《The Cardboard Explorer》Chapter 36
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“Hmm~ These two magic crystals are something new. I don’t think I ever saw my family or anyone else having these crystals. I wonder what it can do?” said Jonathan while his hand was holding two different magic crystals.
One of the magic crystals was colorless and had the shape of a toad. That was the toad magic crystal that Cade can choose from the list of magic crystal drops.
The other magic crystal was red but it had the shape of a tongue. That was the tongue magic crystal. He got two tongue magic crystals and two toad crystals.
Cade thought that Jonathan would be able to recognize them but it looked like it was his first time seeing the two crystals too.
Since none of them knew what it could do, it was better to sell them and let the professionals do their job.
Assuming that the two magic crystals were a completely new type of magic crystals, it might have been due to the new changes happening to the dungeon.
Maybe the two magic crystals were like a new feature in a game that had not yet been revealed but their data can be found inside the game with hacking and data-mining.
With Cade's newfound ability to choose his drop, he gained access to the new drops earlier than other people.
Maybe the new bloodline skills, the essence, key, and core were something new added to the monsters and had yet to be released by the maker of the dungeon.
Cade kept the magic crystals back into his storage and continued walking with Jonathan towards the waiting area for the floor boss.
While walking, other than talking about the magic crystals, Jonathan told Cade a bit about himself, his family and everything else related to him.
There was nothing abnormal about Jonathan. His life was the same as normal people that were not part of the powerful family.
He also said that his family doted on him a lot because he was the youngest in his family and the most well-behaved child.
When he was found to have the potential growth of C grade, he was treated coldly by his family but not as bad as Cade. His parents and siblings still love him, only his uncles, aunties and cousins were looking down on him.
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However, that soon changed because Jonathan was a good child and well-behaved. Everyone started liking him bit by bit and they all ended up doting him a lot.
Jonathan did not try to gain his family’s attention or anything by behaving well but that was part of his nature. It was not a fake act and that was what gained him the love of his family.
Hearing Jonathan’s story about himself, Cade did not hate or felt jealous of him or anything because his life was not the same as him but he was happy to hear that.
Cade always thought that everyone from the powerful family would treat their child with low talent badly just like his family but apparently, that was not the case.
There was some good family like the Armored Bear family around. He also thought that maybe Jonathan would be in the same situation as him if he was not a good boy but Jonathan said that even before they started to like him, he was not treated badly.
There was no bullying, hitting or sneering came from his family. They did talk behind him but it was nothing extreme.
They were just like villagers talking and whispering bad about each other.
Jonathan also wanted to know a bit about Cade but Cade just said that he was an orphan and he did not know who his parents were.
Jonathan also did not want to pry further and their conversation moved on to where they were studying, girlfriend and anything common like that.
After that, they arrived and Shihoon looked seriously bored waiting by himself. There were three to four more parties in front of them but it will not be a long wait.
Shihoon complained a bit about them leaving him alone there for too long but Cade ignored him. However, the good boy Jonathan patiently listened and tried to console him.
More and more explorers reached the area and looking at the long line, they all sighed. They all needed to wait a long time before they could enter the boss room.
After half an hour of waiting, it was finally time for Cade, Shihoon and Jonathan’s turn to enter the boss room.
Just like the two boss rooms on the first and second floors, the third-floor room was the same as them. Nothing special in it. It was just a huge empty room.
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The boss appeared and it was the same huge big tongue toad boss they fought on the first and second floor. Maybe it will be stronger than the first and second-floor boss and that was it.
The toad boss opened its mouth and they saw a blue tongue, “Big blue tongue toad, no wonder there are so many of them on this floor,” said Shihoon.
“I’ll attract the boss's attention and hold him while Cade and brother Shihoon should focus on dealing damage to the boss,” said Jonathan. He has been increasing his endurance a lot and will be able to hold the boss well.
Even the 35 stat points he got from the complete puzzle Cade gave him were put on his endurance. He felt like he needed good defense if he wanted to survive inside the dungeon.
Endurance affected defense and stamina. Increasing endurance meant increased defense and stamina. With his full set equipment that focused on defense, he decided to go that route.
Cade already knew what role Jonathan wanted to take and he nodded. Shihoon just agreed without thinking much because he knew that Jonathan will be good at that.
With that all set, Jonathan moved forward and called the boss to attract its attention. The boss was not that much different from the normal toad in their aggressiveness and thus, Jonathan easily got its attention.
“Mute,” said Shihoon and the sound around him and Cade disappeared. Cade was surprised to see that Shihoon learned a sound-based skill.
“I wonder what his first skill is,” Cade wondered. The first skill Shihoon showed him before was picture come to life and now mute. Both of these skills were unrelated to each other.
Explorers usually focused on getting skills related to the first skill they got. For example, if the first skill they got when someone awakened was a fireball, they will usually get a skill that was related or complimented to the fireball.
Some learn something else entirely and they regret it later. They can delete the skill they learned but the skill was expensive and they would waste a lot of money.
The toad boss started attacking Jonathan and he easily blocked the attack. Cade and Shihoon spread and went to the side of the toad.
With mute masking the sound they made; the toad boss was unaware of them arriving on its side.
Shihoon took out a picture of a mole monster with a huge claw and used pictures to come to life to summon the mole. Shihoon ordered the mole to start digging the toad boss’ body.
The mole followed the order and immediately started digging into the toad boss with its huge claw. At the same time the mole digging into the toad, Cade was slashing the toad boss with his sword.
The toad boss was screaming in pain with the two attacks coming from its side. Its attention towards Jonathan moved to Cade.
Jonathan tried to attract the attention of the toad boss by screaming at it but he was unable to do that. Since Cade was dealing much more damage than the mole, he got the attention of the toad boss.
However, when Cade got the attention of the toad boss, Jonathan did not waste the chance and started using his greatsword to attack the toad boss too.
The toad boss ended up getting confused on who it should attack first and died before it can make any decision.
Cade did not get the notification of choosing the drop and that meant he was not the one that killed the toad boss. The toad boss evaporated and a skill book was left on the ground.
It was the toad skin skill of the boss version. That meant it was much more powerful compared to the normal one. Since Cade was not the one killing the toad boss, he decided to give the skill book to Shihoon and Jonathan.
Jonathan flatly refused the skill because he got a lot of them already thanks to Cade and Shihoon decided to take it.
Cade had a feeling that Shihoon was the one dealing the most damage to the toad boss because he was attacking inside the toad with his mole.
When Cade asked why he learned two contradicting skills, Shihoon said it was easier to take a picture without anyone noticing…
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