► Skill Evolution! ◄

Congratulations! The skill Technomagic has reached maximum Proficiency Points.

Skill Technomagic (Basic), can evolve into Technomagic (Medium).

Requirements for Evolution…

• S – Rank Elemental Cores: 1/1 Fire Core – 0/1 – Water Core – 0/1 Wind Core – 0/1 Earth Core

• Symbiotic Core: 0/1

Waking up with an extreme headache, and a window appearing at my field of vision, yes, it appeared ON, my field of vision, instead of the MPD, I got surprised.

“Skill… Evolution?”

Sitting on the bed and glancing around, I found myself in an unknown room. Looking at my MPD, I checked this Skill Evolution thing. So, the skill can evolve. How so?

“Actually, why just now? I did so many things related to technology, and only after I reached LVL 12 it can evolve? What the shock?”

Getting off the bed, I stretch myself, feeling my body all stiff. Why though? After stretching and hearing pops throughout my body, I look towards the room’s door, and there is a girl looking to me with eyes wide.

“AH!”

Tilting my head in confusion, the girl simply rushed back outside. After an hour or so, someone entered the room again.

This time, it was a man. He had a stylish hair compared to anything I saw until now, an undercut one, being brown in color. He used glasses, with green eyes, and had an office mood around him.

“At last you woke up.”

“Excuse me, wha~t?”

I guess I had a very stupid expression on my face, since this man, and the girl right behind him, held their laugh a bit. That is the receptionist lady from before. Then this guy is the GM, probably.

“Ahem! I am the GM of Caerleon Adventurer’s Guild Branch. My name is Razis. It is a pleasure, Kenji-kun.”

“Yeah. A pleasure.”

“Anyway, let’s cut directly to business, shall we?”

With that, a very, very long conversation started. Which took an entire day to sort it out.

First of all, they brought food to me.

There was milk, bread, fish, meat, grains(like rice), salads, a lot of food. I was even surprised to find even coffee. COFFEE! I searched throughout the capital, but didn’t found any coffee. My favorite hot drink is COFFEE! Without milk, and just a little bit of sugar. Just a bit.

“It seems it was the right choice.”

And then, it started. As I was eating, the GM informed me that I was out for 2 weeks. That explain why my body was so stiff. When they searched for a doctor to analyze my situation, the doctor informed them, that I had emptied my Mana Reserves.

The Mana Reserves do not appear on the STATUS. It shows as the color of someone’s mana. My Mana color is blue, and by default, it has a wider Mana Reserve then the others.

With my Mana Reserves emptied, I would take quite some time to wake up, and there is no way to restore it, unless resting, so that’s why I was out for two weeks.

Thirdly, the town was saved, and lots of people wanted to thank me, but I refused politely. Also, all of the food was more than enough to me. But they didn’t back down from it.

“That won’t do. People will want to thank you, nonetheless.”

“Then I guess I’m gonna get the hell out of here.”

“Isn’t anything you want?”

Now he piqued my interest. Something that I wanted…

“Okay. This.” I pointed towards the cup with coffee.

“This drink?”

“Yes. It’s my favorite.”

“Just that?”

“Hmmm…” I took the MPD, and looked to the Evolution Skill List. It appeared there. “Where can I find S-Rank Wind, Earth and Water cores, then?”

“Those? Oh. Skill Evolution, huh?” I nodded. “I see. That would be to the south. Wind Cores you can find with Flying Monsters. Earth Cores is with the monsters within the Mining Dungeon. As for Water Cores, I guess it’s a given.”

“Yeah. I know.” The ocean, duh!

And we kept talking, over and over of other rewards. He even asked for the Volatilion’s parts. Specially the core. But I refused, since the body of the monster was… unstable.

“That… would be impossible.”

“Why?”

“The body is still in fission. If I try to take it out, then it’ll explode.”

“I see. Then that’s a shame.”

With that, we finished things up, and proceeded to the Magmasaur dismantling, and parts accessing.

“750 Gold Coins from the Quest Reward, plus 500 Gold coins for the Monster Parts. For a total of 1250 Gold Coins. We can provide 5 Platinum Coins only, is that acceptable?”

“No problem. I can deal with the jiggling of it.”

