<< Notice: You have gained the low-level skill, [Grabbing Vines], a skill possessed by the Vine Grabber monster. Congratulations!

It’s a skill that generates vines out of mana. The vines can either be long or short depending on how much magic is put into them. A versatile skill.>>  

<< Notice: System has determined that your luck is still considerably higher than that of others and so, it will be lowering your luck of forty percent by 10 percent, thus evening out the odds between you and others. >>  

Marcel’s Informer notified Marcel of the additional skill he’d acquired, along with his sudden new development. When he came out of his trance, he told the others of the skill and his change in luck percentage.  

“Yeah, no wonder the Luck System decreased your overall luck inside the dungeon. You gained a skill that normally has a 1/1000th of happening on your first day here. If the Luck System didn’t do something, you were probably going to incur the anger of everyone you meet. It's so thoughtful. If it hadn't done that, it wouldn’t be long before what happened long ago happened again at the rate you were going. How many EP points have you got? Show us your EP.” Claude asked and then Marcel showed his status bar just like Claude had asked him to. They were all surprised to see his EP that was around 40 had already increased by a lot. He was around 200 EP when he showed it to them.  

“That’s a hero for you. I wouldn’t expect any less from the Demon Lord’s wife of all people. Gaining a skill then accumulating enough EP that’d take people months to achieve in just a single day. How spectacular. Haha!!” The head guard of the four, an imp, a type of low-level demon, said and laughed and then the other guards joined in as well.  

“Yes, spectacular indeed. If that brat son of mine hears this. Maybe he might finally summon up the motivation to go do something better with his life.” The second guard, a leopard beastman, said.  

“Oh please. You know that your son wouldn’t get off his feet to escape even if a meteor struck your house. He’s so into those dwarven inventions that I haven’t seen him pop up at my daughter’s house in a while, and they’re supposed to be best friends.” The third guard, a minotaur in human form, said.  

“Yeah, those digital inventions of the dwarves are any parent’s worst nightmare. My son is also absorbed in those and makes me buy so many that my house is filled with them on the first floor. He sometimes invites his fiancé over and then they play it for days without end. It’s very frustrating since in the end, I’m the one who has to stand in long lines to buy them, and I haven’t even gotten the chance to try one of them yet.” The fourth guard, a leopard beastman like the second guard, said. They kept on having their discussion and then Marcel asked Allan what the thing they were talking about was.  

“Oh, what they’re talking about is something that came out a while ago. The dwarves managed to figure out how to create this pocket dimension that’s can be linked to one’s senses to stimulate a feeling as if one was inside the pocket dimension. It’s sort of like a realistic game where people go adventuring like we are inside that pocket dimension. They’ve come up with a whole bunch of different games to put inside the pocket dimension, like physical combat and puzzles. It’s very amazing. Let’s try it sometime when we get back.” Allan said and Marcel nodded to his words, gleam in his eyes.  

“Let’s finish setting everything up before the dungeon’s lights go dim to simulate nighttime. The monsters in the dungeon will begin falling asleep by then, so we should too.” Claude said and then he let out all the supplies they were going to need for the night. Marcel and Allan set up the tent and then there was only one thing left to take care of: the cooking.  

The guards stared at one another, asking themselves a question with their expressions, “Does any of you know how to cook?”  

The first guard said, “Well I certainly can’t. I'm best at destroying things, not making em. My wife, however, is the best at stuff like that, so I just leave it all to her.”  

“Well I can. If you want to eat nothing but charred meat that is,” said the second guard.

“I like mine raw, so no.” The third guard said.  

“I’m the same as my fellow companion over there. Charred meat is my specialty too.” The fourth guard said, pointing to the second guard, almost proudly.  

They all afterward, sighed as they wondered what to do. Sure, they didn’t necessarily need food to replenish their energies but the same couldn’t be said for the precious Demon Lord’s wife.  

“Um, I hate to say this, but I’m not good at cooking either. Sephana is a much better cook than I am. We both studied under the same chef but she already has the chef skill while I don’t.” Claude said, a bit ashamed. 

“Huh, do you need a chef skill to be able to cook?” Marcel asked, naïve as ever.  

