The familiar glowing light hid what came out of the box before it faded away. In Sam’s case, it left behind two items. The first was a scimitar with a silvery blade with etchings of the lunar phases, the hilt was wrapped in midnight blue leather, the pommel was a polished sphere of half-transparent moonstone and the crossguard looked like a crescent moon. The second was a set of surprisingly normal-looking shoes, a pair of black loafers of all things.
A second look at the two had the System identify the sword as a Moonblade, the shoes were listed as Flash Step Shoes. The sword was a high D-tier weapon, with a base damage of 40 and a trait that allowed it to do 5 extra damage 10% of the time in shade, darkness or at night. The shoes allowed the wearer to teleport 10m/30ft to somewhere he could see, once a day.
Sam picked them up and held them in his hands as he looked towards Janik. It seemed that his box gave him a few more things, there were five gems, some weird metallic crystal and a dagger. The dagger was sleek, its blade was straight and narrow, made of a dark metal that didn't reflect much. The edge had a subtle serrated pattern, black leather-wrapped its handle and had a minimalistic and almost fang-like guard, ending in a pommel adorned with a small, dark gemstone.
Janik stabbed one of his swords into the ground and picked up the dagger before turning to Sam with a huge smile. “Hey, Sam. You’re never going to guess what I go-” As soon as he saw Sam with a scimitar in his hand his sentence stopped and his expression turned to confusion for a solid three seconds before he laughed.
“Well, it seems we got each other's things.” He added jokingly.
“Yeah, it seems so. But this fucker has a base damage of 40 and a neat little skill.” Sam commented as he held it up, letting Janik take a look at it.
During the few seconds Janik used to look at it, his expression went from his smiling self to a bad attempt to hide an almost desperate expression in his eyes. “You... I don’t suppose you’re game for a trade?” His voice broke a little as he asked that.
“Well, I could have been but...” Sam took a look at the dagger. Ignoring that it looked kind of cool, it seemed to also be of a high D-rank, base damage of 20 and a trait that had 10% of activating, blinding a target for a few seconds. Though impressive it didn’t exactly match the 40 damage the Moonblade did, or possibly 45 when triggered.
“... It seems the blade might be better. Even if I dedicate more hands to lift it, it’ll make up for that in damage.”
This felt true, doing the simple math, the sword felt like it was around 1.5kg, meaning he would need just under 4 hands to match that, so 4 hands to let him wield it. But comparing it, if he used 4x 10-damage daggers, it would somewhat match, but there was more chance of missing with four attacks than just one, there was different math to how it could be beneficial to have more attacks but when the monsters change to come with Defensive ratings... A single more powerful attack would be worth more than four smaller ones.
Janik did his best to recompose himself, but it was easy to see that he was shaken, almost like a desperate kid trying to process a way to persuade his parents to give him something he wanted, Janik had a moment of inner crisis.
“I’m not going to lie to you, that sword is probably worth double the dagger, depending on how they value the Ability. With one hit of that sword, I can do double the damage I can do with both of these.” He lifted the sword in his hand to emphasize which swords he was talking about in a small shrug.
Sam couldn’t argue that the upgrade would hit harder for Janik than for himself. But based on values and percentages, the odds of getting something like this anytime soon were slim at best.
“Ah, you got some amazing shoes as well.” Vaguely gesturing to the shoe with his sword hand yet again he sounded almost complaining, like a kid wanting more candy because someone else is getting it.
Sam considered Janik’s situation a bit, he was a much higher levelled Player than him, suggesting that he had been doing this for a while. But the swords he was using were low-grade E-rank swords, the worst weapon in their class. He was a swordman so it made sense for him to need swords but he had probably just got the bare minimum and ran with that. Given his level, experience and knowledge, it felt logical that he needed the money for other things. He seemed quite responsible in a way, so it didn’t sound like he was using it for shits and giggles.
But, according to things he had said before and the little he saw in the market stall earlier, weapons had absurd prices...
Janik’s expression sank again. “And you got a Random skill crystal...” His expression made him seem like he wanted to headbut a tree until only firewood remained.
“Ok... First of all... Congratulations, I truly mean that but... I can’t help but be extremely envious...”
