Chapter 9: Dungeon Exploration

When we reached the bottom of the ladder, we were at a Safe Zone. I wanted to ask about the Player’s name, but he didn’t say it himself. Plus, he was wearing a cloak; he probably wanted to hide his identity.

Safe Zones were areas in Dungeons where no Monsters appeared. They were indicated by transparent pinkish barriers that surrounded them.

The sewer smelled extremely bad. It was an underground passage with dirty grey walls and a convex ceiling. The passage itself was around 8 meters wide, but there was a canal of sewage in the middle, so the walkable path was only 1.5 meters wide on each side. From the distance, I could see some intersections. There was also an occasional bridge to walk across the canal. The area was surprisingly well lit due to the candle lights hanged at the wall every few meters.

Jumping in Reality was weird. Since physical ability is enhanced by reality, jumping two meters in height was standard; however, there were locations that prevented you from jumping across or above. This canal was one of them. Another was the buildings in the City.

“How do you fight?”

I explained all battle information to my Temporary Party Member (TPM), including my Job, Element, Equipment, Abilitys, etc.

He’s reacting as if he’s surprised… did I say something wrong?

“Is there something wrong?”

“No. I’m just surprised you gave me all your information like that.”

“We’re working together so I think that’s for the best…”

I… I trusted this person… weird as it may be since he would be the type of person most people would avoid and distrust.

“No. I’m very grateful for your trust. I am a Water Spell Blade.”

If I recalled correctly, the Spell Blade Job Class was something along these lines:

“I use two One-handed Swords simultaneously--”

I interrupted my TPM’s explanation with surprise, “How do you use two swords simultaneously!? When I move my sword to the left-hand in unequips.”

“During the customization screen, I selected One-handed Sword twice, choosing once per hand.”

“That was… possible…”

“It’s quite rare since most people don’t figure out at configuration how to do it.”

Amazing! Why didn’t I think of that? Two swords would be cool.

“Even so, as cool as it sounds, dual-wielding holds a lot of disadvantages. Aldrich commented a lot about the disadvantages of dual- wielding when he learned about it.”

“Wait? You know Aldrich’s name? Are you one of the few Players that interact with Characters?”

“Yes. I see that you are too. I enjoy talking to Characters they are as much human as ourselves, even though they may be from reality. Liza has been avoiding conversations lately though.”

My trust in my TPM grew even greater. I didn’t expect an action as simple as talking with Characters to change my opinion on people…

“Going back on topic, I need three hits on Sewer Rats and two on Bats to kill them. I use light equipment because it lets me move faster. Here’s my ability and its description.”

“It takes around 10% of my Mana to use. I fight by getting high Chain Gauges to increase my damage by dodging attacks and cancelling enemy attack animations via mini-stuns caused by Skadi's Caress. It mini-stuns the opponent anytime a weapon or ability hits the cursed target.”

“Do you mind I decide on our strategy?”

“No. Go on.”

“I’ll be the one in front. You’ll primarily use your archery to support me. You should be two meters behind me. Also, keep an eye out to back attacks. If there are too many monsters attacking me, then you should switch to your sword and draw some aggro as well. Is there any problem?”

“Umm. I’m pretty sure a Spell Blade has even worse defenses that an Assassin. Wouldn’t it be dangerous if you got hit too much? Wouldn’t it be better we share the aggro to minimize the damage?”

“I won’t get hit. As long as I don’t get swarmed or surprised, I won’t get hit... probably…”

“Adding probably at the end made me even more nervous…”

Although I had my worries, we decided to begin exploring the sewers. Our first encounter was against three Sewer Rats and two Bats.

Following our strategy, I shot my arrows as accurately as possible. Thanks to my practice in the alleyways, I did not hit my ally, but still missed every now and then.

He… was dodging attacks without even looking at the monster sometimes… Did he have vision abilitys? No… I knew what he was doing… During my practice, I did this too on occasion, but not to this extent. He was predicting the attacks of the monsters perfectly. Well, they were controlled by the AI so they shouldn’t be that hard to predict, but still…

Offensively, his attacks were chaotic. Since my attacks were rhythmic, I followed a consistent pattern in attacks, but he was different. At first, I thought he was attacking at random timings, but I was wrong. He was attacking in moments where he held no risk of getting attack or positions where he could still evade. When he used Skadi’s Caress, he attacked in the middle of the monsters attacking. Despite that, one could safely say that his battle style was a mess.

We encountered a few more battles along the way but took no damage from them. There was once backstab encounter, but I was able to deal with it easily.

“Hey. Why are you so good at predicting these monsters?”

“Each type of monster follows their own AI script. Although you wouldn’t understand my explanation of their AI, after fighting hundreds of the same two types of monsters I’ve already memorized it. I’m sure you can do it too, not with memorizing the AI, but with muscle memory.”

