“Alright, I’ve decided.” There were a few eye rolls until Michael sighed, asking the question on everyone’s mind.

“What was decided, Arthur?” Michael asked while looking to the leader of Einherjar who was blinking at the question before the man seemed to recall that other people didn’t know what he thought.

Good for them, they shouldn’t want to know what he thought.

“I’ve decided that we can’t put off bringing in more people, we really need to create a Kingdom.” The words drew a pause from the group collectively as they looked at their leader.

They were currently on a safe zone on the fifty ninth floor, a week away from the end of June, and approaching the sixth Demon Lord…

Unfortunately the first team to reach the Demon Lord was the British team, meaning that they’d be fighting an ‘automaton’ version of the sixth Demon Lord.

Those versions of the Demon Lords were weaker, and gave weaker experience, also didn’t give any Skills and were much less likely to drop an item.

Some people even ‘farm’ Demon Lords to get specific items, though it was rare that Einherjar would even consider that, though they did ‘farm’ Despair to get another sword like Arthur’s, instead they got the chest-plate that John wore.

It wasn’t worth the effort to farm a Demon Lord unless they were much stronger, and even then, any equipment dropped by the Demon Lord would probably much too weak by that point.

Speaking of Demon Lords, which reminded Arthur of the fifth Demon Lord, the Rusted King… the ‘boost’ gained from that Demon Lord wasn’t readily apparent for Arthur, but Matt apparently gained a Spell Skill finally, all defensive spells of course.

Arthur noted that one person in particular would get a tangible reward from the Demon Lord, but Arthur, if he landed the killing blow, would always get a bit of something even if the reward didn’t suit him.

Alice’s Dark Juggernaut Skill might have also came from killing Despair, now that Arthur thought about it… he didn’t need to know everything about his teammates, though it would help, and their Spells weren’t always necessary, such as Alice’s Dark Juggernaut Skill which let her get a bit stronger with each successive kill, or Matt’s Spiked Wall Spell.

Still, it was not too much of a train-smash to not kill the sixth Demon Lord, the Poisonous Thorn was a Wood-element Demon Lord so it was likely that no one in Einherjar would have gotten a concrete reward, and it couldn’t talk so it wasn’t adding much to the ‘plot’ of the Dungeon.

The first Demon Lord loved the first and burnt himself out to defend her, the second loved the first and surrendered after his death, the third wished to progress among the Undead but was defeated by Chronos, and the Rusted King was devoured by Chronos after Chronos found the golem form of said King.

The Demon Lords that Einherjar missed probably had their own stories, but Guldan was a Goblin, they were horrible disgusting things as a rule of thumb, and this new Demon Lord couldn’t talk, Arthur wasn’t interested in their stories.

“I wonder when I should release that information…” Arthur wasn’t sure if he should make that public knowledge, considering that most people would like to vilify their opponents, and while Despair was definitely a bit evil, given his name, the rest…

The first, second and fifth Demon Lords were all victims of Chronos’ lust for battle, much like the rest of humanity.

“Arthur, explain, you didn’t want to add people to our team before, what changed?” Michael cut off the strange tangent that Arthur was headed for before Arthur could once more get lost in thought, bringing back the leader of Einherjar.

“Oh right, I’ve recalled that little bit of information the Dungeon taught us. Anything that is mentioned is probably necessary. So if there is a Kingdom system, it’s probably necessary for some reason, even if we can’t see the meaning right away.” Arthur reminded, and then they thought about it.

It was kind of true, even if they didn’t want it to be, even John’s ability to cure poison was immediately necessary in the second Area, recalling that Michael had got hit by a knife covered in unmentionables, without poison removal he could have gotten some horrible disease from that… more like he definitely would have.

And then in the current Area, poison removing fruit dropped from a monster, then the next floor had poison monsters.

“But why would the Kingdom system be necessary… unless the Dungeon starts requiring more than six people to travel through it?” Alice offered as she thought about it.

“Maybe, maybe not, I doubt it would be necessary, but the Dungeon does make a habit of having things be easier one way than another.” Arthur offered, reminding them that they could have ignored the poison fruits and have John not get the ability to remove poison.

