Demon Princess had a Red Name PK Value of 9. She had already surpassed the first stage where Bloody Treasure Box drop rates increased. Therefore, opening it would randomly extract two items from the equipment or items she had possessed while alive.
Because the situation had been quite tense at the time, Irene hadn't had the chance to check what she had actually looted when she snatched the chest. Only now did she finally have the free time to look.
The purple, full-body cybernetic suit Demon Princess wore was somewhat similar to the Knight Armor; it was a piece of equipment that simultaneously occupied the chest, leg, and footwear equipment slots. However, its primary function was actually to amplify synchronization with her younger sister, allowing them to better execute the effects of their Combination Skills. Nevertheless, even accounting for that, Demon Princess's Bloody Treasure Box drop pool still contained a theoretical maximum of 13 possible items.
Although her frequent hunting of rookies hadn't helped her survive her Main Missions, she had indeed hoarded quite a lot of miscellaneous equipment.
Irene's luck was pretty good. She drew an accessory ring, something relatively precious within the equipment system, as well as what was likely Demon Princess's primary combat weapon while alive.
The ring was a Green Excellent-grade magic ring from the Diablo series, called the "Ring of Charged Bolt." As the name implied, the spell [Charged Bolt] was sealed and engraved within the ring. Upon activation, it simultaneously released 3 Charged Bolts whose damage variance was incredibly volatile. The projectiles moved slowly and their flight paths were highly erratic. The ring held a maximum of 5 charges; once depleted, the user needed to return to the Space and spend money to recharge it.
The other item, her primary combat weapon, was a "Catachan Mk III Combat Blade" from the Warhammer 40k: Darktide universe. Its rarity was Blue Rare-grade, possessing the dual effects of "Damage against unarmored units +15%" and "When an ally scores a Critical Hit, your Critical Hit chance increases by 10% for 6 seconds."
It was blatantly obvious that this weapon was specifically designed to target rookies who lacked defensive gear, and to be used in tandem with her twin teammate.
Although Irene didn't know how much unlucky rookie blood stained its blade, the item was hers now.
"A share for everyone present. Here, you take this. I'll keep the dagger; I happen to be missing a self-defense weapon for close quarters anyway."
Closing the interface detailing the Ring of Charged Bolt's effects, Irene casually tossed it straight to Chris.
Catching the ring, Chris executed an absolute masterclass of sleight of hand. With unparalleled speed, he stuffed it directly into an equipment slot and actively concealed the ring's physical collision model from his body.
Chris hated wearing accessories like rings because they interfered with his tactical grip on pot handles, sword hilts, and gun grips.
"...Hey, sugar momma. I'm flat broke right now. If you need me to pay you back with my body, I can"
"Get lost!"
"Alright then~~"
Chris executed a beautiful lateral cartwheel, temporarily vacating the spot of potential danger.
Yasha had escaped. This development definitely had the potential to influence Irene's upcoming objectives, but truthfully, the impact wouldn't be massive.
While Irene had no idea who Demon Princess was previously, she easily deduced everything she needed to know from the woman's high PK Value and low combat power, coupled with her purely greed-blinded, beeline charge straight toward Chris. She was a Red Name player who exclusively preyed on rookies.
Within the veteran player circles Irene mingled with, this type of behavior was considered incredibly disgraceful, utterly humiliating, and exceptionally cowardly. Therefore, even if her circles weren't part of the self-proclaimed "Punisher" player factions who took pride in hunting Red Names, they absolutely did not object to killing Red Names either.
Those who kill will permanently be killed. It's common sense, my friend~
Furthermore, factoring in the twins exposing that they relied on a health-draining safety skill, utilizing an unknown magical shield from either a skill or scroll, and instantly choosing to flee the moment Irene's arrow intercepted the ground shockwave... their entire operational directive within the dungeon was clearly focused purely on self-preservation. Given how thoroughly traumatized they likely were right now, even if Irene actively tried to hunt Yasha down, finding her wouldn't be easy.
