Tang Muzhou's guarantee was indeed very important. After the Academic Affairs Office submitted Xie Mingzhe's leave of absence application to the school council for discussion, the school actually approved his leave of absence application within three days.
The leave of absence is calculated by semester. Xie Mingzhe wrote in his application that the leave of absence would last for three semesters, from September 3001 to the winter vacation in January 3003. The reason for adding an extra semester is that the second half of the league's competition will not end until December, and school starts in September. If he only applied for one year, he would not be able to concentrate on playing in the second half of the league next year.
He guaranteed in his application that he would return to school on time to complete his studies when the time came.
The first year of Nirvana Club is the most important. He has to perfect the deck as soon as possible and make it to the professional league with his teammates. Once the club is on the right track, he can adopt Tang Muzhou's method and play in competitions while attending school.
Three days later, the "Notice Regarding Xie Mingzhe's Suspension of Study" was officially issued, and his student status was temporarily frozen.
In order to protect the privacy of students, the reason for the suspension was not stated in the notice. The classmates in the class were very confused. Why did he leave again after one month of school? Did something happen at home? Xie Mingzhe did not explain much and said goodbye to his classmates and teachers with a smile.
He told the people in the studio that he had successfully dropped out of school.
Chen Qianlin had no objection to this, and thought his apprentice's behavior was very sensible. Chen Xiao joked, "Does this count as a one-month tour of Imperial University? You've only moved to the school for a month, and now you're moving back again!"
Xie Mingzhe smiled and said, "Brother Chen, now that you put it like that, it does seem like a one-month trip! But it's not without gain. If I didn't go to school, how could I have met Xiao Ke and Qin Xuan?"
Chen Xiao nodded: "Yes, you have gained a lot this month. You have found two powerful teammates. The first year will be hard, so you should take a leave of absence and concentrate on playing. When the club is established and you are familiar with the management of each department and the pressure is reduced, you can go back to school to attend classes."
"That's what I thought."
"Xiao Xie, come back and continue to live with me!" Xiaopang, who bought the cake for Xie Mingzhe, said happily.
"Of course, I'm still thinking about your drawer of snacks!"
When Yu Ke saw Xie Mingzhe taking a leave of absence from school, he couldn't help but ask, "Azhe, do I need to take a leave of absence from school?"
Qin Xuan sent two words: "Same question."
"You don't have to drop out of school right away. I'm dropping out now because I still have to make a lot of cards and I don't have enough time." Xie Mingzhe thought for a moment and suggested, "You two should study hard first, and then register as professional players next year and officially compete. Then we can decide based on the situation."
"Okay! We don't have many classes this semester. I will use my spare time to train seriously." Yu Ke promised.
"I'll help you pay attention to the key points of each course, and then I'll organize the notes for you so that it will be convenient for you to review when you come back." Qin Xuan rarely took the initiative to help Xie Mingzhe. It was obvious that he already regarded Xie Mingzhe as a teammate, which made Xie Mingzhe very pleased.
What made Xie Mingzhe even happier was that Qin Xuan immediately sent another picture in the group chat and said, "I have drawn a rough draft of the scene of the blood pond hell. Can you guys see if there is anything that needs to be changed?"
This painting is exactly the style that Qin Xuan is good at. The scene is dim, the ground is rolling with hot blood, and the air is filled with red blood mist. There are not many decorative buildings in the whole scene. There are only two huge stone landing points for both players to stand. The rest of the place is a blood pool. As long as the card falls into the blood pool, it will be negatively affected by losing blood every second, and the environmental impact cannot be removed.
The gloomy and terrifying atmosphere of the entire scene is vividly expressed in Qin Xuan's writing.
Yu Ke's eyes lit up immediately: "So beautiful!"
This guy uses adjectives randomly, saying the joker is "so cute" and the blood pool hell is "so beautiful". His aesthetic sense is quite weird.
Xie Mingzhe said: "This picture is very consistent with the concept of the blood pond hell in my mind. Thank you for your hard work, Qin Xuan."
Qin Xuan said: "It's not bad. I drew it in three days of spare time."
Chen Qianlin made a more professional suggestion: "In the game, scene design should not only draw a flat map, but also make a 3D scene model. The specific size of the entire blood pool is in square meters, and the percentage of blood loss per second of the card should be marked in detail."
