Please, good doctor

forget the water

Please don't remind me

Of my daughter

I still see

her face in horror

I still see

how it tore her

The Shanty of the Last Sailor

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Hera went to her rewards screen on her tablet right away to look for the compendium. She knew that she could choose the skill, but the list surprised her. It had over a dozen options, and they all seemed interesting. From basic resistances to combat techniques and even something called 'camp finder.' Before getting lost in the possibilities, Hera looked at the quest that she received.

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Hidden treasures

Explorer exclusive quests

The MAZE is filled with hidden items, places, and secrets. Find one of such treasures.

Rewards: Map skill upgrade

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The quest confused Hera. What would be considered a hidden treasure? Could this place be a secret? And the quest said nothing about Brinefront. Would it still work even if she was in a different room? The reward also worried her. She already got an upgrade to her map skill. Would she get something else or even a higher upgrade?

She needed to talk to someone about this. Maybe Helena could clarify her doubts, even though this was more geared towards an explorer. Either way, she needed to get out of the cave. She stayed here for less than one hour, but being inside something that could flood at any minute wasn't very relaxing.

She marked the location on her map. Then a drawing of a broken boat and a bottle with a scroll inside appeared above the marker she placed. Hera stared at the new icon for a moment.

"You know, this is kind of annoying. It's not enough to make us stronger, control all the MAZE, and even make the guides. But the system has to be good at drawing too?" Hera sighed.

She walked back to the entrance of the cave. The platforms still had a thin layer of water. Nothing that could allude to a high tide had appeared. Climbing out of the cove was much easier than getting down from it. In just a couple of minutes, she was already back on the solid yet muddy ground.

Hera looked at the clock on her tablet. It was still early afternoon. It felt like a waste to go back to the city right now. She could try to look for secrets here, or just hunt a bit to get used to the crocodiles. Picking her tablet, Hera checked what was the area that Mondy's drones could reach. She had yet to see if this city was in range.

Checking the map, she found that the drones could reach Hazelpond's surroundings, but they had a much smaller coverage area than Brinefront. There was also a higher cut from the pay. Instead of 10% of participation in the profits, she would have only 7%. The parts she could sell were also different. He would buy legs, the heart and liver, the tail, and the skin. But the skin had to be at least one square meter, and it couldn't be damaged.

They pay wasn't that different from the frogs, aside from profits. The main issue was butchering one of those creatures. It seemed like too much work for Hera to do alone.

She decided to hunt the crocodiles. Even if she wasn't going to make any money, she could get the experience for fighting alone. Hera also wanted to test her [Explorer's Assassinate] together with her spells.

Walking around the swamp, it didn't take long for Hera to find her prey, a crocodile a bit smaller than the one that rushed her. She quickly activated her [Hide] and approached the creature. Using her poison mana stone, she sent a poison needle towards the monster. The bright orange spike hit the back of the beast, but the crocodile didn't seem to notice it.

Hera waited for a moment before attacking again. She knew that the spell had no initial damage. Only the actual poison would hurt the monster. Since last time it took less than a minute and a few strikes, Hera decided to wait two minutes before changing tactics.

She kept following the crocodile, but the creature didn't show any signs of being hurt. Hera frowned. Could it be that the poison wouldn't take effect every time? Or maybe the place she hit wasn't a good target to poison the monster.

Being stubborn for a moment, Hera prepared another poison needle. This time, she used the base version of the spell. She wanted to aim for its mouth or eyes, but going towards its face was too risky. She turned her attention to the tail. Hera wasn't entirely sure how the nervous system of a creature inside the MAZE would work, but the tail should have some veins connecting directly to the heart.

She aimed at the middle of the crocodile's tail and sent the poison needle. This time the monster seemed to feel something. The creature turned around while Hera ducked to the side, trying to blend in with the area.

The crocodile looked around for some time but returned to its walk. Hera followed it for another couple of minutes. She started to notice some changes in the creature. Its movement started to become frantic, and sometimes it would slam its body on the side of a rock or tree. Hera's stomach started to turn. She was glad that the poison seemed to be taking effect but seeing the creature agonize like that wasn't sitting well with her.

She deactivated her [Hide] and rushed towards it. Her handaxe in hand. The crocodile noticed the movement but was too weak to turn quickly enough. Hera aimed at its head and slashed its skull with all her strength.

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[All In] effects deactivated, the cooldown will now start

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The attack splitt the monster's skull. The impact was much stronger than she imagined. After making sure the creature wasn’t moving anymore. She opened her status and looked at the [All In] skill

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All In (Rank 1):

The user can increase one of its attributes to perform a single action as if all the available bonus points were allocated in the relevant attribute.

The attribute will have bonus increments and, at the same time, reduce all other attributes to 13 (10 + level - 1) for 5 hours.

Value of attribute when the skill is used: 22

Cooldown: 36 hours

Remaining(35:58:24)

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When the skill was triggered, the attribute she was using would jump five points. She had forgotten about the debuff that would be with her for a few hours. Continue hunting like that could be dangerous. Sure, her attributes would be only four points lower, but it was still better to get used to falling back when she had a debuff on her. Later on, the gap between her attributes could be too big to ignore.

