Chapter 4: The Commission

“Well?
What are you going to do?” the blacksmith uncle asked, standing before Mo Ming with his arms crossed, his posture intimidating.

The blacksmith uncle’s demeanor made Mo Ming pause in surprise.

The reason for his surprise wasn’t because he was intimidated by the blacksmith’s presence… after all, anyone would be angry if the roof of their house suddenly had a huge hole smashed through it.

The reason Mo Ming was surprised was mainly due to the blacksmith uncle’s appearance—how to put it, he didn’t seem like an NPC at all.
Even Mo Ming couldn’t discern any minute differences between this uncle standing before him and the onlookers nearby.

The booklet Han Ge had given him mentioned that the NPCs in 【Horizon】 were different from those in ordinary games; they were no longer programs with fixed behavior patterns but were beings whose thoughts and actions were indistinguishable from humans.
And based on Mo Ming’s brief observation, this was indeed the case… he could only marvel at the power of the optical computer.

“Um…” Mo Ming glanced at the blacksmith uncle, then at the roof behind him, and finally managed to squeeze out a sentence.
“Uh… I’m sorry?”

“…” The surrounding crowd of onlookers was stunned into silence by Mo Ming’s move.

The blacksmith uncle just snorted and said nothing.

“Then… I’ll help you fix the roof?” Seeing no reaction from the blacksmith uncle, Mo Ming added.

“You haven’t even met the threshold to be a Junior Professional, let alone an Architect, and you want to repair my roof?” the blacksmith uncle said with a look of disdain.

The Junior Professionals the blacksmith uncle spoke of were what players would call the first job advancement.
The first job advancement required reaching level 10 and leaving the novice village for a town, regardless of whether it was a combat or life skill class.

And Mo Ming was currently only level 1, which was why the blacksmith said that, meaning “you can only do this after reaching level 10 and advancing to an Architect”… but from the blacksmith uncle’s attitude, he clearly wasn’t planning on just letting Mo Ming go level up.

“Is there anything I can help with?” someone from the crowd of onlookers shouted over.

Seeing how intelligent this NPC was, perhaps it was possible to snatch the hidden quest.

“I can help too!
Just say what you need!”

“Me too, me too…”

After someone took the lead and shouted, more and more people started to join in.
After all, hidden quests were almost always tied to rich rewards.
If they could really snatch someone else’s quest, wouldn’t that be great?
Even if they couldn’t, ruining the quest would be good too.

“The repair cost is 3 gold coins,” the blacksmith uncle said to Mo Ming, as if he couldn’t see the clamoring crowd around them.

“…” The previously boisterous crowd of onlookers instantly fell silent.

The in-game currency in 【Horizon】 was divided into gold, silver, and copper coins, with 1 gold coin equaling 100 silver coins, and 1 silver coin equaling 100 copper coins.
In the very early stages of the game, less than half an hour after its launch, the only effective way for players to obtain currency was by fighting monsters.

However, the currency drop rate from monsters was not high; on average, a copper coin dropped from every 5 or 6 monsters.
And while materials dropped by monsters could be sold for some money, most of those materials were needed for quests.
At this point, no one had even completed a quest, let alone had extra materials to sell.

And the initial quests that players received only rewarded some starting equipment and potions; there was no currency.

Although the officials supported the exchange between virtual and real currency, that feature would only be opened after the second batch of game chips was released, as a sort of benefit for later players.

So at this time, let alone Mo Ming or this group of onlookers, the combined assets of all the players in Novice Village No. 2 probably wouldn’t add up to 3 gold coins.

However, following the general progression of games, since such an unattainable demand was presented, there would surely be another, achievable condition—just like the bicycle that was forever unaffordable in a certain game.

Sure enough, the blacksmith uncle continued, “But if you can do something for me, I won’t hold you responsible for smashing my roof.”

“What is it?” Hearing this, Mo Ming finally let out a quiet sigh of relief… Ever since entering the game, Mo Ming had felt like he was being targeted.
Seeing the plot finally unfold in a familiar direction, he was able to relax a little.

‘It seems this 【Horizon】 is really a bit different from other games?’ Mo Ming couldn’t help but think… when had he ever received such treatment when playing games before?

“Help me go to the second floor of the mine to the west of the village and bring back a ring,” the blacksmith uncle answered.
“If you can bring it back to me, not only will I not hold you responsible for the roof, but I’ll also give you some other benefits.”

In gaming, what is the most important and most valuable piece of equipment—that would be the weapon, of course!
And what other benefit could a blacksmith who sells weapons offer besides a weapon?

Not to mention this was a “hidden quest”!

Thus, after the blacksmith uncle finished speaking, more than half of the onlookers instantly swarmed away.

What a joke!
From the blacksmith uncle’s tone, there was definitely only one of that quest item.
It belonged to whoever got it first!

However, Mo Ming didn’t rush towards the mine with them.
Instead, he stood his ground and confirmed once more.

“So I just need to bring that ring back to you, and that’s it?”

“Yes,” the blacksmith uncle nodded.
“But it must be completed before level 6, otherwise there will be no extra reward.”

