死人の領域とダンジョンスイーパー

 

I am now at the nostalgic 38^th floor, it had ample UNDEAD and SPECTRE type monsters but the one I am currently hunting are the WRAITHs, I had two weapons against them and one defensive skill that could protect me from their array of magic.

 

I deliberately looked for them and once in view I would defeat them immediately, there was no need to purposely create a barrier when not needed, my greatest battle is to ensure that I do not make one success get too big in my head.

 

But when my life does get dangerous from their magic, I would erect a barrier blocking their magic and give me an opportunity to use my BANISHING LIGHT Skill using my newly acquired MANA Crystals.

 

If I might point out some weakness to this barrier it would be the fact that it is very fragile against physical attacks. The WRAITHs which had the power to summon lower SPECTREs and while fighting me some SKELETON ARCHER also joined, the barrier completely protected me against the magic hurled against me but as soon as a single arrow was shot the crystal barrier disintegrate so easily it was as if being hit by a boulder. I panic a bit, but reclaimed my guts to return my thanks with a HAMA no SHURIKEN on its head.

 

I guess it was going to be like that, the skill is good for magic but weak against physical attack, as to be expected you can’t expect to have an omnipotent barrier that can do both. Well it will do for now since dealing with physical attacks with my practiced speed was more than enough.

 

Magic on the other hand was difficult to handle for two reasons: one is that when hit with any MANA based attack I will be taking in twice the damage, external and internally due to my MIS. The second would be that it can do more than damage it had longer effects than being just being sliced. For one when you are hit with fire magic I could also suffer from burns and other effects.

 

Well, since this has been a productive exploit I left the defeated SKELETON ARCHER a thank you for pointing out the weakness of my magic barrier earlier.

 

*****

 

In a greatest battle for your own life, there is no such thing as over-preparation. I am currently in the 38^th floor and have stayed here for already 5 days. My goal is to gain further experience in battling UNDEAD and SPECTRE monsters as much as possible before my battle against the LICH. This is just a conjuncture but the LICH might be able to summon the UNDEADs, if worse comes to worst I would also be fighting countless SPECTREs.

 

The UNDEAD and the SPETRE, has a strong sense for the living, I am not sure if it is due to hatred for the living, or maybe they want to gain life by killing the living anyways with that I was able to exploit it by sing my LIFE FORCE as bait to gather a number of the UNDEAD in a certain area and immediately made defeated both UNDEADs and SPECTRES.

 

Thankfully due to my constant battle I was able to gain a natural perception of MANA and KI which allowed me to see the essence of LIFE FORCE. With this I am able to readily release large amount of LIFE FORCE making me the best bait and lured them to me instead of making them.

 

The UNDEAD and SPECTRE on the other hand took the bait, hook, line and sinker. I first took out the possible opponents that could destroy my crystal barriers. That would mean the close quarter combatants are my first targets and was able to vanquish them with almost little trouble.

 

Captain, allow me to call you ‘The Evil Vanquisher’ from now on

 

*****

 

I then proceed to the unfamiliar 39^th floor to continue my adventure. As to be expected the floor still had the Forest Ruins feel with UNDEAD and SPECTRE type monsters lurking about. If there was an addition I would say that there was a new type of SKELETON monster known as the SKELETON GUNNER.

 

These guys are a tier higher than the ARCHERS and while their accuracy has lowered, their power has increased. Most of them were armed with what look like an M1903 Springfield (rifles that were used on WW1) which can pack strong bullets.

 

The most mysterious part of these guys are their unlimited ammo, talk about cheat. They take out 5 round magazines from their side pocket and skillfully shoot from a distance.

 

I was quite excited, I mean if I have one of those side pockets I would have an infinite pack of ammunition… but as you’ve guess it, it looks like it is a dungeon monster thing and as soon as I took the pouch, it could only produce a maximum of two 5-round magazines. Damn.

 

There was no harm in having some of them so after defeating a number of them I would never forget to touch the rifles and the side pockets to get ownership and have them transported to Grim-chan.

 

These guys are probably rare since they only numbered to 15.  No matter where I searched I could only see 15 no matter what. After defeating these so called SKELETON GUNNERS, I waited for 3 hours but it would seem they had a longer respawn period as they had twice that number -6 hours respawn time.

 

While it is a good weapon has got impact for a weapon the rifles have their perks, however since they are normal bullets they can only be used against weak fleshed targets. I could wrap them with MATOI Skills but that would be wasteful since they are still weak against other enemies that have solid defense. However that would change when I get an alchemized bullet with magic affinity I await for the day when I am able to study alchemy at my leisure.

 

For now let’s proceed on.

 

*****

 

I am still lurking in the 39^th floor looking for something new that might come out just like those SKELETON GUNNERS and their rifles, like maybe a machine-gun or other mech-stuffs but none so far.

 

While traversing aimlessly in corner near the entrance to the 39^th floor I found one… though they are not the mech-stuff I was looking for, it might be something that I should consider to be even better.

 

The new monsters that I am currently hunting are SPECTRE type monsters they looked like a coiled shrimp roughly 50.8 centimeters in size with a transparent glow which most SPECTRE type monsters have in common -the SNARLS.

 

You might wonder what so special about these monsters. They attack in swarms just like other SPECTRE type monsters, they are suicidal types and rush to you inflicting whatever elemental affinity they possess. Their bodies are like the basic magic ball series, fireball or any other element.

