Chapter 14
[You have gained 5300 Exp]
[Level up]
[Exp 4600\7700]
[You have gained 13000 coins]
[Coins: 37050]
"They were from the Ravenknight kingdom?" I asked Max while we were heading back to the town.
"Yes, Your Highness," Max replied. No wonder I found that girl familiar. She is one of the villains in the novel. Let's not get into that for now since that wouldn't happen for a very long time.
Right now, she is just a princess or acting queen of the Ravenknight kingdom since her mother, the current queen, is out of commission.
What I am interested in is her ability.
We entered the town and the little girl from earlier came running to me. Before speaking, she handed me a bronze coin and said, "This is all I have, mister adventurer."
She looked so cute saying that, that I couldn't help but melt and smile. "It's more than enough, sweetie."
The rest of the residents of the town came forward and one by one thanked us as well. Some gave me money while some gave me provisions. The greatest reward was the smiles on the children's faces. The second greatest would be the EXP. Although I didn't gain much EXP from them, I was at least able to level up and almost went halfway up to the next level.
No doubt that I would be able to enter the middle stage of E rank before I returned to the empire.
We were allowed to stay in the no-name town for the night without any payment. We were even given food for the night and breakfast. The next morning after breakfast, we left under the farewell of the whole town.
This episode was brief, but it's not like it deviated as much from our plans. We still would have had to cross the town to get to our destination and it's not like I got nothing out of it.
Max didn't level up, but I did and for now, that was enough.
We traveled for two days straight. Only stopping to rest in the deep of the night and departing again at dawn. After two days of arduous and almost nonstop travel, we arrived at our destination. Well, my destination.
"What is this place, Your Highness?" Max asked me and I replied, "This, my friend, is an opportunity."
"What kind of?" He curiously asked. I only smiled in return but didn't reply. This was an opportunity that wasn't only useful to Eric but was also useful to me. Because there was no other place this easy where I could get the blood essence of a vampire. Not of one this high-ranked anyway.
We entered the dungeon and the first thing that assaulted us was the stench in there. It was even worse than the stench in the Arachne dungeon.
This dungeon was one of the undiscovered ones and Eric will come to know of it in the late first year of Academy. This dungeon isn't special in any way. The strongest monster, namely the boss in here is of only E+ rank and the normal monsters are E- which means the maximum EXP I can get is 1000 and the minimum I can get is 10.
But there is one good thing about this dungeon. It's the numbers. This is a dungeon of bats. Now bats don't have great reproduction, but this is a dungeon that has been here for who knows how long but somehow hadn't broken yet. The minimal number of monsters in here could be in the tens of thousands.
This means that even though I will get only a drop of Exp at this time, the drops in here are going to be enough to fill up a pond.
Screech!!!!
I heard the usual sound of a bat only when we had taken a few steps in the entrance. Their number was in the hundreds. It was a good thing that I was a good shot and that with the shop opened now, I wouldn't run out of MP anytime soon.
A hundred magic bullets appeared around me, and I precisely shot them at the bats flying towards us. With how high the level of the bullets was and with my somewhat decent INT stat for this level, each shot pierced through a bat, killing it on the spot.
Bats started dying on the spot and they fell like it was raining. My maximum MP was only 180 and even though the skill had leveled up quite a bit, the only improvement there had been was the size of the bullet.
If before it was the size of a bead, now it was almost fifty percent increased. I didn't know whether it had an effect on the attack or not since the attack power depended on the INT stat.
[It does]
[You can also increase the size by investing more MP]
'You could have told me that before.' I said but I wasn't annoyed in the least. It was working. Even now this skill is growing. Although my skills were the lowest in this world, their potential was close to unlimited and if all it took was to use them to make them strong, then it was the greatest blessing ever.
[MP 0\180]
And as predicted, the MP ran out of soon. There were only a few bats left and Max could take care of them by himself. The problem was that there were even more coming.
[MP recovery potion: Cost 3000 coins]
I bought this one. Although it was quite expensive, it recovered my MP in full. When I had all my MP full, I used another skill on myself.
[Bless has been used on the user]
[All stats +25%]
At level five, bless increased my stats by a whooping twenty-five percent. At first, I thought that with each increase in level, the effect increase would be five percent, but it wasn't. At level three, the increase was only two percent, and at level four, it was four. According to Allison, there might be no increase at all sometimes.
Still, my INT increased by nine and right now, I was only dependent on that stat. The others weren't needed right now. Besides, it would be useless to use them. The effectiveness in combat wouldn't be much and I would tire out very quickly with my current END or stamina.
