The Great Thief

However, Lonesome Flower wasn’t stupid either. If his sister didn’t like it, he would rather never use it then to let Azure Sea Breeze have it.

After they took down Baron Rivendare, the next zone became available to all of them.

In the beginning, the Highlord Alexandros Mograine and Saidan Dathrohan led their troops to attack the Stratholme ruins, fighting the Undead army head-on. In the battle, Dathrohan led his troops and was attacked by Balnazzar. While he tried his best to attack, he was easily captured by the demon and his life force was drained. The demon possessed his body and took over his identity.

He baited Renault to kill his father, which further corrupted the Crusade.

Later on, after Mograine had been slain by his son, Balnazzar led the Scarlet Crusade with its new identity to enter Stratholme again. He then fought against the Scourge army for years and through this war, selected his best men for the next step of his evil plans.

The Scarlet zone still followed the morals of the Scarlet Crusade, but it was all just part of a greater plan.

Although items like the Deathcharger were very attractive, there were other things in the zone that were worth everyone’s time – for example, the Righteous Orb.

The Righteous Orb had many uses. There were at least around 30 Dark Gold grade equips that required it, in addition to a variety of Enchantments and Alchemy recipes. Most importantly, the Design recipes clearly stated its effects.

Besides this, the Archmage Angela Dosantos also had a quest that required Righteous Orbs to complete.

The Righteous Orb was one of the rare materials that even normal monsters would drop, but at the same time, this didn’t diminish its value.

The price would occasionally fluctuate, but it had never fallen under 50 gold for a single Orb.

“This place reminds me a little of the Scarlet Monastery,” Azure Sea Breeze commented as he stepped into the Scarlet zone with a strange sense of familiarity.

“Watch out for packed monsters; don’t underestimate them,” Lu Li reminded him.

“I know,” Azure Sea Breeze said.

However, he didn’t take his advice to heart and they wiped right at the door. The weak image of the Scarlet Crusade had been embedded deeply into his subconscious. No matter how on-guard he was, he just couldn’t help it.

In all honesty, the monsters here had constantly fought with the Undead in the Undead zone. The ones that had survived were the strongest and were equivalent to mini Bosses.

They had passed Baron Rivendare in one attempt, but ended up being wiped by a few small monsters. Everyone was concerned, but only Lu Li looked calm. A wipe was nothing – they weren’t even level 47 on average. Even a team of level 50 players who managed to make it here would be wiped out too.

As for the strategy, it was simple – just go slowly.

There were two troublesome parts to the dungeon. Every wave of monsters had their own scout that would report the situation back.

“The Undead Scourge has broken through; they’ve reached the post!”

Their every move had been reported. The threat of this was that another wave of reinforcements would soon arrive. If they couldn’t clear out the first wave in time, they would be wiped with the increasing amount of monsters.

The other problem was a common one for humanoid units; they ran once their health dropped to a certain level.

If they ran into other monsters during the escape process, the aggression would spread and other monsters would be drawn over. It was like a child running to their parents for help.

Since all these monsters were level 50, and their aggro ranges were very wide, they had to ensure that they didn’t let any of them escape. It took Lu Li and the others a full hour to clear out the hallway.

After this, they reached an intersection and Azure Sea Breeze led everyone to the smaller path on the right.

No one had been here before, so they had to explore the map by themselves.

There were no bosses at the end; it seemed like they had arrived at a forge room that had been deserted a long time ago. Half-made equipment were scattered everywhere and barely any of them were in good condition.

Under normal circumstances, they might have been able to find something here, but they were all quite unlucky this time. None of them found anything worthwhile.

At the very least, they could sell these half-made equips to the blacksmiths in the city. It would be hard to sell them for a good price though – the best that they could produce would probably be Silver grade.

Lu Li searched around and reached his hand out to a scroll on the table that had been covered by dust.

This was one of the main reasons for him to come to Stratholme.

He needed a quest item to improve his Forging that could be found in this particular dungeon. It wasn’t hard for Lu Li to find it since he had already been reincarnated.

After he activated the scroll, he immediately heard an angry shout.

“Fool, let go of your hands!’

A muscular man who wearing a red shirt suddenly appeared out of nowhere. This was the Blacksmith that Lu Li had been looking for.

This guy was a monster for Trading skill classes. If players didn’t actively seek him, he wouldn’t pop out, even if his half-made equips were to be sold.

Lu Li calmly packed the level 50 Silver grade Mold into his bag. The item that it produced had decent Attributes; it was comparable to a similarly-levelled Gold grade. Most importantly, the materials for the Mold weren’t too expensive and it could be produced in great quantity.

The others wouldn’t need them, but the weaker players in the guild did.

“Get out of here!” Azure Sea Breeze yelled as he slammed his shield into the NPC’s face without the slightest hesitation. He didn’t even need to take the time to decipher if this was a good character or not. Anyone who appeared with such a strange manner was suspicious to begin with.

Hence, the battle commenced, but it was an easy one.

The NPC that had appeared was a small Boss. He was the weakest boss in Stratholme, and wasn’t even as threatening as five average monsters combined.

They ended the battle in about ten minutes.

The loot was very basic – a recipe for a Gold grade hammer. On the recipe, was mark that read ‘3/3’. This meant that it could only forge three hammers, which was common for high-end recipes.

Besides this recipe, the boss also dropped a small mineral. It was a rare material that Lu Li was very satisfied with.

What it dropped in the end was a Righteous Orb. No one would complain about him dropping this, and Lu Li even wished that it had dropped more. There was not a single guild that could complain about having too many Righteous Orbs.

After this, they turned back and ran into other monsters again. When they finally cleared them, they began to make their way to Cannon Master Willey, an actual Boss.