Novels2Search
Emperor Saga
Chapter 17 : Guardian

Chapter 17 : Guardian

Here you go, one more chapter, Thanks for reading. It's still not proofread.

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Ring! Ring!

"Hello, can I speak to Daniel?"

"Yes, it's me Daniel."

"I would like to tell you that you have been accepted for the job. You can start working next week and I have sent you an email about the details."

"Okay, thank you. I will check my email later."

Daniel went to the job interview yesterday but he didn't get excited even when he got the job. Instead of checking his email, he pondered whether he should log into the game or not.

"(Whatever I will just log in and see what happens.)"

************

Clan Quest : Feed the Guardian

As your punishment for poisoning the entire raid party, Jurek ordered you to Feed the Mountain Guardian Oroviath.

Condition : Feed Oroviath successfully

Reward : Your previous mistake will be forgiven

Rejection : Upon Rejection, will automatically get kick out of the clan.

*sigh*

One of the reasons the authorities can't find the BloodBrothers’ hideout is because, on this mountain range of the Kramoris kingdom, there's a level 900 guardian boss monster, Oroviath. The giant snake like monster acts as some kind of guardian, it will not attack anyone that passes by the main road. But once someone strays from their path, Oroviath would attack indiscriminately.

Since Jurek is an ogre, he had managed to make a pact with Oroviath as a fellow monster. Jurek promised he would bring Oroviath a lavish banquet every month. In return, Oroviath wouldn't attack anyone from BloodBrothers. With the pact, BloodBrothers managed to continue on their rampage in the mountains without getting caught by the authority.

The authorities used to try sending a punitive force to hunt BloodBrothers, but Oroviath came and attacked the force resulting in huge losses. And when they tried to hunt Oroviath instead, BloodBrothers came out of nowhere annihilating the hunting troop resulting in another huge loss.

Oroviath’s strength as level 900 guardian boss monster, BloodBrothers which is full of users skilled at player killing, BloodBrothers’ hideout which is currently unknown and the difficult terrain of the mountain range all add to the difficulties of the matter. To win against BloodBrothers on the mountain, the authorities needed at least a force that can capture the entire country.

Usually, Jurek and his usual party members came to bring the food. But this time, the task was for Chrono for his punishment. But feeding Oroviath is not a simple task because the guardian is always surrounded by its smaller minions that would attack any non-monster that approached their boss. Since Jurek is a monster, Oroviath’s minions didn't attack him.

To make matters worst, Jurek only let one newly recruited clan member join Chrono’s quest. Oroviath always came to a designated place to receive the offering, but to reach the place Chrono needed to pass by countless monster lairs. In his current state, he needed at least five more users to back him up while passing by those monster lairs.

******

Firstly, Chrono cooked for the guardian’s banquet. Jurek explained what kind of food Oroviath loved and Chrono needed to cook based on that. And Chrono needed to prepare an entire raid party’s amount of food one more time because Jurek had already planned another raid. This time, Sitka will watch Chrono and make sure he doesn't make the previous mistake. Jurek also ordered Chrono to taste all the food himself beforehand to make sure there's nothing wrong with it.

To prepare for the banquet and the raid party’s food while selecting a clan member to join his quest, Chrono didn't do any of his equipment crafting or potion creation. Chrono diligently cooked the banquet and raid party’s food this time, with great detail and focus. When he was done, it was time for food tasting.

Cooking Mastery rose to beginner level 8

It was fine if Chrono just needed to test human food. But the raid party consists of multiple races and some of their food doesn't suit the human tongue and might give a bad status effect to a human. For this, Chrono made a few remedy type potions to heal him in case he got a bad status effect. Once he was done creating the remedy, he sterilized himself and started tasting all the food.

"(I will tasted human and elf food first)"

You felt your body getting lighter for 1 hour

You felt your body get heal faster for 1 hour

You felt your body getting stronger for 1 hour

You felt your body getting better affinity with the mana for 1 hour

You felt your mind getting smarter for 1 hour

"Sitka, help me with the remedy if I can't take it because of confusion, paralasis or any other reason."

"Okay, but how you can determine if the food was fine or not with your human tongue? I mean you would get a bad status effect from it if you taste it yourself. Wouldn't asking the raid party members to test it themselves be better?"

"I don't want to trouble them more. My friend told me if I get the expected status effect from the food, that means the food is fine. If there's any unexpected status effects while I taste the food, that means there's something wrong with the food even if I get a great status effect when I taste it with my human tongue."

"Hmmm...your friend is a pretty amazing user for knowing this kind of information."

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

"Yeah, he has a lot of knowledge about this game."