Consequently, Irene very cleanly tossed the escaped Yasha into the back of her mind and began prioritizing the other matters at hand.
The first thing on the agenda was ensuring the progress of Chris's Bounty Mission.
Irene fell into the specific category of players who only sought out extra challenges after ensuring it wouldn't interfere with their primary business. Therefore, she was determined to help Chris gather all his required quest items first before even considering high-difficulty challenges. This ensured that, no matter what catastrophic situation they encountered later, they would always have the ultimate fallback option of "turning in the quest items and immediately extracting."
It had to be said, this chick's operational style completely aligned with Chris's own approach, making him feel exceedingly comfortable. Chris's original plan had indeed been to prioritize finishing his own mission first.
Only, from the looks of it now, she was planning to help him do it.
The Gray Party Contract was the single team-up contract that could be formed at any time simply by paying a small fee. Its effects allowed contracted teammates to maintain a sensory connection within a 10-meter straight-line radius, allowed for shared kill credit on certain types of quest targets, and ensured that killing a teammate yielded zero dropped items.
However, the reason it was referred to as a "Gray" Contract was because it could be forcefully and unilaterally terminated simply by paying a penalty fine.
For instance, this 2,500 Coin party fee had been fronted entirely by the wealthy archer. She merely needed to pay double that amount as a penalty to instantly dissolve the contract, though there would theoretically be a one-minute cooldown period after a forced termination.
More advanced contracts required completing specific missions or consuming special items to forge. Examples included the strict two-player "Twin Dragon Contract," the three-player "Oath of the Round Table," the four-player "Baseball League," and so on. These advanced party configurations often came with additional innate stat bonuses.
Because the two were currently partied up, this meant that even if Irene killed one of Chris's designated targets, the resulting chest could potentially drop the quest item Chris needed.
And just as Batman had feared, it really was the Moth Gang's turn to suffer.
Because the dungeon Chris had entered didn't possess the "Original Flavor" modifier, Gotham City, which realistically should have been a linear progression of stages, had been directly expanded into a completely free-roaming open-world map. Furthermore, the subsequent stages that should have appeared in a fixed sequence had been transformed into the distinct topographical characteristics of the territories controlled by gangs serving the core supervillains.
Therefore, a player could theoretically run through all four distinct districts and assassinate every single Boss tied to the Main Mission, all while ostensibly just doing this unrelated Bounty Mission.
However, as stated before, killing them wouldn't positively affect the Bounty Mission in any way. Instead, it would prematurely sever any possibility of accepting related storyline missions in the future.
Obviously, Irene wasn't arrogant enough to believe that within a mere 72 hours, and with Batman's inevitable interference, she could break through layers of defense to assassinate four supervillains, each controlling the entirety of a gang's resources... but if she was only targeting one, it provided the exact right flavor of extra challenge.
She had simply handpicked Killer Moth from the multitude of candidate targets. And since it just so happened to align with Chris's quest item targets, why the hell wouldn't she do it?
Coincidentally, Chris happened to possess a rather detailed map of the faction power distribution. That bartender genuinely ran an honest business; he hadn't scammed Chris out of 10 Gold Coins for a useless piece of trash. But even if Chris didn't have the map, it wouldn't have mattered. Irene was intimately familiar with the Old Factory District in Gotham's East End, where the Moth Gang was located.
If Irene's deduction was correct, the martial law over there would undoubtedly have escalated to the next level. Simultaneously, this meant they would encounter denser and far more varied types of Moth Gang combat units in a much shorter timeframe, perfectly aiding Chris's mission.
Chris wasn't tired, and Irene was brimming with energy. So, after a brief huddle, the two utilized the cover of night to stealthily infiltrate the Old Factory District.
What neither of them realized, however, was that their freshly minted duo had already been comprehensively stamped onto the "Must Kill" list of the entire Moth Gang...
[Translated and Rewritten by Shika_Kagura]