I heard that the smart trolls were pretty human-like, but the troll that appeared in the dungeon looked like a massive snowman made of ice. The steps of the creature made the ground shake a bit since it was three meters tall and pretty heavy. Still, the swordsman approached and easily cleaved it in two…
Still, once the body fell to the ground, he also put all his weight into stabbing the beast in the chest. Trolls could regenerate that much if their brains are also left alone.
The group took a bit more time to breathe deeply while Rose stayed on guard near the exit of the previous floor. I wanted to be left alone, but it looked like my plans would be ruined.
“Your skills with the bow are pretty good, almost like you had more than a few years to train them.”
The blond girl said while showing a small smile. I nodded in response and then proceeded to check my bow and arrows. I used all my mana in the previous battle, so I couldn't enchant other arrows. Still, I could check my ammo just in case.
“Not much of a chatterbox, are you? Well, it can't be helped since we ignored you and arrived late for the mission as well.”
After saying that, the girl left to talk with the maid. I sighed in relief since nothing good would come out of us talking. Still, before long, she returned with some quivers. The maid promised some arrows, after all. I wondered why the hell they had those when they didn't have a bow… or maybe they had some hidden magic bag. The next time, it was the swordsman who approached me.
“Can you take guard on the exit with Rose? In two hours, we will guard the exit instead.”
“All right.”
I was a bit tired from staying focused for too long, but that much was still manageable. In the end, when I reached the exit of the boss chamber, I saw the blond girl sitting on a piece of cloth on the ground and then hugging her knees to rest a bit. The maid approached her and offered her some support when the girl began to fall asleep and fell to the side.
Rose seemed fine too, but her eyes were bloodshot. I could tell that she hadn't slept for more than a couple of minutes in the last three days. I wondered if my eyes were like that too… I was more worried about my hair growing and the fact that I couldn't shave my head in front of them.
“Aren't you going to enchant your bow?”
“I am out of mana, even with the mana cores.”
Rose moved her hand to her back and then passed a mana potion for me. All of a sudden, it looked like everyone was counting on my skills. In any case, I identified the potion first, just in case.
Small Mana Potion (Rare): Restores one hundred mana points upon use.
I decided to drink immediately since I didn’t know when the enemies would come… after doing that, I grabbed my mana cores to enchant my bow. The process was quite simple, I just had to activate the skill and then hold the items necessary. The mana cores were absorbed by the bow as I chose the only enchantment that I could select.
You received 300 experience points.
The skill Enchanting Touch leveled up. You received 100 experience points.
Long Wooden Bow (Epic)
Enchantment Slots: Flames (Expert), Flames (Expert), Flames (Expert). (Increases the power of flame-enchanted arrows by 60%)
Bonus Effects: Eagle Eye - Provides an increase in range and accuracy of 20%, allowing the archer to shoot from great distances with little penalty.
Active Effect: Fire Arrow - At the cost of ten points of mana, you can summon and fire a fire arrow that will explode upon contact causing three hundred percent of magical damage and burning the target for a minute causing three points of damage per second.
Attack: 40
Durability: 33/34
The bow began to emit this powerful red glow that kept pulsating. I could feel the power of the weapon. Considering all the bonuses, I had quite a specialized weapon in my hands… I wondered how much it would sell for. Although I had some leeway with money, it looked like I was still quite the penny pincher.
The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.
In any case, why did the skill have to level up right now… was it because I used three enchantments, or was it because of the quality of the bow? Either way, I was thankful that I finally could add another enchantment, but I didn’t have any other slot. I checked the knowledge the skill granted me… now I could add wind enchantments to make items either swing fast or repel some of the damage and nullify some of the wind damage. It was better than nothing.
I could see Rose looking at the bow with curiosity. She usually kept her deadpan expression or when she was staring daggers at me, thanks to that, this made me feel uncomfortable, so I slung my bow on my back but soon grabbed it again since we needed to be cautious of when the enemies would come.
Since I didn’t have anything else to do, I decided to check my new parameter. I had some experience to spend, after all.
