Level Up Inquisitor [EN]: Chapter 28

Quest In (5)

“This is the only place left.”

“Then let’s do one last check.”

Aeil and Alisa stood in front of a large stone door, speaking.

The unusually large entrance compared to the others, and the number of monsters guarding it, suggested this was significant.

Considering the dungeon’s structure, it seemed like the most likely place for a boss monster to be.

And more than anything, they had invested a considerable amount of time to wipe out all the monsters on the first and second floors, leaving only this place left to explore.

“Oof!”

Aeil plopped down on the spot and started a bonfire.

It was just a random spot, but large torches were burning brightly on both sides of the entrance, giving it a cozy feeling.

They had swept away all the thieves in the dungeon, so there was no need to worry about being attacked from behind.

Of course, they couldn’t rule out the possibility of the boss monster beyond the stone door coming out and attacking, but considering it had been quiet despite the noisy battle with the thieves guarding the entrance, it seemed the sounds from outside didn’t carry inside.

“Whew, I’m tired after this forced march. I think I’ll be level 20 after catching this boss… How about you, Aeil?”

“I’m at the tail end of level 14. I think we’ll level up together.”

After clearing the entire dungeon, Aeil’s experience bar was full, and he was on the verge of leveling up.

Unlike the single-digit levels, Aeil had already passed the point where leveling up was easy, so gaining this much experience in such a short time without any completed quests, raids, or PKs [Player Kills] was encouraging.

And as he thought about the third basic skill he would learn, ‘Sanctification,’ he felt eager to finish this boss fight and reach level 15.

Grumble!

But a shameful sound suddenly came from their stomachs, and the two who were facing each other simultaneously gave awkward smiles.

“Now that I think about it, I was so busy hunting that my satiety is at rock bottom.”

“I have some meat, so I’ll grill it for you.”

Aeil said, rummaging through his inventory for rabbit meat.

They had cleared the entire dungeon without resting in between, so their satiety was close to the lowest level, and if they delayed eating any longer, they could suffer from the hunger debuff, which would hinder them in fighting the boss monster.

“No, I’ll cook!”

Suddenly, Alisa stepped forward proactively.

Aeil nodded absentmindedly, and he watched her humming as she prepared.

‘But cooking…’

Clearly, there were no proper tools or ingredients around here.

Low-level users without any cooking rank would only grill the meat they got on the spot or tear off bread, and Aeil was no different.

But as the ingredients were taken out one by one, and the unexpectedly elaborate cooking tools appeared, Aeil stared at her blankly.

She skillfully handled the ingredients and cooked them, then handed him a bowl with the meal.

A seemingly ordinary soup.

The smell was good, but it was a questionable menu choice whether it could fill their rock-bottom satiety.

“Not that I’m complaining… but will this amount be enough?”

“Don’t worry, just try it.”

Alisa said with a smile.

Aeil took the soup to his mouth with doubt, and soon his eyes widened.

It was as delicious as the food he had eaten in the Queen’s Blonde restaurant district, or even more so.

But the most surprising part for him was something else.

[Strength stat temporarily increased slightly!]

The system message that appeared in front of him.

Cooking, a major part of the Warlord content, could also provide temporary buffs similar to doping potions with the completed dishes.

However, raising the cooking rank to that level required a complicated and lengthy process.

The effects gained were insignificant compared to the effort put in, and most users who thought it was enough to use doping potions didn’t pay much attention to it.

But if you could bear that part, it was definitely helpful.

“What’s your cooking level, by any chance?”

“Um, I reached rank 4 recently.”

Alisa replied casually.

Aeil was shocked.

“What? That’s not a level you can reach in a day or two…”

Cooking rank over 4.

Before entering the dungeon, he was surprised that her alchemy was rank 2, but rank 4 was beyond words.

Having that rank despite being only level 19 would be rare even among professional cooking users.

But considering her past as a ranked player and her extraordinary combat skills, he didn’t think she would be a purely support-type user.

“Well… I didn’t originally plan to level up while hunting like this. So after starting Warlord, I was focused on raising these skills. I also leveled up a bit faster.”

Alisa shrugged her shoulders and continued.

Cooking, alchemy, sewing, fishing, smithing, trading, etc.

Her combined rank of all her life content exceeded 14, so you could see how deeply she had delved into that field.

“That’s unexpected. I thought ranked players would naturally focus on combat. And you didn’t switch to Warlord right away, and you don’t seem interested in becoming a ranked player again. Is there any reason why?”

“Um, that’s… I don’t think I should say it here. Sorry.”

“Ah, no! I asked something unnecessary.” Aeil quickly waved his hand as Alisa bowed her head in apology.

“Ahem, ahem…”

In the suddenly awkward atmosphere, the two swallowed their soup in silence for a while.

* * *

Clunk! Squeak!

As the large door opened to both sides, the hidden space revealed itself.

Before entering, when they only saw the entrance and the stone door, they thought the interior would be at most a small room, but that wasn’t the case.

The height was considerable, and although torches were placed sparsely inside the wide interior, the light they emitted was too faint, perhaps due to a special material different from ordinary flames.

