Chapter 12 – First Friend
85th Winter Year 2500, Thumping Gorilla Dungeon, Level 5 Area.
'Boom!!' A small explosion occurred and dust flew around everywhere. Inside the small explosion, a thumping gorilla was looking at Wayne menacingly. "Roar!!!" The gorilla roared and it raised both its arms in the air.
The thumping gorilla smashed the ground with its arms and the ground cracked. The crack continued for around fifteen meters and the ground exploded. 'Boom!!!' Wayne used monkey jump and kept retreating.
"The Ground Breaking skill is too troublesome!" Wayne exclaimed while he retreated. The Ground Breaking skill was one of the four troublesome skills the thumping gorilla could use. The second most used skill was the Launch Jumper and the Ground Breaking skill was the fourth most used by the gorilla.
The gorilla saw Wayne backed off and used Launch Jumper to chase after him. Wayne did not get shocked and instead prepared to attack the incoming gorilla. Wayne landed on the ground and took a fighting stance.
Wayne pulled both his arms back and clenched his fist tightly. "Focus Energy!" Wayne used Focus Energy and mana concentrated on both hands. Wayne stared at the incoming gorilla.
The Thumping Gorilla was coming fast towards Wayne. Similar to Wayne, the Thumping Gorilla clenched its fists too and ready to punch Wayne.
Wayne saw the Thumping Gorilla's distance shortened and lowered his body and used Dash Plus to meet with the Thumping Gorilla.
"Roar!!!" The Thumping Gorilla roared and used its punch to attack the incoming Wayne. Once Wayne was closer, he too launched his punch towards the Thumping Gorilla.
Both of their fists met and a small explosion occurred. Both of them stood rooted on the ground. Both of their fists met and none of them were pushed back. Using all the strength they had, they tried to gain an advantage against each other.
Even though Wayne used his Jab combined with Focus Energy, he was at the stalemate with the Thumping Gorilla because the gorilla's punch was not a normal punch. It was a skill called the Kilo Punch. This skill was another one of the four troublesome skills as well as the most used skill out of the four.
'This stalemate cannot go on!' Wayne exclaimed in his mind. Wayne's feet were covered with mana. He used Focus Energy on his feet and lowered his body slightly. Wayne looked at the Gorilla's face and smiled.
He used Monkey Jump added with Focus Energy and managed to push the Thumping Gorilla's fists away. The gorilla's chest was opened and Wayne did not waste the time and hit the gorilla's chest with his Palm Strike skill.
'Pak!' The Palm Strike hit once. The gorilla was pushed back slightly and its chest concave slightly but it was still standing. 'Pak!' Another Palm Strike hit the gorilla's chest and it was pushed back once again. The concave chest turned deeper.
'Pak!!!' The third Palm Strike hit the gorilla's chest but this one was slightly different. Coated with mana from Focus Energy, the third Palm Strike was powerful. Once it hit the Thumping Gorilla's chest, it flew back a few meters before it started rolling on the ground a few meters more.
After that, the rolling stopped and the gorilla stopped moving. It died. Wayne looked at the gorilla's body and smiled. 'Clap! Clap! Clap!' someone started clapping. Wayne looked behind him and Bendy was coming towards him while clapping.
"You are becoming better and better," said Bendy while smiling and he continued, "When you used the Monkey Jump during the stalemate is the best!"
"That was nothing impressive," said Wayne while smiling. He and Bendy walked towards the gorilla's body to loot anything they could. Wayne extracted the essences, skill books, and technique stealthily while Bendy decided to get some of the gorilla's meat for their dinner that day.
Sixteen days had passed since Wayne met Bendy. Since that day, they had been hunting together in the dungeon. They got closer and their friendship got deeper. Bendy was suspicious of Wayne at the beginning but after a few days with Wayne, he realized that Wayne was just a nice and kind guy.
After that, Bendy started getting familiar with Wayne, and his trust towards Wayne built slowly. He got to know more and more about Wayne and they became as close as brothers.
