Magic Farm 177
by CristaeChapter 177: Icebound Event Exchange Shop
Icebound Boss?
Qi Yu opened the survival panel and was surprised to find that even the background had changed.
The survival panel had always been a semi-transparent, pale blue light screen. Now, that faint blue had shifted to a near-white, and the background was dotted with countless sparkling little snowflakes.
In the lower right corner, there was a conspicuous, glowing snowflake icon. Clicking on it brought up the Icebound Boss Event Exchange Shop.
Aside from the “Territory Appearance” priced at 500 Ice Gemstones and the Magic Sleigh for 100 Ice Gemstones, there were many other items available for exchange.
For example, the Snowball Launcher, worth 50 Ice Gemstones.
[Snowball Launcher: Can automatically load snowballs to strike enemies attacking your territory. Note: Requires the Icebound Boss Event Limited Territory Appearance to use.]
There was also the “Excellent Equipment Exchange Voucher” for 100 Ice Gemstones.
[Excellent Equipment Exchange Voucher: Limited to one per person. Can be used to exchange for any excellent-quality equipment of your choice.]
Beyond that, there were all sorts of miscellaneous items:
The Icebound Boss Event Limited Outfit, worth 50 Ice Gemstones—a full set of clothing styled like a knight’s uniform with a cloak.
The Icebound Boss Event Limited Avatar, worth 10 Ice Gemstones—a very cute chibi snowman.
The Icebound Boss Event Limited Avatar Pendant, priced at 10 Ice Gemstones—a small ice-blue crown, complete with animated snowflake effects.
……
District 01 Regional Channel:
[RoachTastesWeird: How many mobile games did the survival game eat? The flavor is just overwhelming!]
[ReachForTheMoon: The survival game always drops an event on us out of nowhere, just to remind us that this isn’t just survival—it’s a game, too.]
[GrindKing: Everything’s limited! There are only seven days, and if you want to get one of everything, you’ll need 820 Ice Gemstones total. To be safe, you’d need to get at least 120 per day. No idea what the drop rate is like.]
Though he’d never seen it before, Qi Yu immediately understood what “limited” meant.
In other words, if you missed this event, these items would be gone for good, never obtainable again.
His interest, which had been at an eight, instantly shot up to an eighteen!
Qi Yu changed clothes and headed out, carrying the little treasure-hunting mouse.
The silver-grey treasure-hunting mouse: “……”
If Heaven gave it another chance, it would never have sensed that strong life force near its burrow that day, nor led its clan to attack him.
Now, its clan was gone, its home destroyed. Even it had become a laborer for a human.
Heaven knew, when it first arrived at this human’s territory, the desert mouse—so unworldly—had thought it had reached paradise!
But soon, it realized paradise was a lie.
The beautiful, fragrant territory was real, but it had to work.
And its workplace was a vast, white, frozen wasteland. On its very first day, it had nearly been frozen into a stiff mouse stick.
Worse yet, after freezing into a mouse stick in the morning, it would be carried back to the golden sand desert in the afternoon, facing temperatures over sixty degrees, melting into a puddle of mouse pancake.
Day after day, subjected to such extreme temperature swings, this mouse was on the verge of a mouse personality split.
Luckily, the master of the Forest of Stars was rather kind-hearted. Knowing it was cold, the fierce-looking alchemy butler even knitted it a fluffy sweater.
Qi Yu set the treasure-hunting mouse, now dressed in a pale yellow sweater, on the ground and said, “Go find treasure chests. Bring them back to me when you do.”
The treasure-hunting mouse had a special ability: its belly functioned like a kind of subspace. Once it found treasure, it could swallow it into its stomach. And since it was under contract with Shan Xingyu, there was no fear of it running away.
Qi Yu found this mouse quite convenient—a backpack that could carry things all by itself.
With the mouse’s work arranged, he began to make his way across the snowy ground.
He hadn’t gone far when a flickering light appeared ahead.
As he drew near, the glow suddenly brightened. The snow and ice on the ground swirled into a vortex, rapidly gathering before Qi Yu’s eyes and forming a snowman about two meters tall.
A prompt popped up on the survival panel:
[Player has triggered Icebound Boss. Please defeat it as soon as possible.]
Qi Yu didn’t attack right away. He observed the snowman—it looked just like the ones he’d built before: a round head, a round body, no arms or legs.
The snowman seemed to notice an “enemy.” Qi Yu saw it turn to face him, then its round body began to spin, raising a gust of cold wind as it charged toward him.
It wasn’t very fast. Qi Yu shifted his feet, dodging as he observed, and noticed that when the snowman attacked, it never changed direction.
He kept watching.
Five minutes later, Qi Yu was sure: this Icebound Boss had only two attack patterns.
One was spinning, then charging in a straight line.
The other was suddenly leaping up—duang!—and bouncing like a spring, slamming down repeatedly.
But both attacks were fairly slow, and when the big snowman wasn’t attacking, its movement speed was even more sluggish.
Conclusion: the Icebound Boss wasn’t very dangerous.
Which made sense—players had to defeat these to get Ice Gemstones. If the bosses were too strong, the exchange shop would be meaningless.
He didn’t use the Heart of the Great Tree staff, but instead pulled out a common-quality weapon from his backpack and slashed the snowman.
A red -37 appeared above the snowman’s head, and a long health bar popped up.
964/1000.
Wow.