At least by using a magic bullet, I wouldn't get tired. With my attack power increased, I conjured magic bullets around me using all the remaining MP but didn't fire them. I bought another potion and drank it.
The problem was that during combat, I wouldn't gain any EXP, nor would I gain any coins. Although I had a lot of coins, they would only last for ten more potions and then I would run out of MP. I could only hope that the bats would stop for a while so I could gain my rewards before moving forward.
While thinking about that, the next wave appeared in my view, and without any delay, I shot at them. Although the increase in INT was only by nine, it was still a considerable increase at peak point because now the bullets would even sometimes kill two bats in one shot.
This wave was dealt with very easily and I still had some mana bullets left. The unfortunate thing was the absence of notifications which meant that the battle was still ongoing and sure enough, another wave appeared before us. I shot my remaining magic bullets and conjured up even more.
=====
I now had only six thousand coins left. I must have killed about two thousand bats by now. Even Magic Bullet had leveled up despite its exorbitant requirement. Yet there was no sign of EXP gain notification.
"Your Highness, wouldn't it be better to leave?" Max suggested by my side. Of course, it would be but then following the logic of games, escaping mid-battle would cause us to lose all our rewards. I could only hope that the bats would stop in one section by now because if they didn't, then I would have to fight them using my sword.
Given their numbers, we would be easily overwhelmed by them. Even Eric, despite being a protagonist and almost B rank at that time along with an entire party of almost all of the main characters, had a very hard time in this dungeon.
I had to keep in mind that I had already killed more than two thousand bats by now. Some of them were even of higher ranks. My skill EXP was already filled by one-fourth. And yet there were thirteen more sections of this dungeon. Eric had to spend a vast fortune and almost half a year to clear this dungeon. Of course, he had the option of coming here every day, but I didn't.
However, the lady luck seemed to have finally given me some of her attention because as soon as I had consumed the last of my MP recovery portion and my coins had run out, I received a massive amount of Exp.
[You have gained 3300 Exp]
[You have gained E- grade mana crystals x2342]
[You have gained E grade mana crystals 48]
[You have gained venomous bat fluid x 1400]
[You have gained 78000 coins]
Of course, it was massive by the standards of the number of bats I had slain. It barely raised my level and Max finally leveled up as well. Of course, Max also had the option of growing stronger naturally, I on the other hand didn't. I was puzzled why the EXP I received was so low compared to the number I killed.
[Life]
Figures. The amount of life in these bats isn't enough to be harvested so much, so even if their rank is high, the amount of death I can harvest from them is very low.
Anyway, the massive gain was in coins. I wouldn't have to worry about running out of MP anytime soon. The other unique thing about this dungeon was the mana crystals. It was the law of this world, monsters lower than C-rank didn't have mana crystals in them. But these did. Of course, the rewards given to me by the system were separate which meant that there were still 2342 E- grade and 48 E grade mana crystals waiting for me in this pile of corpses.
I waved my hand and started storing all the corpses in here. These corpses were worth a lot. I could gain a small fortune by selling everything that was in them. Not to mention that the mana crystals in them were very important as well. Not to me but to Rose and Max. I couldn't wield mana after all.
Now that one section was done, it was time for the next section. But before that, I decided to take a break after I had collected all the bodies. These bats had a sack of venomous liquid inside of them. It would be in very demand to the alchemists.
After I had stored all the bodies which took some time even though I was able to store multiple of them with one touch.
When I turned to see Max, he was looking at me with his mouth wide open which was actually a little disgusting considering the stench and thick bloody air in here.
"How—How did you do that?!" At least I made him forget honorifics. It was very annoying of him to finish every sentence with 'Your Highness' or 'His Highness'. Of course, he would be hanged for not addressing me properly.
"It's a skill of mine. It's called infinite storage." I replied with a completely nonsensical lie but made it sound so real that even the emperor would believe me.
And for sure it worked. He made an expression as if it made sense. "Still, His Highness seems to have infinite mana as well."
"Nope. That was because of this potion." I purchased another MP recovery potion and showed it to him. "What is that, Your Highness?" he asked me curiously.
Only now did I remember that this world didn't have potions. Alchemists in this world were limited to creating simple concoctions. Such as a venomous one with the bat liquid.
"Nothing. You will find out in time. For now, just rest because we will have to deal with the situations such as earlier a lot more." Although I didn't answer him, his focus was quick to shift when I told him what we were going to do.