Light Novel – Zectas – Volume 01 – Chapter 03

Agriculture is a Dangerous Field

Nash finished his last modifications on his third video upload for Zectas. His second video was about him attacking the armored armadillos. He was doing a damage of 1 with his beginner’s knife until it broke forcing him to use his bare fist for the usual 1 point damage.

He cunningly edited out the part where he learned the passive ability ‘Knife Mastery’ from breaking the beginner’s knife. He was hoping that the results will be just as big or maybe even bigger than the first video. Hoping that everyone would still find him as hilarious but things don’t always go the way we want them to.

His second video only got 223,335,161 views, less than half of his first successful video. Nash was scared about the check that he would be getting with these kind of numbers.

Fortunately Nash’s manager from the game center argued on his behalf and told the higher management that it was still a really high number and it would really be unfair on Nash’s part to set the first video as a standard.

Nash thought of his manager as his second father because of how much he always thought about his well being. He got a check for $15,000.00 and was told that from now on they would now be following certain standards.

As such the minimum amount that Nash could get would be $2,000.00 for videos with 0 up to 5,000,000 views. For videos that would reach 5,000,001 up to 199,999,999 views would be $10,000.00. For videos that were 200,000,000 up to 500,000,000 would be $15,000.00. For videos beyond that there would be a deliberation between the higher management.

Nash didn’t really understand how they came up with those numbers. He just understood that if he didn’t have high numbers he wouldn’t be getting any money.

He desperately needed that money since he decided to become a pro gamer. After all this was his new source of income, replacing his three previous jobs.

After reading the comments on the second video Nash discovered that people found it redundant they even went on saying that he was a ‘trick pony’. Sure it was still funny but watching the same ‘comedy routine’ gets old really fast.

Nash needed to quickly change his approach. Unfortunately he had no other videos to show. He could show them the forgotten Village of Nanahuatl but that meant the rest of the world will know about this serene little village.

It was his little piece of sanctuary that he had always been looking for. He wanted to preserve that sanctuary for as long as he could.

“Well here’s hoping that they will find this video more interesting.”

He uploaded his third video about him entering a hidden cave. There he found hordes of dire foxes. He was attacking the dire foxes with such blazing speed and dodging their attacks as if he knew each attack was coming. The intriguing part of it all was that this novice was using dual wield. A skill thought only available to thieves, assassins and their hidden variations.

He took out the bacon from the freezer and prepared the frying pan. He brewed a fresh pot of coffee. He quickly finished making breakfast. It was still five in the morning, but this was already much later than the usual time he made breakfast.

He called his brothers to join him. As Nash no longer needed to leave the house for work. He decided that for breakfast and dinner he and his brothers will eat together. The two younger Smoaks found this very tiring but readily agreed.

This was their own special time of the day. For almost twenty hours, Nash was inside Zectas earning money for them. They really wanted to join in saying that maybe they could bypass the age requirement or something.

Nash strongly told them off. He has been working so hard so that the two of them will get to finish their college education. It was enough that their departed parents only had one son who didn’t get to finish college. Besides it could compromise his game account seeing as they could detect that they were related.

“So, Nash, why is it that you’re pretending to be so weak that you’re not able to kill those practice monsters?”

“I told you Donny, it’s a secret. I can’t tell you the reason. Knowing you I’m sure you will tell your classmates and then they will tell their older siblings. Then I won’t have enough leverage over everyone else. Do you get it now Donny?”

Donny, the youngest of the three brothers still wanted to know how Nash did it. Everyone kept on saying that he was using a video editor but after having his videos uploaded to the official site of Zectas everything was cleared.

“Come on Seth, help me convince him to tell me how. I’ve been telling my classmates and friends that the famous novice in Zectas is actually my brother and they don’t believe me, they kept saying that if he really was then I should know how he does it.”

“Well Nash already gave you his reason right? Do you want to give Nash’s secret away? Besides if they don’t believe you that your the famous novice’s real brother then they aren’t friends worth keeping. You don’t need to prove yourself to a friend. Do you understand what I’m saying Donny?”

“You guys keep saying ‘do you understand Donny? do you understand Donny?’ but your the ones who don’t understand my situation. I feel like you’ve forgotten how it was like to be eleven.”

The three brothers laughed and enjoyed their special time together.

After breakfast Nash got back to his room and checked to see if there was anyone who noticed his latest video. It has just been forty-five minutes since he uploaded the video and there were already 25,789,227 views.

