[Maximus has levelled up!]
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Ryan glanced at the system message as the body of the mascot in front of him finished falling apart.
"Oh! Congrats, man, just one level away from getting you to 10," he said with a grin, squatting down as he held his fist toward the small knight. With a satisfied nod, Maximus fist-bumped Ryan.
He himself had already reached level 8, and Gaia was now already level 6. The speed at which they levelled up was almost ridiculous. It's been not even a week since they first came into the dungeon, and they've made this much progress already.
Though of course, after Ryan's first day at a dungeon a few weeks ago where he levelled up three times, this was still painfully slow. The first five levels were by far the fastest, and after that things slowed down considerably.
But things have been going pretty well overall compared to the 'usual' speed that people tended to level up, though that was mostly because he could spend all of his time on it. And even when he was doing something else, since Gaia would often do some work in the garden even while Ryan was taking care of unrelated matters, he could still slowly gain experience through that. Not that there were many times that Ryan didn't help Gaia out.
The past week had a very specific cycle that Ryan was going through every single day without a proper break. In the mornings, he would go to work out with Yanna. With the help of specialized salves that helped with recovery, a clever workout plan, and obviously Tiar's influence, he practically recovered overnight. Ryan had already bulked up a little bit since he started, and because Tiar still sucked out all the calories he ate, he looked like some kind of professional athlete or a movie superhero. It was kind of weird, he really wasn't used to it.
Starting around noon up until early evening, before the sun even properly started going down, Ryan was inside of the dungeon. He wasn't accompanied by Runar every single time, though that was because Ryan insisted he should actually keep the café open more regularly. That was why, like today, he was accompanied by Anders, his uncle's dwarven aide. He wasn't quite out of sight the same way that Runar was, but he was still an experienced and powerful combatant, so he was able to follow Ryan without jeopardizing the dungeon dive.
And then, later on, when they left the dungeon, Ryan would go back home and do some work in the garden with Gaia before it got dark out. Though today, Silvia and Modak supposed to come, so Ryan wanted to take a bit of a break. It was getting exhausting doing nothing but this all the time. Just as Ryan thought so, he could feel the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. He quickly picked up the plastic coin that the mascot dropped and turned toward Maximus.
"Another monster is coming," Ryan warned, squatting down underneath the broken window of the shop they were inside of right now. The Spirit Link skill was on cooldown, so Ryan wasn't able to use Gaia and her sub-golems to scout out the area and had to rely a bit more on his own senses. Though, with his Intuition stat at 1.7, his instincts did a pretty good job at warning him that something was coming. That stat's growth was the highest out of all of Ryan's stats, and he couldn't really complain about it either. It felt weird at times, but overall, it was like he was more in the moment. Like he could really tell what was going on around him at all times. It grounded him in a way that he couldn't really describe with words.
But those same instincts told him something else, and that this mascot was a big deal. It was different to the others ones. He had seen this one around a couple of times and completely avoided it, since it was most likely the area boss.
In dungeons that were split up into different areas like this, there was usually one monster that was stronger than all the others. It was something like a 'protector' of the area, and was generally more powerful than other monsters, appearing different as well. When Ryan had seen it for the first time, Runar told him that beating the area boss was the requirement for letting him move on to one of the next areas, though that was just a requirement that Runar set for him pretty arbitrarily.
Ryan grabbed the shield next to him tightly. Bringing a shield was a pretty obvious decision considering Ryan's part in the combat. He couldn't just leave Maximus to fight them all on his own, so after the first day at the dungeon, a choice was made. Ryan, so that he could take a more active part in combat, now carried two things with him, completely customized by Silvia.
First was the shield. It wasn't anything special, just a small riot shield that he could strap to his arm when needed. And the second was a reinforced baseball bat. It was actually pretty heavy since it was made of solid steel all the way through instead of wood or hollow aluminium.
Silvia had painted them both; she was getting pretty good at using her new skills at this point, and was able to use her 'Insight' skill to glance at certain people while they used their skills, gaining inspiration for art that she could imbue with special effects. That was how she imbued the shield with the defensive power of Maximus' Knight's Guard skill, while placing the offensive power of his Knight's Attack skill onto the bat. This allowed Ryan to place a couple of points worth of MP into either of them to support him, though it didn't seem to work to the same degree as Maximus' skills.
At this point they gave the knight a more than 30% boost to attack or defence respectively, but Silvia's skill only allowed for three to four percent at best, though that was still better than nothing, of course.
Ryan waved over Gaia, who carefully approached him. She also had some new equipment, though it was just a new backpack that fit her properly. Silvia had also designed this one, being put in charge of any and all equipment for Ryan and the spirits. She was actually quite upset that the other craftsmen had designed all of Maximus' weapons, but she liked how they looked so that faded pretty quickly. She was sure she would get a chance to make new ones in the future, anyway. But when she made the backpack for Gaia, for some reason she decided to make it look like some sort of wooden scaffolding had been placed onto the golem. But it seemed to fit Gaia perfectly and she was happy with how it looked, so Ryan didn't mind either.
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
He placed the new coin into the backpack. Runar said he would explain what these are for when Ryan beat the area boss as well. They had quite a few of them already, so he was getting more and more curious, especially since it was the only thing that any of the mascots dropped.
Ryan carefully peeked over the windowsill, watching the area boss walk past them in the middle of the road. It was a mascot probably twice the size of all the other ones. While the other mascots contained their 'rotten' parts to their insides, this one was practically falling apart. The fabric that made up its skin was falling apart, and maggots were crawling all over it. The smell of rotting flesh reached all the way here, though Ryan wasn't even all that close to it right now.
