Chapter 18: The Difficult Path of a F2P Player
After finally treating the scrapes on Kuina's body, the doctor left. His medical skills were useless for a patient with such severe cerebral concussion.
In the dojo, a group of junior disciples gathered around Kuina. Some of the younger ones had already started crying. Master Koushirou had to persuade them repeatedly before they finally left.
After the group of brats reluctantly departed, only Ian and Zoro remained in the dojo, keeping watch by Kuina's side.
Master Koushirou walked in and said to them, "You've worked hard. Go get some rest. I'll take care of Kuina."
"No!" Zoro gritted his teeth. "I'm waiting for her to wake up!"
Ian thought for a moment and then said to Koushirou, "Master, I need to step out for a bit."
Without waiting for Koushirou's nod, Ian hurried back to his room.
Except when it was eating, the Den Den Mushi spent most of its time dozing. However, when Ian picked up its shell, it perked up, its big eyes opening wide.
Ian dialed Ivankov's number on the dial pad, and the Den Den Mushi emitted a "Boo... boo..." sound, as if waiting for a connection.
Before long, the call was finally connected. Ian's Den Den Mushi transformed into Ivankov's likeness, with long eyelashes appearing over its big eyes and even purple lipstick on its lips. It was quite a magical sight, but Ian had no time to study it.
Ivankov's voice came through from the other end: "Hee-haw! Who's calling? Is that you, Kuma?"
No wonder Ivankov mistook him. The Den Den Mushi on Ivankov's end had probably simulated Ian's appearance—or rather, simulated the original appearance of Ian's Den Den Mushi. Since Ian was still wearing that bear-eared hat, Ivankov didn't recognize him at first and mistakenly thought he was Kuma.
"It's not Uncle Kuma, it's me, Ian!" Ian said into the receiver.
The Den Den Mushi on the table paused for a moment, then mimicked Ivankov's expression: "Oh, it's you, Ian little candy! Long time no see. I didn't expect you to call me."
"Ivankov, no small talk!" Ian said urgently. "That day on the ship, I saw you giving first aid to Sabo. You're a doctor, right? Something happened to Kuina here! You have to help me!"
"Kuina?" Ivankov was puzzled at first, then suddenly realized: "She's Master Koushirou's daughter, right? What happened to her?"
Ian explained the situation and asked, "Where are you now? Can you come back to Shimotsuki Village?"
"I'm sorry, Ian boy!" Ivankov said regretfully. "I'm in the Kamabakka Kingdom right now. That's on the Grand Line. It would take me who knows how long to get there!"
Ian's heart sank when he heard that. Far-off water couldn't quench a nearby fire.
"But don't worry!" Ivankov suddenly changed his tone. "I understand the situation you described. Kuina little candy has no external injuries, so it's likely intracranial bleeding causing her coma. I can't come, but I can tell you what medication to use."
"Oh, that's great! Tell me, and I'll write it down!" Ian quickly found paper and a pen.
After Ivankov told Ian the medications to use, he added, "One more thing, Ian boy, you need to be careful. Medication can only assist. Even if it disperses the blood clot in her skull, it might not wake her up! The doctor in your village was right—whether her consciousness can be revived is unknown!"
"Then what do we do?" Ian pressed.
"Only external stimulation can help!" Ivankov thought for a moment and said, "When you have free time, talk to her more."
Soon, this phone consultation ended. Although Ian had contacted Ivankov, a doctor, as he said, whether her consciousness would awaken was up to fate.
...
Night had fallen. Ian and Zoro were still keeping watch over Kuina. The medication Ivankov had mentioned had already been entrusted to Instructor Sasaki to find in a nearby town.
"How could this happen!" Zoro muttered to himself. "Yesterday everything was fine. You just made a promise with me, and now..."
Master Koushirou was kneeling opposite them. Hearing this, he said softly to Zoro, "Zoro, people can be fragile sometimes..."
"Master! What if Kuina really doesn't wake up?" Zoro rubbed his eyes and asked Koushirou.