DetectiveRonan: I knew it. This guy has an advance hidden job of either a thief or assassin. Maybe that job had a skill to make it so that he would look like a novice. ZEctAsCollegePro: He would have to be, just look at that insane atk speed. No novice could have that attack speed. His damage is also pretty high for a pure Agi build. I think this guy must be at least level 50. 247Killaz: great job on finding an advance hidden job at only level 50 I think Tristan had his advance hidden job when he was already 60. SupahNovice#1Disciple: My master rocks! I was right and immediately shifted my job to a thief. If only he would share how he got this advance hidden job. N00bMasTeR: Sorry to burst your bubble guys but I don’t think that its an advance hidden job. I think he could just be a plain old thief or assassin. I heard that there is currently a master tailor in Mezco City of the Mictaztl Kingdom who is recruiting players to help him on a quest to hunt the Golden Lion as a reward of the quest the tailor would get the ability to make any type of leather clothing even the type that would make it look like a novice. Dark_AvEngER: Are you for real? I’m in that Kingdom right now. I guess I’ll try heading for Mezco City then. SupahNovice#1Disciple: If what your saying is true then that would mean that my idol is not just strong but he also has allies that is also really powerful. He has been wearing that novice-like outfit since 2 months ago. UrLogicSux: Some guys are just to dumb to see the truth. He could just have bought the outfit from that master tailor doesn’t really mean that they are in a guild or something. mRuleUAll: If you geniuses have noticed. His video has been starting to give out some more information than before. I think his next videos will be on how to get this advance hidden job. He did just show us about that hidden cave of the dire foxes right? cutey4you: So which Kingdom is this? The landscape looks to be in the West Kingdom or the East Kingdom right? ProfessorXectas: I think it looks to be in the West Kingdom those forests looks like the ones I’ve been in recently. I guess making a super novice account isn’t possible after all. Since everyone is sure that this is an advance hidden job. TriTank: You guys are just over estimating this guy. Pfft he still looks idiotic to me and Tristan had his advance hidden job when he was level 40!

Nash’s prayers were answered. The comments went on and on about what job Nash has in ZECTAS. Almost all of them concluded that he has an advance hidden job of thief.

The views kept on rising. At this rate he was sure that he could clear this month’s quota for expenditures and savings for his brothers’ future.

* * * * * * 

“Darius, who should I talk to for my next family token?”

“Hmm well it could choose from Franz Briar, James Jackal or Howard Hide.”

“Ohh, I was hoping that you were hiding another one behind your back and say ‘TADA’, it’s right here.”

With a raised eyebrow, Darius watched Smoke incredulously. There were some things that you cannot joke about and one of those things was a family token.

“Right, right. So, I think I’ll go with Franz. His house is the one embedded with the big potato right?”

TUK TUK TUK

Smoke knocked on the big potato embedded on the door. There was no answer. He tried calling out Franz’s name and he heard a voice calling him from behind the house.

There he saw 2 boys plowing the field by hand and 1 girl mixing some form of fertilizer into the land, while their parents Franz and Magda were clearing out the huge stones and logs that were covering their field.

“Hi, Franz. Do you mind if I talk with you a bit? What are you guys planting?”

“Carrots! We originally wanted to plant potatoes, daikon, yam, or anything except Carrots.”

“Why such hate for carrots? I seem to remember you guys loving the carrot soup I made just recently.”

Smoke forgot that in Zectas time moved four times faster than the real world and he had been away from Nanahuatl Village for quiet some time.

“Of course we loved them Smoke. It’s just that since then we’ve had nothing but carrots and now we’re also forced to plant nothing but carrots.”

Since the Village of Nanahuatl was still recovering, the only food sources that they had were some rabbit meat that were hunted by the teens in the village, some fish caught by the fish trap dam, and some carrots from the field.

Apparently it was the only root crop left available and even that was dwindling in numbers. That was why the farmer family of Nanahuatl Village decided to do what they were meant to do and started cultivating the fields.

If it weren’t for the eight teens that were gathered and trained by Darius to use the bow. Then they would have ran out of rabbit meat all together.

“It’s really uplifting to see everyone working together. Helping each other out. I’m glad I was made to start here in Nanahuatl Village.”

“We’re also glad to have you here Smoke. I mean if it weren’t for you then who knows what would’ve happened to us.”

Since the people of Nanahuatl were all NPCs they would have just stayed in their beds sick. Waiting for a player to come rescue them but Smoke felt that he really did save their lives because of how the NPCs were showing their appreciation.

“Well about that. You see Franz, I’ve just received my first quest and I’m really excited to complete it but it seems that I would need your help in completing it.”

“If it is within my power then without a doubt I will help you.”

“I’m glad to hear you say that Franz, you see I would like to ask you to give me your family token. No, what I mean to say is that please I’m begging you to give me your family token.”

Upon hearing such words everyone in the field stopped what they were doing. The rest of the family members looked to Franz waiting to hear his answer.

“Smoke… umm…. you see… how do I put this…. Your certainly the savior of our village but you asking for our family token is like you telling us that you’ve been doing all these good deeds for all this time just so that you can get our family token.”

Smoke was shocked to hear such an accusation. He sincerely just wanted to help them out. He just got this quest recently how could they say such a thing.

“I’m sorry that you feel that way Franz but that isn’t my intention at all. I just really wanted to help all of you out. I just learned the requirements of the quest just now.”

