Blue Sword

Hagia Sophia is the largest church in Constantinople and the headquarters of the Imperial Orthodox Church. There are many shops scattered around, basically all properties of the Orthodox Church and run by the church deacons themselves. Ask found a shop specializing in alchemy items, walked in and knocked on the counter.

"Hello, customer." Behind the counter, the church deacon in black robes nodded slightly to him, "What do you need to buy?"

"I have two shops that I hope to sell to the church," Aske said.

"Well, you are Asike from the Achilles family." The church deacon recognized his appearance.

After all, before Aske's parents disappeared, they basically raised large amounts of money for the church every year. Therefore, the deacon is not unfamiliar with this young master of the Achilles family. "Are you planning to sell the two shops left by your parents to the church?"

"Yes." Ask said, "You make a price."

"I know the two shops in your home. They are both gold industries that make a lot of money every day." The church deacon said, "I will give you an estimate of 700 pounds for the pharmacy on Theo Cido Avenue; as for the Marina Tower The nearby tavern, because the catering industry has not been booming recently, is therefore valued at 550 pounds..."

"But I still want to remind you, Mr. Achilles, these two properties were left to you by your parents. The monthly stable profit is about 10 pounds. If you are just short of money, you can apply for a mortgage from the Imperial Bank With the loan, there is absolutely no need to sell these two properties directly.”

"I understand what you mean," Ask lied, "but I'm going back to my hometown to get married, so I don't have time to collect rent from these two properties on a regular basis, so I still hope to cash it in directly."

The church deacon frowned. Return to your hometown to get married? Ask, aren't you a native of Constantinople? But looking at the other party's fully armed appearance, the marriage must be fake, and going out for adventure is probably real.

After all, this is someone else's own career plan, so the deacon couldn't persuade him anymore. He turned around and took out the real estate transaction template contract from the box on the shelf, put it on the counter and said:

"In this case, please fill in the name of the store being sold on the contract and sign your name at the bottom of the contract. After we verify the status of your store, we can complete the transfer and pay you ”

If you were any other private buyer, before making a real estate transaction, you would definitely ask a lawyer to review the contract, verify your identity, check the property deeds, etc., and ask an Orthodox church to be present for notarization during the entire process, which would take only a day or two. indefinite.

This is also the reason why Asker chose to sell directly to the Orthodox Church: to save trouble.

After signing the contract, the church deacon stuffed the two documents into the fax machine, and then asked Aske to sit down in the store.

About half an hour later, the church deacon who had answered the phone came over and said:

"The property you want to sell has been verified and the transfer procedures have been completed. Do you need to directly transfer it to your bank card or pay in cash?"

"Cash it," Aske said.

The church deacon took out a wad of banknotes, counted them, and handed them to Aske.

The latter took the banknotes, but did not rush to put them into his wallet. Instead, he asked the deacon:

"Do you have any blank soul contract templates here? I'll buy two."

"Soul contract?" The church deacon was a little surprised, "Why do you want a soul contract?"

"Go back to your hometown, get married, and sign a loyalty agreement with your wife." Asker said nonsense.

The church deacon said oh, thinking that you nobles still know how to play.

The so-called soul contract is an oath that is bound by extraordinary power and acts directly on the mental body.

For example, before a couple gets married, they write in their soul contract that they will never cheat after marriage. Once they sign the soul contract, their psychological consciousness will be extremely resistant to cheating. If they force themselves to break the contract, the final outcome will definitely be schizophrenia.

However, this soul contract is very expensive. The price is basically 100 pounds, and normal people cannot afford it.

Even the truly wealthy nobles would not waste money on this thing. They would only use it occasionally during marriages. It is what Asker calls a "loyalty agreement". Essentially, it is because they are worried that it will not be binding after marriage. The other party caused his own reputation to be ruined, so he had to rely on the power of the soul contract.

Having just received 1,250 pounds, he paid another 200 pounds in the blink of an eye. Asik didn't show any distress on his face. He just carefully put away the two soul contracts and asked with a smile:

"We have made such a big deal, how about adding a pistol to top it off?"

