Chapter Hundred

Artha's new day within the game started with dumping few potions to Edgeless Blade and rushing to don the uniform and clean the place. The exuberance in the village had apparently increased after dungeon opening. That or players were spending coins like nothing because the time to purchase gift crates was near. The former was most likely though. He sorted, dumped rightly, collected and hoarded many more and it was done. Next, right into the inn's kitchen. He polished the skill he had learnt. He didn't even let out a peep while working. No request for recipes, no nagging.

The cook was happy. The result? A quest and a task. Yep. The obligatory task related to dungeons was there. But Artha was more interested in quests. Thankfully, more than half of the requirements was collecting edible items. After getting the taste of extra rewards from quests, he loved getting quests more than tasks. Hmm! He still needed some items before he could handover the things for quest completion. There goes the chance of getting S+ grade. Better the grading of quest completion, better were rewards. Maybe better the multiplier bonus. The last part needed verification though.

He ran around happily to chat with many NPCs collecting tasks and having a daily chat. He didn't forget to stock up his trader bags. He decided to purchase largest bag available. He was now official trading partner in barely formed guilds. He had to carry the requested items till the handover. Better yet, purchase all sorts of items from that bunch of players.

Well, right now he had only three lifestyle job recognised by the game - trader, apprentice cook and apprentice herbologist, unrecognised as he had not handed over all the items yet. Cooking - he helped in the morning. It's a slow way for raising the levels but atleast he was trying. Herbologist - he still needed to collect plant based items correctly to get the job properly. He apparently was laying a strong foundation, whatever that meant. Oh, he needed to learn more. He had a solid foundation there atleast. The book he had read was not the beginer's book.

The problem was trading. He made his first pot of gold from it. He had high expectations from this side gig. Unfortunately, he made money instead of coins using that as based. Which was great, actually. Still, it was a fact that this lifestyle job was struck in the bottom. His aim was to get it leveled up before leaving this village, whenever that might be. That would become a solid foundation, a strong base for his journey to make more money.

He had to pay through the nose to get the largest trader bag. But that's okay. He upgraded it to max with all the available XP he had stored. Call him a walking talking guild warehouse.

Then he rushed towards dungeons. He needed extra XP. Sela and the others were already there. Why were they still waiting? They wanted the free potions Artha would give as convenience fee to each one. As usual, though it was second team run, he took the role of items collector.

The cleared maps were updated more with innumerable deaths. But they would clear only till the level it was bearable. Yep! Till much of the weapons, armours etc got upgraded, it would be better to clear the known paths and not rush forward. However tempting the offer to pioneer the dungeon might be. Even the Indies, the independent players had decided to play nice and slow. All were waiting for newer items and potions from the gift crates which can boost the power.

Artha was a bit distracted today. No, he was not dreaming of gift crates. He wanted to try what NPCs had said before. To collect items within the dungeon. The problem - other than whatever these bunnies were nibbling, they was nothing. The probability of something present was higher as they progress through the dungeons, he concluded. Another experiment halted due to no results.

They had killed enough bunnies that their team could finish the run faster. They could have, but did not. Reason- more areas to cover. Yes. The daring plan was to cover the sections with single elites and then trace backwards. So technically, every tracing backwards meant they killed one Elite bunny.

The first Elite bunny died very soon after they entered dungeon. Is this a joke? Were elites so easily found? It felt soon, that's all. As compared to yesterday when they fought an elite at the end.

Still this was good. They had lots of potions, the durability of weapons were not low and the stamina was high. And, they had experience in killing it in a team.

Artha finally transitioned to a new staff. He had to, one of the drops from normal bunny monster was level 4 common staff. Even that was way better than his training staff. Thanks to the new staff, the glass cannon morphed into a better glass cannon. And the damage by the team increased another notch.

Artha had some serious problem to getting used to the new staff though. But they were facing normal bunny monsters, so it didn't affect the team much. Sela, with lots of experience, decided to push him through intensive regime in few sections. He had to take lot of mana potions. But result was good. By the time he faced elite bunny, he could wield the staff properly. Fast rapid damage while saving one's skin is the key to handle an elite.

Elite bunny died, team relaxed a bit and completely emptied that section of dungeon. Now! As others just rested, recovering stamina and resting, Artha rubbed his hands and started to loot the elite. Same three points- head, chest, abdomen.

Oh look, someone was in luck! There was level 5 uncommon staff here. Oh! The attributes were leaning towards healing. The healer on team had to pay through the nose to get that staff.

"Do you feel like the loots are more abundant today?" Jack asked.

"Yeah, it is." Artha answered first before anyone. " According to statistics I made, on an average,we made 40 coins and and 15 rabbit meat more than what we made yesterday for the same sections."

"Good Lord! You made statistics even for this!" Every one was shocked. Including Sela. Come on, Sela, you were in a guild before, how can you be shocked at this?

Second loot proved the point. It was another uncommon item - a pair of uncommon graves. Level 4. Still it's uncommon grade.

Everyone waited for the last loot. Aaand..it was nothing. Well, it happens. There was no hard and fast rule that there should be minimum three loots from elite. Anywhere between two to four was acceptable. And there were two uncommon items from the loot. So no loss there.

The experiment to carve rabbit meat failed again, much to amusement of the team members. Inspite of roasting he received, Artha was not sad. The skill was improving. Even that much is enough.

After a last look to see if he really missed something, Artha trotted towards the team which was tracing back.

Another branch. Explore till you reach the elite.