“Smoke, I can feel the sincerity of your words. I’m sorry for accusing you of such a dastardly act. Forgive me Smoke if I have offended you.”

“That’s okay but now that you’ve said that you cannot give me your family token I don’t know how to proceed with my quest.”

“Wait, I never said that I can’t give you my family token. If you really want our family token then you must do an even greater act than rescuing Nanahuatl Village from starvation. An act that would put our family and our descendants in your debt forever.”

Smoke was pondering how in the world he would do something like that. Why couldn’t he just give him his family token. Wasn’t it enough that he saved the village?

“Can you tell me how to do just that? I don’t have any ideas at all.”

“We maybe alive and well now. But this alone has not healed us completely. We were born to be farmers. We have been born to plant, raise, and harvest crops. That is who we are. However I can no longer enjoy the thing that we were meant to do.”

So it wasn’t something as heroic as slaying a legendary dragon after all. It was just helping their family get back on their feet and continue on their livelihood happily.

“That does sound truly horrible. Work without enjoyment is slavery after all. Is there a way I can help you with this problem?”

“Well if you could gather some root crops from the Mandragora Forest then I would consider that to be the most heroic of acts.”

+ Quest: Gather Root Crops for the Briars           Gathering Quest           Level: D     Franz Briar has requested that you gather certain root crops for him in the Mandragora Forest.           Daikon (0/5 sacks)           Potato (0/5 sacks)           Desert Yam (0/5 sacks)           Radish (0/5 sacks)           Sweet Potato (0/5 sacks)           Bread Root (0/5 sacks)     Accept the Quest? [YES/NO]

“Yes. I’d gladly do that. If you would have told me sooner that you had this kind of problem then I would have looked into it as well.”

“Thank you Smoke. Here let me show you the way to Mandragora Forest.”

Smoke felt like he was asked to go to the grocery rather than to do a quest. The map indicated the way to Mandragora Forest it was nearer than the hidden cave of the dire foxes.

After gathering some food and other necessities. Smoke started his way towards Mandragora Forest. He looked forward to entering a forest. He felt that he had become stronger. True he was still far from Tristan but he was on his way for extracting his revenge.

* * * * * * 
As soon as he was at the entrance of the Mandragora Forest he did a quick check on his items and status. His satiety was normal so he didn’t need to eat just yet.

“Status Window.”

Character Name: Smoke
Race: Dark Elf	Alignment: Neutral	Level:17	Money: 20,000,000 Zecs
Fame: 517	Job: Novice	Title: None	Pet: None
Life: 2,091 HP	Mana: 2,380 MP
Dexterity:95	Strength:95	Agility: 10 (+280)	Vitality: 10 (+13)
Intelligence: 10	Leadership: 1	Charisma: 1	Luck: 999
Atk Speed: 37 (+11)	Move Speed:43	Attack: 210-238	Defense: 15
Magic Resistance
Fire: 10%	Water: 10%	Earth: 10%	Wind: 10%
Black Magic: 50%
Equipment Effects
* None
Skills Effects
* Agility of the Horned Rabbit (Agility + 280) * Cooking (Vitality + 13) * Dual Wield (Attack Speed + 11) * Knife Mastery (Knife Damage + 13%)

Smoke prioritized to increase his abilities rather than to increase his levels. He was most especially happy with the first ability that he got.

Agility of the Horned Rabbit was now Intermediate Level 9. It gave him so many benefits attack speed, movement speed, dodge rate. Because of its high agility bonus it made it seem like he had an extra 28 levels.

Satisfied with himself Smoke took the first steps in to the Mandragora Forest.

– Entered Mandragora Forest   – Monsters inside this forest are highly aggressive.   – Suggested level for entering this forest is 45.

Smoke thought he was practically level 45 with his agility bonus included. He confidently continued deeper into the forest.

The forest looked really beautiful. It was filled with gigantic flowers. Their colors varied from Red, Pink, White, Yellow, and Blue.

The forest floor was covered in greenery. Smoke also noticed that the floor was somewhat slippery and somehow it felt like it was moving.

-20 Poison Slimes detected.

His ability ‘Cunning of the Dire Fox’ has detected that he was already surrounded by poison slimes. They were skillfully blending with the forest.

He was lucky that he had learned such a helpful ability. As the slimes slowly moved he picked one target and attacked it.

+ Attack hit poison slime. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 68.
+ Attack hit poison slime. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 69.
+ Attack hit poison slime. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 68.
+ Attack hit poison slime. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 69.
+ Attack hit poison slime. Damage 26.
+ Attack hit poison slime. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 67.
+ Attack hit poison slime. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 65.
+ Attack hit poison slime. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 68.

– Attacked by poison slime. Miss damage. 0

The life bar of the poison slime indicated that it had a total life of 1,000 HP it has a life of almost 3x that of the dire fox.

