Chapter 23

Is it a hopeless case?

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Authors note

Sorry for the cliffhangers :) but they fit so well

.........

After a heated discussion with the trio and the godess , they resinged to their fates and currently they were headed towards a ground where the yetis spawned.

It took quite a bit of time to actually reach the hunting grounds the trio had level up in during the last week , but soon Sturm felt vary anxious. After all he had not hunted any monster since Palanthalos had banned him.

With every step they took Sturms body began to quiver from excitment. He hid it pretty well as the dwarf and the curly haired girl were silently leading the way and he was in the back with the little girl that followed even behind him.

It was the best tactic Sturm could come up with , considering the level difference the yetis and he he had. But soon the heard thundering stomps and a furry white thing came crashing through the corridors.

The girl that held 2 incredible large swords instantly sprung to action. She closed the gap in a second and started to slash and hack at the creature. As the yeti roared in pain his life steadily decreased but as it reached 70 % it roared even louder then before.

For just a split second the girl hesitated and the monster took the initiative to retaliate. But with a full body slam into his own ally , the dwarf stepped in harms way and blocked the gruesome slash wounds the girl would otherwise had sustained.

The yeti started to clobber the poor dwarf down and his life was decreasing rapidly. With a few murmerd words besides Sturm , the little girl used a healing spell and healed the dwarf up.

2 swords girl stood back up and barraged the poor creature from behind , as Sturm was just waiting for the battle to end. The life of the monster decreased further and with a few spurts of blood from its mouth it collapsed to the floor.

* tring*

You have leveled up.

* tring*

You have leveled up.

* tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* ,

* tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* ,

* tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* , * tring* ,

" Well that went better then expected. " Sturm said in a laughing manner.

Every head of his ' party ' members turned around towards him and he laughed very loudly , which gained them more trampling footsteps coming from 2 directions at a time.

" Oops , hey give me the group lead , dwarf. " Sturm said non-chalantly while smirking.

As the dwarf was just about to curse the 2 sword using girl shushes him with a slight movement of her hand , which Sturm wasn't supposed to see. The dwarf grumbled and pressed some invisible buttons and soon Sturm received the message.

* tring*

You have gained leadership over the party

Due to your skill born Leader , your party receives 9.5 % increased dmg and healing any attacks against them have 9.5% reduced effects.

Their jaws dropped again and Sturm was whistling innocently.

" So its best if you guys take the one that is incoming from the right , ill manage to distract the one from the left , somehow. " Sturm stated casually.

Now the dwarf and the barbarian girl were both typing something behind Sturms back , he guessed that they were sending private messages back and forth so Sturm tried at least not to notice their behaviour.

The 41 levels he had just received from a single mob were ridicioulus , but on the other hand if he would have killed it himself , without the other 3 , he would have gained 4 times as much experience.

That would have been enough to slingshot him to level 100 , Sturm predicted as he distributed his 164 all into one stat. Intelligence. He was no tank anymore , or meele dps. He did not have to directly confront his enemys as he was in a group to begin with. But with every click he used on the little + besides his int , it rose exceptionatly.

Just those 164 points brought him up to 565 Intelligence. This brought him to 5650 Mana + the 400 he received from his class it was a staggering amount for a lvl 42. But Sturm knew he would need it right away.

He walked about 5 yards into the corridor that forked off to the left and stretched out his palm. He spread his active mana as soon as he saw the Yeti coming around a corner. With lightning speed the mana entangled the Yetis feet and a staggering amount of 1000 mana escaped him in the process.

Sturm had transmitted to the mana particles that were a extension of his own body to bind the yeti at all costs. They headed his command but they had to recast deep freeze 10 times before the yetis feet were frozen solid.

' Im so lucky that thing isn't a named monster or a boss ... ' Sturm thought.

He watched for any crack that formed around the yetis feet and instantly expanded his own body particles around the cracks that had formed and they recasted deep freeze.

* tring*

You have leveled up ....

You have leveled up ....

.....

Another 24 windows popped and Sturm had just reached level 68 with the second Yeti that had been defeated. The dwarf watched in awe at the Yeti that had been trapped at its feet , almost as if superglue had fixated him there , but soon he saw the 24 inches thick ice surface covering his feet.

He snapped out of it as he saw Erica already attacking the beast which now couldn't fight back at all. With a ferocious slash Erica had inflicted on it and since it couldn't move it lost is balance and with the added force of ericas attacks it toppled over. Forwards. With a ear spliting sound its kneecaps broke and the beast wailed in fear.

Behind the running Dwarf a certain High-elf was whistling as if he had fun.

The yeti was dealt with quickly and as Sturm was distributing his points once again , all into INT of course he and his party members received a message

* tring*

You are the first player to exceed 1000 points in the INT stat , unique title acquired.

