Chapter 131: Guardian (1)


    "Tch... Those rats are still at it..." Ethaniel frowned as he tiredly stepped from his position.


    During the times where Shinto and the others were fighting against the rat king, Ethaniel and Kon were busily handling the rats. But to their dismay, fighting against the estimated hundreds of them was no easy feat. Even for a man who has plenty of skills to shoot out, resources was an issue.


    Thus, at the heat of battle, upon noting that the group was nearly finished but were at ends meet with the fight, Ethaniel had pushed back the rats with all his strength and quickly leapt forward to the rear of the kingIn the next moment, he and Kon used their remaining skills on Fischier.


    "D-Do we like... R-Run...?" Kon muttered out in fear. With the group using up everything, the hope of sweeping through the numbers dwindled.


    "Ugh..." Shinto''s eyes moved over towards his skill list, noting that the only skills avable were [ Mark of Umbra ] and [ Divinity Point ] which was nearly about to be off from cooldown while the rest were far away from being able to be used again.


    "In estimations... We''ve only defeated about one-third of them..." Reru clicked his tongue. "You humans should have cleared more before jumping to our aid..."


    "We figured that defeating the rat king would make the rats run for their lives or something," Ethaniel clicked his tongue as he held his de tightly. "But here we thought wrong..."


    "So like... If we''re going to be fighting still... How are we going to make it?" Frey muttered out. "Aren''t we like... nearly dead?!"


    "Er... There''s no way to that other statue unless through here..." Shinto sighed in a helpless manner whilst moving his staff over to the current person with the lowest health, which was Ethaniel and activated his healing skill. "So... Trying to get past here is our only option."


    "...and there''s another fight after this, right?" Kon whimpered. "Ahh! That''s three big guys in a row!"


    "Bah... Let''s just not waste any time and just" The moment Ethaniel was about to swing his sword in an arc against the rats that were making their way to the group, his hands suddenly stopped mid-way as a confused expression was stered on him.


    ...


    Through a dark hallway, a me of fire was constantly shot out from a staff of a mageRaina, whilst an old man was watching from the side.


    "Hmm... The mes that you have shot out are getting much weaker than before," Renryth analyzed. "Do you need a break?"


    "Huff... huff," Raina shook her head in a tired manner whilst continuing to weave her staff around, quickly shooting out more small mes. "No, that is fine. I can still keep going."


    "...hmm," The man thought to himself. "This is no good. Through dedication alone without any breaks would make your efficiency drop. Just stop for five minutes and we''ll continue again."


    "But... You said we don''t have time to waste..." Raina uttered out as she turned to Renryth. "So I''m doing the best I can to finish up with this."


    "I did say that. But, that was under the assumption that it would take you more time to pick up the knowledge that I give," he stated. "But look at you now, you''re learning faster than what I had expected."


    "It''s only just the basics..." Raina shook her head. "The basics are always easier to learn than the advanced parts."


    "You do have a point. But that is besides that. What I am saying is, someone of your calibres needs not to try this hard to master something that is only needing the basics for," Renryth uttered out as his hand moved to the direction of the wall. In the next moment, a pure me shot forward from his hand, hitting it. "Even for me, I have yet mastered some of the technique''s crucial parts."


    What was it that Renryth had been teaching Raina? It was a mage technique in which one dissects down arge spell into smaller pieces, in turn, allowing the caster to throw out multiple spells of the same kind into smaller intervals. This helps to prevent the wait of longer cooldowns in which mages and casters alike suffer from.


    In general,pared to physical damage dealers like Frey''s Brawler ss or Ethaniel''s hidden ss, mages typically have cooldowns beyond the five-minute mark. This was because, by default, magic was a strong power that takes a longer time to master and learn. Even with cooldown reduction items, cooldown was a prevalent problem for mages and Shinto''s ss was no different.


    But for Shinto''s case, his ss was that of a hidden ss, the Shadow Diviner. ThusThe cooldowns was not as dauntingpared to standardized mage sses.


    "But if I manage to master this, then it would mean I can finish this up faster and regroup with everyone. That would also mean I don''t have to rely on them to save me every time enemiese near me," Raina stated. "Even when I tried to do something on my own, I ended up causing a big headache for them..."


    Had she expected for such a problem to arise when she went to meet with Zavir? No. All she wanted to do was to get back the item that Brox had takenHowever, the situation led to another and Ethaniel and Shinto barged into the hotel.


    Although the entire scenario was weird back then, she still couldn''t help but feel regretful that she had been powerless to refuse Zavir or to be able to obtain back the item. She was only just a newbie who just started ying the game recently.


    "I see. So you''ve taken upon the task to learn better spells to be able to stand head to head with everyone," Renryth nodded his head. "But, breaks are important. So do that."


    "...right," Raina helplessly sat down on the warm floors of the catbs. From the countless fires she had shot out, it was a fact that the atmosphere would feel warm.


    Soon after, her eyes nced over to her system notifications.


    [ ''mes of Etheral'' proficiency has increased by 0.20% ]


    [ Current proficiency in the arts: 47.20% ]


    [ Passive: ''Dissection Magic'' proficiency has increased by 0.10% ]


    [ Current proficiency in the basic arts: 45.10% ]


    ...


    "...sigh," Upon the sight at the numbers on mes of Etheral, she let out a sigh. "...I got more progress on Dissection Magic in an hour than the entirety of my time learning mes of Etheral..." Soon after, her eyes turned towards the description of the passive.


    [ Basic Dissection Magic (Degraded) Lv 1 ]


    Allows the caster to cast outrge spells with a cooldown of 20 to 30 minutes into smaller intervals of 10 minutes each. The power will be lesser, however, if all intervals are shot out in session, the effects will be at 50% of its original power.


    The user may choose to activate this passive at any time, however, when they do, 50 MP will be consumed every second until it is deactivated. (Upon deactivating it, the passive will not be usable for 3 minutes.)


    *This is a degraded version of the passive, certain effects of its original skill will not be taken into effect. Likewise, some effects are degraded majorly.


    ...


    From the time Raina had started learning the passive skill, her efficiency in understanding its concept allowed her proficiency in the skill to rise to 30%, thus allowing her to be able to use the degraded version of the spell in just 30 minutes.


    However, for theter 30 minutes, the proficiency of the spell slowly decreased for every time the percentage increased. But inparison to that, the mastery of mes of Etheral rosed up greatly.


    "...with being able to use mes of Etheral every 10 minutes... I guess it''s good enough for me," she nodded her head. "10 minutes with an average of 0.20% increase per usage... I wouldn''t have gotten this much efficient if it weren''t for Renryth, huh?"


    Not only had Raina been learning the passive, but she had also simultaneously been picking up the knowledge from Renryth about mes of Etheral about its concept and advanced chants. Thus it allowed her to efficiently use the spell.


    "..." Thinking to herself on the matter, she suddenly heard the old man''s voice.


    "It''s been five minutes. Let''s continue."


    ...


    Through the hallways in a catb of what was once a battlefield, two figures stared at the end of the hall, with dumbfoundedness, whilst the rest were sitting down and resting.


    "...did they just...go by us and retrieved the fallen king just like that?!" Still dumbfounded, Frey expressed her confusion.


    "It is what it is..." Shinto sighed helplessly as he turned to the spot where the king''s unconscious body once was. "I never expected for that to happen..."


    "These rats could''ve just freaking done it earlier without making us be on the edge like that!" Ethaniel clicked his tongue. "Ugh..."