Li Huailin's five main stats Strength, Agility, Const.i.tution, Intelligence and Mind were all normal. A beginner's stats were capped at 10, but those who had 10 for all stats when they first created their character were nonexistent. Li Huailin's stats were also quite random, but it was already considered to be above average. What was weird was his racial gift…

Racial gift:

Wisdom: Intelligence -10%

Diplomat: Fame -10 in all capitals except human's.

Li Huailin looked at the gifts' description once more. It was really Intelligence -10 and Fame -10. What was going on?! Shouldn't it be '+' instead?

Without saying anything else, Li Huailin immediately logged out and used his desktop to access the game's web page. The information available on the web page were very little, having only basic information for beginners. Li Huailin immediately looked for the information on the races' gifts.

Human racial gifts:

Wisdom: Intelligence +10%

Diplomat: Fame -10 in all capitals except human race's.

"Weird… it says '+' on the official web page!" Li Huailin confirmed that he didn't see the words wrongly. Sky Universe was also a big company, so any mistakes should be rectified immediately. The game had already been running for four days, so if there was a basic mistake, it should have been found out already.

"Could there be punishment for using a self-made game device?" Li Huailin scratched his head and came up with a random theory to try to alleviate his cluelessness.

After thinking about it, he didn't have any choice but to continue on with this bug. If a normal person were to realise that his character stats were wrong, he can just contact the customer service and the problem would be easily solved. Yet, Li Huailin couldn't do that. He didn't have the right to buy a game device in the first place, yet he has a character? The moment he reported this bug, the service staff would notice this irregularity and who knows what they will do. Thus Li Huailin couldn't turn to them for help.

"Haaaa…. Forget it." With no other choice, Li Huailin gave up. "At most I will just give up on being a wizard, and be a warrior instead. Not much is affected if a warrior loses 10% Intelligence, and as for the -10 Fame, I guess I will just have to stay in human territory for the time being. With -10 Fame, other races' cities friendliness level towards me would be [Cold] and buying things would be 20% more expensive. A beginner like me wouldn't be able to take it!"

Other than not having racial gifts, Li Huailin found out that there weren't other big problems at all. It was still within acceptable range. He had illegally logged into this game, so he just treated this weird bug as a punishment. What mattered was that he could still play.

After consoling himself, Li Huailin logged into the game once again.

Opening the character page again, Li Huailin ignored the annoying racial gift portion and looked at his current equipment. Sky Universe didn't let their players come out b.u.t.t-naked and instead gave them a cloth armor set and a broken sword.

The stats are:

Cloth s.h.i.+rt: Physical Defence 1-1

Cloth Pants: Physical Defence 1-1

Broken Sword: Physical Attack 1-3

Li Huailin then looked at the money he had and found out how stingy the company was. Not even a single copper coin! He was really empty-handed now except for the useless armor which main purpose is to protect his decency, and a broken sword. His inventory had nothing either.

"Stingy, I have experienced a new level of stinginess…" Li Huailin complained before finding for his first quest using his past experiences in other games as a guide.

The game had been launched for four days already and according to the information from the forum, there were already who had reached Level 10 and left the beginner village. Now that it was later, more people must have left the village already. Though there were also many people who had just created their characters, the number of people in the village was still within acceptable range.

After all, there was a forum post t.i.tled 'On the first day of game launch, the beginner village is a sea of people' showing the picture of the village, but with so many people you couldn't even see the floor. Indeed, compared to the traffic then, the traffic Li Huailin experienced now can be considered good.

"Creatures of darkness has been appearing around the village. Future hero, are you willing to help me eliminate these creatures? I will give you some rewards." An old man with a gray beard said to Li Huailin.

System Notice: Beginner Village's village leader is giving you an E-rank quest, [Eliminate Black Slimes]. Do you accept?

"Yes."

E-rank quest [Eliminate Black Slimes]: Kill 20 Black Slimes. Rewards: 200 EXP, 10 copper coins.

After finding for a long time, Li Huailin finally found this quest. The other NPCs only bothered to chat with him all day long and didn't give him a quest at all. Thinking that he would be able to accept other missions only after finis.h.i.+ng this one, Li Huailin accepted the quest. He then went out to find the quest monsters.

The outside of the village was a vast gra.s.sland and there were a few people here and there killing Black Slimes. However, these monsters are only meant for beginners, so it only gave 5 EXP, just for the beginners to level up a bit. Thus, not many people killed these slimes. Most were already over this phase and went to higher leveled monster areas.

In no time, Li Huailin saw a lone Black Slime, and looked at its stats.

Black Slime:

HP: 30

Physical Attack: 8

Physical Defence: 4

It looked like a pile of rubber goo. Li Huailin didn't attack first, and let it attack instead.

