A Returnee Wants To Play VRMMO 19 Chapter 18

[Quest Updated! (47/100)]

"Ugh! This is going to take forever! There is no alternative but to do that, if I want to finish this immediately."

Nex has been fighting for the last two hours but unfortunately, he had a hard time completing the quest quickly.

The labyrinth was much bigger than he thought and the monsters were scattered all over the place. He was having a hard time spotting just one.

And so, he came up with a plan. Instead of finding the monsters, the monsters will find him. There is only one tiny bit of a problem.

"They will come in droves."

Although the monsters were at Level 15, they haven't had their First Awakenings, so disposing them isn't a problem at all for our hero. Even if they come in groups of three or four, it will still be a walk in the park.

The complication though lies in the flow of incoming monsters. It would be continuous.

What this implies is that Nex has to take out each group swiftly to prevent gathering too many monsters at one time. Over-luring isn't advisable due to really obvious reasons.

This gives us the second implication that he has to use his mana effectively. He needs to avoid mana wastage on unnecessary moves, or it will be dead end once he depletes all of it.

To the average player, it won't be worth the risk. Better to go about this slowly but surely. To the lazy Nex, with the advantage of having his hunt time decreased, it was acceptable.

"Well, whatever, let's just do this."

Taking a torch from his inventory, Nex held it and muttered a few words.

"[Soul Fire]"

Few sparks began to spew out of the torch, eventually turning into a silver fire that burned slowly.

"All three stat points to mana."

Instead of admiring the fire, he immediately sat down and started to regulate his breathing, slowly restoring his mana and soul force.

It takes one to be at least at the Grandmaster's level to perform any kind of Soul Arts, even if it's just a lowly skill such as this one. For someone to execute it with Nex's current level with having experience in the subject like the said person would mean one thing: Soul Combustion.

Soul Combustion means his soul will burn completely, leaving nothing behind.

It was the reason why the Village Head was so shocked when Nex claimed to have used it and was still standing in front of him, telling him the tale. He also had a bit of a taste of it, proving the truth in Nex's claim. It really is impossible in normal cases but Nex is far beyond even expert in this regard, he manage to use it smoothly with only moderate consume of soul force.

Nex have been through countless of battles before. Naturally, situations like this; he knows how to handle better than anyone. He managed to restore his strength right before he heard a few footsteps coming his way.

Soon enough, three skeletons arrived but strangely enough, their gaze wasn't directed on Nex. They were fixed on the torch that was on the ground.

Using this opportunity, Nex ran straight to one of them and slashed at its head with his sword.

'[Intermediate Enchantment!]'

Its skull was sliced into two effortlessly.

This action finally caught the other two's attention. They both lifted their weapons, a sword and a spear respectively and started to charge at him.

Parrying the sword of the nearest one, Nex then kicked the monster away. He turned to the other one that aimed its spear on him. He leaned slightly to the side to avoid the incoming spear. He grabbed at the weapon once it reached his personal s.p.a.ce and pulled on it slightly, throwing the skeleton holding the weapon off balance.

Once again swinging his sword, Nex eliminated the spear-wielding skeleton. He turned to the monster he had discarded before. It had already regained its footing and was about to slash at Nex.

'[Partial Enchantment]'

Nex reinforced his leg and with this increase in agility, he arrived at the side of his opponent and stabbed his sword through its head. The skeleton died without even having any chance to counter Nex's a.s.sault. It was even still immersed in its offense of slashing.

[You killed a [Skeleton Warrior(Rare) LV : 15]!

[Quest Updated! (50/100)]

Nex didn't pay attention to the treasures that scattered all over the floor, courtesy of the skeleton's corpses. He immediately sat down and once again started restoring his mana. Although he hadn't consumed much this time and there are no signs of another batch, he knew he can't be irresponsible and act indolently if he wants to be done with this quest as soon as possible.

"It's not like I can put out the fire until I recover."

What Nex used to lure the monsters wasn't the Soul Fire but what he made it with. It was an ignited soul force that gave life to the fire and not just a spell. So at the moment that the soul force drifted into the air, it send a signal that no undead would ignore.

'There is a soul of the living here.'