 

Only they attack like homing missiles, when they miss the target they would requisition speed and launch another suicide dive, they kind of remind me of a suicidal planes where my beloved anime, manga and light novels originated from. Having exhausted their ammunition or caught in disadvantageous situations they would bomb dive at a target and booom.

 

Right, back to why they are so special, they are a good monster to farm MAGIC Cores, they count a hundred and get this their respawn rate is totally fast with just 30 minutes and with this much I am able to farm a lot of MAGIC Cores. Since the previous floors did not have this monster on them I decided to farm more MAGIC CORES while on this floor.

 

I remembered how numbers needed to expand, create and unseal Grim-chan’s abilities where quite astronomical back then, however with her level up that decreases that number and these big haul of MAGIC Cores it won’t be just a faraway dream. I should not stop until I get them at least to a 5 digit. Now I am even getting myself a quota by counting my kill and so started to calculate on my mind.

 

In this floor I decided to do a rotation of battle, first I defeat UNDEAD and other SPECTRE monsters, after that instead of waiting for the respawn period I go back to the near the entrance to the 39^th floor and hunt down SNARLS for 3 Hours then hunt for other monsters again.

 

I only stop when my body clock starts to think that it is already night or on the first signs that my physical body starts to lose its strength. Allow me to digress a bit here, there is no concept of morning and night in this Forest Ruins much like the eternal scorching heat of the Dry Plains, it is eternal evening with the eternal light of a moon-look-a-like-thing stuck on the ceiling adorned with the star-look-a-like-thing with it.

 

The next day I repeated the process and while I am on the subject of becoming stronger I then added a few arsenals in my repertoire.

 

Captain you have learned:

• SENKIDOURYUU HONOO NO MAE – HIBASHIRA 火柱
• SENKIDOURYUU SUISEI NO MAE –MIZUCHI蛟
• SENKIDOURYUU KAZE NO MAE –FUUJIN 風神
• SENKIDOURYUU IKAZUCHI NO MAE –RAIJINN 雷神
• SENKIDOURYUU RYUU MATSURI –JISHIN NAMAZU地震鯰

Your skills have gone a long way Captain.

 

*****

 

Just as Grim-chan suggested, my skills are now effective against 0crowds. The first four skills are elemental attacks:

• hibashira creates raging pillar of flames that acts both a wall and attacks those who try to crosses;
• mizuchi is a linear water attack that ranges 8 meters away from me and spans 5 targets have gotten too close will get flushed further away;
• fuujin is wind version of the banishing light but has longer range of 8 meters, it also acts the same as mizuchi and scatters enemies away from me;
• raijin is a AOE skill that spans 8 meters and electrocutes those who are on the ground (well if I miss jumping myself, I also get electrocuted); and
• Lastly jishin namazu is an upgrade of my previous skill called kenzan. jishin namazu creates an earthquake and changes the terrain 10 meter radius making my surroundings less accessible to the enemies.

 

With my new skills I manage to surpass my self-quota, well it took me 11 days for all Attributes to get them to five digits.

 

Oh, the SNARLS may have been SPECTREs, but unlike other SPECTREs that only get damaged by HOLY Affinity attacks, the SNARLS get damaged by their opposing element, that was the reason I had created the Elemental AOE Skills and try to defeat them effectively by batch rather than one by one with my MATOI Elemental Skills. This was also the reason for the rapid rise of my MAGIC Cores which should be able to unseal some of Grim-chans abilities soon after I have get satisfied with this dungeon.

 

While I was digressing with my newly attained skills and hoarded MAGIC CORES, an eerie feeling kicks up from the deepest parts of me. My Danger Perception warns me that something dangerous was coming. And as if to materialize that very fear, my MANA Perception catches a distortion on top of the dungeon, and from that very distortion something big drops.

 

As soon as the dust fades from where it had dropped, I saw a somewhat familiar yet completely different monster, at first it looked like a MASTER ALPHA GREYWOLF, but some visible fur were somewhat reddish almost enflamed and what’s more its ribcage was visible.

 

“Just what the hell is that!?” I cursed out loud.

 

And as if answering me, it howled.

 

Captain the UNDEAD MASTER ALPHA CURR used a racial specific skill ≪UNDEAD HOWL≫ and inflicted you with unnatural fear.

Captain! In 15 minutes the effects will wear off, you have to take evasive actions quick!

 

At first I was just plainly standing there, while the fear was somehow reduced thanks the resistance I had acquired, the however panic caught me off guard. Had it not for Grim-chan’s telepathic message I would have taken a slower pace on my evasive action.

 

As I have thought whatever danger that comes my way and wherever I am, Grim-chan is always looking out for me. Yosh! With the panic state gone, I make my move away from this area. If this guy is as strong as --no I should consider him greater than Kizuari, then I am unable to defeat it with my current strength, so the most logical action I can take right now is not to try and fight it but to take flight.

 

On the way I defeated some gunners and took some of their rifles to derail and slow down the UNDEAD MASTER ALPHA CURR, he is faster than me after all so I need to ensure it does not immediately catch up me by shooting its legs. This really feel like being hunted by Kizuari, why is a high level monster like it doing here anyway.

 

There has to be a reason why this guy is hunting me, while continuing to flee I put some logic as to why it’s hunting me. What was different from the other areas I have been that has not happened from the other areas. I will not take reasons like: because this is the 39^th floor. If that is the case it should have attacked the moment I entered the 39^th floor.

 

Wait a moment… wait on the 37^th floor I lurked there for 6 days, here on the 39^th floor 10 days, this guy is a dungeon sweeper.