243 Cerberus

Brother Windcloud Nine invested way too much that even the Windcloud Clan's clan leader, Windcloud Overlord tried to put a stop to it but Brother Windcloud Nine listened to no one. He kept on buying Gold Coins to open Great Gift Packs, from day one to day six. As long as he got his hands on Gold Coins, they were all wasted away.

Compared to the wealth of Brother Windcloud Nine, Chu Tiange's was nothing. Brother Windcloud Nine was never lacking in cash, only in Gold Coins.

Two-thirds of the Gold Coins Li Yi sold went to Brother Windcloud Nine...

"Of all the world's idiots, Old Nine from Windcloud takes the cake. Silly is the wealthy, those with Gold Coins, come one, come all."

Because of Brother Windcloud Nine alone, the ardor in the Western Continent in purchasing Great Gift Packs was not as high as it was in the Eastern Continent. Selling Gold Coins to Brother Nine brought greater returns than opening Great Gift Packs.

"Brother nine, I have 1,000 Gold Coins for 2,000 RMB."

"Don't bother to message me if you have less than 10,000 Gold Coins. The ratio is not an issue, as long as you have a large amount of Gold Coins. 1: 3, 1: 4, 1: 5 is not a problem."

Brother Windcloud Nine's generosity had players of the Western Continent on the move, clearing dungeons, solo-ing on monsters and killing bosses, all for the sake of selling Gold Coins to Brother Nine.

Everyone thought that Brother Windcloud Nine was done for. Windcloud Overlord even sought Sister Windcloud Nine's help to talk to Brother Windcloud Nine, but she refused. Based on her understanding of Brother Nine, she knew that nothing could pull Brother Nine away from what he set his mind to.

Although Li Yi was far away in the Eastern Continent, he learned of this from the forums.

Similar to the past life, there was no change in Brother Windcloud Nine's life. The way things were developing, he would become the Immovable King.

And things were just as Li Yi predicted. On the sixth night of the deceiving event, Brother Windcloud Nine's long-elusive luck finally won out.

The system's announcement was in rainbow-colored fonts. This was the notification of the birth of an orange-colored legendary item!

[Player, Brother Windcloud Nine opened a Ruler of God's Great Gift Pack of Blessings. In a rainbow flash, a Cerberus pup mount appeared before him. This event is recorded in Pantheon's Hall of Fame.]

[Player, Brother Windcloud Nine obtained Cerberus, an orange-colored legendary mount, unlocking a Legendary achievement and Battle Cavalry title.]

[Cerberus pup (orange-colored legendary battle mount with minimal odds of dropping): SPD 150% on land. Mount unleashes a threatening aura while on the go, causing lower-leveled mounts to spiral out of control at a certain percentage.]

[Special mounting skill: Hellfire. Cerberus unleashes Hellfire on all targets in a 200-yard attack range. Cooldown period: 1 hour.]

[Special passive skill: Agile reflexes raising owner's EVA permanently by 30%.]

[Special passive skill: No weakness. Cerberus keeps watch of its owner at all times, guarding the back of its owner. (Owner suffers no backstab penalties, such as extra damage, extra odds of dropped equipment, Weakness Break, Evasion penalties, etc.]

...

The announcement from the System caused another uproar amongst players who had lost interest in the Great Gift Packs. 

Brother Windcloud Nine needed his Cerberus to live up to the Immovable King's name. Only with Cerberus, could Brother Windcloud Nine become that superhuman Immovable King from the past life.

It was because Brother Windcloud Nine had Cerberus, this legendary mount that even when he was surrounded and blasted by several thousand Wizards, he managed to turn the tables triumphantly, and set a one-against-a thousand record.

"Only you would be able to spend almost 300 million RMB to get a mount like this," Li Yi sighed.

This was the day Brother Windcloud Nine made headlines, pushing Toucher God, Pursuing War God news to the back pages. When a picture of Brother Windcloud Nine calmly riding Cerberus circulated in the web, the sales of Ruler of God's Great Gift Pack of Blessings rebounded.

"Bugger, the life of the wealthy. That Cerberus is to die for."

"I know, right? I was riding a little white horse trying to get near to Brother Nine but motherf*cker, the little white horse suddenly bowed to the ground. It dare not move no matter what I did. It just trembled there."

"Sigh, that's no biggie. I couldn't even summon my mount from just being too close to Brother Nine..."

"Cough, I tried standing in front of Cerberus. Well, I dare say this, but the sight of its three heads almost brought me to my knees."

...

Brother Windcloud Nine was really living in the limelight. Although the investment he put in was considerable, he was not bothered about the sacrifice. More importantly, he got what he wanted.

"Peh, it's only a three-headed b*tch. What's with the arrogance and publicity? No matter how awesome he is, didn't he lose to me?"

Scumbag Wang of the Eastern Continent was most dissatisfied seeing Brother Windcloud Nine in the limelight, He thought of a good plan to outdo Brother Windcloud Nine.

On the last day of the Ruler of God Appreciation Festival, Scumbag Wang made his entrance riding on his mount.

