Chapter 77: Ancient Summoner (2)

TL: Haku

Editor: Hungry Panda

"Herz, buy me 15 more seconds!"

Whooong-!

Fiolan started casting 'Frozen h.e.l.l', the highest-ranking ice magic skill amongst the skills she was mastering.

As she did so, with her staff as the centre, a bright blue chill drew a large arc and began to be sucked in.

And Herz blocked the dungeon's boss monster, the 'Forlan Giant', which was headed towards her.

Bang-!

Along with a boom, the giant's club struck Herz's s.h.i.+eld.

And although he succeeded in blocking it properly, Herz's body was pushed back 1 meter.

Even from looking at it, it was a tremendous destructive power.

After checking his Vitality gauge, Herz's complexion slightly darkened.

"Euh, that might be pus.h.i.+ng it a little."

He clenched his teeth as he watched his blinking Vitality.

If he allowed just one more hit like this, his Vitality would hit the floor.

Fiolan shouted with an urgent voice.

"Just 7 more seconds now. If this attack just explodes properly, I think we'll be able to catch it!"

Herz was momentarily conflicted.

'If I dodge this attack here right now, Fiolan's magic will be cancelled, and then clearing the dungeon would have gone down the drain anyways…'

The time limit was the problem.

If it was a normal situation, it would have been right to back off one tempo, but because there wasn't even 1 minute left until the time limit was over, they would have failed to clear the dungeon anyways if they missed this chance.

'Let's try to hold out. If I die, well, then I'll have 24 hours to rest.'

And at that moment, the giant's club rushed towards Herz once again.

Swaaeeek-!

A blow accompanied by a sound that was terrifying just from what could be heard exploded.

Herz calmly checked the route of the club that was flying towards him and lined his s.h.i.+eld up.

Users who didn't know much about Kailran often said that the 'Knight' cla.s.s didn't need a lot of control, but that wasn't the truth.

To calculate the angle of which the opponent's attack was rus.h.i.+ng at, its destructive power, etc. and minimize the amount of damage was a high degree of skill that demanded an incredibly detailed control.

And depending on the level of that control, the amount of damage received was different by the thousands even if it was the same attack.

Because of that, Herz focused all of his mind for this moment unlike any other time before.

Baang-!

Along with another large boom, Herz's body was pushed back.

And Herz's expression brightened shortly after.

'I survived!'

He survived with barely 1500 Vitality, but his leftover Vitality didn't matter anyways.

After Herz threw his body and escaped the giant's attack range, he turned his gaze towards Fiolan. As he predicted, a large chilly whirlpool was beginning to erupt from Fiolan's staff.

While Herz was blocking the giant's attack, the casting for the magic skill was completed.

And her magic attack spread forward.

Ba- Ba- Bang-!

"Okay!"

The chilly beam that shot out lodged exactly into the giant's body.

The giant wavered and within that time, Fiolan quickly shot out low-rank magic attacks that had a short casting time continuously.

Pung-!

Fiolan held her breath.

It was an attack done with her whole body, as she had poured out all of her Mana.

If this monster died with this attack, then they finally would have cleared the dungeon. And it seemed as though the two people's desperation went through, as the body of the boss monster, the 'Forlan Giant', slowly started to collapse.

They had succeeded in cutting down all of the monster's Vitality.

Thu- Thu- Thu- Thud-

As the gigantic monster collapsed, the whole dungeon vibrated greatly.

And in front of it, Herz and Fiolan breathed heavily.

"Whew, we finally cleared it, Fiolan."

"No kidding. How much time did we have left before the time limit was up?"

"I wonder. Won't we know if we check the result window?"

And shortly after, the result window that notified the two that the dungeon was cleared popped up in front of their eyes.

Ring-.

Time Limit - 00:50:00

Clear Time - 00:49:43

Clear Rank - D

Obtained EXP - 3,356,000

Obtained Gold - 35,250 gold

Obtained Items - Piece of the Forlan Hero's Armor x2

After checking the result window, a cold sweat broke out on Herz's forehead.

"Wow… We made it with just 20 seconds left."

Fiolan smirked and corrected his words.

"There was 17 seconds left, to be exact."

Herz smirked.

"Keu, still, we did pretty good since we made it in five tries."

"No kidding. From what I saw outside, there was a party that came out after already failing their tenth try."

Fiolan, who thoroughly read through the dungeon clear result window, opened her mouth again with a slightly surprised expression.

"Oh, but this EXP is nicer than I thought."

Herz, who also was checking the EXP part at that moment as well, was surprised over the EXP that was higher than expected.

"No kidding. I was just thinking of the same thing. If it's 3 million EXP for about a 50-minute investment, then it's effectiveness is similar to hunting."

Fiolan nodded her head.

"That's right.  As our clear rank was the lowest rank, if we get a little more used to the dungeon and clear with a high rank, then it might be more effective than hunting."

"If we collect the pieces and make a set item, then we'll be able to obtain a decent item that must for sure be at least a Heroic-rank as well."

However, the problem was that the clear success chance was not 100%.

The monsters that appeared in the time attack dungeon didn't give anything when hunted, whether it be EXP or items.

That meant, if they failed to clear, then they would be throwing away all of their 50 minutes without any reward.

If they failed in clearing even once, then the hunting effectiveness of the dungeon would drop remarkably.

"Fiolan. I think it would be best if first you and I together finish our attack perfectly before we call over our other guildmates."

"I agree. After the two of us are completely familiar with the dungeon, we should take one person each and attack separately, then our other guildmates will probably be able to clear a little easier."

After making up their minds, the two left the dungeon quickly.

Once the dungeon was cleared, they could challenge it again after 10 minutes.

