There was nothing to gain from just the title alone and that was all he allowed to show. The rest was blanked out to their eyes. They both looked at each other and shrugged. Then talked a little more on how to learn spells from his special magic. Neither of them had any ideas so he figured he might as well just try to buy them like he would any other skill. He happened to ask how many points he earned her just now and she just said “Enough to put into third place with not that many between me and second.” Last he knew she was in the thirties so he figured it was quite a lot.
He said their goodbyes and went back to the counter in the main lobby. Sure enough after he played with the menus for a while he found that he really did buy his special magic just like other spells. It even had its own little category. He was ecstatic until he saw how many points it required to learn. The cheapest skill to learn was still one of the most expensive he had ever seen.
*Angelic summoning- Summon an angelic creature to fight or act on your behalf until you either run out of mana or the summon is banished. The strength of the summon will be decided by the mana invested during its sixty second cast time and will be sustained by the summoners regeneration. Cost 100,000,000 G and 50 SP to learn. Tier 15
The gold was frankly dirt cheap for a spell like this but there were two enormous problems. One was that 50 Skill points was nothing short of prohibitive for anyone except him and the other was that It required massive amounts of both Initial mana cost and equally massive regeneration to sustain the summon. With a sigh he bought it and just like that a year's worth of dungeoning was gone in an instant. He couldn’t learn the spell yet but it wouldn’t be too long once he unlocked a high level dungeon. First though he had to teach these newbies what it meant to dungeon dive.
With a sigh he exited out of the panel and thanked the receptionist before leaving. They all piled into the car and he drove to the navy pier. At the very end of the pier there was -yet again- a sectioned off piece that was covered in canvas. The ladies had all changed into combat fatigues with knives and swords on their waists, he had their other weapons in his inventory. When they stepped inside they were greeted by the armed guards, a maintenance shack was cordoned off. The barrier was still up but it was obviously on its last legs as the time for the field monsters showing themselves drew closer.
He had them stand back a bit and one punch was enough to break it. The guards just gawked like he was a monster but the girls were confused about their reaction. What looked like a door to hell appeared as the barrier dispersed. It was decorated with flames, elementals, demons, and other firebased monsters like a mural. He gave the guards one more rundown and then entered with the girls. “Ok first thing you do when you enter the dungeon is canvas the area to make sure no enemies are waiting on an ambush. Second is distinguish if the area is a safe zone or not. Third is check for tr-” He noticed they were looking at him like they would a child who was trying to act like an adult.
He grinned evilly and asked “What do you respect?” The sudden question caught them off guard and they could only stammer while avoiding his eyes. You know what lets do it like this. I, Jacob Dawn formally request a duel with the four women standing in front of me. The duel will continue until loss of consciousness or forfeit and my stats will be lowered to equal theirs. Now you all accept the invitation, that’s an order.” They all hesitated then looked at him like he was an idiot as they accepted. It was an order after all.
“Now when I say start I order you all four to attack me like your life depends on it. And if you don’t I will have you dismissed from the family or imprisoned for disobeying orders, is that understood?” Now they were clearly all visibly irate. They were so pissed they were shaking, that was good. “Start.” Almost before the word was off his lips they were attacking, and they weren’t veterans for nothing. Two dashed to the sides while to stepped in to tie him up with their footwork and fast blows. They were good but before they joined the family they had never even seen eachother so their team work was only adequate due to their combined experience.
All in all he simply toyed with them and they could see it. He was always just one step ahead or just barely dodging their hits. Most of the time his feet never even hit the ground and was using their own momentum and strength to literally spin between them like a gust of wind. Soon one of them overextended and a quick blow to the jaw ended her. The other fell like dominoes so after with only miss Nina still conscious. But since he had pinned in an armbar he let her go. She looked like she was in shock. All this time she had been thinking that he was a spoiled young master that rode on his family's money, but now she new that her thinking had been entirely backward.
They were all seasoned veterans with at least four tours in multiple warzones across the globe but this twenty year old youth had toyed with them like they were simply punching bags. They were already immortals so they were all in the know about what was coming but they weren’t core members yet so they had no way of knowing that it was entirely Jacob who was preparing the family for the coming years.
If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.
She slowly came to terms with everything and it seemed like when she looked at him now her common sense had collapsed and she was no longer looking at a human but something more like a god. Soon after the others woke up and this time he had already set up camp. They were all exhausted and sore so he let them get to sleep while he stood watch. It took them quite a while but eventually they all dozed off. He didn’t know it yet but they were all half expecting him to climb in with them for night services.