It would be much more difficult and they probably would have died, but they technically could have made it through without those things.

Technically, but honestly no, who would take that risk?

So in the same sense, there would probably come a time where they would need more helpers, but could choose to continue without them.

Rather have and not need, than to need and not have.

“Okay, so you want us to increase the members of our group, make a Kingdom, we’re still the Einherjar though… but who would we get?” Matt offered, rolling his left shoulder to regain a bit of feeling in it after blocking using his left arm so often.

“We could hold interviews? I mean, it’s not like we don’t have a template from businesses already, we work, we earn money, we’re picking people to work for our ‘company’ right?” Emilia offered, getting a pause from the group before Arthur groaned out loud.

“Right… it could be that simple really. I recall someone that interested me so I could get into contact with his team, but interviews is a possibility.” Arthur admitted reluctantly.

They were all friends before becoming Einherjar so they didn’t really think of Adventuring as a job, even if it was their primary income at this point.

Banks were probably having a field-day trying to consider loans to Adventurers when the income of an Adventurer increased over-time but there was a chance of death so the Adventurer wouldn’t be able to pay…

But for some Adventuring teams it really was basically a business, even if Einherjar hadn’t hoped onto the train just yet, many others were already treating Kingdoms as such.

“Well, I got the idea after I saw that suit Shaun wore for the U.N meeting, and recently I heard that actors and actresses are entering the Dungeon for stats, you wouldn’t exactly need a stuntman if you could shrug of real bullets right?” Emilia added, the members of Einherjar slowly realizing that they had also seen proof of what Emilia was saying.

A certain Matrix actor was one such ‘celebrity Adventurer’ and that one South African actress, the main character of that spy movie with the quote ‘manners maketh man’ was another, even musicians were getting in on it, Arthur recalled a comment by a rapper who had a famous song named ‘Earth’ on one of his Soul Theory posts online saying he’d like to talk to Arthur about it if Arthur was ever around.

Arthur was quite happy about the last one, that rapper was funny; even if most of his friends didn’t know him until that Earth song was released.

“Huh… Adventurers are kind of celebrities too, right? Why haven’t we gotten any sponsor deals yet?” Michael asked, getting a cough from Arthur in response.

“Well, it might be partially because we’re well known as ‘America’s Adventurers’ not to mention never reaching out for talk about sponsorship.” Arthur added, thinking on maybe making his Email account a bit more accessible.

Only Adventurers seemed to message him, questions about the Dungeon really, but he never really hinted at anything more than a business relationship.

He was a private guy in the first place; he didn’t like being in the public eye, but that was being a bit selfish considering his teammates might want more.

“Right, guess we’ll start that up too. I might even get us a PR guy.” John joked, though it was probably not entirely a joke considering he had quite the network of contacts out of the whole of Einherjar.

Other graphic designers, sound engineers, accountants, aforementioned PR people, he worked with a lot of people on side projects to make advertisements for them, so it made sense that he’d know quite a few.

“We’ll deal with all of that, but heads up, fight.” Arthur interrupted the conversation as their weaponry was all prepared.

After getting out of the Dungeon, the group understandably went to Shaun to talk to him about the plan to get more members for Arthur’s non-existent Kingdom.

“Wait, so you’re finally considering something I told you a few months ago?” Shaun was understandably a bit annoyed/confused at why Arthur was having the sudden change of heart only now.

Explaining his mind-set just had Shaun shake his head with a sigh.

“That’s more of an excuse than a reason… but alright, the Guild is kind of your patron so we’ll put up flyers on the Guild notice board. Any particular requirements?” Arthur hummed in thought, looking to his teammates if they had any suggestions.

“Only women-” John was summarily ignored as the remaining five members of Einherjar considered who they would like to fight with.

Einherjar was… unfortunately kind of elitist, so they didn’t socialize with other teams that much, despite the Guild being a place where socializing Adventurers was the norm.

“Well… there’s no major requirement actually.” Michael offered, getting glances from the other members of Einherjar.

“Well obviously they need to get to our level or near it, but we’re the highest levelled team in the world if you were to believe social media, we’re not going to find many people above level sixty.” That was a good point, anyone above level sixty was likely employed by the Guild or already a member of Einherjar.

