Leveling Up Through Death: An Unorthodox Gaming Tale 0002

Chapter 2: My Character is a Mess

Li Huailin’s five main attributes—Strength, Agility, Stamina, Intelligence, and Spirit—were all within the normal range. The maximum for each attribute in a new account was 10 points, and it was rare to find anyone with all attributes maxed out. Li Huailin’s attributes were average, which meant he was doing relatively well. What puzzled him was the racial trait.

Racial Trait:

• Wisdom: Intelligence -10%
• Diplomacy: Reputation with other races’ cities (excluding human cities) -10

Li Huailin took a closer look; it really was -10% Intelligence and -10 Reputation. What was going on? Shouldn’t it be a bonus instead?

Without a second thought, Li Huailin immediately logged out of the game and grabbed his home computer to access the official website of Glory of the Heart. The site had very little information, just some introductions to races and classes, along with a simple beginner’s guide. Li Huailin quickly searched for the human racial traits on the official site.

Human Racial Traits:

• Wisdom: Intelligence +10%
• Diplomacy: Reputation with other races’ cities (excluding human cities) +10

“That’s strange; it says here it’s a bonus!” Li Huailin was sure he hadn’t misread anything. Tianyu Company was a big name; if there were errors on the official website, they would have been corrected immediately. The game had already been live for four days, so if there was a mistake, it should have been discovered by now.

“Could it be that the self-made login gear has penalties?” Li Huailin rubbed the back of his head, perplexed, but could only guess.

He thought about it but realized he had no way to resolve the issue. Normally, if someone found their character’s attributes were wrong, they would contact customer support to fix it. However, Li Huailin couldn’t do that. He had no eligibility to buy a helmet in the first place, and now that he could access the game, customer service would definitely discover the problem. So he couldn’t risk contacting them.

“Ugh… forget it.” With no other options, Li Huailin sighed. “It’s not a big deal; I just won’t choose to be a mage. I’ll just play as a warrior. Losing 10% Intelligence isn’t a big deal. As for the -10 reputation with other cities, I’ll just stick to the human city. It’ll be fine; I can’t afford the increased prices in other cities anyway.”

Thinking this way, he realized that aside from the lack of a racial trait, he didn’t have any major issues. He could accept this; after all, he was playing illegally, so he figured this penalty was just part of it. At least he could still play, right?

After a bit of self-reassurance, Li Huailin sat back down in his homemade gaming pod and logged back into the game.

Once back at the character interface, Li Huailin ignored the glaring racial trait and checked his current equipment. Tianyu Company didn’t leave players naked upon spawning; they provided a set of clothes and a broken sword.

Clothes: Defense 1-1
Pants: Defense 1-1
Broken Sword: Attack 1-3

Li Huailin glanced at his currency bar; it was pitifully empty—he didn’t even have a single copper coin. He was completely broke, with nothing in his inventory except for the three pieces of equipment on him.

“Wow… how stingy,” Li Huailin complained, then began searching for initial quests, relying on his MMORPG experience.

The server had been up for four days. According to information from the official forum, someone had reached level 10 and left the beginner village that morning. Now it was the afternoon, and many players must have already left. While there were still many new players like Li Huailin just starting out, the overall foot traffic in the beginner village was manageable, unlike the exaggerated photos shared in a forum post titled “Day One of Launch: A Sea of People.”

“Dark creatures have appeared around this village. Future warrior, would you help me eliminate some of them? I will reward you,” an old man with a gray beard said to Li Huailin.

System Prompt: The village chief has issued an E-rank quest: Eliminate the Black Slimes. Do you accept?

“Yes.”

E-rank Quest: Eliminate the Black Slimes: Kill 20 Black Slimes. Reward: 200 Experience, 10 Copper Coins.

After searching for a while, Li Huailin had only found this one quest. Other NPCs only wanted to chat with him and didn’t issue any quests. He thought it might be that he could only accept other quests after completing this one, so he didn’t overthink it. He left the village and began looking for the quest monsters.

Outside the beginner village was a vast expanse of grass, with a few players scattered about fighting Black Slimes. These were beginner monsters, giving only 5 experience points, so not many players were still fighting them. Most had already moved on to higher-level monsters.

Soon, Li Huailin spotted a solitary Black Slime and quickly checked its attributes.

Black Slime: HP: 30, Physical Attack: 8, Physical Defense: 4.

