kscans

Chapter 14 - Stream Chat

On social media and message boards, a certain piece of information was gaining a lot of attention.

The news that Hayate, the one who cleared the Black Dungeon faster than anyone in the world, had entered a Grade 2 dungeon. It spread in an instant, and a large crowd gathered at Hayate's Booth, where his dungeon challenge was being streamed.

Despite it being early in the morning, the comment section was buzzing.






The dungeon Hayate chose to clear was the Ash Dungeon. It was a different dungeon from the one the Shinonome Group's latest AI predicted he could clear the fastest.

"Here in the Ash Dungeon, there are a lot of fire-attribute monsters. The stone-type weapons I got in the Black Dungeon will be the most effective here."

Here too, he climbed higher and higher, explaining his actions as he went.







Just as someone in the comments was about to explain, a fireball came flying at Hayate.

He caught it with the sword in his right hand and imbued the flame onto the sword.

<...Huh?>




Viewers who didn't know FWO well were confused, not understanding what had happened.

As many people watched in astonishment, Hayate used the red-hot sword to cut the monster that had shot the flame in two. He had forcefully defeated a monster that should only be beatable with a magic sword by cladding a physical sword with magic.



With Hayate busy fighting newly appeared monsters, viewers who had been watching his streams for a while explained for him.










To the viewers who had played FWO, what Hayate had done was nothing short of divine. Moreover, there was a difference in feel between a VR game and reality. There was no guarantee that timing it based on the game's feel would work in real life.





The super-difficult character control of successfully doing this even once was said to be what separated an intermediate FWO player from the top 30% of advanced players.

Calmly using this ultra-high-difficulty technique known as Magic Cladding, Hayate had imbued all four of his swords with flames.



<...Huh? Hey, wait a minute!!>


This was a new technique that Hayate had not shown on stream back when FWO was still a game.

The wind attribute sword was an enhancement attribute for fire. Something that was impossible according to conventional wisdom was happening.

In the first place, only a limited number of players could use Magic Cladding with a physical sword, and doing it with a magic sword and a different attribute made the timing even more difficult.

Currently, the only person in the world who could use this technique was Hayate.






The more a viewer had played FWO, the less they could hide their astonishment at the feat Hayate was performing. In the game, it was considered impossible for a single weapon to have multiple attributes.

They couldn't comprehend a situation where something considered impossible in the game was being executed in real life.

There was a technique where a dual-wielding swordsman would hold a wind and a fire attribute sword in their left and right hands respectively and attack simultaneously to increase the power of the attack. The damage increase multiplier for that was 2. However, if a single weapon could hold two attributes, the attack power with dual swords would be multiplied by 4.

If Hayate were to hold four magic swords with his four-sword style, and if he could use Magic Cladding on each sword with an enhancing attribute, his attack power would be multiplied by 16. This multiplier was an abnormal figure in FWO.

A few viewers realized this.










That's impossible. The viewers wanted to believe that something that would fundamentally overturn FWO's game balance wouldn't happen.

However, Hayate, who had sworn to clear the dungeon at top speed, held nothing back.

"The enemies get stronger from here on, so I'm going all out. First, I'll buy some magic swords on the Market and enhance them as much as my funds allow."








Many comments mocking Hayate were posted by those who were jealous of his popularity.

Without seeing such comments, he continued to repeat the reckless enhancements.







Some Super Tips were gathered, but Hayate was tapping the enhance button so fast that it was like a drop in the ocean.

Someone should stop him. Just as many viewers thought so, Hayate's status screen flashed for a moment. Several people immediately took a screenshot from the stream and began to analyze it.












Almost simultaneously with this post, a screenshot of Hayate's funds was leaked on social media and message boards.

<...Huh? 50 billion?>
<50 billion lmao>




The amount was so huge for a single person's funds that many people in the comment section were confused.

Just as a debate was about to erupt over how Hayate had obtained such a large sum of money, the stream's screen flashed brightly.

"I did it! I made four Wind Magic Swords (Modified +30)!!"

In FWO, even weapons you get in the initial dungeons can be used later in the game if you enhance them repeatedly. However, the success rate of those enhancements is extremely low.

A weapon enhanced to Modified +10 is enough to clear a Grade 2 dungeon. Modified +20 for Grade 3. And Modified +30 is strong enough to be used in a Grade 5 dungeon.







It goes without saying that this was strong enough. However, Hayate performed an even further enhancement.

"A monster just happened to attack me, so I'll borrow its flame."

Saying so, he completed the Magic Cladding on the magic swords with utter ease.

A powerful flame was clad onto the swords with a wind attribute base, completing four of the strongest possible swords that could easily burn through fire attribute monsters.

"Alright. Now that I'm ready, I'm going for the clear at full power!"

In this dungeon, there were no longer any monsters that could stand in his way.