?The Smugglers Stronghold
The screenshots posted by Boxlunch quickly caused a sensation after it was uploaded in the official forum of Elven Kingdom.
After examining the images in jis post, it can be concluded that the ruins of Rivendell is truly a magnificent place with its towering elven architecture that still looks grand and majestic, even after a thousand years had passed.
As the former manufacturing and mining center of the elven kingdom, the ruins of Rivendell still bear some traces of its industrial past such as the various mining tracks that still have carts on it and the various forging furnaces which are vaguely distinguishable within the distance. All these mechanical and rusted objects give the place a steampunk aesthetic one wouldn’t normally expect in a high fantasy world like Elven Kingdom.
Moreover, the vicissitudes that have endured for over a millennium along with the eerie and frigid atmosphere that is unique to the dark canyon have imposed a profound sense of mystery to the entire area.
The mine tunnels crisscrossing beneath the massive building complex and the towering spire at the center that looms overhead as it cast deep and enigmatic shadows, basking everyone into a shade of impassivity…
All in all, seeing all these screenshots have exhilarated the players desires to explore this vast befallen ruins!
The number of comments to the post have arisen exponentially within minutes.
“Damn! This elven ruins is quite impressive! It fulfills all my fantasies about a ruined world…”
“Did you see that deep hole at the back? I think its the entrance to the underworld…”
“This new location seems great! I’ve been adventuring in the forest all this time, and although the scenery is still great, I kinda feel like I need a change of pace, you know? Seeing these steampunk ruins makes me wanna explore the mysteries hidden behind this place!”
“I’m curious about what kind of mobs will spawn in this new map! There are fewer and fewer monsters in the elven forest that I can hunt, and the only ones left are too strong for me to handle alone. Going to some farther places is also unsafe…I wonder if Rivendell will have cave spiders, kobolds, and so on…”
“Forget about the mobs for now…Did any of you guys remember? The holy city of Florence once had so many good things that was uncovered when we first discovered it. As the elven manufacturing capital, Rivendell was destroyed before the elves even had a chance to evacuate, right? Surely there must be more treasures hidden beneath these ruins!”
“Dude, you’re really tempting me…”
The players were boiling with excitement.
For a while, the post with the screenshots of Rivendell uploaded by Boxlunch had became the most popular topic on the forum.
The in-game public chatroom was also flooded with messages from various players…
“Sir Box, please do a live broadcast!”
“Yeah! Please! We also want to have an early look at Rivendell!”
“Boss Box, I heard you were captured by some human smugglers…can you post a screenshot? We want to see what the caravan looks like.”
“Boxlunch, is it really true that you currently have a beautiful elven girl along with you?”
“Damn, there are even NPC girls? Friggin’ lucky winners in life, go explode, tch…”
“Lol, I’m so jealous man, how about you? xD”
“Bruh, this is literally the stereotypical story of a hero saving a damsel. Dammit, I also wanna trigger a hidden sidequest with an NPC maiden!”
“How shameless! I bet you just want to trigger a hidden quest so that you can cozy up with an NPC girl.”
“Lmao, I think this guy’s more interested in the NPC’s body.”
“Pffft…You guys are all perverts!”
Boxlunch: “…..”
He took a deep breath and blocked all the players whose posting increasingly inappropriate comments at the public chatroom.
The elven girl next to him looked nervously at the human mercenaries around her, then glanced at Boxlunch who was just absent-mindedly looking at nothing in midair, and pursed her lips.
Just what’s up with this guy...
How can he still have the guts to daydream despite their precarious situation?
She hasn’t been feeling well ever since she heard from him that there was a silver-ranked experts in this human caravan.
However, this dumbass who mentioned it all seemed to be entirely fearless and she truly didn’t know whether he’s really unafraid or just too overconfident with his abilities…
She was a bit skeptical about the backup with silver-ranked strength that he mentioned, but regardless…She’s now starting to regret her reckless decision.
What if…
What if this dumbass is completely unreliable, and they somehow run into those silver-ranked experts while they are escaping?
Wouldn’t they all be doomed then?
The thought made the girl shiver uncontrollably.
After closing the public chatroom, Boxlunch turned his attention back to the caravan.
The human caravan wasn’t particularly large, with only about fifty or sixty people, half of whom were mercenaries.
To avoid arousing suspicion, Boxlunch didn’t tried appraising any of their strengths.
However, he observed the movements of their footsteps whenever these mercenaries walked and roughly judged that their strength was not very high.
