The next instant, a fair portion of my mana was sucked out of me, and a black magic circle formed on my right side, white light particles quickly appearing and then forming the shape of a large beast, over 2 meters tall.
When the light finally dissipated, what remained there was a black stallion-like beast with defined muscles, a pitch-black leathery body, and obsidian-like protrusions coming out of its shoulders, head, and 2 tails.
(Image)
"Neeeiighhhh!!!"
It cried, raising its sharp and sturdy front hooves covered in hard obsidian up in the air, threateningly.
The approaching Hollow Knight wasn't expecting there to be another enemy, but unfortunately for him, I was also a Tamer, kind of. I was a dude with multiple jobs at this point, really. A bit of many standard builds inside one perfect body that allowed for that sort of thing.
Seeing that the summon was done, I immediately ordered.
"Nebula, ahead. Charge!"
Those simple and concise instructions were enough for my summon as without wasting a second, it rushed towards the oncoming hollow knight with another loud cry, pointing its sharp and deadly horn in front of it. Crystal armor made up of the same obsidian-like crystals covered its shoulders, legs, and head.
'Nice. She's going all out.'
Meanwhile, I turned back to check the state of the door.
'Locked. As expected. Can't get past it without defeating the knight. Or so is supposed to be the case…'
My summon, whom I had fittingly named Nebula, had already reached the Hollow Knight.
Its initial attack didn't quite hit the mark since the knight managed to dodge it, getting only barely graced. But it was still enough to tackle him a bit, making him lose his guard a little and my summon used that opening to turn and kick the knight with its back legs. Its strong and sturdy hooves created loud thuds and a small shockwave upon impact on his chest that launched the hollow knight a little up in the air and a few feet backward.
'Whew. A heavy hitter, despite being only Tier-4. Just like her mother.'
But the knight didn't really suffer much damage. As fast and strong as my summon was for a Tier-4, it was not easy for her to hurt a Tier-8 much.
Well, that's where I came into play.
I didn't waste any more time dawdling after that and quickly cast elemental spells I knew one after another. Every time my summon shoved him back, I threw one of the spells at him.
The damage was steady and I was shaving away at his HP and it soon showed effects. In no time at all, all of his black tendrils were gone and I could finally see the pristine black and grey armor.
'I'll be happy to take it from you.'
With a greedy glint and a smile, I ran back toward the Hollow Knight, sword in my hand. He was now truly enraged.
"This… ends… NOW….!!"
The second phase of the fight was about to begin.
***
The dungeon shook heavily, dust and debris leaking from the stone ceiling.
I disabled the
"Phew. 19 minutes and 25 seconds. Did it under time. Thanks to you, girl."
I smiled tiredly as I patted my summon which stood taller than me.
"Sorry I couldn't bring you inside the underground area of the castle with me before. The paths were narrow and trapped to the brim."
"Huff… Neigh…"
It replied with a huff and licked my hand in response. I had a feeling she said 'No problem.' Though, that was only my guess. I couldn't decipher her words, even after she became my Familiar. Pity. I had thought taming came with an automatic translation or mental communication or something.
'Alrighty, then. Now that the Hollow Knight is resting in pieces inside my Inventory ready to be assembled back and I have a brand new armor, I can finally get the ring and escape.'
The previously locked door was now open and inside it was a room filled to the brim with piles of gold and treasures! … If only.
"It's so underwhelming to find a single chest on a podium with Hollow Knight armor's poor replicas surrounding it, inside the so-called 'treasury.' Old king, my ass. More like Old Beggar. But, oh well. Not like I am lacking in money right now."
It was quite surprising how much you could earn if you recklessly speedran dungeons every single day for months. I didn't have that many places where I spent that money, other than gathering stuff related to traveling and dungeoneering from different places.
Thankful for the gift of foreknowledge, I made my way inside the so-called "treasury" and opened the trapped chest after disarming the trap.
This particular dungeon had really reminded me of DnD video games like Routefinder in many ways.
Before long, I found the thing I came here for; A well-crafted platinum ring with a dark blue, almost purple, jewel.
'Hmm, I can't remember if it looked like this in the game. Oh well. Doesn't matter.'