“Huh, of course. Cooking is exceptionally hard to do, even with the 'Chef' skill. I just acquired mine but I still am not any good at making any food. I learned that alchemy and meal preparations aren’t the same things the hard way; a stomachache that lasted for an entire week.” Allan said.  

“Oh, but um... I can cook just fine without this 'Chef' skill. It’s what I’ve been doing since I started living alone as a child. Wait, is it just something only humans can do?!” Marcel asked.  

“Of course, you’re human. Why didn’t I remember that? Humans don’t need special skills to be able to make food. How did I forget about that?” Claude said, looking slightly pleased. He seemed like he'd suddenly recovered from something bad.  

“Then how about you cook then, Marcel? Since we all can’t do any better, why don’t you try impressing us?” Allan asked. Marcel agreed and so, he began cooking the food for the night. The others sighed in relief as if a huge burden had been lifted off their shoulders.

The guards were so embarrassed that they were making the honorable wife of the Demon Lord cook the food himself that they were thinking of handing in a resignation letter for not being capable enough, but when they saw that Marcel didn’t have any problems with cooking, they began re-evaluating whether Marcel cooking skills were a good thing or not. After all, if he’s to adventure from now on with a group of people, it’ll be vital to have someone who can cook something that doesn’t taste like charcoal. In the dungeon, there's a saying that goes, 'A chef is a glue that binding the party together.'

Marcel cooked the food and Allan tried helping as much as he could while Claude watched to see if his highness could really cook. He watched as Marcel did everything as his teacher had once taught him and soon, an hour was almost up and he was almost done. It was already night time in the dungeon by the time Marcel had finished all the preparations for his meal and was about to cook and the guards and Allan were discussing his fighting style when suddenly, two people fell from the sky and suddenly landed close to them, spreading dust everywhere.  

“Ow! Ow!! Ow!!! Ow!!!! That hurt, Silva!!!” They heard one of the two yell.  

“Oh! I’m sorry~!” The other said sarcastically towards the first. The dust began clearing and there they stood. Two girls, one black-haired with white skin, wearing a maroon-colored robe with white outlines and a blue soft armor bodysuit designed to be both practical and gorgeous. She was a bit shorter than Allan, about 170 cm in length. The other girl was blond with black stripes in her hair, had fair skin, and was wearing a small top that covered as little as possible, exposing her stomach and short jeans. She was taller than Allan but slightly shorter than Marcel who was almost the same height as Allan, 174 cm. She was wearing a small furry coat on top of the top and wore knee-high boots. Her clothes exposed a large portion of her breasts that were hardly staying inside her top, about a C-cup. The two had dirt and plants covering their faces and clothes.  

“Cough! Cough! You suck at wind magic. Couldn’t you have made our landing a bit smoother than that?! So much for being a magic genius.” The blond girl said, then she looked away from the black-haired girl. She didn’t seem to have noticed that they had company and neither did the black-haired girl, so they continued arguing.  

“Ooh?! So, I’m not good. Well, you aren’t either. Who got her ass handed to her by that vine monster because she didn’t look at her opponent while fighting? You’re supposed to be smart, but you act like a musclehead most of the time. Do you realize how many times, I’ve saved your sorry ass?!” The black-haired girl said in an angry tone to the blond-haired girl.  

“Hmm! But still, your wind magic sucks. No, all of your magics suck. I can’t believe that you’re putting all the blames for our failures on me. And I’m not a musclehead!” The blond-haired girl said, just as angry as the black-haired girl.  

“Oh, then I’m sorry. I’m sorry for saving your ass when a monster was about to munch it off. I’m sorry for destroying more than half of the monsters we’ve fought for the past few days all on my own while you could only handle a few with your sleazy assassination skills. Oh, sorry... that I used my special ability at the cost of going blind for the rest of the day! I did way more than you did the whole day and you say that I suck afterward?! What an ungrateful person that you are, Valeria!” The black-haired girl said, angrily to the blond-haired girl who was sort of beginning to have mixed feelings now and wishing that she’d never made that one comment about the black-haired girl’s wind magic. She had forgotten just how petty the black-haired girl can be if she wants to.  