Smoke’s damage on the poison slime wasn’t as high as the damage he dealt with the dire foxes. He decided to use his ability ‘Armor Break of the Armored Armadillo’

+ Attack hit poison slime. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 69.
+ Attack hit poison slime. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 68.
+ Attack hit poison slime. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 68.
+ Attack hit poison slime. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 69.
+ Attack hit poison slime. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 69.
+ Attack hit poison slime. Damage 22.
+ Attack hit poison slime. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 69.
+ Attack hit poison slime. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 68.

– Attacked by poison slime. Miss damage. 0

+ You’ve dealt a fatal blow to the poison slime.
+ You’ve killed the poison slime.
+ You’ve gained 2400 exp.
+ You’ve gained a level.

The poison slimes give a pretty decent experience. However what was concerning was that his damage remained the same. Even with armor break his damage didn’t increase at all.

While Smoke was still trying to come up with a reason as to why his damage was so low. He was caught off guard by a poison slime.

– Attacked by poison slime. You’ve been poisoned. Health -250
– poison continues to lower your life. Health -40
– poison continues to lower your life. Health -40
– poison continues to lower your life. Health -40

+ Attack hit poison slime. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 69.
+ Attack hit poison slime. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 68.
+ Attack hit poison slime. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 68.
+ Attack hit poison slime. Damage 28.
+ Attack hit poison slime. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 69.
+ Attack hit poison slime. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 69.
+ Attack hit poison slime. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 69.
+ Attack hit poison slime. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 68.

+ You’ve dealt a fatal blow to the poison slime.+ You’ve killed the poison slime.
+ You’ve gained 2400 exp.
+ You’ve gained a level.

– poison continues to lower your life. Health -40
– poison continues to lower your life. Health -40
– poison continues to lower your life. Health -40

The situation was very bad. Even when the battle had already ended Smoke was still losing HP because he was poisoned. He only had 1430 HP left and he didn’t have a clear path towards the exit.

While trying to fight his way through the poison slimes he was eating the smoked rabbit meat that he had as an emergency ration. He continued eating as many of them as he could to try to raise his HP while walking towards the exit.

He somehow managed to get of the forest but he only had 500 HP left and the poison was still continuing to decrease his HP there were no signs of the poison from fading.

Smoke didn’t have any form of antidote on him. If he didn’t think of something fast he was sure to die even before he would get to Nanahuatl Village.

He quickly remembered the gift that Darius gave him before setting out. It was a portable pot where he could make small meals good for 1-3 persons.

He immediately started making a fire and prepared the ingredients required for the medicinal soup that gave the residents of Nanahuatl Village some HP Regen effect.

He quickly gulped down the stew as soon as he completed the ‘Medicinal Rabbit Stew’ the effects had worked immediately. Instead of losing 40 HP it had become 5 HP. His ‘Cooking’ ability was still Intermediate Level 3 it looks like he needs to improve this ability quickly.

The HP Regen from the medicinal stew wasn’t strong enough to cancel out the poison. None the less it made the needed impact that Smoke was looking for.

He continued to eat some of the smoked rabbit meat to regain his HP. The poison lasted for about 3 hours. While the effect of the medicinal stew only lasted for 20 minutes.

During the time that the medicinal stew still had its HP Regen effect. Smoke was out hunting the horned rabbits. He felt sick to the bone just hunting for the rabbits once more.

However, he needed their meat in order to make more medicinal stew. While hunting for the horned rabbits meat. He noticed the carrots among the fields while he was picking up medicinal herbs and decided to pick some of those carrots up as well.

In his next preparation for medicinal stew he decided to add in those carrots. It resulted in ‘Medicinal Rabbit Stew+’ the effects of HP Regen was indeed higher than before. If his calculations were correct it would mean that he would only lose 3HP per poison attack now.

Smoke gathered some more of the needed ingredients for the medicinal soup before venturing back into ‘Mandragora Forest’ this time he was prepared for the poison attack.

* * * * * * 

Keeping track of the time when the effects of the medicinal stew would wear out was the top most priority. He made every effort not to be placed in a situation where in he would be surrounded by poison slimes like before.

Even though he was not surrounded the slimes do sometimes manage to make a successful attack causing him to be poisoned.

He decided on staying within the first layer of the forest before proceeding further in. He wanted to make sure that his HP Regen would be high enough to face any kind of monsters in the inner layers.

This was the hunting pattern that Smoke decided to use. He would fight with the poison slimes for about 20 minutes find a safe corner to make his medicinal soup and continue fighting the poison slimes after wards. Repeating this process for 10 hours until his ingredients would start to run out and then head for the exit of the forest. Hunt and gather for the ingredients for 2 hours before heading back into the forest once again.

Smoke did this for 3 days. He did notice that the breaks for needing to make the stew was longer now. Instead of 20 minutes it was now 30 minutes. This also meant that he no longer needed to hunt more ingredients.

On the fourth day he finally reached his goal of receiving +1 HP Regen even when he was poisoned. As his cooking ability increased so did the bonus to the vitality stat. It was really small at +1 vitality per level increase, but that was still 1 point more than nothing.