Until then, they needed to finish all of their maintenance.

"Hoo…"

A short sigh pa.s.sed through Ian's mouth.

It was already almost a week since he had come down to the lowland of the 'Arnovil Plateau' field.

Including the 5 days that he spent hunting in the hilly section, Ian hadn't left the field for 12 days already.

Two days had already pa.s.sed since the first discoverer's buff had ended as well.

'I want to leave here now!'

Ian ground his teeth while looking at the large tiger-like monster that growled in front of him.

'How many have I hunted now? Let's be humane this time and drop it!'

The reason why Ian wasn't able to leave the field yet was because of the Heroic-rank monster, 'Hallikan's Spirit', which he was in a fierce battle for a while with now.

'7th piece… Please!'

In the previous quest, the 4th piece was a troublemaker, but this time, the 7th piece was testing Ian's patience.

A bundle of electricity filled with Ian's anger shot out towards the Hallikan.

"Current Proliferation!"

Za-Za-Zap-!

Ian was facing the Hallikan easily as if he was basically playing with it.

His opponent was a strong monster, but because he had already gone through a countless amount of battles against it, he had memorized all of its attack patterns.

Using the surrounding terrain features and monsters, Ian reset his Current Proliferation's cooldown time multiple times and shot out Current Proliferation and Magic Spheres.

It seemed he had worn down the Hallikan's Vitality quite a bit, as its name was flickering quickly.

'I should be able to catch it any minute now.'

However, just then, a completely unexpected situation appeared in front of Ian's eyes.

Ba- Ba- Bang-!

Along with the sound of a large explosion, the currents that Ian had shot out exploded altogether.

And a flash that was so strong it caused his vision to turn all-white filled up in front of his eyes.

"What the h.e.l.l?"

Ian, who was taken aback, instinctively threw his body and widened the gap between the Hallikan and him.

It was so that he wouldn't be attacked while he lost his vision.

However, far from the Hallikan's attack being continued, an unexpected system message rang out.

Ian was fl.u.s.tered.

'What the h.e.l.l? It was time for it to die, but it wasn't enough for all of its Vitality to disappear with this attack. And what the h.e.l.l was that sudden flash as well?'

While Ian was in confusion, his vision that turned all-white returned to normal, and system messages continuously appeared in front of his eyes.

'Oh, Jjaekee evolved. Was the explosion that happened just a moment ago generated while Jjaekee evolved?'

Ian, who understood it as an explosion that occurred during the evolution process, only then nodded his head.

Jjaekee's outer appearance, which was small in size and looked like a sparrow, transformed into the form of a quite cool-looking rapacious bird.

However, before Ian opened up the evolved Jjaekee's information, he wanted to check the corpse of the Hallikan that was collapsed in front of him first.

'Jjaekee also evolved… Now, if just the 7th piece drops from this monster, I feel like I'll be able to leave this place without any regret…'

Once hunted, the Hallikan was a monster that took at least an hour before it appeared again.

The drop rate of the Soul Stone piece was around 30% from experience.

Even if he was to gather all ten pieces at once without any overlapping, he would have had to hunt around 30-35 Hallikans.

However, there was no way that Ian's item luck would be that good, and because of the countless overlapping pieces, he had already caught over 50 Hallikan's Spirits.

It was a situation that even Ian, who enjoyed grinding, would be tired enough of.

Ian closed both his eyes tightly and placed his hand on top of the Hallikan's corpse.

And he didn't forget to chant a meaningless incantation.

"7th piece!"

And a system message popped up.

Ian, who checked the system message, let out a shout without him realizing.

"Done! It finally came out!"

This was the first time two pieces came out at once.

'I might have cried if I didn't get the 7th piece this time as well.'

With an even lighter heart, Ian plopped down onto the ground.

As he had achieved his goal, his knees gave in.

'Shall we check Jjaekee's information now?'

Ian called over Jjaekee, who had become quite cool after evolving.

"Jjaekee, come over here."

Chir- Chirp-!

However, at the unchanged cry, he burst out laughing without realizing it.

'Why is his cry just as is?'

And Ian opened Jjaekee's information window.

Spirit Capacity: 0/5000

Type: Lightning

Rank: Intermediate-level Spirit

Summoning Duration: 525 minutes. (Cooldown time: 800 minutes)

*Once Spirit Capacity reaches its max, it evolves into a higher-ranking spirit.

(Whenever a Summoning Magic that requires Lightning-type is used, a fixed quant.i.ty of Spirit Capacity is filled.)

*The higher the Summoner's Summoning Magic, the longer the Summoning Duration becomes.

Inherent Ability - Charge

*10% of the damage dealt by Lightning-type Spirit Magic will be taken as Vitality.

'Ooh… It developed an inherent ability as it became an Intermediate-rank. On top of that, isn't this the same as Health Absorption?'

Jjaekee, a spirit, didn't have a notion of 'Vitality'. In that case, the 'recovered Vitality from taking it away' definitely had to mean the character's Vitality.

'It's a little disappointing that Current Proliferation doesn't have a strong Offensive Power since it's not a damage-dealing skill.'

Still, by roughly calculating, he thought that it was quite a decent recovery skill.

'Since it's like this already, if I have a reason to stop by Myuran, I should go to the Tower of Summoners and buy a lightning-type Spirit Magic attack that is a little more offensive.'

Ian, who was excited over the thought of using the newly developed inherent ability, abruptly stood up and called Ly over.

"Ly, let's go back!"

Grr-!

Ian, who Summon Released all of his Familiars excluding Ly, got on Ly's back.

Without a moment's delay, he wanted to restore the Hallikan's Soul Stone that he had such difficulty collecting.