"(I hope Seth didn't lie to me this time. I will start with orc food, it supposedly gives me minor poison status effect.)"

You felt your body getting weaken by poison, your health decrease by 2 every second for 5 minute.

Chrono tasted all of the orc food before drinking an antidote and proceeded with the rest of the food.

"(This time it's dwarf food, I am supposed to get the drowsy status this time.)"

You felt you're getting drowsy. Speed and strength decrease by 15% for 30 minute

This time, Chrono also tasted all the dwarf food before drinking the remedy, then he proceeded to the rest of the food with the same procedure. Chrono tasted the food regardless of the food’s actual taste. His human tongue didn't only give Chrono bad statuses if he ate another race’s food, it also gave a bad taste when Chrono ate non-human food. Sometimes Chrono felt like vomiting and sometimes he actually vomited the food. Sitka was always ready with the remedy in case Chrono got a status such as paralyzed, confused or any other status that made him unable to take the remedy himself.

"(Finally I have tasted a quarter of the raid party’s food.)"

Chrono felt like he's been through hell getting all kind of bad statuses and the food’s taste was horrible. He had been sweating all over his body just by tasting the food.

"(It's harder than I thought, I shouldn't have heeded Seth’s advice and just asked the raid party members to taste it themselves.)"

Trting!!

By eating all kind of food regardless of it taste and effect, you gained the skill 'Gourmet'

"(What?)" Puzzled by the sudden skill triggered, Chrono checked on the skill.

"Gourmet skill window!"

Gourmet (Passive)

A true gourmet will taste and experience all kind of different food regardless of its taste.Enhance the food taste and reduce the bad status effect duration by 5 second (only if getting the bad status while eating or drinking) . Every 100 dishes, will gained random stat.

Chrono smiled happily. It’s a great skill for his current situation. If the skill works like he thought it did, he could finish tasting all the food faster.

"(I will try it now by eating draconian food.)"

You felt your body getting weaken by a great poison, your health decrease by 50 every second for 5 second.

"(It works.)"

Chrono smiled wryly. The food’s taste wasn't as horrible and the bad status only lasted for 5 seconds. Now he didn't need to drink remedy potions anymore. He continued eating the food and by the time he had eaten 100 dishes, he gained a stat.

Dexterity increased by 4, endurance increase by 1

Chrono continued eating the food and by the time he ate another 100 dishes he gained another random stat

Wisdom increase by 1

By the time Chrono finished tasting all the raid party’s food, he managed to gain another 2 strength, 3 dexterity, 4 stamina and 1 luck. Undoubtedly, Chrono felt happy from this turn of events.

"(Now it's time to taste Oroviath’s banquet.)"

But Chrono didn't get anything by eating the banquet. Since there's nothing wrong with all the food he had cooked, Chrono stored the food in the freezer and made his preparations to recruit one clan member to join him.

*******

"...Err...I'm quite weak and fragile."

"I can't do anything without a party."

"I got things to do in real life, sorry."

"(What the....)" Every user Chrono asked rejected the offer. The reason was because they thought they needed to protect the weak merchant Chrono while going through all those monster lairs which is quite the impossible task.

Newly recruited clan members didn't know how to measure a chaotic user’s skill by looking at their eye colour. Like normal users, they measured Chrono’s strength by looking at his equipment and class. And right now Chrono’s eye colour wasn't as concentrated as before making any new member that actually knew about the eye colour reject his proposal.

"Ah, it's frustrating."

"Don't worry, Jurek said you can choose whoever you want and he will order that member to join you."

"So I can force them to join me? Okay, thanks Sitka."

Chrono walked around the clan hideout to look for the potential member. But everyone avoided him every time he tried to observe them and they even acted weak in front of Chrono.

"(Hmm...should I bring along a monster type or dark type race? But it would be useless if they are not skilled in fighting monsters.)"

When Chrono passed by the training hall he saw some users sparring. He thought it was a great place to search for the potential member. But as soon as he entered the hall.

"Ahh....This sword feels heavy! I can't lift it!"

"Hey, don't hit me so hard it hurts!"

" Ahh!! I'm sorry for hurting you mister warrior, I usually can't hurt a fly!"

Sweat run across Chrono back as he saw them.

"(.....Ridiculous.)"

It's impossible to know someone’s true strength without seeing it in a fight. Chrono felt it was a waste of time to measure everyone’s strength if they didn't want to show their true potential. He decided to just pick a user that he knew was skilled enough to complete the quest.

"Sitka, I have already decided who will join me."

"Really? Who is it? I will inform the leader about it."

"It's Aramis."

*****