Smoke finally felt confident to go further inside the forest. Further inside he noticed that there were almost no slimes. He managed not to get poisoned as he had already made a detailed map of safe places to pass through inside the first layer of Mandragora Forest.

On the second layer there were only the colorful gigantic flowers. He looked around everywhere and tried to sense with ‘Cunning of the Dire Fox’ for enemies but he couldn’t feel any. His gut instinct was telling him otherwise. It told him that there was something here.

He tried to continue towards the third layer towards the center. When suddenly he felt a sharp pain coming from his back. It was a deep slashed wound.

– Attacked by orchid mantis. BACK STABBED. You’ve taken damage. Health -525

‘What was that?’

He turned around but couldn’t see anything. All he could see were the flowers.

– Attacked by orchid mantis. BACK STABBED. You’ve taken damage. Health -532

Smoke instinctively went to a big tree and had his back covered by the tree. The flowers were slowly moving back and forth as if dancing.

He still wasn’t picking up any enemies with the ‘Cunning form the Dire Fox’ but he could somehow see a figure starting to form from the dancing flowers.

There it was a giant orchid mantis. It stood at a height of five feet with long scythes for front legs. From what he could tell with his eyes there were at least thirty of them.

He came to the conclusion that the orchid mantis was somehow suppressing its blood lust causing them not to be registered as enemies.

It almost seemed like a master stealth ability. If those orchid mantis didn’t move back and forth so much he would never be able to distinguish them.

Smoke was saved by his medicinal stew once more. With the decent HP Regen he managed to recover most of his lost HP.

He was doing mental battle simulations on how to face the orchid mantis. He was sure that if he could get one he could make a better plan on how to deal with the rest.

He started running towards one of the orchid mantis and got a successful hit in.

+ Attack hit orchid mantis. Damage 238.
+ Attack hit orchid mantis. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 595.
+ Attack miss orchid mantis. Damage 0.
+ Attack miss orchid mantis. Damage 0.

– Attacked by orchid mantis. You’ve taken damage. Health -340
– Attacked by orchid mantis. You’ve taken damage. Health -332
– Attacked by orchid mantis. Miss damage. 0

It revealed a terrifying fact. The life bar of the orchid mantis indicated it to be 8,000 HP and he only managed to make around 580 damage points even with ‘armor break of the armadillo’ and the scariest part was that it had a high dodge rate.

If Smoke would continue fighting this monster he would surely die. He quickly headed towards the first layer of the forest and immediately went out to the leave the forest entirely.

In the safety of the plains outside of the forest Smoke was reorganizing his battle plan. If the orchid mantis would swarm him he would surely die in just 6 hits.

He needed to boost his attack damage, his chance to hit, his life and his defense basically he needed to boost everything. In order to do that he needed to level up a lot. He decided it was time to grind in some levels.

Now that he has set an objective on how to deal with the orchid mantis he continued on hunting the poison slimes. He didn’t mind being swarmed by them anymore. In fact he welcomed it. Saves him the trouble of looking for them.

He just needed to make sure that he could get enough space to move out of the way in order to prepare his medicinal stew.

After spending another four days of hunting the poison slime Smoke’s level was now 32. He placed all of his stat points on Dexterity since he wanted to have guaranteed hits rather than high damage hits that would occur only once or twice. He estimated that he needed to be at least be level 40 to have sufficient life and damage to take on the orchid mantis.

It has been almost eight days since he started on this quest for gathering of root crops. He originally thought that this would be a simple gathering quest. He was gravely mistaken.

Smoke always checked the durability of his knives and this time it’s durability was about to run out. He didn’t want to use his bare fists again. He knew he had to return to Nanahuatl and have them fixed. As he was about to head for the exit…

+ Gained Poison Resistance     You have accumulated a total of 168 hours in poisoned state.   Due to being poisoned for so long you’ve naturally gained some resistance to it.   Continued exposure to poison will increase in resistance.   Poison Resistance: 10%

He was shocked to see the system notification. So you can also gain resistance by this method. This wasn’t mentioned in the forums. He was glad about this new found discovery.

He didn’t really need the poison resistance because he had increased his cooking ability. Now his medicinal stew could easily over power the poison. He didn’t need it but decided to increase his poison resistance once he would get back here.

* * * * * * 

Once Smoke got back in Nanahuatl Village he immediately went to see Darius to have his knives repaired. He told him about the gained poison resistance and the problem that he was currently facing against the orchid mantis.

“Orchid Mantis eyy… hmm if I recall correctly they can completely hide their killing intent, so your ability ‘Cunning of the Dire Fox’ wouldn’t really work on them.”

“Yup I figured that out myself. I could somehow see them with my eyes though but if I try to get close to them then another 4 or more orchid mantis would jump at me right away. If only there was a way for me to attack from a far.”

“Ranged attack huh? That’s not a bad idea but you would need a high amount of Dexterity in order to do some decent damage.”

“Just how much Dexterity are we talking about? I just so happen to have 235 Dex.”