Sam chuckled a bit, he understood it, completely. Janik had recruited and was training him to be an ally in dungeon runs, and in less than a week he was getting all this stuff. From the sounds of it, it wasn’t just good and expensive items, but... He had to admit that the sword was almost perfectly made for Janik. He understood envy, he did, though they were allies he couldn’t just give things that might be smarter to keep.
“I can understand that.” He smiled back at his envious friend. But he couldn’t stop looking at the sword not only as a powerful tool but as a pile of money. “However... I can’t say that I’m not interested in using it myself, I mean... You did say that Defense ratings were going to be a problem on higher-level monsters.”
“Yeah... I did say that... didn’t I...” Again he didn’t look entirely happy about things. He took a moment to think and inhaled deeply before letting out a long sigh. “Listen, I’m not going to let this come between us. If you want to use it, I mean... it’s yours. I’m probably going to keep being envious until I get it out of my system but... It’s up to you.” His smile was back, though he wasn’t as happy as normal he was at least being honest and proper about it.
“I appreciate that, and I’ll admit that it’s a hard choice. How much do things like these go for anyway?” Sam needed to consider what to do about it, he didn’t have particular favouritism for daggers, it was just that when he started he couldn’t lift anything else, now his Psyhand limits are much more powerful than before. Upgrading is always a smart move.
“I don’t remember, but I think this dagger, with a 10% activation change, would go for somewhere around $20-30 thousand or something.” He looked at the dagger as he tried to remember, saying those numbers without much thought.
This had something react in Sam’s mind. A brief thought of Janik only a few moments ago mentioning that the sword cost ‘easily twice’ the dagger... If that was true then he was holding a $40 000 sword in his hand... Come to think of it, Janik mentioned that the cores of the beastfolk in this dungeon went for around a thousand per core... His bag had a bunch of them, just the 17 normal frogmen would net them 17 000 to share.
“Are you... are you doing ok there?” Janik sounded a bit worried as he looked at Sam, who was looking almost a bit pale.
“Yeah...” Sam replied with a thousand-yard stare as he was processing the sudden jump in the value of things. “... Just trying to get used to the values of things... A week ago I struggled with $100, this is a bit...”
Janik chuckled. “I remember going through the same, take your time.” He nodded understandingly as he started to process things. Being already caked in blood and gore he didn’t seem to have a problem being the one digging out the cores this time.
The good thing was that this gave Sam a moment to go through things.
Sam sat down on a rock and considered this, he immediately wanted to sell. Suddenly getting at least 40 thousand was... Hard to consider. He could just buy a car cash, or get somewhere to live for quite some time. But at the same time, this was just a random drop, not something he should expect every day, naturally but... It was just so weird to consider.
As Janik kept digging in the corpses, fishing out core after core, Sam used that time to process the value and weight of things. He did manage to get over the initial shock and started to analyse things properly. Almost had to persuade himself that this was going to keep happening, and if he wanted to keep being a player he might have to just get over it and start considering swinging around tens of thousands in gear.
Janik completed his gathering, he had piled up the cores for easier cleaning in some water before bagging them. Though Sam couldn’t clean his clothing and body in the same way as the swords, at least he did what he could to get the gore off him. It helped a tiny bit but this was to be expected. Having taken a short moment to process the whole worth thing, Sam had managed to properly persuade himself about the value of things and to accept that swinging around the value of a car was a good thing. Worst-case scenario he could sell things later and get cheaper items.
However, the question of whether he should sell the sword to Janik or keep it was a bit harder to figure out. As he considered earlier, the damage output was dramatically better, even considering that he would have to use four hands to swing it, the ‘damage per hand’ went from 5, or 15 in the case of the Vampiric Dagger, to 10. It didn’t sound like a huge improvement compared to the 4x 10dmg daggers he already swung about, but it came in a single hit which would do wonders when Defence ratings became a thing. As an example, now knowing that the bandits had a defence of 10, the only thing that could properly damage them at the time was the Vampiric Dagger, and then only 5 damage came through, critical hits not counted. With this sword, it would let 30 damage through, which was a dramatic upgrade.
Though... This would increase his damage since Janik had skills that allowed his Attributes to add to the damage, based on his statement this could increase his damage potential substantially.