Most Adventurers were only in the thirties-forties, this was because there were more Adventurers signing up little by little, so that was the average.

But Adventurers could be split into those who were part of the first wave, Einherjar being a leading example of this group, the first groups of Adventurers were all in the lower fifties or so.

Then there were the newbies who were somewhere between level one and twenty.

The rest of the levels was just a zone of ‘average’ Adventurers.

“Good point, so we should resign ourselves to getting someone lower levelled than us by around ten levels at least.” Arthur admitted, and Shaun just sat staring at the meeting that was taking place in his office.

Obviously, the Einherjar were kicked out of the office moments after this realization by Shaun, and they sat at the open area of the Guild, everyone sitting with some drink.

Not that alcohol worked quite right for Adventurers really, people with high Vitality scores, such as Arthur, found it difficult to get drunk actually.

Alcohol was technically a poison.

“Continuing, ten levels lower at minimum, but what about the maximum, I doubt we’ll be happy with people who are level ten or lower, I mean, then we’d have to basically spoon-feed them equipment and help until they got strong enough, and that would leave their Skill levels behind.” Alice reminded, and the discussion continued.

Einherjar was also being stared at occasionally by other Adventurer groups, especially the newbies who were looking at them like celebrities…

Well, Einherjar were celebrities but only really to other Adventurers after all.

“I’d say level thirty for the maximum gap between us and them, with a bit of advice and some extended Dungeon time we should be able to get them to at least the fifties in a month or so.” Levelling was not exactly constant, and it was in fact slowing down quite a bit for Einherjar.

The only reason it didn’t seem so bad was because they were also constantly fighting stronger and stronger enemies but where before they could level up once or twice a day, they’d now level up once every two or four days depending on how many enemies they encountered.

But if Einherjar brought the newer Kingdom members with to a high area, and worked with them, well, they’d level up fast.

“Okay, so anywhere above level thirty… how many are we looking for anyway?” Matt offered, and once more the group ignored John’s suggestion of getting many, many girls into the group.

It might have sounded chauvinistic to someone who didn’t know John, but he was just messing with them, and they didn’t mind the jokes, it kept them from getting too serious.

“Well if we add too many at once then we won’t be able to really work together, so… maybe six? I mean, there are Kingdoms with like thirty people already, so having twelve of us total is fine right?” Arthur put down his beer with a frown.

He didn’t actually like alcohol that much even when he could get drunk, it was why he rarely drank…

“So a full team basically… that seems like it would work out, swap teammates around kind of like how superhero teams have different members for different situations.” Surprisingly nerdy comment by Emilia aside (they all watched Anime, Emilia was a fan of a certain rubber pirate) they got the idea.

“Yeah, about that… I actually recall someone asking me about a chance to be part of our Kingdom… I’m just trying to recall his name.” Arthur admitted, and the rest of the group tried to recall if Arthur ever mentioned such a person.

“Wasn’t there a day a month ago where we went out and you said you spoke to someone about Adventuring stuff? We were playing pool, you had just gotten your ass kicked by Michael, remember?” Emilia’s words, while factual, brought a smile to Michael’s face as Arthur’s head made contact with the table they were seated at.

“Yes, I recall. Everyone lost to Michael. Ah, Drew Simmons was his name.” Arthur sat up as he recalled the name of the aforementioned Adventurer, remembering that the boy/teen was in high school.

“Alright, Drew Simmons, what level was he a month ago?” John asked leaving Arthur to explain his conversation with Drew to the group, as well as Drew being level thirty five back then.

“Well he’s already met the requirements if you’re just looking at that, and if he has five dedicated teammates then that is a whole team in one go… got a way to contact him?” Alice offered and Arthur shrugged, leaving the rest of the group to sigh.

Right, Arthur was good with technology but hated social media somehow.

“Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, there will be something he’ll be on, let him know you want to meet up and have it happen.” Michael explained in the end, leaving Arthur to stare at his second-in-command with a dull look for a solid minute.

“I really don’t want to go on any of those things. Someone else do it, I’m not doing it.” Arthur leaned back, downing his beer and leaving it at that.