“That’s pretty good for your level. I think you can manage to use this somehow.”

Darius took out a black beginner’s bow with a damage (1-4) and a quiver of arrows. He mentioned for Smoke to grab the items and follow him outside.

Outside there was a newly made archery target practice facility. There were eight targets made out of straw with a distance of about 30 meters.

Eight teenagers stood closely together and proceeded to hit the first target simultaneously. All of them manage to hit the target and almost all of the arrows were dead center. They then continued on with the rest of the targets.

All eight of the targets were turned into pin cushions of arrows. The group moved with such precision and unity. These were the teenagers who had taken his place in hunting for the horned rabbits meat.

After seeing such exhibition Smoke understood how they had hunted the horned rabbits. If all of them attacked at the same time then the horned rabbit was sure to die by just one group attack. It was simple and effective.

“Smoke let me introduce to you the newly formed hunting party of Nanahuatl. I plan to send them out to Coatl City to have them get a job change of an Archer then after wards have them apply to be Hunters.”

“You guys are amazing. How long did it take you to make such a coordinated attack pattern?”

“It only took them about a week. From your left you have Laernea, Sharanga, Ichaival, Vijaya, Thyrsus, Sharur, Gandiva, and Jinggu.”

The young hunting party slightly bowed down their heads to show their respect for Smoke. All of them were inspired by his generosity and kindness. That’s the reason why they took up the bow in order to help provide food for the village.

“Darius, I’m suppose to imitate what I just saw right?”

“More or less. Do not be too discourage if you can’t perform as well as them though. This is your first time using a bow after all.”

Smoke held the bow and placed the arrow, carefully aiming for the bull’s eye. Everything felt natural. He rapidly release eight arrows almost simultaneously. His hand movement from taking an arrow out of the quiver that hanged on his back was so fluid that it almost looked like he was using an ability of the advance job ‘Sniper’.

Everyone had their mouths wide open. They couldn’t believe that Smoke just hit the bull’s eye on all of the targets for all 8 arrows. All the audience could do was clap at such a display of skill.

“Wow that was really impressive. I didn’t know that you had also increased your Agility by that much already.”

“I did take the time to increase my ‘Agility of the Horned Rabbit’ to Advance Level 2. I now have Agility +360 and surprisingly enough the effects of the increased attack speed from ‘Dual Wield’ still applies.”

“I see. So that explains why you were able to shoot so many arrows and with your high Dexterity stat you were able to accurately hit all of the targets.”

Smoke also couldn’t believe what he just did. He was trying to act as cool and as calm as he could in front of the young future Hunters. However deep down inside he wanted to run, jump and scream ‘AWESOME! That was so cool!’.

He did immediately realize the drawback of using bow and arrows. The quiver that Darius gave him only had a capacity of 100 arrows. The good thing though was that he could fetch the arrow back but that would mean that he would need to get close to the orchid mantis once more. Defeating the purpose of his ranged attack plan.

“Darius, this is really a great help but I’m afraid that I will quickly run out of arrows before I can manage to kill 50 orchid mantises.”

“Hmm… I think I have one more thing that could help you out. Everyone return to your practice while I talk with Smoke inside.”

Once inside Darius headed to his back room and quickly returned with a glowing red stone. The stone was emitting some heat it was about 6 inches long and had a rectangular shape.

“This is an ember stone. If you use this to sharpen your weapons they will gain some fire damage. If memory serves me right plant monsters are really weak against fire. You also mentioned that your damage against the poison slimes was small even with ‘armor break of the armored armadillo’ right? The reason behind that is that slimes have a unique ability to endure pure physical attacks. So by adding an elemental attack you will get to see some amazing results.”

“So I could use this to sharpen the arrows making them into fire arrows! Darius you really are brilliant!”

“That too, but you could also use them on your knives. The job of enchanter can cast elemental attributes on weapons using this method you could get a similar effect. However weapons that are empowered by the ember stone can only hold its fire attribute for 10 hours. You would need to sharpen them again after that.”

“But can’t you just craft me an enchanted weapon then, that is embedded with the ember stone?”

“I could if I was a master blacksmith. Alas I am not. But if you seek an enchanted weapon with elemental attributes I seem to recall a dungeon in this Kingdom that had a sword imbued with the power of lightning. It’s suggested level of entry is around 200 if I’m not mistaken.”

“Right! Using the ember stone is really practical and useful. I think I can somehow manage with just these items.”

Darius taught Smoke how to sharpen the knives and arrows using the ember stone. He was given a thousand arrows, it took about 1 hour to sharpen all of the arrows and the knives.

With everything in place, Smoke set out again to face the most dangerous grocery pick up he has ever experienced.

* * * * * * 

In front of the entrance of ‘Mandragora Forest’ Smoke proceeded with his new ritual before hunting. He sharpened his knives and arrows using the ember stone. He was slowly getting the hang of it that he decreased the time to 50 minutes.

