Level: 20
Experience: BLOCKED
Healing: 500/500
Stamina: 580/580
Mana: 800/800
Class: Tier 1, Adult Human (Blue)
Effect: Increased Skill Acquisition (+10%), Increased Learning Speed (+10%), Increased Stat Gain (+10%), Increased Physical Gain (+10%), Increased Mental Gain (+10%)
Vitality: 50 ()
Endurance: 58 (+3)
Strength: 40+20 (+2)
Agility: 47+20 (+1)
Perception: 37 (+1)
Mind: 160 (+1)), Sweet Teeth (40), Demonic Lore (40), Focused Throw (40), Monster Analysis (38+8), Dwarven Lore (35), Elven Lore (33), Focused Spear Skills (33), Depth Sense (30+9), Focused Cooking Skills (30+7), Eldarin Lore (28), High Vostner Lore (28), Low Vostner Lore (27), Focused Rage (25+5), Focused Axe Skills (20), Focused Combat Tactics (12+12),
Tier 3 (117) (5+): Empowered Will (100), Mana Manipulation (100), Fear Resistance (80), Empowered Gestures (77+2), Light Orb (75), Eldarin Runes (74+2), Empowered Meditation (62+2), Silent Casting (61+1), Skill Control (61+1), Hidden Status (59), Lightning Resistance (58+3), Clean (44+4), Fireball (43+3), Cold Resistance (42+2), Sleep (40), Flame Blade (40), Ward (40+4), Empowered Breathing (38+3), Empowered Writing (38+6), System Control (33+3), Arcane Resistance (31+2), Empowered Running (31+2), Physical Resistance (29+3), Lightning Beam (28+3), Cure (27), Status Analysis (25), Dwarven Runes (22+2), Elven Runes (22+2), Demonic Runes (20+1), Soul Strike (20), Calculus (20), Advanced Geometry (20), High Vostner Runes (18+1), Low Vostner Runes (16+1), Social Resistance (10+2), Sonic Resistance (10+10), Alchemy (8+1), Empowered Stealth (8+1), Empowered Toughness (4+4), Empowered Sword Skills (1+1)
Tier 4 (32): Experience Siphon (C), Soul Link (66+6), Poison Immunity (35), Multi-Casting (21+2), Vibration Blade (15), Pain Immunity (12+1), Soul Immunity (8+1), Healing Immunity (6+2), Fire Immunity (5+3)
Equipment
Gloves: Gloves of Magic (T3) (+20 Magic)
Boots: Boots of Agility (T3) (+20 Agility)
Head: Helmet of Clarity (T3) (+20 Focus)
Body: Heavy Armor of Stability (T3) (+20 Strength)
Ring 1: Ring of Alarm (T3) (Gem turns red if other Mana interferes)
Ring 2: Ring of Force Deflection (T3) (Reduces impact force by a quarter)
Amulet/Bracelet: Experience Blocker (T4) (Prevents all experience gain for primary level)
Weapon 1: Reforged Beginner's Blade (T3) (Sharpness-T4, Durability-T3, Self-Repair-T2)
Equipment 1: Runic Writing Set (T3) (Write Runes T3 and Below)
Equipment 2: Monster Processing Set (T3) (Processes Level 150 and Below)
Equipment 3: Ring of Remote Awareness (T3) (Allows for remote viewing from companion ring)
Winged Serpent
Level: 39/462
Experience: 4,887/5,611
Healing: 1,200/1,200
Stamina: 500/500
Mana: 1,200/1,200
Class: Tier 1, Young Winged Serpent (Orange)
Effect: Alchemy Skill Growth (+50%), Alchemic Skill Power (+100%)
Vitality: 120 (+8)
Endurance: 50 (+8)
Strength: 67 (+8)
Agility: 99 (+8)
Perception: 53 (+8)
Mind: 111 (+8)
Magic: 120 (+24)
Focus: 60 (+8)
Free Points: 0
T2: Alchemic Vision (100), Focused Bite (100+20), Toxic Breath (97+17), Danger Sense (58+15), Health Sense (23+1), Stamina Sense (21+1)
T3: Cure (100), Purify (100), Refresh (100), Alchemy (76+3), Poison Insight (69+2), Fire Insight (44+1), Cold Insight (41+1), Arcane Insight (40+1), Spatial Insight (34+1), Soul Insight (24+1), Healing Insight (15), Anatomy Insight (11), Atmospheric Insight (8)
T4: Soul Link (60), Flight (59+2), Alchemic Bounded Field (51+2), Greater Cure (33+3), Greater Purify (26+2), Greater Refresh (20+2), Petrifying Gaze (12+2)
Three months of fighting in the dungeon and I had gained an insane 610 skill levels. There were only three explanations. The first being was the life and death struggle that I had constantly put myself through. That was the obvious explanation. The second being the increased Mana in the air.