“Okay! Okay! I’m sorry for the comment I made about your wind spell just now. We didn’t die so everything’s okay. Thank you for saving my life.” The blond-haired girl said in a condescending tone. The black-haired girl could see that she wasn’t being sincere and so, she was about to hit the blond-haired girl with another comment when she finally became aware of her surroundings. She saw people all around them and a boy standing in front of her. She was startled when the boy suddenly asked a question when she still hadn’t fully come into herself yet.  

Oh, while the two girls were arguing earlier, Allan decided to try and stop them, then ask them who they were and so he walked towards them and bode his time as he waited for them to stop arguing. He waited until the black-haired girl, who finally noticed him, got startled when he asked her, “Excuse me, but who are you guys?”  

The blond girl also came into herself after hearing Allan speak, then she sensed the presence of the entire group behind Allan.  

The black-haired cleared her throat, “Ahem!” and then she answered Allan in a soft voice unlike her previous brash and angry tone, “We’re sorry to interrupt your preparations for the night. I’m Silva and the girl beside me is Valeria, my best friend and travel companion. Nice to meet you.” She said politely so that the others beside Allan could hear her as well.  

“Nice to meet you as well...” Allan said with a smile, and then he continued, “May I ask why you fell from the sky as you had just a while ago? You almost gave us a scare.”  

“Oh, sorry about that. You see, we were a bit unfortunate today while adventuring. In the end, we both got injured and just barely recuperated, a powerful beast attacked, and we, having used most of our power to heal our injuries, were forced to flee in this direction. Luckily, it was almost sunset, or else I would have run out of magic power and we’d be in danger, leading to the ‘falling from the sky' incident that just happened.” The black-haired girl explained.  

“Well, it’s good that you’re fine. We’re camping for the night. Would you like to join us, ladies?” Claude from behind Allan asked the girls, staring intently at them. The black-haired girl became nervous.  

The blond-haired girl answered, “Yes, gladly. We haven’t come across anyone in this dungeon for quite a while. I think the company will do us good. What do you think, Silva?” She said, looking towards the black-haired girl.  

“It’s fine! We can stay if that’s what you want.” She said and then she looked towards Marcel currently beside the fire and resuming his cooking. He was grilling a big piece of meat with equipment that was in no way accessible in the dungeon. She looked at the silver-haired beautiful boy grilling the meat and her interests were instantly piqued.  

She didn’t know what came over her, but she walked up to cooking Marcel and then lightly grabbed a few strands of Marcel’s silver hair and whispered, “Oh... the silver-haired one...” while touching the silky streams of hair that flowed through her fingers. “... it’s beautiful.” She said, then smiled to Marcel who paused, a bit surprised upon seeing the girl's sudden action. After a few seconds, she left him and his hair to sit beside Valeria who was occupying a spot beside Allan and Claude. The guards looked at the girl as they nodded in agreement that Marcel’s hair was indeed pretty, then they laughed.  

Marcel, then resumed cooking the meat and began making soup. Claude looked at Marcel who wasn’t at all as surprised as he expected him to be when Silva touched his hair and found it very interesting.  

“Will you two be joining us for dinner?” Marcel asked the two girls a while after he began making the soup.  

“Of course!” The black-haired girl exclaimed joyfully, and her friend nodded as well. Marcel then went back to finishing the meal while the girls began chatting with Allan and the disguised Claude.  

After a while of chatting with Claude about random stuff, Silva, who’d been oddly quiet ever since commenting about Marcel’s hair, suddenly asked Claude who he was.  

“Oh, he’s Dave now. He’s a new hero who came to the demon realms not too long ago.” Claude answered.  

“Ooh~ Like the Demon Lord’s new wife whose also a hero. He’s been the talk of the town lately, but strangely enough, nobody has seen him since the day that the Demon Lord announced that he’d be taking him as his wife. Weird, right~?” Valeria said. Allan looked in Marcel’s direction and Claude signaled him to look away from Marcel as to not make things suspicious. The girls looked at the two. Allan had this awkward laughing expression on his face after Claude signaled him and scratched his head a bit while Claude stared daggers at him. Allan began sweating, profusely.  

