MMORPG: Rise of the Peerless Pumpkinmancer

At the edge of the New Leaf Training Camp, a young man was handling a small white cube with a nostalgic smile. The Cluck-Cluck loot box had always been a classic of Infinite!

The item surprisingly looked chic with barely noticeable feathers engravings on the sides. With a grin, Jack powerfully clenched his hand, reducing the item into purple glowing particles. He then carefully controlled his mana to fish inside the amalgam of light.

He gave a satisfied smile, and it was over. The entire process barely took a second, and only Bubblegum witnessed it. She couldn’t help but gasp. This guy even had a secret technique to open loot boxes?! How extravagant!

The other players all had their loot appear at their feet, bending to grab it. Jack had instead sent it to his inventory directly. This method considerably lowered the chances of targeted PK happening. It was a habit that was ingrained in his bones.

Jack had received plenty. As soon as he had opened the loot box, system messages had flooded him:

[Analyzing Contribution: Chicken Onslaught]

[Ding! ~ 25%: Mythical Grading! Wow!]

[+300 Reputation in the New Leaf Village]

[Acquired Title: Anti-Chicken Warrior +10% DMG vs. Chickens]

[+ Bloodstained Head of the Overlord]

[+ Bloodstained Chicken Feather]

[+ Bloodstained Chicken Beak]

[+ Cluckinator]

One OP Title and 4 OP items!

Jack couldn’t help but grin. This was HUGE!

The Chicken Warrior title would barely show an effect at the start of the game but would scale monstrously. Anything % based had the potential to reach incredible heights by stacking buffs.

The chicken part wasn’t that restrictive either. The damage buff would activate against anything with any remote link to chickens. A good example of this was cockatrices. Hell, it even had the possibility to affect certain breeds of phoenixes.

Plus, there was a dungeon that had just appeared. As the shape of the entrance suggested, there would be plenty of these feathery creatures in there.

The bloodstained head was a trophy. He could have it stuffed to act as a buffing station or use it to negotiate with NPCs. For instance, it could be used as proof of subjugation.

The bloodstained feather and beak were magical materials with so many uses that he couldn’t list them all. He already had a few inklings of how he would use them.

Then there was the Cluckinator. It was a long feather shape white falchion that would no doubt slightly glister in the sun. Jack had truly lucked out on this one.

It was Epic!!

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Epic Cluckinator! ??

Rank F+

Level 10

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[Attack] 3-5

[Speed] Fast

[Range] Melee

[Durability] Very High

[Passive] + Cluck-Cluck

[Active] + Berserk (1/h)

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Obtaining such an OP item this early was a miracle!

To put things into perspective, most players wouldn’t see an epic item before they were level 50, much less own one! The little ?? proved that the falchion wasn’t a pseudo-epic.

What made it Epic? Of course, it was the two skills! Jack was more than eager to test them, but he had a decision to make beforehand.

At the end of the previous event, he had heard the level-up chime sound twice. This meant he now had more HP, mana and had attribute points to spend.

He opened his status screen, almost shocked at how empty it looked. The system really was doing its best not to overwhelm the players too much with the menus.

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[ STATUS! ]

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Player: Jack’ O Level 2

Class: None

Title: Anti-Chicken Militia

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HP: 24

Mana: 12

Condition: Healthy

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STR: 1

AGI: 1

INT: 1

SPI: 1

+ 6 Points available

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As he noticed the Condition line, he thanked the constant regeneration in the beginner village once again. Not having to eat, drink or chug stamina potions was a blessing.

He now had two choices to make.

The first one was to select his preferred title, but this one was a no-brainer. Early-game, Chicken Militia was 100% the best one he had unlocked.

The second was to invest his bonus attribute points. He could either dump it all in one stat or spread them to many.

1. Strength would help his physical damage capabilities and his capacity to block. It also affected any physical activity.

2. Agility would increase his movement speed as well as increase his evasion. It helped with anything requiring dexterity.

3. Intelligence was the key stat he would eventually need as a necromancer. Any scholarly activity would require it.

4. Spirit was always good to have in any and all builds. It affected all regeneration and buffs. All professions could use Spirit!

One could have expected that such a choice would be easy because of his knowledge, but it was the opposite. He knew many ways to progress by investing in any of the attributes. The question was now which one would serve him best right now.

For a while, he would have to hunt chickens, foxes, and wolves.