This guy seemed like he was the most popular mascot of all of them. At least, there was more art of him on the walls, and the souvenir shops sold more of his things than any other mascot. It appeared to be something like a gorilla, with blue fur, holding a large jute bag that it was dragging on the ground behind it. Ryan didn't know what was in that bag, but it was completely stuffed.
"You think we can take him?" Ryan looked at Maximus, who glanced over the windowsill to take a closer look as well. He carefully turned over to Ryan, nodding his head.
"Alright, then let's do it," sighing slightly, Ryan got ready to attack the area boss. The only good part about this guy was that he seemed to scare even the other mascots, so they didn't have to worry about being surrounded by other mascots, at least not until the battle was over. Ryan glanced at the back of his hand, "Tiar, you get ready as well, I might use the Spirit Armament skill if I need to."
Tiar's patterns quickly changed, as the symbiote replied with a quick salute, " o7 "
With a smile, ready to attack the area boss, Ryan carefully moved out of the shop he was in right now. The massive gorilla mascot was slowly dragging its feet through the road, kicking up dirt and crushing trash in its way.
All the mascots so far acted completely the same, so Ryan doubted that this one would be any different, but he should still be careful. It was the only one with a bag like that too, so it was possible that it had some kind of new pattern to it. Plus, considering its size, it might be a bit harder to get through some of the attacks.
Ryan glanced at Maximus, who was currently asking for the largest weapon that had been prepared for him. It was so large that carrying it around normally was quite unhandy, as it was a whole 30cm long, almost 10 more than Maximus himself; and that was just the blade itself, not even the handle. It was basically a dagger that Ryan could also use in an emergency as well, though the handle was a little thin.
But for a guy this large, it was necessary to use a large weapon, since anything else could only cause shallow wounds. The downsides of Maximus' size were becoming more than apparent. Ryan took a deep breath. It was time to bait the area boss.
Gaia was safely staying inside the shop for now, and Maximus was waiting behind some trash until the area boss was properly distracted. Ryan glanced at the knight to make sure they were on the same page, before stepping into the middle of the road. The shield was strapped tight onto his left arm while the heavy bat pressed down onto his palm.
"Yo, you big monkey!" Ryan exclaimed, getting the area boss' attention. The massive gorilla turned its head around toward him. One of its eyes was missing, revealing a maggot-filled socket. It slightly tilted its head for a few moments, as if curious about Ryan. But that curiosity only lasted for a few moments, since the mascot immediately rushed over toward him. It moved with that sort of clunky, newborn-deer type of control that all the other mascots seemed to have over their bodies. Or maybe it was even rougher, since its body was clearly decomposed much more than the other mascots. But even so, due to its size it still moved incredibly fast and came at Ryan like a truck.
Just in case, he poured mana into his shield and bat, waiting for the right moment. He held the shield in front of his body to defend against the area boss' massive reach, jumping to the side at the last moment. The mascot couldn't stop or swerve, though it did swing its arm at Ryan. But before the mascot could hit him, he hit the mascot's knee with his strengthened steel bat.
Ryan felt the massive resistance, but with all the forces working together, he could tell that the attack worked. Though, before he could process how much damage was actually done, Ryan watched as that massive jute bag was swung toward him. He had managed to dodge well enough out of the way so that he couldn't be hit by the mascot's hand, but with the extra range of the bag, he was still hit.
He tightly held onto the shield and braced himself, but was still thrown across the road. His arm felt numb; rather, both of his arms did. Both attacking the mascot and defending against its own attack was pretty intense. But it wasn't anything he couldn't handle. Ryan scraped over the road, but his armour protected him from actually getting too hurt because of this. He might get some bruises later, but that was fine.
Especially because now, the area boss' limp became rather extreme. Its defence was quite high, but its body was broken down to the point that any damage was a lot of damage. The mascot was slowed-down and focused completely on Ryan, which gave Maximus the perfect opportunity to attack. He stabbed his sword into the back of the mascot's leg, tearing through it horizontally. The sword enhanced with aura cut through the mascot's tough bones with ease, and its leg was now only attached through a few lumps of rotting meat.
The mascot lashed out, trying to swing the bag at Maximus, but by then Ryan had already run back toward them, blocking the attack by holding the shield above them. The impact coursed through his body and Ryan buckled under the weight, dropping onto one knee. He groaned loudly, "Maximus!"
The knight knew what to do; he threw his large sword up over the shield, and then stepped into his domain, travelling up onto the shield almost instantly to catch the weapon there. The mascot's bag was still in reach, so, in order to get rid of the area boss' main weapon, Maximus slashed at it.
The mascot pulled the torn bag away, and a flood of those hard plastic coins flowed out of it. There was something else mixed in with those coins, but it seemed to be some kind of figurine so Ryan ignored it for now.
Once he recovered enough, Ryan slightly pulled down the shield and then pushed it forward rapidly to throw the knight at the area boss. Maximus stabbed the sword into the mascot's shoulder, and the aura seemed to be making sure that his body weight was enough to let him tear through the boss' arm, from shoulder to hand.
The mascot's right arm and leg were now loosely hanging onto the its body, but it wasn't done yet. Clearly, it didn't quite care about the integrity of its own body; just like the other mascots. One of them had impaled itself because it didn't care about keeping itself safe. And this one didn't hesitate to use its own arm as a whip, swinging it at Ryan, the target that it was confident it could hit. Once more, Ryan could do nothing but block the attack, for the third time. This time, though, his arm didn't just go numb; he felt something crack.