ALL NOVEL Chapter 49: Somewhere in the Mountains
[Acquired Liger Tooth x10, Liger Claw x20, Liger Mane x1, Tiger Tail x1, Liger Bone x45, ..., ...]
[Acquired 38 Gold Coins]
[Acquired West Summit Hell Dungeon Pass x1]
Other than the usual materials and gold coins that Maria would get from killing a boss monster, there was a new item this time from the drops.
"A dungeon pass? I think this is used to enter a dungeon?"
[West Summit Hell Dungeon Pass
Rank: Rare
Use to unlock Hell-mode difficulty of the Enoch Mountain West Summit Dungeon.
Uses: 1
Level Requirement: Lv.55]
"Aw, there's a level requirement to use this thingy~ too bad then~"
Maria tossed the pass into her inventory and continued to head even deeper into the mountains. Whenever she came across a monster, she would immediately attack it with a [Fire] and then follow it up with her new combo, an axe throw + [Ruin].
She was beginning to enjoy throwing around that large axe of hers because it was satisfying to see the monsters scrambling around or just outright getting hit by the large projectile.
Maria was also relying more on her magic spells rather than her normal attacks or skills now. She remembered about the [Earth Shock] spell book in her inventory, but unfortunately for her, she still couldn't learn it.
She needed to raise her [Magical Affinity] skill's rank in order to have affinity with more elements. With her skill only being rank E, Maria could only learn fire and water elemental spells. Even the [Ice] that she would get from Paimon's Magic Tome would have to be shelved until her [Magical Affinity] rose in rank.
"Ugh...how do I raise the skill rank?"
[Magical Affinity (14/100)
Rank: E
Basic affinity with the elements enabling the use of basic fire and water elemental spells
Provides a 10% increase to all Elemental Resistance
Upgradeable: Magic Mastery E
Requirements: Magic Comprehension S, Magic Deduction S, Magical Affinity S]
After separating from Paimon, the skill had only risen by 6 proficiency points until now. Even after facing off against a strong boss monster and multitudes of other mobs while mostly using magic, it only rose by so little.
"Muh...if only my normal attacks were based on my M.ATK and not my ATK stat..." Maria mumbled before pulling up her stat window.
[Maria Lv. 22]
HP: 2,560/2,560
MP: 87,925/87,925
SP: 320/320
EXP: 75,000/2,200,000
Race: Fallen Angel
Class: Dark Priestess
Sub-Class 1: Magus
Sub-Class 2:
Titles: Wolf Slayer, Slime Slayer, Monster Bird Slayer, Sprite Slayer, Angel of Death, The Knowledgeable One
ATK: 550 (+50~100)
DEF: 320 (+15)
M.ATK: 879 (+20)
M.DEF: 4,396 (+15)
STR: 100 (+10)
AGI: 100 (-5)
VIT: 120 (+8)
INT: 1650 (+26) (+80.5)
LCK: 10
Free Stat Points: 20
"Oh yeah, I leveled up earlier...let's just add all 20 FSPs into STR."
Maria was pretty lackadaisical with her stat distribution. She just put in her FSPs in whatever stat she thought was best and didn't go to the forums to see the recommended stat distributions for a player with her class.
Actually, that'd be pretty pointless as well. After all, Maria just made-do with whatever skills she had and didn't actually conform to any play-style. She wasn't the stereotypical Priestess that only focused on healing.
Technically, she was a Priestess, but a Dark Priestess to be exact. And judging by the class skills she had tucked away in her inventory, a Dark Priestess leaned towards dealing damage and debuffing enemies with status ailments. Unlike the normal Priestess which would to the opposite, healing and removing status ailments.
It was still a long way for her to get her first class skill since she needed to be level 35, but she didn't mind that and thought that it'd be better to go at her own pace.
******
Maria and Lilah were flying through the mountains and killing any monster that she caught within her bird's eye view when a request window for a video chat popped up in front of her.
When she saw that it was Lizzy who was making the request, Maria immediately accepted it.
<Hey, Mary! Where are you? Didn't you promise to meet up with me and the rest once you were finished with your quest?>
"Ehehe~, sorry Liz, I got sidetracked!
<Yeah, I already saw the vid of you burning down the plains with you magic.>
"W-wha?!"
<Anyways, where are you?!>
"I am—" Maria took a quick look around. She didn't know the name of her present location and only saw mountains all around her. "—somewhere in the mountains!"
<I knew it, can you send me your location's coordinates? Me and a couple of others from my guild will come pick you up. Just so you know, the numbers floating just above your minimap is your current location's coordinates!>
Maria quickly looked at her minimap on her HUD and saw the string of numbers and quickly informed Lizzy.
"It's 523,221,211!"
<Great, I'll be there in a bit...but seriously, what're you doing way out over there? You're still level 22! Why're you in a level 40-50 hunting grounds?!> Lizzy exclaimed when she re-checked her friend's level on her friends list.
"Hehe~ I dunno~ I was only flying and suddenly I wound up here for some reason!" Maria replied with a shrug.
Lizzy shook her head helplessly on the screen and quickly bade farewell to Maria. She also made sure to tell the directionally-challenged girl to stay put and not move around so much. Maria only gave an okay sign before she disconnected the video chat.
Maria was only able to wait in place for about 10 minutes before she could no longer take it.
"Let's walk around a bit~"
"Master...didn't your friend say to stay in place?"
"It's only a little bit~ come on, I'm bored!"
"...That's up for you to decide Master. I listen to whatever you say," Lilah responded.
"Alright, let's get going then!"
Maria began walking around while reminding herself not to stray too far away from her current location. But that wasn't going to happen because if she didn't want to stray too far away, she could have just walked around the area on FOOT. Instead, she stupidly decided to take off into the air.
After Maria had moved quite a bit away from her previous location, she spotted a couple of mobs on the ground and immediately engaged them in battle.
******
It took Lizzy and her guildmates another 30 minutes after Maria left her previous location to arrive at the base of the Enoch Mountain Range.
"Alright, the coordinates say she's at the West Summit Area, this should be a cakewalk for us since the monsters are lower leveled than us! Let's hurry, knowing my friend, she's bound to have wandered off somewhere despite me telling her to stay put!"
"Ahaha~ what's with that Guild Leader? Does your friend have ants in her pants or something?" A guild member called out. It was a player named ShootfortheMoon, a Ranger at Level 52. Ranger was the second tier class after an Archer.
In the Beta, the testers were only able to make it up to the third tier class so it wasn't known how many class tiers there were in total. The developers didn't give out any info so the player base only speculated that there were probably 4-5 tiers altogether.
"Nah, that's just how she is. She's the type who just can't sit around and do nothing. Once we're inside, I'll call her again." Lizzy said in reply.
Her group proceeded into the area and immediately came across some Iron Hawks, Iron Moles, and Iron Tigers, all of them monsters unique to the area that ranged from level 35-45.
"Hey, Lead! I thought you said your friend was only level 22 earlier? What's she doing in a place like this?"
Even Lizzy was wondering about that. She had no clue at all what the girl could even be doing here.
"I dunno...the only thing she told me was that she was flying and suddenly—Poof—here I am."
Her guild members could only laugh at the reply. They began to look forward to seeing this eccentric friend of their guildmaster's.
"Okay, enough chit-chat, let's hurry up and go find my friend."