Star Moon Kingdom, White River City.
Shi Feng, clad in a black cloak, had barely stepped out of the teleportation hall when he noticed that the streets — once filled with players shouting for party members — now bustled with far more than just adventure teams. A great number of merchant players from other kingdoms had also set up shop, buying and selling goods.
Thanks to the latest system update, players from neighboring kingdoms no longer had to transfer through the Star Moon royal capital to reach White River City — they could teleport straight here now.
The thriving trade scene was a far cry from the old White River City.
Beyond the merchants, far more guilds and adventure teams had made their way here as well, clearly because the reduced teleportation fees from this update had finally convinced the hesitant ones to come take a look.
"So this is White River City? The commerce here is incredible! It's even better than the royal capital of our Northern Kingdom!"
"How are the players' levels so high here!"
"No way — does this city even have an airship system?"
……
The newly arrived guilds and adventure teams from all over were utterly stunned by White River City's prosperity.
Before, they had only heard about it online. White River City in the Star Moon Kingdom was said to be the kingdom's number-one NPC city, but they had always dismissed that title as a joke.
After all, how could an NPC city possibly compare to a kingdom's royal capital?
If an NPC city truly surpassed a kingdom's capital, that could only mean one thing — the kingdom was far too weak. And the fact that the Star Moon Kingdom's top guild was a newly established guild in the Divine Realm only proved that point.
Had it not been for the drastically reduced teleportation fees and the ability to teleport from White River City directly to the heart of the Twin Tower Kingdom to hunt Abyssal monsters and change to a hidden class, they would never have bothered coming to White River City.
But now that they saw it with their own eyes, it was nothing like they had imagined.
The streets were packed with merchant players hawking their wares, every single item a quality piece. There were even level 40 Gold-grade weapons and level 45 Gold-grade equipment for sale — the sort of thing you might occasionally spot at a royal capital's Auction House, yet here players were openly selling them right on the street.
What truly shocked them was the dungeon scene — pickup groups were forming to tackle level 40 Hard-difficulty 100-man dungeons…
While many players in the Divine Realm had already surpassed level 40, level 40 was merely the minimum for a 100-man dungeon, let alone a Hard-difficulty 100-man raid. Those were typically tackled by major guilds, with a dozen or more veterans who had already cleared the dungeon leading the charge, or by large adventure parties.
A pickup group would count itself lucky just to clear a Normal-difficulty 100-man dungeon — tackling a Hard-difficulty one was nothing but a pipe dream.
The newly arrived guild players had been ready to cast contemptuous glances, but the moment they saw the levels and equipment of those forming parties, every last one of them shut their mouths.
Every single member was level 41 or above, with the worst equipment being level 35 Mythril gear. Many wore level 40 Mythril equipment, and the party leaders had mostly level 40 Gold-grade and level 35 Dark Gold equipment — even the elite squads of major guilds were no better than this…
"Haha, another batch of dumbfounded newcomers! They really dared to treat White River City like some ordinary NPC city. This is just the street outside the teleportation hall — just wait until they see the commercial district in the center. Their eyeballs are going to pop right out of their heads!"
"Weren't you the same way before?"
"That's because I didn't know any better! And I'm nothing like them — I came here because of the Zero Wing Guild. It's just a shame Zero Wing's recruitment standards are a bit too high. Last time, I missed passing by just a little."
"Alright, enough chat — the captain said it's time to rally up. Today, we've got to take down the first boss of the Hell-difficulty 100-man dungeon!"