“Very well then. 5 Platinum Coins, and 750 Gold Coins. Please, uhm… Verify the quantity.”

Taking the MPD once again, I checked the pouches. No way in hell I would count all of thing. Yep. 5 P coins and 750 G coins. Nodding and taking the rewards, I walked back to the room assigned to me.

“Alright. Girls, come out.”

Both Amara and Kasumi were surprised with my words. They probably thought that I would start working again, huh?

“Master. You’re… Fine.”

“I wouldn’t consider myself fine exactly, but… yeah. What about you? Are you alright?”

Putting my hand on Amara’s head, she looked downwards, and started fidgeting a bit. She laughed with an “Ehehehe~” and was with a really happy expression on her face.

“Kasumi? Why are you pouting?”

(Hmph!)

She scoffed and looked away. I see. 2 weeks out, and she wants attention, huh? Grinning, I grabbed both of them, and jumped on the bed. Amara was surprised, and almost fainted. As for Kasumi… she was pleased at least.

“Well, I’m sorry for doing all of that. Sorry for not giving you two attention as well.”

Kasumi ears fell flat on her head, and she started making a strange sound. Can foxes Purr? I don’t remember. Amara already fell asleep at my side, hugging my hand. She was in her Small Viper form by the way. Her human appearance looks more… human? I don’t know how to specify that.

Her Viper body, which was basically her lower half, was more like a plant, really. As for her upper half, she looked more like a human woman. Her skin was paler before, but now, it was more beige. If she was to be another type of monster, I think she would be a Lamia.

Well, the two fell asleep, and I stayed there, petting them as they sleep. Was I bored? Yes. Could I do something? Nope. So, I just enjoyed petting them, while they were sleeping. Also, I was thinking of a way to send the Krakagator’s Core to the Witch at the Capital. But I fell asleep not long after.

After the two woke up, they left me work on repairing Raijin. After having breakfast, I repaired it, and started making another weapon. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to make new cells, not until I evolved my skill, at least.

As for the new weapon, I stopped midway. I didn’t had enough material. My Adamantite reserves were empty, since I’d made the bolts for Raijin before. I wasn’t able to use against the Volatilion, unfortunately, but I might be able to use them after I evolve my skill.

After finishing that, I walked towards the guild, and asked about sending packages to another city.

“You can send them through the guild. Does the address is in the capital?”

“Yes. I need to deliver it to the Alchemist’s Lair at the capital, but I also need to go south.”

“Hm. I understand. You can send the package today. A carriage will be going to the capital at noon.”

With that, I followed the receptionist’s advice, and prepared the package. Of course, I made something really hard to open, needing a Monster Core to do so. Well. Will the Witch find out, or will she rage quit? I look forward to it!

Finishing with that, I searched for a carriage to the south. There was one that would go the port city, but it would only depart in 2 days. So I had free time in my hands.

“What should I do?”

Looking to my MPD, I glanced through the list of Cores I needed, and remembering what the GM said to me, I had only one option.

“Well, to the Mining Dungeon!”

It was just 2 hours of travel towards there, and the Dungeon wasn’t really deep. Only 20 floors? I mean, it is low in quantity, but really hard, I heard. Walking out of the reconstruction, and out of the town, I followed the path the Town’s Guard informed me.

The path to the dungeon wasn’t hard, and there was very few monsters on the way there. Different from the dungeon close to the capital, where it had super powered monsters close to the city. Which, doesn’t make sense.

The entrance of the dungeon was downwards, with rails for mining carts at the entrance.

“Let’s see what this place will provide us.”

The first floor, had small rock monsters. Literally monsters in the shape of rocks and crystals. Their drops were mainly low purity ores.

As for the crystal ones, they dropped some gems, but all of them were the size of the tip of my pinky finger. Really smol.

Second floor, were Rock Golems. I thought they would drop Earth Cores, but no. They did dropped slightly purer small cores though. Just slightly. Also, I found 3 unique Golems on this floor. Iron, Bronze, and Steel Golems. The Steel Golems were bigger than the others, with more resistance to impacts, and slashes. Alas, they dropped their entire body.

By the way, to defeat them, I got help from Amara to pin them down in place, while I rushed behind them, and strike a soft spot. The soft spot, was located at the neck, and if you pushed something sharp downwards that soft spot, it would hit the core maintaining the Golem in place.