Arthur was damn stubborn at times, so recognizing this as a fight no one wanted to fight, Michael sighed pulling out his phone and going online.

Another issue with being an Adventurer, being in the Dungeon meant spending a lot of time without an internet connection, this resulted in Adventurers experiencing a strange disconnect from ‘current’ news.

Not that Arthur cared for much of current news, knowing that the world wasn’t going to explode tomorrow was enough for him on most days.

The only news he actually cared about was stuff related to books, anime, and games, and now Adventuring stuff after Red Sky Day.

“I’ll get on that, might as well.” John admitted with a sigh, knowing that he had to talk to some of his network anyway, so might as well send the invitation to this ‘Drew’ while he was online.

“Okay, so we’re going to be getting six new members unless we have issue with this guy’s team, or he’s a free Adventurer.” Alice leaned back with her statement, looking at her own beer with a shrug before drinking it.

Underage she may be, but considering Ellie, the government worker, was the one that handed it to her after they ordered their drinks, she didn’t care.

Besides, Vitality stat.

“Good point, but let’s wait until we find out whether he’s a free Adventurer or not before we look for other options.” Arthur reminded with a raised eyebrow, getting an exaggerated ‘backing off’ motion from Alice, getting laughs all around.

“Alright, alright, let’s leave the talk of recruits and publicity alone for a while, let’s talk about anything else. I’d like to talk Skills, Stats and all that, but if you all don’t want to…” Arthur was being… oddly considerate today.

Normally he’d just talk about Skills and Stats regardless of what the rest of his team wanted, not to say that nothing else was spoken of, but that was part of the only topic Arthur spoke out on.

Anything to do with Adventurers was something that Arthur knew very well, enough to discuss for hours about almost any topic related to Adventurers.

“I’d rather not but it is a bit necessary, been a while since we shared after all.” Michael admitted with a frown, getting sighs all around.

Typically everyone was left to their own devices when it came to their Adventurer Status, the only shared info was really their levels.

It was already enough to worry about your own Stats and Skills, worrying about another’s was complex, though Arthur always found time to do so.

It came with being the leader and always theorizing strategies.

“Alright, alright, everyone got their notes on their status?” Matt asked, removing his own piece of paper as everyone dropped them into the centre of the table.

Einherjar didn’t exactly care enough to notice that anyone close enough to hear what was being said, which was many an Adventurer with their enhanced abilities, was trying to sneak glances at those pieces of paper.

Their stats and skills were the subject of intense discussion online, considering they were the ‘strongest’ team gossip and contemplation was natural, the only concrete things known about the team was that their levels were approaching seventy and their Classes.

Roles in the team were still being guessed at, though obviously Arthur was the leader. Seeing these status pages would give people more info, and might inspire certain stat builds.

There was a website where people could anonymously upload their status and ask for advice, get criticism and all that.

Understandably it quickly devolved into talks of ‘hax’ or ‘garbage’ when referring to the stats of others because no one’s stats or skills were truly the same.

And no one mentioned Animae because they were private information.

The first page they looked at was Matt’s, knowing it was simple.

Matt Jacobson

Level: 69 (C-Rank)

Class: Wall of Steel- Grants two stat points to Endurance per level

Gives Spatial Recognition (Rare) Skill and Shield Arts Skill

Anima

Shield of Immunity

Anima Skills

Bulwark- ranged attacks against team are redirected towards the shield

Spikes- Parrying a weapon might result in its destruction

Unstoppable Wall- Shield bashes are more effective and cause bleeding.

Primary Element: Metal

Other Element: Earth

Personal Skills

Stand Strong IV (47/200)- increases Endurance by 25%

Shield Arts IV (38/200)- decreases Damage taken when blocking

Spatial Recognition III (31/300) - Allows tracking of all things within a fifteen metre radius, causes headaches with long use

Lightened Load IV (3/200)- Weight of carried items lowered by 20%

Quick Response II (53/200)- The more enemies you face, the better your reaction speed becomes.

Steel Guardian I (23/100)- Grants use of defensive Metal Element Spells.

