Chapter 102 Upgrade

After the bath, Shiro had changed into a more casual outfit. The clothes she decided on was a white long-sleeved shirt that was decorated with small amounts of frills, a black skirt that reached her knees, white stockings and a pair of boots.

Making sure that her hair was completely free of dried blood, Shiro was surprised to see her hair back to their silk-like state.

'Could it be that my body stays the same as long as there are no outside interferences?' She thought whilst running her hands through her hair.

Shrugging her shoulders, Shiro was happy if that was the truth. It meant that she didn't need to worry about conditioning her hair.

Walking towards Lyrica and Madison, Shiro informed them about her going to upgrade their weapons right now.

"Eh? That fast?" Lyrica asked.

[Yeah, I might as well get it out of the way now since I got stuff to do tomorrow.]

Shiro smiled.

"Alright, don't take too long to come back though." Madison said as she was still drying her hair.

Shiro nodded before leaving the area.

Yin, who had lost her hood to sleep in, could only perch herself on top of Shiro's head.

Once she made her way back to her 'lab', Shiro took out the purple shield and Lyrica's dual-ended blades that she had commissioned Helion to make.

The first thing to do was for her to make a better Nano Growth Infuser.

Sitting down on her chair, Shiro leaned back before flexing her fingers. Lightning and metal twined together before a device could be seen in her hands.

After upgrading her Nanotech engineering to tier 2 along with the fact that her mana pool was huge right now, the process was quick and efficient.

[Nano Growth Infuser Level 30-50 (Purple)]

Seeing the device in her hands, Shiro smiled and flexed her hands to create a second device.

With the two Nano Growth Infuser's in her hands, Shiro chuckled when she understood that the moment she put these into the auction, all hell would break loose. Especially if she was able to make ones of a higher level, which she could.

"Hmm… I'll upgrade the sword first since it's only a green ranked weapon." Shiro muttered since if she were to do the process manually, she should be able to upgrade it into a purple grade weapon.

*KRRSSSS!!!!

The Nano Growth Infuser hissed when it made contact with the magic crystal. The transformation was much more violent than the previous upgrade since this was the bonafide Nano Growth Infuser and not some prototype.

[Insert materials to enhance the weapon? Y/N]

Pulling out a few of the purple grade materials in her inventory, Shiro accepted the prompt.

[Materials discovered.]

[3x Pseudo Blood Dragon Essence, 2x Blood Crystals, 5x Blood Beast Talon, Blood Crystalized Heart.]

Watching the Infuser devour the materials, Shiro smiled with anticipation.

Once the process was finished, a beautiful dual-ended blade laid in front of her. The blades themselves were narrow with the edges being similar to that of a row of teeth. The colour of the blades were black with veins of red that pulsed through the blades. The nanotech wasn't visible since it worked on the interior structure of the blade rather than the outside appearance.

[Nano Tech Blood Dragon Slayer LVL 30/50 – Purple]

+150/350 Attack

+150/400 Attack Speed

+50/150 Ignore Defence

+50/100 Life Steal

+100/250 STR

+100/250 AGI

+10% Suppression against enemies equal

or lower level than you

Skill(Locked) – Blood Rain

Blood Rain:

Cause blood to rain down onto the battlefield. Each droplet siphons your enemies HP into yours.

Duration: 5/15 Seconds (Can be ended earlier)

Health Siphoned: 1/5% Health

Cost: 5k MP per Second

Cooldown: 5 Minutes

Upgrade Requirements:

10x Blue Blade Type Weapons (LVL 35)

1x Blood Crystal

20x D ranked Mana Stones

Looking at the stats, Shiro was rather surprised at the fact that the weapon had gained the party wipe skill one of the guardian twins had used.

'Maybe It's because I used the Blood Crystallized Heart as one of the materials.' Shiro thought since the blood crystalized heart was one of the drops she harvested when they had killed the Guardian Twins.

As for the basic stats, they were rather impressive in Shiro's eyes. While it may lose out a little once it reached level 50, the skill made up for that loss.

Naturally, she couldn't have the fact that it was a Nanotech weapon revealed so she made a skill chip with the skill, Disguise, to hide a portion of the status. Now the weapon was just shown as Blood Dragon Slayer.