"According to Xiao Xie's idea, the Blood Pond Hell is Xiao Ke's main battlefield for his joker cards. In order to make it easier for Hei Wuchang and Nie Xiaoqian to harvest the opponent's low-blood cards, I suggest that the blood loss per second be controlled at 2-5%. If it is too much, Xiao Ke's fragile joker cards may be killed by the opponent."
Xie Mingzhe nodded seriously. "Master, what you said makes sense. The specific percentage of health loss depends on Xiao Ke's own experience in the arena. The amount of health loss in the environment must be connected with the skills of your own cards. After Qin Xuan finishes making the 3D version of the map, Xiao Ke will try it out in actual combat to see what design is most comfortable."
Maps that have not been officially reviewed will not appear in the arena's gallery, but players can practice their own scene maps in "simulation mode" privately. In this mode, players can invite their friends to play together.
There is a special "scene map" section on the forum, with many player-made maps for netizens to download, but these are unofficial maps and are used for personal entertainment. Some of them are warm and lovely scenes drawn by girls, such as fairy tale castles, toy houses, etc.
If you want to import the map into the competition gallery, you have to wait until the Nirvana Club is officially established in March next year, and then send the map to the league for review.
In terms of originality, Star Card Storm gives players the freedom to fully unleash their imagination, and provides a "self-entertainment" mode that does not affect the balance of the game. This is indeed convenient for Xie Mingzhe and his team to do map research.
Qin Xuan said, "If the picture doesn't need to be modified, I will finalize this drawing."
Xie Mingzhe nodded straightforwardly: "No problem! Qin Xuan, please find some time to make a 3D version of the scene as well."
Qin Xuan said: "Before Friday."
Drawing such a large scene in three days, and making a 3D version before Friday, Yu Ke admired Qin Xuan's drawing speed. Originally, he thought this guy had a weird temper, a particularly sharp look, and seemed difficult to get along with, but now he found that Qin Xuan was actually a good person and was very serious about his work.
Thinking that he would have his own exclusive scene soon, Yu Ke was so excited that he couldn't express it in words.
It feels like a dream. Not long ago, he offended the Judgment Guild by accepting a bounty mission due to lack of money, and created a small account to avoid the Judgment's pursuit. As a result, now he not only has a joker card tailored for him by Uncle Fatty, but also has an original scene... He is so lucky!
That night, Xie Mingzhe moved his luggage back to Nirvana Studio and took the initiative to invite everyone to dinner.
Qin Xuan and Yu Ke also arrived on time. It was convenient that the school was close.
Everyone talked about recent events at the dinner table.
Yu Ke practiced all the jokers that Xie Mingzhe gave him, but he also knew that his level was not good enough for a professional career and he had to continue working hard. Chen Xiao's number of dark plant cards increased to 20, which was enough to build a complete card pool. He shared all the cards with Qin Xuan, and the latter also began to practice plant cards slowly.
Xie Mingzhe didn't make a single card in the past ten days, but he managed to apply for leave of absence, which was a big progress. Next, he can concentrate on perfecting his deck.
Everything on the guild's side was arranged in an orderly manner. Xiaopang and Jinyue organized everyone to play guild dungeons every day, Yingying was in charge of recruiting and reviewing, and Chi Qing was in charge of overall management. They would still participate in the weekly resource battle, so recently the guild warehouse was filled with so many materials that it could hardly hold them all.
According to statistics from the Internal Affairs Manager Jin Yue, the first batch of members of the Nirvana Guild have all accumulated enough points to redeem their welfare cards, with the largest number of members redeeming Zhou Yu. In order to take members' enthusiasm into consideration, the Guild Store will add new welfare cards after 80% of the members have redeemed three cards, but that will be two months later.
The current priority is another guild activity - the Guild League.
Chi Qing said, "I suggest that we sign up for this week's guild league. Currently, there are more than 500 players who have reached the Star Card Master level in Nirvana, and 3,000 players above the Expert level. Everyone has been very active recently."
The total number of members in the guild is 5,000, and more than 3,000 of them have reached Star Card Expert in the ranking matches. This ratio is indeed very high.