Stats

Strength: 73

Dexterity: 73

Intelligence: 73

Wisdom: 73

Endurance: 141 (176)

Vitality: 73

“As expected, Matt is probably going to become immortal at some point.” John joked, and Matt was pretty smug about his defence.

That smug smirk replaced to a look of fear as he looked at the knife pierced into the table where his hand had been a moment ago, taking a moment to stare at Emilia who was looking oddly innocent despite throwing a knife into the table.

“Did you just…” Matt slowly asked, no one else seemed to care that much as Emilia shrugged.

“What, it’s a normal knife, not an Anima or a Blacksmith forged weapon, you know it can’t pierce your skin even.” Emilia shrugged while Matt just gave her a dull stare in return.

“Yeah I don’t appreciate knives being thrown at me just because they bounce off.” Matt realized he had said something wrong when Emilia started smiling, and Arthur started covering up his chuckles with his hand.

“You just admitted that you know they bounce off! Who threw you with a knife?” Emilia was really interested in this apparently as Matt realized that he did kind of admit it by accident.

“A… close friend’s dad threw me with a knife while I was jumping out his daughter’s window a week ago.” Matt admitted, trying to put it a bit gently.

Which was uncharacteristically nice of Matt. Normally he’d say something to the effect of:

I ploughed this guy’s daughter and he tossed a knife at me.

Rather than that, the question was ‘what does Matt do with his free time… that this sounded normal for him?’.

Moving on, they looked at Alice’s status next after Matt pocketed his status page.

Alice Grave

Level: 69 (C-Rank)

Class: Martial Berserker- Grants one stat point to Strength and Dexterity per level

Gives Pain is Gain Skill and Hero’s Strength Skill

Anima (Skill)

The World is a Weapon- grants use of any weapon as if holding a rank III skill of that weapon type

The World is a Shield- grants use of all defensive skills to the point of rank III

World of Magic- Lessens Mana cost of elemental manipulation by a small amount

Primary Element: Darkness

Other Element: Wind

Personal Skills

Hero’s Strength IV (22/200)- increases Strength by 25%

Pain is Gain III (56/150)- The more damaged, the more powerful the user becomes, causes intense anger

Calm Mind II (189/200)- Keeps a person calm and collected

Quick Reflexes III (121/150)- Increases Dexterity by 20%

Dark Juggernaut II (65/200)- Grants Darkness based Supplementary Spells

Stats

Strength: 105 (132)

Dexterity: 105 (127)

Intelligence: 74

Wisdom: 74

Endurance: 74

Vitality: 74

Arthur, as usual, found Alice’s status to be brilliant, he was beginning to think he had OCD when it came to having numbers balanced out like this.

“It’s still a shock when we remember that you’re a berserker… but you never go into ‘rage mode’ like other berserkers or get angry.” Michael said with understandable fear given this was his sister.

“Oh, don’t you know the secret, I’m always angry.” Alice said with a serious look, holding it for a moment before every member of Einherjar laughed, Arthur’s shoulder shaking as he slumped forward onto the table.

“Oh god the reference, the reference!” Arthur groaned out as they laughed a bit more, breathing sighs all around as they calmed down after that joke.

They weren’t the only ones laughing, anyone who was listening in, aka most of the other Adventurers, had to keep themselves from spitting out their drinks at the reference to big mean and green.

“I’m hoping that when we find Chronos I can call him a puny god.” Alice just kept it going, drawing more laughs from her friends…

It was nice, joking around like that. Honestly the joke wasn’t even that funny, but sometimes it didn’t have to be to get such a laugh.

They’re the laughs you live for really.

After recovering, Emilia offered her status page up next, telling Arthur straight away that he’d be going last.

Emilia Vasilievna

Level: 69 (C-Rank)

Class: Hunter Thief- Grants one stat point to Dexterity and Intelligence per level

Gives Tracking Skill and Dagger Arts Skill

Anima

Bloodletting Daggers

Anima Skills

Shred- increases damage dealt to animal-type enemies, occasionally causes Bleeding

Armour Piercing- chance to bypass armour, weakens blows to flesh after bypassing armour though

Bloody Mary- life steal effect granted against living creatures, at 8% of damage dealt converted to health.