* tring*

You have acquired the unique title > apprentice <

The title apprentice increases the proficiency gain by 300%.

" HAHAHAHA . " Sturm was laughing and equipped the unique title he just had acquired.

' This is truly perfect the 20 or so Deep freezes i casted brought my deep freeze lvl up from (1/100) to (3/100) now even though i get power leveld i won't have to worry to much about increasing it. ' Sturm thought.

" Lets go! " Sturm shouted in excitement.

The others were still dumbfounded as Sturm urged them on to go deeper into the icy caverns.

.....................

As they encountered the next Yeti , a single one this time , Sturm decided to do gain a bit of proficiency with his Ice shards. While the barbarian girl and the dwarf were focusing on the legs of the 5 yard tall beast Sturm used his spell once and aimed for its eyes.

* Schwip * , * Schwip * , * Schwip *

The three shards flew out. But as Sturm had predicted it , they hit the walls besides the beast. This was an incredible feat at which he grinded his teeth as they missed the beast 5 yards in front of him by double the amount of the distance.

Now with a concious thought he summoned only one and it took him over 10 seconds to aim it properly. But to his surprise it hit. He watched in excitement at the health bar above the creatures head and finally noticed how much health they had.

A staggering amount of 10 000. Now his Iceshards did a damage of 300. If all three hit , in the ideal situation he would do a maximum amount of 900 damage. He needed 12 full blasts when all 3 hit into the yetis face to kill it.

But Sturm knew this was the ideal situation. Considering its natural armor and most likely also resistances Sturm had inflicted maybe 50 damage with this shrapnel. So for a fact with 50 dmg per shard and 3 shards per , just to decrease this things health by 1 % would require 7 full blasts.

That was also calculated with the 20% spell damage bonus Sturm had because the area around him was below the freezing point of water. Now if he wanted to kill the beast by himself he would need 700 of those blasts with a manacost of 350.

This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.

All in all he would need 245 000 mana to just kill that thing. He had 11 000. Sturm hoped , with all his might , that when the proficiency of the spell rose it would inflict more damage and cut the amounts and amounts of direct spell activation he needed down.

As he casted 10 single shards in succesion he noted that his ability to concentrate on the action became incredibly harder. Every 2 or 3 yetis they rested for a short amount as the battles sometimes took 15 minutes and they had to wander quite a bit to find a new one.

............

After they had killed about 30 more they made a long and extensive rest.

" Hey you , that was all there is for 3 days. " The dwarf informed Sturm.

But Sturm couldn't even register that someone spoke to him as he was puzzled of what to do about the rest of the stats or the way he should progress in his spells. After the dwarf once again started to grumble Sturm finally realized that someone talked to him and his concentration broke.

" Sry , i was lost in thought. How may i help you? " Sturm asked politely.

The dwarf eyed him with suspicion but repeated what he said before which Sturm replied with a firm nod.

Everything just didn't add up for Sturm and he was kind of lost what to do about the situation so he decieded something which he had never done before.

" Guys i want your honest opinion. How did the High-elfs survive. They gain no strength , okay sure they can cast spells incredibly well , but with resistances ... Im already level 150 but i don't know what to do with all the other stats. I have 248 banked up and as you know 1000 Intelligence. " Sturm asked for their opinion.

But soon he realized a mistake he had made straight from the beginning , as the godess had pissed him off.

" Ohh , i am sorry for my rude behaviour so far. I don't want to find excuses but too much has been on my mind and i forgot all about it. My name is Sturm , what is yours dwarf? " Sturm asked as politly as he could with a warm smile.

Now the dwarf almost backed of a few steps at the change in Sturms behaviour. He just couldn't figure out that guy.

" My ... Name ... is ... Izabell ... call me ... Iz . " The shy little girl said.

" Erica. " The barbarian told him.

" Im called Damion. " The dwarf said.

" Good thank you. Now what do you guys think. The question of the day is how a race with such low strength has survived. I don't think the godess held her hand over them all this time. " Sturm said at his wits end.

Damion and Iz both went into a deep thinking mode and Erica just looked around uninterested in the conversation.

" You still have one spell left. How about you create a stronger spell version of those Ice shards? " Iz thought out loud.

Sturm had already thought about that but to his surprise Damion explained it to her why the idea was not as good as it sounded.

" No , i don't think that will help. The problem lies within his magic itself. First we are in a frost region. Everything here will have high frost resistance and even a greater spell will have less effect. Now he has a inter cardinal element. Ice the combinatin of 2 other elements combined into one. "

" It has both is weaknesses but close to no strength. I understand why you have ice spells and you will have to use every spell you have efficently as you have a limited arsenal but these spells are just weak here. Maybe you should go with a fire spell? " Damion finished his reasoning.

