chapter 1282  exchanging goods

    "eh?" to no surprise, valyr looked at darklight with curiosity the moment he heard those words. "you also need the shard?"

    "why not?" darklight shrugged. "no one here said two people can''t choose the same item, no?"

    "i know that, but that''s not what i meant," replied the young man as he shook his head. "what i wanted to ask was..."

    "you got the quest too?"

    "huh?" hearing those words, darklight immediately looked back at valyr in confusion, only to then sense that everyone else in the group was beginning to look at him.

    feeling a bit of pressure from everyone staring at him, the man let out a faint cough as he followed the flow of valyr''s conversation. "y-yeah. it''s that quest... right? that one?"

    "the one that involves collecting the exotic parts of various monsters before eating them for a stat boost?" replied the young man in response, his head slightly tilted as if he were truly curious.

    "y-yeah! that one!" inwardly shuddering at the words that left valyr''s mouth, darklight still forced himself to nod with a smile. "t-that''s the last item that was missing from my q-quest, actually."

    "well, that''s a problem." valyr scratched the back of his head at those words. "the shard is also the last item i needed to complete my quest."

    "is there any way for you to let me have the shard? i don''t mind exchanging stuff for it."

    "i-is that so?" expecting the young man''s explanation to take a more gruesome turn after his response, darklight was instead briefly left at a loss for words when he heard the words that came out of valyr''s mouth.

    then, realizing that the young man had given him an opportunity to get what he wanted, the man''s attitude quickly did a 180 as he looked back at him with a slightly excited expression.

    "well... it''s not like it''s impossible for me to part ways with it..."

    in other words, it was an incredibly crappy movement skill.

    ''in any case, it seems he''s starting to bare his fangs now that we''re getting closer to the boss,'' thought valyr to himself as the group continued to move through the corridors.

    recalling how their fight against the mini-boss unfolded, he was certain that although darklight reacted the same way the others did when they found out how strong the mini-boss was, most of the man''s focus was still on him.

    even when the man fulfilled his role as a ranger during the fight against the ogre, most of his attention was still focused on him.

    ''well, even if it does happen in the end, it''s not like i wouldn''t be able to resolve it,'' continued the young man, only to then glance at the dark gray shard in his spatial bracelet.

    ''but i guess i''d still consider it as a worthwhile trade, especially now that i have one of the fragments of persistence with me.''

    out of the five items that dropped from the mini-boss after their fight, only the shard had piqued valyr''s interest.

    that was due to the fact that the shard was none other than a fragment of persistence, an item that the young man remembered only dropped consistently if one cleared the cave of beginnings at nightmare difficulty.

    though a single fragment seemed utterly useless at first glance, collecting nine of those fragments would allow one to enter the lesser trial of persistence, giving one the opportunity to gain a good amount of stats with relative ease.

    however, with how long greater beyond existed in his past life, the player base eventually came to know that there existed another tier to the trials, needing one to collect 81 fragments of persistence in order to access it.

    being termed the greater trial of persistence by the majority, many began to farm these fragments for themselves the moment they found out they could even obtain hidden stats from it alongside a huge chunk of the usual stats.

    but then again, it was due to the existence of the greater trial of persistence that players eventually began to speculate...

    would there be an even greater trial to face if one were to collect 729 fragments of persistence?

    that exact question... was what valyr wanted to know for himself.