I see… he wasn’t some super talented athlete in real life. He understood how patterns of the AI and used them to his advantage.

Every now and then, there would be paths that were not passable due to iron bars blocking the way. When we went by the first one, my TPM immediately started swinging on the bars to no avail. He was quite insistent and continued for a minute until he gave up and we went on.

We soon arrived at a path blocked by iron bars. My TPM immediately started swinging at the bars. The bars did not scratch at all and reflected his sword again and again. As I watched him persisting on trying to break the iron bars I struggled to hold back my laughter on how idiotic he looked. Thankfully, after a minute or so, he finally gave up.

After around half an hour, we arrived at an intersection. There were two paths for us to take, one straight across the bridge and one to the right.

“We’ll go right first?” said my TPM.

“Why?”

“Wind.”

I did not understand the meaning of those words, but I followed along with his decision.

After around ten minutes, we arrived at a dead end with only a ladder leading directly upwards to the surface. Light beamed down from what appeared to be an open manhole on the top of the ladder.

As we climbed up the ladder, eight Bats spawned and attacked us. Since we were climbing, I could not use my Bow. Since I could only use my Sword with my right hand, I got attacked a few times from the left side. The same was true for my partner as he lost 5% of his health per hit.

“Move to the right a bit!” commanded my TPM.

In an emergency situation, I decided to follow him without a second thought. He climbed back down to the same level as I was. Since I moved my body to the side, we could occupy the height on the ladder.

Since my TPM could use his left hand while I couldn’t, he covered the right side as I focused on the left. Since we changed to this position, less attacks reached us. We fended off the Bats with my Health at 68% while my TPM’s at 82%. After the battle, we rushed up the ladder quickly and did not run to anymore encounters.

“Where are we?” My eyes twitched due to the sudden exposure to sunlight after being in the sewer for a while.

After a few seconds, my vision cleared. We were at the middle of a number of buildings of Naut City. A square around 5 meters wide surrounded by a number of building walls. Because we were technically in Naut City, our Health and Mana was restored to full.

“Hey, look…” said my TPM as he pointed to one of the corners corner. There lay a closed treasure chest.

We walked towards it quickly.

“Shouldn’t we move cautiously?”

“No. Our location says we are in Naut City, so it should be safe.”

We opened the treasure chest.

Elven Cape x4

Type: Accessory

Rarity: Uncommon

Cape made by elves for easy movement. Increases evasion.

We both equipped our newfound capes instead of ours cloaks. They were wooden green and a lot more comfortable to the skin than the cloaks. As discussed, we split the Elven Cape two each.

“Hey. What happens if only one piece of equipment was found in the treasure chest for a Party or Temporary Party?”

“The Player who does not receive the Equipment will earn all the money acquired until the cost of the Equipment has been paid for.”

“And if the money acquired is not enough?”

“A warning will appear when ending the contract. The other Player can accept it, fight more monsters, or ask the Equipment acquiring Player to pay him the remaining amount.”

“I see… shall we return?”

“Sure.”

We reentered the sewers to explore further. An idea sprang up in my head as we did.

“Wouldn’t this be a good grinding spot?”

“Grinding is… annoying in Reality…”

“?”

“I think Reality has a weird mechanic where you stop gaining experience from weaker monsters at a certain point.”

“Really?”

“Defeating Sewer Rats and Bats no longer increase my stats. At least I don’t feel like they do. Well, I can’t prove it either way. Without any way to see our stats, this was quite a problem.”

“Hmm… I still feel ever slightly stronger when I do defeat them, so I can’t relate.”

“I guess it depends on how many monsters you have already defeated.”

“How many have you defeated anyway?”

“Around 3000 I think…”

“Are you serious?”

“Yes. It’s not that much. In this dungeon alone we are already in the hundreds, considering it has been two weeks since we came here; that’s was only over 200 per day. It probably would be more if I discovered the sewers earlier…”

The consequences of locking myself in my room showed… I had a lot of catching up to do.

[Spell Blade]

A job specializing on supporting its weapon attacks with magic.

Stats: Health: * Mana: **** Attack: **** Defense: **

Magic: **** Resistance: ** Speed: *** Dexterity: ****

Usable Weapons: One-handed Swords, Two-handed Swords, Spears, Shields

Usable Armor: Light Equipment, Medium Equipment

[Skadi’s Caress]

Inflicts a curse on the opponent. Whenever the target takes damages outside from Skadi’s Caress from any weapon or ability source, the target will be mini-stunned and take a slight amount of damage for the duration of the curse.

Range: Single-target; Clear Vision

Cooldown: 20 Seconds

[Status Effect: Mini-stun]

The victim cannot act or think for a 0.1 seconds. If the victim is the middle of any activation animation, the action will be cancelled without triggering the Cooldown. After being mini-stunned, the victim gains immunity to being mini-stunned again for a second.