Rebirth of the Thief Who Roamed the World

Nie Yan normally wouldn’t pay heed to petty taunts from a group of nobodies, but the thick arrogance in Destroyer’s voice ticked him off. This was why he had Tang Yao show off the Netherthunder Eagle in such a flashy manner. Besides, with it appearing on the flying mount leaderboards, everybody would assume it belonged to him.

The Netherthunder Eagle circled around in the sky. The more it beat its gigantic wings, the higher up it flew.

Nie Yan and Tang Yao rode on top of the Netherthunder Eagle, mountains, forests, and streams darting past them as the wind whistled in their ears. Flying mounts were more than 10 times faster than ordinary land mounts.

“Hey, do you want to tag along with me to get a few things?” With the Netherthunder Eagle, Nie Yan could explore places out of reach for ordinary players and obtain the treasures hidden there.

“What are we getting?” Tang Yao asked after feeding the Netherthunder Eagle another slab of meat.

“You’ll know in a bit,” Nie Yan mysteriously smiled. Since they were the only players with a flying mount right now, he couldn’t let this opportunity go to waste!

Tang Yao’s curiousity couldn’t help but be piqued.

“Fly east,” Nie Yan said.

“Alright.”

After about 10 minutes of flying, Nie Yan and Tang Yao arrived above a mountain plain.

“H-hey, this already looks like a Level 120 zone!” Tang Yao said. He had seen the territory map of Calore, so he knew this region was full of high level monsters. It was still completely unexplored at this stage of the game. Level 60–70 players had no way of reaching here. The danger was simply too great. Any random monster encounter could be fatal. As for what sort of mysteries this place contained, he had no idea.

Tang Yao’s heart was full of apprehension.

Nie Yan was quite familiar with the maps around here. In the previous timeline, back when he was over Level 100, he had holed himself up here for five months of nonstop grinding. He knew this region like the back of his hand, where all the best drops were, which places contained treasure chests...

“Let’s descend,” Nie Yan said. Seeing the familiar landscape, he couldn’t help but get excited.

“Wait, are we really going down there? It’s too dangerous!” Tang Yao said.

In spite of his own misgivings, Tang Yao decided to trust Nie Yan. He gave the orders to descend. The Netherthunder Eagle flew around in the sky before gradually descending in altitude until it hovered at about 50 meters above ground.

“That should do. Stay here, and wait for my command.” Nie Yan shot out a web line at the Netherthunder Eagle’s plumage, then jumped off. He fell about 10 meters before coming to a stop.

Suspended in midair by the web line, Nie Yan scanned the forest canopy below. Before long, he spotted a treasure chest through a gap between the trees.

This area contained 35 locations that spawned chests at random. Only on the first clear of the map did all 35 locations contain chests.

Nie Yan knew all 35 locations. However, there were many places where his memory was a little fuzzy. He could only rely on general directions to find them.

“I’m going down, come pick me up in a bit,” Nie Yan said.

“W-wait!” Tang Yao barely got a word in before Nie Yan broke off the web line and dropped down into the forest.

Nie Yan rapidly plummeted to the ground. As he adjusted his position midair, he activated the Featherfall Jewel. His descent slowed to a crawl as he gently landed atop a giant branch. He peered at the forest ground below. From time to time, monster would pass through. After searching for a while, he spotted a gold chest resting against a tree trunk about 10 meters away.

Numerous hammer wielding Gnolls roamed the area. They were fearsome Level 120 monsters.

Nie Yan jumped down to the ground, then stealthily approached the chest and started opening it.

Opening treasure chest… Progress: 3%… 15%...

A moment later, the chest popped open with a click. Nie Yan rummaged inside and fished out a dagger and a skill book.

The dagger was a Level 120 Gold-grade weapon with over 1,200 attack power. It was called the Gnoll Slaughterer. Level 100+ equipment was completely different from Level 90 equipment. As for the skill book, it was for the rare Mage spell, Fast Flash.

“Nice!” Nie Yan exclaimed. These two items were quite valuable. He put them away in his bag.

