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Chapter 28 – Information, Information, Information
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Sucking up the glow from the altar, the container surrounding the doll, scintillate with a bluish light, before fading away. Fire of life then infused into the dead eyes of the doll. Slowly, it regain conscious and looked around in half-daze mode. Seeing the humans, it directed its attention to them and started speaking:
“Why am I here... Oh... I remember...” then it started crying.
“Let me guess, you are the first and last squirrel beastmen who lost all your tribesmen” Bunny asked. She was mentally exhausted from long hours of killing both Fungi and Slugs, so manners seemed lacking.
“No, my tribe is well and good... I just happen to lose about 100 years worth of experiment... Now I have to start over... from nothing again...” the squirrel answered with uneven tone, sounding like she just work up.
“I'm Angel, nice to meet you, is there anything we can help you with?” Angel was also mentally tired but she was gentler. Bunny may have forgotten, but Angel remembered they were still on the quest. Judging from the NPC's reaction, it could be a chain quest.
“Ah... sorry... I am Snow... first of the Squirrel-men... although I am a women... The squirrels are doing well... so you don't have to worry about us... We just hide from others... making personal habitats like this one.”
“Nice to meet you, did your creator name you after your coat?” Bunny asked out of nowhere, while looking at the squirrel's snow-white fur.
“Oh? You guess correctly... now that I observe more closely... you three smell like my creators... Are you perchance the current generation's Phantasm Breeder?”
Looking at Bunny nodding, Snow continued:
“Ah... let me see... there is Zenon, then Fluffy, the next one is... Aha! I got it... this generation should be Silva's turn, so how is that old bucktooth doing? I guess he gave you people some ridiculous task without explaining much.”
“Silva is fine, still staying at Serabroug as a farmer. We are given the task to revive his extinct rabbit race, so far, doing trial and error, we only managed to raise them slightly.” Angel replied pointing towards some meter-tall rabbits nearby.
Looking at the rabbits and noticing the other animals, Snow broke into a smile and rush forward hugging Angel while say:
“Ah... You people are pretty diligent... not only rabbits, you have cats and minks too... even squirrels... Seeing them after being in isolation... for so long makes me so happy... even if they are very distant kins and not of my caste... I am still so happy I want to kiss you.”
“Ummm... Can I ask you what are you doing deep underground?” Gene asked meekly. Back to his unsure self due to presence of a stranger. He did improved considering he actually initiated to talk
“Haha... you have a shy Druid... for the first time in many centuries... Most of those Animistic Druids were rude... I am starting to like you all more...” Snow changed her target and started hugging Gene.
*****
After some chaotic times filled with merry-go-round hugs, the squirrel-women started to explain things that Silva didn't. To put things simply without the additional skinship and drama, Snow gave the trio a general direction to proceed.
Starting off:
This dungeon was an artificial habitat Snow created. As with the name of the dungeon, it was a mushroom farm, although those 'mushrooms' walk around. Just having a single race would not last long, so Snow introduced another element, the slugs. Slugs feed on mushrooms, so they eat the Fungi-men, in return, after they die, slug corpse become good nourishment for the Myconids. With these two depending on each other, they formed a micro enclosed eco-system.
Why did she take the trouble to make a system instead of just farming the Myconids as food? The reason was simple, beast people need to fight; They need exp to 'grow up'. Without exp, offspring of the evolved animals would start to devolve. The process wasn't immediate, so it takes a few generations to observe.
The rabbit race went extinct purely because they were peaceful herbivorous that avoided fighting. With their young growing up without Exp, after 3 generations they moved down a tier... another 5 generations later, they lost their sentience. In a total of 18 generations, the tribe reverted to normal rabbits again. It was sad fate.
Checking on her 'A'-Rank quest again, Bunny called up the quest window.
Revival of the Sentient Rabbit Race
There were once a sentient rabbit race, Shiva was the first as well as the last of them. The race had died out and rabbits were reverted into simple critters. Shiva will teach you all you need to know about breeding and evolving. You were to evolved the rabbits into sentient beings, and also help them create their own habitat.
Difficulty Level: A
Indeed, the quest did required her to give the rabbits suitable living condition. If Bunny wanted to complete the 'A' rank quest, she would not only need to help the animals reach high-tier evolution, she must also help them found a habitat with suitable opponents.
As to why Snow's experiment went bad, when she first introduced both species, they were peaceful with each other due to having a stronger common enemy, that was Snow herself. With her high levels, she could easily wipe out all the monsters, but that would basically ruin her efforts. With mental struggles, she finally decided to just encase herself in a shield and eliminated herself as a threat.