If there is something that a low-level undead can't resist, it is a soul of someone alive. It attracts them like bees to honey; food to gluttons; drugs to junkies. To them, the soul fire is like a giant feast of mouth-watering soul. Yummy!

Once again, footsteps could be heard.

Nex who managed to restore most of the mana he consumed, stood up.

"Time to hunt."

♦♦♦

[You killed a [Skeleton Warrior(Rare) LV : 15]!

[Quest Updated! (66/100)]

Nex sighed as he looked at the other two remaining monsters and then at his remaining MP.

[MP : 520/770]

"32 more to go."

♦♦♦

[You killed a [Skeleton Warrior(Rare) LV : 15]!

[Quest Updated! (85/100)]

[MP : 270/770]

♦♦♦

[You killed a [Skeleton Warrior(Rare) LV : 15]!

[Quest Updated! (92/100)]

[MP : 180/770]

"MP is still at a tolerable range, but this is a problem." Nex sighed as he watched eight Skeleton Warriors coming his way.

If he had some decent weapon, he could finish it without dispensing too much mana. Sadly, the one proper weapon he found was destroyed because of the Soul Arts he used to defeat the Corrupted Orc King. He couldn't kite them either because they will just catch up to him in no time.

"Time to get a little messy."

Nex picked up the still-burning torch and waved it in order to attract the attention of the monsters while walking towards them slowly.

Surely, like moths, their gazes were locked on the fire burning on that torch. The moment Nex saw them entranced, he threw the torch in their midst and activated [Partial Enchantment] on his legs.

The skeletons that were so focused on getting the torch that they even turned their heads away from Nex. They didn't notice that the latter is now right in front of them, swinging at them with his sword that became brighter than normal.

'[Advanced Enchantment]!'

And the sword not only cut through the skeletons it grazed, it even fired a glowing arc of silver light that destroyed the skeletons behind the first ones! Killing five skeletons in just one move!

Nex didn't wait for the remaining skeletons to respond. With a few quick steps, he arrived right in front of them and raised his sword again, killing another one.

Unfortunately, the other two skeletons managed to dodge this time and launched towards each side of Nex.

Gritting his teeth, Nex ignored the backlash from what he just did and activated [Intermediate Enchantment] on his arms. He slashed his sword diagonally, blasting away both of their weapons.

The power behind his blow was so strong that not only both skeletons lost their weapons, they were also thrown completely off of their feet, giving Nex the opportunity to finish them with just [Partial Enchantment].

[You killed a [Skeleton Warrior(Rare) LV : 15]!

[Congratulations! Quest Completed!]

[HP and MP restored!]

[You will be pa.s.sed to the next part in five minutes.]

Finally finishing the quest, Nex stared at his MP bar before it was recovered.

[MP : 20/770]

"Well, this was a close one." Nex blinked as the pain in his began to disappear.

Normally, he would have hard time to moving his arm properly for a while as the backlash of using [Advanced Enchantment], but luckily for him, one of the rewards of the quest was that his HP was restored, so his injuries will all be healed. He channeled the skill mainly to the wooden sword that was more capable to take the load. If he didn't, then his hand would have most likely been destroyed completely.

If he had more mana, then he would have used the more safe Secret Arts. Sadly, those have really high mana consumption and in the state that he was, he would have entered ManDeprivation just by initiating it. It was a condition he didn't want to happen.

ManDeprivation state is when mana goes into the negative zone and when something like that happens, the results are very simple. The body will exchange health points (HP) for mana and not just for it to go back to the normal zone, but fill a large amount of it altogether. Even though Nex has some ways to deal with it, in the end, his mana is more than twice his Vitality.

So at his current situation, he needs to make sure not to do any mistakes as it may end up being lethal.

"Never mind that now," Nex shook his head. "As it seems this was just the first part. I sure hope there will be missions more suitable for me."

He then looked around. The monsters were just Rare and weren't Bosses, not to mention that the weapon that these monsters dropped were just at Level 15 so they were all useless for him. And because these monsters were made up of just bones, they was nothing useful to harvest from them.

[Time Ended!]

[You will now be transported to the second part area.]

And with that message, Nex's vision darkened and the next time he opened his eyes, he found himself in a different place.