Evil Avalon - Volume 1 - Chapter 15

Chapter 15: A Sleepless Night

Every channel on television ran breaking news alerts to inform viewers of the Colors Clan’s heroic victory against the lich. The station that aired the broadcast extended its programming by four hours, and retired adventurers commentated on footage of the thirty-second-floor raid.

My mother and sister, mega fans of Colors, sat glued to the television all night as they celebrated. Incidentally, my father had gone to bed since he had work the next day.

The spirit of celebration that seemed to grip the country after the successful raid astounded me. It didn’t look like the broadcast was ever going to end.

“It’s past midnight,” I said. “Shouldn’t we all get some sleep?”

“I’m good,” Kano said. “There’s no school tomorrow.”

“Oops. I need to get up for work,” said my mother.

Then, I remembered what I wanted to ask my mother and spoke up, “Mom, what would you do if you could become an adventurer?”

“Oh, I doubt I could fight monsters at my age,” she replied.

It was natural for someone who’d passed their physical peak to believe that changing careers to adventurer would be difficult. But when I told her that the physical enhancements gained in the dungeon had an anti-aging effect, she nearly jumped out of her chair!

“Why didn’t you tell me sooner?!” she exclaimed. “I think I’ll go on a slime hunt on my way home from work tomorrow!”

“Take me too!” Kano joined in.

I’d read about the anti-aging effect in a magazine for adventurers I’d found at the Adventurers’ Guild. In it, Japan’s Holy Woman had written, “What’s my secret for staying young? Why, the dungeon, of course!” They should direct any doubts they had about that claim to her, not me.

After all, that woman’s adventuring career spanned from the prewar period to today. Her age was a mystery—she kept that information secret for privacy.

Anyway, back to the subject at hand.

I explained I knew a good spot for power leveling on the fifth floor that removed struggling fights on the early floors. But I kept my explanation vague enough that I wouldn’t give too much away. Combat experience would be necessary if they wanted to fight on the front lines of dungeon expeditions. Power leveling, though, was the easier method if all they needed to do was to get stronger. There’d be enough time to drill them on tactics and dungeon know-how as they progressed to higher levels.

“Wait, bro, you’re already on the fifth floor?” asked Kano. She looked at the calendar, counted on her fingers, then tilted her head, puzzled. “How? You’ve only been raiding for these last two weeks.”

“Adventurers’ High really is something else,” said my mother. “Your dad’s never gotten past the fourth floor!”

Of course, he hadn’t. Finding a group of ten or so people on the weekend and strolling around the dungeon was no way to level up. Big parties worked amazingly for adventurers at higher levels. But the most efficient way to level up in the early floors was to secure a nice hunting spot and exploit it solo or with a single partner. That required having knowledge of the game.

“I’ll take mom when she doesn’t have to worry about work. As for you, Kano, I can take you a day later, so Sunday. We can’t do it tomorrow because I want to level so we can power level safely.”

“Yay!!!” Kano chirped with delight. “But how will I get into the dungeon? I don’t have an Adventurers’ Pass.”

“Yes,” my mother agreed. “She’s still fourteen. The guild won’t give her one.”

Most people thought sneaking into the dungeon was impossible. The government had strict restrictions on entry, and the gate wasn’t common knowledge. I still found it odd that nobody had discovered and used it to help with expeditions.

“Don’t worry,” I said. “I know a way around it.”

“Yay!!!”

“Are you sure?” asked my mother. “Don’t do anything that will put you in danger.”

After that, my mother went to bed. The television was still broadcasting reports of the successful dungeon expedition.

“I wonder,” said Kano, “will Colors have to fight all the bosses again as they come back up through the dungeon?”

“Floor bosses either stay dead or respawn somewhere else,” I replied, “so you don’t have to fight them if all you’re doing is passing between floors.”

“Oh, okay.”

The orc lord on the fifth floor was originally a floor boss. I took a moment to think about how that boss fight would go. Level 5 Newbies would only stand a chance against an enemy like that by forming a large party... Or by bridge-dropping.

“I can’t wait for Sunday to come,” said Kano. “’Night, bro.”

“Goodnight.”

I went upstairs to brush my teeth and went to sleep, but thoughts about the dungeon expedition still had my heart pumping and kept me awake. As I lay on my bed, I reflected on the raid and how the adventurers had put their lives on the line to slay that boss.