Claude then thought of doing a bit of damage control to make sure that the girls didn’t suspect a thing, “Oh, yes... the Demon Lord’s wife. I heard that the Demon Lord hasn’t shown the populace his fiancé since the day he announced his engagement at the party a while ago because he might put them in danger if he did. What a noble gesture!” Claude said.  

“Yeah, I kind of understand. That hero is still new here. If he was let out to roam free, it wouldn’t take three steps outside of the castle before ‘that’ happened. It’s something all heroes must deal with daily. How incredibly exasperating.” Valeria said, then he sighed. She was right! This was basic knowledge to everyone who wasn't a new hero.

“Um... it’s not certain that everyone will accept the Demon Lord’s wife right from the start as well since he’s new, probably weak, and powerless to do anything against any opposition while the Demon Lord is an incredible overlord that can move mountains with a gesture of his hand. That man can relocate his castle and city across dimensions as if moving a brick from one place to another. The gap between their strength and status is so big now that the Demon Lord probably didn’t hesitate to lock him away from the world. A good and incredibly bold move.” Silva said so straightforwardly that Marcel just a bit away from them felt like he was being directly attacked by her words. The words were so sharp and straightforward that they felt like arrows shot right at him and he had no way to defend against them, so he kept quiet and told himself that those words were motivation to get stronger in the future. Sure, he might be weak now but one day, he’ll become a threat to the Demon Lord. That’s for sure, he thought, almost crying.  

Claude who noticed Marcel getting depressed when Silva accidentally shot incredibly fatal arrows towards him, sent him a telepathic message, “Don’t worry. One day you’ll become a terrifying monster that the Demon Lord will have to placate to survive, like someone I know. Don’t worry, okay~” Claude said in the message. Marcel nodded and Claude smiled when he looked in his direction to find him nodding. Marcel went back to finishing the last of the meal preparation while the others talked among themselves; the guards in one group, talking about dwarven technology that had taken away the attention they'd once received from their children and the other, about whatever it is they could think off and casually getting to each other. Marcel’s food had begun giving off a nice aroma that spread around in the air and Claude soon set up a barrier to stop any monsters from smelling it and becoming active, even though monsters normally fall asleep when the light in the dungeon dims to simulate nightfall.  

“So, could you please explain to me in detail how you ended up here? It’s not like I don’t trust you, but you see, I’m the vigilant type who always considers all the possibilities.” Claude asked after a while of chatting with the girls, still suspicious over some things.  

Valeria, understanding what Claude meant, nodded and then began talking, “I understand what you mean. I wouldn’t mind telling you all that happened. You see, it all began with me and my friend there deciding to take a trip to the dungeons like we always do. You see, we’re both D-class adventurers and since we like challenging ourselves, we decided to pick a landscape-type dungeon to further broaden our range of skills and we picked blindfolded.”  

After that, Valeria explained that during their journey across the dungeon they’d chosen. According to her, they came across an almost evolved C-class monster while still on the third circle, which they found incredibly hard to deal with, but in the end, defeated and sustained multiple injuries in the process. They then decided to rest in a nearby small cave to heal themselves and they stayed there for a few days when suddenly, Silva sensed that someone else had entered the same dungeon as them and Silva’s power told them to seek them out, and so they did. They were then met with the misfortune of meeting another almost evolved C-class monster as if it wasn’t already bad luck that they met one just a few days ago, so they made a beeline for it and ran away before the monster got too close to them, which lead them to this moment. 

Claude, finally understanding why those girls had suddenly fallen from the sky, no longer harbored as much suspicion towards them as he used to. These two girls also resemble two prominent characters he knew of and if it really might be the two of them in disguise, then it’s probably safe for Marcel to interact with them, he thought as he let go of his suspicion towards them. They’d cleared themselves of suspicion, so he decided to no longer take any actions against them, but they still couldn’t avoid more questions from him.  

“Which classes are you two girls?” Claude asked.  

“I have two classes and so does my friend, Silva. My classes are of the Assassin and Enhancer variety while hers are of the Mage and Priestess classes.” Valeria answered and Silva stayed as quiet as anyone could be at that moment as Valeria handled all the questions while only saying a bare minimum of “Mm-hmm”, “Yes” and “Okay.”  