Hearing this, the remaining small portion of onlookers also ran off… but they weren’t heading to the mine, but to the area outside the village to level up.

Quests with an upper-level limit like this were generally not easy.
To be safe, players would usually wait until their level reached the quest’s limit before attempting to complete it.

And the blacksmith uncle said to complete the quest before level 6, which meant the quest’s level limit was 1-5.
In 【Horizon】, the difference between level 5 and 6 was a whole level tier.
The quest’s requirement definitely meant that players had to fight with a level suppression of 1 tier.
In this situation, wasn’t it courting death not to level up to 5 first?

“That ring… is it very important to you?” Mo Ming asked, glancing at the ring on the ring finger of the blacksmith uncle’s left hand.

Although he wasn’t married and didn’t have a significant other, Mo Ming could still understand the meaning of something like a 【partner’s wedding ring】.

“…I suppose so,” the blacksmith uncle paused for a moment, then nodded.

“Then I’m off,” Mo Ming immediately turned to head towards the mine.

“Wait a minute!” But he was stopped by the blacksmith uncle.
“Come over here first, I have something to tell you.”

So Mo Ming was led into the house by the blacksmith uncle.
As soon as they were inside, the blacksmith uncle opened a large chest and began to rummage through it.

“Is there something you need?” After waiting for a while, Mo Ming finally couldn’t help but ask.

But the blacksmith uncle didn’t reply to Mo Ming, still buried in the chest.

“Young people these days have no patience,” after a while longer, the blacksmith uncle finally looked up and threw something he had found in the chest to Mo Ming.
“Take this.”

The thing the blacksmith uncle threw was a milky-white, smooth, orb-like jade, about the size of an egg.
It felt warm to the touch.

“What is this?” Mo Ming caught the orb thrown by the blacksmith uncle, gave it a little squeeze, and then asked.

“See for yourself!
Don’t adventurers these days even know how to check item properties?” The blacksmith uncle shot Mo Ming a glare and even grumbled, “I really don’t know how a person like you obtained the Proof of Valor.”

“…” Mo Ming felt it was a waste of time to explain the origin of the 【Proof of Valor】 to an NPC, so he chose to ignore the blacksmith uncle’s complaint and inspected the item in his hand.

【Essence of Holy Light (Excellent): A product formed from the condensation of holy light, allowing the holder to gain the power to fight against the undead.

Effect: While holding this item, your Level Tier is considered +1 when fighting undead creatures.

Quest Item—Cannot be destroyed, cannot be traded, cannot be dropped.

Player 【Born Without a Name】 gains temporary usage rights for the duration of the quest.】

According to the information provided on the official website, the item qualities in 【Horizon】 were divided into Inferior (Gray), Common (White), Excellent (Green), Fine (Blue), Rare (Red), Epic (Purple), and Legendary (Orange), a total of 7 grades.

It was rumored that above Legendary quality there was also Mythical… so-called artifacts, but this was a rumor, and the officials had not responded.

“Although I don’t know how you did it, the Proof of Valor is indeed on you,” the blacksmith uncle finally said after seeing that Mo Ming had finished inspecting it.
“If it weren’t for the sake of the Proof of Valor, I wouldn’t have entrusted this matter to you.”

“…So I’m off now?” After all, this was a man who had lost his wife’s ring, so Mo Ming didn’t say much more to the blacksmith uncle.

“Even with the Essence of Holy Light, it will still be somewhat difficult for you to complete the quest with your current strength,” the blacksmith uncle continued.
“So you should go and improve your strength a little first.”

After the blacksmith uncle said this, Mo Ming suddenly received a system notification.

【Quest Accepted: Find the Ring (Extremely Difficult)

Quest Content: Go to the second floor of the mine west of the village to find a ring.

Quest Limit: Complete within 72 hours (Advanced Requirement: Complete the quest below level 5)

Quest Description: Blacksmith Hu from Novice Village No. 2 has requested that you go to the second floor of the mine to the west to find a ring.
Although he didn’t specify what kind of ring, there probably aren’t any other rings in the mine.

Quest Reward: Forgiveness of the repair fee for Blacksmith Hu’s roof (Advanced Reward: Unknown)

Failure Penalty: 3 gold coins】

Quests were not divided by level, and the quest difficulty was a rough judgment based on the attributes of the player who accepted the quest.
For example, a difficult quest accepted at level 10 might become normal when viewed at level 11.

However, with Mo Ming’s attributes, apart from errand quests, the difficulty of other quests probably wouldn’t be lower than normal.

After leaving the blacksmith’s shop, Mo Ming headed straight for the west of the village, intending to enter the mine directly… To deliberately grind monsters just to level up?
That was not in Mo Ming’s modus operandi.

What Mo Ming didn’t know, however, was that not long after he left, at the village’s Respawn Altar, a large group of people suddenly began to be teleported in one after another.
The light representing teleportation flashed for several minutes before stopping.
This large batch of players being teleported in naturally attracted the attention of many onlookers.

“Damn it!
I was so close!” The faces of the last few people to be teleported were filled with frustration.