"You have to believe in her!" Koushirou said with a slight smile. "Kuina is a strong-willed child. She won't be defeated so easily. As for you, Zoro, if she wakes up and finds you haven't improved, she'll probably mock you!"
"At a time like this, who has the heart to train!" Zoro said.
"Don't say that!" Koushirou replied. "Didn't you make a promise with her? Don't you want to give her a surprise when she wakes up?"
Zoro stared blankly at Kuina on the ground, looking at her calm face. After a long moment, he nodded and said, "I understand. I'll keep working hard!"
Koushirou nodded with satisfaction.
Ian, standing nearby, had been silent. He was checking the system in his mind.
According to what Ivankov said, for Kuina's condition, pure medicine wouldn't do much good. So he wanted to see if any of the system's cards had skills related to mental or spiritual power.
It had been over a year since he came to this world. Besides the first draw that got him a card of Akechi Samanosuke, Ian had saved up enough time for three more draws.
However, these three draws made Ian understand just how helpless a F2P player could be in a money-grubbing game.
The card draws in the card shop didn't guarantee a card every time; it was just a probability! Because the draws also included other items.
In these three subsequent draws, the first time Ian got five evolution stones, the second time he got a piece of green common equipment—a cloth robe. The third time was a bit better; he finally got a character, but it was only fragments! Two fragments of Nakoruru from the Samurai Shodown game!
And Nakoruru was a two-star card, requiring twenty fragments to synthesize a complete card.
With so many cards in the shop, drawing once every three months, how long would it take to collect the remaining eighteen Nakoruru fragments?
Moreover, after asking the system, Ian discovered something even worse, concerning one-star and two-star cards.
According to the system, every card had a talent attribute. One-star and two-star cards had the lowest talent, three-star and four-star cards were next, and five-star cards were the highest. Note that this referred to native cards!
That is, native five-star red cards had the highest talent. Even if a four-star card was upgraded to five-star through various breakthroughs and evolutions, its talent would still be somewhat inferior to a native five-star card.
Talent meant growth, representing how many attribute points a card gained per level, and the overall attribute increase when breaking through to +1, +2, +3. Since all these card attributes were ultimately added to Ian, the host, it naturally affected Ian's own growth.
Even if one-star or two-star cards could eventually evolve to five-star, the process would consume a massive amount of resources. So the system didn't recommend Ian cultivate them. The main use of such cards was for bond and synergy bonuses with higher-star cards, and they could be decomposed for souls. Souls could be used in the exclusive soul shop to buy desired card fragments. Cards truly worth cultivating started at least from three-star.
Single draws accumulated over time had a very low chance of getting a full card, so the only option was ten-draws, which supposedly had a higher probability. But ten-draws required Ian to have money to recharge.
Ian was lucky, but also unlucky. Lucky to come to this world with a system to support his growth and survival, but unlucky that this system was a domestic money-grubbing product...
Even that could be tolerated, but what Ian wanted to complain about most was that most of the system's functions were complete, except for the storyline part.
Anyone who had played card-based mobile games knew they almost all had a fixed pattern: clearing story chapters, commonly known as "pushing maps." After finishing a chapter's map, based on the stars the player earned, they got a chance to open treasure chests. The chests usually contained diamonds, the main source of diamonds for F2P players.
However, this damn system had absolutely no story map to push! It dismissed Ian with a single "unknown error"!
In other words, if Ian wanted diamonds for card draws, he had to recharge. That was the only way.
Faced with this kind of game that seemed desperate for money, like a domestic knockoff planning to cash out and run, Ian could only say he couldn't afford it...
"System, are there any card characters with spiritual or mental power abilities?" Ian asked.
"Yes!" the system replied bluntly.
"Oh!?" Ian was delighted and asked, "What characters? What star level?"
"Card character: Yuri! Four-star orange-level card; Card character: Queen of Blades Kerrigan, five-star red-level card!..."
As soon as the system listed two names, Ian's heart turned cold. He immediately understood that card characters with mental power abilities were almost all high-level rare cards!
They were simply not something he could obtain at his current stage!