Marcel, while Valeria explained, had a few questions of his own, so he phrased them to his friend, Allan sitting beside him and a bit detached from the conversation between Valeria and Claude.  

“What’s this Enhancer class that she’s talking about? I don’t get it.” Marcel, who’d never heard of the class before, asked.  

“The Enhancer class is one of the rarer classes that exist out there. As you may already know, there are different classes. There are racial classes that come from the race one comes from, for example, I have two classes; the first being my racial class: the Alchemist class, and the second, an acquired class of the Mage variety. Those two are my main classes and for my other acquired classes, they are the Pyromancer, Spell mage and Aeromancer classes, and a few others as well. There are a few other subclasses as well, which you’ll soon learn of since you’re a hero. These classes do different things and make it easier to perform tasks based on those classes' strengths than normal people find it.  

The Enhancer class that the blond girl mentioned is a special class that is usually found in the metamorphic races, like the werewolves, vampires, and the other shapeshifting races. As its name suggests, its primary abilities are that of enhancement. The Enhancer class’s abilities differ from person to person, but generally, the people of that class can use it to increase their physical abilities using magical power, enhancing speed, strength, and agility. Valeria seems to be from this variety of Enhancer since she also possesses the Assassin class, then there’s the latter, the supporting Enhancers. Some Enhancers can boost their ally's strength and they’re normally Enhancers who also possess the support classes like Priest and Shielder classes.”  

“I see, then what about the other classes? Are they the same as I think I know?” Marcel asked.  

“Well, I don’t know, but I think they’re should both similar in some way. From what I know, the Priest class unlocking requires one to have the divine element and to forge a contract with a god of some sort. Those gods are usually the creators of the guardians of their races and forging such a contract allows the Priest to summon a small portion of that god’s power to perform rituals like strengthening and healing. Those of this class are also the divine vessels of their contracted gods as they’re bodies can be used as a medium to temporarily allow the god to inhabit their bodies as well. It’s very complicated but I think that’s about it for the Priest class.  

The Shielder class isn’t at all demanding as the Priest class to acquire. It demands one to have a body capable of high defense and that’s about it. This class is a bit special as, like Alchemic-type witches who can borrow all elements while performing alchemy. Shielders can borrow three other elements to aid in their defense spells and techniques. They mainly use the shield as their main weapons, but some shielders also use only magic as well. You’ll need to meet one, then you’ll understand. It's like a blessing they automatically receive when they become a shielder.” Allan explained.  

Marcel was now fully intrigued in the subject of classes and so, he just had to know about that, “Then what about the hero class? What are its primary abilities?” He asked, gleaming sparkles in his eyes with a smile on his face.  

Allan, who saw this gleam, decided to tell Marcel although, he didn’t want to, he decided to make it sound very bad. He said, “Well, the heroes are a bit special as their 'Hero' title applies for both their race and a class. It’s a bit special, like a few other classes, and is basically the most annoying class there is. Just having that class makes heroes the most exasperating people to be around. They have exceptionally high luck; their magic capacity is immense and is believed to be almost endless like a guardian as long as they desire its growth and the most annoying thing about their class is that almost nothing is known by the general populace about this class. All we know is that this skill allows the heroes to become anything that they want to be, thus making their potential endless, which I find unfair since I worked my butt off and I only possess a few classes.” Allan said, anger brewing from deep inside him. Marcel looked with an expression that said ‘I’m clueless’ and so, he couldn’t do anything but calm down and accept the fact that the world favors the heroes. Exasperating indeed.  

Marcel thought of what he’d heard for a while and reaffirmed his earlier knowledge about the demon realm being more interesting than the human world. He knew from the human world that people couldn’t own more than a class, but in the demon realm, that was a whole different matter, meaning that there probably is some demon out there with about twenty classes if there’s a hero who has awakened more than 20 elements. He smiled as he thought about the future in a good mood and then went back to making food again. 

 

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[A/N: Hello! I'm back now. I'm sorry it took so long to finally start updating again. Life just hasn't been kind to me like many others recently. Since we're entering a new year, 2021, I figured, "Why not surprise someone by continuing my story now instead of next year?" This time, I think I'll be able to keep my promise to upload frequently, #newyeargoals2021.]