What happens when an experienced soldier gets a hold of sufficient weapons?
The answer is the eradication of his enemies.
[SP: 42] [SP: 67] [SP: 85]
Rowan walked into a rank E dungeon, gun in hand, eyes darting left and right.
A goblin appeared directly in front of him. He did not even bother with stealth anymore. He just blasted the AA-20 and ripped apart the group of goblins as he walked deeper inside.
When they tried to charge from around corners they never even got the chance.
Before they could close the distance, a spray of massive pellets tore through them.
He cleaned group after group until he reached the final boss room. Without wasting another second he activated [Soul Devourer] and violently shredded the goblin shaman, punching clean through its magic barrier with ease.
[You have gained skill: Magic Barrier (E): Creates a magical barrier.]
"That makes five today." Rowan was very pleased with his progression speed.
[You leveled up!]
"I guess my limit is near..." He sighed. A level up no longer made him happy because now he needed to clear two dungeons instead of one to gain a level, and that number would only keep increasing.
The experience both needed and given by dungeons was multiplicative. An E rank hunter might see good progress in their first year clearing E rank gates, but at a certain point they would need to move up to D rank gates to keep growing.
At his current speed he would hit his ceiling in about two days. Maybe tomorrow morning if he skipped going home and ignored the harvesting entirely.
'But I can't do that now, can I? Wasting precious resources like this is a no go.'
Rowan had lived through an era where supplies ran thin. It broke his heart just to leave Mana Cores lying around. He was already lucky enough that he did not have to harvest their meat for food too.
Each clear took him around 45 minutes to an hour. The actual combat only took 10 to 20 minutes, more than half the time was spent harvesting Mana Cores. But the yield was already good.
His giant backpack was packed full. Gauging by the size alone he was sitting at around 200 cores by now. That amounted to almost 200,000 dollars in a single day of raiding.
He was also level 7 now.
--
[Status]
Level: 7
Class: Assassin (E) / Soul Reaper (Tier 2, SSS)
[Stats]
Strength: 22
Agility: 11
Vitality: 15
Dexterity: 15
Magic: 7
--
The average hunter took about a month to go from level 1 to 7, and the climb would only get longer after level 10.
'If one day equals one month of normal progression speed, I need around 60 days to reach my ceiling.' Rowan tried to cheer himself up but only ended up sighing at the goal he had set.
Hunter leveling was a zero-sum game. To reach higher levels, he needed higher rank enemies.
When he first started out, he reached level 70 in about 4 years and spent 3 more reaching level 100, and that was with Orelia's help and monsters flooding the entire globe.
Roughly estimating, he would need around 50 S rank gate solo clears to reach level 100 this time.
He could not even imagine it. Clearing an S rank gate alone.
Clearing E rank gates was just killing simple monsters. An S rank gate meant facing armies or demi-gods with tricks, traps and layers of complexity that brute force alone could not solve.
He would need a party for that.
Rowan walked out of the dungeon with blood-stained cloth. Since no enemy could reach him in melee now that his stats had improved, it was just splashed filth from the harvesting process that had still gotten on him.
"I wonder how long it will be before I meet my friends again..."
Rowan missed his friends.
Aside from Orelia, he had many comrades who had fought by his side and helped push him to the final stages, notably the barrier of [Aegis of the Human Age]: a girl whose process rank was S-class, called [Saint].
She should be in Italy right now.
'Come to think of it, maybe my first order of business should be forming a party.' While leveling alone was nice, Rowan knew that once he hit level 30, around the range that required C-rank gates to farm, he was going to need a party for faster clears.
Hell, even at D-rank he would need them now, since D-rank was a level that people who worked as professional hunters usually raided in groups. He only got a few openings each day, and it was going to take a lot of time to find one he could solo.
Rowan opened his phone and there were only 2 D-rank gates available, while 8 E-rank slots were open.
He had the power of an SSS-class, and he wanted to maximize it to its fullest potential.
This is what it meant by having a better starter class being the greatest advantage one could have.
While his [Soul Reaper] might not offer powerful attack moves, its special conditions were what made it strong.
He never felt tired, self-healed, could not die, felt no hunger or thirst, and even mental fatigue was nonexistent. He could keep going as long as he had SP in reserve, and while his normal skill set was for utility, with AA-20 he could offset that.
But if he were an attack class, people at the same level with S-rank damage skills could already kill C-rank monsters, while E-rank people could maybe damage D-rank monsters.
"Hmm... what to do, what to do..." With so much time but so few opportunities to grab, he felt stuck.
If he were attack class, he would just upping his offensive stats right now and asked to join a high level party to get carried, but that wasn't option.
All SSS-class barriers are flexible classes.
Even the most damage-adjusted ones have no attack skills.
Time Lord, Soul Reaper, Archdruid, and Sword Saint.
But unlike SS-class and below, they had much more room for growth, which sadly some never got to see reach its full potential.
He could keep speed-running these E-rank gates, but that was not going to be enough when face to face with Orelia.
This should be her 1,573rd run, and she must have had everything down perfectly.
But he knew that even with her [Time Lord] class, she still needed rest, and as far as he knew, her class had the lowest firepower among them since it had no attacking skills.
Needing no rest was the one and only advantage he had over her, and he needed to use it well.
Bzz. Bzz.
While thinking about his next move, his phone rang even though he had put it on mute.
This could only mean it was an emergency.
"A D-rank dungeon break?!"