With their common enemy missing, the two races started fighting among themselves. The Myconids won the first round and gained Snow within her magic shell as a trophy. The slugs won next, which drove the myconids back to their upper caves. This marked the start of the small inter-racial war of the mushroom farm.
Being dragged away from her source of magic, which was the Altar - made of mana-stone, Snow lacked the power to free herself from her self-imposed prison. Being held by the Myconid Spore King, there was little she could do except to wait for the Slugs' victory. Alas, even when the slugs won, they didn't bother to take her back... Being an immortal, Snow stayed immobile for a hundred years until Bunny found her. For lesser beings, they would have gone crazy over the isolation, but for someone who lived for millenniums, it just felt like a boring day with nothing to do.
As thanks for saving her, Snow gave the trio more information with regards to their 'A'-Rank quest. First and foremost was the levels needed for evolution. Since Bunny already knew of the procedure up till Tier-2, Snow started from after. Given that most of her animals were Lv1 when they first started, things were easy to explain.
To reach Tier-3, the animals needed be Lv130 and have a catalyst. Without evolving, they would reach their level cap of 150. Snow also gave Bunny a very complex looking mathematically formula that could determined the levels needed by animals that did not start from level 1. The equation was automatically entered into her Phantasm Encyclopedia. Doing some simple maths, Bunny derived that Lv2 rabbits would need to be Lv155 to evolve.
As for the catalyst, it must be rich in Mana. Meat of 'High Mana Monsters', Mana stones, Mithril... it could be anything as long as it contained lots of Mana. Beyond Tier-3, the simple animals would need be able to harness magic. In order for their bodies to adapt and create a 'mana core', they needed to consume items that had plenty of mana to trigger the evolution.
To enable the trio to be better able to find valid catalysts, Snow taught them the skill Color Sight.
New Skill: Color Sight
Enables the user to differentiate mana density using colors.
Color ranks are: Green, Teal, Cyan, Azure, Blue, Indigo, Magenta, Violet, Red.
At beginner levels, you can only see Green, Blue and Red
With higher levels, more colors will be available, being able to differentiate more thoroughly
“Catalyst must be at least be Azure when viewed with Mana-Sight, but since your skill-levels are too low, take those that look Blue.” That was what Snow said.
After learning the skill, another window open in front of Bunny.
You have successfully place the doll onto the Altar made of Mana-stone. Within is the first-born of the squirrel beast race.
Reward:
- Skill:Color Sight
- Information on Beast-Race.
You have level up
You have level up
Getting the animals to Tier-4 was also taught to them by Snow, but that information would be for later. The trio, at the moment, needed to cross the hurdle of getting the animals into Tier-3 first. As spoiler, Snow just told the trio that Tier-4 required the animals to be at 275 or higher... with the option to Tier5 if they manage to get those animals to reached 400.
Snow then happily relegate the farm to the trio, partially as thanks, but mostly because she was bored staying underground for so long. She also said that the Subterranean Farm wasn't suitable for rabbits because the animals tend to be lethargic underground... Their natural instincts when hiding in barrows. Saying that she would visit Shiva in Serabroug, Snow left after more skinship and drama.
Although there wasn't any continuation to the quest, the trio were happy that the 'C' rank quest was quickly completed. They felt lucky because their opponent were Giant Slugs. Even though Slugs looked disgusting and produce foul smelling goo, they were easily killed with the glaring weaknesses of salt.
If they had faced other Lv180 monsters, it would have taken them at least another week (1 month in game) before they could push forward. Maybe adding two more weeks before they could clean the area around the Altar. Spending such a long time, some of the animals could have reached their limit and stagnate in levels which would lead to Bunny panicking over her animals. All in all, the trio thanked their lucky stars.
Checking the time, it was already Sunday night near bedtime, so they decided to rest and relax. Moving back into the Fungi Caverns, as it was safer there, the trio said their good-byes. Bunny gave the roaming animals instructions to continue leveling before she log-off.
*****
Monday came after a good night sleep.
As usually, Alan met with Jeanne in the morning, lounging in the Student-Council Room. She had become more open to him. Jeanne seemed to have undergone some intensive change during the weekend because the amount of dialogue between them improved significantly from a few random sentences to a 15 minutes of small talk and idle chatter.
Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
For once, Alan was the one stuttering instead of Jeanne. He was very happy about the quality time spent with his crush, with little to no thoughts about the change. Maybe it was him being overjoyed , but contrary to his more observant self, he did not find her acute improvement quizzical.
Jeanne did improve over time, as she first started only able to mutter a few words before going silent. It improved over the weeks and she could then converse a few sentences. The change over the weekend was extremely huge, just without Alan noticing.
After Alan had his weekday dose of Jeanne, school went as per normal until lunchtime. Alan was waiting for this hour as it was the only time Luke would exit his capsule and free to talk. Luke was not only the Student-Council President, he was also one of the TOP dark-gamers in the world. For RR, the data Luke had at his fingertips were far beyond what the 'Dark-Gamer Union' could provide, and that was already much more advance then surfing the Internet.
Alan was actively seeking Luke on this day for 'Business'. Luke traded in game news and dossiers, which meant that if Alan wanted specific details, Luke was the one to turn to. Since Bunny's success as a Breeder, Alan had a good amount of information that were worth much, for these he could trade with Luke for intelligences he needed.
Knowing that his army of Rabbits would reach a level-bottleneck, Alan wanted details on how to overcome this ordeal. Things that contained mana, like Mithril and Mana-stones, were extremely expensive. The amount needed to evolve a hundred animals could make Bunny virtually bankrupt... and Bunny had over 500 of them ...
Turning to the last option, Alan wanted to know about meat with high mama-content. If he could farm monsters for those special meat, it would solve the problem about monetary cost as well as enable future animals to evolve without care. The basis of the 'A'-Rank quest was, after all, not only to have the animals reached sentience, but to have those sentient animals become self-sustaining.
“Hey Luke!” Alan greeted, when his target emerged from his gaming device.
“Yo Alan! You waiting for me?” Luke asked
“I want to trade some information” Alan started ignoring small talks
“What kind?”
“I want to know about magic beast... those with meat containing mana”
Luke pondered a little before replying:
“I am not too sure about this, but if you are looking for monster meat that can help you gain stats, those are really rare. Also, eating most of those will raise your infamy, change your alignment or give unwanted permanent status like 'hated by some race'”
“Care to give some examples?” Alan asked
“Lets see... the simplest will be wild fairies. They are magical beings, they can be considered embodiment of mana, I know of people who feed on their corpse and gain some stats... but there are drawbacks. Fairies are 'good', killing them is like killing players, it will net you the murderer's mark as well as infamy.”
“What about evil fairies?” Alan inquired
“Well... you can try those, but being evil means their mana is tainted. If you eat those, it will boost some stats, but your alignment will slowly shift towards evil. Personally, I think having an evil alignment is worse then just infamy as alignment shift is much more difficult then gaining or losing infamy.”
“Any others that have little or no side effects?”
“You see, when a beast is infused with mana, they are considered 'magical beings' by the general AI in RR. Killing them will be treated like killing player. Of course killing the evil ones will be like killing evil players, so those will have no detrimental effects... The problem is eating their meat... Evil beings mostly have tainted mana, and those will affect alignments. The only exception to this rule is undead, non-humanoid demons and dragon-kins”
“Non-humanoid Demons? I thought all demons are humanoid, like Imps, Satyr, Demon Spawns, Succubus, Nephilims, Fomorian, Rakshasa, Wendigo... etc..” Alan started counting the different types of Demons he knew.
“Hmmm... did you know about that 3-headed dog that guards hell's gates?” Luke asked
“Cerberus?”
“Yes, or to be more precise, Hell-Hounds... Cerberus is just the name of a great Hell-Hound, also they are actually denizens of the Demon Realm, not hell... There really isn't a Hell in RR, at least it is not discovered yet. In the Demon Realm, there are not only Hell-Hounds, there are also other Hell-this and Hell-that... ”
“Wait! You mean to say that those Hell-whatever are all from the Demon realm instead of Hell? What the hell... Why are they not called Demonic-something instead? Hell is too misleading a prefix! Also, are there actually Hell-Rabbits or Hell-Raccoons?”
“There are... Hell-Hares are at the top of their food-chain...” Luke answered seriously
“Huh??”
“Demon realm is somewhat different from the common one, they have very different ecosystem and what we deem 'weak' are actually the stronger types of monsters there. Demon spawns and Imps... the humanoids there are actually the bottom feeders, wild predators as usual are the middle class with rabbits, deers and rats taking the top.”