Messed around with modifying his spells for most of the night until one of them woke up then he started breakfast while giving a warning. “Until you get an Item box you will have to carry anything you want to bring and anything you find so keep in mind to pack extremely lightly. Most of your money will come from selling the items you get from the dungeon to the store we were at earlier. What’s with the long faces? You guys still tired?” He noticed they were all quite grumbly this morning- particularly Nina- but couldn’t figure out why. Finally Nina sighed and said “We wanted you to come for night services master but you didn’t show.”
He couldn’t help but blush a little at that since he hadn’t even considered it. Now that he thought about he had heard his cousins talking a few time that their personal maids would give night services at their own discretion, by no means were they forced but it was a quirk of his family. “Well I figured you girls were tired from the fight and I...” He trailed off as he realized that he was now being ignore and they were talking about passing him around like whose turn was when. He simply didn’t know what to say and his instincts were telling him to just stay out of it. Finally Nina looked up struck him dumb again, “Master for girls like us fighting doesn’t just make us tired but also horny.”
Then turned back around like it was nothing. Yep, even after the apocalypse there is no understanding women. And he then left it at that. When they were finally ready he said something that made them all grin with bloodlust. “Essentially just treat this as a battlefield and you’ll be fine. The rest will come as you begin to understand skills and spells. Unlike the common theory for video games dungeon are not usually infested with traps they are simply swamped with monsters. The reason for this you can discover later if you want or you can ask me in a few years. Right now it's useless to you and could bring increased danger so just forget it for now.”
Over the next few months they all came closer together as a team and he explained all about skill, spells, party composition, and the importance of levels as well as bosses, roaming bosses, mini-bosses and named enemies. Their favorite part was about equipment though unsurprisingly. All in all it took them about two months until they had everything completely mastered. He had gotten to know them quite well so he made recommendations about how to fight with different builds and maximizing effectiveness of certain builds.
The two redheads named Amy and Melain were huge magic geeks so he had a lot to teach them, but due to his experience of eighteen odd years he also had a lot to teach Crystal and Chloe as well who were both more suited to rogue or assassin styles of combat. He also made constant effort to stress the importance of how suitable someone was for a certain role. Nina was a total tanker and was nothing short of amazing with a shield a mace. The only words that fit was that she was a natural paladin. As they were walking back to the entrance he taught them all his [Bone Armament of the Sorcerer] which they freely modified on their preference and chosen styles, and his meditation.
While it technically wasn’t made by him the framework that made it as powerful as it was could be called his product. They successful learned them both and he wasn’t penalized so he just sighed in relief. As they reached the entrance their whispered got a little louder until they stopped and said “Master we’ve decided, Nina will accompany you. You said yourself you get lonely at times and we decided that since you first picked Nina for this assignment then she should be the one to come with you. And this decision is final.” Every time he tried to cut in he was shut down and had no real argument so he could only nod his head.
Truth be told he hadn’t been looking forward to being alone again anyway. They all laughed asNina was beet red by this point. It was hard to believe that these were the same women who never smiled or laughed two months ago but once they broke past level one hundred they started loosen up. He didn’t know the reason but had the hunch it was related to always being edge waiting for someone stronger to show up. Now that they had a decent taste of real strength they were much more relaxed.
When they left the entrance they were greeted by the guards and updated. The field monsters would appear any day now so he sent them ahead back to the house and spent the next six hours breaking open all the low level dungeons barriers all around the city. Each point was controlled by their people so it made the task simple. He finally made it back to the house and flopped on the couch. No sooner did it seem like he nodded off that a noiseless shock wave washed threw him.
He immediately bolted awake and started yelling for his dad. It had happened, the field monsters had just spawned on their world. A blue box appeared in front of every humans face and said this
*Humans of the planet tera that you call earth, two years ago a series of gates started appearing on your world. They grant you access to the system and immortality. They grant you the ability to fight back against monster that will be appearing in your world soon. Dungeons also have now began to appear. Strength is now the only true unit of measure. The human race has now entered the initialization phase. Fight, win, survive, and grow stronger. Good luck humans, your sheltered period has come to an end and it is time to join the wider cosmos.
And with those words the apocalypse had begun. It didn’t have a name yet but it would come to be called ‘The systems Advent’.