Chapter 31 – My Way (3)

I had decided on my current goal.

I needed an M/B or M/A ranking weapon.

The reason I needed a weapon was for the dungeons that were resistant to magic.

For mana stat, no matter how much you raised it, it wouldn’t affect the magic’s damage.

Only the total mana and the recovery rate.

Even the Awakened’s level did not affect the skill’s damage.

No matter how high leveled you were.

If you had the same skill and skill level, you’d do the same damage.

If there is a difference between a low level Awakened and higher leveled Awakened…

Increasing the mana stat to improve your overall mana pool and mana regen, allowing you to continuously cast the strongest skills.

Thus, the important thing to a magician class is the ‘skill level’.

That’s why they would be entering the level 18 dungeon.

If you think about it, it’s a hunt for weapons, but I’m skipping from the level 13 dungeon to the level 18 dungeon all at once.

For the average Awakened, the level 13 dungeon’s requirements was a 5 to 6 man party of level 65 minimum.

However, for the level 18 dungeon, you’d have to be a party of 5 to 6 members, all 85 levels higher than before, a group of lv 150s.

It took a minimum of 4 to 5 years of effort to make it possible.

And if you take account of the experience points and equipment befitting these members, there was a huge gap between me and them.

The amount of experience points you could earn would be on a different level.

The experience you could earn from the manticore dungeon would be 12 million or so.

By clearing the succubi dungeon once, you could receive up to 80 million experience. Just by the dungeon level increasing by 1, there was this much of a difference.

Of course, it’s biased since I was able to defeat the revival succubi as well in the level 13 dungeon.

My current level is 95.

I was able to achieve what would’ve taken others 3 years in only 3 months.

Roughly speaking, I had 12 times the growth speed of others.

A regular Awakened’s year would be only a month to me. But this isn’t the end.

Because the gap will only increase from here on out.

The skill and level growth rate only being 12 times higher?

No. I was sure that at the minimum, it would be 50 times.

It was like hitting the cheat key in BattleNet and casting ‘Psionic Storm’ that a ‘High Templar’ uses?

I didn’t think of stupid thoughts like ‘I’ll go to the level 18 dungeon when my level meets the requirements.’

Raising my main attack skill and shield to level 100! That was my requirement for entering the level 18 dungeon.

It was the time of year that nights became longer than day, and cold winds from morning till evening blew.

Time had passed to the point where I had to flip the calendar past October.

The safe house Jong Ho and I looked for before, we were able to match the timing of moving in with her birthday.

After the move, I went around to my neighbors to giving welcoming rice cakes around, and most reacted like this.

Common welcoming gifts shared around new neighbors, at least traditionally speaking. I think the tradition has nearly died out except in richer/older communities.

‘There are people who still do this?’ or ‘They are coming in because they won the lottery,’ was the general response.

I was a little disappointed.

But I really liked the home that was going to give peace and reassurance to my mother and my heart.

Since I was earning a lot more than what I thought, it was time for me to whip myself back into shape from a period of relaxation.

Happiness I obtained through difficulties.

I cannot have it stolen.

I cannot have it crushed.

I only hope that it’ll stay this way.

Finally today. I was able to reach level 100 in all skills with the exception of ‘Frost Orb’, ‘Heal’, ‘Hold’, and ‘Bind’.

For ‘Eye of the Storm’, since the increase in level didn’t do much, I leveled it up on to 70 and stopped it there.

I only hunted to level my skills, but ended up naturally leveling to 108.

If Jong Ho heard about this, he would probably fall over backwards and faint.

The only reason I was able to achieve such a satisfying result was diligence.

I could get rid of fatigue and physical wounds with Heal.

However, there was the hindrance known as ‘sleep’.

This was something that Heal couldn’t cure.

But I found even time used for sleep a waste. I wanted to grow even quicker.

I even searched for magic that would get rid of sleep.

The time I allowed myself was 6 hours.

This period of time did not only include sleep, but also for eating and taking care of myself.

Other than that, I only focused on hunting. 18 hours a day succubi hunting.

It was a brutal training. However on Sundays, I would take a break no matter what happened.

I was growing stronger for happiness, so I wouldn’t skip time with my mother.

Returning from the hunting grounds, I opened a safe in the corner of my room to retrieve the Awakened Essence.

And without hesitation, Awakened Gravity Laser.

I held the skill book against my chest and thought about Awakening the Gravity Laser.

Then.

[Would you like to Awaken Gravity Laser?]

Look at this kind narration provided by this noona.

I know this would be impossible, but I wanted to meet her someday and take her out for dinner.

“This is great.”

After Awakening the spell, the status window that showed Gravity Laser had a star in front of it, and the skill’s level became 1.

The required experience to level was 98 million.

Before Awakening, the experience required to level up the skill from level 1 was 100. It felt like the difference was too steep.

Finishing the Awakening, all preparations to enter the level 18 dungeon was perfect.

I arrived in front of the dungeon entrance, located in Nowon.

Nowon-gu, Seoul, South Korea.

Guri, where I was currently living at, was 30 min away from the entrance.

Guri-si, Gyeonggi-do.

Since I could not find any level 18 dungeons nearby, I was forced to waste 1 hour a day traversing.

Preparation was complete, and I could see the dungeon entrance before my eyes.

“Is there a need to hesitate?”

Dungeon is being activated.

The interior of the dungeon was something completely different from what I’ve seen so far.

A narrow rural road of 5m wide.

Each side of the road was accompanied by darkness that seemed to swallow light itself, which I found to be cliffs.

If felt as though if I fell, I would go straight down to hell.

Not only were the cliffs, but the ceiling and everywhere else was covered in complete darkness.

The only thing that had color in my sights was the rural road.

‘If there was a road the grim reaper would guide people through, would it be like this?’ was what I was considering.

Sightseeing ends here.

Without hesitation, I started to run.

I wonder how much time has passed.

When the entrance seemed smaller than a fingernail.

I heard the cries of the monsters ahead.

When I looked at where the sound came from, the first one I noticed was the ‘Poison Naga.’

The owner of the sharp piercing cry was the ‘Griffon.’

And next to it, there was a ghastly faded form.

It was exactly as I learned.

Until now, all dungeons had a single type of monster.

However, from level 16 and beyond had 2 to 5 different types of monsters mixed in.

For the level 18 dungeon that I’ve entered, it featured 3 different types of monsters.

If the variety of monsters increase, the different defense and attack become difficult to deal with.

Melee and ranged monsters, as well as monsters that use special abilities.

The reason why 5 to 6 members enter together as a party was to execute the correct strategies that work against the different monsters.

Even if physical attacks didn’t work, this was why tanks such as Paladins and Dragonite Warriors are needed.

Amongst the warrior class, the tank was treated like royalty.

Without being carried, it could keep growing.

But is that really important.

‘Even today, I’ll do it by myself!’

As the Griffons Fear rang out, I casted the ‘Awakened Gravity Laser’ to max range and ran full speed.

It was an attack skill that attacked anything within 100m without discrimination, regardless of what monsters and life forms they were.

The attack had begun the moment I could tell their shapes clearly.

All lasers within range were firing out in all directions.

I could not help but be surprised as I closed the distance between me and them.

“Huh? What the?”

Awakened Gravity Laser had a different thickness and color.

The thickness and clearness could not be compared to the previous version before Awakening.

Even when it got near level 100, it never showed crushing force like this.

It was as 3 times as thick, a mixture of red and blue powerful laser that poured out.

Through Awakening, the skill’s increase in power had increased to eye opening levels.

“Guess this is the reason why everyone focuses so much on money. Let’s kill!”