Xie Mingzhe thought for a moment and said, "I also think that the timing is about right now. Anyone with an expert level or above can sign up for the Guild League. With more than 3,000 people, even if everyone scores 5 points on average, that would be 15,000 Guild points. Experts, let alone 5 points, might be able to get several hundred points. I think it should be no problem for the total points to exceed 50,000."
Chi Qing said, "The top three in last week's Guild League were Fenghua, Judgment, and Guiyu, and their total points were all over 100,000. The guilds under these large clubs have always been very popular, and they have many die-hard fans of the great players, and there are also many experts who can play in the arena. If we really play in the Guild League, we may not be able to compete with these big guilds."
Xie Mingzhe smiled and said, "It's okay. You can't become fat in one go. Just take your time."
Chen Xiao also agreed: "We are still a level 6 guild. The number of members cannot be compared with that of the level 7 guilds, but our members are very motivated. This time, it is normal to rank in the top 50 in the league. If we can make it into the top 10 and make it to the leaderboard, it will be a great accomplishment."
Yu Ke raised his hand positively and said, "I know a lot of the competitive players in the guild. I will mobilize everyone in the next few days and try to get as many people to sign up for the competition as possible during the weekend!"
Everyone quickly agreed on the weekend's activities. Chi Yingying went back to prepare the promotional materials, while Chi Qing and others began to mobilize everyone to participate in the competition in advance. Xie Mingzhe returned to the studio and began to continue thinking about the card method.
He and his master summarized it together. Currently, the ten instant-death cards in his card pool are all disposable functional cards. They are designed for different decks. In future games, when he sees that the opponent has a very difficult card in his open cards, he can play the instant-death card to kill it instantly.
For example, in the last duel with Tang Muzhou, Xie Mingzhe specifically brought Lin Daiyu to defeat his Begonia in seconds.
Among the other competitive skill cards, there are four healing cards, namely the formation healing card Shennong, the single healing Da Qiao, the instant group healing Xiao Qiao, and the earth-based "fake healing card" Huang Gai that relies on shield to restore health.
There are a lot of output cards. The Five Tiger Generals of the Shu Kingdom Cavalry are all powerful gold-type critical hit cards; Zhou Yu and Lu Xun of the Wu Kingdom Fire Team are very powerful in fire-type group attacks during team games. In addition, Sun Shangxiang, a harvesting card, can be used as a key card and sent into play when necessary. The effect of the blood-depleting pursuit may turn the tide in an unfavorable situation.
The only resurrection card is Nuwa. Lü Meng, Pangu, and Fuxi are all pure control cards, but compared to other great cards, Xie Mingzhe's control cards are too few.
Chen Qianlin suggested: "You have already made a deck of cards for the Fire and Gold elements. You can try other elements next."
Xie Mingzhe nodded seriously: "I want to try a water control deck. I will sort out my thoughts in the next two days. When I have an idea, I will discuss it with Master!"
The cards he makes are quite diverse, currently covering the five elements of gold, wood, water, fire, and earth. This is because he has never limited himself to any one element since he started making cards.
The masters of the Professional League who are famous for their original cards all have their own expertise in the system. For example, Nie Yuandao specializes in the fire system, Tang Muzhou specializes in the wood system, Fang Yu only uses water cards, Ling Jingtang and Zheng Feng are the representatives of the gold system and earth system.
But Xie Mingzhe is different, he does all five.
If he were to enter the professional league in the future, he would become the only player in the history of the professional league who is proficient in all five disciplines!
Xie Mingzhe hadn't realized how amazing this was, but Chen Qianlin had already discovered it. If his apprentice could really make a five-series card set, he would be the best card maker in the entire alliance, and no one would dare to question him.
After returning to the studio's dormitory, Xie Mingzhe lay on the bed, put his hands behind his head, closed his eyes and thought about how to make the new card. Xiaopang was embarrassed to disturb him, so he ate snacks by himself.
Suddenly, the computer screen lit up, and it was the Star Card APP showing a message from a friend in the game.
Xie Mingzhe closed his eyes and didn't see it, but Xiaopang saw it and reminded him, "Xiao Xie, you have news."
"Oh!" Xie Mingzhe opened his eyes and took a look at the laptop. He saw a private message from an ID he hadn't contacted for a long time. The message was very simple and direct: "Hello, Uncle Fat. I'm Fang Yu from Liushuang City. Do you have any ideas for the custom deathrattle cards I mentioned to you before?"