Two weeks had passed since the group had arrived in Surt, time in which Ren had managed to bring half of the buried city back to the surface along with all the technology of the ancient civilization.
"This place is interesting" - Elisabeth said as she looked around the dining room with her head cocked to one side - "It's perfect for all kinds of exotic foods, in fact, I was craving for some Sushi."
"Sushi?" - Eric asked as he frowned because this was the first time he had heard of food with that name.
"It's a typical food from the kingdom of Amaterasu" - answered Ren while shaking his head.
"You mean the sea kingdom Amaterasu?" - Eric asked with surprise as he looked at his fiancée - "How do you know about food from nations so far away?"
"Does that really surprise you after all the things I've done?" - asked Elisabeth with a huge smile.
Eric was silent before looking at his best friend, who simply shrugged - "She's right."
"What are you two talking about?" - Rea asked as she walked into the dining room with Erika, who simply blushed at the sight of the prince.
"Ahem!" - Elisabeth coughed to catch the prince's attention, who simply blushed as he saw that he had been captivated by the red-haired woman's eyes - "Everything okay?"
"Yeah, I was just thinking about something random" - lied Ren as he took a long breath - "Back to the topic, we were talking about exotic foods and Elisabeth mentioned Sushi."
"Sushi!" - Rea exclaimed with excitement - "I love Sushi!"
"S-Seriously?" - Ren asked in surprise at the blonde girl's overreaction - "I see..."
"Ahem! Sorry..." - muttered Rhea with her cheeks as red as a pair of tomatoes.
"You don't have to worry, I would react like that too if I was offered some smoked pork ribs" - replied Ren while shaking his head.
"Is that your favorite dish, Ren?" - Erika asked excitedly.
"W-Well, it's one of my favorite foods, I've only had it about three times in my life, but every time I've eaten them they bring back good memories" - replied Ren while scratching his cheek.
"I can prepare them!" - Erika exclaimed firmly - "I promise I'll make the best smoked pork ribs you've ever tasted!"
"I-I'll be looking forward to it" - nodded Ren as he shook his head - "Anyway, I'm going to continue with my experiments, if anything happens, you can come to find me."
"Ok, go" - said Elisabeth as she gave him a blank look, though her expression changed to one of irritation when she saw how Eric was also going on patrol - "Tch, those two insensitive fools..."
"Sorry, but I'm going to be busy" - Erika said as she excused herself before going into the kitchen.
"Well, I don't think that will take long, at least not with the enormous wifely power Erika has" - muttered Rea as she shook her head and remembered the description the designers gave the red-haired woman.
Erika Belldandy, the perfect woman. She was not only blessed with beauty, but also with enormous latent power that could be unleashed at any moment, and that's not counting her enormous ability to do household chores thanks to her training as a slave. Erika was specifically designed to be the ultimate "waifu" for all players.
"Power, beauty, talent, all mixed in one person, we could say that she is the counterpart of Ren, who is handsome, strong and a caring man" - muttered Elisabeth while shaking her head - "I guess the designers got their point across, because Ren was always ranked number one in popularity in the boys' ranking, and that's saying a lot when [Dragon Frontier] has at least 100 playable male characters."
"I know, and the same goes for Erika, who was considered the most popular female character in the game despite 150 playable females" - replied Rea while letting out a sigh - "Well, leaving that aside, I think this is a good time for us to plan our first move."
"Right, I had forgotten about the first major event of Ren's route" - muttered Elisabeth while frowning as she remembered this "little detail".
[Dance under the red moon], that was the name of the scenario, and it consisted in that a horde of monsters would become violent during the red moon, a natural phenomenon that occurred in Surt every full moon, and one of the reasons why this place was an inhospitable location.
During the [dance under the red moon] event, the player would have to make a few decisions, and these would vary the difficulty of the event. Obviously, the more difficult variations would give better rewards, and among it was the possibility that a random hero would come to Surt by "mere coincidence". If the player was lucky, he could get an extremely powerful hero that would help him overcome future events, or even a hero with an interesting profession that would improve [Neo Bahamut's] living condition.
"I guess you'll make the harder choice" - Elisabeth said with a frown.
"Yes, it's the option with the best future potential" - replied Rhea while letting out a sigh - "Although..."
"We just need to make sure we have good defenses, and now that we are in a real world, we don't need to wait for a week before the event happens for this" - Elisabeth said while hiding her smile with her fan - "This will help us get through the mission more easily."
"Let's wait for the random hero to be good" - muttered Rhea with a frown.
"Do you by any chance not know the probability rate?" - Elisabeth asked with surprise.
"No" - replied Rea as she cocked her head to one side.
"Hmm, tier C heroes have a 50% chance of appearing, then I'll give you a list of who are available" - said Elisabeth while shaking her head - "Tier B heroes have a 35% chance, tier A 10%, Tier S 4%, and finally, tier EX 1%."
"EX?!" - Rea exclaimed in surprise as she grabbed the girl's shoulders - "Who?!"
"W-Well, according to the developers, they are Altia, Bella, Jin, Nicolas" - answered Elisabeth while shaking her head.
Rea was silent as she remembered the named characters. She already knew about Altia, after all, she had researched everything about her to confirm her hypothesis.
[Bella, the Seductress], the stereotypical "femme fatale", an assassin who uses seduction as a weapon to kill all her targets. She was basically the highest DPS in the game below Ren, Erika (Priestess Mode), and Altia. Her special ability was [Grand Charm], which reduced damage taken by 50% from humanoid enemies, making her not only a high damage character, but a tough one as well.
[Jin, the Demon Hunter], a man who lost everything to the cult of the fallen god, generally speaking, he is not the most powerful hero, but in certain scenarios his damage level is much higher than Altia or even Erika, all thanks to his unique ability [Evil Destroyer] which triples the damage dealt to monsters or enemies of the fallen god's camp.
Finally, Nicholas, the great bard, he was the weakest of the EX heroes, but he made up for it with his unique ability, [Great Harmony] which increased the affinity between heroes, which unlocked their combined techniques much faster. In other words, he was the best hero if you wanted to recruit as many playable characters as possible.
[Dragon Frontier] was a game where there was no such thing as levels or stats, in fact, the only thing heroes could use to level up was to unlock advanced jobs to increase their HP bar, as well as active skills, equipment, or relics, which boosted the characters' unique abilities.
Now the question... If there was no experience, levels or Stats apart from HP and a fatigue bar that measured the amount of offensive skills a hero could use, and the only way to strengthen the characters was to boost their jobs and improve their equipment... How was it possible to finish the game?
It's simple, by recruiting soldiers.
[Dragon Frontier] was a resource management game, so the important thing was to recruit soldiers.
As for the sacred artifacts, these were difficult to get, mostly because the improvement they gave was much higher than the jobs, and skills, that's why these artifacts were in the most dangerous places in the game, a situation similar to that of the [Grimoires].
"Do you think it's a good time to pass him the ring?" - Rea asked as she shook her head as she saw that she had sunk into her thoughts.
"No, he doesn't yet meet the requirements to unlock the first level of the artifact" - Elisabeth replied as she shook her head - "I don't think it will take long though, not when you're both this mellow."
Rhea nodded when she heard this.