" A fire spell sounds good for this kind of enviorment but , as you know I will also have to decide on a favoured element when i hit lvl 200. My guess i should pick ice. Then the aspects of fire would become weaker. " He threw in some counter arguments.

They all fell into silence again , but soon Iz broke that again.

" If you raise your Wisdome to 200 points you should get about 1% mana back every second with 11 000 Mana as you have now it should regenerate 110 mana every second so that means you can cast 1 Iceshard spell every 3 seconds. "

Sturm had also considered this but once again Damion took it from him to explain.

" That is still only 150 damage every 3 seconds. Even me with my close to 300 strength i do close to a 150 damage with each swing of my weapon. Erica should do about 300 damage with each swing after all the yetis reductions and she has 2 weapons. " He said.

This was new information to Sturm and he prompted a question himself.

" Is it maybe that the Yetis are just tanky mobs that have high physical and frost resistances? "

After a few seconds Damion answered.

" Hard to tell , but compared to other monsters we have fought we do definetly less damage with out increased levels. Trust me these monsters are the hardest we have ever fought. If i don't block the damage they will kill me in 6 strikes the others less since im made for takin damage. "

" But i told you all about my skills as well as my defective race and you know my class what level are you guys? " Sturm asked.

All 3 of them shifted uncomfortably but soon Erica , much to Sturms surprise , answered.

" I am 220 at the moment. The others a little lower by 1 or 2 levels. I still gain about a third of a level per yeti. You only get 2 levels per yeti now huh? That 1/3 extra experience per level really impaires you. " She stated calmly.

Grim was astounded once again but as he thought deeper about the matter it made sense. They had been in the snowy plains for a month and in this cave waiting for the godesses quest to become updated for close too 2 weeks.

Their gear had not been updated since they entered this area , as they were no towns or proper crafting utensils around.

" You made 70 levels in 1 and a half months , thats incredible. When i hunted like a madman i gained about 100 levels in 2 months but that was because i killed hundreds of thousands of Goblins. " Sturm said amazed.

" I suspected it by your appearance and after you introduced yourself as Grim , you really are the Ruby prince. " Erica stated after a while.

" Yeah i am. Or i used to be. " Sturm replied feeling nostalgic.

" Even though you are the most idolized person in the > new Beginning < you are hopeless at the moment. " Erica rubbed salt inside Sturms wounds.

" Yeah , yeah. I know people idolized my avatar but that doesn't change the fact that im a screwed up mage that doesn't do any damage. I mean really , i am used to fighting with a mace and a shield. But with these kind of limitations i have to be a mage. Not even a archer is viable since i will never have enough strength to pull a bowstring yet alone to wield a sword or mace. " Sturm replied.

" Why can't you? Why not make a ice weapon or something with a new spell and you will surely get alot of damage out of it. Maybe even more then my two swords now. " Erica threw in her opinion.

" Don't think that will work. Every swing consumes Stamina and that is also impaired through the small pool of Strength. " Sturm said. " Guess i will have to ask the godess. "

They dusted themselves of and headed towards the main chaimber once again.

.......................

They reached the chamber of the godess 12 hours later , as they had circled around the maze quite often to find the last of the yetis.

As soon as they arrived there the godess materialized with a smile on her face , as she saw the progress her champion made. But as she was about to speak Sturm broke the flow she just wanted to create and told her some facts.

" Later , oh godess. Is there anyway to leave this place , and return later , with the exception of walking all the way back and forth. " Sturm asked in a polite tone.

" Yes behind me is a secret room with a teleport circle. On the other side is also a circle that leads back to here , but that can only be used by my Champion alone. Not even a group travelling with him can be transported through it. " The godess replied.

Sturm thought for a moment before he returned to the trio.

" Listen , it will be best if you guys leave for now and do some things on your own until i have found a way to gain control over my abilitys. I can't get the quest done myself in the first place also i don't have the quest so you can relax about that. " Sturm told them his honest thoughts.

" I will call you though , so we need a way to communicate. But since im from a fallen race i can't put you guys on my friends list. Already tried and since no one has even flinched at a new window , i noticed. So give one of you give me a email adress in real life. " He finished.

Damion and Erica both were very uncomfortable with this but Iz took the initiative and whispered her phone number in his ear. Naturally Sturm had to bend down , with his 7 foot of height to even hear her whisper.

" Okay guys i will log out for now and save the information. I will contact her as soon as i am ready and i got some information about the ' guardian ' of this quest. " Grim told them bowed towards the godess and the trio as he pushed the log out button.

And the trio proceeded through the teleporter.