Chapter 216: Chen Mo Teaches You How to Play
In the experience store, Lin Xue was also enthusiastically playing the new season.
Her stream was titled "Crusader Pushing the Season Ladder," and there were many viewers in the chat, with dense bullet comments all discussing the new season.
Lin Xue was farming rifts while interacting with the chat.
"Why are there always new viewers asking when I started playing? As a high-end player who really loves *Diablo*, of course I bought the expansion the moment it was released!"
"Is the Crusader strong? Uh, from what I've seen so far, it's pretty average. Can't compare to the Wizard or Barbarian. But maybe I just haven't figured out the right way to play this class yet."
"Is the new version fun? I can only tell you, it's incredibly fun! For example, the old *Diablo* was like a small cake—looked tasty and was indeed tasty, but eat a bit too much and you'd get sick of it. But *Diablo* after the expansion is like taking drugs—you get addicted to farming for loot and can't stop!"
"Where's Chen Mo? I don't know. He spends a lot of time in the studio, so I might not be able to catch him. Uh, not now—I'm in the middle of a rift. I'll go grab him after he comes over."
Lin Xue was a regular at the experience store. Since she could play Chen Mo's latest games here, she came by every few days and had gotten pretty familiar with Su Jinyu, Jia Peng, Zou Zhuo, and the others.
To stream in the store, Lin Xue had even brought a portable camera with her.
Just as Lin Xue was playing, she suddenly noticed the bullet comments going crazy.
"Whoa? Is that Chen Mo?"
"Found a wild Chen Mo! Quick, Xue, go catch him!"
"Wow, it really is Chen Mo!"
"Xue, go!"
Lin Xue turned her head and saw Chen Mo walking in from outside the experience store. He was probably tired from work and planning to sit on the sofa in the store for a bit.
Lin Xue was overjoyed: "Store Manager!"
Chen Mo was startled: "You... what are you going to do!"
Lin Xue smiled: "Hehe, nothing much. My viewers want to see you."
As she spoke, she pointed the camera at Chen Mo: "Everyone, look! A real, live Chen Mo, one hundred percent authentic! Hey, you guys have been clamoring to see Chen Mo every day, and now you finally get to, right?"
Chen Mo: "..."
He felt a bit helpless. Being stared at by hundreds of thousands of people was really annoying, like being treated as a monkey in a show.
Chen Mo glanced at Lin Xue's computer screen: "I say, aren't you supposed to be starting the new season? If you're starting, then focus on it. Don't be half-hearted all the time. How can you expect to climb the ladder like this?"
Lin Xue looked at the chat: "Store Manager, the viewers say they want to see you play games. Either *Warcraft* or *Diablo* is fine."
Chen Mo rubbed his forehead: "You're the streamer. Why are they looking at me?"
Lin Xue said: "Just for something fresh! Come on, perfect timing—I have an account here. Just play on mine."
Chen Mo was reluctantly pushed into the seat by Lin Xue.
"The problem is, even if I use your account, it won't help much. This game doesn't require too much mechanical skill; it's mostly about gear builds," Chen Mo said.
Lin Xue flashed a slightly sly smile: "Then help me put together a gear build! I have a ton of unused equipment in my inventory!"
Chen Mo: "..."
Lin Xue's character was a female Crusader. She didn't have much good gear, but the transmogrification looked nice. She had almost no set pieces, but her entire stash was full of various random items.
"Your... your gear is an eyesore! You barely have any decent set pieces. How am I supposed to play with this?" Chen Mo said helplessly.
Lin Xue smiled: "You're Chen Mo, the designer, the legendary 'S-God' who once dominated the ladder. A little trouble like this can't stump you, right?"
Chen Mo: "..."
Even though it was flattery, it felt pretty good.
Chen Mo said helplessly: "Alright, since your flattery was decent, I'll save this account of yours."
Chen Mo looked at Lin Xue's skills, Kanai's Cube extracts, and so on. From his perspective, this build was almost unbearable to look at. It seemed like clearing even a Greater Rift level 40 would be a struggle.
But that wasn't Lin Xue's fault. The players in this world hadn't spent much time studying *Diablo*, and without the ladder system to push them to develop new strategies, everyone's understanding of the game was still at a relatively shallow stage.
Chen Mo had already decided to use this opportunity to broaden the players' horizons in this world and let them experience the unique gear system of *Diablo*.
Although the gear on Lin Xue's account was pretty terrible, with almost no set pieces, Chen Mo thought it could still be salvaged.
After rummaging through the stash, Chen Mo found some good news: Lin Xue was frugal. She had saved all the legendary and ancient items she'd found, whether useful or not, and stored them in her inventory. Some key items were there, like Convention of Elements, Aquila Cuirass, Pegasus Chain, and so on, enough to support a decent build.
Chen Mo started operating quickly.
First, he replaced all the skills, equipping Shield Glare, Bombardment, Steed Charge, Iron Skin, Consecration, and Akarat's Champion. For passives, he chose Fanaticism, Indestructible, Iron Maiden, and Finery.
Then he swapped out all the gear: Aquila Cuirass, Pegasus Chain, Leoric's Crown, Goldwrap, Hellfire Amulet, Swamp Land Waders, and Illusory Boots...
All these seemingly useless random pieces, Chen Mo equipped them.
And, Lin Xue's account even had the set rings Litany of the Undaunted and The Wailing Host, which made Chen Mo very satisfied.
He extracted the powers of Mortal Drama, Heart of Iron, and Convention of Elements.
Then he rerolled stats, enchanted, and socketed gems.
After all that tinkering, Lin Xue's Crusader had been completely transformed. Chen Mo checked the Crusader's stats—not bad. Key attributes like cooldown reduction, all resistance, and thorns damage were stacked up pretty well.
"Alright, finally done." Chen Mo closed the character panel with satisfaction. It was really quite an achievement to pick out a build like this from a pile of junk.
Lin Xue had been watching Chen Mo's every move the whole time, watching him pull out her treasured junk from the stash and equip them one by one.
At this moment, Lin Xue was completely baffled.
Based on her understanding of the game, she could only comprehend about 20% of Chen Mo's bewildering series of actions.
First, the skills: none of them were conventional sustained damage skills. Steed Charge was a mobility skill, Shield Glare was a control skill, Iron Skin and Akarat's Champion were buff skills, and Consecration was a small-area damage skill.
Among them, only Bombardment counted as a real damage skill, but its cooldown was extremely long, and where it landed was entirely up to luck.
As for the gear, she was even more confused. The only thing Lin Xue understood was the set effect of Litany of the Undaunted and The Wailing Host: when these two rings are the only set items equipped, each ancient item you wear increases your damage by 100% and reduces damage taken by 4%.
These two rings were practically the nemesis of other sets, because equipping them meant you couldn't benefit from any other set bonuses. It looked like Chen Mo was going for a Legacy of Dreams build, using all random pieces with these rings to form the gear system.
But, would it work?
Lin Xue was extremely skeptical.