Cutback- as long as one Dagger is held, you can throw the other and summon it to your free hand, range is limited to 10 metres.

Primary Element: Water

Other Element(s): Mind

Personal Skills

Quick Reflexes IV (47/200)- increases Dexterity by 25%

Dagger Arts IV (73/200)- Increases Dagger-type weapon damage

Tracking III (62/150)- Allows tracking of wounded enemies, can be used to map areas, but is not designed to do so.

Martial Arts IV (18/200)- increases damage dealt without a weapon.

Regenerator III (12/150)- increases Vitality by 20%

Aquatic Defence II (39/200)- Grants Water based defensive spells

Stats

Strength: 100

Dexterity: 101 (126)

Intelligence: 95

Wisdom: 70

Endurance: 70

Vitality: 70 (84)

“…I really, really want to know what kind of life you’ve lived before you moved to New York.” Arthur admitted and Emilia actually looked a bit uncomfortable at that line of questioning.

She relaxed when Arthur placed a hand on hers, giving a small smile.

“Don’t got to explain it, but you have to admit its a bit weird, martial arts, daggers, and you knew how to track before we even went into the Dungeon.” Emilia was once more a bit sheepish about admitting things, but no one actually asked her anything, just letting her know what they knew.

At this point the other members of Einherjar assumed she had military family members who trained her, simple, easy explanation, Michael had family members in the military after all, and he was quite the gun-nut.

Emilia’s reluctance to speak about it said that their assumption was wrong, but they weren’t going to force anything from her.

Ironically, despite being the thief/assassin archetype of the group, Emilia didn’t have the highest Dexterity of the group… that title belonged to Michael, who tossed in his status next while Emilia removed hers from the table.

Emilia’s abilities as a thief/assassin were brilliant though, so it didn’t really matter that much in the long run.

On the other hand, Michael didn’t really seem like he had the highest Dexterity of the group at all with how he only really had the option of ‘moving’ ‘shooting’ and ‘moving while shooting’.

He was wondering about using the bow as a close range weapon though…

Michael Grave

Level: 69 (C-Rank)

Class: Bowman Surveyor- Grants one stat point to Strength and Dexterity per level

Grants Archery Skill and Hawk Eye Skill

Anima

Longbow of Skill

Anima Skills

Elemental Shift- Grant your arrows magic damage based on element

Focus- perception of time slows down with bow string drawn back.

Nimble Fingers- Double Dexterity for one shot, seven minute cool down

Skill Down- enemies hit with your arrows lose 5 Dexterity for a minute; stacks for a max of five stacks, stacks renew duration.

Primary Element: Fire

Other Element(s): Light

Personal Skills

Hawk Eye IV (107/200) – Enhanced vision, drains stamina

Archery IV (46/200) – increases accuracy with ranged weapons

Hero’s Strength III (132/150) – Increases Strength by 20%

Quick Reflexes III (96/150) – Increases Dexterity by 20%

Stats

Strength: 126 (150)

Dexterity: 126 (150)

Intelligence: 62

Wisdom: 52

Endurance: 70

Vitality: 70

“Always, always, so simple, but it’s effective…” Arthur complained, wishing his own status page was that simple.

It wasn’t really the status page itself that was simple, it was Michael’s lack of unique/rare Skills, and his Anima was extremely useful to the archer of the team.

“Sorry if I’m boring, but if it works, it works.” Michael shrugged, downing another beer, reminding Arthur that Michael was very pragmatic when it came to combat, unlike Arthur who wanted certain things to be a bit flashy, such as magic or his swordsmanship.

Sure, cutting out the needless flowery actions made the fight faster, but Arthur still found himself twirling and flipping from time to time when they fought certain enemies.

Quite a surprise given Arthur wasn’t always the most athletic of people.

On the other end was Michael, who pretty much just did his three things, if an enemy got close enough to disrupt his shots, someone was not doing their job right.

Michael was quite good at handling himself at close quarters with that bow according to him though, having practiced with Dante along with the rest of Einherjar, Dante didn’t exactly make it easy to hit the ‘doorman’ with an arrow.