"Pistol?" The church deacon really believed that the other party was getting married. How worried are you about your future wife?

Signing a loyalty agreement is not enough, but you also need to buy a pistol and carry it with you? Are you going to use it to beat the adulterer to death or your wife?

"Of course." The church deacon considered his words, "According to the above rules, I have the right to give you a 5% rebate for transactions with a price of more than 50 pounds. You can actually buy a semi-automatic rifle for 10 pounds, but you need to provide an automatic weapons authorization. certificate."

"I don't have a license, so I'll just buy a pistol." Asker said, "Do you have a more powerful pistol here? It's best to have a large caliber and strong armor-breaking power.

"I must recommend the Imperial Eagle to you." The church deacon took out a black box from under the counter. "The caliber is 15.2mm. If paired with a special super-heavy elephant bullet, the kinetic energy of the muzzle is more than 10,000 joules. Even the Titan can do it. It was blown up from the front. In fact, we basically only sell this thing to the Kalmar Empire in the North, and they use it to hunt frost giants."

He opened the black box, revealing the silver revolver inside and a row of shiny metallic 15.2mm bullets, each of which was as long as an adult's hand.

"Very good." Ask said, "I want this gun, but do you have any rapid-fire automatic pistols? It's best to bring a silencer."

"You should be talking about Aphrodite." The church deacon took out another box from the shelf nearby, "Just from the name, you can tell that it is specially made for the Province of Cyris. It is a small and flexible rapid-fire pistol. "

"By God, I must be honest with you. This pistol was originally designed for female nobles of the empire. However, it has been sought after by mages since its release because its recoil is so small that even women and children can use it. "

"If a pistol can achieve the effect of self-defense, why spend money to hire a mage guard? Of course, I suggest that you also buy this pistol and use it as an auxiliary gun for the Imperial Eagle."

"Then let's take these two." Ask said, "How much do they cost?"

"11 pounds." The church deacon replied, "The Imperial Eagle is 7 pounds, and Aphrodite is 4 pounds. Please forgive me for not exempting you from the fraction of 1 pound, because it is originally included in the rebate."

"I'll give you 20 pounds." Asik took out a banknote, "For the rest, help me exchange all of them for the Spiritual Light Scroll."

"Authentication of spiritual light, right?" the church deacon said with a smile, "Wise choice, after all, if the adulterer has extraordinary power, even the Imperial Eagle cannot be sure to kill it... Well, please forgive me for being presumptuous, I just said I was thinking about other things and made a slip of the tongue."

"Ah, please don't worry." Ask said, "There is no such thing as an adulterer."

"I understand, it's your wife, right? A partner with extraordinary power is the main cause of domestic violence after marriage. It's definitely worth your money to buy these two guns." The church deacon coughed and pulled the gun from the shelf. Taking down two boxes, "I will give you two more boxes of bullets, one box is 15.2mm elephant hunting bullets, and the other box is 9mm standard bullets, as compensation for my rudeness just now."

"You are so polite, I forgive you." Asker took two pistols, loaded the aura scrolls and bullets, then made a blessing gesture with the church deacon, turned around and left.

"Oh, love." Looking at Aske's leaving figure, the church deacon sighed with emotion. He seemed to have seen a young aristocratic man with a rich fortune and a bright future turn into a pitiful husband who was shaking with a pistol and being insulted and insulted by his wife every day.

"Well, it's much more pleasing to the eye now." Asik passed by a store and looked at his appearance in the window. He was wearing armor and a sword, and had two pistols at his waist. He was fully armed, as if he had regained the player with full combat power in the past. Feel.

In the early stages of the game, firearms are much more powerful than swords; by the time you reach the middle of the game and the NPC level has steadily increased, ordinary firearms are no longer powerful enough (note, they are ordinary firearms!).

After all, the power of a bullet depends on the explosion of gunpowder inside, and its exit kinetic energy is constant. As the enemy's physical resistance increases, the bullet's killing effect will only become weaker and weaker.