He clambered up to the top of a tree, then sent a whisper to Tang Yao,「Alright, come pick me up.」

Seeing Nie Yan waving his hands from the treetop, Tang Yao ordered the Netherthunder Eagle to descend. It was getting closer and closer, 30 meters, 20 meters…

The Netherthunder Eagle’s presence alerted the Gnolls. They quickly gathered over. It was a pity they weren’t ranged monsters.

Nie Yan leaped 10 meters into the air with his Leaper Ring and shot out a web line at the Netherthunder Eagle’s talons.

He swung himself up and landed safely on top of the Netherthunder Eagle’s back, grabbing tightly onto its plumage.

“Got it! Success!” Nie Yan laughed

Tang Yao sighed a breath of relief. Nie Yan had really given him a scare by jumping head first into a Level 120 map. That said, he never expected Nie Yan to return so quickly.

“What did you get?” Tang Yao asked.

“I opened a gold chest and obtained two items.”

“What kind of items? Let me see.” Tang Yao was shocked. Did Nie Yan really open a chest in a such a short amount of time?

Nie Yan showed the two items to Tang Yao.

The Level 120 Gold-grade dagger and Fast Flash Skill Book were extremely valuable. Tang Yao’s eyes widened in surprise. “Awesome! You never fail to amaze me. We’ve really struck it rich!” He immediately understood the usefulness of aerial travel.

Nie Yan was the only one who could come up with such a method. With the Featherfall Jewel, he could safely drop down to the ground. At the same time, with the Leaper Ring and Silk Spinner Ring, he could return to the Netherthunder Eagle from up to 20 meters away. This saved him a lot of trouble, especially from having to deal with scary monsters like those Level 120 Gnolls.

“Come on, let’s head to the next location.”

The Netherthunder Eagle was extremely fast. Like this, the travel time was cut down significantly. Nie Yan could quickly go from location to location, and so began the frantic chest hunting.

After almost five hours, Nie Yan had swept through the maps in the vicinity and opened a total of 160 chests—2 Dark Gold, 60 Gold, 28 Silver, and the rest were either Bronze or White-grade. When he opened the last Gold chest, he suddenly heard the clear jingle of a notification.

Chest successfully opened! You have obtained 3 skill proficiency. Locking Specialist has ranked up to Advanced.

Locking Specialist had finally ranked up! This was thanks to the fact all the chests around were over Level 100. He gained quite a bit of additional skill proficiency for opening them.

Nie Yan was elated. With Lockpicking Specialist reaching Advanced, he could treasure hunt in even higher level maps. Opening any chest below Level 160 would be no issue for him.

After a few more days of hunting chests in this manner, Nie Yan might even receive the Treasure Hunter title!

“Come on, let’s head to even higher level maps,” Nie Yan declared in high spirits. He was quite familiar with maps under Level 180. He clearly remembered the spawn locations of at least 60 chests. He could also search for chests while hanging below the Netherthunder Eagle. He planned to spend a few days opening all which he could find. And after they respawned, he could open them again. With such a frightening chest opening speed, he felt he was getting closer and closer to the Treasure Hunter title.

Nie Yan’s harvest was good. He obtained more than 30 pieces of Level 100+ equipment and a large heap of materials. He stored everything in his bag. With this, when the players of Asskickers United reached Level 100, they wouldn’t need to worry about finding equipment.

Nie Yan recalled back in his past life players could spend two to three days grinding Level 100+ monsters without seeing even a single piece of White or Bronze-grade equipment drop. In these several large maps, there were only around 100-200 chest spawn locations. Not to mention the respawn time of these chests were random. They could be up to a week or two without respawning. Furthermore, these spawn locations were frequently camped by other players. Even if a chest spawned, the items inside wouldn’t fall in the hands of ordinary players. This was why Level 100+ equipment was so scarce in the previous timeline.

Since Nie Yan would frequently grind in one location for months at a time, he ended up becoming extremely familiar with these maps. Every nook and cranny was still fresh in his mind. Coming back, he couldn’t help but feel nostalgic.

After opening another chest, Nie Yan received a pleasant surprise. He obtained a Life Crystal. His luck was pretty good. All he needed was one more. Obtaining the other crystals was a relatively easy affair. With all the crystals collected, he would finally have a flying mount of his own, the Darkwing Dragon!