＜ 4. Worst choice (6) ＞
“Nonsense. Are they the tears of an archangel? What the hell… how did you do it?”
It wasn’t that the black merchant didn’t know that a new item could be created by combining several items. The reason he was surprised was that Archangel’s Tears was an item with no known recipe.
Andrea calmly opened the lid and drank the archangel’s tears. It tasted like a mixture of watery Bacchus with peach ionic beverage. After drinking it all, Andrea’s deck shone brightly.
Pasasasak –
All the curse cards popped out and burned away.
Andrea smiled contentedly and jingled the bag of money she had received from the black dealer.
“It pays well, prosper. Marco, let’s go now.”
“Wait a minute! Please tell me…”
Andrea walked out of the room with Marco, leaving the black dealer behind.
Marco was still unsure of what had happened. Marco asked as soon as he entered the aisle.
“So… I will tell you what I understand. You got some bad cards from that merchant friend for 3000 gold. And you got rid of all those cards with something you bought with 500 gold. Did I understand it right?”
“Strictly speaking, the map value has to be subtracted, so it is correct to say that it was removed with 400 gold.”
“So you mean you earned 2600 gold without any penalty?”
“That’s why I said creative economy.”
“Oh My God.”
Marco wasn’t quite sure what the ‘creative economy’ meant exactly, but he knew what it meant. Andrea lightly snapped her finger in front of Marco’s eyes.
“But it was a method that could only be used this once. Now that the blacksmith knows the recipe, the price of the item I bought will jump.”
“Then shouldn’t you have done the combination in front of the black dealer?”
“That, in fact, is an item with a fairly high probability of combination failure. By the way, black merchants basically carry artifacts that increase the chance of combination. Since you can get the effect just by being close, I had no choice but to do it right in front of you.”
“Your knowledge really… surprises me every time.”
Andrea smiled at Marco’s innocent reaction.
“As you can see, I know a lot about this dungeon that others don’t. You’ve done well so far, but you just have to follow my instructions from now on. We have a common goal of getting out of the dungeon, right?”
“···yes. I will do that.”
Marco answered and then rummaged through his pockets as if he had suddenly remembered something. What he took out was a strange-looking seal.
“Ah, this is what you got when you caught a monster that looked just like you. I was going to give it to you right away when you wake up, but you forgot.”
Andrea exclaimed inwardly as she received the stamp.
‘The Bloody Seal!’
“Is it a good thing?”
“No way! It’s something I was going to buy from the merchant earlier, even with money.”
“That’s good.”
The bloody seal was a rare-grade artifact. The effect is to increase the number of card options that can be received as a reward to two. It is an artifact that exerts great effect when the deck is not yet completed.
However, there was a reason why Andrea wanted to obtain this artifact first by putting other artifacts aside.
‘In the event of meeting the devil, this artifact pays off.’
Andrea put the seal in her subspace pocket and resumed her journey with light steps.
Walking down the aisle, Andrea sensed that something had changed. My body was much lighter than before.
Until not too long ago, walking slowly down the aisle had gradually brought me tiredness. Now I was not tired at all, even though I walked at a fairly quick pace.
Andrea felt her leg. There were quite strong muscles in the legs that were only caught in bones.
I was startled and kicked my arms. His forearms, which had been so skinny that they had no more than two layers of beef jerky, were now swollen to the size of an adult male’s average.
Andrea wasn’t the only one who noticed the change. Marco also looked over at Andrea and added a word.
“Come to think of it, your physique has gotten ridiculously better? Is this also the effect of the potion you drank?”
The potion had no such effect. Andrea hurriedly pulled out her status card.
[Name: Andrea]
[Class: None]
[Level: 18]
[Max Mana: 1]
[Strength: 15]
[mana: 20]
[Resistance: 18 + 1]
[Luck: 15]
[quirk: none]
The level went up unexpectedly.
It was only natural that the level would go up quite a bit after catching the elite monsters twice in a row. I didn’t even have time to think about it because I went through so much trouble when I was facing it right away.
However, this was a level up beyond common sense. Level 18 was a level that could only be reached by catching a lot of elite monsters and even a boss monster.
‘Is it Andrea’s characteristic that the experience level rises quickly?’
Every character has an unknown characteristic in the character creation window. For example, Johanna, a crusader character, deals 30% more damage to undead enemies, but there was no way to find out this fact until she directly hit undead enemies.
‘But this is… it’s something I’ve never experienced while playing Andrea.’
The highest floor Jung Hyun climbed as Andrea was the 42nd floor. In my experience, Andrea’s level-up speed was not significantly different from other characters. On the contrary, it was difficult to catch elite monsters, so it was slow compared to other characters.
‘No, wait a minute… Come to think of it, I’ve never caught an elite monster with Andrea on the lower floors.’
It was virtually impossible for Andrea to catch an elite monster that wasn’t a doppelganger on the lower floors. Success in catching an elite monster this time was truly a miracle.
At that moment, a sentence crossed Andrea’s head. A core structure that penetrates the system of this dungeon. High risk, high return.
Trials have a price, and curses have a reward. So what about the extremely difficult feat?
It was possible enough for the dungeon to give unconventional experience points.
‘…It’s not something you have to find out right away, so let’s think about it later.’
Currently, Andrea’s stats are now comparable to all other characters. Of course, the higher the level, the slower the level up speed, so the average will catch up soon.
‘Until then, I’ll have to equip myself with other weapons.’
Even if you complete it, you can’t get rid of the backward compatibility of other characters, but Andrea could build a decent concept deck if you explore the dungeon properly.
As I walked, I came across two paths. Andrea unfolded the map.
