TL: Haku

Editor: Stealth

An item in the shape of a slightly big pebble with lingering yellow light was in Ian’s hand. An unusual point was that a warm energy was flowing out of the stone.

‘Is it an item that I can use in place of a hot pack during winter?’

It was one of the items that the three good-for-nothings left behind while dying but Ian couldn’t a.s.sume what it was.

Even when he opened the item information, it was only written that it was entirely unknown and he couldn’t find a similar item in the auction either.

But to just toss it, he was somewhat skeptical, so Ian put the stone within his chest.

Ian, who roughly finished cleaning up the items, called Harin.

“I’m finished, Harin. Let’s go and finish off the quest now.”

Harin, who had already bought all the items she needed and was standing nearby, scuttled over to Ian at his calling.

“Alright!”

To complete the quest, the two went to vigilante leader Lapierre.

“Oh, Ian. I’m glad you came. I heard about your performance from Hugo! As expected, you are reliable.”

As he shook hands Lapierre, a system message popped up.

Because of his incredible contribution for the quest, an excessive amount of EXP poured in. On top of that, the gold reward was also quite good.

‘Ahuehue.’

Ian’s mouth hung from his ears.

“Oh, Ian, I leveled up!”

Harin, who was already at lv 45, also leveled up to hit 46. It was another detail that confirmed how much EXP they had earned.

“Congratulations!”

“Did you not level up, Ian?”

Ian had not yet revealed his level to Harin. That’s why Harin a.s.sumed that Ian was around her level. In the beginning, because Ian’s cla.s.s was Summoner, she obviously thought his level was low but because of the image that he showed while fighting, she naturally thought it was higher.

“Yes, I also leveled up.”

Ian, who thought it was too troublesome to explain this and that, spoke vaguely before talking to Lapierre again. This was because there was still a reward left for him to receive.

“But Chief.”

“What’s wrong?”

“I met the Goblin Chief Priest at the back of the camping ground.”

While speaking, Ian pulled out the Goblin Chief Priest’s headdress from his chest and handed it to Lapierre.

Lapierre, who saw that, widened his eyes.

“No, this! Are you saying that you’ve killed the Goblin Chief Priest!”

“That’s right.”

“Whoa… You’re amazing!”

As soon as he finished saying those words, another system message about completing a quest popped up in front of Ian and Harin’s eyes.

As it took a long to kill the Chief Priest, the clear rank was only at B+ but Ian, whose level was incredibly low compared to the progressed quest, leveled up again.

Lapierre continued his words to Ian, who was grinning from ear to ear.

“You are truly surprising. I really didn’t know you would even find the Goblin Chief Priest and kill him for me. The vigilantes had been looking for him for months. How exactly did you find him?”

Ian, who was in a good mood, spoke humbly.

“I was lucky.”

“That’s not true, no.”

Lapierre pulled something out from his chest and handed it to Ian.

At the system message that popped up after, Ian nodded his head.

Truthfully, Ian already knew that Lapierre gave a Mercenary Evaluation Recommendation if you completed the Chief Priest quest.

‘When I have a reason to go to Myuran, I must get a Mercenary Card after getting the Mercenary Evaluation.’

In Virtual Reality Kailran, there were five large continents.

The areas open among them so far were two places, ‘Colonar Continent’, where most users were active, and ‘Malakar Continent’, which opened through the update not long ago but not even 10% of Malakar Continent has been developed.

The place where Ian was currently active was, of course, Colonar Continent.

In Colonar Continent, two enormous empires existed.

One of them was the Luspel Empire and Myuran was the capital of Luspel Empire, which was a gigantic city named after the founding hero of the Luspel Empire.

‘Although I don’t have any reason to go to Myuran before I hit lv 50…’

Ian, who took the Recommendation and put it away, shook hands with Lapierre.

“If you take this Recommendation, you can take the Mercenary Evaluation of Luspel Empire. As I see excellent mercenary qualifications in you, I’m giving you this Recommendation, so make sure you go to Myuran and take the Mercenary Evaluation.”

Ian nodded his head as he responded.

“Thank you, Chief. I will make sure to take the Mercenary Evaluation.”

“That’s it, I hope you will continue to work hard for the public order of the Luspel Empire.”

Harin, who cleared the quest as the same party member, was given the same reward. Harin, who cleared the Chief Priest Quest for the first time unlike Ian, asked Ian about the Recommendation.

“Ian, what is this Recommendation? Do you happen to know?”

