Skipping a day of school, of course...brought unwanted troubles. Being level 347 was strange as well. When using a disguise item that I got from the mage's association, they couldn't exactly give me an expensive, most high-tech disguise item. So I settled for an inferior disguise choker. The choker was pink in colour and matched my purple cardigan. It only changed my name and used an extremely little amount of mana. Not enough to hide my levels.
So when it was brought to the attention of 9 year olds, it was normal for them to be shocked and crowd around your table. There were only 15 students, so 3 people crowding was an exaggeration, but you get the idea. It was strange for people to come to my table in the first place. For humans, stats can be hiddened without the use of a disguise item. Otherwise, people would be picking fights in public.
When asked for a reason, all I could say was that I went to the dungeon "Harab". The spike in levels show just that, so it wasn't exactly impossible, but it was obviously quite unbelievable. Resuming my lesson a little later due to being scolded, 1 day didn't actually change much. I would ask Fez about what happened yesterday and she would reply, "Nothing much, same as usual." I found that odd as we were in the "first class". Education was supposed to be sped up, but I guess they were still nothing to Fez.
Anyway, I told Fez about how as a 7 year old, I'm not exactly educated enough to be part of her clan's research team. She said it was fine and that I could go to her families' secret facilities if I needed. Since she goes there to play with new technology sometimes. Rich people have it good huh~ Treating state of the art technology as a toy. Well, it's probably just Fez as her family was the only one boasting technology on par with that of the royal families'.
The king actually has his own royal research team and keeps most of the technology to himself. On the outside it looks like any other kingdom and their fortress-like royal palace, but on the inside, you can see things like the king's throne having strange outlines on it. This is probably just my inner-nerd, but I feel like that high-tech throne is hiding weapons underneath it.
'That's because it is. '(Bavner)
' Hey! It's rude to read other people's mind! '
' Sorry, I just heard my name from a distance and decided to focus on it. There's a higher chance of it being a terrorist instead of you. '(Bavner)
' Speaking of which, this voice... You're the old man who made the FBI joke in my head! The one during my weekend break! So I already caught your attention before the tournament! You sick lolicon. '
' I'm sorry! I can imagine the look of disgust on your face right now, oh ye-.. I mean, please stop! '(Bavner)
Ignoring the old man in my head. I decided to get a mental resistance bracelet, so that the king can no longer read or interrupt my thoughts. There was nothing different in school, so I waited patiently for lesson to end.
Immediately looking for an item shop, I bought a bracelet and headed for the dungeon. On other days I would buy magic gems to save my mana in dungeons. The minor boss changed to a nature manipulating monster that changes everytime I clear it. Going further than before, I went up to the area with level 700 monsters, before stopping. During the grinding, I practiced fighting to respond to any situation. Slowly, I incorporated [Shadow step] and [Abyssal dome] more and more into my fights. [Abyssal dome] had gone up to tier-2 and I got used to fighting under different amounts of gravity. At the ghost section, I would copy and learn some of their debuff spells, and in school I would try formulatting different components of said spells to add to my arsenal. Deciphering spells was a matter of practice, and I had plenty of that.
After 2 days of grinding, it was a saturday and my level had gone up. Resting on a bench at a park near the school, I open my status bar to look at my stats:
Name: Emily Shuu
Level: 503
Health: 2500/2500
Mana: 142 500/142 500
Strength: 2 000 000
Vitality: 250
Intelligence: 14 250
Agility: 315 600 000
Only a hundred more levels until I can evolve my class. The experience requirement for leveling up has already spiked in amount, I'm not sure how long more it takes to level up. On the second day of grinding, I had already reached the level 900 section of the dungeon. Gaining levels was gradually getting more difficult.
On the weekend, I received a nametag, lab coat and all the fancy stuff to prepare my debut at the secret research lab. Going through a series of security measures that consisted of disarming lethal traps and going through the correct dimensional doors, it took 5 minutes to finally make it in. There were magical stones embedded into the wall that power a tiny magic circle, giving a futuristic look and filling the area with cold air like an air conditioner.
It was a small group of less than 10 total scientist, and only 3 of them were entrusted with weapon research. There was even a device that looked slightly like a rifle, except there was no trigger and the user had to pour mana into the magic circle at the handle. In the barrel was a reusable tier-3 [explosion] formula, the barrel could concentrate the explosion and basically shot intense fire.
Though it looked good, the practicality was horrible as the range was barely 5 metres. If they used a higher tier, the gun itself may break so it technically formed some sort of dillema for them. Hmm~... "You guys should have [Shadow step] right? May-"
"AHH! Then we can shoot something far, but we need some form of arrow... A tiny form that can be inserted into the barrel..." (Scientist A)
"Why don't we just find a way to make magic gems smaller and insert them into the barrel? Since they're detonating outside, we can now also use high tier spells and build a mortar." (Scientist B)
"Ah, looks like I started something."
"Eh, it's okay. They're like this all the time. In fact you just gave them an idea. Guess I can expect more in the future." (Fez)
"Alright, time to indulge in the succes of generations of scientist, uhehe~"
"You don't have to get so excited. The lab can't run away from you yet.Mouu.. " (fez)
"Yet?!"
This continued on for 2 days, getting back to school was really tiresome. Having been a month, I got used to school life and found it incredibly dull. After another week of grinding experience, I finally grew to level 600.