The last explanation was that the cursed skill had been degraded.
How many skill levels was Xanatos stealing?
Despite doing well these last three months, the rage was real. The two soul fruits my mother had given me should have had a much greater impact. Or they were having a greater impact, but Xanatos was siphoning off my hard work.
I had been working on Stillness when I had watch, but it was a slow skill to improve, despite my focus on it. It didn't like being leveled outside of combat or a threat to my life.
But I was going to keep working on it, since it was my mother's legacy.
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Empowered Toughness improved my physical body, while Physical Resistance used Mana to achieve a similar effect. So, while both had improved after all the battles and the minor damage I had taken, they were interfering with each other.
I had also finally gotten the tier 3 weapon's skill, Empowered Sword Skills. It had been a struggle to get this far, but the battles had caused me to break through a lot of bottlenecks. I guess that could be a fourth reason my skill gains went up quite a bit these last three months.
What was slightly annoying was that I hadn't gotten Combat Runes as a skill for being a spellblade and using runes in combat. I could almost feel the skill, but I wasn't good enough for it yet, which was annoying. However, it was a tier 4 skill, and I had not mastered my runic skills. I was too slow, and my runic arrays weren't good enough to be considered.
It was the first time that I wanted a skill but couldn't get it. It was a problem people had with other lower-tier skills but a first for me.
I could work on improving Drawing. There was a reason that higher tier skills were harder to get and more complex to master. They weren't simple; they had had more complex requirements.
The most surprising was Sonic Resistance, but the constant firing of The Indomitable's weapons made it absolutely necessary. I wouldn't be surprised if everyone else on the team possessed such a skill. Sound-based monsters were incredibly rare, and people used social skills instead of screaming for sound-based attacks.
In fact, there were very few sonic spell skills.
The noise from the heavy weapons of the war mech was so constant and loud because the chief weapon was the Rapid Lightning Cannon. I was almost surprised I hadn't gotten a Visual Resistance skill of some kind from the constant flashes.
As for my stats, I had gained no Vitality, which wasn't a tremendous surprise. I was getting older, and it wasn't a stat one could easily increase through training. That every other stat had increased wasn't a surprise either, but I wasn't about to use my free stat points just yet.
It was tempting, but I wanted to keep pushing them up and not slowdown in my stat gain. Once I used my free stat points, that would be it. I wouldn't be able to level my stats easily. And with the class I had selected, I needed to keep up stat growth for as long as possible, or my class selection would be a waste.
I was also at the edge of Meldor's Threshold once again.
If I wanted Combat Runes as a skill, then I needed a higher Mind stat. It was my constant nemesis.
I had used up seven skill spaces with the new skills and upgraded skills in these last three months.
There was no defined term.
Most people didn't pack in the skills like I did and were much more focused on their selections. While Stillness applied to my build, it was a skill I would ignore. I still had soul skills I needed to work on as well. I really had too many skills.
The enormous battles on the 11th layer had gone well, at least so far. The trick was blocking off the other tunnels to narrow entrances, forcing the monsters to take their time to rush into whatever cavern we were using as a battleground.
If their numbers didn't become insanely large and with Sam distracting them, they were much more manageable than the horde we had to face previously. It meant a really long and exhausting day of fighting. While the fighting took only two hours at most, there was the preparation, monster processing, and cleanup.
Then we would rest for a day afterwards before repeating the cycle. It was a three-day cycle.
That wasn't bad considering this was the 11th layer with much larger groups of monsters. It wasn't an amazing pace, but it wasn't bad either. The problem was that it didn't properly break up the fights, and we were going through a lot of consumables.
Everyone finished eating, and I began putting everything away. We had a battle yesterday, and we're now on our rest day.
"How is everyone doing with supplies and equipment? I know I have gone through a third of my potions," I said.