It looked like a blob of black gelatinous material. Li Huailin approached without attacking first, letting it strike him instead. My Character is a Mess.
-3
-2

The attack was indeed low; with 100 hit points, he could take over 40 hits before dying, so it wasn’t really dangerous. Lifting his novice broken sword, Chestnut Heart attempted to strike the enemy.
-5, -6
Calculating, he figured it would take about six or seven strikes to defeat one; sure enough, beginner monsters weren’t too difficult.
After hacking away for a while, the Black Slime splattered into a puddle of black water, and a copper coin bounced out from it.
Battle Record: You killed a Black Slime, deducting 5 experience.
“Hmm, just as the forum said, 5 experience…” Just as Chestnut Heart finished this thought, he realized something was off and looked more closely at his battle record. “Deducting 5 experience” didn’t mean he gained 5 points.
Chestnut Heart hurriedly opened his character attribute panel.
Name: Chestnut Heart
Class: None (Unemployed)
Sub-class: None
Level: 1
Experience: -5/500
…
His experience had actually turned into -5/500. Chestnut Heart initially thought he was seeing things, but the system was serious; not only had he not leveled up, but his experience had also gone negative.
“What the hell? This… is possible?” Chestnut Heart struggled to get out those words.
Without hesitation, he rushed towards another nearby Black Slime and took it down with a few strikes.
Battle Record: You killed a Black Slime, deducting 5 experience.
Looking at his experience bar, now showing -10/500, Chestnut Heart felt a bit speechless.
“Can this game even be played? I can accept that my talent is negative, but my experience is also negative now; how am I supposed to level up…” Confirming that his experience was indeed deducting, Chestnut Heart was left utterly speechless.

Chestnut Heart felt that his character seemed to be stuck in a bug. Recalling the dislocated opening animation and the distorted new player receptionist, along with his strange character attributes, he increasingly felt that this was likely the case. After all, he hadn’t logged in with the official client; his self-made gaming pod was still in a BETA testing phase, so encountering problems was quite possible.

“What to do now…” Chestnut Heart felt a bit depressed. The character data for Glory of the Heart was stored on the official server, and to fix his bugged character, he would have to delete it, then improve his login software, and try creating a new account. However, once a character was deleted, it would take a month to create another one. That was way too troublesome; what if he improved it and ended up with another bugged character, or worse, couldn’t log in at all? That would be game over for him.

“I might as well keep playing like this; I want to see what happens when my experience hits -500,” Chestnut Heart thought defiantly, too lazy to care. After all, he wasn’t trying to conquer the gaming world or become unbeatable; he’d just play through it, bugs and all.

After a bit of a downer, Chestnut Heart defeated a few more Black Slimes and finally completed the task of killing 20. His experience had already dropped to -100/500.

“Heh.” Chestnut Heart chuckled helplessly, then glanced at his HP; he only had 13 points left. Given his health regeneration speed, it would take him half a day to recover. Since he’d completed the quest, he figured it would be easier to just die and respawn instead of running back.

Looking around, he casually drew in two Black Slimes to attack him. In no time, his screen went gray—he was dead.

System Prompt: You have died and gained 50 experience.

“What the hell?” Chestnut Heart couldn’t help but shout as he respawned at the new player village, drawing the attention of nearby newbies. However, they quickly turned back to their business, probably thinking that this young man had been killed by some powerful monster.

Still a bit dazed, Chestnut Heart looked at the system prompt again: dead, and gained experience…

“What do you mean I gained experience from dying?” He confirmed his experience bar—it really showed -50/500, indicating he had indeed gained experience.

“Wait a second, I remember the Glory of the Heart website mentioned that when killed by a monster, you lose 10% of your current experience. I’m level 1, and it takes 500 experience to level up, so 10% is exactly 50 points… I get it now, my character is bugged! Now, receiving experience deducts from my total, but what should be deducted turns into an increase.” Chestnut Heart, not lacking in intelligence, quickly figured it out. “If that’s the case, I just need to die ten times, and I can level up to level 2! Right, dying deducts 10% of my experience, so if I die ten times, I’ll level up. Wow, I’m really cashing in; my leveling speed later on will be unbeatable!”

“I’m definitely going to be super awesome!” Seeing the hope of leveling up, Chestnut Heart started to feel cocky.