Philip hooper, Francis Bello and anonnymous. Thank You for proofreading this chapter!
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Chapter 55 : Support Role
Her hair was purple in color, with a bob hairstyle, pointy ears and a short stature. From a glance, she was from the Holf race, a mix of both hobbit and elf races. While she pulled out a skeptical face, she questioned Chrono again after she heard his story.
“So, you were dropped here from the first floor a month ago?”
After one month of isolation, Chrono was happy to see people he could speak to. Out of gratefulness, Chrono decided to tell the party he just met his true story. He felt that he needed to show his sincerity if he wants to be saved from that dungeon.
As he told them the reason why he was stuck at the dungeon, starting from the incident one month ago to the day they met him, the further the story went, the more absurd it sounded.
By the time Chrono ended his story, everyone looked at him with a doubtful gaze. Before he knew it, he ended up getting questioned. To the girl questioning him, named Clara, he nodded while answering her questions.
“....Yes”
“Then, you went back to B71st floor ALONE and wait for a party to come by?”
“...Yes, that because I have the ‘Silent Dead’ skill.”
“ ‘Silent Dead’?”
“Yes, it is the third evolution of ‘Fake Dead’ skill, a skill that allowed me to completely hide my presence as if I am dead.”
At Chrono’s remark, someone scoffed at him.
“Fake Dead? Isn’t that a merchant skill? So, you are a MERCHANT?”
“.....Yes.”
Clara and everyone in the party giggled as they heard the word ‘merchant’. As Chrono’s face was about to turn sour, a barbarian guy with a big axe on his back went in front of him.
“Let me summarize this. As a chaotic user, you can’t kill yourself and respawn to the nearest city. Because B71st floor doesn’t have stairs you are stuck here in the dungeon.”
“Yes, I’m not lying about that.”
As Chrono said that, the guy pats his shoulder with his right hand while having his left hand on his mouth as if he tried to hold his laughter.
“So, you end up fighting monsters way higher level than yours. Because of your amazing SPEED, skill, and real life training, you managed to fight dozens of monsters at once. On top of that, you gained a mastery out of blue and worked your way down here again with your new found strength.”
“Well, it’s not that amazing…...”
At Chrono’s remark, everyone in the party broke a laugh as each one of them voiced their mind.
“And now he tries to be humble!”
“A humble hero indeed!”
“All hail the fighting merchant!”
“No, it is the CHAOTIC fighting merchant!”
“Why not just told us you were the infamous ‘Skull Mask’!”
“Hahaha! This is funny, a chaotic user without red eyes.”
As he felt being ridiculed, Chrono retorted.
“T-That because of this ring. It is an artifact that can hide my status, if I just take it out of my hand….”
At Chrono’s remarked, the party fell silence. Everyone stopped laughing as they nervously waiting for Chrono to take off his ring.
“.......It stuck. Don’t ask why, it just stuck.”
No one in the party could hold their laughter. Everyone laughed as hard as they could.While everyone was laughing, the barbarian guy took it on another level. He rolled on the floor while holding his stomach as he laugh as hard as he can.
“Guys! We found ourselves a jester!”
“(I want to kill them all, especially this barbarian guy!)”
*****
When the laughter died down and everyone started to calm down. The barbarian guy, stood in front of Chrono while offering his right hand to the sullen-faced Chrono.
The barbarian was two meters tall, had a robust body, brown unkempt hair and a fine looking face. His main weapon is the big axe on his back and he was clad with high-end leather armor. He was Salvanor, the party’s leader.
“You are quite a funny man, how about joining our party? We are in need of more support roles anyway.”
As the party descended lower in the dungeon, the numbers of loots they need to carry increased significantly.
By the time they reached B77th floor, the four wooden carts they brought was almost filled. The party meeting with Chrono was a coincidence, and while it was funny to them hearing Chrono’s story, they were happy to hear that Chrono was a merchant.
Chrono watched the hand extended to him with a sullen face. He thought he should be honest for once but it turned out the truth made him a liar.
He hated their first meeting but he had no other choice as the party was his only hope to escape the dungeon. While gritting his teeth, he grabbed the hand extended to him. If being ridiculed was the price for him to escape the dungeon, he should not complain.