“Yes, if you go to the Mercenary guild in Myuran with this, you can take the Mercenary Evaluation.”

“Oh… What’s the benefit of taking the Evaluation?”

“Based on your fighting power, you can get a Mercenary Card with a rank equivalent to your skill. If you have a Mercenary Card, it’s easier to get quests from NPCs and you can get pretty good requests from the Mercenary guild.”

Harin’s eyes shone.

“Wow, it’s a good thing. But since I’m only going to be cooking for a while now…”

“Cooking?”

“Yes, until I’m stuck on a Chef cla.s.s’s main quest, I’m planning on just raising my cooking skill again.”

Ian once again felt Harin’s top priority was on cooking and admired her on the inside.

‘All I know is that Harin’s cooking level is definitely in the top ranks of Kailran.’

The biggest reason why Ian thought this way was because he saw Ly’s stats increase, although for only a short time, through the food that Harin gave him.

‘Up until now, I had never heard anything about getting a stat buff when eating food even through the community.’

Ian was suddenly curious of Harin’s cooking proficiency.

“Harin, could I ask what your Chef cla.s.s’s proficiency is?”

Ian was cautious as he was asking personal information but Harin responded while smiling as if it was nothing.

“Sure, there’s no reason to kee[ it a secret, anyways. What was my current proficiency again…”

As she was momentarily checking her information window, Harin paused before opening her mouth again.

“It’s at High-rank lv 1. I must work hard so I can quickly learn better high-rank skills.”

“Whoa…!”

He did hear last time by chance that her skills were high-rank but hearing her exact proficiency, he was once again surprised.

From what Ian knew, in the case of the most popular production cla.s.s, the Blacksmith, the most well-known person with the highest proficiency was at High-rank lv 3.

As the Chef was a cla.s.s with even less popularity, he was positive that Harin was a user in the top ranks.

Ian’s flattery skill that he used to raise his Affinity with NPCs, which he usually perfected, was invoked.

“I’m rooting for you, Harin. I heard it’s really hard to raise the proficiency of production cla.s.ses… You’re amazing! If you need my help again next time, let me know.”

At Ian’s words, Harin’s face momentarily lit up.

“Thank you very much, Ian. Those words, you have to promise to keep!”

Ian momentarily flinched.

‘I didn’t make a mistake with my words… right?’

He was slightly nervous that Harin would ask favours constantly and make it troublesome for him.

However, as she was happy, Ian also became happy shortly after.

“Yes, of course.”

As soon as he said those words, a system message popped up in Ian’s view.

Ian of course accepted.

“Then see you next time, Ian. I’ve played for too long, so I think I’ll have to head out now.”

It was approaching 8 hours since Harin and Ian began the Goblin Camping Ground Quest and had been together up until now. That much time was not a big deal to hardcore gamers like Ian but in the position of a normal user, that could be considered a long time to be logged on.

“Alright, Harin. I’ll see you next time.”

However, Harin, who was about to leave, seemed to have suddenly remembered something as she started to look through her bag.

“Ian, this is a gift.”

Two lunchboxes were in Harin’s hands.

“What is this?”

“This is a dish I made while waiting for you, Ian.”

It was an instant meal that Harin, who was bored while waiting, swiftly made using her cooking skills. Truthfully, it wasn’t amazing enough to call it a dish but Harin seemed to have been embarra.s.sed saying that she ‘cooked’ as her face slightly reddened.

‘What if Ian thinks this is weird?’

Harin slightly covered her two reddened cheeks and slightly glanced at Ian. However, Ian’s eyes only saw the lunchboxes that had steam rising from it.

Ian’s face shone.

‘Just as I thought, Harin was an angel…!’

“The one on top is steak and that’s for you, Ian. Ly will probably like if you give him the things that look like meatb.a.l.l.s on the bottom. I thought Ly would like it if you gave him one every so often.”

“Alright, we’ll eat it when we’re hungry.”

At Ian’s words, Harin shook her head.

“No, not when you’re hungry, eat it before you fight. There are stat boosts.”

At those words, Ian gave a bashful laugh.

“Ah… right.”

Harin laughed and nodded her head.

“Yes, it’s not a lot of stats but they shouldn’t be low enough to disregard.”

Ian could agree enough with those words. He felt the difference in 200 Health was quite big while doing the Camping Ground Quest.

“Thank you. We’ll eat it well, Harin.”

“What do you mean, it’s nothing compared to how much you’ve helped me.”