Almost to rather than think of something else, his mind moved from the weapons to the Random Skill Crystal. Sam expected it to be random like the one he got earlier, in that it would give him a random skill crystal, but rather it seemed that the crystal was still undefined.
[ Random Skill Crystal - C
When consumed will unlock a random C-rank skill in the Player. ]
“Sooo.. How does this crystal work?” Sam asked no one in particular as he stared at the item in his hand. Though it was clear it was meant for Janik.
“Well, you can either sell it for a surprising amount or use it. As the info says, it’ll give the user a random skill. It can be something dumb to something amazing. You can never have too many skills if you can afford them, so it’s almost always best to use them. Sure... you might get something shit like a skill that protects from sunburn, or you might get something amazing. It’s often worth the risk.” Janik commented as if he had done the math, or knew enough about it to confirm.
“So, even if I get something bad, like the plant-growing thing I got a while back, it’s worth gambling?” Sam remembered the niche skill he sold for a pittance back after his first quest. If he had mana he could at least have used it. “What if it needs mana and I can’t use it?” Sam had explained the mana thing to Janik earlier, so he should at least know what he meant.
Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.
“Then you just need to find an item or skill that gives you mana. A surprising amount of high-rank warriors get something like that to let them use skills that need mana, just like you. You’re just a weird mix since you’re not a warrior and not a mage.”
That made a lot of sense, since Mana seemed to be class-related it would make sense that others shared his status like that. A non-mana class could still get mana-needing skills. Having some spells or something did sound like a good idea.
“Though, they are expensive, as you can expect.” Janik ended as part of his explanation.
Sam understood the logic there, gaining a new resource was powerful in itself, but it being a gatekeeping kind of skill also raised its value. In the end, Sam decided to consume the Skill Crystal.
[ Do you wish to learn a Random C-rank skill from the Crystal? ]
Confirming the question had the crystal glow brightly in his hands before it disintegrated in a pulse into a yellow field of energy. The field hovered for a split second before it all flowed into Sam’s body, making his entire body glow for a second before fading.
[ Skill [ Eagle Eye ] unlocked. ]
[ Eagle Eye
+20% chance to hit ranged targets.
+10% chance to land a critical hit. ]
A quick thought, wondering if Psyhand attacks counted as ranged attacks or not had the window updated itself right away.
[ Eagle Eye
+20% chance to hit ranged targets. (Affects Psyhand attacks).
+10% chance to land a critical hit. ]
Sam smiled widely, this felt almost too perfect, he had struggled with missing every so often, so increasing the odds of hitting buy 20% felt amazing. He knew there was no such thing as a 100% chance to hit, but it was all a mathematical thing, the chance to hit vs the chance to dodge/miss and so on. But based on how often, or rather how rarely he missed, 20% should cover up on that a lot. The bonus of 10% extra to crit was also amazing.
“Well? Share with the class, what did you get?” Janik asked curiously.
“Should I even share it? I mean, wasn’t it you who said that I should keep this kind of thing to myself?” Sam chuckled at Janik’s amusedly annoyed expression. “I got an Eagle Eye skill, it helps me to land hits and critical hits.” Sam admitted in the end, he got the expression he was after but decided to share with his mentor nonetheless.
“Oh, that’s amazing, a very good skill for you. Congratulations.” Janik, as normal, looked honestly happy on Sam’s behalf. “Now you just need some Stealth skill and you're becoming dangerous!” The way he worded and toned it was extremely supportive, making Sam feel good about how he had chosen... or rather ended up focusing on his style.
“...Thanks.” Though it was nice to hear and felt good, it also felt somewhat awkward. Janik was a good man and everything he said and did felt honest, it still felt strange getting direct compliments like that.
“Why don’t we test out your newfound skills by taking another run through the dungeon? We’re done here now and I didn’t have anything else planned for the rest of today anyway.” His smile as he got up from his rock strongly suggested that it was his plan all along to have several rounds through this dungeon if it worked out for them.
“Are you sure? I mean, I can still be one shot in here...” Sam felt a bit unsafe. Though he felt safe with Janik, the close call with the Frogman Chief was... well... had Janik not stopped that spear thrust he might have died right away.