Third floor were Treants. Not normal Treants, mind you. But actually Ironwood Treants. Ironwood not as wood that is hard as iron, but the alloy of Ironwood. You can find it in nature, or make it yourself. It is made out of Ebony wood and iron by the way. Their drops? 1/3 of Ironwood ingots.

Fourth floor was a mix of the three first floors, so it wasn’t really interesting. The drops of this floor was much better than the others though. The ores could be classified as medium purity levels. Also, the Ironwood ingots were complete, not just half of them.

Fifth floor and ahead… They were… Traumatizing… Why? Because it were insects there. Mix insects with rocks, gems and ores, and you have the fifth to ninth floor.

Fifth floor were giant beetles, the size of a human, just more bulky. Imagine giant versions of the Hercules, Goliath, and Titan Beetles. Their jaws and wherever those things they had were, could break metals easily. Also, they were collecting ores, for an unknown reason. Specially low purity Mythril.

Sixth floor… Those things. Those abominations. Black. Lustrous and… giant. Roa… I can’t say their names! It is a taboo saying their names! Anyway, I asked Kasumi to set the entire floor on fire. She did so without caring if the drops would remain or not. And honestly? I didn’t care about the drops either.

Alas, their drops didn’t burn though. They were their wings only. And you know what’s worse? The drops are good. Like, really good!

“Urgh! I… Can’t! This is disgusting! I! Gh! NO!”

“Uhmm… Master? This can fetch money right? Why you won’t take it?”

“Because it’s gross! Look at these things!”

“Uhmm… Even if you gonna get a lot of money?”

“Guh! Fine!”

Using my Digi-Scan, I stored all of those drops, while holding myself to puke.

“Let’s go.”

Seventh floor, were Praying Mantis. The difference from the normal ones I used to know? Instead of normal front legs, they had blades. Made out of Mythril to make things worse. Their drops were the blades and eyes.

Eighth floor were… Centipedes… No comments. Actually, their drops were their jaws, carapace and legs. Very hard by the way.

At the ninth floor, were moths. They had the capability to spread some kind of paralyzing spores when attacked. Their drops were their wings by the way.

At the tenth floor, was the boss room. It was a giant metal snake. A Mythril Snake. It reminded me of a certain giant, steel snake, that is also a pocket monster.

“What a drag. This’ll gonna take some time.”

Amara reverted into her giant Viper form, and Kasumi started preparing her spells. As for me, I had one of the Mantis’s Blades on my left hand, and Satz at my right.

The giant snake not only had Mythril Scales on its body, but also spikes going through on the sides. It was really big, much more so than a bus. Like, three time that? But as it’s body was going, the head was the biggest part, while the tip of its tail was my size.

Kasumi started attacking, sending packs of dark balls of fire and lightning at the snake. Its size didn’t help much, and the two magic spells hit it cleanly. The fire hit its head, and the lightning hit its side.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t very effective. It did gave the giant snake a crack on the scales at its side. Not much, but it did.

Amara started coiling around the serpent, holding its mouth with her hands. As for me, I held the mantis’s blades and tried to cut through the snake’s scales. It did pierced and cut it into, but the blade broke and got lodged on the scales.

“Great.”

With that, I shot Satz over and over, reloading and shooting once again. The Tungsten bullets at least pierced the snake’s scales, but it was getting harder to fight it.

The HP of the Snake was falling slowly. Amara was still trying to stop the snake, but it tossed her away. Its focus was now on me. Great.

It tried to gobble me up, but with Kasumi’s help, a fireball hit its head, and made the snake gobble air. While the snake’s head gone to my right, I jumped to my left. With that, I rushed behind the snake and shot on its back. While I did that, there was a crystal right at the back of its head.

Seeing that, one of my shots hit there. It cracked with a loud sound, and the snake straightened its body up, and lashed its tail at me. Jumping, I avoided the tail by a hairs breadth, but the tail hit Amara, who was just about to get off the wall.

“Gah!”

“Ah. Oops.”

(Pfft!)

“Kasumi~ Don’t… PFFT!… Don’t laugh!”

“Will you two please, help!”