You had been invited to a party by Salvanor
AcceptDecline
“Accept”
You have joined the party
****
Swiftly after the introduction, the party continued their journey. Chrono was placed at the very back of the party. As a support unit, he had to carry the party’s baggage along with five other merchants.
Apparently everyone was serious in conquering the dungeon as it would be their first achievement after arriving at the North Continent.
After a few hours of walking, the party stopped at an area with few trees. The party leader, Salvanor gave his command.
“I guess we can call it a day. Me, Clara, Sasu and Luka will guard the merchants while they make a cart for our new member. The rest of you can logout the game.”
Most of the party members exit the game after that. The barbarian warrior Salvanor, Clara the thief, Sasu the fighter and Luka the knight left behind to protect Chrono and five other merchants.Some party members did stay as they wanted to grind their level or skills.
“( I can build cart in less than an hour, and we have others merchant to help me. I don’t think we need to go so far.)”
Chrono and the five other merchants used axes in the wooden carts and began to cut the trees. Since they were working together, the woodcuttings works was done swiftly.
As they about to turn the trees to lumber, Hansoo, the max level artisan complained Chrono’s work.
“ This…..What a sloppy work. You just destroy the quality of the lumbers with your crappy hands. I don’t want to build cart with this kind of lumbers, I guess we need to redo everything again.”
“Wait, I thought everything was perfect”
“Perfect? Every lumber you made was as plain as Salvanor’s face! Nothing special about it, everything was boring as hell!”
“Well, it’s good as long as it useable.…..”
“Nope, the lumbers you just produce are the worse. I don’t want to work with this kind of crappy products.”
“....Than, I will just make it alone…”
“ Even watching you make it will destroy my reputation! Just get rid of this trashes! “
As Hansoo said that, he used the axes on his hands and crushed all the lumbers made by Chrono into pieces.
Blue veins pops on Chrono head as he watched Hansoo’s actioned. Instinctively, he grabbed Hansoo’s collars while raising his fist.
“Why you….!”
“What, you want to use violence? You can punch me or even kill me, but if you produce that kind of products again, I will do the same thing again.”
“.....Pfft!”
As he heard that, Chrono lowered his fist. He knew violence couldn’t solve the problem. Hansoo had his pride as Artisan while Chrono had his own pride as warrior, beating someone weaker than him would just hurt his pride.
Salvanor smirked as he watched Chrono and Hansoo bickered. He knew something like this would happened because every merchant in his party was a perfectionist in their own fields of expertise.
Han Soo would complain anything unartistic, Wu Lei was picky about the foods, Renji would destroy metals below artifact level, Sven treated any cloth below artifact level as rags and Albert only touched the finest ingredient for his potions.
Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
He did invited more merchants in his party, but they left once they learned about these people attitude. Wu Lei, Hansoo, Albert, Renji and Sven were splendid merchants, Salvanor felt it was a waste if he kicked them out from the party. But his decisions created him with problems in recruiting more merchants.
“(Let’s see how this plays out.)”
Salvanor continued to watch on his new member as he thought that.
******
“This is hopeless! How about just letting us make your cart and you just stay put.”
“Nope, I have my pride too as a merchant. You guys can help, but I will make my own cart.”
For three hours Chrono continued to cut the trees and made lumbers. Hansoo crushed every lumber he deemed unworthy to pieces. Still, there were some lumbers he left out. Chrono realized he was not completely hopeless as he saw that.
After four hours, Chrono finally made enough lumbers that Hansoo satisfied with. The work to make the cart finally in progress. But….
*Crush!*
“I hate how its looks even before its complete.”
Hansoo said that.
“........”
“........”
“........”
“........”
“..........”
********
After seven hours, finally Hansoo satisfied with how the wooden cart initial look. It was the time to make the metal coating at some part of the cart for extra durability.But…..
*Crush!*
“I don’t work with scrap metal.”
When Chrono was about to use the metal pieces they looted, Renji the blacksmith said that as he crushed the metal coating Chrono had just made.
“(There were the same!)”
*****
High quality metals was extremely rare. It was not that hard to get it in big city, but they were deep in the dungeon. Searching for mobs to loot for specifics items was near impossible as they had not much choices.
“Kekeke…..This is when I come in.”
When Chrono about to feel despair, Albert the alchemist said that. Albert took out his tools and started his work.
