Chapter 37:  Exp Continues to Rise (4)   

These cute little things, finally revealing themselves .

Awakened Essences .

"I just hit level 63 right now . I only have one skill that's over level 90 . "

"Is that so? Even if you're level 63, you don't normally reach skill level 100?"

"Of course . That's obvious . Mana is limited, and the experience required to level up skills is enormous . "

"Hm… Hyung . I think I found something funny to show you . "

"What's that?"

Jong Ho's eyes widened as he fumbled through the stones .

He opened his palm to uncover three Awakened Essences .

For over three months, I had spent at least 12 hours a day, or up to 18 hours a day, hunting without any breaks .

Even with that, I was only able to earn 2 Awakened Essences .

But with the mimic, I had just earned three .

Jong Ho did not look like he could close his mouth anytime soon .

Jong Ho said that he was able to earn an Awakened Essence through party hunting once .

But he had to share the profit between 8 members .

The records in the trading center show that since the profit was split between 9 members, it became obvious to anyone that these were low leveled players .

Jong Ho continued to speak .

"I'm continued to be surprised . Really . "

"Hyung . I'm almost scared of opening the duffle backpack . "

"Don't you have one or two skills that are near level 100?"

"Of course . There are a few . "

'Plenty of skills begging to be Awakened' is the truth though .

"That's good . You'll need the Awakened Essences soon . "

"Still, you should take one, hyung . It doesn't come by often . Once you get a skill to level 100, how could I let you wait?"

"I'll say I received the skill books because they were warrior class only . But this isn't . "

"Should I feed it to the hounds?"

"Yeah . This is something I wouldn't receive even if it was fed to the hounds . I've lived my life by reading people and keeping my pride . Don't make me doubt anymore . "

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"Stubborn . "

"Yeah! Being a hyung, how can I live depending only on you? Let's see the rest of the gear . "

Jong Ho rubbed his nose once with his finger, and began to search through the equipments buried under all the blood stones .

It's little habits like this that make it impossible to hate him .

I also joined Jong Ho's search .

"Looks like all the gear is useless?"

"Why? You don't have any mana rings . Stop using that skull ring . The ring and necklace raises your mana, so you can use it . "

"Not pretty . I have a thing called preference, so I'd appreciate it if you let me stick to it . "

"Sounds like you're very spoiled . You sure you're not going to use it?"

"Yes . Stones and the gear are going to be sold, and I'll give you half . If you won't even receive this, I'm not going to meet you again . "

"You're just like a pumpkin farmer . Thanks!"

The items we acquired through hunting with Jong Ho were amazing .

Three Awakened Essences, skill books, blood stones, and the rare Titan Boots .

It wouldn't have been possible without the mimic .

It was the first time Jong Ho had seen a mimic, and he had been Awakened for years .

I felt as though the mimic's tongue that was sticking out would appear in my dreams for the next couple of days .

* * *

The amount summoned by 'Devil Avatar' had increased by two .

It was due to arriving at skill level 100 .

Due to the 60 minutes cool down, it bothered me a lot .

But thankfully I didn't only earn 1 skill experience for summoning it .

The enemies hit by the summoned's skills gave experience as well .

Red . Blue . Yellow . These are what they are called .

Personally, I liked Blue, since it could cast frost magic .

With one cast, there would be days when two Blues would come out .

I only had Frost Orb as far as frost magic would go, so I needed frost magic that would slow down my enemy's movement .

The spot was being filled by Blue instead .

The 4m avatar displayed some incredible destructive force .

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At level 100, they could slow down the movement of the level 18 monsters just by being near them .

Something similar to a frost aura .

Avatars didn't only attack with magic .

Each hand held a giant sword .

The shape was something like that of table knife .

Their attacks, both physical and magic, would freeze opponents solid . How much the mobs froze depended on how many times they attacked .

The sword attacks were physical, but it had effects as though if it was enchanted .

From the sky rained icicles while the avatar swung its giant sword .

Kind of made me feel bad for the monsters .

The avatar's weakness was that they were mortal .

Fire Shock and Gravity Laser caused friendly fire damage .

I could put shields on them and freely cast magic myself .

However, taking care of it myself felt better .

In dungeons where only physical attacks work, it was obvious that they would prove useful .

Also, the summoned would attack until its life force ceased .

Which means that after I summon them, I would be able to freely cast spells with both my hands .

After summoning them for the first time and ending the hunting with them…

I had the worry of 'How will I bring these giants around?'