“Hey, nothing against the basics, they’re important after all… it’s just… it makes it seem like you don’t have any uniqueness.” In a sense Arthur was right, but at the same time everyone in the team knew that it didn’t matter whether he was right or not.

Michael didn’t have some super move, or rare Skill, but his basic attacks were pretty strong overall in the team, he did more damage than anyone else in one hit except maybe Arthur and Alice when they used their magic Skills.

There was a good reason that Michael was their Archer even when he didn’t have any rare or unique Skills.

John Collins

Level: 69 (C-Rank)

Class: Shade Healer- Grants one stat point to Wisdom and Intelligence per level

Gives Sneak Skill and Light Scripture Skill

Anima

Enhancing Arts

Anima Skills

Hard Hitting- lets someone deal five times damage on their next two attacks

Tempo Accel- Increases movement and attack speed by 30%.

Protected- Increases physical defence by 25%

Grounded- Reduces knockback effect of enemy attacks by 10%

Primary Element: Mind

Other Element(s): Metal, Water

Personal Skills

Sneak IV (113/200)- grants the ability to erase ones presence

Light Scripture IV (47/200)- Grants Healing Spells, lowers Mana cost

Computation III (79/150) – Increases Intelligence by 20%

Staff Arts III (38/150)- increases spell effects by 20%

Mind Over Matter I (42/100)- eases the use of Telekinesis using the Mind Element.

Stats

Strength: 70

Dexterity: 70

Intelligence: 126 (151)

Wisdom: 110

Endurance: 65

Vitality: 65

Ah, the Shade Healer, John was the secret weapon of the team in the sense that people tended to forget he was around during a fight…

And with his new Mind Over Matter Skill, he could make swords float around him for his use.

He wasn’t at the point of being able to try swordplay though, he’d never be able to really use that ability to defend against blows, at current it was all he could do to send one or maybe two swords flying at the enemy point first.

“I’m waiting for the day you can call ‘Gate of Babylon’ while fighting…” No one but Arthur caught the reference unfortunately, the other members of Einherjar didn’t know about the King of Heroes after all.

“It was an interesting idea, though I got to ask, why did you say swords, instead of say, hammers, axes, spears, anything else?” John asked, thinking to his newest ability.

Sure, he followed Arthur’s advice and used swords, but John was a bit curious on how Arthur got to thinking swords were best.

“Well it looks cool. Firing off spears just isn’t as awesome as having swords floating around you.” Arthur’s blunt admission as to the why of his choice had been swords.

No one begrudged him for it, swords were heroic and all that.

“Plus swords have a bit more versatility to them in comparison to most weapons, you have to admit. In thrusts they are beaten by a spear, in powerful slashes they are beaten by axes and in blunt blows defeated by hammers, but swords can do all of that well.” Some of what he said was complete nonsense, but Arthur was the only one who would know that.

People did have an unfortunate tendency to believe him when he spoke after all.

Finally, Arthur slid his own status page out onto the table.

Arthur Clive

Level: 70 (C-Rank)

Class: Linked Swordsman- Grants one stat point to Strength and Wisdom per level

Gives Soul Sight (Unique) Skill

Anima

Dagger of Hunger

Cloak of Will

Anima Skills

Dagger- Devour- Increase Soul Gain by 22.5%

Dagger- Rend- Damage to living beings increases by 4%

Dagger- Void- can create a minor gravitational pull, 5 Wisdom per use a day.

Dagger- Feed- Absorb a magic attack from an enemy to be used against them, limited to Elements you possess.

Cloak- Defence- lowers damage taken by 4.5%

Cloak- Wise One- Increases Wisdom by 35% (total 160%)

Cloak- Rags to Riches- 8% of enemies drop two times the loot.

Cloak- Blink- teleport up to five metres away from your current position, costs 8 Wisdom per use a day.