Scumbag Wang's most faithful subordinate, Lonely Perfume was in between his thighs, crawling on his hands and feet, with a bitter look in his face.

"Good boy. Useful. He can even help the owner in attacks. This is the Perfume brand mount!"

Scumbag Wang whacked on Lonely Perfume's ass and balls forcefully with his ax, causing Lonely Perfume to yelp and lie flat on the ground.

"Needs to work on durability though."

"Leader Scum, this is humiliating." Lonely Perfume covered his face and started to wail.

"Humiliating, my ass. I'm making you famous, you know. You're a smart boy yet you can't figure what could happen after this? Don't you want to hang with Fengxi?"

"Leader Scum, I was wrong! Ride me into the sunset!" Lonely Perfume shouted out loud, straightening his back.

"Now, that's the attitude, but it's my turn this time. Now take a video, and remember to take my good side."

Scumbag Wang whipped his long mane like a hair commercial, getting down on all fours with his ass up in the air.

Lonely Perfume leaped onto him, drawing out his dagger, and poked it on Scumbag Wang's ass, "Giddy up!"

"F*ck my sister... I only hit you with the axe haft while you really stabbed me... No way... You're too smart for your own good."

...

The video of Scumbag Wang and Lonely Perfume riding each other was published on the official web, under the title, "Strongest Mount". Although the attention it received was far beneath Brother Windcloud Nine's post, Scumbag and his subordinate had their 5-seconds of fame again.

"Scumbag Wang of the Eastern Continent, is this fella f*cked in the head?"

"Not... something an ordinary person would do."

"You're the man. What talent."

"I finally found my family! I going to migrate to the Eastern Continent!"

"F*ck, the birth of an idiot!"

...

The Ruler of God's Great Gift Packs sales made its rebound, but due to the lack of funds of players, the numbers did not rise as high as before, especially when Brother Windcloud Nine was no longer purchasing Great Gift Packs. This caused the Gold Coins rate to crash.

The seven-day Ruler of God Appreciation Festival was officially over, with many of the players falling into the trap. There was a shortage of Gold Coins in all servers. If Gold Coins were used to purchase items before, the majority of players were now using Silver Coins because they spent all their Gold Coins.

This was just the beginning. With the Ruler of God Appreciation Festival over, now came the real highlight of the show.

The System's spamming announcement in red shook the world once again.

[After a year in service, the game's center of operations has made a program adjustment to close the gap between the game and reality. From now on, normal monsters killed will not drop any currency. Additionally, currency rewards from quest completion will be reduced by half. Notice is hereby given. Happy gaming.]

"No... No way? No more Gold Coin drops from killing monsters?"

Every single player was dumbfounded.

Killing a monster and looting money from the corpse has been a fact of life in the eyes of players. Now they were cut off completely. The days of farming monsters and earning Gold Coins were at an end.

"WTH? This is crossing the line. The price of items is too high already. And now this? GM, have you lost your mind?"

"F*ck! I'm not gonna play anymore. We're stripped of our rights! What do you take us for? How dare you play with us?"

The System had only made its announcement when over a million posts objecting appeared on the web. Many of the players opposed this change.

Gold Coins dropped from farming monsters is a principle not lightly changed. AoE classes could handle monsters in groups. As long as one was proficient in operating their controls, just one person could solo a group of monsters. Massive amounts of Gold Coins could be earned just by spending a bit of time. There were a lot of guilds offering boosting services in King of Pantheon. This change radically put a stop to their source of income.

The majority of those opposing the change were guild members offering boosting services. Of course, there were some regular players as well but their numbers were not huge.

The players protested for days but the officials of Pantheon made no comment. It did not matter if they protested, the change has already been made. It was up to them whether they want to continue playing or not!

Of course, this change was a good thing to the majority of players. For example, the numbers of players quitting halfway in clearing dungeons have lessened.

The reason for this was simple. If the final boss was not defeated at the end, then they would not receive a single Gold Coin. If one were to leave while clearing halfway, they would end up with nothing, with all the while, dealing with repair fees. It was fine if it happened once or twice but no one could do it for an extended period of time.

After a few days of protests and complaints, life soon returned back to normal. Boosting-service guilds took a large hit, but it was no different than before for regular players. However, the ratio of Gold Coins exchanging to cash was now fixed at 1 to 1.

Apart from individual competitions in Blade Peak Arena, there were also party competitions. Rewards for winning the 2 versus 2, 3 versus 3, 5 versus 5 was a Tier 1 Equipment Set while the reward of winning a party competition of over 100-persons was a purple-colored weapon of their current level.

With such bountiful rewards, Little Drunk Cat would not leave such opportunity alone. The hundred-men party led by Chen Yang and Pretty Good Mood had achieved 8,000 Points and ranked fifth on the party board of points. The current first place was Star Fire while second place was Platinum Hand.

Little Drunk Cat's party points had experienced stagnation in the past few days. Li Yi originally had thought to head to the Western Continent to attempt an Epic-class quest but now he had long abandoned this idea.

The honor of a party was everything. In order for Little Drunk Cat to prosper in the long run, they absolutely must not lose this competition!

...