Amara noticed that we were about to laugh, so she called for us. She was holding the tail, and I rushed towards the snake once again, with Kasumi back at my shoulder.

“Alright! Listen up! There’s a crystal at the back of the snake’s head! Amara! Hold it there! We will finish it as soon as possible!”

“Then do it already!”

The snake was glaring between me and Amara, but didn’t know which one to deal with it first. Please, go to Amara. And it did!

It tried to bite Amara, but she used her… -hair?- I don’t know, to prevent the snake from doing so.

With that, we seized the opportunity, and climbed on the snake’s body, holding myself on its scales to not fall or be tossed around. As it was fighting Amara, I was being swung from side to side, almost falling every time.

“Shock! Hold it in place!”

“I’m trying!”

After climbing the damn snake towards the back of its head, Kasumi hopped off, and used a binding spell. As for me, I just put the gun at point blank range on the crystal, and shot.

HISAAAAA~!

And with that, the snake straightened its body up, and fell on the ground limp. Also, I fell on Amara’s chest. It was really soft by the way.

After a bliss moment(really short), I jumped to the ground, and walked to the middle of the room, where a big chest was. Inside, there were 5 chunks of high purity Mythril ore, and of course, the drops of the snake.

Some scales of it, a medium silvery core, fangs, venom sack(it had one, albeit really small) and lastly, its meat. Yes meat. Using the MPD, it showed me that it was a high quality meat. Nice, looks like I’ll need to learn how to prepare it.

We proceeded afterwards towards the next floors.

The next floors… were strange monsters.

Spider-Ants from eleventh to thirteenth floor. They had variants, like colors, queen, and king. The queen was the most powerful, and I fought it with Kasumi and Amara, since there was two Spider-Ant Knights. The king had only two small ones with him.

Fourteenth to Sixteenth floor, were Flirers. Basically, insects, like mosquitos. But… it were nests of them. Fourteenth floor were larva Flirers. If you let them alive for some time, they would enter the ground, entering into a cocoon. After that, they would evolve in a matter of seconds to their adult forms.

Not only that, but they could evolve even further. The sequence was like this:

• Larva → Adult → Armored/Acid/Some Element → Apex

The Fifteenth were Adult forms of the Flirers, and at the Sixteenth, it was a mix of the three evolved forms. Thankfully, it didn’t had an Apex. Oh, and the MPD was giving me lots of info.

And there was the Seventeenth to Nineteenth floors. It were… strange monsters to be honest. They had 3 legs, with crystals surrounding the tip of them. Their names? Crystalights. They had bio-luminescent sources on those crystals.

The MPD informed me that the crystals were hard to come by. Even on the dungeon, their crystals weren’t easy to get. And the reason why was plausible. The weak spot on the Crystalights, were the crystals at their legs.

And when they die, they explode, instead of dropping something. But, there is a chance, of only 5% for when they explode, it drops some crystals. Kinda neat.

At the Nineteenth floor though, it was a boss room, before the boss room. What the shooock? Nonetheless, we entered. Finding a giant, reaaaally giant Crystalight. The difference though, was the crystal colors.

The normal Crystalights, had yellow, green, red and blue crystals. But this one, had purple crystals.

The battle wasn’t that interesting. Avoid the rocks that it trowed, which were more like boulders, and the stomps it did on the ground, sending shock waves towards us. Other than that, it wasn’t that hard.

Except that if you didn’t destroy all the crystals on its legs, then it would regenerate and be full HP again.

As for the last floor?

“What the shock is that?”

It looked like a lizard, except for the lustrous dark blue scales on its body. MPD, help me out!

► Terrae Drake ◄

A unique type of Terra Drake, where it has its scales made out of Mondálium.

It has high resistance against any kind of physical and magic attacks.

It has a very small weak spot right behind it neck, but it’s protected with a scale on the upper part of its neck.

It has the capability to breath some kind of beam.

“A drake? That’s surprising. Never saw one before.”

Entering the room, the giant beast, who was sleeping, woke up. Its golden eyes looked towards us, and with a growl, it got up. I won’t lie, to a drake, it was… small. Around 4 buses together?

Its claws was ¾ of my body, and its jaws could snap Amara’s Viper form easily. And the only weak spot is behind its neck? Yay~. Just great.

