As Lizzy continued to proceed deeper into the canyon, the wind and lightning tribulations she faced increased in scale to the point that she actually had to put in some effort to defend herself from them.
“Jeez, if I found out about this Awakening feature before surpassing level 100, wouldn’t this quest be nearly impossible to complete?”
Ever since she started hunting by herself, Lizzy noticed that she increasingly had more monologues than before. Well, things did get lonely at times now that she’s trying to do things on her own. Usually, she’d be partying with her friends or guildmates but not this time and even though she could have partied up for the quest, she knew that it was better if she did this alone because her guild had more important things to worry about like the Void Sea Realm’s opening and leveling up in preparation for it.
“Hmm...Mary’s been hunting and playing the game alone like this ever since she was forced out of the guild...but she does have her pets, familiars, and subordinates around to keep her company…though this method of playing the game does suit her rather introverted character...”
Elsewhere, in the midst of an intense battle between two awakened players, Maria, who was in her Nightmare form, suddenly sneezed mid-battle and was punished for it by her opponent. Eos quickly took advantage of the opening and sent her flying away with an attack that she normally could have easily dodged.
In the crater that was formed from having been slammed into the ground by her opponent’s attack, Maria angrily got out and sent a [Flame Cannon] back at her opponent before mumbling, “Tsk, cheap shot.”
Returning back to Lizzy who was still trudging her way through the perilous canyon after making it past the 1,000-meter mark, she noticed that the intensity of the storm inside of the canyon increased in scale all of a sudden.
“W-What’s this?!”
Lizzy had to pull out her two greatswords and stab them into the ground to anchor herself in place or else she would have been picked up by the winds and sent flying into the air.
“C-Crap, how come the difficulty suddenly increased?!”
She had to use her two greatswords as anchors as she made her way behind a rock that was a few meters ahead of her. Thankfully, the area behind the rock was shielded from the intense winds so she could take a slight break.
“Dangit, at this rate, it’ll take me even longer to finish the quest!”
Lizzy didn’t know how deep the canyon was, but if the difficulty from just moving through the canyon increased, the winds and lightning might even become lethal even for her, who was at level 142.
“There’s not even a monster in sight but I’m actually being hindered this badly? I guess Eur still has a lot for even advanced players to explore…” Lizzy said as she began eating some food to recover her HP and SP.
Dodging the lightning and braving the blade-like winds that cut into her body wasn’t the only thing she had to worry about. Her HP depleted from just walking through the canyon thanks to the winds and being struck by lightning would only worsen that. Not to mention the SP consumption that suddenly spiked just after she stepped past the 1,000-meter mark. Thankfully, Lizzy habitually kept an eye on her HP, MP, and SP gauges, or else it would have been bad for her.
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It didn’t matter if her HP was depleted to dangerous levels because one of her skills would automatically activate and restore her health but if her SP reached 0, then she’d be completely helpless. Depleting one’s SP would inflict them with a few abnormal statuses such as [Stasis], [Paralysis], [Dehydrated], [Hunger], and a few others. The inflicted status would be randomized but if they didn’t raise their SP levels to a safe number, those status inflictions would pile up on each other to the point where the character wouldn’t be able to move, use items, or do anything at all.
For Lizzy who was currently inside this perilous canyon, that could only mean one thing for her, death.
“Ugh, I should have packed some more food if I knew things would be like this...going back now would be a waste since something might change and I might not be able to enter this place again…”
Lizzy restored her SP to 100 percent before she took a page out of Maria’s book by taking out some rope from her inventory, tied it securely around her weapons and waist before stabbing them into the ground, anchoring her in place, and taking a careful look beyond the large rock she was hiding behind.
“Oh, there are more ‘safe rocks’ like this...I guess those are my ticket to get through this canyon!”
In the end, this was still a game so even if this was a trial that Lizzy had to get past in order to complete her Awakening Quest, there would still be a way for her since all quests are meant to be completed. Before moving forward, Lizzy tallied the food items in her inventory before gritting her teeth and saying to herself, “No use in worrying, let’s just do this. I’m sure there’s enough food to last me until I’m at the end of the canyon!”
Lizzy buffed herself with a few STR, AGI, and VIT-enhancing skills before she immediately rushed out from behind the rock and started making a dash for the next rock while she kept a close eye on the terrain, her HP, and SP bars. To make it to the next rock, she didn’t have to do anything special but moving to the next rock after that, Lizzy had to anchor herself with her weapon near the end before kicking off of it and getting to safety.
Retrieving her weapon was easy since all she needed to do was tug on the rope she had wrapped around it.
“Ugh, only getting to the 3rd rock is so difficult...the next rock…” Lizzy briefly took a look beyond the rock she was hiding behind and dejectedly muttered, “...is even farther away...how am I supposed to get past this?”
She quickly began restoring her HP and SP before sitting down and just thinking. In Lizzy’s mind, there was no such thing as an ‘impossible’ quest. Every quest was doable, the only thing you needed to know was the method to solve it.
“...what’s the method…”
Lizzy began looking around her surroundings and her eyes turned towards the rock that she had previously been taking refuge behind and noticed that the surface of the rock was surprisingly smooth. The wind right now was moving so fast that it was forming blades that could literally chop a player in half if they were too low-leveled. Even the rope she had been using earlier was worn-down to the point that if she were to use it in the same manner that she had just done earlier, it might snap thanks to the winds.
This was a high-quality rope with high durability so if the winds could wear the rope down to this extent, the power behind the wind blades was at least on the level of powerful intermediate-ranked wind magic.
“Hmmm… I obviously need to use the rocks for cover but that’s not enough...if I can’t move over to the next rock then...hey, wait a minute…”
Lizzy’s eyes narrowed when she noticed how the winds behaved when they got closer to the rock.
“They’re being...split apart?”
The wind blades were barely noticeable but if Lizzy concentrated, she could see them.
“If they can be dispersed…”
She took a look at her weapon and back towards the rock before shaking her head and standing up.
“Thinking about it won’t help me. I’ll just have to run with it and see if it’ll work.”
Before she started on her crazy plan, Lizzy climbed up the rock she was hiding behind and peeked just over it to experiment a little while.
“...I can definitely...see the blades alright...but not all of them...and they only become visible once they’re 5-meters away from me…”
She began calculating and simulating what she should do in her head before walking out from behind the rock with her greatswords in hand. Lizzy didn’t run anywhere and just stayed next to the rock before she suddenly slashed out with one of her greatswords.
“!”
The weapon split the wind blade coming at her and it burst apart, opening a brief wind tunnel right in front of her. Inside of this wind tunnel, Lizzy immediately noticed that there was no wind impeding her so she could move forward without being buffeted by the winds. She quickly dove behind the protection of the rock just as the wind tunnel dissipated 2 seconds after it formed.
“Yes!”
Lizzy cheered and pumped her fist in the air as she had finally found the method to get past this place...when suddenly, a lightning bolt struck down from the sky and hit her directly on the head.
-10,000!
“...Dammit…”