He puts thirty nine different ingredient in thirty nine different cylinder and heat it with different temperature.
Albert then took out a big black pot from his cart. He puts the metals they got from monsters loots and heat it extra hot, enough to melt it.
“(Is that…..Demi Orc’s bone?)”
As Chrono practised alchemy, he recognized every ingredient Albert used.All the ingredients were easy to find even in the dungeon.
Still, Chrono remained clueless about the proportion and scale needed from each ingredient. In alchemy, any tiny mistake would lead to a completely different result.
After he grinded the bone, Albert put it into the scale to confirm it’s weight before he threw it into the big black pot.
Then, Albert put the thirty nine ingredient into the pot and stirred counter clockwise. Chrono noticed Albert strictly supervised the temperature for two hours before extinguishing the flames.
“Here, it’s done.”
Albert presented the new metal to Renji as he completed it.
“..........Hey.”
“What?”
“ Don’t you think adamantium is overkill?”
As Renji said that, Albert replied with a smile.
“I only produce the best things.”
*****
While producing the metal coating with Renji, Chrono made everything with extra care. Until now, Everyone said his works were the best, but after meeting with these merchants, he realized he was just a frog in a well.
Maybe because Chrono was quite skilled in blacksmithing, Renji didn’t crush every metal coating he made. The works after that was done smoothly, or so Chrono want to believe.
“Now, It’s time to make the flag.”
“.....No don’t think we need…”
“We need a flag, look, every cart has a flag.”
As Sven said that Chrono could say nothing in return.
“....Right.”
With Sven the tailor helping, Chrono started making a flag.
******
“Hmmm….”
“(Please….)”
“It’s a rag.”
“(Noo!)”
Bitterly, Chrono continued to make more flags. His fingers were numb but he was too tired to argue with Sven….
******
“Finally!”
Under the Heaven Wooden Cart :
Said to be number one under the heaven wooden cart. Made by five legendary craftsmen while assisted by quite a talented craftsmen.
Special Effect : The flags from the cart emitting fear aura. Normal monsters would never get near the cart
Quality : Grand Artifact Durability : 10 000 / 10 000
Trting!
You had been rewarded by participating in the making of a Grand Artifact item.
Endurance +10
Sense +10
Wisdom +10
Construction skill proficiency increased by 30%
Trting!
Construction skill increased to intermediate level 2
Chrono clenched his fists as tears about to shed on his eyes. After enduring everything about a day, he felt his hard work had been rewarded handsomely.
“Hmm...I feel something is missing.”
Said Hansoo .
“Yes, the wooden cart I have in mind is more….flamboyant.”
Said Renji.
“I think we need some space to preserve food.”
Said Wu Lei
“That flag…..I hate the shape.”
Said Sven.
“Let’s just redo everything again.”
Said Albert.
“(Nooooo!)”
As Chrono taught that, Hansoo voiced his mind.
“I have been thinking this for a while. How about we carve the cart with sky dragon design.”
And Albert spoke.
“Now that I see it, the side of the cart is too plain. If we carve it with sky dragon design, I will make four more colors.”
And Sven said.
“My flags, need sky dragon in there. And more colors.”
Chrono started to worry.
“Hey, wait. I’m not from some arts major in university, sky dragon carving is too much….”
Without hearing Chrono’s words, everyone proceeded with their plans. Needless to say, the cart they made for one whole day was trashed by their own hands after Chrono made a mistake with the carving.
Everything was back to square one…...
*****
Only after two more days, everyone was finally satisfied with the cart.
Sky Dragon Wooden Cart :
The cart was said to be as strong as a dragon! Made by five legendary craftsmen while assisted by quite a talented craftsmen.
Special Effect : 1) The flags from the cart emitting fear aura. Normal monsters would never get
near the cart.
2)The flag also emitting recovery aura to the one pulling the cart.
Quality : Legendary Artifact Durability : 100 000 / 100 000
Trting!
You had been rewarded by participating in the making of a Legendary Artifact item.
Endurance +20
Sense +20
Wisdom +20
Construction skill proficiency increased by 60%
******
Side note :
1) Don't worry, this legendary artifact is not like 'Grave' . Legendary artifact that absorbed the user experience is only weapon, armor and some other special items.
2) Chrono cannot pull out his ring because the creator(or maybe Alex?) make it so.