Most of them probably hadn’t even reached the intermediate iron-rank!
This surprised Boxlunch a little.
He felt that the strength of these human mercenaries seemed to be somewhat low.
In fact, this is because Boxlunch didn’t know much about the general strength of the various sentient races living within Saigües.
In the mortal realm, there are not many people who can reach the iron-rank. The ratio was that out of a hundred people, there may only be two or three practitioners who can broke through to level 10, and the majority of the populace only have the base strength of an apprentice.
And the cost of hiring professional mercenaries is not cheap either.
Relatively speaking, a human in the iron-rank would have no worries finding employment. Any mercenary organization or caravan will welcome such an expert with open arms.
Human caravans in Saigües are generally focused on maximizing profits. When hiring mercenaries for escort, the owners of these caravans have the tendency to hire low-cost individuals.
Generally, they will hire a large number of low-ranked mercenaries, plus one or two impressive experts to be in charge.
The reason why Boxlunch feels that these mercenaries are weak is simply because he has always been dealing with strong mobs and the orcs.
In fact…In the eyes of ordinary humans, the mobs and orcs the players besieged, are fierce and powerful creatures that one couldn’t normally handle.
Of course, although the overall strength of humankind is relatively low, their population is very large in comparison. Therefore, the number of ranked experts among humankind is actually the highest amongst all the sentient races.
Moreover, there are many lucky ones who have ranked even further among the humans who become Experts. The Sauron family is proud of its strength because of their capacity to employ such strong individuals that’s dominating the continent.
If we look at the overall strength of humanity, they are actually the strongest race in Saigües.
Indeed, the ruler of the current Eternal Era is definitely humankind!
Their only problem is that mankind has a tendency to wage war against each other, which has resulted in the segregation of their population into various countries, thereby lowering their overall strength. This weakness is enough to make any other sentient race feel a breath of relieve since a unified humanity is a very fearsome force to be reckoned with!
As for the Sauron caravan, which is widely renowned all throughout the continent…generally speaking, no one would dare to have any thoughts of attacking them, as long as they can assemble the power to resist the wild monsters and display the Sauron family’s banner along the way to deter bandits.
Therefore, although the value of the goods escorted by this caravan is not low, their overall strength is only two capable silver-ranked experts.
Of course, these silver-ranked mercenaries are already very strong…
Boxlunch’s gaze flickered slightly as he looked towards the front of the caravan.
There, a human mage dressed in gorgeous attire stood in a regal manner. He appeared to be around fifty or sixty years old and beside him was also a tall golden-haired swordsman who seemed to be his guard.
Even though they were far apart, Boxlunch could still sense the strong aura emanating from the both of them…
Silver!
These are the two silver-ranked experts among these human smugglers!
After a while, the merchant group stopped in front of a hundred-meter tall spire in the ruins.
The mercenaries drove the wagons into an empty plot of land next to the spire, and brought Boxlunch and the elven girl inside the tower.
Once inside the spire, the two understood that this was one of the smuggling stronghold of this merchant group!
Unlike the ruined exterior outside, the interior of this tower was well-organized with various living facilities, but the air inside was murky, making the two elves instinctively wrinkle their brows.
After the merchant group entered, several guarding personnel promptly greeted them.
Boxlunch saw a guy in a mage attire, who seemed to be the leader of this place, made a respectful gesture towards the the silver-rank expert that entered along with them.
“Lord Belus, you finally arrived! Our clients have been urging us for these goods several times already, and the amount they wanted is too large this time…Of course, I didn’t dare to trade without your presence.”
The silver-rank who apparently is named Belus shrewdly smiled.
“The kingdom has been keeping a close watch on us lately, so we took a detour and made a small profit from the orcs, and unexpectedly obtained something valuable as well along the way.”
After speaking, he pointed to Boxlunch and the elven girl and said, “Here are two more elves! Lock them up too and sell them with the next batch of goods.”
“Two more?”
The man’s eyes lit up.
He looked at the two and nodded, “They are quite good. I’ll have them locked up right away!”
After that, he waved his hand and two more people came forward and took Boxlunch and the girl away.
Both of them didn’t resist and were escorted by some human guards into the depths of the tower as if they had really lost their strength. They were ushered towards a dark underground passageway that led straight down a narrow path.
They silently walked down the underground passage for ten straight minutes before finally arriving in front of a deep and damp dungeon that’s dimly illuminated.
As soon as they arrived here, Boxlunch saw seven or eight young elves locked up in a horrid condition and all looked towards them with surprise etched upon their faces!
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