The Drake showed its teeth, and launched at us. Amara was back at her giant Viper form, and Kasumi on my shoulder. Against this guy, she couldn’t be on her own, so Kasumi stayed with me all the time.

“This thing has resistance against magic and physical attacks! Amara! Use your necrotic venom on it! It might give us some advantage!”

“Got it!”

“Kasumi! As soon as he opens its mouth to use a breath! Use a lightning ball!”

(Yes!)

With orders given, they did as I said. Unfortunately, Amara had to stall it for a good time. And a really long time passed. My Tungsten bullets were useless. They broke as soon as it touched the Mondálium scales. Guess it’s not just talk, that Mondálium is super resistant.

“Better give me lots of it just to kill this thing!”

After 10 minutes of running around, avoiding claws, and bites, the Terrae Drake got pissed, and opened its mouth. A purplish light illuminated his mouth, and he was about to shoot. Just then, Amara tossed a blob of black ooze at the drake’s mouth, and after it swallowed, Kasumi tossed the lightning ball.

It had quite the effect, by the way. The Necrotic Venom took effect instantly. It wasn’t that strong, but the drake had Poisoned (Medium) on his Status Condition, and Internal Bleeding to stack on the equation.

Its HP was falling steadily, and to top it all off, the purple light exploded inside its mouth, since Amara forcibly closed its mouth with her body. Unfortunately, her body got in the explosion, and the explosion made the mouth of the drake open, destroying her lower body.

“Amara!”

Taking a clear cylinder with a small crystal inside within my hands, I pressed the top button, and tossed at the drake’s face.

What it was, you ask? It was a Flash bang grenade.

The grenade exploded at the drake’s face, and while it was distracted, I grabbed Amara, and we hid behind one rock on the room.

“Shock! Why she always get the short end of the stick!”

One thing that I discovered, and it was by chance, is that Amara can regenerate super quick, if an HP potion is given to her. She really gets back really fast with that.

“C’mon. Drink.”

After she just gulped, her lower body started to literally grow. And in less than 10 seconds, she was full once again.

“Ugh! Master~ I’m not doing this again~”

She was a bit wobbly, but was alive. Good. Now for the Drake… Wha?

I was speechless. Why? The drake was blinded! It was moving all around, sweeping its claws at anything around. Looking to its mouth, the lower jaw got… burst? There was blood dripping from his mouth, and upon looking with the MPD, its HP was lowering with a frightening speed!

“It had more than 250K HP, but its already at 32K?”

There was now Internal Bleeding, Bleeding (Heavy) and the Poisoned (Medium), was now Rotting (Heavy). But every time his HP fell, it was back at 32K. Why?

Looking closely through its title and skills, there was something. A Skill that got my attention. It was Extreme Regeneration. In short, it would activate only when part of the total HP was down. So it works like that. But with the three effects piled up, it’s not working that well.

The skill was really good, if you think about it. But, it had a gimmick. After the skill activates, it will enter in a cool-down state, and would only work again after 1 day. That’s certainly a nice skill!

When the regeneration was gone, I jumped over the stone, and rushed towards the drake. It roared, and probably detected me. It had the Seismic Sense skill, which allows the user to use the vibrations on the ground, to detect anything.

Nonetheless, it opened its mouth. Charging the same light from before. Seeing that, I took the last cylinder, another grenade, and glanced at the drake. Will this really work? It was a different one, housing inside a small sphere. It was… an acid sphere.

I got this from the Witch. She got it from a Super Acid Slime. Its only use was to melt things. Like, everything. Don’t even know how she put it inside the sphere, but it was the only thing I had in hands. Well! Whatever!

Pressing the button, I tossed at the gaping mouth of the drake, and it swallowed. With that, I rushed around the room, so to not get the beam at my face.

“C’mon! Take effect already!”

The beam was fired, and I rushed with all of my life to not die. I ain’t dying here! After sometime, the beam was now hitting everything. Up and down, left and right. When I stopped, and looked towards the drake, its stomach was melting.

“It worked!”

With a loud slam on the ground, the drake roared and fell limp. After a few seconds, I received a lot of XP, and both Amara and Kasumi as well. The drake’s body got absorbed by the ground, and soon, a chest was right at the middle.

“Let’s see what’s inside.”