A map purchased from a dark merchant is an intermediate map. Like the advanced map, it was impossible to know specifically what was coming out of the room, but it was possible to know roughly what kind of room it was.
A red circle was drawn on the floor where Andrea was currently located. In front of it, two dotted lines stretched out towards the marks of different shapes.
‘The road to the right is a question mark. The road on the left is a normal monster Macra…’
When you enter the place marked with a question mark, you will experience various events. Stats can be enhanced, quests can be received, and other characters or NPCs can be encountered.
‘But it could be a trap room or a hostile event.’
Andrea, who was worried, eventually chose the normal monster side. Rather than gambling, it was better to farm cards and gold with certainty.
Coming down the stairs and passing through the passageway, Andrea felt a sense of deja vu. Of course, Andrea had been to and from this dungeon countless times, so it was not unusual for her to feel a sense of déjà vu.
However, this sense of déjà vu was something more vivid. It feels like seeing a landscape that I haven’t seen in a long time.
Andrea soon figured out why.
‘No, this aisle. Didn’t it pass right before coming to this world?’
It is common for dungeons to appear in different rooms every time even on the same floor. Now, quite by accident, Andrea passed through the same passage as the floor she had been through before entering the game.
‘I can’t forget. He died on this floor right before he came.’
Mandragora and Goblin met on the 8th floor. It was the cause of Jung Hyun’s death as Andrea.
‘I don’t make the same mistake twice.’
Andrea sent Marco the card back and entered the room.
The eighth floor, as expected, was the same as before. A wide open space, the floor was moderately covered with soil and sparsely placed trees. It wasn’t as lush as the jungle, but there were brushes everywhere to hide.
Goblins must be hiding somewhere in there.
Turn 1 begins and you draw a card. Fortitude, blow, blow.
Andrea took a fresh look at her indomitable will. It’s still an unusable card, but it felt like a lucky charm to Andrea that helped her survive the moment of crisis.
Andrea vowed to use this card sooner or later.
I used a blow and moved towards the bushes. The bushes didn’t even budge. If it were a normal goblin, it would have quickly caught on just by moving from a distance. The Goblins of Trial were well-trained elite soldiers.
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Nothing was a problem though. Andrea had already planned everything from the moment she entered the room. Andrea picked up a stone from the floor and threw it over the bush.
‘It must have been about this.’
Took.
There was the sound of a stone hitting something dull. Andrea quickly covered her ears.
aaa!!
The screams of Mandragora who had been hit by the stone resounded loudly and deafeningly.
It was a voice so loud that my heart sank even though I had expected it and covered my ears. When I heard it myself, I thought it was not unreasonable to faint.
When the screaming stopped, Andrea took out the Polar Dawn and headed for the bushes.
‘No matter how elite the goblins were, they couldn’t have trained their eardrums.’
I looked through the bushes. One of the goblins was slumped to the ground with its eyes closed, trembling. Andrea thrust the knife into the goblin’s throat.
hooked
The weight of the knife was quite heavy when cutting before, but now it was easy to stab. The goblin died without even lifting a finger.
Hiss!
It was a specification to leave it alone until it screamed again and then pass out. Andrea quickly turned around and cut the mandragora.
“Grrr, Kiek!”
Meanwhile, the goblin hiding next to him came to his senses. I was going to kill two of them and start over. Andrea licked her lips in regret. It didn’t work out as planned, but it wasn’t a big crisis.
On turn 2, I draw a card. With nothing much to offer, Andrea used her defenses and charged at the other goblins.
A goblin club that swings aiming at the waist. Andrea didn’t dodge and hit back with the Polar Dawn.
chin!
Andrea’s strength was already not at a level that a low-level goblin could compete with. The goblin’s body staggered backwards. Without missing that gap, Andrea swung her sword in a horizontal direction.
Chain – Liquid!
“Greureuk, Greureuk. Kieh…”
The goblin’s abdomen split like tofu in the direction the knife was swung. The goblin let out a weak groan, grabbed its stomach, and collapsed.
‘I think another Mandragora was crying around this time.’
Andrea covered her ears. Indeed, Mandragora’s scream rang out again.
aaa!
When the screaming stopped, Andrea quickly found Mandragora. He cut them off without hesitation and continued to search for other goblins.
However, as I searched through the bushes, I felt the presence of something flying toward the back of my head. Andrea straightened up.
Poof!
A stone narrowly slipped over my head.
‘Kieack!’
Looking back, I saw a goblin holding a catapult. He was stomping his feet as if regretting that he missed.
‘right. There was one guy with a ranged attack.’
Andrea rushes to deal with it quickly. Seeing that, the goblin loaded the stone again and whirled the catapult.
Poof!
Again, stones flew at lightning speed.
Andrea did not avoid it.
The stones didn’t look slow in slow motion like in the movie. However, the trajectory was visible. The direction the catapult was turned, the strength of the forearm, and the moment the stone was thrown. The flow from which it all flows.
Andrea could see where the stones were flying. And I felt confident that I would be able to catch it without difficulty.
chin.
Andrea grabbed the stone right in front of her face.
As he slowly lowered his hand holding the stone, a triumphant smile was revealed. The goblin opened its mouth in disbelief.
“I never ordered one, so return it, you bastard.”
Andrea returned the stone back to the goblin.
puck!
The goblin, hit in the face by a stone, collapsed helplessly.
Andrea had become a completely different person from the weakling who couldn’t even throw a torch properly a few floors ago.
＜ 4. Worst Choice (6) ＞ End
“It’s under 2 hours, so I’m taking refund for this stone”