Gregory knew what he needed to do to get back to his time now, but he also now found out that he was the ancestor to his family. His being a Legendary Great Sage started this Legendary Great Sage lineage. It also started the ice magic in his family, which means that his own existence, the entire existence of his family after this point, is a temporal paradox. He shouldn’t be able to exist without a beginning, but he is meant to become his own beginning. It can be confusing, but it is these that temporal magic allows the user to see. It means that it wasn’t only the fact that he hadn’t fulfilled his role in being the only person to use both temporal and spatial magics, but also that he couldn’t be born that was preventing him from returning.

Continuing to look in her direction, Gregory saw two more people. One a knight, and the other an assassin. Both had very high, and mostly similar physical stats. These two showed only the original six stats that Gregory showed. STR, VIT, AGI, INT, WIS, and LUK. The knight and assassin had average INT and WIS, but both of their STR values were ridiculous. They reached 500 STR, enough to crumble stone with a single light punch. The knight had a VIT of 500 and an AGI of 250, while the Assassin had an AGI of 500 and a VIT of 250. Their strengths were incredible, and physical abilities probably unrivaled. These two were probably hunting with this woman, and assisting her in beating this dungeon. Especially true if they had all gotten stuck in the dungeon. Not everybody it seemed was as lucky as he was to have been given such mana blessings from the beginning of their abilities. Looking at the woman and the two men near her, Gregory saw that their levels were all nearly 100. Twice his level, but below him in overall stats, even considering they were merged. The woman’s name was Elizabeth, while the two men had the names of George and Charles. Elizabeth had 450 in both INT and WIS, with 200 in AGI and VIT. She was definitely the most skilled overall of the three, and the most likely to be able to handle this dungeon alone.

Checking their ages, George and Charles were 27 and 39 respectively; Elizabeth was only 19, the same as Gregory. It was confirmation, as if saying that he was meant to be with this woman forever. It would even work out for them to be together, as Gregory’s temporal magic could shield her from aging as well if she were to love him as he loves her. Gregory wondered how normal people leveled up now, especially considering that most natural mages shouldn’t be able to get physical stats that high. There must be something she was doing as part of her training that raised them, but what could it have been? They had also spotted Gregory, and felt the power rolling off of him. Using his reveal, he found that he could even see their skill lists, which showed that none of these people had a natural way to generate mana aside from sleep or meditation. It also revealed to him, that the most dangerous ones to him would be George and Charles, as both could quickly close that gap between them and turn him into a pincushion. Even his armor would do very little to protect against swings from weapons with that much strength behind them.

It was at this moment that the three began talking amongst themselves, and then spoke up with a proposition for Gregory. How about you join us in hunting dungeons? To have been able to clear out the entire thing aside from the dungeon lord alone, you must be very strong. We’d love to have somebody like you to assist us in scourging the land of these dungeons so that those who are weaker do not get trapped and killed in placed like those.

It was Charles that spoke, the oldest of them, and also the knight. Gregory was not sure what to do. He had purchased the very small plot of land that his store was on, and he could always travel back in time to get back to his store whenever he desired.

Very well, I will accept, but I want to know what kind of abilities you all need in your group right now.

He knew that what they needed was a healer, but one that would not easily die and could defend themselves. One of the elves he had killed had a party heal skill, but it would be one that he would need to get them into a party with him to use. Most people probably formed parties through oral or magical pacts, but his system allowed him to form parties with others. There would be no way to keep secret what his abilities were if it came to that. The only thing Gregory could do, would be to use the healing ability that a different elf had dropped to let him heal one of them at a time.

We need a healer, but considering you cleared the dungeon by yourself, I doubt you are one.

You’d be wrong, I am actually a quite skilled healer, and even have a group healing spell.

They all nearly gawked when he said this, as the ability to heal a group of people was one that was extremely rare, and only the most powerful healers possessed. This was something unbeknownst to Gregory, but made his value go way up in their eyes.

Very good, then you will be a big help to all of us. This was our last raid for now, we meet up once every seven days in London outside the gate, and remain for three days hunting. You should return to where you come from and be prepared to assist us then. It is also then that we will require a demonstration of your skills in healing.

Gregory left at this, walking into the woods a little way before using blink to return to his shop. He didn’t want to let them know what exactly he was capable of, especially since these abilities were ones that shouldn’t normally be commonly known. Even the group healing spells weren’t commonly known apparently, which meant that he would already be in possession of less known magic. Using both skill books, Gregory was able to learn both of the healing spells inside. It seemed they went off of his magic mastery passive, but that their power was influenced by WIS, not INT like most active spells. The costs were 250 and 750, The healing amounts were the same for individual, but the second did work for everybody in the party and had the same cast time. Since there were four of them total, it meant that it would not only be more mana effective, but also faster and put them in less risk or danger.

The real question, is how to play off the party menu. They are bound to ask questions about it. Then what happens if they level up in my party? Will they be able to gain levels like I do? If that is the case, I will have to play it off as some very high level magic ability, one that is beyond even Elizabeth’s skill or knowledge.