With the pressure it exuded and its size, people may mistake it as a portal explosion .

But I found out that you could shrink the Devil Avatars to the point where they could fit in your pockets .

Anytime at my will .

They've become something like my own Pokemon .

With their size reducing to that of a finger, they looked a lot cuter than I thought they'd be .

From using the Devil Avatar, I was able to find out the potentials of a summoner .

Fast skill leveling, destructive power, survivability, and even cuteness .

I became really greedy for another high ranking summoner skill .

* * *

It's been about half a month since I've hunted with Jong Ho .

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I had learned 'Iceberg' and 'Meteor Call' .

Both were A+ ranking skills, displaying devastating force and price .

But with the vast amounts of B ranking stones and gear earned from the mimic, I was able to amass an earning far more than what I thought I could obtain .

With all the money saved up until now, along with half a month's worth of hunting, I purchased them .

When I first obtained the Awakened Essences, I thought to sell them so I could afford to purchase more skills .

While this method would speed up my growth immediately, it would be a heavy lost if you considered the future .

I would only be earning more and more money, to the point where I'd be sick of it .

But no matter how much money you had, you couldn't obtain Awakened Essences .

You'd know it just by looking at Yoon Jong-sun, who worked under Ilseong .

I used one of the essences on Reflect Shield .

Compared to the other shields, the Reflect Shield was superior .

It was a worthwhile investment since it would increase the reflect chance as well as the damage reflected back .

The other two leftovers, I was definitely going to use it on the A+ rank spells .

Originally I was planning to buy Glacial Field, as it did more damage than I thought .

It had an AoE freezing crowd control effect as well .

But I could get the freezing crowd control from the Devil Avatar .

Of course due to the summoned being random out of the three types, there was a chance that Blue won't come out .

But to hunt faster, I needed stronger skills first . That was my choice .

Out of all the skills I've learned so far, none of them had a cast time .

But both Iceberg and Meteor Call had one .

At level 1, both skills needed 5 minutes to cast .

And both had a cool down of 5 minutes .

Thus, it took 10 minutes to be able to finish casting it again .

Thankfully for every 20 skill levels, the cool down would be reduced by 10% .

So if I was able to Awaken these skills and get them up to level 100 again, I could use them without any limit .

It'd only apply to me though .

From level 1, it used up 4,000 mana, and as the spell leveled, so did the cost .

Only a magician who put all his points into the mana stat until level 160 could use one of these spells once when it's at level 1 .

To a regular Awakened, forget about getting it Awakened, you couldn't even reach level 100 .

To test the destructive capabilities of these spells firsthand, I entered the dungeon after obtaining the skills .

Since I was equipping the Titan Boots, my movespeed had increased more than two times .

Running to the end of the dungeon didn't even take 5 minutes .

It was a massive upgrade from the Boots of Haste, which took 10 minutes .

Arriving at the end of the dungeon with 10 monsters in tow, I used the skill .

From what I've seen at the guild pvp, both skills seemed to exist only for the purpose of complete annihilation .

First test was with the Meteor Call .

Above the rabble of monsters flew down a flaming meteor .

The poison naga was instantly decimated due to its weak defensive stats .

The corpses that were left quickly disintegrated, not even leaving ashes behind .

After the meteor falls, it continues to explode and causes damage over time .

The next skill was Iceberg .

The griffons flying above that wasn't directly hit still flew about without any major injuries .

However .

A massive iceberg came forth from the earth, swallowing them whole .

Without even being able to use Final Attack, they were instantly trapped in the ice and became frozen chicken .

The insides of the iceberg continued to split apart and freeze again .

Almost like mixing puzzle pieces or a rubik's cube .

Within 5 seconds, the 4 griffons had been ripped apart to pieces until I couldn't recognize them anymore .

Only a level 1 skill .

But the damage it caused was more than sufficient to surprise me .

Since it had a cool down and cast time, I couldn't level it up quickly . However, I was certain that I must level them up by any means possible .

Entering the dungeon again, I casted both spells at the same time .

Both skills were of the same level .

However, both skills canceled each other out as if to remind me that they're both polar opposites, causing zero damage to the monsters .

If I cast a ton of buffs on myself and debuff the enemies, nothing would be a match against these spells . That's if the dungeon mobs weren't immune to spells though .

"Does casting Meteor Call and Iceberg on each hand still raise the experience? Or doesn't it?"