"A bit more than half," Harren said. He didn't have a pet boosting him.
"Same," Stormy said.
"About a quarter gone," Sam replied.
"Fuel is holding, but repair materials are a concern. I have used about two-thirds of my stock, primarily on the weapons patching and repairing them," April said.
"That much? I thought you slowed down the fire rate?" I asked.
"A bit, but the problem is the sheer amount of Mana. Even with the high quality, they are degrading. The Indomitable's skills are helping slow the breakdowns, but I can't hold back on repairs and upkeep. An accident with a weapon would be disastrous," April explained.
"Then we should probably start looking for a passage back to the surface. The ascent is going to be a pain," I said.
This caused them to look slightly frustrated.
Each of us had earned around 70,000 orange monster cores, which would probably be closer to 80,000 when we finally got out of the dungeon. With each one from the 11th layer having an average price of 50 copper, we would only make 400 gold from this descent.
With the number of potions we had consumed, we would come out ahead. But with the wear and tear on our equipment, we would lose money. The consumption rate was too high. That was why pacing was important instead of having massive battles.
The skill gain and harvest speed for cores weren't that much different, but the problem came from burning through too much of our reserves too quickly and needing potions to win the fights. That turned what should have been a nice payday into a money-losing descent.
The warmech was to blame for all of it. Again, it wasn't just its combat ability, but the little things about it that just built up and made it unviable to fight with in the dungeon. I could tell that April knew this as well with the grimace on her face. But there was no getting around this issue.
None of us wanted to use more consumables, not even me. But in the face of these enormous battles running out of Mana or Stamina was too dangerous. So, they took potions to ensure there wouldn't be issues. Unfortunately, it also meant we were losing money.
While I hadn't had to worry about money issues that much, I owed a debt to the College for Ozy's skills. I also didn't want to ask my father for money. That would have been an awkward conversation.
"That is unfortunate. I was hoping it wouldn't be the case," Stormy said heavily while we were all silent.
While we all had different personalities, we were a team. Kicking out April and The Indomitable would mean the end of the team.
Its high Mana use attracted monsters from nearby caverns, which meant we had to change our grinding strategy. That led to higher potion consumption and the entire descent being a money loser.
While some people might come down into the dungeon for skills and levels, ultimately money was the primary motivator. Even leveling purists needed money to buy equipment. Unless we went Blood Gore's route and ran around the dungeon naked, there wouldn't be a need to worry about one's armor.
If we had been taking half the consumables we were right now, then we might break even. I could get away with more since I had Ozy. But for the others, the financial loss hurt even more.
The metal alloys used to make the war mech and its weapons weren't cheap either.
"Do you think it could be viable one day?" April asked.
"You would need a team centered on it, and then you would have to accept monetary losses for a while. Realistically, it would only be profitable on the 21st layer with yellow core basic monsters. You would get ten times the money from those cores with a minimum price of five silver each. But the challenge is getting to that part," I replied.
"Or having a dedicated potion maker on the team," Stormy said.
"Adding another person?" I asked, and she nodded.
"It would be worth considering," she replied.
"It's difficult to find a crafter who wants to fight in the dungeon. And even with potions, we would break even at best. Our cut of the monster cores would be six instead of five," Harren said.
The more people we brought, the more unfeasible all of this became.
"I am sure we can find someone," Stormy said.
She clearly wanted the war mech to succeed.
"I am not opposed, but skilled Alchemists don't like to fight," I replied.
"What about your pet? Can't it make potions since it can use Alchemy?" Sam asked, and I let out a sigh.
"If you want to spend all the money to teach it all those support skills, go ahead. Alchemy is about transforming physical substances, but potion making is a distinct sub-discipline. It isn't just Potion Refinement as a tier 4 skill, but lots of sub-skills as well. The number of sub-skills is quite large, at least around 10 to 20 . You have Alchemic Brewing, Alchemic Balancing, Alchemic Analysis, and so on."
"They weren't on the main course list," Sam said.
"Most skills aren't, since they aren't easy to teach and not required. There is no prerequisite for Tier 3 Alchemy, but learning to do anything useful without that skill requires all those support skills. And without the support skills, good luck with tier 4 Potion Refinement," I said with a huff.
I had looked into this for Ozy. It would have been great to have a mobile potion factory. But after realizing all the support skills needed to make proper potions, I had completely given up on that idea.