Chapter 44. The Librarian

Hettie the Librarian

Level 15 Boss, Harpy Undead

HP: 195/195

Stamina: 220/220

Mana 290/290

I ran back to make space as Janica attacked the boss. If I were Silenced twice in a row and unable to heal for sixteen seconds, I doubted that Janica would make it. To make matters worse, I was thirty Experience Points from leveling up, so I had switched my Job to Instructor. I hadn’t been able to purchase any Restorative Mystic skills, so I was back in my old Loadout.

Janica and the Librarian went at each other with blows. Janica swung her mace, unable to use any of her skills due to the Silence effect. The boss retreated while throwing books at Janica. If my companion wasn’t in mortal danger, I would have laughed at the ridiculousness of a book-throwing boss. Instead, I watched her health dip in horror.

When the Silence wore off, I immediately put a Rejuvenate on Janica, who was already down to 70% health. I followed that by pounding out the opening to “Ghostbusters” by Ray Parker Jr. The song starts with a sweet rising drumroll that gets louder, then a catchy uptempo beat. I smiled to myself, nodding my head to the rhythm. And I wished that Rowan and Cassandra were here. And Henry. Just to see their reaction to my song choice. Would they get into it? Would they complain but then sing along to the parts of the song? “I ain’t ‘fraid of no ghost.”

Rhythm and Tempo both activated, giving us much needed boosts to our timing and Haste. There wasn’t much else I could do, but I would use every drop of mana and stamina that I could. I also started a count in my head the second that Silence wore off. One-thousand one, one-thousand two, one-thousand three…

Janica swung again and again while chasing the boss. She hadn’t used a single skill even though the Silence had worn off. Maybe because she was focusing on dodging hardbacks.

Four seconds after the Silence wore off, the boss started to pull her finger up to her mouth for another shush.

Janica slammed down on the floor, stunning the boss. This is what Janica had been waiting for. She didn’t want to miss her chance to S ilence by being in the middle of another Skill sequence.

Janica followed the Slam up with three Uppercuts in a row. Her stun would only last two seconds, and interrupting the spell cast would lock the boss out of spells for four seconds.

One second after the stun, I started casting Lightning Strike. Maybe it was my counting. Maybe it was the Rhythm buff that granted us a little bit of grace with our coordination. But my timing was perfect. It landed exactly when the Librarian raised her finger to her mouth to Silence us again.

A white twenty-one floated over her head, bringing the boss down to 60%.

I started counting again, keeping Rejuvenate on Janica. We alternated back and forth, stunning the boss and using the other tricks in our bags. The boss’s health decreased more and more quickly as Uppercut reduced her armor. Janica’s health never fell below 50%. For some reason, Janica took it slowly. She uppercut every time she needed to, letting it stack higher and higher, but her stamina remained nearly full.

At 25% health, the Librarian enraged. She dropped every book but one and began swinging it at Janica at 25% increased speed and damage.

Janica’s health dropped quickly, from 50% to 35% to 20% in a matter of seconds. Rejuvenate couldn’t keep up, and I couldn’t stack it because I was stuck with my old Loadout. I didn’t have Rejuvenate 2.

But when the boss’s health hit 25%, Janica also seemed to enrage. Not with a buff, but with focus. We were in a race to the death, and Janica, like the experienced fighter she was, had prepared for this. She emptied her stamina bar into the boss, executing over and over again onto a target with fully reduced damage reduction. She melted the Librarian in a matter of seconds.

Congratulations, you defeated Hettie the Librarian.

You earned 270 Experience Points.

You earned 500 Reputation with Edreru University.

You earned 110 Job Points with the Instructor Job.

You leveled up with the Instructor Job. +4 Constitution, +2 Dexterity, +4 Intelligence, + 4 Wisdom, +0 Strength, +4 Perception.

I looted the sparkly pile where the boss had fallen.

You received 100 Silver.

You received 1 Shard of Edreru.

You received 8 pieces of Ghost Cloth.

You received Ghostly Leather Chest Piece.

You received Ghostly Plate Shield.

“A shard!” I told Janica. “Nine more to go.”

“Nice,” she said. “What else?

“Ghost Cloth, Silver and two armor pieces.”

This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.

“Let me see,” she said. I linked them.

Ghostly Leather Chest Piece

Item Class: Leather Armor

Item Quality: Rare

Armor: 3% Damage reduction

+6 Wisdom

+4 Intelligence

+6 Perception

+6 Dexterity

Requirements: 40 Perception or Dexterity

Bind on Equip

Ghostly Plate Shield

Item Class: Shield

Item Quality: Rare

Armor: 8% Damage reduction

+9 Constitution

+9 Strength

+4 Dexterity

Requirements: 40 Constitution

Bind on Equip

“Gimme gimme,” Janica said. “I want that shield.”

“Sure,” I said, handing it to her.

She holstered her two-handed mace on her back, and strapped the shield over her right arm.

It was a kite shield with a flat top that came down to a point at the bottom. However, the front of the shield was the color of the specters we’d been fighting. Its texture moved and swayed like white fire. The shield fit her perfectly. It went from her feet to the middle of her torso. That is to say, it was about a foot tall.

“I don’t get it,” I said. “This mob randomly drops a shield that’s the exact size for a Fairy?”

She laughed, shaking her head. “It’s bind-on-equip. Meaning that the shield will form to the size of the person who first equips it.”

“Ohh,” I said. “What if it wasn’t bind-on-equip?”

“Then it would be whatever size it was when the mob was using it,” she said.

I pulled the Leather Chest Piece over my torso, strapping it on on the sides. It had the same ethereal texture to it, as if the air around my chest were moving.

“The stats on this thing are insane,” I said.

“Yep,” she said. “It’s Rare quality. It gets one and a half stats per item level whereas Uncommon pieces only get one stat per item level. And a level fifteen mob dropped it.

I looked at my core stats, which had improved significantly since I started getting some gear.

Constitution: 44

Dexterity: 30

Intelligence: 45

Wisdom: 46

Strength: 10

Perception: 46

It seemed like leather gear required either Dexterity or Perception to equip. If I didn’t keep building one of those two up, I’d have to switch to cloth, which required Intelligence or Wisdom. And that didn’t work for me. I had already leveled up my Leatherworking Expertise high enough that I didn’t want to switch over to Tailoring.

I looked at my advanced statistics.

Maximum Health: 128

Maximum Stamina: 75

Maximum Mana: 113

Stamina and Mana Regeneration Per Second: 5

Accuracy against same level mobs: 77%

Haste: 5%

Crit Chance: 11%

My crit chance hadn’t progressed much, but 113 was a decent amount for maximum mana and my mana regen per second was respectable.

“We need to look around,” Janica said. “There’s at least one rare book around here somewhere.”

“There are thousands of books,” I said. “How are we supposed to know what we’re looking for?”

“Thankfully, one of us has the Perceptive Attribute,” she said.

The floor had twenty rows of shelves in a large rectangle. We started walking up and down the stacks, looking through the titles. We did so systematically. We started at a corner, and walked up and down the aisles. Slowly. We snaked through nearly the entire floor when I felt something.

Your Perceptive Attribute triggered.