It didn’t properly illuminate the darkness that had settled around it.

It was even darker than the Hard Rock Cave, where there were hardly any torches.

Moreover, they were now inside the boss room, not just a regular hunting ground.

It wouldn’t be strange for any being to appear in this darkness.

“Ugh… it’s too dark here.”

“I’m glad I made the potions in advance.”

Feeling the solemn darkness and silence that had settled in the room, Aeil and Alisa quickly manipulated their inventories.

And what they simultaneously took out from their pockets was the ‘Elixir of Keen Eyesight,’ which they had made just right.

As they swallowed the elixir sloshing in the glass bottle, the darkness around them, which had been completely dark, began to be clearly visible.

“What is that…”

In the middle of the room, an unidentified black stone was placed firmly.

The object, which looked like a crystal, was emitting a strange energy in all directions that they could feel.

“There…!”

Alisa, who had discovered something, pointed ahead.

Next to the large stone, a dead body was sitting.

It was the corpse of a man who had become a skeleton, with only bones remaining.

‘Is that guy the boss?’

A giant greatsword stuck in the ground.

It didn’t seem like an ordinary guy, with a large build that made you wonder if it belonged to a person, and wearing armor all over his body.

And as he expected, the guy slowly raised his body and stood up.

“Intruders…? Surely… I told them not to let anyone in…”

Clatter! Clang!

The shackles on his arms and legs were firmly fixed to the floor with iron chains, but as the monster repeatedly pulled with all his might, they began to break one by one.

And the information of the guy who stood up completely, emitting a sense of oppression, appeared in small letters below Aeil’s vision.

The guy’s identity was the level 18 boss monster, Gahhar, a member of the bandit gang.

‘Not Casano…?’

Aeil frowned as he checked the information.

Judging from what appeared in the system window, it was definitely not Casano, who was originally the target of the quest.

There was a possibility that he would appear for the second time after defeating the boss monster in front of him, or that he would appear in a deeper place.

But even if he looked around, there was no deeper place than this, and there was no space where other monsters could hide.

Thud!

Gahhar, who had drawn his greatsword, slammed his weapon down once, and the entire room rang loudly.

Blue flames flickered in the guy’s eyes as he glared at this side.

Seeing the mark of the heretic stamped on his head, it seemed he hadn’t lived a virtuous life.

“Let’s check the patterns first, since it’s someone we’re seeing for the first time.”

Aeil said, stepping back to create distance from the monster.

The number of people in the party was only two.

Since there were no teammates to take responsibility for cleaning up after a mistake, there was a possibility of immediate disaster if they rushed in recklessly.

Whoosh! Whirr!

Gahhar swung his greatsword, and the iron chains attached to the shackles were swung secondarily according to the movement of his arm.

Crash!

Aeil managed to dodge by diving out of the way, but he sighed as he turned to look at the aftermath.

The cave floor swept by the chain was all torn up, and both the greatsword and the chain showed tremendous and threatening power.

The movements were very erratic, and even though it was such a wide range of attacks, it seemed that even one hit would make it difficult to collect the bones [a euphemism for dying].

“Die…!”

Gahhar, who was looking at Aeil, raised his greatsword high.

The guy’s aggro [aggression, or focus of attack] seemed to be definitely focused on him, and conversely, it was fortunate that he wasn’t targeting Alisa, who was a healer.

The very moment Gahhar slammed down his massive greatsword, Aeil jumped forward with all his might.

“Dangerous!”

Alisa, who saw the scene, shouted in surprise.

The method of digging forward when a large monster attacks with a large motion was often used effectively among users who were confident in their skills, but this case was not the same.

The risk was too high in such an unpredictable range attack.

Even if he could avoid the greatsword with his excellent dynamic visual acuity, it was impossible to avoid the movements of the irregular chains divided into several branches.

It was nothing more than reckless courage for Aeil to squeeze in between them.

But it was already too late to pull his body out.

The greatsword was flying right in front of his nose, and it was in a position where he couldn’t avoid it based on the path.

‘Oh no…’

Alisa endured the urge to turn her head and stared ahead.

As a healer responsible for the lives of party members, she had to understand the battle situation better than anyone else, and she had to clearly see even the death of her comrades.

If he was hit head-on like that, the probability of survival was slim, but if he miraculously survived, she was ready to immediately restore his health.

Crash!

The greatsword that overturned the floor was embedded in the ground, and dust rose in clouds.

But the figure of Aeil, whom the guy was aiming for, had disappeared without a trace.

“What…?”

Rare skill, Reverse Grip.

Aeil, who used the skill to grab the monster’s back, was already floating right behind Gahhar’s giant body.

Aeil, who spun his body in the air, stabbed a dagger into the back of the guy’s neck.

[Special effect ‘Curse’ is activated!]

– Slows the movement of the attacked enemy and increases the damage received by the opponent by 5%.

As the rare-grade weapon ‘Dagger of Lamentation’ was stabbed, a curse was activated on Gahhar.

And at the moment the system message appeared, Aeil, who had already changed his weapon, raised a long sword.

Situation where he received a speed buff, which is the second effect of the reverse grip skill.