“Of course, I’m not sure...” Janik answered honestly, almost sounding a bit annoyed. “I would love to just do lower and safer dungeons forever, but... I’ll be honest and say that I need the money, you do the same. We both need the money, and we both need the experience... I don’t like to go against something this unsafe either but... As long as we can keep you hidden I think we’re good. Besides, your shoes could probably get you out of a sticky situation once, before you exit the Dungeon.”
He was correct, if Sam could avoid being discovered or at least if Janik could keep the aggression on him, it should make it all very simple to handle. The problem was the Chief but knowing their intelligence and somewhat knowing how he does things could be more than enough. And the teleport of the shoes would also help, though high utility in nature it could be used as a defensive teleport as well. Funnily enough, it was in the same range bracket as his Area, meaning that he’d still be in range for a counterattack once he popped away. He could also just escape the next time, being a bit more prepared helped that as well.
Besides, it would be neat if they got more of the rare items. The odds didn’t look too amazing but, it was a very nice bonus.
“Ok, let’s give it a go.” Sam agreed.
“Yes! Onwards to riches and Experience!” Janik pumped his fist in the air as he started heading towards the exit portal.
Finding themselves back outside they were first approached by one person, wondering if they succeeded or escaped. Sam accidentally let slip that they succeeded which had them swarmed by group invites. Probably not expecting two players to handle this alone their value probably jumped a lot.
Janik politely, but loudly, declined any invites, saying that they were fine as they were. This lets them have no problems leaving the influence of the portal before going back and accepting to be pulled back into it.
Like before they landed in a forest clearing, everything looked the same, the main exception was Janik’s reaction as he took a few steps.
“Nope, noooo... No. We’re leaving this one and going in again.” He sounded instantly against continuing, it wasn’t until Sam got the Dungeon Clear prompt that he understood why.
[ Dungeon clear conditions:
Kill the Bearfolk chief. 0/1
Optional: Kill all monsters
Monsters killed 0/20
Rewards:
1500 xp
1x Healing potion - D
Bonus rewards for optional step:
1000 xp
Random Box - X
Chance (1%): C-tier weapon (25%), gear (25%), skill crystal (25%) or misc item (25%). ]
Rather than frogs they were now based on bears...
“Soo... do we just.. Exit and go back in?” Sam asked.
“Yeah. Different races have their stats moved around, if I remember, the bears have much lower Dexterity but their Vitality and Strength are higher... That’s very bad.” He smiled as he gestured at Sam.
Sam got the point...
“See you outside.” Janik commented as he suddenly disappeared in a flash of light. Requesting the system to bring him out had the window confirm if he wanted out, confirming it he found himself outside in the landing area just as if they had completed it.
There were a lot of confused looks from the people outside, they entered less than two minutes ago.
“Bears.” Janik confirmed, the other player’s expressions changed to understanding nods before the duo just went back in again.
Yet again finding themselves in the clearing, Janik took a few steps and nodded to himself. “That’s better.”
Taking a few steps out of the landing area gave Sam the Dungeon Clear window again.
[ Dungeon clear conditions:
Kill the Rabbitman chief. 0/1
Optional: Kill all monsters
Monsters killed 0/20
Rewards:
1500 xp
1x Healing potion - D
Bonus rewards for optional step:
1000 xp
Random Box - X
Chance (1%): C-tier weapon (25%), gear (25%), skill crystal (25%) or misc item (25%). ]
“From what I’ve read, they are fast and agile, but they are somewhat frail and don’t hit as hard as the others. The problem is their speed, making them hard to hit.” Janik explained like he had read about everything in existence.
“So, sneak attacks should do wonders on them?” Sam stated it as a fact but lifted the end of the sentence somewhat asking to make sure.
“I think so, yes. I feel confident that I can hit them but I don’t know what kind of damage they can do... So I think we’ll test a little. If we find a single one I want to get hit by it once. Then we’ll use that as a base.”
Sam agreed. It made sense, but he couldn’t help but wonder if there existed some guidebooks or something where someone had already written down the math. Putting on the shoes he got, they started sneaking
They didn’t need to sneak around much before they found the first Rabbitfolk!