She moved away from the crocodile's corpse and headed back to the city. While walking, Hera thought about her skill. The attribute raise to 22 meant that the skill still considered an increase of one to be worth two attribute points, and it had an increase to three points when it reached 20. This meant that the [All In] still followed the same rules about attributes as everyone else. Every 10 points, the cost would go up by one.

Arriving in the city, Hera stopped by a restaurant to get some takeout, just a burger and fries. They sold crocodile burgers, but she was still feeling guilty for hurting the monster so much. Picking a regular chicken burger, she went back to the house. To avoid the big crowd, she took the long way around the lake. She noticed that quite a few people were walking around with pickaxes and other types of mining gear. They were all heading to a large building embedded in the wall of the cavern. She made a mental note to ask Helena about it.

Arriving at the house, Hera took off her boots before walking in. They were covered in mud, and she didn't want to make the entire house dirty.

"Lena, I'm back," Hera called.

"Hey, sweetie. Welcome home!" Helena walked out of the kitchen, wearing a maid outfit.

Hera blinked a few times, staring at the mage, "I think... I hope that something messed with my head," she rubbed her eyes, casting her mend spell. But Helena was still wearing the costume, "Why are you dressed like that?"

"Like what?" Helena looked down, "Oh! Sorry!"

The mage snapped her fingers, and the maid uniform disappeared. She was now back in her blue jeans and a baggy t-shirt.

"I was talking to Quinn. I forgot about this. If you do an illusion spell on yourself, it's kind of hard to remember. Especially since my mage gear also has gloves," Helena said.

"Oh. No, don't worry. It's your house, after all. But we might need a signal. Like a sock on the door or something," Hera suggested.

Helena stared at Hera for a moment, "What are you talk... OH! NO! Heavens, no!" the mage shook her head vigorously, "Quinn is my cousin, this was just a bet that I lost. It's a stupid thing we do. We bet things, and the loser has to take some compromising pictures."

"Oh, that's weird. And you never told me she was your cousin."

"Well, family is weird. And she doesn't have a good relationship with her parents, or with anyone in our family, to be honest. Aside from me, of course. Because of that, she always says that friends are more important than family, and she calls me her friend exactly because of that. She says that I mean more to her than her family."

"I get it... I guess. Anyway, it is good to know that I have a contact that can give me some dirt on my boss now," Hera said, walking to the laundry room.

"Careful with that, Miss Kingsley, your boss is very powerful. You wouldn't want to angrer the person who can use all the hot water before you shower," Helena chuckled.

"True. Good thing our shower is powered by mana, and we don't have to worry about that," Hera replied.

"You're no fun," Helena scoffed while heading to the kitchen.

Hera cleaned her boots and went to take a shower. Sometime later, she was back in the living room, drinking coffee with Helena. They talked about Hera's quest and how it was to hunt around this area. Helena agreed that it was a good idea to keep the Dead Man's coins. There were several quests, secrets, and situations that required a rare item, or something very specific. There was no guarantee that she would ever find what asked for the coins, but it couldn't hurt to have them on her.

"Oh, and what skill do you think I should get? I also have an elemental essence from the Arcanist Lookout. Any suggestions?"

"The skill depends on what you want to do. Think about your shortcomings. What do you need to improve? The essences, what are your options? You can't actually use them by themselves, but you could use it to strengthen your weapons. If you get something that can interact with your skills can be good."

Hera stopped for a moment, thinking about her possibilities. She felt like she lacked some long-distance capabilities. Among the skills, there was a combat form called Wire Trap style. It was a mid-range technique that focused on the use of a chain to keep the enemies at bay. Hera was searching the net about every skill that she found interesting. The style also allowed the use of chains with something attached to the end which could work with her chakram. The main issue with the other skills was that they would only show how to acquire it. But if Hera picked a fighting style, she would get a compendium that she could use in one of the ATRs. That would make getting the skill much easier.

She took a look at the camp finder skill, and it was a bit underwhelming. The skill simply marked spots on the map that were good places for camping in the wild. Sure, it helped when she was in a hurry, but it seemed like the type of skill that you would get naturally when staying away from cities.

"Lena, what could combo well with spirit? That one seems to be less common," Hera asked after choosing the Wire Trap Style.

"Oh, want to go for the road less traveled, are we? That can be good, but you will have to figure out things on your own. Either way, spirit can combo well with fire creating soul fire. It makes the body burn from the inside. Wind and water are not that compatible, but some people like the idea of going for a river of the dead theme. Earth can make some strong golems if you use spirit, but that is a bit more advanced. I have no idea how that mixes with poison. Either way, you need first to figure out where you want to use the essence. If you are slapping it in a weapon, spirit won't increase the damage, but it will make your enemy less... energetic," Helena explained.

Hera nodded. She looked for some ideas online, even asking Blue and the others for their opinions. In the end, she picked the spirit essence. Ghost monsters existed, and it would be good to have a weapon that could target the immaterial. Using the spirit essence, she could make Mayura's Feather a stronger weapon.