– The chickens would be a cinch thanks to his title and equipment

– The foxes were way too fast

– The wolves were fast and powerful.

An intelligence rush would leave him a sitting duck. He would then require someone to act as his vanguard, which would screw his plans to attempt to solo clear for increased rewards.

Spirit could have worked very well if he had more time. Picking a bard pseudo-class was always a possibility, but he had no experience with it and would have to learn from scratch.

Bards were actually overpowered early game because they had many small percentage-based buffs. The system would round up the final result to a +1, and it was even more effective for self-buffs. But, all in all, it was balanced in the grand scheme of things.

This left him with two choices.

1. He could do an agility rush and dodge every single hit. This was something he was perfectly capable of doing. Plus, the increased movement speed would increase his clear speed a lot.

2. He could invest his points into strength. This would mean relying on blocking to counter the speed of the enemies and would require decent gear. The advantage of this was that his damage would increase drastically too.

Agility would be better right now, but strength would fit more in the build he had in mind. Having reached this conclusion, Jack poured all his available points into strength. This would make him a mighty warrior with the speed of a snail!

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STR: 7

AGI: 1

INT: 1

SPI: 1

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He couldn’t help but chuckle. This looked so damn unbalanced! He would definitely have to branch out at some point, but for now, this would suffice.

As he came back to his senses, he noticed Bubblegum. She was glaring mid-air at her status screen as if it owed her money.

“You alright?” Jack laughingly asked.

“I’m hesitating between 2 STR + 1 AGI or 1 STR + 2 AGI….”

“That’s it? What kind of Class are you aiming for?”

Bubblegum took an elegant pose, raising an arm high in the air as if shooting down the stars. “I’ll become a legendary assassin dreaded by all!”

Jack couldn’t help but fleetingly grimace at the Class, forcefully pushing the bad memories away. “You can put all your points into Agility then. No need to over-think this.”

“Won’t there be diminishing returns?”

“Yes, but reaching certain milestones will give you another push forward. Think about this, as an assassin, most of your skills will require Agility. Relying on gear for your skills can lock you out of great new equipment.”

“What about in the future?”

“For a melee assassin branch out in strength, for a magical one add intelligence, for a ranged one you can go pure agility, and finally for mad sustain pick spirit too.”

“Alright, I’ll keep this in mind. I guess I’ll have to figure out my preferred playstyle for Infinite.”

“Yep, don’t worry too much about it. It takes time.” Jack reassured.

“Quote of the day: It takes time. Says the man that somehow knows everything about the game. Say, you’re one of the developers, right?”

“Haha, no way.” Jack chuckled.

“True, seeing you…more like the lead developer!” She sized him up before nodding confidently, sure of her conclusion.

“Well, that’s….” Jack scratched his head awkwardly.

“Yes, yes, I know. You can’t admit to it, NDA and all. I understand!” She gave him a thumb up.

Jack was okay with this outcome. This explanation was better than something as crazy as coming back to the past. Just as he was musing about his circumstances, a pop-up appeared in front of his eyes.

[Bubblegum has invited you to join a party.]

Jack looked at her puzzled but accepted. As they formed a party, she began to emit a soft green glow in his eyes.

“Oh my god! You’re glowing! You’re all green! This is so cool!” She exclaimed with stars in her eyes. “With this, I can easily locate you whenever! I see your name too!”

“This only works in relative proximity. Allies will glow green, the neutral units blue, and the monsters red. This is to make the raids a little less messy, I believe.” Jack explained.

“What happens when you are farther apart then?”

“Medium range it tells you the general direction in which the allies are. Long-range, it just stops working.”

“I see…” Bubblegum absent-mindedly replied. A second later, Jack understood why.

– Bubblegum: I can now spam you with messages Muhahahaha! ??

– Jack’O: I can block you ˉ_(ツ)_/ˉ

– Bubblegum: Nooo *breathes in* noooo!

Jack couldn’t help but smile, seeing how happy she was. This was only the friend chat too!

– Bubblegum: Ah, the CPR wolf wannabe is coming our way. Time to run?

The Mighty Wolves were approaching with incredible momentum and stern faces, the whole squad. What now…

Creator’s Thought

Getting an Epic weapon this early is incredible! Was it the first one in the entire game? Quite possibly. Getting one was only possible with a contribution rating of at least 15% on the Chicken Onslaught. Mine was so high thanks to being the main strategist and that one devasting combo at the end.