Being the first to slay a new floor boss and conquer a new floor had been an event worthy of celebration in the game. In DEC, the players who’d fought against the mightiest monsters had been the ones everyone had talked about. Floor bosses were the strongest monsters to appear on any floor, so a party with a handful of players stood no chance against them. Without defeating them, the floors beyond would be unreachable. And so various clans would join forces to defeat the bosses and respawn and try again and again until they’d won and had unlocked the next floor. In the days before I’d arrived in this world, the game’s clans had flooded message boards seeking to recruit members to raid the hundredth floor.

But the raid I’d seen on the television earlier and the raids in the game were completely different. I’d watched adventurers fighting for their lives and those of their trusted comrades. The Colors Clan seemed in their element to the ordinary person. But I knew they’d suffered many failures on their journey, and it was easy to imagine how much pressure they felt, how hard they had to fight against their own fear. They couldn’t repeat the raid over and over. In this world, death was final.

I couldn’t just plan my dungeon raids like I had in the game. And I’d found that out the hard way when I created the train of orcs in my fight against the orc lord. Still, I’d learned a few things while watching the fight against the lich.

First, there was a lack of Manual Activation of skills. The adventurers had only used Automatic Activation during the fight as there’d been no skill motions or drawing of magic circles. Had they avoided using Manual Activation because the raid was live? Not likely. Colors wouldn’t have skimped on anything that would’ve given them an edge since Manual Activation reduced skill cooldowns and increased skill power. The fight had been too close for that. In that case, either nobody from this world knew about Manual Activation, or the knowledge existed but was kept top secret and revealed to only a select few. The former seemed the most likely.

I’d also learned a few things about jobs, like how none of the healing support roles had a job higher than Priest. Colors had plenty of Priests but not a single adventurer with the advanced Cleric job. Even Sanada was just a Priest. Adventurers at a high enough level to fight against the lich would have more than enough experience points to attain the job.

The clan had also given Warriors shields and made them act as tanks even though they were best suited to dealing damage. Someone with the Knight job, another intermediate job, would’ve been a better choice. Knights had resistance against physical and magical attacks and possessed valuable skills, so there was no reason to exclude them.

Could no one know how to change jobs to either Cleric or Knight? I hadn’t found any information about Clerics. Knights definitely existed in this world because I’d found records of them in some European countries.

Given the risk of dungeon information falling into the wrong hands, the governments undoubtedly treated specific information as top secret and withheld it from the public. For example, I’d found no occurrences of adventurers with the advanced Samurai job in other countries. The Japanese government treated the method of becoming a Samurai as a state secret, revealing it only to promising young adventurers for their loyalty. They must have treated the Knight job the same way, reserving it as a privilege to give to a chosen few. In a way, high-level adventurers were national assets.

The raid had also presented a few questions for me. Why hadn’t the Holy Woman participated in the lich fight? The Holy Woman’s skill Turn Undead could inflict massive damage on the lich, even with its high magic resistance. Even Tasato’s Samurai skills couldn’t do as much damage. Moreover, the four chaos soldiers would’ve gone down faster if they’d had the Area of Effect Sanctuary skill, which healed adventures and hurt undead monsters within a wide radius. Holy Women were also indispensable in fights against floor bosses or other strong enemies because of their Revive skill that brought the dead back to life. Even if one didn’t need it, it would be a huge comfort to know it was there.

At least one Holy Woman resided in Japan, so why hadn’t the Colors Clan enlisted her help? Perhaps they couldn’t? Could the Holy Woman be too divine for even a leading raiding clan like Colors to contact? Or maybe her existence was just a bluff concocted by the government?

I put aside whether a Holy Woman truly existed in Japan since I couldn’t verify that. If Pinky played through the correct events, she’d eventually become a Holy Woman, which could be a problem. How would Japan react if that happened? And the rest of the world? Many variables were at play, even if this world followed the stories from the game.

As such, I needed to investigate the effect of discovering new jobs on this world. That included the Hero job the protagonist could get. It would be good to meet and talk with Japan’s Holy Woman or a high-level adventurer.

Though, I’d have to level up. Nobody would take a random level 7 Newbie seriously, and they’d slam the door in my face.

All this hard thinking finally wore me out, and I drifted off.