Due to Bendy being his cousin, Wayne worked hard to form a connection with Bendy. He wanted to get closer to his family and thus worked hard to gain Bendy's trust. In the beginning, Wayne thought that Bendy had trusted him but soon, he realized that Bendy was wary about him.
After he figured that out, he did his best to gain Bendy's trust. Having your family suspicious of you was devastating. Wayne knew that feeling immediately after he found out that Bendy was suspicious of him.
Luckily, his hard work paid off. A few days later, Bendy's suspicion was gone and Bendy started to get to know more about Wayne sincerely.
The brotherhood between them strengthened much more a few days ago when they were attacked by a group of Thumping Gorilla. There were ten of them and all of them used the four troublesome skills making the battle extremely difficult.
Both of them were injured but thanks to their teamwork, they won the battle without suffering any heavy injuries. The worst injury they got was broken bones which they easily healed by drinking a high-quality potion.
During that fight, Bendy showed everything he had and Wayne finally knew Bendy's real power. Even so, Wayne realized that Bendy was much weaker than him.
Bendy excelled in his strength and dexterity and it was clearly shown in that battle when he easily severed the arms of the gorillas many times. Not only that, but his dexterity also saved his life many times by evading the attack of the gorillas at the last minute.
As for Wayne, he did not use his full power. The fight was hard but he never activated his cultivation map and never once used his most powerful tier 1 skill, the 10 Palm Strike. He also did not use his Magic Iron Skin skill even once.
The reason for not using them was nothing complicated. It was because there was no need to use them. Wayne's usual power was enough to deal with the gorillas. He suffered a few injuries but they were small ones. He was bruised a few here and there unlike Bendy with broken bones.
He had experienced fighting a group of gorillas, so he did not find it difficult. More so after he had powered up considerably for the past few days. The group of gorillas was child's play.
After witnessing Wayne's capability when fighting the gorillas, Bendy was shocked and amazed. Wayne's claim of him being level 5 at the beginning of their meeting was real and a few days had passed and Wayne might be at level 6 or 7 (Bendy's assumption).
Bendy had powered up too but he was not as strong as Wayne and he realized that Wayne's current power could easily sweep through the level 5 area. The level 5 area was not challenging to Wayne and Bendy knew the reason why Wayne decided to go through this easy area.
All because Bendy wanted to find the Drumming Gorilla. When Bendy realized that, he was thankful and appreciated Wayne's kindness. His trust in Wayne grew so much from this event. He was pumped up to find the Drumming Gorilla. He did not want to shackle Wayne at the level 5 area.
Be that as it may, they had been looking for the past few days but there was no sight of Drumming Gorilla. It was the 85th Winter and in five days, the Diam Academy's Entrance Exam would start. That day was the last day they could stay in the dungeon.
There would be a lot to prepare before they departed to the Diam Continent and they would need the five days to prepare everything. If they could not find the Drumming Gorilla that day, they would need to leave immediately.
They walked for a few hours but there was no sight of the Drumming Gorilla. All they met was the Thumping Gorilla. Wayne and Bendy had changed their strategy when dealing with the Thumping Gorilla. They decided to do the one-hit-kill. They had no time to waste fighting the common gorillas.
Before this, they decided to fight the gorilla to gain experience of fighting monsters. In the beginning, they fought to show off their skills, especially Bendy. However, their mindset changed a day later to fight for the experience. After that, they had been engaging in a long-drawn battle all for the sake of fighting experience.
Although they could not get more fighting the same monster over and over again, it was better than nothing. Thanks to the long-drawn battle, they started to learn how to control their power better from their status to their skills.
They were in no way comparable to those of the Wailler Family but they learned and achieved a lot. Now, they knew how much energy they should use in a fight. It was not refined but they realized that they could fight longer thanks to their control.