Along with whatever else I could find and loot, I quickly made my way to the large teleportation circle inside.
Coming out of a room that was connected to the main hall of the castle where I had entered, I made my way toward the outside of the castle.
'It was one giant castle.'
I thought, looking at the old and dilapidated but still towering building, hidden between the mountains on all sides and a deep forest.
'Took me almost 4 hours to explore, even with the shortcut.
Defeating monsters for EXP, and looting all random treasures and items because of my FOMO took a lot of time… Honestly, it wasn't worth it.
If not for the ring in question, I wouldn't have come here, to be honest.
I used
'Luckily, I got what I needed from—'
[Item: Ring of the Old King
Rarity: Rare
Description: A ring belonging to the Old King Hirrien Alaburne. It is enchanted with special corrosive magic and mental ailments infliction enchantments.
Effect: -Allows the user to caste
-Gives the wearer Advanced Corrosion Magic Resistance, and Advanced Mental Ailment Resistance.]
'—the cast… le…'
I stared at the ring, or rather at the description of it, blankly.
[Pfft! Ahahahaha! Oh, oops. Sorry, sorry. My bad. Don't mind me. This was just way too funny. Pfft. Hehehe…Ah, sorry again. Couldn't hold it back…]
I smiled as I completely ignored Iris's bullshit. My eyes weren't smiling though.
Then, I took a sharp breath in. Then…
"MOTHER FUCKER!!!"
What followed was a short and "mild" gamer's outrage, followed by a few rounds of intermediate and advanced spells fired on the damn castle. Until I gave up, sighed and went back to my camp to rest.
***
2 days later when the dungeon reset itself, I tried raiding it again and finally got the right item this time. Sadly once a named dungeon was cleared for the first time, which it was by me before, it didn't give as many enemies or loot.
For instance, I didn't get another copy of the cool Hollow Knight's armor. I did have over a dozen replicas of it, though. But they were mostly for aesthetic purposes. Not actual magical armor.
And I made sure to fight the Hollow Knight wearing the same armor as his.
His anguished expression was delightful… Not that I considered myself a sadist who took pleasure from others' misery. Not at all.
It was annoying, but the dungeons having random loot drops and random chances at finding treasures was a thing that unfortunately was present in this world.
In that regard, I actually had had pretty decent luck before. But my luck seemed to have run out on this particular dungeon. Because, why not? It wasn't like I was out here in the middle of nowhere, trying to collect items so I could begin raiding one of the massive dungeons and get that OP item.
Shoving the actual 'Ring of Loyalty' inside my Inventory, I made my way back to the nearby town on my trusty steed.
Along the way, I started talking to my stead, because that's something I had started doing a lot lately. God, I so really needed to have some actual human companions.
"I'm really sorry that you have to sleep outside the town again, Nebula. I want to bring you with me but they don't really like monsters inside their town here in this region. Even though you are tamed and so nice."
[+50 Affection Points from 'Nebula.']
Ah, yes. I could also get AP from my Familiars. Not that I was aiming for that. But lately, almost all of my AP came from Nebula alone.
"But don't worry. The next region where we'll be going is much better. We can put you in a nice barn or let you roam in the pasture fields. Not only do they allow monsters inside the town and but also have specific services related to familiars. Isn't that nice? Oh, but make sure you're on your best behavior there, okay? We don't want any trouble."
I was going to stay there for a while. I needed to meet someone.
"Neigh!!"
"I know you're a good girl. But… how do I say this… people get scared when they see you for the first time. Your species is somewhat rare in most of the regions outside of where I found your mum and you."
Not that Nebula was some super rare and exquisite species of monster, but she was certainly not that common.
She neighed in what I guessed was either delight or affirmation— or both— and we slowly made our way back.
I had found this Familiar of mine in the beast glades as a foul— or whatever her species' younger version is called.
After I was almost stomped by her mother in one of my monster-hunting expeditions, I managed to defeat her, gaining a lot of EXP(relative to my level and EXP requirements back then) and a few levels. And then I found her alone, and for various reasons, I ended up taming her, mostly coz I needed a faster and more independent means of travel and her species was among the fastest runners in their respective tiers.