With his current stats, a slash from a common weapon only took 37 HP.
Which meant, even if the snowman stood still, he’d have to stab it more than thirty times.
Qi Yu snapped a photo and sent it to the District 01 Survival Team chat.
After a moment’s hesitation, he took another and posted it in the regional chat channel.
[RoachTastesWeird: What’s this? A big snowman? Is this the event monster? The game pro already found it?]
After sending the photo, Qi Yu closed the panel, switched to the Heart of the Great Tree staff, and swung it down.
-237.
With the Heart of the Great Tree staff, it would take four swings to finish off its health bar.
Qi Yu didn’t hesitate, whirling the staff with practiced force.
When the Icebound Boss’s health hit zero, its whole body seemed to collapse, scattering into a pile of snow and ice.
A shiny object dropped onto the snow.
[Player has obtained Ice Gemstone X1, and Intermediate Stamina Potion X1.]
One Ice Gemstone?
Qi Yu picked them up.
The Ice Gemstone was an ice-blue, diamond-shaped crystal about the size of a cherry. Even aside from its use as currency, its looks alone made it a worthy collectible.
An unexpected bonus: a stamina potion.
So the survival game… gives you a potion to recover after a tiring fight?
Qi Yu opened the regional channel. Everyone was talking about the photo he’d just posted.
[ILoveSurvivalGames: This big snowman is the Icebound Boss.]
[ILoveSurvivalGames: I just ran into one. Not too hard to fight—moves slowly, has a lot of health. If your attack isn’t strong enough, you’ll have to whittle it down.]
[ILoveSurvivalGames: After killing it, I got one Ice Gemstone and a bottle of Intermediate Stamina Potion.]
[GrindKing: That fast, pro? I’ve been out for a while and haven’t seen one yet. But you killed it pretty quick.]
[GrindKing: Only one gemstone per snowman? So you’d have to kill over a hundred a day?]
[ILoveSurvivalGames: I’ve only met one so far. Maybe each boss only drops one.]
If the drop rate stayed like this, then for ordinary players—first, they’d have to go out and find the Icebound Boss, and even then, most wouldn’t be able to kill it as easily as he could.
Trying to get every item from the exchange shop would be no easy task.
There was a discussion in the group, and soon a player named “Hualushui” posted a photo, saying they’d also encountered an Icebound Boss.
For a long while after that, he didn’t speak again.
Qi Yu triggered another Icebound Boss, and after defeating it, got another Ice Gemstone.
Hualushui reappeared half an hour later:
[Hualushui: Guys, I finally made it back.]
[Hualushui: That big snowman really is slow. I ran straight ahead and it chased me. Later I got smarter—found some cover, or if there wasn’t any, a big tree works. Circled around it like King Qin and the pillar, and took a swipe whenever I could.]
[Hualushui: But its health bar is seriously thick. Each hit I landed only did a bit over ten damage, and it’s got a full 1000 HP! It took me half an hour to grind it down.]
[Hualushui: It dropped one Ice Gemstone. This gem is so pretty! (picture)]
[ReachForTheMoon: Yeah, I met one too. Only dropped one gemstone.]
[OldBrotherCivil: So, to get all the prizes, you’d need to kill over a hundred a day?]
[Hualushui: Help, I feel like even if I fought all day without a break, I couldn’t kill that many! And it hurts when it hits, so I have to dodge however I can.]
[GrindKing: I just found two while mapping. Got two gemstones in total, so it really is one per snowman.]
[GrindKing: This monster is slow, hits hard, and has a thick health bar. Try not to let it get close. @Hualushui, is your weapon low quality?]
[Hualushui: Yeah TAT, I’m still using a unique-quality longsword.]
[GrindKing: Then you should save up gemstones and get excellent-quality gear from the event shop as soon as possible. Once your equipment quality improves, your damage will go up a lot.]
[OldBrotherCivil: Right, there’s so much in the shop, but you don’t have to collect everything. Focus on what matters. The 500-gem Territory Appearance is for the pros and grind kings.]
Qi Yu exited the regional channel.
He planned to collect 100 gemstones first and exchange them for the Magic Sleigh.
Honestly, he had no idea what a “sleigh” even was. Judging by the shop icon, it looked kind of like a carriage?
The only reason he wanted to prioritize it was simple: if the survival game announcement had singled it out, it had to be special.
Hunting for Icebound Bosses on foot was just too inefficient.
He stopped, letting the power of ice and snow surge through him. White winds rose at his back, expanding outward from him and sweeping in all directions.
Within a kilometer, several points of light appeared.
The survival panel flashed prompt after prompt:
[Player has triggered Icebound Boss. Please defeat it as soon as possible.]
[Player has triggered…]
A pair of azure wings unfurled behind him, and in an instant, Qi Yu vanished from the snowy field.
Half an hour later, his backpack held 30 more Ice Gemstones.
Qi Yu thought to himself that this method was much more efficient, though it was a pity the Azurewing could only be used for an hour each day. Later, he wouldn’t be able to reach the Icebound Bosses so quickly, but with wind element buffs, his speed was still decent.
Another thing: Qi Yu clearly sensed that the farther he got from his territory, the less frequently the Icebound Bosses spawned.
That was probably the survival game’s way of taking care of players, making it easier for ordinary players to complete the event.
[Author’s Note]
[food][food][food]—see you later tonight for another chapter [heart]