Primary Element: Lightning

Other Element(s): Darkness

Personal Skills

Tactician IV (41/200) - increases Wisdom by 25% (total 160%)

Sword Sage II (213/300)- Any bladed weapon deals 30% extra damage

Soul Sight III (27/500) - Allows insight beyond mortality

Dual Wielding IV (72/200) - Greater use of two weapons

Lightning Elemental III (80/300) - Use supplementary lightning spells

Quick Reflexes III (104/150)- Increases Dexterity by 20%

Stats

Strength: 88

Dexterity: 105 (126)

Intelligence: 56

Wisdom: 120 (192)

Endurance: 56

Vitality: 88

“That Wisdom stat is nonsensical.” The first note to the absurdity that was Arthur’s status page.

Arthur didn’t feel like it was that amazing, given that it was his and he never really felt proud of anything he himself did bar video games.

But he also acknowledged that, as far as anyone else was concerned, Arthur’s stats were absurd. His Tactician Skill certainly was good at the fourth rank, there wasn’t anyone with a Skill in the fifth rank around so he was good there…

But others didn’t have his Cloak.

Arthur’s main Anima was the Dagger of Hunger, he admitted, his Cloak didn’t exactly get a lot of focus despite always being on him inside the Dungeon.

But his Cloak was arguably as good as the Dagger, if not better, what with it boosting his Wisdom, defence, and the drop rate of enemies, and the teleportation?

Plus with his latest Wisdom total, he could use his Anima Spells much more often; being able to instantly escape/enter danger twenty four times a day was awesome.

So with his Cloak’s boost and his Tactician boost, his Wisdom got an extra sixty per cent to it. So despite having less Wisdom that Matt had Endurance, after boosts Arthur’s Wisdom was higher than Matt’s Endurance.

Then again if Matt had his Endurance boosted to the same point as Arthur’s Wisdom, Matt would really be bulletproof.

“Okay, okay, ignoring the Wisdom stat that gives you, what, almost twenty per cent of your Mana per minute… meaning you can go from zero to full in five minutes… your Skills.” Ah, the other elephant in the room, so to speak.

“I count two Unique Skills, one Rare Skill, two Stat boosting Skills, honestly the only Common Skill you really have is dual wielding. Six Skills is a lot, and half of them are better than Common.” Emilia checked on the page, some nearby listeners choking on whatever they were drinking at that information.

The average amount of Skills depended on level, around level fifty the average amount of Skills would be four or five, and at their levels six Skills could be considered okay…

But having two Unique Skills and a Rare Skill was venturing into ‘unfair’ territory. Many of the Adventurers in the Guild had never even seen a Unique Skill, and there might be one person in every team with a single Rare Skill.

Hearing this, it was becoming a bit obvious why Arthur was considered the ‘Strongest Adventurer’.

“Okay, okay, I get it, my status page is nonsensical, moving on…” Arthur knew there was another bit of nonsense in that he had two powerful Animae compared to most Adventurers, but his team knew well enough to not leak that information.

Oh Einherjar was well aware of people listening in to their conversation, it was a measured choice really, after their discussion in the Dungeon.

Einherjar was mysterious because information wasn’t known about them beyond names and Classes, but getting more information might make Einherjar more popular actually.

And if they were more popular, getting a media presence and recruitment would be easier, especially later on.

And none of the shared information was truly bad, yes, people now knew that Arthur had two Unique Skills and a Rare Skill but no one knew what Skills they were, it was like knowing your opponent had a gun, but not which gun it was.

You could prepare to face a shotgun and end up getting sniped from a distance, so in that sense, even if someone on the wrong side of the law was sitting in the Guild to take information to those people robbing banks, they wouldn’t have any actionable information to give.

“Well, now that we’ve all shared a bit, let’s get going, I’ve got food waiting for me at home.” Arthur said with a smile as he stood, the rest of Einherjar agreeing as they stood.

The bottles were left on the table for the server to get later, though Arthur had to be stopped from time to time when he tried to help clean up… cleaning was a job for a reason, let the cleaner do their job.

There was a bit of silence and then a cacophony of noise as the Adventurers burst into discussion, many pulling out phones and sharing the information they overheard.

By the end of the hour, many, many people would know of some of the oddities that made Einherjar the best Adventurers in the world.

Including a man with many faces, who sat looking at his phone with a narrowed gaze…

“Arthur Clive huh…” Jack Mourn flipped Razorback in thought.