With Lyrica's weapon upgraded, Shiro turned her attention to the already purple grade Shield.

Since the Shield had already come with 3 skills of its own, she needed to avoid adding more skills since too many skills and the shield would break itself.

'The only thing I need to do for Madison's shield is to convert it into growth type equipment and buff its basic stats.' Shiro thought to herself since the stats of the level 40 shield were rather disappointing if not for the skills that it came with.

Injecting the Infuser into the shield, Shiro only added a few items to reinforce the basic stats of the shield.

[Nano Tech Blood Rock Giant's Protection – LVL 30/50 Shield (Purple)]

+150/350 Shield Defence

+100/300 DEF

+100/300 VIT

+100/200 Reduce Knockback

+10/20% Damage Reduction

+50/150 Negate Critical Strike

+50/150 Damage Reflection

Skills:

Rock Giant's Projection:

Summon the projection of a rock giant that protects your entire team.

Damage is reduced by 60% (Limited by level. Loses effect against LVL 55+)

Aggro is increased by 70% (Limited by level. Loses effect against LVL 55+)

Speed is reduced by 80%

Cost: 5,000MP

Duration – 30 seconds

Cooldown – 2 minutes

Rock Giant's Presence:

Increases one's aggro on the field exponentially.

Aggro is increased by 70% (Limited by level. Loses Effect against LVL 55+)

Cost: 2,000MP

Duration: 1 minute

Cooldown: 3 minutes

Rock Giant's Stomp:

A ground-shaking stomp that stuns your enemies for a short moment.

Cost: 2,000MP+

Range: Increases with the amount of MP used. (Maximum Range: 15 meters)

Duration of stun: 5 seconds

Cooldown: 1 minute

The skills of the shield had no changes but the basic stats experienced a huge change.

In addition to this, Shiro grinned when the requirements were wiped from the weapon meaning Madison could equip this shield without any problems.

Stretching her body slightly, Shiro pulled out her phone and checked the dates.

"Hmm, the auction is being held tomorrow. I should probably go alone so that Lyrica and Madison can rest back at the tent." Shiro said as she stood up.

"Come on Little Yin, we're going back now." She called out.

*Chirp!

Chirping in response, Yin landed on Shiro's head to make her territory known. Shiro only chuckled slightly at Yin's behaviour before making her way back to the tent.

[I'm back.]

Shiro greeted as she entered the tent again.

This time, Lyrica wasn't able to hold Kanae back as she leapt into Shiro's embrace.

"Shiro-nee! Welcome back." Kanae said causing Yumi to chuckle slightly.

She smiled warmly seeing Shiro become something similar to an older sister to her daughter. Not only that, but Kanae was rather attached to Shiro as well.

Shiro patted Kanae's head as she turned toward the slightly jealous Lyrica and Madison, who was only smiling at the situation.

[I've finished upgrading your weapons.]

Pulling out the sword and shield, Shiro handed them over to their new owners.

"Oh wow…" They both muttered seeing the stats on the weapons. Understanding that they shouldn't keep the weapons out for too long, they stored it away in their inventories.

"Thank you Shiro."

"Thank you."

[It's pretty late now, we should sleep since we're rather fatigued from fighting in the dungeon.]

"True, I've barely been able to keep my eyes open." Madison yawned while stretching her body.

Since they were all tired, they didn't talk much and went to sleep.

###

The next morning, Shiro woke up a little later than usual but was still earlier than the rest of the people in the tent.

As always, she moved Kanae back into her own sleeping bag before walking out of the tent.

'So today, I want to go to the auction to look at what they have. I also want to see if I can get Aarim to change my outfit a little since white is not the best colour to be dressed in whilst going on a slaughter.' Shiro thought as her current outfit was what she had worn after going to the bath house.

Feeding herself and Yin some D ranked Mana Stones, she couldn't help but frown at her stockpile.

Due to the fact that she wasn't able to take a break whilst fighting, she didn't have the time to excavate the mana stones. Even with Yin excavating the mana stones when she could, they had eaten more than what they had harvested in the dungeon. This caused her stockpile to be whittled down slowly.