Other than learning how to control their power, their raw power had increased considerably. Bendy had absorbed 25 more normal rank cultivation gems and decided to stop absorbing more. At the moment 50 out of his 350 cultivation points were filled with normal rank cultivation gems.
Bendy wanted to absorb more as he had decided to give up the sword talent but Wayne persuaded him not to do that. After a few hours of persuasion, Bendy gave up. He never thought that Wayne would work that hard to stop him. Even so, he was thankful to Wayne because if his sword talent ended up with the mark and he had given up on it, he would be in big trouble.
After absorbing another 25 normal rank cultivation gems, Bendy's average level increased to 5 and his strength and dexterity were at the whopping level 14. Similar to Wayne, Bendy could sweep through the level 5 area too but he could also die easily too due to his other status merely at level 2.
Wayne had absorbed another 9 iron rank cultivation gems by combining 90 normal rank cultivation gems. His average level was 8 with all his status at level 8. He had no specialty in his status but his all status at the same range.
He had absorbed 20 cultivation gems in total out of 360 cultivation points he had in his cultivation map. Out of these 20, 5 were normal rank cultivation gems and 15 were iron rank cultivation gems. After this, he decided to start absorbing bronze rank cultivation gems.
However, since he had no power to fight a bronze rank monster, he needed to use his Precious Touch skill to create the bronze rank cultivation gem using the normal rank cultivation gem.
He would need 100 normal rank cultivation gems to create one bronze rank cultivation gem. He first needed to create iron rank gems before he could create the bronze rank gem.
Luckily, Precious Touch skill was a cheat skill. He did not need to use his energy to use the skill, so he had no problem creating many things with the skill. All he needed were materials and in this case the cultivation gem.
Although the cultivation gems were common, it was hard work to collect 100 of them when their drop rate was 70% and only the one dealing the most damage to the monster would be able to use the gem. So, he needed to collect them all by himself.
"It was late evening now. If we cannot find the Drumming Gorilla in an hour, let's go back," said Bendy. Since that was their last day, they could not stay the night in the forest.
"Should we kill a few gorillas and lure more here using their blood? Who knows, maybe one of them will be the Drumming Gorilla?" suggested Wayne. He had used the same method to lure the gorillas before and it worked wonders although a bit blundered happened but still, it worked well.
"Should we?" Bendy asked and a second later, he agreed. The duo went around the area and killed many Thumping Gorillas. After that, they brought the body back to an open area in the forest and laid down the bodies there.
They arranged the bodies in a massive circle for the best effect. Once they were done, Wayne and Bendy climbed a tree and waited there. When a Thumping Gorilla appeared, they would kill it and add the body to the circle.
While they were waiting silently, Bendy broke the silence, "This looks like some kind of ritual." Bendy pointed at the big circle they made on the ground. With the dead bloody body, it did look like some kind of ritual. The bad kind of ritual.
"Hmm… it does look like that," said Wayne and he pursed his lips. "Well, there are no magic circles and mana supplies for anything bad to happen. I think we will be fine," assured Wayne.
The circle might look like a ritual but without the magic circle and mana supplies, it turned to a normal pile of corpses. In the past, there were a lot of rituals done by foolish people to call some higher being or something similar and ended up calling a monster of high rank.
Luckily, nothing big happened when many strong hunters and explorers felt the massive energy and headed to that location immediately. After the first happening, the laws about making a ritual were formed and those that did those rituals would be punished severely.
Even so, there were still many people who did not follow the law and did that ritual. Be that as it may, nothing major happened and everyone was living peacefully.
"You are right," Bendy agreed and they fell silent again when they saw a bush nearby rustled. Something came out and it was another Thumping Gorilla. Bendy was disappointed. He stood up and went to kill the gorilla.
Once he was done, he got back on the tree and said, "It looks like luck is not on our side. There is no sign that we will meet the Drumming Gorilla."
"Let's wait for more. If we give up now, we really might not be able to meet one," Wayne said to Bendy.
