Ark

Ark: Volume 3 Chapter 1

The Silver Arrow

About 100 people were gathered on the wide balcony of the Magic Tower's top floor. They were players who passed the level 60 restriction screening of the Magic Institute.

As expected of a next generation game, New World offered countless variables within the system. To put it simply, the level of freedom was high. Of course, since there were countless variables in raising a character, simply hunting wasn't everything. That said, the unchanging basic formula, which applied to all games, also applied to New World.

It was 'time spent equals level'. If your level is higher than others, then it means you spent more time than others!

New World had been out for a little over four months. Moreover, it was three to four times harder to level up in new World compared to other games. This meant the players would have raised their levels to 180-240 in four months in a different game. 100 such extraordinary high-leveled players had gathered in Giran alone. This was the result wrought by New World's strong addictive nature, which exceeded all imagination.

Of course, everyone had their own know-how. It was the reason why they were overflowing with confidence despite receiving a quest where they didn't know what kind of enemies would appear.

However, Ark wasn't at all interested in their confidence. He was just drooling over their equipment.

'This is no joke, just where did they get such items?'

Ark thought he was pretty lucky with items in his own way. But after looking at the gathered users' equipment, his confidence vanished.

'That one's definitely at least a Rare item.'

A brightly shining, horned viking helmet, gloves studded with sharp blades from the back of the hand to the elbow, shoes made of bones as red as dripping blood, a two-handed sword with a saw-like blade; they were all unusual pieces of equipment.

In addition, although there were 100 users gathered, he didn't see any pieces of the same equipment. It felt like he'd come to an exhibition of high-class items.

He was gulping down his drool. 'If you converted all the items into money, just how much would it be?

Ark's keen eye was further honed at the blind auction. After making calculations on the spot, each person was wearing equipment worth around 400-500 gold.

'With 100 users, that's at least 40,000 Gold. 400 million when converted into Won (~$400,000)!' An unreal estimate.

Ark was just a commoner who sighed when the monthly utility bills came. Though they said the value of money wasn't the same as it used to be because of the soaring prices, for a commoner, hearing the word "million" was still enough to make them cry out. "Millions" in gold were swimming before his eyes.

[T/N: The author includes a pun here, where the Korean word for million, pronounced "ugk," is like a sound of surprise, like "ah!"]

News he'd seen recently came to mind- the auction site specializing in New World items had already hit 10 billion won in market size. At the time, he just thought, "whatever." It was unimaginable anyways. But now, it didn't feel like someone else's matter.

'Ack, if all those people were monsters...'

"Please lend me your attention for a moment." Just then, the Magic Institute NPC appeared at the top floor after finishing the screening process. "New information has just come in. The Magic Institute isn't the only one who thinks this is a bad situation. A renowned Merchant guild located in the Commerce District south of Giran, 'Midus', has sent an Armed Merchant Ship loaded with already recruited militia to Jackson territory. In addition, the renowned Warrior guild of the Northern area, not far from here, 'Sword X' has also sent militia to Jackson."