At that time, almost 2 months ago, she was still as big as a small-sized adult horse. Now, though, she'd grown bigger as she started consuming monster cores in abundance and helping me in some battles.
Also growing her Tier from 1 to 3 in the process.
It was an inefficient process, sadly. Feeding her a high-tier monster core didn't immediately rose her tier quickly. I had to do it slowly, in order, and bit by bit.
Things would have been faster if she were an advanced monster, but she sadly wasn't. Not that it mattered much. I did most of my fighting on my own and only occasionally let her in to gain experience and stuff.
I used
[Name: Nebula
Age: 0(3 months)
Gender: Female
Race: Obsidian Grazer
---
Tier: 4 ->5
---
Affection/Obedience/Reputation: 100/100/100[Locked]
Capture Difficulty: None [Already Captured]
---
Remark: Enjoys the company of her Master and Rider, Loves you unconditionally.
---
Status: Tired, Happy, Hungry]
'Nice, she tiered up. I can feed her higher tier monster cores now.'
I also made a note in my head to feed her all the monster cores once we were near our camping place.
Initially, I had found it ironic that she actually accepted me as her "Master" so quickly after I started feeding her magic stones and letting her roam free when I didn't need her, especially considering the fact that she had seen me killing her mother.
Monsters were savage in that regard, I had learned. The family didn't really matter to these monsters— the ones who actually cared enough to reproduce and make offspring, I mean. They really had no need to, since they didn't have such deep-rooted "reproduce to survive" instincts and new ones often spawned out of literally thin air in certain "hot spots."
All they cared about was getting stronger.
It reminded me of something that was once talked about in the game's lore. The reason for this particular behavior and the monsters' existence were both linked to the Evil God. But that was irrelevant; Perhaps, a story for the future.
'To think my first max Affection/Obedience/Reputation would be a female horse-like monster. I don't know how to feel about that.'
Not to mention, her having a 'Capture Difficulty' and the
I had stopped thinking about it after a while when I first noticed it because it had started weirding me out. And Iris, being the "best friend" that she was didn't shy away from making it more awkward and even brazenly laughing her 'ethereal ass' off… Sometimes I wished she had a real body with a real ass so that I could spank her silly. She'd been getting a little too cocky and brazen lately.
She knew I felt that way and had even dared me to do it, not hiding her recent desire to have a real body for some odd reason.
Anyway, I did figure out the thing with Nebula having a 'Capture Difficulty' later.
[You don't have 'Capture difficulty' for random monsters. But Familiars are different.]
That was what she said when I was mulling over the fact and that was enough for me to piece things together.
Monsters who were tamed gained a slight bit of awareness and emotions, especially when they are tamed by me, who had a 'Legendary' rarity Subduing/Taming skill. Furthermore, since monsters could grow stronger(raise their tiers), once they reach a certain threshold, they could even gain sentience. That's how the legendary divine beasts became divine beasts. Something that wasn't mentioned in the game, but was fairly easy to deduce, since they weren't always divine beasts and the monsters' ability to "tier-up."
Shaking my head wryly, I started arranging the new loot inside my Inventory as we made our way to our next destination, the town of Sycilis. The hometown of the soon-to-be wanted criminals in the Empire and the user of one of the two forbidden magics: Aurora Livingstone, later known as the 'Eternal Necromancer.'
As for the reasons for this detour— because it really was a detour from my actual goal of raiding the next dungeon and getting the other item for my Main Quest— One. I wanted her (help). She was going to be very helpful in my upcoming Main Quest. Two. I wanted (to help) her. She was one of the characters that I actually felt sympathy for in the game. Three. I wanted her… yeah, I just 'wanted her.' And I was finally strong enough to handle her mess. That is, the upcoming event that forced her to choose the path of being a wanted criminal, joining the cult.
'It's about time I finally paid back to them for the mess they created in my life. By taking away one of their future central pieces.'
I smiled, but it wasn't a happy smile. It was slightly crooked and deranged, just like the girl I was about to meet.
[New Side Quest has been created!]
[Quest Tile: Revenge is a dish best served to the dead
…
…]
***