Smoke tried attacking the poison slime with his fire empowered knives and was very pleased with the result…

+ Attack hit poison slime. +FIRE DMG. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 1143.
+ You’ve dealt a fatal blow to the poison slime.
+ You’ve killed the poison slime.
+ You’ve gained 700 exp.

The poison slimes weren’t giving such high exps anymore. Smoke planned to finish the quest within the ten hour limit set by his fire weapon enhancements.

Smoke already saw the entrance towards the third layer of the forest before so going back there will be a lot quicker. He just needed to wipe out all the orchid mantises that would block his way.

As he entered the second layer, the layer of the orchid mantises, Smoke switched to his bow and arrow. He began shooting all of the flowers in sight. Regardless if it was an orchid mantis or not he planned to wipe all of them out.

+ Attack hit orchid mantis. +FIRE DMG. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 1143.

Once he hit a monster, he kept on attacking that orchid mantis until its life bar was depleted.

+ You’ve dealt a fatal blow to the orchid mantis.
+ You’ve killed the orchid mantis.
+ You’ve gained 4000 exp.
+ You’ve gained a level.

Smoke continued on picking off the orchid mantises one at a time. Anytime he saw the figure of the orchid mantis there was no escape for it. All the orchid mantises did was sway back and forth. As if trying to be a flower being blown by the wind.

Since his arrows hit practically at the same time there was no chance for the injured orchid mantis to react. It would fall dead to the ground after the eighth arrow hit its body.

At first the orchid mantises continued to stand their ground away from Smoke trying to hide within the flowers. Despite that the dead bodies of the orchid mantises started to stack up around them.

As they saw that they were dying one by one at an alarming rate, their movements changed. The orchid mantises were enraged. The stealth that they were so proud of was no longer working for them.

Instead of dancing back and forth waiting for a chance to attack. The orchid mantises rushed towards Smoke they came at him eight at a time. Just the right number for Smoke’s attack speed.

The orchid mantises were running towards a rain of arrows, falling to the ground at around 5 meters away from Smoke. From all the scattered dead bodies of the orchid mantises, it looked like there was an invisible force field that stopped them at that distance.

After almost 4 hours of non-stop fire arrows the orchid mantises near the area were no more. He had gained a total of 3 levels and added them all to his Dexterity. Smoke quickly picked up as many fire arrows as he could, as he only had less than 6 hours left of fire empowerment.

All he could gather were 400 fire arrows, the rest of the arrows were buried under the pile of orchid mantis carcasses.

Smoke finally reached the center of Mandragora Forest. It was a clear field somewhat similar to the Maneator’s Forest but instead of a cave there was a sole rickety tree at it’s center. It was a huge rickety tree.

However the things that Smoke focused on were the root crops that were scattered all around the tree. He quickly took out his sacks and started collecting all of the root crops that the quest had required.

As he was about to complete the needed number of sacks for the potatoes. He felt a root grab him. It took hold of his feet rendering him immobile, unable to move the spot.

The next thing that Smoke saw was a huge wooden hand swatting him like a fly. He was thrown against a big tree still within the boundaries of the 3rd layer of the forest.

– Attacked by Tree Ent: ReenTe. You’ve taken damage. Health -3000

The rickety tree was a colossal Tree Ent it was the boss of this forest. It had used its root to grab hold of Smoke stopping his movements. The Tree Ent was very very very slow. He needed an immobile target in order to successfully hit it. He does however have a high attack power.

Smoke only had 693 HP left. In his excitement to finish the quest quickly, he forgot to make the medicinal rabbit stew. He thought about eating something to regain some of his health but decided not to. Even at full health it would only take 2 hits for the Tree Ent to kill him.

The magic number being TWO. Smoke wasn’t going to give him another shot. He was going to wipe the floor with this boss. Luckily the Tree Ent stayed at the center of his forest and continued to use it’s roots into trying to capture Smoke.

Smoke felt the  roots coming at him from all directions but he could easily sense them with ‘Cunning of the Dire Fox’ and dodge them within a hair’s breadth.

While dodging he used his ‘Agility of the Horned Rabbit’ to attack the Tree Ent with his fire arrows.

+ Attack hit Tree Ent: ReenTe. +FIRE DMG. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 1493.

Seven more fire arrows attacked the Tree Ent.

The Tree Ent’s life bar indicated that it had a total of (197,969/210,000 HP) Smoke had more than enough arrows to deal with this boss.

Smoke was very careful not to get caught by the roots. The Tree Ent only needed one hit but Smoke was too fast for him.

The Tree Ent was slow but it’s roots were not. They moved like fast whips making sounds as they break the empty air that Smoke was making them hit.

Smoke headed towards the left side of the Tree Ent. He maneuvered carefully towards his goal while continuing his rain of fire arrows. It took him 15 minutes to reach his destination but he finally reached it. The back of the Tree Ent was exposed!

+ Attack hit Tree Ent: ReenTe. +FIRE DMG. CRITICAL HIT. BACK ATTACK. Damage 2239.