"This will be much easier if there is a Drumming Gorilla dungeon," said Bendy as he felt tired mentally waiting for the rare Drumming Gorilla.
"If there is the dungeon, we might not meet each other," said Wayne while smiling and he continued, "You might not get the best buddy like me."
"Pfft, you are not wrong but that felt weird, kekeke," said Bendy while chuckling. "If you are a girl, that might sound better. Also, even if you are a girl, I am not available." Bendy kept chuckling but Wayne was surprised to hear that last sentence.
"You are dating someone?" Wayne asked. He was curious. It was not weird for someone as handsome as Bendy to have a girlfriend but Bendy never talked about it and they were quite young too to have a girlfriend.
"Hmm~ I am not sure if we are dating. I do like her but not that deep," said Bendy, and Wayne frowned.
"Then, she is not your girlfriend," said Wayne.
"No, she is not my girlfriend but my fiancée," said Bendy, and Wayne was shocked. Bendy looked at Wayne and explained, "Our parents arranged us to get married since we were a child. We have known each other since childhood and I do like her but like I said earlier, not that deep."
"I have this feeling that my 'like' for her is more like how I like you," said Bendy while staring at Wayne. Wayne got goosebumps.
"I don't swing that way," said Wayne while he hugged his shoulder.
"Pfft, I don't mean that kind of like. I mean to say that I view her as a close buddy like how I view you," said Bendy trying to hold in his laugh. Wayne nodded.
"Then, are you going to continue this relationship?" Wayne asked.
"I have to. Many other complicated things are happening with our match up. I cannot willy-nilly break the engagement. You are aware of how complicated things are in noble families especially a big and powerful family like mine," said Bendy.
He added, "Although I realize that my feeling for her is not love, I want to try loving her. If I work hard enough, I might love her in the future." Wayne nodded. Bendy looked at Wayne and asked, "How about you? Single?"
"Haha, I am single," said Wayne while smiling. "I have no chance of meeting anyone because I am home school," Bendy was surprised and Wayne continued, "To be exact, I am not really home school. I took the class online. I learn everything that is taught in my middle school through online classes."
"… Why didn't you go to school?" Bendy asked. It was weird that Wayne did not go to school… physically. The school was mandatory and for Wayne to be able to learn from home was weird.
"My mom is afraid that I will become a bad boy and forbid me from going to school," said Wayne while smiling but Bendy frowned. "Hahaha, I think my mom is too afraid of me abandoning her or something. She doted on me too much. Well, I turned out okay and grew up nice and well just like what she wanted," said Wayne.
"… Then, is your mom okay now letting you go outside? Especially in this dangerous place?" Bendy asked.
"My mom passed away last month from an unknown illness," said Wayne and he looked sad. "I miss her," said Wayne and he smiled again. "Anyway, I need to make a living so I cannot stay at home doing nothing. Although my mom left me with a lot of money, I want to gain some by myself too," said Wayne positively.
Bendy fell silent for a bit as he felt depressed listening to Wayne's life. He felt like Wayne's mom was too much. Now he realized why Wayne was too nice and he worked hard to befriend him because Wayne did not have any friends. Bendy was his first friend.
"So, you are by yourself now? No siblings or other families?" Bendy asked.
"Yeah, I am by myself now," Wayne said. He looked fine when he said that but there were traces of loneliness on his face. Bendy could see it. As if sensing Bendy's concern, Wayne said, "Don't worry, I might be a bit lonely now but in a few days we will enroll in the academy. At that time, there will be a lot of people there I can befriend."
Wayne paused for a few seconds and said, "Also, I am not lonely now. I have my first friend here in front of me," Wayne smiled at Bendy and Bendy sighed. He was worried about Wayne but it looked like his worry was unnecessary.
Bendy could see that Wayne's will was strong. Wayne could also be used to the loneliness that it did not bug him a bit. They talked for a bit more when they heard a drum sound.
Wayne and Bendy stared at each other and they were smiling. "It's here!"