Name: Regulus Dawnshield
Race: Dhampir
Health: 70/70
Regen: 0.1 per hour
Mana: 40/90 (0/1000)
Regen: 1.5 per minute (0/1000)
Stamina: 120/120 (0/1300)
Regen: 2.0 per minute (0/2100)
Dexterity: 58 (0/4600) 1.3x
Spirit: 05 (0/600)
Movement Speed: 5.2 (0/700)
Traits: Minor Weakness to Sunlight, Minor Sensitivity to Holy Magic, Minor Aversion to Silver
Classes: Archer, Explorer, Scribe, Fletcher, Tattoo Artist, Bowyer, Hunter, Enchanter, Dual Wielder
Aptitudes: Precision Training, Master of Exploration, Master of Record Keeping, Master of Archery Craft, Ink Master, Master of Bowcraft, Unseen Hunter, Arcane Craftsmanship, Swift Strikes,
Experience: 333
‘Hmm, it only increased my movement speed by 0.2 points. The rate is different from the other parameters, but I guess it makes sense… it would be weird to suddenly move one meter per second faster. If someone focuses on that with the multiplier of other classes, then they still would become insanely fast pretty soon.’
If I could move faster, perhaps the cost of stamina would increase too, but it was still better to move faster in that situation, as long as I could move faster than possible pursuers. In any case, since I couldn’t do anything else, I had just to wait for the possible attack of the enemies, but two hours passed and nothing happened. They sure were taking their time, or they were busy recovering from fighting the monsters too.
During that time, I wondered if I would be fine, in killing other people… when I prepared the trap back home, I knew the possibility that the assailant could be killed, but I didn’t mind since I wouldn’t be there and someone looking for me in the middle of the night wouldn’t have any good motives.
Still, things would be different now… I would have to actively aim for the lives of the enemies. I would see them die with my own eyes, it was either them or me, but it was still something that could be difficult since it would be the first time I would kill someone.
When the guards came to take our turns, I left still thinking along those lines… I couldn’t avoid that, but I wondered if something would change inside me. Once I did that, would I think less of those actions and other people’s lives? I was in a world where wars were constant things, and fighting and surviving came hand in hand as well… perhaps a modern mindset wasn’t the best one to keep under those circumstances.
‘I am not their target, but I don’t want to become a secondary victim for them either… since they want my life, it is fine if I take theirs first… it is self-defense. In this world, things like police officers and a proper criminal law don’t exist for those without money or families to back them up. I had to use everything in my power to fend for myself.’
I told that myself a bunch of times before falling asleep… it was the truth. I had to keep that mindset if I wanted to keep living for a while longer. I kind of forgot how people hated me for my blood too, but I also had to keep that in mind.
In the end, I managed to sleep for two hours nonstop without being bothered, but that also surprised me since the enemies should have the chance to find us with their numbers already. The others also looked a bit surprised… In any case, the spearman broke a part of the frozen lake and was fishing with his spear while the others were guarding the exit.
Somehow, Rose managed to sense their approach before, but things were different now. Since she didn’t say anything, they probably didn’t activate whatever spell she had left behind to warn her of their advance.
“We arrived here in more or less three days, the best party of the guild should take half of that with the guild master. At this point in time, they should be aware of what is going on, so they will make their move somewhere the next day. They must be waiting for the situation to wear us out even more.”
The swordsman had a point, but that wasn’t enough to make the group feel better… if it was to happen, then it was better to happen as soon as possible while they were focused. The blond girl woke up after four hours of resting. She looked around confused, as if she didn’t know where she was, and forgot about the last events. Eventually, she woke up and began to stretch her sore body.
“Nothing yet? As expected of assassins… unless everything is in their favor, they won’t try anything. Damned cowards. They must have realized that we are aware of them and they are making sure to disarm your detection spells, Rose.”
Maybe she found some bravery and energy while she rested, but it was still quite surprising to see her completely unfazed. Maybe it wasn’t the first time that someone targeted her life for whatever reason. There are people like that when they can’t target those who cause them trouble, they want to frustrate them by causing harm to those close to them, and she didn’t seem that bothered about being related to someone like that. I was a bit bothered since they didn’t have any relation to me…
Things got silent again and I realized that the maid was standing with her eyes closed… I wondered if she was just resting her eyes or if that was some sort of technique to make her rest while maintaining her focus on her surroundings. I wanted to learn something like that.
Back on Earth, there were times that I couldn’t sleep, but just keeping my eyes closed for a while helped me a fair bit, so maybe it was the same thing.
While I was thinking along those lines, Rose suddenly opened her eyes, and then her arms blurred for a moment… everyone opened their eyes widely and then looked in the direction of her attack with our weapons in hand. Before long, she went there and returned with her knife in hand… it had pierced a rat. We never found one inside the dungeon so far.
“A familiar?”
The blond girl asked while furrowing her eyebrows and Rose nodded… it looked like the enemies had some interesting skills and used them to scout ahead without losing manpower in the process. Either way, our ambush was no longer going to work since they knew where we were…