"Heh- exactly. You are already at level 6 yet you are joining us lowbies when you are supposed to be doing a different quest with that level?"
"No man, I've been killing some monsters at the forest earlier, that's why I managed to get a higher level without taking on the quests."
"Oh... I see. Well, I guess that's also possible huh. You must've been really power leveled by your friends."
Devin didn't answer and only gave a quick smile. He can definitely not tell anyone about the fact he got extra exp just by buying some skill books that cost some amount of gold that no player till this day would have. They wouldn't even believe him if he told them about how much gold he had.
"So, am I in or what?"
"Yeah, you're in. Since you're the only one that we need then we'll be moving out now."
After being added to the party, he saw that there were two females with the rest of them being males. They were all at level 4 with him being the only one at level 6.
"Alrighty then, let's get that bread!"
After that brief moment, they immediately set off and have encountered their first monster about 15 meters away from the village gates.
(Night Buff)
Stats:
HP: 150/150
STR: 13 AGI: 20
INT: 5 VIT: 15
Skills:
Steals 5% of targets HP.
Deals 30 damage to target and splash damage of 50% to nearby enemies.
Encountering this type of monster for the first time, Devin was surprised when he saw its status being sent to the party chat. It appears that somebody had already encountered one before and has defeated it. He noticed this fact when he defeated several of those Rabid Dogs and saw their status.
"There's three of them. Since we already decided this back before I'll just remind everybody of the plan. Split up into three. Dork, Mest and I will tank them first then the rest of you deal damage. When you get too much aggro then we switch and we take over dealing the damage."
Devin was already briefed about this when they left the village so he immediately followed the directions and when the party leader has successfully managed to take the aggro of one of the three bats he immediately did his role and started hacking it to death. Due to his high level and stats, he managed to kill the bat before it changed its aggro to him. Fortunately, the bat's AI was not that smart enough to use its aerial advantage which caused its quick demise. After collecting its loot, Devin took note of the bonus Exp that was granted to him for killing a monster with the night buff which he looked at with delight.
A minute after the battle, Devin had also noticed that the counter on his quest had increased by one. After another three minutes, the others had also managed to kill their own targets.
"We'll recover some HP and when we recovered about 90% then we will continue."
The party leader was already at complete health due to them finishing their monster quicker than the others. Despite being skeptical of Devin at first, he began to understand that he probably wasn't one of those who trick lowbies and grief them. He was still cautious though as there was still a level gap between the two of them.
After a while, the party has already completed about three-fifths of their quests but because most of them were just casual gamers and had jobs or classes to take tomorrow which meant that they still need to sleep. So, they decided to call it a day and once again returned to the village and have logged-out leaving Devin alone.
Since he didn't have anything in particular to do the next day, he decided to continue playing until he felt tired enough. Eventually, he also saw that he received a message and when he checked it, a user with the name of has left him with a friend request with the note "Hey bro it's me".
He lightly chuckled and accepted the friend request. Surprised he saw that his little brother has nearly caught up to him and was just a level away from reaching the same level as him.
"Well, it looks like somebody's working hard. Geez, how can I sleep knowing that my little brother's already reaching my level? I better finish up this quest and reach level 10 quickly."
Despite being disabled, Devin was still quite competitive. Especially with his little brother who likes to brag.
Quest Progress:
Vampiric Bat 5/5
Slime 2/5
Giant Rat 2/5
Death Worm 5/5
Horned Boar 1/5
Looking at his Progress, he was very conflicted. He had already killed the monsters that he could have done by himself. The ones left are either strong or those that he needs a party to kill. The Horned Boar would belong to the former as it almost wiped out their party if he didn't use a skill just in time. His party members didn't notice it though, as he only used the ones that temporarily increased his stats like Lethality, Haste, and Endure. On the other hand monsters like the Giant Rat burrows into a hole when it reaches 10% health which makes it harder to kill it while the Slime was really hard to find. Every now and then they would appear but it wasn't as often as the other monsters.
"I guess I can still try? After all, I already have some skills."
However, since most of the players are ones who aren't fully invested in gaming, the village had freed up some space. This was bad for Devin though as he could no longer find a party that was gonna do the same quest as him. Most of the players left are the hardcore gamers who would probably be at a higher level by now.
"Well... I guess I'll go alone then?"
"Halt! Young lad, it is currently night time. Monsters outside are very active and are stronger during the night. as a friendly reminder, I suggest you start your journey when the first beam of sunlight shines again."
The same village guard tried to stop him but he disregarded it and went past through the village gate to once again fight some monsters.