Smoke unleashed his fire arrows with his maximum speed. He was able to do ten volleys of eight arrows for each attack. The life bar of the Tree Ent showed that it only had (63,243/210,000 HP) left.

The whole forest floor of the 3rd layer started to shake. The roots buried deeply underground started to rise and were slowly heading towards it’s source, towards the Tree Ent. The thick roots were forming into an impenetrable root barrier.

Smoke saw that the life bar of the Tree Ent was also gradually increasing. It was using a regenerative ability. His fire arrows did no damage at all when it hit the thick roots. Realizing the situation he quickly adapted and switched weapons.

He dashed with everything he had towards the forming root barrier. He was aware of the thinner roots that were still targeting him and was also planning a way to get past the forming thick roots.

Barely making it in time, the root barrier was finally done but Smoke was already inside before it was completed. He swiftly drove both his knives deep in the back of the dying Tree Ent.

The regeneration ability that the Tree Ent had activated was disrupted as Smoke started his blitzing knife attacks. The Tree Ent’s roots were desperately trying to grab him. It could feel that it was on its last few minutes of life.

+ Attack hit Tree Ent: ReenTe. +FIRE DMG. CRITICAL HIT. BACK ATTACK. Damage 2121.

A series of back attacks kept on coming. The Tree Ent could do nothing against it. Finally, the killing blow came.

+ You’ve dealt a fatal blow to the Tree Ent: ReenTe.
+ You’ve killed the Tree Ent: ReenTe.
+ You’ve gained 90,000 exp.
+ You’ve gained a level.
+ You’ve gained a level.
+ You’ve gained a level.

As the body of the Tree Ent started to fade away, it left behind a precious loot.

+ Acquired rare amulet: Heart of ReenTe.

Smoke excitedly inspected his first BOSS loot.

Heart of ReenTe (Necklace)   A rare amulet with a red mana stone at its center. It is the precious item of the Tree Ent as it was it’s way of regenerating his rickety body sustaining him to last these past 500 years.     Equipment Ability:     *Regeneration (Active)       > You can cast regeneration on yourself to last for 2 hours       > Regeneration rate of  2% Max HP/sec at the cost of  4% Max MP/sec       > This is a channeling ability, once interrupted the ability will be cancelled.       > Once you’ve used the item you cannot use the item again for another 6 hours.     *Increased Vitality (Passive)       > you gain 30 vitality points when you wear this necklace.

After inspecting the amulet he quickly equipped it and activated its ability ‘Regeneration’ he saw a faint green light and felt a soft hot wind covering his body.

With his health fully rejuvenated Smoke finally got to do his original quest. He started gathering the needed root crops.

Before leaving the Mandragora Forest, Smoke decided to gather some of the mandragora flowers that were scattered all over the 3rd layer. He thought that these flowers must have some amazing property after all a whole forest was named after it.

On the way out of the forest in the second layer. Some of the orchid mantises were respawning since Smoke had already destroyed most of the flowers that served as their camouflage there was no place for them to hide.

He switched back to his bow and arrows and quickly dealt with the 50 orchid mantises that were blocking his way. Among the dead carcasses he found another loot, it was their deadly scythe like front legs.

Making sure to pick up all of the loot before heading towards the first layer. Smoke didn’t even bother with the poison slimes since he wanted to return to Nanahuatl Village as soon as possible.

* * * * * * 

Instead of taking his usual path towards Darius’ house Smoke headed towards Franz’s house. He brought out a lot of sacks filled with different kinds of root crops. Franz was ecstatic, he was worried since Smoke took so long. Franz hurriedly gathered every member of his family to greet Smoke.

+ Completed Quest!                                    Gather Root Crops for the Briars You have gathered all the root crops. The Briar family can now continue their growing the fields with smiles on their faces. Reward:              * Briar’s Family Token              * 10,000 Exp

“In the presence of all the members of the Briars, I Franz Briar turn over our family token to Smoke.”

Franz took out a small wooden rake and wooden plow intertwined together and gave it to Smoke.

“As is the custom. Smoke you are now the official clan head of the Briars. We will follow your will no matter what it is.”

+ Received Briar’s family token

+ Family Token of the Briars You have earned the family token of the Briars and as such you are now their new Clan Head. The Briars are a family that has been said to be inborn farmers. Of course this is all self proclaimed. Family Tokens Count: (2/5)

+ Intimacy with the Briars has risen to ‘Blood Brothers’ You have completed the ‘Important Quest’ that Franz Briar has given you and for that they are eternally grateful. The Briars will now follow your will as their new Clan Head.

“No wonder you were so hesitant to give me your family token. My dear Briars as your new Clan Head I promise to treat you with the respect that you justly deserve and also swear to never abuse my authority.”

The quest proved more difficult than originally expected but it did result in a lot of wonderful things. Smoke was now level 43 and more powerful than ever.

He excitedly headed towards the next family token. The family of Howard Hide.

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