As for swords, their lethality gradually increases as their strength increases.

The body of the original owner NPC seems a bit similar to myself before time travel? Ask carefully studied the appearance reflected in the window, and found that except for the deep eye sockets, high cheekbones, and slightly Western features on the entire face, the general facial features were very similar to his own in reality.

After all, the Solomon nation in the game also has black hair, brown eyes, and darker skin (compared to blond white people). At least the color tone is no different from the Chinese.

Maybe he wore a soul and a body, which led to the fusion of the original body and the NPC's body, and finally turned into this hybrid appearance?

Or maybe he was just kidnapped, intubated in the back of his head, soaked in a jar of nutrient solution and played games, like The Matrix or Sword Art Online?

Because the programmer was lazy, he directly copied his own appearance, changed it casually and pasted it into his own character?

Ask shook his head and pushed these conjectures out of his mind, because they basically had no answers.

Looking at his equipment again, Asik pondered. Although this body is still at Level 0 and has been bled by vampires for a long time, its strength, agility and endurance are unexpectedly much higher than those of ordinary adult men, and it is unknown why. Now, due to time travel, the vampire's hypnosis on this body has been broken. In addition, "Iron and Fire" is not a game that only looks at level attributes. Tactical awareness and combat skills are equally important.

With the current situation, Asker can be 100% sure that he can kill all the dozen or so unsuspecting vampires in his family.

But now is not the time, it’s time to go find Paige.

Nearby cemetery at dusk.

"...The fire burned away her body, but her soul will find peace in the Lord's kingdom of heaven, Amen." The priest said in his final speech.

"...Amen." Everyone present said in unison. Those who came to attend the funeral were all neighbors who lived in the same neighborhood.

Asker swung the shovel and buried the last shovelful of earth on the coffin. According to imperial custom, the closest relatives of the deceased should be buried. However, Peggy's entire family was burned to death in the fire, so Asker offered to take over the task.

Neighbors who came to pay their respects also breathed a sigh of relief. In fact, no one dares to compete with you for a shovel despite your fierce appearance wearing armor, sword and gun!

The priest and the neighbors left, and Aske sat on the newly erected tombstone and yawned lazily.

"It seems like it's going to rain." He smelled the moist smell in the air and looked at the dark, overcast sky.

In the world of "Iron and Fire", level and attributes are two separate lines. Attributes come from extraordinary power, which can be obtained by killing monsters, taking spiritual substances, and performing rituals. By the way, the English scientific name of extraordinary power is "Ethereal_Xeno_Power", and the abbreviation is EXP, which is actually equivalent to experience points in the game.

After acquiring extraordinary strength, it can be transformed into two attributes through exercise or actual combat.

The first is physical strength, Stamina, which increases the explosive power, control, endurance and reaction speed of human muscles.

The second is spiritual power, Magicka, which is used to improve the intelligence and willpower of the human brain. These two determine the "hardware" level of a character's combat effectiveness.

In addition to attributes, level is another system. All players and human NPCs are level 0 when they are born and must gain upgrades by ingesting specific drugs.

In the Eastern Solomon Empire, where magic and technology were developed, this drug was a blood potion; in the Western Solomon Empire (which has been destroyed), which adhered to the original scientific and technological system of mankind, and now the Holy See of Solomon, this drug was a genetic preparation.

In essence, spiritual substances are integrated into the human body, resulting in the transformation of extraordinary characteristics and the acquisition of certain special abilities.

If the improvement of attributes and combat effectiveness are quantitative changes, then the improvement of level is a qualitative change.

Peggy, who was turned into a vampire, naturally possesses the first extraordinary characteristic - Flesh I.

At this time, her level has been upgraded to 1, which has considerable bonuses to explosive power, control, endurance and reaction speed. At the same time, she has gained the ability to heal wounds quickly, and no longer has fatal parts except the heart and brain.

During the public beta plot stage, having such a companion would not be as simple as 1+1 to help Aske himself.