Checking his inventory though, Gregory was amazed at the total loot gained from the monsters he killed in that dungeon. Even the dungeon lord gave him the drops, though directly to his inventory since they were unobtainable otherwise. The items included a passive regeneration ability skill book, a book about how to bend mana to naturally raise protection against it, and a large amount of a metal called slivgnor. The description said that it could only ever be shaped once, and only through magical energy. Once the shape had solidified, it said that it would hold resilient to any more forging. The description also gave information that it was the strongest magical metal. His 700 luck, and direct 70% chance to get the best drop available, turned the .0001% chance of getting this metal into a 70.0001% chance of getting this metal as a drop. Even with his high luck, a luck equaling 700, the chance was .0001%. The next highest luck in the world was only at 130 in this time, and that would have an only .000000001% chance of finding this metal from the strongest monster able to drop it. This metal was meant to be impossible to find, and he had gotten more of it than was even thought possible.

Once nightfall came around, Gregory used blink to return to the dungeon he had previously visited. He entered the dungeon, and found that it had been refilled with monsters. They were the same types of monsters, a little higher leveled, with the exception that the elves were replaced with greater elves. The descriptions stated that they were the direct ambassador’s of the greatest high elves. This basically cemented that the tiers of elves in this world were the regular elves, greater elves, and high elves. Considering the greater elves had better stats overall than the regular elves, high elves were probably much stronger yet. Getting back up to the room of the dungeon lord had gotten him another 22 levels, and since he had decided to use hand-to-hand or sword combat as much as possible, he had also gained a substantial number of points in DEX, AGI, STR, and END. He was hardly hit, meaning his VIT had only gone up another three points, and his SPD had only risen two points. DEX and END had raised nine points though, while AGI and STR had raised seven points. His skill proficiencies for martial arts and sword mastery had risen to 59 and 57 respectively, making it much easier to fight this way, the added stats just made it that much easier to fight this way. Due to skills levels and the armor he had made previously, he was able to beat all the monsters but the werewolves and orcs with physical attacks. The way he was now, he couldn’t even imagine being able to take down the orcs or werewolves. Their physical stats were right around the same as George and Charles’ stats. This meant that he would be completely powerless against them without raising his stats just as much.

There were also some new skills gained for the skills that had reached above 50. His DEX allowed him to react even faster to incoming attacks, and gave him a natural stamina regeneration that was dependent on DEX, but 2% for every 10 DEX. Checking AGI, he saw that the ability was saying that it doubled his total stamina. Giving him a very good amount of fighting potential and the ability to run for very extended periods of time.

Seeing as VIT was only 10 away from a passive, Gregory was very tempted to spend them there, but knew that his magic was strong enough to keep much physical damage from getting to him.

[i]Still though, can't stay weak forever, I will need to raise it before too long. If I don't, I will be way too easy to kill should I ever end up getting too close in a fight. I need to think of a way to raise my VIT without doing much. Perhaps making a ring that will cause me some damage every minute. That way I could get VIT up, at least until a point that I get the passive from it. Copperhead's Respite may be a good way to do it, It will do just a little bit of damage, but should be enough to raise my VIT for now. Once it is up a bit, then I will be able to probably double my current health pool.

His healing spells also made it possible to fight this way, which is how he was able to win now. His party heal had reached level 51, which seemed high, but he knew that there would be a next level of it that would grant a much larger increase to the healing amount. Gregory then wondered if it would be possible to create a dungeon in his protected space, perhaps mirroring the strongest dungeon he had seen and defeated. If that were the case, it would allow him to train indefinitely long against this dungeon, at least until such time as he weren’t able to gain a level for completing it once.

This time, Gregory needed to beat the dungeon lord solo, and he knew just how to do it. He was going to encase it in ice again, but shatter it with the spinning mana lance. Moving forward he saw the same monster, but he didn’t know that the drops had changed. He continued to get skills books from the elves, but different ones this time as they were greater elves. He even managed to find a book on earth magic, as well as some that worked on controlling plants and nature. So, defeating the dungeon lord, the same monster as before, awarded him entirely different gains.

He was able to go up a full five levels, reaching level 77 because of it. However, the drop was definitely worse. It only gave a CHIMERA CORPSE as the reward. It was something he would need to dissect to see if maybe there was something he could learn from it. He brought it into his protected space through touch, and then left so that he could leave the dungeon.

He once again blinked back to London, and got some sleep there as a way to create a refresh point in the case that he would nearly die. Still though, he didn’t know what exactly would happen should he actually “die”, as he had never reached total death, only a near death state to which he was returned to his refresh point before anything he did after resting last.

Waking up from the rest only a couple hours after falling asleep, Gregory blinked back to the dungeon entrance, hoping he would get a skill this time to allow him to create a dungeon in his protected space.

NAMEGREGORY NEAL FROSTCLASS/CLASSESTHE LEGENDARY GAMER, LEGENDARY GREAT SAGE, LEGENDARY LUCK MASTERRACE/RACESANCIENT ICE DRAGON, HUMANTITLENOVICEAGE19(16 APPEARANCE)LEVEL77HEALTH400/400MANA5000/5000STAMINA1220/1220STR57END39VIT40AGI61DEX51SPD47INT250WIS500CHA93LUK700UNSPENT STATUS POINTS294