"Seems like I should see if I can buy a bundle of D ranked mana stones as well." Shiro sighed and made her way to the auction house.

However, this time, her appearance had earned her more stares from the crowd. With nothing covering her face and hair, it was hard not to see her.

There were also a few malicious stares originating from the slums area which only caused Shiro to narrow her eyes coldly.

Before she went to the auction house, she made a trip to the adventurer's guild since it was in the same direction.

Waiting in the queue, she had the occasional adventurer give her a second stare since they only casually glanced at her before being shocked by her beauty.

"Ah it's you again nya. How can I help you today nya?" Susie asked.

[Just the same as usual. Update my status please.]

"Sure nya. Just give me a moment nya." She said whilst taking Shiro's card.

"I'm surprised that you're already level 43 nya. Normally, people would take a few months to years to get this level nya. What did you do?" Susie asked curiously whilst updating Shiro's status.

[I was stuck in a mutated dungeon.]

Shiro shrugged. It wasn't much of a secret to keep since everyone knew about mutated dungeons.

"Mutated dungeon nya? You mean the one that mutated yesterday, Blood vale nya?" Susie asked with surprise.

[Yeah. It became a level 50 dungeon.]

"Wow, you entered into the dungeon as a level 35 or something right nya?"

[Level 37]

"That's still a 13 level difference between you and the monster's nya. How did you even kill the boss? A shield of a level 50 boss isn't something that can be broken easily you know nya." Susie asked.

[Trade secret.]

"Well, I suppose that makes sense nya. Here's your updated card and have a nice day nya." Susie said as she handed back Shiro her card.

[Name: Shiro

Estimated Age: 13

Class: Ice Mage

LVL: 43

Mage's Association Membership: VIP (New York Branch)

Priority Rank: 9 (New York Branch)]

Storing her card away, Shiro made her way to the auction house.

'It would be great if I can find some Jade Ice. At least I'll be able to class up quickly before my 5th star.' She thought whilst entering the auction house. Sitting down at one of the terminals, she searched for Jade Ice.

"Mn… Only 2 are available." Shiro muttered with a frown.

"Well I guess it's fine."

Pressing purchase, she received a receipt and walked over to the counter to redeem her items.

[Two Jade Ice's please.]

"Thank you, can I have your receipt please to confirm that you are indeed the buyer." The receptionist asked as Shiro did as they asked. Receiving the receipt, the receptionist walked away to retrieve the items.

After waiting for around 3 minutes, they came back with her items.

[Thank you.]

Shiro left the queue while storing her items away.

'Since the auction finale items are three purple grade objects, the previous items should also be pretty decent as well.' Shiro thought to herself.

Due to the fact that this was going to be a huge auction, it started in the afternoon and was hosted at the biggest hall the auction house had.

As there were still a few hours until the auction house started, Shiro decided to send Aarim a text to ask about the outfits.

[Shiro: Hey Aarim, are you free to chat for a bit?]

Surprisingly, she didn't need to wait too long for Aarim to reply.

[Aarim: I have a few moments to spare right now. What do you need?]

[Shiro: You see, I need your help with the monster cloth outfit you made for me. I want to see if I'm able to change the design a little and re-dye the outfit from white to black.]

[Aarim: That isn't too hard. I'm able to rent a tailoring station in this city so I can work on the outfit. But why do you need to dye it? I think white looks pretty nice.]

[Shiro: It's because I was stuck in a dungeon. The blood dried up and somewhat dyed the white robe with splotches of red.]

[Aarim: Ah I see, that's why.]

[Aarim: Okay sure, I can work on it. Do you know where the tailoring association building is? I'll just wait for you there and you can give me the outfit. I'll have a look at the state there as well.]

[Shiro: What about the payment? I still owe you a few photoshoots I think.]

[Aarim: Well I'll just keep it on your tab. I can't do much about the photoshoot since all of my stuff is back in my workshop and we both know how New York is right now.]

[Shiro: Alright, I'll meet you up at the tailor's association soon.]

Putting away her phone, Shiro glanced one more time at the clock.

'I should have enough time to see Aarim and make it for the auction.' She thought whilst walking towards the tailor's association.