-3

-2

The attack was indeed low. Li Huailin had 100 HP, so he needed to be hit 40 times before he could die. There was no danger to speak of at all. Raising up his [Broken Sword], Li Huailin tried attacking it.

-5, -6

After calculating, Li Huailin determined only 6-7 hits were needed to kill it. As expected of beginner mobs, no difficulties at all!

After casually slas.h.i.+ng the slime a few time, the [Black Slime] turned into a pile of black water with a 'squish'. A copper coin popped out too from the body.

Battle Log: You killed a [Black Slime]. You have lost 5 EXP.

"En, as expected, it's the same as what was written on the forum. 5 EXP…" Just as he finished saying that, he found something wrong. Looking at his Battle Log more closely, it wrote 'You have lost 5 EXP', not 'You have gained 5 EXP'.

Li Huailin quickly brought up his status page.

Name: Forest

Profession: None

Secondary Profession: None

Level: 1

EXP -5/500

The EXP really turned into -5/500. Li Huailin thought and hoped that it was his eyes that had seen wrongly, but the system was being serious with him. Great. He hadn't leveled up yet, but his EXP had now gone into the negatives.

"What is going on? Th-this is possible too?" Li Huailin said after being speechless for a long time.

Without talking anymore, Li Huailin quickly went to kill another [Black Slime] not far away.

Battle Log: You killed a [Black Slime]. You have lost 5 EXP.

Seeing his EXP that had turned -10/500 now, Li Huailin was left a little speechless already.

"Can this game even be played? Racial gift becoming negative, okay, so be it. Now even my EXP is negative? How do you expect me to level up?!" Confirming once more that his EXP will become negative, Li Huailin didn't know what to say anymore.

Li Huailin felt that his character had been bugged. Recalling the bugged video and the bugged beginner attendant, combined with his weird EXP now, Li Huailin was even more sure that his character was indeed bugged. After all, he didn't use the official game device, but his own homemade one which was still in its beta phase. Having some bugs was possible.

"What should I do now…" Li Huailin was quite depressed.

's character is kept in the game servers. To change this bugged character, he would have to delete it, fix the code for his homemade game device, then try to create another character again. However, after a character has been deleted, one would have to wait for one month to create a character again. That was too troublesome. If his character was still bugged after fixing his code, or his device becomes unable to connect to the server, he wouldn't be able to play anymore.

"I will just keep playing on like that! Let's see what happens when my EXP gets to -500/500!" Li Huailin made a snap decision and didn't care anymore. He didn't play this game to conquer and become unbeatable in it anyways. If it is bugged, then let it be bugged.

A slightly depressed Li Huailin continued killing black slimes for awhile and finally completed the mission. His experience also turned into a pathetic -100/500.

"Haha…" Li Huailin made a helpless laugh and looked at his HP. He was still left with 13 points. According to his HP recovery rate, it would take half a day for it fully recover. Now that he had completed his mission, why not just die and resp.a.w.n back in town? He was too lazy to run back. What else did he have to lose? His EXP was an enormous(lol) -100/500 after all.

Looking at his surroundings, Li Huailin lured two [Black Slimes] into attacking him. Not long after, Li Huailin's vision grayed and he died.

System Notice: You have died. You have gained 50 EXP.

"Whut?!" Li Huailin who had just revived at the resp.a.w.n area of the village couldn't restrain a shout. This attracted the attention of many beginners, but they quickly moved on. They thought that this young guy must have been killed by some strong monster and was shouting in disbelief.

Li Huailin still hasn't recovered yet. He looked at the notice once more. 'Died', 'You have gained 50 EXP'……

"I will gain EXP when I die?" Li Huailin looked at his EXP, and it really became -50/500. This showed that his EXP really increased this time.

"Wait! I remember that the web page stated that when someone dies, he will lose 10% of the total EXP needed to raise to the next level. I'm level 1, so I need 500 EXP to level up. Isn't 50 points just nice 10% of 500? I know now! My character is bugged, so I will lose EXP when I gain them, and gain EXP when it should have been lost!" Li Huailin was smart and immediately deduced the situation. "So this game can be played like that too! Doesn't this mean that if I die 10 times I can get to Level 2? Furthermore, the death penalty is 10% of current level EXP, so wouldn't I be able to level up no matter what level I am after dying ten times? d.a.m.n! This is indeed a bug, but a good one! This means that my leveling in the later stages will be unparalleled!"

"I'm indeed super-duper-extremely awesome!" Seeing hope for leveling up, Li Huailin started praising himself shamelessly and arrogantly…

Translator's Notes:

Second chapter of the 5 chapter ma.s.s release of new project~

Saquacon (Translator)

Saquacon (PR)