After sharing a couple more words, Harin logged off. And Ian, who was now left alone, checked the time.

“There’s still about 5 hours until it’s time to go to sleep. Since I leveled up faster than I thought, I can probably eat dinner at least properly, right?”

The Goblin Camping Ground Quest was a repeatable quest. Every time you received the quest, the location of the camping ground that was being attacked changed, but the quest content itself was similar.

Ian was originally counting 2 days in order for him to hit lv 35. He thought it would have taken about two Camping Ground Quests.

However, with his level of contribution and by engaging into even the hidden quest, he was able to reach his goal in one go, so he was incredibly satisfied.

“It’s been a while, so I’ll order chicken and eat that.”

He felt he could give himself chicken as a reward for being so faithful today.

Ian, who gobbled up one chicken by himself, hurriedly logged into the game.

While eating the chicken, the second wasted Intermediate-level Training  haunted him.

‘Can’t they make macros in virtual reality games? I want to rotate Training even when I’m sleeping…’

After Ian logged on, grumbling, he summoned Ly shortly after.

“Ly summon!”

Grr- Grrr-!

As soon as Ly was summoned, he rubbed his face against Ian’s hip. His Affinity with Ly now was at its highest, to the point he could no longer raise it up anymore.

Ian, who invoked the Intermediate-level Training skill shortly after, got on top of Ly’s back.

“Ly, let’s go to Abysmal Lake.”

Grr-?

Ian began to move after petting Ly, who tilted his head.

‘As I know, the boat that went into Abysmal Lake came in every hour on the hour…’

The Abysmal Island was an island that was in the middle of Abysmal Lake. And as it was a place that didn’t have a reason for you to go to unless you were a Magician, it was also called the ‘Magician’s Island’.

‘We need to get there in 25 minutes. We’ll have to hurry.’

Ly’s foot movement got faster with Ian on his back.

‘I thought it was somewhere around here… Am I right?’

Thanks to Ly’s fast movement with Ian on his back, he was able to reach the dock on time.

“Ly, it’s over there, you just need to go there.”

He was worried that since it had been a while, he would get confused but fortunately, he found it in one go and it wasn’t a situation where he missed the boat.

“We made it just in time!”

Ian hurriedly moved and approached the boat.

At the dock, there were about four or five people that came before Ian and were getting on the boat.

It looked as if the boat just arrived.

‘There’s fewer people than I thought.’

Before Ian reset, he came to Abysmal Island to help Fiolan with her quest.

Back then, it was immediately after the news that a quest related to freezing magic was at Abysmal Island, so the dock was always crowded but compared to then, it was incredibly quiet.

Ian rode the boat with Ly.

Creaak- Creak-.

The sound of the wooden board dragging on was harsh to the ear and Ian grumbled to himself.

‘I can never get used to this boat no matter how much I ride it. Can’t they use a boat that’s in better condition?’

As this boat that went around Abysmal Lake always went on the same route unmanned, it was also called a ghost s.h.i.+p. Of course, the worn-out appearance also contributed to it gaining the name ghost s.h.i.+p.

Ian complained to himself as he sat down on a spot.

On the opposite side, there were two females and two males and it looked as though they were a party.

As if he felt awkward since it was his first time on a boat, Ly wandered here and there before sitting next to Ian modestly shortly after. However, he kept on looking around and glancing here and there. As it was his first time seeing a lake this big, his eyes were full of curiosity.

However, just then, one of the males of the party that was sitting on the opposite side approached Ian.

“h.e.l.lo, do you happen to be a Summoner?”

The male, who looked as though he was around his early 20s, looked at Ly with incredibly curious eyes.

Ian found it a little troublesome but as it looked like the man’s expression was that of pure curiosity, he responded.

“Yes, I’m a Summoner. Aside from myself, it looks as though your all one party?”

“Yes, that’s right. My two friends over there are Magicians and I promised to help them with their freezing magic quest.”

“Ah-ha, I see.”

Fortunately, after saying a couple more words, the male quickly lost interest in Ly and returned to his party.

Ian slightly leaned his back against the wall of the pilothouse and closed his eyes.

It took at least 1 hour to get to Abysmal Island. As there was nothing really to do until then, Ian decided to try to sleep. This was because, although not as much as sleeping in reality, sleeping in the game was quite helpful in recovering fatigue.

However, Ian, who closed his eyes and was trying to sleep, heard the voices of the party riding the boat. Because their conversation was about Ian himself, he p.r.i.c.ked his ears up.