“Are you serious? Is this hearsay or are they facts?” Alan asked incredulously
“Very sure, I am currently in the Demon Realm doing a quest for the Hell-Huemul, a deer type demonic beast, their chief, Zenon, is an immortal that lived for thousands of years. They are at the top of the food-chain and each warrior is at least level 300.”
“What??? What level are you to actually meet such a race?”
“Me? I am currently 338”
“How? Isn't the highest level only 270? I read on the net some weeks... maybe a month ago... someone named Bart or something posting a video about being the highest level in the game.”
“Hahaha... and you believe whatever you see or read on the net... I will put it simply, that guy is the highest level known to the public, we Dark-Gamers live in the shadows, unless it is money related, we will not reveal our levels or skills, not even the weaker ones. There used to be 6 others with similar level to me, sadly two of them quit...”
“You kidding me right?” Alan tried to verify what he heard
“Nope, I can meet up with you to prove it, that is if you even reach the Demon Realm... hahaha”
“I hold you to your words... My team will go to the Demon Realm and you will be our tour-guide.”
“Hahaha, how will you do that?” Luke laugh off the thought.
“Oh! one of my teammates learned the 'portal' skill, and we tried to lure Demons over to make our own demonic dungeon... sadly it mostly only lured the imps. If we level that skill high enough, I believe he can make a path there, so you better...”
Raising a serving tray taken from the canteen, Alan managed to block the flying viscous fluids aimed at him. Luke usually took a game-break during lunch-time to replenish nutriment, and if Alan spoke with him, he would talk while eating. From previous experience, Alan knew Luke would spew thing at him whenever he heard things he wasn't prepared for.
When Alan told Luke his newly acquired class, Luke sprayed milk. For Litvart personal dungeon, it was hot chocolate. Plum Tea came when his avatar 'Bunny' became 'Lady of the Manor'. With previous experience of being dirtied, this time Alan came prepared, using a shield borrowed from the cafeteria, he managed to block the shower of Coffee.
Watching Luke coughing after expulsion of caffeine-filled liquid, Alan thought he looked like the Livart Queen Worm after spewing poison. However, he kept his mouth shut until his friend recovered, as he still needed information from Luke.
“You! How lucky are you going to get before you are happy!” Luke slurred after regaining his voice.
“Hey, its not me this time, the portal is discovered by a team-mate.” Alan rebutted.
“Still... never mind... Let's get back on track... ”
Clearing his throat, Luke continued:
“If you can get into the Demon Realm, just be careful, the realm itself is heavily infested with monsters, they are mostly weak, between 40-80. But there are roaming big ones around 200 running randomly. Its a big jump, so don't get complacent when you make massive killings”
“Are those big ones good enough to be considered mana-intense?”
“Eating the meat of those will give permanent MP gain, I think the limit is only 100MP. Another thing to note, everything in the demon realm is considered poisonous if you eat them, that means you will need lots of antidotes... Anyway, your priestess should have no problems curing your team.”
As the saying goes: Talking about a person would make him/her appear. Angelina the Treasurer knocked and entered the Student-Council Room.
“Hi Lina” Luke greeted her nonchalantly, while Alan just nodded in her direction.
“You just lost the right to call me Lina, you can call me Angel instead.” the girl said to Luke.
“Why? Because I didn't support your action during the DG meeting?” Luke asked while acting hurt.
“Yes!” She replied bluntly.
Picking up something from her desk, she the left leaving some final words:
“Lina is reserved for those close to me, so you will call me Angie, Angel or Angelina, call me Lina again and I will turn your life into hell... UNDERSTAND?”
Alan had been quiet during the exchange because he wasn't very comfortable around the girl. For reasons he himself didn't know, he found communicating with her... difficult. He brushed it off as just a difference in personality or simply not knowing each other enough.
Luke just sigh at the leaving girl and grumbled:
“Ah... that girl, using her name to differentiate people...”
“Are all girls like that?” Alan asked
“Depends, not all have names that can be split... I know a Crystalbella who does something similar. Then again, there are names like Jeanne which cannot be split, so you have to ask her yourself to find out.”
The boys continued small-talks about beings they would spend the rest of their lives trying to understand.
*****
As Lunch-Break ended, Alan 'Bought' Knowledge on the Demon Realm for the 'Price' of Evolution of Poisonous Mink with Camouflage Ability. The way Luke traded was based on Trust: Alan had told Luke about some of his 'Secrets', and Luke pasted a value on each. Whenever Alan needed wisdom, Luke would take one of his 'Secrets' and make it his own... Meaning he could then sell that 'exchanged' information.
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