but so far he had not find it yet.

“I should have picked 1,000 people to be qualified for the offline qualification already.  But I think I’ll take a closer look.”

Kim Jongwoo was a little nervous because he could not get a definite “hook” yet even though the offline preliminaries were starting in ten days, but he did not think the competition would be ruined even though he could not get that “hook”.

The “hook” was necessary to make the competition very exciting but not necessary to keep it from failing.

“Ah…. it would be good if only the Lone King would participate…But because I can’t contact him, there is nothing to do.”

Kim Jongwoo asked Gale through Lee Mirae PD to let him contact the Lone King. But the answer that came back was always ‘no answer’.

Now he completely gave up, but no matter how he search again for the “hook”, he could not help but come back to the name of the Lone King.

Jungwoo, who has not much to do right now, sat on an empty seat and brought a bunch of unreviewed applicant documents that his subordinates had printed out in advance.

His subordinates had been barely sleeping for a few days and worked hard, so he meant to help even just a little.

Jungwoo looked at the applicant documents one by one and classified them into three kinds.

The first is ‘failed’.

Most of the applicant documents belonged here. In fact, over 200,000 people applied for it, but most of them were below level 30.

Jungwoo was also a gamer of EL, so he knew how funny it was for the users below level 30 to send an application to participate in the competition. So most of the application documents had to go straight to the failed basket.

The second was ‘on hold’.

It was a place where a few applicant documents went. The documents, that he thought the level, experiences, self introduction, etc were awkward but perhaps would be useful, were thrown into this ‘on hold’ basket.

The last one was ‘Passed’.

It was literally a place to go for applicant documents qualifying for the offline qualification. Most of the documents, that appear rarely, belong to the rankers who are often mentioned in the Gladiator Hall and Hall of Mortality.

Kim Jongwoo, who was sorting the applicant documents one by one, suddenly glanced at the document.

“Level 57? What is this…. Is this real?”

The applicant documents really stated that the level was 57.

“The highest level which just released some time ago was level 58, right.”

The user, known as a Chinese user, said that he was concentrating solely on level-up as a one-soul user, saying there will not be a higher level user than himself.

Even in interviews, he said it would find it hard to find users above level 55.

“Is this real? Let’s see…. ID is Immortal…. There is no Gladiator Hall and Hall of Mortality war record. Is this user only focused on leveling-up too?”

First, the ID was an ID that Jungwoo had never heard of. If Kim Jongwoo knew a little more advanced information about EL, when he look at the name Immortal and his high level, he might have been able to think of the One Guild first.

Unfortunately, he still did not know the name Immortal. Although the paid video was released, the name Immortal did not appear in the video, and the name Immortal was still a secret name that only some top-level users know, because of the power of Line Dark that controlled the information.

Of course, the secret is spreading little by little, so you can hear the name Immortal a little bit. But at the moment at least he did not know the name of Immortal.

Jongwoo looked at the document more, but there was nothing special except for the level.

The unnecessary information like “Guild” and “Self-Introduction” were left empty.

It was an application without much enthusiasm, to the extent it would be totally normal if it was rejected. However, the high level troubled Jongwoo.

“Not a named user, no experience of Hall of Mortality nor Gladiator Hall, but the level is high? Hmmmm….. In this case, even if this person was not a ranker, it would be good to participate in the qualification, right? The limitations of high-level single soul users is clear, but at least you’ll be able to create some interest with just a high level.”

Jongwoo, who was worried for a moment, threw the papers toward the ‘passed’ basket.

It was the moment when the decision to let Sang Hyuk participate in the offline preliminaries was made.

Chapter 110 [Episode 57] Offline Competition 1 – End